Some ME2 facts

[Dr. Paine]

Hm.

I use brown hair/eye combo (which is mine) on my Shep, but otherwise, I don't try to go for my face- if I'm going to invest 20+ hours into a character, I like them to look decent (And what can I say, pale skinned brunettes are just the most aesthetically pleasing).
Femshep.
Infiltrator/very occasional soldier (as in, I just did my first attempt at a soldier in ME1, I am not letting it carry through. SPAH SHEP FOREVER)
My team varies quite a bit, but constants seem to be Garrus/Thane/Legion. Sometimes Mordin. Grunt or Miranda are brought along for kicks.
Normandy was upgraded as soon as I got the resources.
Everyone survived.
Cerberus can go to hell and I'm taking my shiny new toys/friends with me.

 

[DustyDrB]

Grunt's power is pretty useless to me. It's kind of the same way with Jacob. Grunt's personality is grating. It's mostly all "I will break you" kind of stuff, even when you talk to him often and do his loyalty mission. People didn't play as Grunt because he's not Wrex.

As far as party member's usefulness goes, everyone can pitch in. You just need to have a balanced team with anti-armor, anti-barrier (usually the same as anti-armor), anti-shield (automatic weapons do great, as well as many tech powers), and anti-Husk (anything that makes them leave the ground kills them instantly, as long as their armor is down). I switch up my party often, though I consistently use Miranda because she has great powers for any situation (Overload and SMGs for shields and mechanical enemies, Heavy Pistols and Warp for armor and barriers, Smash for Husks)

 

[Grygor]

Lies. You cannot get the Widow as an Engineer.

Heh, is that true?

I think I fiddled with the .ini files a little too much.

Well, my engineer has a Widow.

Ah, that explains it then. In the vanilla game, you can't actually get the Widow, what with the class being unable to use sniper rifles in the first place.

Pfft, who needs guns anyway?

One of the things I loved most about playing engineer was how many fights I won without personally firing a single shot.

I especially loved how if the enemy deployed mechs, they were basically handing me an "I WIN" button.

 

[Terminate421]

I garuntee you legion would have replaced garrus if he was available sooner. (Despite me liking them both alot, seriously both Garrus and Legion are so badass)

 

[FieryTrainwreck]

They went completely overboard nerfing biotics for ME2, which is why the gun-oriented classes are so much more effective and satisfying. Really too bad; I had a lot more fun flinging people all over the place in ME1.

My one and only play through: male shepard, standard face, soldier, mostly used Miranda and Garrus.

I'm thinking about a second play through with a female shepard infiltrator now that I can run it with max settings on PC.

 

[cerebus23]

ini editing ftw giving all the soldier types access to the assault rifles is a must .

my fav new squad mates were samara and thane, but i used grunt a ton as a substitute for wrex, who was my fav me1 character. grunt just comes off as a tad too homicidal but he is a new born krogan he is almost like dealing with a child sometimes which gives him an interesting flavor nm his admiration/competition vibe you get off him at times adds a wonder what is going to happen in me3 with this guy type of deal. taking him along with mordrin on his loyality mission he is suprisingly absent on his dissent if you choose to blow up the cure work or to withhold it in your own hands, he seems so down on his race in general it is not shocking but i expected a little more shock and anger out of him depending on my decision.

beyond all that male shep, soldier, hey i like shooting things ok? told cerberus to goto hell, and played more paragon than renagage tho by my third playthru i had enuf points on either side to play most situations any way i wanted.

never had any issues about staring at my characters ass tho shepherd is as close to me as i could make it in me1 and i do not go around staring at my own ass to worry about his. then we got miranda, tali, and samara that got perfectly fine backsides if your into staring at them.

 

[EinTheCorgi]

Maranda+Grunt=win or Garus+Thane=win as well. Though bioware kinda laughed in my face by adding liara back though tali is still the best because shes so adorable!

 

[Magicman10893]

-Only used the default face twice
-Mostly male Shepard, by also made female Shepard
-Played as every class and only played as Soldier twice with Vanguard 3 times, two Adepts, two Sentinels and two Infiltrators
-Used Garrus and Miranda all the time
-Always let Grunt out
-Always completely upgraded the Normandy
-Never let a squad mate die
-Depends on whether my character was Paragon or Renegade.

 

[Cmd. Shepard]

Created my own face for Shepard
Played as Female Shepard
Was a Vanguard (which is by far the best class)
Love Garrus but my party was usually Miranda and Jack
I let Grunt out
Fully upgraded the Normandy
Not one person died on my Normandy, not even the crew
Sided with Cerberus

And that was just on the first of god only knows how many playthroughts now

 

[crobulator]

Created my own face for Shepard
Played as a male Shepard
Was a Vanguard (Charge plus Krogan shotgun ftw)
Fully upgraded the normandy
every one was 100% loyal and survived
let grunt out
Legion and Thane were my party
told Cerberus were to stick it after they killed admiral Kahoku in Mass effect 1

 

[CAPTCHA]

"83% of people created their own face for Shepard"
Give a man a character creater and he'll use it I suppose.

"82% played as a male"
Not really suprising. Most men want to play as a man so they cann relate. Plus would you want to be a straight man playing as a woman trying to get in to Jacobs pants? I ended up doing that by accident in Dragon Age with Zevran and it made me feel a bit uncomfortable (crafty elf tricked me).

"Garrus most popular"
Garrus was undoubtably the best soider type character so I can see why he was chosen by a lot of people. Plus he was a cool "buddy" character to be Sheps' best mate. However Miranda + Mordin were the most effective combo to use.

"10% didn't release Grunt"
Don't understand that. Why miss out on game content by not doing?

"50% upgraded Normandy"
I wonder if this includes the Med Bay upgrade. If it does than I'm supprised this number isn't lower.

"14% of squad die in the final mission"
Not that suprising really. I guess most people try to save everyone, but chances are you're going to make the wrong choice with one character. (the Miranda, Jack or Samara choice comes to mind as a bit of a crap shoot).

"36% sided with Cerburus"
Well the game does have you working with Aliens throughout the game. Seems unlikely that this will go unnoticed by the player. Also, I think people always tend to play the good guy when given the choice anyway.

 

[Amethyst Wind]

I've played as both, I have 2 male and 2 female Shephards (different choices for each playthrough but always custom appearance), though I prefer playing as female Shephard due to the voice acting.

I used every squadmember at one point or the other for the loyalty quests (Mordin and Grunt are both Tuchanka based so paired them, same with Thane/Garrus and the Citadel etc)

I tend to favour Tali, Jack and Kasumi for my everyday squadmates.

I'm surprised at Engineer being the least used class, pairing up Engineer Shephard with Tali and Legion = 3 Combat Drones = Insane not being so Insane. That's how I did Insane playthrough, I knew people were going to die because I picked Legion up so early but by the end of it I was melee-ing Harbingers.

Also, it saddens me that the Soldier class got so much use, it's boring compared to the others.

 

[CleverNickname]

If you play Renegade, you need to play Femshep. The way she oozes maliciousness is just too awesome. I wonder if that says anything about me...

 

[Nom Pretentieux]

I was thinking. Is it possible to not sleep with anyone?

 

[The Wykydtron]

I play Male then Female with all RPGs. Always let Grunt out of the tank and always romance Tali XD

 

[repeating integers]

Wow.

From the discussion on this thread, it looks like I'm one of the only ones who likes all the characters and alternates between them.

I am generally very specific about which squadmate I pair up with which:

Garrus and Zaeed (partly because their abilities complement, partly because I find it impossible to believe these two would not be great friends)

Jack and Samara (uber biotic godsquad of death)

Jacob and Grunt (again, their weapons and abilities work well together)

Miranda and Thane (pair the spares)

Kasumi and Mordin (as above, though I would have liked to pair Kasumi with Thane if their abilities meshed better... they seem like a good match-up personality wise, I can imagine something kicking off ;p)

Tali and Legion (haven't got either yet on this playthrough... but they're both skilled engineers, and it'd be funny anyway)

Fun fact: On Lair of the Shadow Broker, I discovered that Singularity + Inferno Grenade = THE MOST AWESOME POWER COMBO EVER.

Also, is Sentinel any good on Insanity? I only ever play Mass Effect on normal anyway (I don't play it for the challenge of fighting, see, and tbh the combat in both games isn't good enough for me to warrant increasing its difficulty). The Sentinel was my first playthrough of ME2, he was awesome for me. He was also my favourite class in ME1, so I think it's fair to say that, despite my playthroughs as other classes (I'm currently playing through ME2 with an Infiltrator, I never use the cloaking lol) I am a Sentinel through and through.

 

[spartan231490]

Why would you not use Grunt?

Because you would have prefered Okeer, who seemed much more interesting than a tank-bred generic warrior kind of krogan. Or was that just me?

Grunt has a lot of story if you actually use him.

 

[TJ rock 101]

Why is soldier used most? Vanguard kicks so much ass...
And i used Grunt for most missions since he is so hard to kill.
Oh and in the final mission, Shep, Legion and Thane all with snipers and Thane's epic ammo power is so amazingly powerful...

 

[Darth IB]

Why would you not use Grunt?

Because you would have prefered Okeer, who seemed much more interesting than a tank-bred generic warrior kind of krogan. Or was that just me?

Grunt has a lot of story if you actually use him.

He really doesn't. He was "born" when Shepard released him from his tank. All he has is a few imprints and a bad attitude.