Audio Cues: Audio cues such as footsteps, ammo fire, and enemy or squadmate chatter can all be used to help you make better decisions in combat. This extends to Multiplayer modes as well, especially since teamwork and synchronization are essential. Using a set of headphones can improve your ability to hear where enemies and attacks derive from.
Creative Hover-Fire Usage: Hover fire is a unique mechanic allowing for creative aerial assaults. Not only can you hover in place while airborne, but you can also combine hover fire with certain powers. Tactical Cloak and hover fire, for example, let you ambush an enemy in stealth with a huge damage multiplier, all while having the advantage of high ground. You’re also free to use most offensive powers in the air, including biotic attacks like Charge and Nova.
Wall Hacks: Infiltrator profile plus a sniper rifle with a penetration mod is a very powerful combo. Infiltrator profiles allow you to see through cover, while the penetration stat lets you deal damage to enemies behind cover. Even if you deal less damage, you can score easy critical hits because most enemies hiding behind cover are stationary.
Power Use While Scoped: It’s worth noting that powers can be used while you’re zoomed in, even with a scoped weapon like a sniper rifle. Although you won’t see Ryder’s animation, the power still activates and behaves normally. For instance, scoping in on an enemy and using Overload behaves as you’d expect. The Overload goes off while you’re still zoomed in, ready to finish off the stunned enemy.
Profile Switching: Switching profiles is extremely effective in certain scenarios, especially late in the game when you have a large amount of skill points invested into separate skill groups. Since there are no penalties for switching profiles mid-combat, you can go from having a huge damage reduction bonus (Sentinel), instantly into enhancing your weak point, sniper rifle damage (Infiltrator). This tactic is exceptionally strong against the Architect and Ascendant.
Reloading: Reloading is debilitating, and if you run out of ammo at an inopportune moment, it may be tempting to execute other actions during your reload. However, doing so may be detrimental, as a proper reload carries the strict requirement of fully completing the reload animation. This means once your character begins reloading, you cannot perform any action that cancels it, or else you have to start the reload process over eventually. Applying elemental ammo to your gun reloads the gun without a reload animation. Optimize your damage output by emptying your clip before using disruptor/cryo/incendiary ammo for an instantaneous reload, effectively “double-dipping” from a single clip.
Vintage Heat Clip “Reloading”: This throwback to the original Mass Effect is arguably the best augmentation in the game for weapon and power combination usage, and surprisingly, not for its benefit of providing infinite ammo (which is rather nice). What makes this augmentation incredible is that it removes “reloading” altogether. Since it uses a recharge speed timer, you can perform other actions while you “automatically reload,” including using powers and attacking with your melee weapon. Normally, reloading requires an animation commitment, leaving you vulnerable. This makes the Vintage Heat Clip ideal for high-damage weapons with low-capacity clips, since their main weaknesses are reload times. As long as your play style includes weaving in powers and abilities, you can make the most of the Vintage Heat Clip augmentation. Additionally, make sure your clip size after applying a Vintage Heat Clip is at least two, since a one-shot clip forces a much longer “overheat” reload every shot, which you should avoid. This Milky Way-based augmentation is highly recommended for Shotgun Vanguard and Black Widow infiltrator builds.
Skill Swapping: By using the skills menu (even in the heat of combat), you can swap out power abilities for other ones. Take advantage of this when you run out of power cells for another power to maximize your combat effectiveness. However, there’s an important limitation to keep in mind. When swapping out a power, all projectiles, objects, and effects originating from the swapped-out power are nullified and removed from the field. This is to prevent exploits with hot-swapping persistent powers. So if you throw out your last Omni Grenade, make sure it explodes and deals its damage before you swap it!