Welcome to the main story walkthrough. This chapter provides a tour through all of the Priority Ops missions, with notifications when certain side quests become available.
Overall, the main game is broken into several missions, with interludes in between major plot developments. The “middle” of the game is a wide-open area, affording you the freedom to go through side quests at your leisure. However, keep in mind that almost all side missions and optional tasks can be saved to be completed later, after more pressing matters are dealt with. For details on side quests see the Secondary Ops chapter.
Character Creation (Effects on Gameplay)
Starting a new game with the Customize Character option allows you to customize the main character’s physical appearance, first name, training history (subsequently, starting powers), the appearance of the main character’s twin, and whether or not Commander Shepard (the original Mass Effect’s protagonist) was male or female. Most customizations are aesthetic, but some affect gameplay.
The main difference in gameplay when selecting a gender involves your romance options. For a spoiler-heavy guide to romance, see Romance in the Compendium at the back of this guide.
Choose Training
Ryder’s training history determines what powers he/she starts with. As you level up and obtain skill points to invest, you can branch off to other power groups so you aren’t locked into any particular fighting specialty. Although Ryder’s combat aptitudes aren’t tied to a “class” system, training history lets you set a plan for what type of play style you want to emphasize in combat—one for each profile (see Profiles in Combat Concepts Expanded for details).
Even if you aren’t interested in adjusting Ryder’s appearance, it’s recommended that you create a custom profile since starting abilities may affect how you want to fight—especially if you’re planning to play on a higher difficulty setting like Hardcore or Insanity. For instance, you may find these difficulties more manageable with the Technician, Leader, or Operative background. The abilities these backgrounds start with lend to playing a safer style, giving you better odds at surviving the damage output from enemies. For details on individual powers see Powers in Combat Concepts Expanded.
Several starting powers listed normally require an investment into their power skill groups before they can be purchased. For instance, starting as an Operative gives you Tactical Cloak right off the bat. Starting with any other history would require you to invest a significant amount of skill points into tech before being able to unlock it.
| Training | Details | Play style | Starting Power | Unlocked Skill 1 | Unlocked Skill 2 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Security (Default) | During your Alliance military service, you focused on learning everything you could about weapons and tactics. | Firearms; aim-based, effective against single targets | Concussive Shot | Turbocharge | Combat Fitness |
| Biotic | You were effectively “designated biotic” during your Alliance military tenure, assisting your cohorts with your ability to control mass effect fields. | Crowd controller; effective against groups of grunts | Throw | Singularity | Barrier |
| Technician | As a technician in the Systems Alliance military, you learned to operate drones and hack enemy systems. | High-damage anti-defense “mage”; effective against armored and shielded enemies | Overload | Invasion | Team Support |
| Leader | You were a team player and a natural leader in the Alliance military, working closely with your cohorts for their safety and the safety of others. | Close-range “sentinel”; high survivability support | Energy Drain | Annihilation | Team Support |
| Scrapper | When a fight broke out, you were always the first soldier in the thick of it—mostly according to Alliance military protocol, and occasionally not. | Close-range crowd controller and “tank”; effective at drawing attention | Charge | Combat Fitness | Charge |
| Operative | In the Alliance military, you studied covert operations and tech used by special forces—knowledge you rarely found a use for until the Andromeda Initiative. | Sniper, assassin; effective at thinning out unsuspecting enemies quickly, high survivability | Tactical Cloak | Combat Fitness | Tactical Cloak |
Choose Name
Characters in the game refer to you as Ryder and refer to your sibling as Scott or Sara, depending on which Ryder you choose. This also determines the name of the folder your saved-game files are saved in (when browsing your saves through the Load Game interface).