For those who want to play on Insanity here is a copy of all the posts that Icemage made offering his advice on the easiest way to get through the game on Insanity:
Credit 100% goes to Icemage and this "guide" has MASSIVE SPOILERS
[Show spoiler]Least frustrating way to beat Insanity:
- Play as a Sentinel
- In a previous playthrough, earn Liara T'Soni's loyalty to get access to Stasis and use Stasis as your Bonus Power
I have not verified this on the PS3 version, but HEAVY SPOILER WARNING:
in the PC and Xbox 360 versions, Stasis has an interesting side effect of knocking enemies down after you've put them into stasis. If you hit them as they are falling down, they take extremely massive damage - to the point of one Widow sniper rifle shot one-shotting YMIR mechs on Insanity through their shield AND their armor
- Keep Miranda in your party whenever its feasible for her squad damage and health bonuses (you'll need them!). She doesn't really need extra points in Warp or Slam, so beef up her Overload and Cerberus Operative powers and just stick with one point in Overload, Warp, and (eventually) Slam until the other two skills are maxed out. Area Overload is incredibly good, both against non-Blood Pack mercs and synthetics like robots and geth.
- Research everything you find, and keep your eyes peeled for upgrades. You want to be able to do as much damage as possible, as fast as possible, because having enemies close in on you spells certain doom on Insanity (hint: Vanguards are awful in Insanity difficulty since their Biotic Charge ability does nothing but put you right in front of an enemy).
- There are very few time limited missions in the game, so be PATIENT and kill things methodically. Enemies who have a tendency to charge forward to engage you are the biggest priority, always (Pyros, Fenris mechs, YMIR mechs, Husks).
- Make use of your heavy weapons against stubborn targets. Saving heavy weapon ammo isn't a good idea.
- Have everyone who has access to them learn area attacks that propel enemies. Pull, Throw and Concussive Shot all have a variant that hits all enemies in an area when they hit level 4. You will NEED these abilities to buy breathing space. Any time you see an enemy charging, focus your powers on them to strip away their shields and/or armor and use of of the above powers to get them away from you.
- Also a priority are abilities that strip away shields (Overload for shields, Concussive Shot and Warp for biotic Barriers), and especially armor (Incinerate, Jacob's Incendiary Ammo - learn this at level 4 for Squad Incendiary Ammo if you're not a Soldier.
Another HEAVY SPOILER regarding bonus powers:
Before attempting Samara's loyalty mission, SAVE THE GAME manually. At the end of the mission, kill Samara and choose to save her daughter Morinth instead to unlock her special bonus ability, Dominate, which you can then learn as Shephard. After doing this, re-load your previous save and choose to save Samara, which gives you access to her special power, Reave. Dominate is the stronger of the two bonus powers, but Samara is the stronger of the two allies in terms of other abilities. Yes, this means you can use Dominate as Shephard while having Samara as your ally. Area Dominate is incredibly handy in the last mission and in several other otherwise-nearly-impossible situations.
In light of the above, here's a few DON'Ts for those who haven't played Mass Effect 2 before.
DON'T upgrade or use Incendiary Grenade or Flashbang Grenade. Both almost never hit what you're aiming at, and don't do much even when they do hit.
DON'T bother mining planets with Poor or Depleted minerals.
DON'T spend money on weapon upgrades that your class can not use unless you've got tons of extra cash (200k+). It's nice to help your team mates do more damage, but that only applies when said team mates are in your party (and you'll often be juggling them around based on the specific mission you are attempting). You can go back and buy less important stuff later, but in the early through mid game you're going to have a lot more available to buy than you can immediately afford, and it's better to prioritize spending money on stuff you'll use + spending money on fuel for exploration/probes.
DON'T split your reactions between Paragon and Renegade. There almost no conversational choices where you absolutely must have one-but-not-the-other at a specific level. It is much, much better to have one of the two at a high rank than both at moderate levels.
I'd pick up Zaeed and Kasumi right off the bat since you don't need to do any missions to recruit them.
I'd recruit in this order:
1st half: (very mild spoiler)
The Thief (go visit the Citadel ASAP)
The Mercenary
The Professor
Archangel
The Convict
2nd half: (moderate spoiler)
The Warlord
The Justicar
The Assassin
The Quarian <- this is the most difficult recruitment in the game
Liara <- this last has more to do with the storyline-related events than any specific difficulty.
You don't get to pick when you get your last ally, so that one obviously goes last on the list.
here's a rough threat level rating of each of the various loyalty missions (* = easy to ***** = hard)
1st half of the game allies: (heavy spoiler)
Miranda: ***
Jacob:**
Mercenary: ****
Thief: ****
Archangel: **** EDIT: Upgraded from * since I just recalled one particularly nasty encounter.
Professor: ****
...and 2nd half: (heavy spoiler)
Convict: ***
Warlord: *****
Assassin: *
Justicar: *
Quarian: *****
Last ally: *****
Icemage feel free to add anything else to this post
