Mass Effect-3: Weekend Operation Details.

First topic message reminder :


I'm going to use this thread to post up the Weekend Operation details for Mass Effect-3 Multiplayer each week, as I'm on it most nights anyway and have been completing these every weekend since I started playing it except one I missed when Bordlands-2 (before it reset my Badass Rank on me) first came out. Maybe it'll encourage some of you to join me or at worst increase my post count here I usually do the operation on Friday evening, as I play Gears-3 on Saturday nights.

Bioware used to run the events every second weekend but after the last update in October they have been on every weekend. The idea is that you complete an individual goal and are then awarded a commendation pack, which contains one of five weapons, which can only be gained through the Operations. The pack is available to you free in the store as soon as you have completed the Operations Goal. From time to time they may also add a Community Goal which might net the community a reward like the ability to carry an extra Med-Gel in multiplayer matches. They also have special events, which can reward you with a Banner to display against your name in the multiplayer lobbies and packs to boost your consumable item supplies.

Below I've listed the weapons you can gain through participating in operations, which are generally some of the better weapons in the game on a par with the Ultra rare class available.

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N7 Hurricane SMG
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Description:
While some militaries pass on the Hurricane because of its lower accuracy, the Alliance feels the gun's rapid firing rate offers excellent suppressive fire. A disciplined marksman can use the fully automatic submachine gun to chew through targets with alarming speed. Alliance officers were so pleased with field results that the Hurricane is now many squadrons' standard-issue SMG.

Review:
The cons of this gun are a lot of recoil when firing and it eats through its ammo very quickly. The good thing is that it also eats through enemies quickly and is by far the most powerful SMG you can get. It's particularly effective against bosses as they are big targets so the recoil doesn't matter as much. Against other enemies (unless you've got a stability mod on) it's best to hip fire or you'll struggle to hit anything not standing in front of you. You can also counter a lot of the recoil by pulling down on you're right tumbstick while firing zoomed.

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N7 Eagle Pistol
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Description:
When the Alliance's Offensive Handgun Project received funding to update one of its designs, its engineers chose to redesign the already impressive Phalanx pistol. The Eagle is a compact, fully automatic pistol that delivers unprecedented accuracy and punch with a rapid firing rate. The Eagle is named after the Desert Eagle, a classic handgun which gained a romantic reputation among gun collectors, thanks to its popularity in 20th and 21st-century Earth action movies.

Review:
There is a little recoil when firing the Eagle but it's easily manageable. There are more powerful pistols available than the but this is the only one that has rapid fire. It's also reasonably light so while it isn't the best pistol you'll find in the game its a good all rounder and outperforms almost everything bar the Utrarare pistols like the Talon and Scorpion.

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N7 Crusader Shotgun
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Description:
Bruised and bloody Alliance marines on Torfan attributed their survival against waves of Batarian mercenaries to the precision and stopping power of the Crusader. With a design patterned on riot shotguns, this weapon has a moderate rate of fire that rewards careful aiming. Since this accuracy requires little room for error, the Crusader is primarily used by highly trained soldiers.

Review:
This gun has a big kick but isn't rapid fire so it's not a huge issue. It's weight is also huge which restricts the classes it can be used on without badly effecting their power recharge speeds. The plus side is that it's as accurate as a sniper rifle and packs a huge punch easily headshotting enemies across the map in a couple of shots even on higher difficulties. The main thing is to try to put it on a class that doesn't use many powers like a soldier or maybe one of the infiltrators. Turian's work well as they have extra stability built in to their power options, which helps with the recoil.

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N7 Valkyrie Assault Rifle
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Description:
After the carnage of the Battle of the Citadel, Alliance officers commissioned a new rifle for their ground forces. A variation of the popular Avenger Design, the Valkyrie is now standard issue for new recruits. Exceptionally well-crafted, accurate, and packing ample firepower, the rifle is a hot black-market item when it surfaces.

Review:
Weight is the main con of this gun meaning it can't easily be equipped on characters with heavy power use. It also has a little recoil but it's very easy to manage as it only fires in short bursts. On the plus side even at a low level this gun pack a good punch with a fast fire rate. It will out perform most of the other assault rifles even if they're already level ten. It's not quite as great as the best assault rifle the Ultrarare Cerberus Harrier, but it comes very close.

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N7 Valiant Sniper Rifle
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Description:
The Valiant is a sniper rifle tested by Alliance soldiers during a series of harsh survival exercises on the planet Kruljaven. This streamlined weapon employs a sophisticated fire-control system that improves accuracy by stabilizing the barrel during targeting. Although this comes at the cost of reduced capacity and rate of fire, most soldiers find the increase in precision and quick reloading time a worthy tradeoff.

Review:
This gun doesn't have a lot of cons and is the most desired of the commendation weapons. Even at level one I'd class it as the best of the sniper rifles available in the game. It's devastatingly powerful on an infiltrator, as it has a three shot magazine and all three shots fire quickly enough to benefit from the cloaks damage boost. It has only minor recoil too and reloads faster then the Ultrarare Black Widow, which would be its only rival.

Now going to do the silver challenges. Don't think I'll be able to do the platinum difficulty.

Kev Lar 1 wrote:Don't think I'll be able to do the platinum difficulty.

You were wrong we kicked ass and you were certainly no hindrance to the team even with your Asari Adept under LVL-20.

I ended up doing over twelve platinum games over the weekend with various people off my friends list. It was a good laugh and plenty of credits were earned all around. I think this was the toughest weekend challenge they ever put out, but at least they gave us a few extra days to get it done.

Huge amount of tweeks relating to the new characters this week as it's the first update since their release.

Biggest thing in the update is that commendation weapons are now available in Ultra-Rare packs!! this most likely means the weekend operations are at an end which will make it harder to get these guns then the guaranteed drop from a commendation pack. Though they haven't odffically said the operations are over so I guess we'll have to wait until Friday to actually find out.

Vague hope maybe you'll get any ultra rare from weekend operations. Though I doubt it as they added two new challenges to the Squad Elite banner that did have operation participation as part of its tasks.

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March 12, 2013
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Commendation Pack Weapons
- The following weapons have been added to the ultra rare pool of cards
- N7 Valkyrie Assault Rifle
- N7 Eagle Pistol
- N7 Crusader Shotgun
- N7 Hurricane SMG
- N7 Valiant Sniper Rifle

Spectre Mastery
- Fixed an issue where medals earned could become stuck on completion

Squad Elite
- Added a new challenge to complete 25 matches on 'unknown enemy'
- Added a new challenge to complete 25 matches on 'unknown map'

Talon Omni-Bow Mechanics
- Base number of arrows fired increased from 3 to 5
- Omni-Bow max charge length decreased from 3 seconds to 0.35 seconds, so holding the heavy melee
button will cause the attack to release almost instantly

Elite Mercenary Passive Power
- Base charge regeneration cooldown decreased from 90 to 60 seconds
- Evolution 5 charge regeneration bonus increased from 50% to 100%

Omni-Bow Mastery Passive Power
- Base Omni-Bow damage bonus increased from 10% to 15%
- Rank 3 Omni-Bow damage bonus increased from 20% to 25%
- Evolution 1 Omni-Bow damage bonus increased from 30% to 35%
- Evolution 3 Omni-Bow killing spree damage bonus decreased from 50% to 25% but duration increased
from 8 seconds to 30 seconds
- Evolution 5 Omni-Bow damage bonus increased from 40% to 50%

Concussive Arrows Power
- Base number of arrows fired increased from 4 to 5 when you have this power active

Armor-Piercing Arrows Power
- Number of charges loaded per grenade increased from 2 to 3, so for each grenade used
you can fire 3 charges of Armor-Piercing arrows before going back to normal arrows
- Base damage reduced from 100 to 75
- Base number of arrows fired increased from 4 to 5 when you have this power active

Ancient Warrior Passive Power (Collector)
- Base Ascension Stance duration increased from 30 to 45 seconds
- Base Ascension Stance damage taken penalty reduced from 20% to 15%
- Evolution 5 Ascension Stance damage taken penalty reduced from 20% to 10%

Repair Matrix Power
- Base duration decreased from 15 to 8 seconds
- Base number of shields restored per second reduced from 150 to 75
- Evolution 1 damage reduction bonus decreased from 10% to 5%
- Evolution 6 damage reduction bonus decreased from 15% to 10%

Alliance Infiltration Unit
- Base melee damage reduced from 400 to 350
- Base heavy melee damage reduced from 750 to 650

Biotic Focus Power
- Evolution 6 damage reduction bonus increased from 15% to 20%
- Evolution 6 melee damage bonus increased from 20% to 30%

Poison Strike Power
- Base poison damage per second increased from 60 to 75

Adas Anti-Synthetic Assault Rifle
- Base damage increased from [161.9-202.4] to [178.1-222.6]

Geth Spitfire Assault Rifle
- Base damage increased from [56.5-70.6] to [62.2-77.8]

Venom Shotgun
- Damage multiplier when fully charged increased from 10% to 25%

Blood Pack Punisher SMG
- Base damage increased from [38.2-47.75] to [40.1-50.1]

Hex Shield Power
- Fixed a bug where enemy Geth Prime siege pulse projectiles could pass through the shield

I do hope the Weekend Operations continue as they are fun and enjoyable, even if they do stop I'll still play the multiplayer as I love it.

Well no operation this weekend. but they still haven't ruled out that there will not be any more coming.

Bioware wrote:Hey all,

Sorry about the short notice but to answer some of the pings going around - No we're not able to get a challenge event up this weekend.

Nathan.

Bioware wrote:Hi Everyone,

My name is Jonathan Warner; I’m the Senior Producer on the Mass Effect franchise. I joined the Mass Effect Team when we launched ME3 and our Multiplayer Service and it has been a wonderful, wild ride!

It has been our pleasure to run and support this service for over a year now and provide the maps, kits, gear, and weapons that we all love. I wanted to thank everyone who played Mass Effect 3 Multiplayer, and participated in our challenges and events. You have made working on it a real pleasure.

After a solid year of dedicated service, we are now turning our attention to new projects and endeavors, but Mass Effect 3 Multiplayer will live on. Our challenge system and N7 HQ will be maintained and looked after.

Thank you again and we look forward to seeing you online!

Jonathan

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It was always really exciting to see how the message boards reacted to every new drop of information released, or any change in the game we introduced. Working on the live environment and all of the DLC for the multiplayer was a blast, in large part to the community. I’m still ecstatic over how much content we got to deliver in the last year.

David Crooks

Still a bit vague as to weather they're finishing the multiplayer operations in the above blog post from Bioware though on the second page of someone else post on the forums asking was there a weeekend operation happening. they stuck in a little BTW note

Bioware NPlewes wrote:
Hey guys - so yes the servers and challenge systems will keep running as long as we can keep them up but there will no longer be any organized weekend events.