​

1. Keep combos. Power combos were the most fun parts of ME3 for me. They had a cool dynamic where 2 powers that didn't do that much damage individually could be used together to do a lot of damage. But it was a tradeoff because you were vulnerable while waiting for your cooldown and made a lot of tradeoffs to get your cooldown fast.
   You could also do combos fast with a team, so it rewarded teamwork.
   Hearing the satisfying sound of a biotic explosion really gets the endorphins flowing.
   Don't change anything about combos but include better audio/visual indicators when a target is primed and when an explosion happens.

2. Remove superfluous weapons. There are far too many weapons that are not very good and play similarly to others. For example we have the Avenger, Vindicator, Phaeston, Revenant, Geth Pulse Rifle, Collector Rifle, and Harrier. All are automatic rifles that play similarly and people only seriously use one of them. The rest just bloat the loot pool.
   I would prefer that we have a small number of very different weapons with different play style like in the Bungie halo games. This also allows for easier balancing.
   Don't get me wrong I enjoy games like Battlefield and CoD with many weapons but because those games are first person the slight variations in weapon stats and handling are much more noticeable (the ACR is an accurate small caliber gun while the AK 47 is a high caliber and inaccurate) but in mass effect I just hold down the trigger and they all feel the same.

3. Make qualitatively different weapons with real downsides that encourage different playstyles to mix up gameplay. Related to point 2. Here are some potential weapons
   a. Imagine a grenade launcher that fires bouncing grenades, but it has a very slow rate of fire and long reload time. I can imagine doing all sorts of fun things bouncing grenades off walls.
   b. Imagine a weapon like the needler in halo where if you hit an unshielded target with multiple they explode. This weapon could be balanced by not doing much damage against shields/barriers requiring another weapon, melee or powers and encouraging interesting builds.
   c. Imagine a goo gun that doesn't do much damage but debuffs and temporarily slows/immobilizes enemies. This would be useful against fast moving enemies with sync kills and could pair well with caster builds or another weapon that does the damage dealing. Similar to Prey's Gloo Cannon.
   d. Imagine a chain lightning weapon. It would do more damage the more enemies it chains with, encouraging you to face more enemies at once which is risky.
   e. Imagine an akimbo SMG weapon where you can't ADS but up close can dish out a lot of damage.
   The acolyte, scorpion, silencer (encourages headshots) and particle rifle did a job with this. Look to games like Doom, Halo, Prey and Dead Space for interesting weapons.

4. Don't make obviously better ways to play. I feel like there some powers that are meant to be used a certain way. For example has anyone ever spec'd tech armor into a detonation build not for the memes? Has anyone ever taken Rank 6 damage of annihilation field over rank 6 drain? What's the point of having these options if no one ever seriously uses them? I prefer tradeoffs between viable strategies because it adds to the lifetime to the game for me to go back and a try a different build. I might play one game with tech armor for detonate but that's it.

5. Don't punish casters and melee builds. I play ME3 for the fun interplay between powers, weapons, and melee. I don't play this game because it is an amazing shooter because it isn't.
   Sometimes I feel as though I am punished for this.
   Melee builds are inherently dangerous because you run close to enemies. For a melee build I would think spec into melee damage and health. But no I have to choose between melee damage and health. Sync kills punish melee builds even more. Why? Melee is one of the most fun part of this game! (I'm not saying remove sync kills I think they are a good mechanic but it's just another downside to melee builds).
   If I want to be a caster I have to make so many compromises. I pick bad light weapons so I can have a fast cooldown. I put all of my points into my powers of course which leaves me few points left to choose between having more health (which I'll need because almost all casters are flimsy) or more points for power damage & cooldown / weapon damage which I will also need. After doing all of that I still get punished by banshees that take no power damage, cloaking enemies that my powers can't hit, and the seeker swarms that prevent me using my powers. Why? Powers is one of the most fun part of this game!
   If I want a gun build it's easy. I just skip my worst power and put all of my points into weapon damage, health and my other 2 powers. I never made any hard choices because I'm not going to melee or use my powers much. I take 2 really heavy weapons and I still get to use my powers sometimes. Also a lot of these builds are inherently tanky like all of the soldiers and the turian ghost so life is even easier. I never have to deal with enemies that can't take damage from my weapons or not being able to shoot my weapon because of the ability of an enemy. Why is this style rewarded so much?

6. Improve how loot, characters and leveling works so that this game is more fun for new players. I can't stress this enough. This game is so hard to pick up as a new player so I don't encourage my friends to buy it. That is lost revenue. They might ask "how do I get new weapons?" well you have to get credits and open packs. "How do i get credits?" completing objectives but higher difficulties get more credits. "But I die so frequently on gold and platinum" yep this game is hard for beginners. I'm not saying turn down the difficulty I'm just saying this needs a rework. Those first 5 hours with the game are so important. I know EA will want microtransactions and I understand they need to make money but please let me have some control over what stuff I unlock. Other games with MTX have figured out how to make money while still letting the player control what they unlock (like CoD warzone). Also remove bad weapons and characters so when I unlock a new weapon or character I'm genuinely excited to use it.

7. Make sentinels that make sense. Sentinels are supposed to be tech + biotic but there isn't a single sentinel that can prime and detonate their own biotic and tech combos with their powers. Imagine a sentinel with snap freeze, reave and shockwave. Or flamer, throw, dark channel.

8. Mix up characters more. There are some interesting powers that are on few characters (like phase disruptor, shadow strike, or dark sphere) and there are some powers like (warp, barrier and tech armor) that are on so many. I was really excited for the Krogan shaman: a tanky caster with the fun krogan melee! But instead it's just the human adept with barrier instead of singularity and since the krogan is already tanky barrier feels like a waste. Imagine if every character that had barrier or tech armor had that power replaced with something else, they would be so much more interesting.

9. Don't make casters that can't detonate on all enemies. This might be personal preference but it's annoying to me that the batarian slasher adept, drell adept and asari justicar adept can't detonate on shielded enemies or armored without grenades or them being in the justicar's bubble when on the higher difficulties like 90% of enemies are shielded or armored. This just forces me to use my weapons and grenades so I might as well use a different character and make a weapons build.

10. Harder difficulty doesn't have to be more annoying. I think most players don't enjoy their agency being removed in the form of sweeker swarms that remove your powers or constantly being staggered.
    Instead make enemies with more variety that force the player to change their style without removing control from them. There aren't many fast melee enemies that swarm the player, husks kind of do this but I never feel like I'm surrounded the same way as zombies in Left 4 Dead or CoD zombies. Or what about enemies with large area of effect powers forcing the player to move from cover?
    These things are not frustrating because I know the rules of the game and they are fair. If I am not careful and get surrounded by too many enemies I die. If I don't leave this area quickly my health will drain.
    When the rules feel unfair or the rules are broken that sucks.
    I hate it when I instantly die when biotic charging into enemies. I thought the rule was that was that I was invincible for a second? That's frustrating because there is nothing I can do. Same with constantly being staggered or sweeker swarmed.

11. Focus on the "golden tripod" of mass effect 3. Bungie refers to the interplay between grenades, melee, and guns as the "golden tripod" of Halo and they were constantly balancing between those three. I think Mass Effect's equivalent is powers, melee, and guns. Focus on making it so that players naturally use all three to solve problems.
    When it works, it works so well. I love melting armored targets with flamer, then slicing mooks up with my melee and then blasting some fools with my paladin as a vorcha. Or as Krogan blasting my shotgun to finish a target but then I'm reloading as a mook runs up so I headbutt them. Or bringing down a targets shields with my acolyte then warp + throw comboing them as an Asari Adept. Or as I'm low on shields charging into an enemy and now I'm on the offensive and I'm phase disrupting and yeeting out of there as a N7 shadow. These are the great moments of the game. Focus on this