How do Vanguards handle Silver and Gold Multiplayer matches?

It seems to me that most Vanguards I see are when I occasionally play bronze to level up some of my characters for some N7 Rating. I never see a Vanguard playing in Silver or Gold. I'm curious if they would be any good as it would appear that if they aren't extremely careful they would be demolished by the onslaught of enemies as they charge recklessly into the fray.

Anyone have any luck with a certain combo of biotics or a strategy, or maybe some Do's and Don't's, when it comes to harder difficulties?

I know there are some die hard Vanguard players who know the advantage Vanguards have in higher difficulties that, for example, an Infiltrator doesn't.

Solution 1:

Play smarter!

My favorite vanguard on multiplayer is actually the Drell Vanguard. They make excellent support without too high of the charge->nova risk, especially since on later waves its almost suicide to just charge in and have full shields, much less try for the charge->nova leaving you with no half/shields.

Pros:

• Strong support with pull spamming. Pull is an excellent disabler, and with 200% cooldown (I just carry a SMG, a strong single pistol such as the hand cannon works as well), I can spam this none stop. The stagger is also extremely handy against armored pyros and rocket troopers, you can easily keep them from doing anything until your teammates take them down.
• Cluster grenades rock. Fully upgraded, these do a lot of damage. Just hug a ammo cache or two (on the harder difficulties your team really has to position themselves near some ammo to be effective), to be able to survive for a long time.
• Biotic charge to build up barriers and to mop up small enemies with biotic explosion, don't use it to start a fight since you'll be gunned down very quickly.
• Use your missiles wisely. Don't just use it on the big Atlas that is halfway across the map. Only use it when you see one charging at you while your team has to extract some data i.e. has to remain in one spot for a long time. If its just a standard kill all enemies wave, a smart team will be able to kite anything big to conserve the items.

Cons:

• Weak vs armored targets. You really don't have anything great against armored targets once you run out of cluster grenades. You'll have to rely on teammates and just use pull to stagger.
• If you are the last one alive, you'll have to use charge to escape and go from ammo stash to ammo stash for the grenades since all you have for damage is a SMG.

If you have to play human vanguard, its not bad either, but rather than using the Nova offensively, use it defensively. Mop up any enemies that get too close to keep your team clean, don't use it to charge halfway across the map into a group of enemies.

Solution 2:

The real problem with playing charge+nova offensively in gold and silver is the lag.

I've only had one proper lag free silver game and I had no issue doing a charge+nova on banshees and brutes without getting instant killed. It's about how you dance around them as you charge and nova.

With lag however, a lot of the cues are not accurate, like, to you, you might be to the side of the banshee but to the game after compensating for lag, you're still in front of it. That's what gets you killed.

Then you have the stupid bug that gets you floating off the map enjoying sweeping panaromic views.

I've pretty much given up on vanguard coz of the lag issue.

That said, with a lag free game, it's hard to die if you know what you're doing. With a 200% cooldown (pistol), by the time you're done with a nova, biotic charge's ready to go and it brings your barriers back up again, rinse and repeat. Fantastic way to clean up the non-boss enemies. That's actually a strategy itself, allowing your team to concentrate on the boss while you mop up the kids.

If you want to risk charge+nova-ing bosses, only use it on banshees, brutes, atlas' and geth primes and charge from the sides, never the front. If you find yourself charging them from the front, roll away, preferably to the side.

After awhile you should be able to get into a rythm like:

Charge - roll - nova - repeat, or Charge - nova - roll - repeat.

The only boss target your shouldn't charge are Phantoms. The other bosses are large and ponderous, needing time to turn to face you. Phantoms are agile and they can do an instant-kill from any direction.

If you still insist on charging them, then charge and roll back. I find that nova gives the phantom time to pick you up.

Super, super high risk of course, but in the right conditions, it's extremely fun and satisfying