Mass Effect 2

Since the Prima guide was utterly useless for figuring out the endgame and there seems to be a great deal of confusion on the boards about how this works, I thought I'd spend some time running different teams through the endgame to see what variables are at work.

Space Battle.
If the Normandy is not properly upgraded, each missing upgrade will result in a team member death before you even start the assault on the Collector base.  If you take this team member with you during the oculus fight, or haven't recruited them, or they are dead, a different character dies instead.

-No Silaris Armor:  Oculus beams punch through; Jack dies.
-No Cyclonic Barrier Shielding:  Engine core overloads; Tali (or Legion or Thane) dies.
-No Thanix Cannon:  Normandy charges in with main guns;  Thane (or Garrus) dies.

Base Assault.
For the assault itself, there appear to be three types of characters that are required for the various key roles: 

-If the Tech Specialist is not one of those listed below, they will die at the first rendevous. 
-If the first Fireteam Leader is not a leadership character, the Tech Specialist will die at the first rendevous. 
-If the second Fireteam Leader is not a leadership character, they will die at the second rendevous. 
-If the Biotic Specialist is not powerful enough, one of your current squad members will be swarmed by seekers and die. 
-If the crew survivors are not escorted, they will die (any character can do this and the crew will live).
-If the Heat Exchanger valves are not opened in time, the Tech Specialist will die and you're forced to restart.
-If there aren't enough Combat Specialists left behind to hold the line while you fight the last boss, characters die
-Some characters are worth more as Combat Specialists than others; these point values are still being tested
-Characters with low point values are the first to die if there aren't sufficient points to hold the line

The following characters are the only ones that will succeed at their respective roles:

Tech Specialist
* Tali
* Legion
* Kasumi

Leadership
* Miranda
* Jacob
* Garrus

Biotic Specialist
* Samara / Morinth
* Jack

Crew Escort
* Any loyal character

Combat Specialist
* Zaeed
* Grunt
* Garrus
* possibly other partial contributors

Disloyalty (Normal Loyalty).

Not having a character's loyalty has different effects depending on what you do with them:

-Having disloyal characters in the above key roles will result in deaths, regardless of whether they are suitable or not.
-A disloyal crew escort will sacrifice their lives to protect the crew (the crew will still make it).
-Disloyal characters don't get as many 'points' as loyal characters when holding the line and are more likely to die
-Keeping disloyal characters in your active squad prevents them from dying, except for...
-In the final boss fight, disloyal characters in your active squad will be crushed by rubble after the fight and die.
-If all team members are dead, Shepard misses the final jump and lets himself fall to his death rather than risk Joker's life.
-Note that with all 11 team members recruited, it's actually not possible to kill off all of them and get yourself killed.


Kidnapped Normandy Crew. ( Not essential for the achievement)
If you do not go through the Omega-4 relay quickly enough after the Collectors kidnap the Normandy crew, the captured crew members will die off in the endgame.  Watching Kelly get liquefied was particularly horrifying.  Who dies depends on how many missions you did after the Joker level (actual clock time does not affect the outcome, nor do relay jumps, fuel spent, or landing on Illium/Omega/Citadel/Tuchanka; any quest, big or small will count though):

-If you use the relay immediately, everybody survives; Horizon colonist gets liquified instead.
-If you do one mission, Kelly, engineer Daniels, mess sergeant Gardner, and half the crew dies.
-If you do two missions or more, everyone except Dr. Chakwas dies.

Legions loyalty mission.
Note that if you activate Legion and learn about his loyalty quest immediately after the Reaper IFF mission, the Collector attack / Joker level will wait for one extra mission before triggering.  This allows you to complete all the loyalty quests before the crew is even kidnapped (assuming you did the other ones already).

The X-Factor.

Some people also report having trouble keeping a character (typically Mordin) alive at the end, where they must hold the line until Shepard kills the last boss.  This seems to be related to a choice or choices made during the final mission, as rearranging team roles from the same savegame will affect whether this mysterious death happens or not.

All credit goes to Ken Ueno of the BioWare social site.
(who gave permission for this to be posted here)
His thread.(Link below)
http://social.bioware.com/forum/1/topic/105/index/871030

O.K. All of these suggestions are very good but I have the solution to the problem people are having with the fight between Jack and Miranda. The solution is somewhat easy. First off make sure that you put off either Miranda or Jack's loyalty mission until the very very end.

I played through as a vanguard and I noticed that the assault power that the vanguard has could be evolved into "champion," which gives a %100 bonus to your paragon or renegade score, so it basically doubles your score. This means that it is only necessary for you to get your para/rene up halfway as long as you have evolved it into champion before you get involved in the fight.

If you are successful in doing so then you will be able to choose either a para/rene option during the fight. This will diffuse the situation and keep the loyalty of both of them.

This same situation will also come up between Legion and Tali. If during that fight, you find that you cannot use one of the options, do not fret! There is a solution. I believe they do this simply so you do have to make a game changing decision. To fix this simply walk up to the person you didn't side with and select to talk to them about the fight. Then select the para/rene option. This will fix the situation and that person's loyalty will be yours once again.

Now for the people that did not know about this fight and sided with Jack/Miranda. You can fix this by doing the same thing that I mentioned to fix the Legion/Tali fight as long as you have %100 para/rene or %50 and assault power evolved into champion. I do not know which classes this will work for because I am not sure if they all have an evolution that doubles para/rene scores but I can confirm that it will work for the vanguard.

These were my choices for the final suicide mission:
FIRST CHOICES:
Specialist (person going through the tunnels): Legion
Second Group Leader (fire team): Garrus
Personal Group (people you fight with): Samara and Grunt

SECOND CHOICES:
Escort (survivors back to ship): Mordin
Specialist (biotic shielding): Jack
Second Group Leader (fire team): Garrus
Personal Group: Miranda and Legion

FINAL FIGHT CHOICES:
Take with you Miranda and Legion

*Make sure you choose Garrus for both fire team leaders and also make sure they are all loyal!

PLEASE IF YOU HAVE SUCCESS WITH THIS PLAN OR HAVE CONFIRMATION THAT OTHER CLASSES HAVE EVOLUTIONS THAT BOOST PARA/RENE SCORES PLEASE LEAVE A COMMENT THAT SAYS SO!! THANKS AND HOPE IT WORKS!!

Here's how i did it without having Zaeed and Jack's loyalty:
1st Choices:
Tech Specialist - Tali
2nd Squad leader - Miranda
My Squad - Thane & Jack

2nd Choices:
Survivor escort - Legion
Biotic Shield - Samara
2nd Squad leader - Miranda
Finale Fight - Thane & Samara
I choose the Renegade option in the end, i don't know if it matters, but there you have the recipe for "No One Left Behind" without the loyalty of Jack and Zaeed :-)

Spoiler Alert!


I just got the achievement on my 3rd try. My problem was that I had pissed off Tali and lost her loyalty. So she was the only one who would die, either not surviving the door defense or dieing after fighting the final boss. Using the bit about getting it without Jack's loyalty at the end of Necromancer2k8 guide I figured out that what matters is at the last point to choose squad members (After the squads regroup and before the final boss) you need to choose the the person opposite the one you lost loyalty to (ex: Legion & Tali or Miranda & Jack). For the begining of the mission I used the character list off of LegendaryMSN guide. I used:
Tech Specialist
* Legion

Leadership
* Miranda for the first squad
* Jacob for the second squad


Biotic Specialist
* Samara / Morinth

Crew Escort
*Garrus
For the first squad I used Jack and Grunt
For the second squad I used Miranda and Grunt
For the final squad I used Miranda and Legion

So in a nutshell if you lose loyalty to Tali use Legion in the final battle, it should also work the other way around or with Miranda and Jack.

Everyone has legit guides. Hopefully I can be helpful with my choices and what I did. So here goes...

The first thing I did was get all additional assignments done as well as recruiting. There are a few missions that can't be opened up until during some of those main 'dossier' ones. I do this for the most amount of Paragon (or Renegade in some matters) as possible. By the time I reached the infamous Miranda/Jack fight (Jack's loyalty being the last, aside from Legion, that I achieved) I was just under 100% Paragon and still broke them up. I'm going to guess that you have to be 80% or higher. By the time I finished Legion's loyalty mission I had 100% and all went smoothly between the Tali/Legion fight.

I got all ship upgrades, even the one's that aren't important. I also spent a lot of time getting upgrades on armor/tech/weapons, etc. Thanix Cannon, Silaris Armor, Cyclonic Barrier Shielding. I'm pretty sure the rest are optional -- but hey, might as well get the others if you have the credits. I made sure that everyone's skill was up, proper weapons in place...just in case.

My choices:

Tech: Legion
1st Fire Team Leader: Garrus (was also my love interest)

Biotic: Samara
2nd Fire Team Leader: Garrus, again.
Team Escort: Grunt

My Squad: Miranda and Mordin

I was on the edge of my seat until the achievement popped. There was a gap between achievements, so I started to panic a little. I just recommend getting as many assignments and upgrades done before even going after the IFF. Also, after I gained Legion's loyalty and received his sniper rifle, I didn't have enough resources to get it so I made a special save just in case and went after some Platinum, also upgrading the Shotgun's damage as well. I don't know if this helps, but it's always better to play safe. I hope this might help someone.

This is What I did and I got the achievement
1/Completely Upgrade the Normandy
2/Make sure all team-mates are loyal
3/These are the choices that I made
Specialist - Legion
2nd team leader - Garrus

Biotic Shield - Jack
2nd team leader - Garrus
Escort - Mordin

And my squad contained Shepard & Tali (She was my chosen love interest) all the way through and the final spot was taken up by Mordin for the entry and the switch activating for the Specialist, Zaeed for the bit while your Travelling with the biotic and finally Thane (I think for the final fight)
I Also chose to destroy the base.

For anyone that has everyone loyal except Jack, I got the achievement first time around by doing the following:

All Ship Upgrades.

Vents: Legion
1st Fire Team Leader: Garrus

Biotic Specialist: Samara
Second Fire Team Leader: Miranda

Crew Escort (Half of the crew died...): Zaeed
Team to fight the Larva: Mordin and Tali

I left my strongest characters to hold the line, along with Jack, the only one not loyal. Everyone survived. There may be a degree of randomness in the survival of disloyal characters holding the line so I might just have been a bit lucky the first time around.

Here's something handy from Game Informer:

http://www.gameinformer.com/b/features/archive/2010/06/04/ho...

To reiterate this can be done without loyalty from everyone. On my successful run I did not have Jack's loyalty, and so didn't use her for any role.. I did this on Insanity, don't know if difficulty has an effect.

My squad went as follows,

Tech Specialist: Tali
Second Assault Team: Garrus
Squad: Miranda and Legion

Biotic: Samara
Second Assault Team: Garrus
Crew Escort: Mordin
Squad: Miranda and Legion

As I said I did not have Jack's loyalty and she still survived, she was with all Loyal members in the final battle. I

n theory this should apply to any unloyal member aslong as you dont have too many. If this fails just keep reloading the auto save until you get it, as I believe luck does play a part.

If you leave a negative vote please say why so that I can adjust the solution.

*Contains Spoilers*
---
Before going into the Omega 4 Relay:
-All main party members were recruited + Zaeed.
-All party members were loyal.
-All ship upgrades were applied, including med bay.
-All custom upgrades to specific characters were applied (eg. Grunt, Legion, Mordin, etc.).

In the Jack/Miranda fight I used a Renegade line to break up the fight.

In the Tali/Legion fight I sided with Tali because my Renegade score was too low. Later I talked with Legion and used another Renegade line to convince Legion that I lied to Tali. Both were loyal and none the wiser.

In the Tali/Legion (second?) fight I'm fairly certain that you have to have 100% Renegade/Paragon to break it up. If not you can always talk to them later.

Slept with Miranda, don't know if that had any affect.
---
FIRST CHOICES:
Tech Specialist - Legion (what better tech spec. than a robot)
Fire Team Leader - Miranda
Squad - Grunt & Thane

SECOND CHOICES:
Survivor Escort - None
Biotic Specialist - Samara
Fire Team Leader - Garrus
Squad - Grunt & Thane

FINAL FIGHT CHOICES:
Squad - Grunt & Tali
+Tali almost died in Final Fight, saved at the last minute.
---
In Summation:
-To get this achievement you need to have all the ship upgrades (Med Bay?).
-DLC party members do not affect outcome as long as they are NOT chosen for leadership rolls.
-Loyal leaders must be chosen for the Fire Team, but they don't need to be the same leader both times.

+LegendaryMSN has the right idea with party members meant for specific roles (ie. Legion for Tech Spec.)
+Hope this is useful, esp. if someone uses this data to make a foolproof guide.

I was worried when I didnt get the achievement right away, but your team that holds the line at the end requires strong defensive characters, especially loyal ones.

This is the best place to leave any Non-Loyal (Normal Loyalty) characters.

A bit repetitive but here's my team structure.

Vents: Tali
Fire Team 1: Garrus
Biotic: Jack (with biotic Upgrade- a must!)
(I took Grunt and Tali as my team)
2nd Fire Team: Miranda (not Loyal! But apparently she has enough experience to not die here lol)
Escort: Mordin
Final Team: Jack and Tali

Having read through this thread I got the achievement on my first go - thanks to all the previous contributers. Here's everything I did on my run through that may or may not be relevant.

Played as a male soldier, romanced Miranda, recruited Zaeed and Kasumi from the DLC. Completed all side missions, visted all planets, all ship upgrades, almost all weapon upgrades - missing 3 from the Krogan seller. Had played the paragon route pretty much all the way through.

For the loyalties, had recruited everyone apart from Tali and Legion. Was half way through the side and loyalty missions when I did Jacks. Miranda was already loyal. Sided with Miranda as paragon wasn't high enough at time. Finished existing loyalties then recruited Tali and completed her loyalty. Recruited Legion and did his loyalty straight away. Jumped through Omega4 relay soon as was able.

Crew choices:-
Miranda and Legion on my team everytime

Vents: Tali
Fire Team 1: Garrus

2nd Fire Team: Garrus
Biotic: Samara
Escort: Mordin - all crew survived

Final Team: Miranda and Legion - all others on the door

Worked for me, hopefully will for you as well

I finished every side mission, 100% every system and probed every single planet, 100% upgrades... Before i went through Omega 4 relay.
Heres who i chose for what:

Tech Specialist - Legion
Leadership 1 - Garrus
Leadership 2 - Miranda
Biotic Specialist - Jack
Crew Escort - Grunt.

I beat the reaper larvae with Mordin and Zaeed.

Every single crew/squad member lived. Received achievement, finished game on hardcore.

Apparently if you arent quick enough to pass through the omega 4 relay the only crew member who lives is dr. chakwas? B.s. My play time was easily 40+hrs.

I saved the collector ship too :O i wonder what to expect is me3?

1st Choices:
Tech Specialist - Legion
2nd Squad leader - Garrus (I think black guy can work, too...never tried)
My Squad - Mordin & Miranda

2nd Choices:
Survivor escort - Mordin (since he died the first time when he held the doors along with Jack, used Grunt to escort the first time but I think that's why the others died too)
Biotic Shield - Samara (You COULD use Jack if she is loyal from what I hear)
2nd Squad leader - Garrus
My Squad - Miranda & Legion

Final Fight:
Miranda & Legion

Stupid Jack wasn't loyal since I chose Miranda over her.. The first time around when I sent Grunt to get the crew back, Mordin and Jack died.

Ok, I learned everything I needed from the above guides and there was only one question left:

If I lose the loyalty of Miranda/Jack or Tali/Legion will I still get the achievement?

The answer is yes. If you did the loyalty mission for all characters and then simply do not select the disloyal NPC for anything on the final mission you WILL still get the chieve. You still have to follow the above - make sure the Normandy is fully upgraded (yeah I upgraded the med bay but I have a feeling that means nothing, but who cares you have more than enough resources to do it), Do all the loyalty missions, and then select the combo of characters for each position based on the above guides.

I used Garrus for squad leader, Samara for the Biotic, and Mordin to take the survivors back. I can only assume you can replace Garrus with Miranda or Jacob if you have your loyalty halo, replace Samara with Jack or potentially Miranda since she says she can do it in the cut scene but I don't trust her cause she smells funny, and I don't know who would make sense to replace Mordin for the rescue team but hey if your using Mordin for something else your a noob. :P

And I'm sure your wondering, so yes, I had sex with Grunt the Krogan cause his hump is just dreamy. Kidding, I had sex with Jack, but I kept my clothes on and so did she so it's all within PG status and basically just silly.

Hope the halo, non-halo thing helps. The rest was just for fun.

Just got this on my first attempt and studied up as I went so thanks for all the above posts: here's my layout by the time I hit Omega:

all loyalty gained except Thane, screwed up on his w/o realizing it, lost Jack's after I gained it by siding w Miranda

Ship decked out, all weapons and armor pretty much done, missing a few submachine guns and maybe one armor, Normandy done to my knowledge

Sent Tali down the vent, Miranda had the 2nd team and I took Garrus and Grunt, I was lvl 30 soldier so approached as firepower and movement team

For the 2nd part: 2nd Team leader was Garrus, sent Mordin back as escort (thanks to all for that bit of advice) and took Miranda and Legion with me to the end, my Biotic for last stetch was Samara. Finished on Veteren with this mix, no deaths. Also think the key is keeping you normal and not loyal crew in the generic mix and not choosing them by name for a mission.

P.S. I listened to the chatter and heard things were going well, its not until after the IM conversation after my other completion acheivements popped up that the acheivement showed up so I was a little nervous that I dropped someone somewhere along the line but was fortunate. Wasnt sure when it popped up for the rest of you guys, get the feeling it can be anytime after mission wraps up but the delay did have me worried that I missed it.

While maybe nothing new, also my observation that a couple of members of your crew not being loyal(i had 2 thru when I hit the Omega relay) will not affect the outcome, think this is guided by not designating them in any role.

Lost part of the crew of the ship due to doing some other missions but not really my main goal anyways. Reminder-has no affect on this achievement.

There's lots of good guides here already, I just wish to add the following:

I was in the situation where only Dr. Chakwas survives, and I decided to send Grunt as the crew escort. During the second door fight, Mordin died. Thus, I restarted the final mission and decided to send Mordin back to the Normandy to escort the survivors, and then *blip* I got the achievement after the final fight.

I lost the loyalty of Tali after doing Legions loyalty mission because I chose to side with Legion in their argument. I didnt have a good enough alignment so I was unable to regain her loyalty. I went into the suicide mission pissed and worried that I was going to lose her somewhere along the lines after all that time gaining everyone's loyalty and upgrading all the weapons. But, I was carful with my choices and was able to keep her alive. So, if you have one unloyal member it seems like you can still survive by not putting them in any key roles and not bringing then in your party. Below is my setup.

Tubes: Legion
1st and 2nd Squad Leader: Garrus
Shield: Jack
Escort: Jacob

Everytime in my party I brought Miranda and Mordin. They are a great combination. You have Miranda with warp to get rid of barriers, and she also has overload for shields. And Mordin has incinerate to get rid of armor. Those combined with pull if you used that as your special ability make the Harbinger sooo much easier to kill. I only died once throughout the entire suicide mission and only had Miranda downed once. This was on hardcore setting. Anyways, hope this helps someone. Now off to get the final achievement.....Insanity.

To clarify, you CAN still get this achievement even if you’ve lost the loyalty of two of your squad members (Tali/Legion and Miranda/Jack). Just make sure to complete all loyalty missions and acquire all Normandy upgrades. You’ll also need to set the difficulty to casual.

Up until the final fight, choose the two non-loyal members to accompany you.

In the vents, choose to send either Tali or Legion, whichever of the two is loyal.

I chose Garrus for both team leaders, but you can also send Jacob or Miranda (if she’s loyal).

For the biotic bubble, choose between Samara, Morinth, or Jack (if she’s loyal).

Send Mordin as the escort.

Choose Kasumi, Tali, or Jack/Miranda to take with you for the final fight, leaving the two non-loyal members with everyone else.

Following this you can get the achievement with two non-loyal squad members. The achievement will pop after speaking to the Illusive Man.

Ok first you need to buy most or all upgrades for your ship and some for your character. If not some of your team might not even survive landing. Then when you are asked to choose your tech choose Tali and Garrus for leader. Then choose anyone to accompany you. When you open all 8 doors and meet up with Tali and Garrus (Garrus was the best choice for the leader because if you chose someone else Tali would probably die). Then for your Biotic choose Samara and for Crew Escort choose Mordin because he usually dies for some reason. For leader choose Garrus again and any two from your squad to accompany you. It is also impartant that all of your squad member should be loyal to you because if they are not they would die during the course of the mission like it happened with Miranda when I first played the mission. She wasn't loyal even though I did her loyalty mission probably because I chose to be on Jack's side during their argument and she died. Also save just before you go to Omega 4 Relay so if something go wrong you can do mission again.

Going into this final mission, I had everyone loyal except Jack due to siding with Miranda. On my first attempt, I took Jack with me in the final fight, but she died during the escape.

On the 2nd time around, I left her behind in the "hold the line" group, and she came out alive, and I got the achievement. Here was my setup:

Tech Specialist: Legion
Fire Squad: Miranda
My Squad: Jack/Thane

Crew Escort: Mordin
Fire Squad: Garrus
Biotic Specialist: Samara
My Squad: Jack/Thane

Final Fight: Legion and Zaheed

TLDR, if you have 1 or 2 non-loyal members due to the fights, I believe the best chance of them surviving lies with them remaining in the "hold the line" group, leaving them with the best Combat Specialists (Garrus,Grunt)

I more or less followed the Achievement Hunter guide, but forgetting a step on my first attempt I thought I'd need my heavy hitters for the final fight against the big bad, so I picked Garrus and Grunt. Alas, Mordin died.

So here's how I did it the second time around:

Completed all recruitment and loyalty missions.
Got the Normandy's shields, guns, and armor upgraded.

Tech specialist: Tali
Second squad leader: Miranda
My squad: Garrus and Legion

Survivor escort: Jacob
Biotic shield: Samara
Second squad: Miranda
My squad: Garrus and Legion

Final Fight: Garrus and Legion

(NOTE: This is partially taken from the Mass Effect Wikia but also draws on my own experiences).

This is not an overly difficult achievement to get but does require a good deal of preparation before even starting the Suicide Mission and making the correct decisions. All preparation must be done before going through the Omega-4 relay.

Morality Points
Several points later on will require persuasion checks. Some require quite a bit of morality points. If you upload a save file from ME1, you gain a bonus in ME2. Regardless, you'll want to err on the side of being a pure Paragon or a pure Renegade throughout ME2 in order to build up sufficient points.

Normandy Upgrades
The Normandy can be upgraded by choosing the dialogue option when talking to different squadmates aboard the Normandy and then upgrading on the console in Mordin's lab. Three upgrades are required: Heavy Ship Armor (talk to Jacob), Thannix Cannon (talk to Garrus), and Multicore Shielding (talk to Tali).

Loyalty Missions
To clear one thing up, loyalty does not guarantee a squadmate's survival nor does not having their loyalty ensure their death. However, loyalty plays a very big role. For Garrus, Kasumi, Grunt, Samara ( ), Mordin, and Thane, achieving and keeping their loyalty just means doing their loyalty missions.

For Zaeed and Tali, it's possible to do their loyalty missions and still not get their loyalty due to making the wrong decisions. In Zaeed's mission, you have the choice between following Vido or rescuing the workers in the burning factory. Chasing after Vido gains Zaeed's loyalty. If you choose to rescue the workers, you will not get his loyalty unless you can pass a persuasion check.

In Tali's loyalty mission, you can refuse to reveal her father's actions, which will result in gaining Tali's loyalty but has negative storyline results for both ME2 and ME3. Choosing to reveal what Tali's father was doing results in no loyalty from Tali. The third option if you the required morality points is to point to Tali's history as proof of her innocence. The fourth option is to rally the crowd during the trial. To do this, you after 1) Refuse to give Veetor to Cerebus during the Freedom's Progression mission, 2) Keep Kal'Reegar alive during Tali's recruitment mission (it's best just to use the paragon interrupt and keep him out of the fight altogether, 3) Talk to Veetor and Reegar and ask for their help during Tali's loyalty mission, 4) Talk to the admirals and discover their political and military motivations. Talking to Veetor, Reegar, and the admirals must be done prior to going to the Alarei.

On top of that, two pairs of squadmates will get into an argument once both are loyal. Those pairs are Miranda & Jack and Tali & Legion. You will have two ways to resolve the conflict: 1) Choose one over the other, which will result in the loss of loyalty for the squadmate you didn't choose, or 2) Use a persuasion check to get them to put their differences aside, thus maintaining both characters' loyalty. So, it's best to wait to do at least one character's loyalty mission until you've built up sufficient morality points, i.e. do Jack's loyalty mission but wait for Miranda's. If you have to choose between Jack or Miranda, choose Jack as an unloyal Miranda as a better chance at survival than an unloyal Jack.

The Suicide Mission
During the course of this mission, you will have to assign roles to your squadmates. Picking the wrong person for a job can lead to them getting themselves or other people killed, even if loyal.

Tech Specialist: A LOYAL Legion, LOYAL Tali, or LOYAL Kasumi.

First Fire Team Leader: A LOYAL Garrus, LOYAL Jacob, or LOYAL Miranda.

Biotic Specialist: A LOYAL Samara/Morinith or LOYAL Jack.

Second Fire Team Leader: : A LOYAL Garrus, LOYAL Jacob, or LOYAL Miranda.

Crew Escort: Not required but your crew will die without an escort. If the escort is loyal, both the escort and the crew will survive. The escort will die if not loyal (but the crew will survive). Anyone can serve as escort, but weaker characters like Mordin, Tali, and Kasumi are best as it gets them out of the way for later on.

Your last decision involves which two squadmates to take with you for the final boss battle. The squadmates you take with you should be loyal. Anyone not chosen for the final battle or sent to escort the crew will stay behind to hold the line. The Hold the Line portion considers both the combined strength of the team and the individual strengths of the squadmates. Having more people and more loyal people reduces the risk of losing people. Should you lose people, there is also a pre-determined list that they will die in. Weaker characters like Mordin and Tali will die before stronger ones like Grunt. It also takes into account loyalty. So, all else equal, non-loyal squadmates have a greater chance of dying (though I'm not sure if a non-loyal Grunt would die before a loyal Mordin). So, it helps to take squishier characters like Mordin, Tali, and Kasumi with you for the final battle.