In a game dominated by gun power comes the class who has a unique set of abilities and specializations making her what I call the “spellcaster” of Pandora. If you enjoy playing the mage role in more recent RPGs or intend to play with a friend but don’t like the simple “huehue gun guns guns” gameplay, the Siren is for you. With the choice of being a hardcore DPS, a crowd control player, or even a team healer, Maya the Siren is an interesting character.

Note: This isn't really a guide. It's more of an overview just to help you choose your character. After all, the game never tells you what a character is capable of in the character selection. If you haven't checked out our review for Borderlands 2, don't forget to check it out here first.

Review: Borderlands 2

Mental energy wins games

Every class has a unique ability they can activate every now and then that is unique to the specific class.

For Maya, it’s a move called Phaselock, which allows her to launch a sphere of energy at her enemy, locking them in place and removing them from battle completely for a short duration. Even though the basic ability is pretty wicked and incredibly helpful, it’s the ability to augment the orb depending on which specialization you use that makes it interesting. Want an orb that blows up? Sure. How about one that heals? Yup.

Regular bullets are over-rated

Every class has three skill trees, each rather different in concept. You don’t pick a skill tree and have to stick with it. For one, you can re-spec at any safe haven town and on top of that, you can distribute your points in any of the skill trees. So you can focus on the one that gives you the most gun damage for instance, or distribute them evenly between the one that’ll give you more speed and the one that’ll give you more armor.

Maya’s three specializations are Motion, Harmony, and Catacylsm.

Motion

The Motion specialization focuses more on disables and defensive abilities. If you want a lot of crowd-control, this specialization is for you. In the long run, you’ll be able to completely stop hordes of monsters, reflect bullets, and even confuse enemies into doing your bidding. Pretty neat gameplay style if you ask me.

Harmony

The harmony skill tree brings harmony to your allies... not so much the enemies, because it keeps your rampaging beasts you call friends going on forever. Yup, this one's the healer specialization. Every game has to have one, right?

Going this route allows you to turn your phaselock into an orb that heals yourself and your teammates. Don’t think this is just the point-and-click healer. Well, it can be if you allow your bullets to heal your allies. But no no, this healing class is pretty unique. It makes it so you have to kill monsters in order for phaselock to heal nearby friendlies.

If you’re worried about damage, this class makes it so your buddies deal more damage. On top of that, you can put some pretty mean damage-over-time debuffs on the enemies so don’t think this class can’t fight on its own.

Cataclysm

Want mega burst damage? Well, here you go and just looking at the skill tree’s name makes you wonder…

Cataclysm focuses on dealing elemental damage which is very powerful in this game. Once this skill tree is complete, everything you do does damage over time or nukes enemies. Phaselock becomes an explosion, bullets can ricochet and leave behind trails of lethal acid, and your mere presence on the battlefield does fire damage. I actually find this class quite over-powered, but in the later-levels, you’re going to want all the damage you can get.

Using the Siren

Maya is probably the most unique character in the game. Her gameplay is very much different from the rest, and even though she, much like everyone else, uses guns, her sway of using them is different. Instead of just shooting, you’re going to want to think outside the box, marking targets for your teammates or choosing who to phaselock so you can disable hordes more efficiently.

If you’re into magic and unique gameplay, pick Maya, you won’t regret it. But of the four classes, I’d say she’s the hardest character to master… unless you go cataclysm and just lay waste to everything.