Starting at Ability Points

Starting with the basics: Ability  Points

AP - Ability points. These are currency for your abilities and highly useful. The more quests you do, the more AP you get, so those little side quests come in handy in the long run!

Every 40,000xp points, you earn 1 AP. This is a fixed amount as there are no "levels" for the character in game.

You start out with a cap or maximum amount of AP points you can have at one time of 175

Later in the game, once you start putting Skill Points into the Augment abilities when it opens, the cap of AP you can have will increase to the maximum of 515 AP points.

Some good rules of thumb:

1. Fill out the inner wheel first. Gives you plenty of options to grab passives you need for later.
2. Use more than one weapon - This is the entire point of the synergy system, to be able to use two or three consumers with only one builder and gives you utility as well.
3. The premade decks aren't great with the exception of the Elite decks once you get to end game content such as Kaidan. Don't worry about them, all they give you is cool outfits.
4. Ask for help if you're still confused. Many people will be glad to share their builds or help you tweak yours! (/chat join sanctuary - the best channel ever)
5. Don't start over if you "chose" the wrong combination or spent it on something you didn't need. Just go out and earn more AP. It's a lot simpler than starting a new character. Plus there's no wrong combination. Just some combinations or synergies that work better than others.

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Useful Terms
Builder: Builds Weapon Resources
Consumer: Consumes Weapon Resources
Offensive Target: The enemy be it a mob or another player
Defensive Target: Whichever player/yourself you're targeting for your buffs/heals

PBAoE: Point-Blank Area of Effect
TAoE: Targeted Area of Effect spreading out from the target
GTAoE: Ground Targeted Area of Effect (either you click on the ground where you want it to be placed, or select a mob and before you cast it, click CTRL)

Afflicted: Damage over Time
Hinder: Slowed but not stopped
Impair: Completely stopped/silenced
Weaken: Corrupted: lowers a mobs' healing
Weaken: Debilitated: lowers damage from mobs
Weaken: Exposed: increases damage a mob takes from you

Blast: Cone/column attack
Burst: 2-6 rapid attacks that are applied together(all are low damage)
Chain: jumps between said number of mobs
Focus: Attack that gives multiple hits over time and can be interrupted by: a hinder, impair, line of sight, distance, or you accidentally jumping
Frenzy: PBAoE or TAoE
Strike: Single target damage attack

Barrier: Shields which absorb damage
Beneficial effect: Buff
Detrimental effect: Debuff
Hate: How Aggro is measured
Leech: Converting a percentage of your damage to defensive target heals or self heals.
Heal over time/HoT: Heals player for a certain amount of time
Cleanse: gets rid of the debuffs on you, your defensive target, or the enemy

DABS Deadly Aim + Breaching shot - buffs in a shotgun/pistol build
SF Short Fuse - buff from the Elemental abilities
CU Clean up - cleanse ability from shotguns
WW Win-Win - cleanse ability from pistols
SoH Slight of Hand - Misc ability that removes all crowd control debuffs from you

AoE Area of Effect - You'll see a white area on the ground either on a column, cone, or circle spreading out from the enemy. Get out of it by dodging (double tap w, a, s, or d)
Cleave - normally a cast attack that will not have a white area on the ground but a cast bar somewhere near your ability bar.
Stuns - Usually caused by an AoE, roots you in place and normally leaves you vulnerable to a powerful attack from the enemy.
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Pros and Cons of each weapon
Ranged:
Pistols:

Pros
Part of the DABS buff set
Good for DPS and Heals
Good from the start of the game

Cons
Mid range weapon, will have to watch your toes especially with mobs that send out a lot of AoE.

Shotguns:

Pros
Part of the DABS buff set
Lots of AOE damage for DPS
good from the start of the game

Cons
Mid range weapon, will have to watch your toes especially with mobs that send out a lot of AoE.

Assault Rifles:

Pros
Longest ranged weapon in the game
LEECH builds are great for soloing/healing
AR/Blood leech build = EZ mode to Kaidan north of the wall

Cons
It takes a LOT of AP to get an effective leech build
Fights will take longer but you'll be able to down things way above your QL level.

Magic:
Elemental:

Pros
Good for DPS/ SF Buff Build
Good for AOE DPS
Good for Soloing
Good for Scenarios
Good for PVP

Cons
Can take a lot of AP to get a solid build for the later areas

Chaos:

Pros
Good for Tanking
Good for PVP
Good for Soloing

Cons
Can take a lot of AP to get a solid build for the later areas
Mostly useful for its passives unless tanking/PvP
Boring animations. Seriously, the most exciting is Domino effect that gives you a green whirlpool for .5 seconds.

Blood:

Pros
Good for Leech
Good for Healing
Good for Dps
Used for Soloing
Good for Heal Tanking

Cons
Can take a lot of AP to get a solid build for the later areas
Have to build for shield strength
Cold-blooded applied at the wrong time - u r ded
You generate a lot of hate. Seriously. Do not. Heal. Before. Tank. Goes. In.

Melee:
Swords:

Pros
Good for Tanking
Good for DPS
Good for Solo
Good for Scenarios
Impairs for daaayyys

Cons
If you can't do a DPS dance out of AoE/Cleave/Stuns, don't melee in dungeons

Hammer:

Pros
Impairs for daaayyys
Good for Tanking
Good for DPS
Good for Soloing

Cons
If you can't do a DPS dance out of AoE/Cleave/Stuns, don't melee in dungeons
Feels a bit clunky to wield sometimes especially lining up the blast column attacks.

Fists:

Pros
Good for Healing
Good for Soloing

Cons
Boring animations. If you're think you're going to be Wolverine-levels of bad-ass, be prepared to be disappointed.
If you can't do a DPS dance out of AoE/Cleave/Stuns, don't melee in dungeons