Adjustments to make Infinite less competitive and more fun

Games Halo Infinite
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Here are just some pitched ideas to make the social playlists in Infinite less sweaty and more fun

  • More debris in the maps (Bring back the days of traffic cone splatter clips)
  • Increase acceleration from things like explosions and the gravity hammer
  • Increase arena team size from 4 to 5
  • Adjust weapon balance so power weapons are easier to use.
  • Bring back player collision and friendly fire
  • Remove sprint/slide/clamber
  • ̶R̶e̶m̶o̶v̶e̶ ̶a̶l̶l̶ ̶s̶e̶l̶f̶ ̶s̶e̶r̶v̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶e̶q̶u̶i̶p̶m̶e̶n̶t̶ ̶l̶i̶k̶e̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶g̶r̶a̶p̶p̶l̶e̶ ̶h̶o̶o̶k̶ ̶a̶n̶d̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶r̶e̶p̶u̶l̶s̶o̶r̶
  • Add more neutral equipment like the bubble shield and power drain
  • Buff vehicle health but also remove the doom state so players die with their vehicle
  • Loosen SBMM

Obviously there’s more that goes into making Halo fun like map design and vehicle/weapon placement but these are just some relatively easy changes I see that would make a massive difference in making social playlists in Halo Infinite less sweaty and more focused on just having fun.

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  1. I guess it couldn’t hurt, Forge should fix this regardless.
  2. Eh, maybe, soo no issues.
  3. I’d say no, instead, allow people to maybe pick team sizes from the playlist. This way, people who prefer 4 vs 4 can still enjoy it.
  4. They’re not really difficult to use, except for maybe the Skewer honestly.
  5. No issues with this
  6. No, clamber isn’t even really a competitive thing as they try to actively avoid it happening since you cannot fire your guns ( or aim even ) when preforming it. Hell, it’s honestly better to disable auto-clamber for this reason.
  7. No
  8. Sure, why not
  9. I’d say buff or nerf vehicles based on performance, only thing about the doom state I want to see gone is the glow that makes it obvious that it’s going to explode. If you want it to detonate quicker, keep attacking the vehicle to get it to explode quicker.
  10. No, play custom games if you don’t want SBMM. I don’t want to be playing newbies when I can slaughter them regularly. Keep SBMM, but tweak it to better put people of simular skill together ( both teammates and enemies ). It’s not fun in the slightest getting slaughtered by people to completely dominating others. I want a fair match.
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I think doing away with “sandbox purity” would help too.

All kinds of stuff like dual wielding that is removed to balance the sandbox, but removes a lot of the fun as well.

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I agree sandbox doesn’t need to be super balanced. What weapons are included in the sandbox can always be adjusted for ranked playlists.

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(3). 5v5 would only apply to social arena. If people still wanted the more competitive 4v4 they can play ranked

(5). Enhanced movement takes away from the sandbox. By giving the player more inherent abilities you’re encouraging them to ignore sandbox elements that are meant to help them get around the map (Vehicles, equipment, mancannons, ect)

(6). Self serving equipment is inherently more about solo play. While I don’t believe the equipment should be removed from the game entirely they have no place in social.

(9). Regardless SBMM as we can tell is far too tight. It doesn’t allow for true casual play which is what social is supposed to be.

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No, it’s far to weak. So weak that skill gaps within matches are enormous and teams are mostly unbalanced. Everybody i know stopped playing because of the extremely weak SBMM. No one is having fun either being completely outskilled or having to heavy cary with still no chance of winning.

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I’m just going off of what I hear the most. From what I can tell most people I hear from complain that the current SBMM causes them to play too sweaty.

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There is a lot of debris on the 4v4 maps, though its not equal across the board. Streats in particular is just filled with clutter (rats needs homes I guess)

yeah sounds fun

This would work fine for Behemoth or Launch Site, but for a lot of the maps it would be too many players on a small map. Also just sounds like change for the sake of change. Not needed.

Edit: Also keep in mind this would hurt the matchmaking even more, so longer wait times and worse servers in general.

Fair. Though many are already very easy to use.

Now your asking for competitive changes. Funny how many don’t know the difference.

Again, sounds pretty competitive focused but ok.

You want the game to be more boring? Ok.

This is one of the biggest myths about Halo 3’s equipment. Some were insanely OP and basically gave you the win in many situations (Regen, Energy Drain, Bubble Shield, etc.) so to imply they were “neutral” while they could lead to simple overkills is just nuts. They are just fluffy words you use to try and pretend Halo 3 had well designed equipment… It didn’t. Flare, Radar Jammer, and Mines were horrible in particular.

they just did though. Which vehicles? Do you realize how insane that simple request could be depending on how they would do it? Maps like Highpower would be insane, indestructible Wasps everywhere raining hellfire down on helpless spartans just trying to do their jobs.

Sounds fine. Do keep in mind though this would hurt you (and many) in a lot of situations. You’d be playing against pro/amateur players way more often, pubstomping would be more common. There is a negative to this idea, though its generally agreed upon to be a better idea.

Edit: When I play with friends matches are significantly easier from my POV. I’m talking like me dropping 30+ kills no problem. So what you are asking has a negative side to it.

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  1. Give us an option to switch between 4 vs 4 and 5 vs 5 in social as well. This way everyones happy.

  2. Eh, the only one that might do that is sprinting, and no, it doesn’t even come close to comparing to taking a vehicle in the game at all. Hell, I still take the mongoose all the time if it’s around to quickly get to the front.

  3. So? This sounds like a change that’s more in favor of competitive then actual social. competitive is generally where people want things removed then kept, not social. Social generally is more loose in what stays and what goes, even obnoxious or op stuiff even. This includes the grappling hook and respulser. I’m still going to stand firm that these should stay in Social.

Too many people find them fun as well, regardless of what type of player they are, social or competitive. Removing fun is generally a bad thing all around just because you want it removed.

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you use this as an argument then advocate for the removal of Grapple/Repulsor… You realize how hypocritical and/or inconsistent this is right?

clearly grappling around the map like Spiderman is just not fun enough for the prestigious standards of social play.

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It’s more so about the idea that equipment should be a double edged sword. Enemy players should have the ability to turn your equipment against you.

The grappling hook has great custom games potential once forge is implemented.

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This person ask for less competitive and more fun in social, then asks to remove things that most people find fun in social. Competitive is generally where things are “removed” things, not social. I agree with your statement early about not feel like this person actually understands competitive and social aspects that well.

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These are pitched ideas, I’m open to criticism. Everyone talks about how Infinite is more competitive focused so I thought it’d be great to start a discussion on what exactly 343 could do to make social playlists less sweaty and more focused on relaxed play.

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They do though, if you screw up they destroy you. and once you die they can take it from you.

Equipment in Halo 3 was nuts. You could put down a Regen field and assuming you had a sword or shotty you were damn near unkillable, you could throw an energy drain in a certain area and potentially hit an entire team… Compared to grapple or repulsor its bonkers.

great then :slight_smile:

If you ask me I think the biggest issue (in terms of design) is just how insanely OP/annoying the AR/pistol are in this game. Both can kill you across the map, both are either unskilled or inconsistent. So you can get sniped across the map with a pistol and its frustrating, you can try to run away from an engagement and because AR is so damn powerful its almost impossible… This means that every engagement is life and death and the inbetween isn’t as common as it should be. Add to this grenade spam and you have some insanely frustrating gameplay.

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It’s just something that is wrong with gaming nowadays. A significant portion of the skilled (‘sweaty’) players demand to be put against the casual, so they can stomp them.

A couple of weeks ago i checked out one of those who complained about “only getting matched against people my skill”, turned out: less then a third of the players in his last 10 matches where his skill (onyx), so about two third were less skilled then him. About a third even 2 complete ranks or even more lower skilled then him. His ‘defense’ when i pointed that out was that in the majority of matches (in reality only half) there was 1 player his skill… That all the others were lower skilled didn’t even matter, the fact that there was already 1 was to much. He wanted everybody to be lower skilled then him. That just says enough.

It’s something you see with most games nowadays. In New World (a game that because its PvEvP had no SBMM) the behaviour of a significant portion became so toxic (deliberately stomping and humiliating lesser skilled casual players, some were even exclusively targetting newer players) that the devs had to act and change parts of the game to protect the casual gamers. They had to completely remove the part where you can just attack a player and now you only can PvP when you opt in and you will be matched against people your own skill.

And also in other games you see the more skilled players demanding to being matches against weaker players, or when its a PvEvP game that the weaker players are forced to fight them and can’t escape.

It’s just an extreme toxic and entitled mindset of a significant part of the players nowadays, they only think a game is ‘fun’ if they can stomp and ruin the game for others

And Halo is no exception. That is why some people here are complaining about the SBMM being ‘to tight’ even though there are already big skill gaps. Low gold players can already easily be matched against (high) diamond or even onyx players, even on high populated servers during peak hours like US and EU.

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I don’t know how true it is but I have heard the SBMM in Infinite doesn’t take your rank in consideration when matching you with other players but rather your actual recorded skill level hence why the game tries to keep you at an even 50/50 win rate.

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I know a lot of people didn’t like the Halo 3 Assault Rifle but I felt like it was the perfect starting weapon. Strong enough for you to defend yourself but not strong enough to compete with the better pickup weapons.

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Ding Ding Ding!

SSBM needs to stay because of this mind set. Making the game unfun for new players is just how you kill a game off, since no new people are coming into the space, just coming in, getting destroyed, then noping straight out again to another game is just bad all around.

People should instead be pushing for the Custom Game Browser instead. Which would be a much better option for people in general.

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You are right that visible rank and the matchmaking rank (MMR) don’t have to be the same, but for people who play enough ranked it will be, since how ranked is set up your visible rank will be pulled towards your MMR.

But it doesn’t give you a 50/50 win rate, but it is designed to give you as close as a 50/50 winchance every match. Obviously it fails to do that, since most matches are not close.

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I’m of the belief that more skilled players should have a higher win rate. I don’t go into a game I’ve never played before expecting to do well, I expect to get dunked on until I get around the learning curve.