I want to start by saying that I absolutely LOVE objective games. I love the teamwork they tend to foster, I like that they typically require more strategy than straight deathmatch/slayer, and I like they tend to focus player movement on maps. With that being said, I believe that Halo Infinite’s current sandbox and movement system combined with movement penalties/exposure to enemies actively punishes playing the Objective.
Halo Infinite is at its core a game built around the pillars of guns, grenades, melee, and movement. The game does its best to try to push these pillars as the focal points of gameplay, and for the most part they’re solid pillars. However, I truly believe that the way that the movement of players holding objectives is hampered makes playing the Objective a punishment, and let me explain why.
1. Slow movement.
Halo Infinite’s current movement system puts any player who plays the objective at a severe disadvantage due to the fact that Oddball carriers can’t sprint, and Flag carriers who sprint are revealed. This means that you either lose access to movement mechanics that other players not playing the objective get to keep, or are punished for using the mechanics that 343 designed the game around.
Halo’s Infinite’s sprint, dashing, and grapple hooks make it so that a ball carrier will never outrun or out maneuver someone chasing them (barring doing a jump that the chasing player is unaware of), and flag carriers have no choice but to be outrun while trying to capture flags without using sprint which actively takes away the aspect of hiding flags, which at that point why not simply flag juggle? Playing the objective leaves you completely exposed to the enemy team if you hope to take advantage of any of the movement mechanics of the game. This creates feel bad moments where players feel slow and disadvantaged for playing the game mode the way its meant to be played. Add to the fact that at this current moment that players have no way of choosing the game types they are playing, and you can understand why players would refuse to play the objective.
2. Being made defenseless.
Its already bad enough that objective players are exposed to the enemy team and are slower than all other players, but being unable to fight back efficiently without dropping the objective creates moments that clog up the game due to the constant dropping of the oddball or flag in order to fight a squad coming your way (assuming you survived the grenade barrage). On top of that, the 1-hit melee kills have been removed meaning that you don’t really have a valid defense at close range with objectives. This means either you drop the ball to fight an enemy team (losing ball time, which yes I know has been a thing in previous Halo games, but more on that later), or you accept you’re more likely to die because you’re trying to run a flag and can’t fight back without dropping said flag which exposes your flag position and kills any chance you had of hiding the flag.
I want to propose a few solutions to these issues.
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I think movement penalties need to be removed from objective carriers. This would help speed up gameplay as well as require teams to setup better due to the fact that they not only would have to catch the ball carrier but also be more likely to fight a full team over the ball. I also think that sprinting with the flag should not reveal your position. Juggling used to be a skill that players developed and also had a risk-reward element. Exposing flag carriers who sprint doesn’t create a skill barrier, it helps give teams who had their flags taken a chance to have an easier time retrieving their flag (lessening the punishment of making mistakes in setups or managing the map).
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Give objective players a weapon. I would honestly love if they let objective carriers have their current weapons while carrying objectives but I know that won’t happen probably, so I think a pistol at least would be a set in the right direction. Guns are arguably the biggest component to Halo’s gameplay, and in a FPS game, the last thing you want is for players to not be able to shoot. It leaves them feeling powerless which is never a good thing in a game that strives to be competitive and exciting. I really think Infinite could take notes from Halo 4 in this regard.
I’m sure this will probably get buried, but I just wanted to put these proposals out there and see how other people felt.