Fighting For Map/Power Weapons

Games Halo 5: Guardians
1

A common notion on these forums is that prior Halo games placed power weapons on the map for players to fight over. I admit this is mostly likely the case in FFA gametypes, of course, but I want to talk about the team games (4v4, 8v8).

I believe this notion of fighting over power weapons in team games is one of the most overused and fundamentally flawed arguments around. If this is a reaction to personal ordinance, then I understand why people will be against PO. But I don’t recall the whole fighting over map weapons being that big integral to Halo. Sure, it happened, but it was hardly a defining feature. I say you’re more likely to walk upon a power weapon unchallenged rather than fight your opponent over them, especially after the first 30 seconds of the match. Here’s why:

  • Many power weapons spawn near your base (Brute shots, missile pods, Spartan lasers on Sandtrap; shotguns, sniper rifles on Pit). If you’re “fighting” anyone for these, it’s your own teammate. And even that isn’t a “fight”, it’s more a race or roll of the dice on spawn…
  • A handful of weapons centrally located (Rockets, Sword, Overshield on Pit, Hammer(?)on Sandtrap) and will draw players into a fight. But only at spawn.
  • Once the game is under way, player movements/deaths/spawns make it just as likely to walk upon these power weapons unchallenged as not.

I provided a few basic examples in the Pit and Sandtrap from Halo 3 as I remember them. I’m curious to hear others opinions on the “fighting over power weapons” experience.

Anyone else share this opinion, or feel it misrepresents the experience?

2

That’s still a better system them having them spawn at your will, at your feet.

Personally I disagree with you. From my experience in CEA the team that holds map control holds control of the power weapons. If you just stumble upon a PW uncontested its either because your team has map control or your enemies are unskilled and not keeping track of timers. I’ve noticed that PWs will be fought over more often if teams are of the same skill level, if its one sided not so much.

You have a point about PWs spawning at base but those are usually weapons that aren’t really contested even if they are on a neutral part of the map so might as well give them to the teams at the start. Then again the only PWs in cea are the rocket, sniper, and shotgun and power ups so maybe that’s why people fight over them more often in that playlist.

So perhaps, the more power weapons on map = the less significant each one is = the more likely they are to go uncontested.

3

First of all, “fighting over power weapons”, isn’t literally two players meeting each other next to the weapon, and the better player winning. It’s about two teams controlling the map, and making it hard for the other team to reach the places where power weapons are located.

Secondly, it is a team effort. If you think it’s more likely for you to fight with your teammate than the opponent, you’re obviously looking at team gametypes from a lone wolf perspective, which is a totally wrong perspective when it comes to team gametypes. If your teammate gets a power weapon, that’s good for you. If your teammate is closer to the weapon than you are, you should do whatever you can to help them get the weapon.

Finally, I feel like you’re not considering the fact that in an optimal system, players can know the exact time when the weapons will spawn. This means that right after the weapon has been picked up, its spawn location is not interesting, it’s useless to keep under strict control. However, when the spawn draws closer, if both teams are educated on the weapon spawn times, you should start seeing more interest in the spawn locations. And that’s the point at which both teams will do their best to snatch the weapon while making it as difficult as possible to the opponent.

The concept of power weapon might be difficult to understand to a lone wolf who sees their teammates as enemies that will do everything they can to get more kills than you. However, it’s absolutely a crucial aspect of team play, and in can only be understood in that context of team play.

4

‘Fighting’ over the map/power weapons only includes players actively fighting. I think ‘controlling’ the map/power weapons is a better way to describe it. Sometimes you are fighting over map resources but in other situations it is all about using the resources of the map effectively.

In examples that you used like the pit, the team that uses their half of the maps better is typically rewarded for it.

The problem with random ordnance, pods, and loadouts is that they are reactionary. There is no way to account for them before spawn or after, you are forced to deal with them as they come, which greatly limits the countermeasures that can be implemented. With a loadout system I cannot predict when some player will deflect my rocket with a hardlight shield, I can only react to it after the fact. I can call him out and deal with him with my team, but the next time he may spawn with camo, or hologram, or thruster, or anything else.

The advantage to having a pickup based system is that whenever a player dies, they are ‘reset’ and must take time to re-acquire certain items. Even something as seemingly minor as a plasma rifle will add up once you include it with all the other minor details.

More reactionary gameplay can work with other shooters because their killtimes are so fast that minor advantages can be much more easily overcome with twitch shooting skills.

‘Fighting’ over the map/weapons/items is better for the pace and flow of Halo.

5

The thing that made Halo so interesting to many players is the map control aspect. What those people love about it is that it dictates the outcome of the game. Whichever team controls most of the map controls most of the power weapons, and thus, has a better chance at winning.

You can say that Personal Ordnance puts players on more even ground, since everybody can get a power weapon to fight back. That is true, but it’s a flawed system for many reasons. Unlike map control, personal ordnance is completely random. No matter what any player does, no matter how well he/she plays, which actions he/she takes, the opposing player can win simply because they got lucky and got a better weapon as personal ordnance. You could have a pro player who’s playing against somebody who just started playing the game. The pro player could get a Scattershot in his ordnance, while the new player gets an Incineration Cannon. When these two players meet up in battle, who wins? The new player, even though his skills are much less refined. Why? Because he got lucky.

Map control takes skill, and allows a player to win using superior skills and strategy. A team will own the map because they have earned it, because they outplayed their opponents. If a team gets cornered at their base in Valhalla, with the enemy team controlling their power vehicles, then that’s on them for not outplaying their opponents. It’s fair, it’s fun. That’s what Halo is about, being a better and smarter player. Rewarding the players for having a superior position and map control is what makes Halo so unique and interesting.

6

> A common notion on these forums is that prior Halo games placed power weapons on the map for players to fight over. I admit this is mostly likely the case in FFA gametypes, of course, but I want to talk about the team games (4v4, 8v8).
>
> I believe this notion of fighting over power weapons in team games is one of the most overused and fundamentally flawed arguments around. If this is a reaction to personal ordinance, then I understand why people will be against PO. But I don’t recall the whole fighting over map weapons being that big integral to Halo. Sure, it happened, but it was hardly a defining feature. I say you’re more likely to walk upon a power weapon unchallenged rather than fight your opponent over them, especially after the first 30 seconds of the match. Here’s why:
>
> - Many power weapons spawn near your base (Brute shots, missile pods, Spartan lasers on Sandtrap; shotguns, sniper rifles on Pit). If you’re “fighting” anyone for these, it’s your own teammate. And even that isn’t a “fight”, it’s more a race or roll of the dice on spawn…
> - A handful of weapons centrally located (Rockets, Sword, Overshield on Pit, Hammer(?)on Sandtrap) and will draw players into a fight. But only at spawn.
> - Once the game is under way, player movements/deaths/spawns make it just as likely to walk upon these power weapons unchallenged as not.
>
> I provided a few basic examples in the Pit and Sandtrap from Halo 3 as I remember them. I’m curious to hear others opinions on the “fighting over power weapons” experience.
>
> Anyone else share this opinion, or feel it misrepresents the experience?

If the enemy team is any good, they’ll always try to fight you for the power weapons. Only very stupid players skip over the power weapons. The only time where the game doesn’t have emphasis on this map control element is when the other team just doesn’t understand the game. Whenever you have two skilled teams fighting against each other, there’s a very large emphasis on map control in the game.

And as tsassi said, fighting over power weapons doesn’t always literally mean two players fighting over the weapon, it’s also when two teams are fighting for control of the map’s power positions, and denying access to the power weapon spawns. I would like to add that it’s also about memorizing weapon spawn times down to the exact second, which adds an entirely different layer of skill to the game that wouldn’t be there without weapons/powerups spawning on the map the way they usually do.

The emphasis on map control adds way more depth to the game. This and many other gameplay elements commonly found in arena shooters like Halo, Quake, etc, result in way higher of a skill gap when compared to games like COD or Battlefield. Taking out the emphasis on map control would reduce some of the skill gap found in these arena shooters.

7

> The thing that made Halo so interesting to many players is the map control aspect. What those people love about it is that it dictates the outcome of the game. Whichever team controls most of the map controls most of the power weapons, and thus, has a better chance at winning.
>
> You can say that Personal Ordnance puts players on more even ground, since everybody can get a power weapon to fight back. That is true, but it’s a flawed system for many reasons. Unlike map control, personal ordnance is completely random. No matter what any player does, no matter how well he/she plays, which actions he/she takes, the opposing player can win simply because they got lucky and got a better weapon as personal ordnance. You could have a pro player who’s playing against somebody who just started playing the game. The pro player could get a Scattershot in his ordnance, while the new player gets an Incineration Cannon. When these two players meet up in battle, who wins? The new player, even though his skills are much less refined. Why? Because he got lucky.
>
> Map control takes skill, and allows a player to win using superior skills and strategy. A team will own the map because they have earned it, because they outplayed their opponents. If a team gets cornered at their base in Valhalla, with the enemy team controlling their power vehicles, then that’s on them for not outplaying their opponents. It’s fair, it’s fun. That’s what Halo is about, being a better and smarter player. Rewarding the players for having a superior position and map control is what makes Halo so unique and interesting.

Agreed. However, I wouldn’t really say that emphasis on map control is unique to Halo.

8

> A common notion on these forums is that prior Halo games placed power weapons on the map for players to fight over. I admit this is mostly likely the case in FFA gametypes, of course, but I want to talk about the team games (4v4, 8v8).
>
> I believe this notion of fighting over power weapons in team games is one of the most overused and fundamentally flawed arguments around. If this is a reaction to personal ordinance, then I understand why people will be against PO. But I don’t recall the whole fighting over map weapons being that big integral to Halo. Sure, it happened, but it was hardly a defining feature. I say you’re more likely to walk upon a power weapon unchallenged rather than fight your opponent over them, especially after the first 30 seconds of the match. Here’s why:
>
> - Many power weapons spawn near your base (Brute shots, missile pods, Spartan lasers on Sandtrap; shotguns, sniper rifles on Pit). If you’re “fighting” anyone for these, it’s your own teammate. And even that isn’t a “fight”, it’s more a race or roll of the dice on spawn…
> - A handful of weapons centrally located (Rockets, Sword, Overshield on Pit, Hammer(?)on Sandtrap) and will draw players into a fight. But only at spawn.
> - Once the game is under way, player movements/deaths/spawns make it just as likely to walk upon these power weapons unchallenged as not.
>
> I provided a few basic examples in the Pit and Sandtrap from Halo 3 as I remember them. I’m curious to hear others opinions on the “fighting over power weapons” experience.
>
> Anyone else share this opinion, or feel it misrepresents the experience?

In many ways I concur with your opinion. The notion of placing power weapons on the map to force teams to take control of a map is, frankly, unnecessary, especially in Halo, because experienced players/teams understand that map control is vital to winning and don’t really need any more incentive than that. In other words, if there were no power weapons spawning on the map, good teams would still fight for map control because they want to win. Who really believes that wouldn’t happen without power weapons spawning?

I think the real issue is that we all understand spawning with power weapons is not a good idea, so how else can you get power weapons into the mix other than spawning them in places that involve risk?

With Halo 4, 343i apparently assumed (I’m assuming) that we wanted to play the game with power weapons, so they made them available without risk. I don’t think that idea worked for the majority of players used to the previous games, but some new players seem to like the idea.

Are there any other methods out there?

9

> In many ways I concur with your opinion. The notion of placing power weapons on the map to force teams to take control of a map is, frankly, unnecessary, especially in Halo, because experienced players/teams understand that map control is vital to winning and don’t really need any more incentive than that. In other words, if there were no power weapons spawning on the map, good teams would still fight for map control because they want to win. Who really believes that wouldn’t happen without power weapons spawning?

Sure, maybe pro players or coordinated teams would learn map control whether or not there are power weapons, I won’t disagree with you there. But the truth is that most people who play online are not pro players nor are in teams, or necessarily good teams if they do play with friends. Without the weapons that spawn on maps to guide them around the map, they would just wander around aimlessly, finding an enemy to kill.

Just look at Halo 4 and you’ll see why having weapon spawns is, in part, essential for map control. Take Haven, for example. Is there any place on that map which is really considered a power position? Not really, no. The top center of the map is a meeting point for players, sometimes, but you’re just as often going to meet somebody walking down a hallway, or in the bottom middle. Until Legendary Slayer gamemodes added the Sword to that middle zone and the Rockets to the far end ramp, there really was no part of the map that could be fought over, nor did teams ever really try.

Now, you could say that this is due to poor map design, and yes, that is very true. However, once again, take a look at Pitfall compared to The Pit. In Halo 3’s version of the map, the sniper towers were an essential place to control, as were the Sword and Rockets spawns. The team that had these spots had a much better chance to win the game. You took your Sniper Rifle, went to the top of the tower, and then sat there for a good portion of the game, controlling your half of the map. But in Halo 4? You hardly see people on the sniper towers, and the sword room is often empty. 3. Why? Because there’s no reason to take control of them. When you can have a Rocket Launcher, Incineration Cannon or any other power weapon dropped at your feet, there’s no incentive to take over those spots. And if you do, then chances are that some other guy is going to run around the corner with some powerful weapon he got randomly and take it away from you. Controlling the Sniper Rifle spawn on Pitfall is great and all, but it’s of no use if the other team has three snipers of their own.

Controlling the map and the weapons on it isn’t just about having good positions, it’s also about splitting the potential power on the map itself. Each map has a certain amount of power weapons on it at a time, and once they’re all picked up, you can’t get more of them until later. There’s a maximum amount of power to split between the teams, and it’s designed to make things fair and fun. When a team can get half a dozen power weapons more than the other team out of pure luck, it creates an extreme unbalance that completely removes any point to map control.

10

Are there other methods for introducing power weapons into a game?

Give everyone a weapon after x amount of time. Thats one way…

Limited use loadouts. Every player can choose to spawn with a given power weapon only so many times. Or give these loadouts a cool down.

Are these better? I dunno. I would prefer these than rewarding players for already doing well.

11

Fighting over power weapons and power ups has absolutely been a huge part of Halo from the start. Try winning a slayer game on Chill Out in Halo CE without fighting over rockets, os, or ac. A perfect example of fighting for power weapons is a game we play at our LANs all the time. Hang Em High CTF. Team that spawns Red is at a slight disadvantage so they have to get power weapons or power ups to have a chance. We always designate one person on the team if we are blue team to watch the top ramp and keep any red team player from getting the OS at the end of the ramp. This is huge because if that person gets the OS they more than likely can get the rockets and the AC. This makes them a killing machine and a HUGE threat to get control of the top of our base and start throwing the flag off.