I find firefight particularly frustrating at times for two reasons. The first is that there are simply just overpowered bosses that seem to one hit any vehicle I spawn, oni tanks, Hannibal tanks, tundra tanks, ultra banshees, temple banshees, ultra wraiths, temple wraiths all get torn apart by a single knight or ghost. Second is the lack of a proper matching system, what I mean by this is that I will get at least one other descent player on my team but the rest are low level players that get around 1 boss kill and 20 or so regular kills. This is really frustrating because I am consistently placing in the number one spot of my team even though I am nowhere near the best player in the game. To me it just seems that when one person is always the best scoring player in the lobby then they should be put in a lobby with players of equal or better skill level rather than be forced to get dragged down by other players.
They have to balance it out. There are the designated “carriers” and then there are the noobs. I’ve had many times where I’m the only good player.
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> They have to balance it out. There are the designated “carriers” and then there are the noobs. I’ve had many times where I’m the only good player.
They have to balance it out sure but they might not even be bad players. It just comes down to they don’t have any reqs to use no matter how skilled they might be. The problem is how firefight is designed after usually round 2 you need to be using a vehicle. The people that don’t have those reqs are kinda screwed. Maybe they could put a level requirement for legendary and mythic but I don’t know. They can always play heroic where the enemies are much easier to deal with
You’re correct, according to the powers that be, there’s no skill matching in Firefight. To a certain extent I understand it, but there needs to be some attempt to create better rounded teams.
As a side note, if you see someone struggling, try to help them out (concentrate fire, watch their back, etc).
As to the question of balance, I agree they added difficulty to the game cheaply rather than through thoughtful design and AI improvements. Lamentably, that’s not going to change.
Bosses one hit any vehicle you spawn? Do you have wheelman armor perk on? Also if you don’t like powerful bosses play heroic. As far as bad teammates try and recruit or team up with good ones. Rely on random teammates and you will get random results.
You just learn that if you are good at firefight (or just work hard to win) and you solo queue, you will be required to work a little harder to win. Trust me, i feel you pain, but it is part of the challenge. You can’t win every time and you need to understand that the REQs are there to me used and in the correct situation. FYI bosses cannot “one hit kill” any vehicle unless you are using a ghost against a mythic warden or something. Use the correct tier REQ for the correct boss and you can take a few hits for sure
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> Also if you don’t like powerful bosses play heroic.
Yeah, this is the best advice I can give in situations like this. 343 gave us Heroic firefight for a reason, after the community had been asking for a less bullet-spongy version of firefight. And yet it seems like people still insist on playing Legendary or Mythic and then running to the forums to complain that it’s too bullet-spongy ¯_(ツ)_/¯
That said, on some rounds, even Heroic can be a challenge if nobody on the team has good reqs to call in. But even so, I highly doubt that tanks and Wraiths would ever get torn apart by a single Knight or Ghost on Heroic.
I got one hit killed by a boss in Heroic before that wasn’t Warden. It was on Darkstar with the round 5 two Knight bosses. I came in with a Mantis and then all I see is 3-4 incineration cannon shots coming at me and I died. I was mad because right before that I had another Mantis which didn’t last long either, but I thought this time would be different.
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> I got one hit killed by a boss in Heroic before that wasn’t Warden. It was on Darkstar with the round 5 two Knight bosses. I came in with a Mantis and then all I see is 3-4 incineration cannon shots coming at me and I died. I was mad because right before that I had another Mantis which didn’t last long either, but I thought this time would be different.
My favorite is getting cross-mapped and blown apart by a River of Light-wielding Knight Headsman on Apex 7.
Also, even after detuning, the Grunt Goblin has taken me down in a single shot.
In relation to Firefight I just wish that our profile statistics showed what average finishing position you achieve as well as the average points you earn under Heroic, Legendary, and Mythic.
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> In relation to Firefight I just wish that our profile statistics showed what average finishing position you achieve as well as the average points you earn under Heroic, Legendary, and Mythic.
Actually I think that wouldn’t be a good idea. Firefight is Halo 5’s most casual mode and more stat tracking would encourage people to play to outscore their team rather than just win. It’s not supposed to be competitive.
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> > 2727626560040591;8:
> > I got one hit killed by a boss in Heroic before that wasn’t Warden. It was on Darkstar with the round 5 two Knight bosses. I came in with a Mantis and then all I see is 3-4 incineration cannon shots coming at me and I died. I was mad because right before that I had another Mantis which didn’t last long either, but I thought this time would be different.
>
> My favorite is getting cross-mapped and blown apart by a River of Light-wielding Knight Headsman on Apex 7.
>
> Also, even after detuning, the Grunt Goblin has taken me down in a single shot.
I always thought when playing mythic or legendary, why can’t I lock on with the River from that far away?
Why can’t I snipe with the regular Storm Rifle? How come my Boltshots don’t have that kind of range. Was that reincarnated Annie Oakley who killed me without even looking? How the hell can an A.I. Banshee thread 2 columns and an overhang to blow up me and my Ghost?
lol
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> > 2533274816788253;5:
> > Also if you don’t like powerful bosses play heroic.
>
> Yeah, this is the best advice I can give in situations like this. 343 gave us Heroic firefight for a reason, after the community had been asking for a less bullet-spongy version of firefight. And yet it seems like people still insist on playing Legendary or Mythic and then running to the forums to complain that it’s too bullet-spongy ¯_(ツ)_/¯
>
> That said, on some rounds, even Heroic can be a challenge if nobody on the team has good reqs to call in. But even so, I highly doubt that tanks and Wraiths would ever get torn apart by a single Knight or Ghost on Heroic.
Well no matter which difficulty you play on the bosses are all pretty bullet spongy. Except for the first round bosses. I have found the biggest issue being that people don’t pull out their vehicles or they are a low level soo they don’t have reqs to use. Then it puts a lot of strain on the couple people trying to win to basically kill all the bosses.
Then of course the elites in phantoms that you can’t kill that melt you or your vehicle with a turret. Also the Knights with continuous incineration fire that almost feels automatic.
I personally like legendary and mythic more because it is a challenge, but some small details are what make it frustrating. I believe having a level requirement would fix some things then the players would have reqs to help out. Maybe sr100 I’m not sure maybe that’s too high can’t remember when I unlocked most things
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> > 2775209234672000;10:
> > In relation to Firefight I just wish that our profile statistics showed what average finishing position you achieve as well as the average points you earn under Heroic, Legendary, and Mythic.
>
> Actually I think that wouldn’t be a good idea. Firefight is Halo 5’s most casual mode and more stat tracking would encourage people to play to outscore their team rather than just win. It’s not supposed to be competitive.
People already play to outscore their teammates and the fact that the mode ranks your score in relationship to your teammates scores is demonstrative of it having a competitive angle beyond just earning the “W”.
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> Well no matter which difficulty you play on the bosses are all pretty bullet spongy. Except for the first round bosses. I have found the biggest issue being that people don’t pull out their vehicles or they are a low level soo they don’t have reqs to use. Then it puts a lot of strain on the couple people trying to win to basically kill all the bosses.
Yeah, I blame the req system for this. It’s very unfriendly to new players.
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> Then of course the elites in phantoms that you can’t kill that melt you or your vehicle with a turret. Also the Knights with continuous incineration fire that almost feels automatic.
I agree, those things are very annoying especially the un-killable Phantom gunners.
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> I personally like legendary and mythic more because it is a challenge, but some small details are what make it frustrating. I believe having a level requirement would fix some things then the players would have reqs to help out. Maybe sr100 I’m not sure maybe that’s too high can’t remember when I unlocked most things
You aren’t the first one to propose a level requirement for higher difficulties of firefight. Whatever the best solution might be, new players dragging their teams down regardless of their skill because they don’t have reqs is a problem caused by the req system. I’m only hoping it doesn’t return in Halo 6 
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> People already play to outscore their teammates
Of course some people do that. It’s their choice to have a competitive mindset in a cooperative mode. But “I gotta get first place to show all those scrubs that I have more reqs than they do!” is far from the mindset I have when I play it, personally. It’s difficult to relax when I’m all worried about outscoring teammates. And I’m sure there are lots of people who share my less competitive mindset, too.
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> and the fact that the mode ranks your score in relationship to your teammates scores is demonstrative of it having a competitive angle beyond just earning the “W”.
Yeah the scoreboard is bad enough but you’re arguing for even more stat tracking. I do understand why you want it, if you’re one of those people who plays it with a competitive mindset and cares about your place on the scoreboard. However, what kind of effect would more stat tracking have on people who play casually just to get the W? I feel this would put more pressure on them to play it like you do.
Consider how points are given to Warthog drivers. If you’re driving someone in a Warthog, you get zero credit for a boss takedown unless your gunner gets the killing shot. Meanwhile, your gunner can get credit the normal way by dealing damage before it dies, even if someone else gets the killing shot. This means that Warthog drivers aren’t so likely to score very high. So what would increased stat tracking do to people who might like to drive Warthogs, but they know their scores and placements are being tracked on their profile pages? It’s already hard enough to find a decent driver when playing with randoms.
It would also encourage selfish behavior. Here’s what I mean: when I play firefight, I like to leave powerful vehicles like tanks and Wraiths for my teammates when I feel like using something else. Would I do this and go out of my way to arm my team, if I didn’t want them to outscore me? I think not. And another kind of selfish behavior: calling in a scout hog in round 1 to splatter splatterable bosses. I’ll admit I used to be guilty of this, but I learned that it’s actually better to spend some time killing the soldiers and crawlers before getting to the boss, to have a better chance of gaining level 3 reqs on round two. With more stat tracking, you’d get more people rushing to kill the boss before their team does.
Not to mention, what would stat tracking in firefight actually track? It wouldn’t exactly track skill. Scoring high in firefight is all about having a big enough req collection, and knowing the best reqs to call in for each round (which is knowledge gained by simply playing it a lot). It’s certainly not going to track your skill with weapons. If they implemented firefight stat tracking and you saw someone with a lot of high scores and first places, you couldn’t conclude much from that besides “this person has a lot of reqs and probably knows about the trick where you can put a bullet into each enemy after the round ends to get credit for killing them when they drop dead”. And if you want an idea of how big someone’s req collection is, you can use their SR for that.
Don’t get me wrong, when you say the scoreboard is “demonstrative of it having a competitive angle” then I can’t disagree without knowing why 343 added it. And if I remember correctly, they said the increasingly long respawn timer, up to 30 seconds on round 5, was implemented in order to encourage teamwork or something. So maybe 343 does want firefight to be a competitive sweatfest to see who can get the highest score.
But then again, they would. When placing 1st is so highly dependent on having lots of reqs, I’m not surprised that 343 wants to encourage players to be competitive and try to out-req their teammates. Because after all, they have a clear financial incentive to make players spam reqs so they’ll be more likely to engage in microtransactions to get more.
Which is fine but personally I don’t support them if they’re trying to make firefight into a competitive thing. In my opinion (which you don’t seem to share, and that’s fine), firefight is more fun to play for just winning and without worrying about placement. It is fundamentally a cooperative game mode where players have the shared goal of completing all five rounds, and that’s how I think it should be. Increased stat tracking would be a move in the opposite direction from that and I just don’t think players need that kind of pressure in a supposedly “casual” mode.
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> Of course some people do that. It’s their choice to have a competitive mindset in a cooperative mode. But “I gotta get first place to show all those scrubs that I have more reqs than they do!” is far from the mindset I have when I play it, personally. It’s difficult to relax when I’m all worried about outscoring teammates. And I’m sure there are lots of people who share my less competitive mindset, too.
I find it funny in how you associate the supposed competitive mindset into “I gotta get first place to show all those scrubs that I have more reqs than they do!” as that doesn’t represent me and I’m sure most people who might be interested in having additional stats tracking our Firefight performances. You basically created a strawman argument against me by refuting the mindset of an a-hole verses someone who’s simply interested in knowing more information about their performances and how they historically stack up to their teammates within the Firefight mode.
By the way, why would you be worried about outscoring your teammates when as you say it is a personal choice to carry the mindset you wish to carry. Point being, you could just as easily carry the mindset of being as cooperative as you want to be and not worry at all about where you finished in scoring. This is no different than when you acknowledge there may be people who choose to take a more competitive mindset and that they have the freedom to do so. Firefight is a cooperative mode just as you say, but it’s cooperative to the same degree that any team based mode is; I mean, you’re essentially working with teammates to achieve the goal of winning the match. Just because there’s no obvious PvP element attached to achieving that goal doesn’t detract from a person having a personal interest in knowing how they may stack up in relation to their teammates in their attempt to achieve that goal. Like I said, the fact that the game includes a scoring mechanism and finishing positions provides the mode a type of PvP influence so I don’t think there’s anything wrong with asking for a statistic that provides more historical context to that element; specifically, for those who have interest in knowing.
> Yeah the scoreboard is bad enough but you’re arguing for even more stat tracking. I do understand why you want it, if you’re one of those people who plays it with a competitive mindset and cares about your place on the scoreboard. However, what kind of effect would more stat tracking have on people who play casually just to get the W? I feel this would put more pressure on them to play it like you do.
Why would people who play more casual even care if there’s additional statistics? I mean, the term casual here has already implied that the person has quite a limited interest in the mode and one that’s unconcerned with anything beyond just the relaxed enjoyment that they personally get from playing the mode. I think the real issue here is that you personally feel and believe that it may put more pressure on you to alter your supposed “casual” mindset, but that also implies that maybe you’re not as casual as you wish you were.
> Consider how points are given to Warthog drivers. If you’re driving someone in a Warthog, you get zero credit for a boss takedown unless your gunner gets the killing shot. Meanwhile, your gunner can get credit the normal way by dealing damage before it dies, even if someone else gets the killing shot. This means that Warthog drivers aren’t so likely to score very high. So what would increased stat tracking do to people who might like to drive Warthogs, but they know their scores and placements are being tracked on their profile pages?
Well, I have been disappointed in how Halo 5 awards Warthog drivers, so in my opinion the solution here is to simply advocate for proper awards and credit for drivers. I definitely think there should be incentive to help encourage people to take up the action of driving a Warthog beyond just being a good cooperative teammate – I mean I already personally do that because to me the win always comes first, but it’d certainly be nice to see actions as a driver recognized and acknowledged by the game’s reward and point system verses it simply being a sacrifice.
> It would also encourage selfish behavior. Here’s what I mean: when I play firefight, I like to leave powerful vehicles like tanks and Wraiths for my teammates when I feel like using something else. Would I do this and go out of my way to arm my team, if I didn’t want them to outscore me? I think not. With more stat tracking, you’d get more people rushing to kill the boss before their team does.
From my point of view the win always comes first and in achieving that goal there’s a sense of selfishness. Just about everyone on the team wants to earn that win before they care about anything else. If the action of leaving powerful vehicles/weapons for teammates helps you to achieve your goal of winning the match then that action can be twisted into a selfish act. I think the concerns of Firefight becoming rampant with competitive individuals who would put their own statistical positioning and scoring over the goal of winning the match is extremely embellished. In my opinion, there’s nothing wrong with the competitive aspect of outscoring your teammates because under the majority of instances that mindset won’t come at the expense or risk of the team reaching its goal of winning the match; in fact, I think that mindset would even lend a hand toward some of that vehicle sharing that you speak of because a player who’s earned enough REQ points to upgrade to a more powerful vehicle is going to be even more likely and willing to leave their current vehicle behind – and if someone else grabs it… oh well. The a-hole role would be to destroy it afterwards, but again that action needs to be considered under the circumstance of winning the match and I doubt many people would be so focused on their scoring position that they’d care about preventing the use of their previous vehicle.
> Not to mention, what would stat tracking in firefight actually track? It wouldn’t exactly track skill. Scoring high in firefight is all about having a big enough req collection, and knowing the best reqs to call in for each round (which is knowledge gained by simply playing it a lot). It’s certainly not going to track your skill with weapons. If they implemented firefight stat tracking and you saw someone with a lot of high scores and first places, you couldn’t conclude much from that besides “this person has a lot of reqs and probably knows about the trick where you can put a bullet into each enemy after the round ends to get credit for killing them when they drop dead”. And if you want an idea of how big someone’s req collection is, you can use their SR for that.
I already mentioned what I’d like to see. Wins are already recorded, but it’d be nice to see win percentage in relation to Heroic, Legendary, and Mythic. It’d be nice to see average historic finishing positions, average AI kill count as well as Boss kills (Regular, Legendary, and Mythic), plus average scoring per Heroic, Legendary, and Mythic. While it may not indicate your skill with weapons it would be an indication of your knowledge, experience, and success within the mode itself. Plus, it would also potentially indicate something about your playstyle. Now, I suppose it may act as a reference of a player’s REQ arsenal, but I don’t think it would to the degree you seem to be implying.
Having a massive REQ collection is not the only way you do well in firefight. Having the large REQ collection, knowing the enemy spawns, knowing how and when to use each weapon/vehicle, having the ability to use said weapons and vehicles without getting killed and number of kills/average rank is how you can rank each persons rank in any playlist. I myself win over 90% of the firefight games i play (1st place). This is because of all of the items mentioned above.
I am not by any means a beast in any means in arena (1.2 KD). Firefight is a much different beast and them making a “rank” would be kind of fun and for those who care how well they do in firefight, give them a little extra incentive for continuing the push.
As far as the ranking of firefight ruining the game. I leave vehicles (mainly ghosts and scout hogs) all of the time because it is time for me to pull out the higher level item that is need for the next round. This allows someone not doing as well to upgrade themselves if they choose to. This in turn helps the entire team do better and get us closer to winning the round/game. As long as they make finishing round 5 weigh heavier on the ranking than getting 1st place and losing at round 3, i believe it would be a good addition
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> Having a massive REQ collection is not the only way you do well in firefight. Having the large REQ collection, knowing the enemy spawns, knowing how and when to use each weapon/vehicle, having the ability to use said weapons and vehicles without getting killed
Yes, that’s true. A perfect example is on Stormbreak during the round 5 Hunter bosses. The majority of the time when round 5 comes up it will be the Hunter bosses so I’ll equip a Wraith (since it’s best for those Hunters) and go to where 5 Elites spawn in first and wait for the Phantoms to bring them in. Once they drop, it’s an easy 5 kill splatter and then I’ll move to the Hunter bosses. The majority of people in my games on that round never even realize that or don’t do it so it’s easy points for me.
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> > 2533274811192667;17:
> > Having a massive REQ collection is not the only way you do well in firefight. Having the large REQ collection, knowing the enemy spawns, knowing how and when to use each weapon/vehicle, having the ability to use said weapons and vehicles without getting killed
>
> Yes, that’s true. A perfect example is on Stormbreak during the round 5 Hunter bosses. The majority of the time when round 5 comes up it will be the Hunter bosses so I’ll equip a Wraith (since it’s best for those Hunters) and go to where 5 Elites spawn in first and wait for the Phantoms to bring them in. Once they drop, it’s an easy 5 kill splatter and then I’ll move to the Hunter bosses. The majority of people in my games on that round never even realize that or don’t do it so it’s easy points for me.
The Ultra Wraith is the best of hunters on all round as well. When they hide behind the walls or get inside the core room, you can “bounce” your shots either off the walls or ground to still hit them.
Yeah, I usually pick between the Ultra or Temple depending on which one I have more of at the time.