Gripes with Final Oddball Settings

Games Other Halo
1

Well, I had a huge wall written out that I am not even about to rewrite, so we’ll just simplify it down. 3 options in the Oddball settings being used for Matchmaking are detrimental to how the gametype will play out in Halo 5. This is how it works now:

Carrier Waypoint: Always On
-Pros (+): Can always tell where the carrier is :slight_smile:
-Cons (-): Can always tell where you are as the carrier :frowning:
No element of surprise
Grenade spam

Ball Throwing: Disabled
-Pros (+): Classic-styled gameplay?
Ball cant be easily heaved off the map forcing it to reset when the enemy charges in on you.
-Cons (-): Takes out any strategical value to the objective beyond “staying alive”
Getting out of a grenade spam is harder since the ball isn’t moving nearly as much.
No sprint means enemy can catch you much faster (more below)

Thrust Activation Cost: 100% (1 thrust per charge)
-Pros (+): You get to, uh, thrust. Like normal.
-Cons (-): You only get 1 thrust.

This seems like fun, yes? However, there’s 1 huge, gaping flaw. Every objective gametype in Halo 5 has never had an “Always On” indicator for a carrier, besides Grifball. I’m talking about CTF and Assault in the standard 4v4 environment here. Now, what does this turn into? Right now, the carrier is always marked, like in Halo 4. This happened because of the introduction of Sprint as a neutral ability for all players. Now, with that in mind, dying and respawning can become quite hectic on 4v4 maps, because sprint is introduced. In normal Slayer games, its slowed down because of the unknown; exactly where players are at a given moment. Right now that is gone, since the carrier is exposed 100% of the time. This, also introduces another problem…Grenade spamming. Just like King of the Hill, you’re pretty much a walking hill with an Always-On indicator flailing above your head. This worked in Halo 4, you know why? Because you could throw the ball. Imminent death was almost always guaranteed and was countered. It worked great. So, why not have it here? Yeah, throwing the ball off the map was semi-exploitable, but with random balls spawns, you couldn’t reliably use that to your advantage.

What I want to suggest is a couple minor changes that would not only balance out the gametype, but make it more accessible and fun for not just competitive players, but social ones as well:

PROPOSED CHANGES

Carrier Waypoint: When Spotted (5 Seconds)
-Pros (+): Can breathe a little as the ball carrier
Adds strategical depth on whether or not to allow someone to know when and where the carrier is (killing someone with the ball or not)
Attacking team isn’t always left completely in the dark if they manage to damage the enemy carrier
-Cons (-): None. I really cant think of a negative statement for this. Pretty beneficial equally for both defending and attacking teams.

Ball Throwing: Enabled
-Pros (+): Allows for strategical setups involving passing the ball between teammates.
Allows for quickly getting the ball out of a kill-zone, such as grenade-spammed corners and hallways.
-Cons (-): Could possibly be exploited by throwing balls off the map. COULD be alleviated by giving a player or team-point punishment for repeated offenses (like Ricochet did in Halo 4)
Could be frustrating to worse players to play “follow the ball” or “keep away” the entire match.

Thrust Activation Cost: 50% (2 thrusts per charge)
-Pros (+): You get 2 thrusts, just like in Assault, where you also get a “When Spotted” waypoint.
Helps to avoid grenade-spamming.
-Cons (-): May help too much in helping avoid grenade spam.

So, in the end, I wouldn’t suggest changing ALL of the above, but rather EITHER changing the Ball Throwing to Enabled, or giving the Carrier a waypoint ONLY When Spotted and for 5 seconds. This eliminates grenade-spam problems to an extent, and gives some sort of strategical value to being a carrier instead of just “trying to survive.” Does anyone else agree with me on this?

2

One problem I see about not having the indicator always on (like in previous iterations of Oddball) is the potential for camping and hiding. Managing to get to a hidey hole or somewhere not easily accessible, like people do sometimes in Infection, would make it easy for you to make great headway on point accumulation, even if you don’t manage to hide the whole time. With the indicator on, it’s about being squirrely and trying to juke around enemies at all times. With the indicator off except for a temporary amount of time when spotted, it’ll be about trying to break line of sight so you can find a hiding spot, set up a defensive front, and hold out until you win; if you get spotted, rinse and repeat.

3

> 2533274817408735;2:
> One problem I see about not having the indicator always on (like in previous iterations of Oddball) is the potential for camping and hiding. Managing to get to a hidey hole or somewhere not easily accessible, like people do sometimes in Infection, would make it easy for you to make great headway on point accumulation, even if you don’t manage to hide the whole time. With the indicator on, it’s about being squirrely and trying to juke around enemies at all times. With the indicator off except for a temporary amount of time when spotted, it’ll be about trying to break line of sight so you can find a hiding spot, set up a defensive front, and hold out until you win; if you get spotted, rinse and repeat.

But that’s the thing. 343 has managed to pretty much obliterate any potential for actually hiding on most maps. That’s why I said having a Spotted indicator would be beneficial rather than trying to juke out the enemy like you said, because you know, you only get 1 thrust AND they know where you are but you don’t know where they are. That’s why I said if they feel they must leave the waypoint on for the carrier to at least allow passing the ball like in H4. This is like a -Yoink- child variant because they aren’t incorporating all the settings that need meshed together to flow well. Throwing on with indicator always on is the only way this doesn’t turn into a complete nadespam-fest.

4

There needs to be a carrier indicator at all times… for an objective that is so dependent on position/hiding to accrue points…

Like what if the guy is hiding out on Sneaky Beam on The Rig and there’s a bunch of noobs in the game that have no idea that you can even hide out there? 'Dude wins the game uncontested… even if you have two solid teams, there’s no time to waste trying to locate the ball the further you fall behind. It’s just not balanced.

It’s a central objective… in CTF, you at least know your flag is away and you know where they have to run it to score, and you can hound around and spot the carrier. Oddball, being central, and dependent on possession to score, both teams need to know it’s location at all times. You sacrifice a 4th man for time, that’s why a good set-up is so key to defend the carrier… use the fact that they KNOW where the carrier is, to block off and cover all incoming lanes to their position. They’re forced to play more aggressively than you are, which can really work in your (or the defending team’s) benefit.

That’s how high level teams think… use your knowledge of the game to gain an upper hand.

5

Is the game mode live or where did you get this info from?

6

> 2535405256565919;5:
> Is the game mode live or where did you get this info from?

The officially used gametype was linked in last week’s Weekly Update. I downloaded it and looked at the settings.

7

> 2533274873580796;4:
> There needs to be a carrier indicator at all times… for an objective that is so dependent on position/hiding to accrue points…
>
> Like what if the guy is hiding out on Sneaky Beam on The Rig and there’s a bunch of noobs in the game that have no idea that you can even hide out there? 'Dude wins the game uncontested… even if you have two solid teams, there’s no time to waste trying to locate the ball the further you fall behind. It’s just not balanced.
>
> It’s a central objective… in CTF, you at least know your flag is away and you know where they have to run it to score, and you can hound around and spot the carrier. Oddball, being central, and dependent on possession to score, both teams need to know it’s location at all times. You sacrifice a 4th man for time, that’s why a good set-up is so key to defend the carrier… use the fact that they KNOW where the carrier is, to block off and cover all incoming lanes to their position. They’re forced to play more aggressively than you are, which can really work in your (or the defending team’s) benefit.
>
> That’s how high level teams think… use your knowledge of the game to gain an upper hand.

Well in H4 there was an option for Waypoint behavior that went unused, called Blip, and had a timer on it. I feel that’d be an even better option here in this case then. Blip basically just makes the waypoint show up for a second every so-many seconds like a radar blip (hence the name). It went unused though and is absent in H5.

I’m just against an Always On because 2 evenly matched teams means the defending team is automatically disadvantaged having to fight 4 players with only 3 active shooters. Again, unlike classic Halo, there’s no surprise element either, and little hidden areas like you stated on the Rig, are more or less accepted as part of the map or 343 would’ve patched it out like all the others. Yeah, there’s a few other inconvenient spots that I KNOW need patched anyways that could be abused, but that’s besides the point because even with a waypoint or not, if someone isn’t skilled enough to even get to certain spots, said waypoint won’t even matter.

Just watch what I said, people are going to complain about heavy grenade spam in this playlist and its because it falls directly on no ball throwing and an always on waypoint.

8

> 2533274795739611;7:
> > 2533274873580796;4:
> > There needs to be a carrier indicator at all times… for an objective that is so dependent on position/hiding to accrue points…
> >
> > Like what if the guy is hiding out on Sneaky Beam on The Rig and there’s a bunch of noobs in the game that have no idea that you can even hide out there? 'Dude wins the game uncontested… even if you have two solid teams, there’s no time to waste trying to locate the ball the further you fall behind. It’s just not balanced.
> >
> > It’s a central objective… in CTF, you at least know your flag is away and you know where they have to run it to score, and you can hound around and spot the carrier. Oddball, being central, and dependent on possession to score, both teams need to know it’s location at all times. You sacrifice a 4th man for time, that’s why a good set-up is so key to defend the carrier… use the fact that they KNOW where the carrier is, to block off and cover all incoming lanes to their position. They’re forced to play more aggressively than you are, which can really work in your (or the defending team’s) benefit.
> >
> > That’s how high level teams think… use your knowledge of the game to gain an upper hand.
>
> Well in H4 there was an option for Waypoint behavior that went unused, called Blip, and had a timer on it. I feel that’d be an even better option here in this case then. Blip basically just makes the waypoint show up for a second every so-many seconds like a radar blip (hence the name). It went unused though and is absent in H5.
>
> I’m just against an Always On because 2 evenly matched teams means the defending team is automatically disadvantaged having to fight 4 players with only 3 active shooters. Again, unlike classic Halo, there’s no surprise element either, and little hidden areas like you stated on the Rig, are more or less accepted as part of the map or 343 would’ve patched it out like all the others. Yeah, there’s a few other inconvenient spots that I KNOW need patched anyways that could be abused, but that’s besides the point because even with a waypoint or not, if someone isn’t skilled enough to even get to certain spots, said waypoint won’t even matter.
>
> Just watch what I said, people are going to complain about heavy grenade spam in this playlist and its because it falls directly on no ball throwing and an always on waypoint.

How was there an element of surprise in classic Oddball compared to Halo 5’s variant? Both Halo 3 and Halo 4 featured “always on” markers for the ball carrier. The only difference in Halo 5 is that you have unlimited sprint and a useful area-denial grenade, but there are better ways to reduce grenade spam than making the marker temporary based on spotting.

The blip feature you mentioned might be an ok comprimise, so long as the interval between marker reveals wasn’t too long.

9

> 2533274795739611;7:
> > 2533274873580796;4:
> > There needs to be a carrier indicator at all times… for an objective that is so dependent on position/hiding to accrue points…
> >
> > Like what if the guy is hiding out on Sneaky Beam on The Rig and there’s a bunch of noobs in the game that have no idea that you can even hide out there? 'Dude wins the game uncontested… even if you have two solid teams, there’s no time to waste trying to locate the ball the further you fall behind. It’s just not balanced.
> >
> > It’s a central objective… in CTF, you at least know your flag is away and you know where they have to run it to score, and you can hound around and spot the carrier. Oddball, being central, and dependent on possession to score, both teams need to know it’s location at all times. You sacrifice a 4th man for time, that’s why a good set-up is so key to defend the carrier… use the fact that they KNOW where the carrier is, to block off and cover all incoming lanes to their position. They’re forced to play more aggressively than you are, which can really work in your (or the defending team’s) benefit.
> >
> > That’s how high level teams think… use your knowledge of the game to gain an upper hand.
>
> Well in H4 there was an option for Waypoint behavior that went unused, called Blip, and had a timer on it. I feel that’d be an even better option here in this case then. Blip basically just makes the waypoint show up for a second every so-many seconds like a radar blip (hence the name). It went unused though and is absent in H5.
>
> I’m just against an Always On because 2 evenly matched teams means the defending team is automatically disadvantaged having to fight 4 players with only 3 active shooters. Again, unlike classic Halo, there’s no surprise element either, and little hidden areas like you stated on the Rig, are more or less accepted as part of the map or 343 would’ve patched it out like all the others. Yeah, there’s a few other inconvenient spots that I KNOW need patched anyways that could be abused, but that’s besides the point because even with a waypoint or not, if someone isn’t skilled enough to even get to certain spots, said waypoint won’t even matter.
>
> Just watch what I said, people are going to complain about heavy grenade spam in this playlist and its because it falls directly on no ball throwing and an always on waypoint.

Yeah these hidden areas are part of the map, that’s not the point… the point is, there’s a high potential for runaway games without the Waypoint. Depending on a player/team’s knowledge of the game, there are little nooks and spots on these maps that can easily go unaccounted for by an “attacking” team. Halo has a wide skill/knowledge spectrum…

So teams will “complain about nade spam…” well… they should communicate and protect the ball carrier, and the ball carrier’s job is to protect themself. It’s the nature of the game man. Ball throwing (or lack thereof) was never an issue in the OG trilogy. That’s where the importance of a good set-up and team dynamic comes in. Establishing map/objective control… That’s why people “played” the ball off the map where possible. Reset the ball, reset your team to 4 players and make another push for the “balanced” central objective.

The game is far more exploitable without a Waypoint, and with the ability to pass. The inclusion/absence of these features respectively helps keep the game balanced and in-check.

10

> 2533274873580796;9:
> > 2533274795739611;7:
> > > 2533274873580796;4:
> > > There needs to be a carrier indicator at all times… for an objective that is so dependent on position/hiding to accrue points…
> > >
> > > Like what if the guy is hiding out on Sneaky Beam on The Rig and there’s a bunch of noobs in the game that have no idea that you can even hide out there? 'Dude wins the game uncontested… even if you have two solid teams, there’s no time to waste trying to locate the ball the further you fall behind. It’s just not balanced.
> > >
> > > It’s a central objective… in CTF, you at least know your flag is away and you know where they have to run it to score, and you can hound around and spot the carrier. Oddball, being central, and dependent on possession to score, both teams need to know it’s location at all times. You sacrifice a 4th man for time, that’s why a good set-up is so key to defend the carrier… use the fact that they KNOW where the carrier is, to block off and cover all incoming lanes to their position. They’re forced to play more aggressively than you are, which can really work in your (or the defending team’s) benefit.
> > >
> > > That’s how high level teams think… use your knowledge of the game to gain an upper hand.
> >
> > Well in H4 there was an option for Waypoint behavior that went unused, called Blip, and had a timer on it. I feel that’d be an even better option here in this case then. Blip basically just makes the waypoint show up for a second every so-many seconds like a radar blip (hence the name). It went unused though and is absent in H5.
> >
> > I’m just against an Always On because 2 evenly matched teams means the defending team is automatically disadvantaged having to fight 4 players with only 3 active shooters. Again, unlike classic Halo, there’s no surprise element either, and little hidden areas like you stated on the Rig, are more or less accepted as part of the map or 343 would’ve patched it out like all the others. Yeah, there’s a few other inconvenient spots that I KNOW need patched anyways that could be abused, but that’s besides the point because even with a waypoint or not, if someone isn’t skilled enough to even get to certain spots, said waypoint won’t even matter.
> >
> > Just watch what I said, people are going to complain about heavy grenade spam in this playlist and its because it falls directly on no ball throwing and an always on waypoint.
>
> Yeah these hidden areas are part of the map, that’s not the point… the point is, there’s a high potential for runaway games without the Waypoint. Depending on a player/team’s knowledge of the game, there are little nooks and spots on these maps that can easily go unaccounted for by an “attacking” team. Halo has a wide skill/knowledge spectrum…
>
> So teams will “complain about nade spam…” well… they should communicate and protect the ball carrier, and the ball carrier’s job is to protect themself. It’s the nature of the game man. Ball throwing (or lack thereof) was never an issue in the OG trilogy. That’s where the importance of a good set-up and team dynamic comes in. Establishing map/objective control… That’s why people “played” the ball off the map where possible. Reset the ball, reset your team to 4 players and make another push for the “balanced” central objective.
>
> The game is far more exploitable without a Waypoint, and with the ability to pass.

The ability to throw isn’t an exploit. It was introduced because of Sprint becoming a staple to all players, thus immensely speeding up gameplay. An Always On waypoint in H3 and H4 didn’t hurt because H4 you could pass and H3 didn’t have Sprint and was extremely slow-paced. Ball carriers had time to breathe so it is a non issue with those games.

11

> 2533274817408735;8:
> > 2533274795739611;7:
> > > 2533274873580796;4:
> > > There needs to be a carrier indicator at all times… for an objective that is so dependent on position/hiding to accrue points…
> > >
> > > Like what if the guy is hiding out on Sneaky Beam on The Rig and there’s a bunch of noobs in the game that have no idea that you can even hide out there? 'Dude wins the game uncontested… even if you have two solid teams, there’s no time to waste trying to locate the ball the further you fall behind. It’s just not balanced.
> > >
> > > It’s a central objective… in CTF, you at least know your flag is away and you know where they have to run it to score, and you can hound around and spot the carrier. Oddball, being central, and dependent on possession to score, both teams need to know it’s location at all times. You sacrifice a 4th man for time, that’s why a good set-up is so key to defend the carrier… use the fact that they KNOW where the carrier is, to block off and cover all incoming lanes to their position. They’re forced to play more aggressively than you are, which can really work in your (or the defending team’s) benefit.
> > >
> > > That’s how high level teams think… use your knowledge of the game to gain an upper hand.
> >
> > Well in H4 there was an option for Waypoint behavior that went unused, called Blip, and had a timer on it. I feel that’d be an even better option here in this case then. Blip basically just makes the waypoint show up for a second every so-many seconds like a radar blip (hence the name). It went unused though and is absent in H5.
> >
> > I’m just against an Always On because 2 evenly matched teams means the defending team is automatically disadvantaged having to fight 4 players with only 3 active shooters. Again, unlike classic Halo, there’s no surprise element either, and little hidden areas like you stated on the Rig, are more or less accepted as part of the map or 343 would’ve patched it out like all the others. Yeah, there’s a few other inconvenient spots that I KNOW need patched anyways that could be abused, but that’s besides the point because even with a waypoint or not, if someone isn’t skilled enough to even get to certain spots, said waypoint won’t even matter.
> >
> > Just watch what I said, people are going to complain about heavy grenade spam in this playlist and its because it falls directly on no ball throwing and an always on waypoint.
>
> How was there an element of surprise in classic Oddball compared to Halo 5’s variant? Both Halo 3 and Halo 4 featured “always on” markers for the ball carrier. The only difference in Halo 5 is that you have unlimited sprint and a useful area-denial grenade, but there are better ways to reduce grenade spam than making the marker temporary based on spotting.
>
> The blip feature you mentioned might be an ok comprimise, so long as the interval between marker reveals wasn’t too long.

Like I just stated a minute ago in my previous commenf:

> 2533274873580796;9:
> and with the ability to pass.

The ability to throw isn’t an exploit. It was introduced because of Sprint becoming a staple to all players, thus immensely speeding up gameplay. An Always On waypoint in H3 and H4 didn’t hurt because H4 you could pass and H3 didn’t have Sprint and was extremely slow-paced. Ball carriers had time to breathe so it is a non issue with those games.

Having even a 2-3 second blip timer helps tremendously because that alone prevents the premeditated grenade spams. My OP even said if the compromise of needing the Waypoint Always On due to the hide-n-seek issue, that throwing be on just to have that strategical value at hand to help counter spams in the first place exactly how Halo 4 did. I’m just weirded as to why it’s not set up like that anyways when it wasn’t a problem last game is all.

12

besides your points OP, there is one little detail that is important to me anyway and some, and that is the fact that this does not truly feel like the halo 3 Oddball experience that was established back then and I am refering to the fact that we dont have the “Oddball Skull”.Instead we have the Assault ball,like really? We that for Assault itself since we have it in Skirmish,keep Oddball unique like the Oddball we all know and love.Some may call this nitpicking,but its just not the same thing,I may play it a few times but 343 could have just used the Halo 3 Oddball and they have the resources,im just curious as to WHY they did not simply use the Skull.

13

> 2533274871425050;12:
> besides your points OP, there is one little detail that is important to me anyway and some, and that is the fact that this does not truly feel like the halo 3 Oddball experience that was established back then and I am refering to the fact that we dont have the “Oddball Skull”.Instead we have the Assault ball,like really? We that for Assault itself since we have it in Skirmish,keep Oddball unique like the Oddball we all know and love.Some may call this nitpicking,but its just not the same thing,I may play it a few times but 343 could have just used the Halo 3 Oddball and they have the resources,im just curious as to WHY they did not simply use the Skull.

I know, and what’s funny is the Halo 4 Oddball is in Halo 5’s code and seems mostly functional. It was found almost a ago, but for the sake of not getting in trouble, I cant discuss that matter any further.

In short, the ball is used because when Hammer Storm released adding the Gravity Hammer to the game, it included Grifball. The base gametype that uses the ball can make Assault, Grifball, Oddball, and Ricochet since 343 put every option in that supports these gametypes. It’s easier to have 1 gametype that controls all 4 of those than completely seperate ones so they all use the same ball because they’re all part of the same base gametype.