One of the main problems the series has had since Halo CE is that shields and health did not have equal hitpoints in every game since.
In CE health and shields both had 75 hitpoints
Compare this to say Halo 3 where it was 45 health and 70 shields. See the problem? No? Lets put it this way:
In Halo 3 a melee does 70 pts of damage so it takes takes two hits to kill a spartan with full health in multiplayer. However any damage you take to your shields leaves you extremely vunerable because unlike non-power weapons melee attacks and grenades do not have damage modifiers for shields and health so they do blanket damage.
This imbalance of health and shields combined with a strong melee created the spray rush gameplay in Halo 3(And Reach assuming they don’t nerf melee when bleed though is present) that I can safely assume the majority of community hated. It turns close range non-headshot weapons into clubs rather than firearms and lowered the close range skill gap. Removing bleed through stopped that problem but created a whole new set of problems.
Combining equal health and shields with a melee nerf(that’s another thread though) would bring back fair, balanced, and more skillful close range encounters.
This same imbalance is what made Reach frags seemingly overpowered and made the frags in Halo 2/3 be so pitiful out of necessity. Any damage you take to your shields in Halo 2-Reach has a much greater impact on your survivability that damage to your health. Because of this any damage you take to your shields leaves you very vulnerable to grenades. If Reach had an equal health/shield system, than the only way one grenade could kill you was if you had 1/3 of your shield left in the maximum damage radius of the grenades.
Unlike how it currently is where you can’t survive one grenade with slightly less thatn 2/3 of your shields remaining. It doesn’t sound like much but makes a huge difference in gameplay.
Equal hitpoints also helps to balance plasma weapons since they do not have to be artificially nerfed against health since it would have be unfair to give them a damage modifier against shields and give them normal damage when shields are make up the majority of player hitpoints.
Then Plasma weapons could get a damage bonus against shields and projectiles against health and leave damage untouched otherwise.
TL;DR
*Halo 4 Health and Shields must have equal hitpoints to properly balance the weapon sandbox, grenades, and melee.
*75+75(CE) >>>>>>>>> 45+70(roughly Everything else)
P.S. it should take 3 melees to kill a spartan other than the back. First hit takes 2/3 of shields, second takes 1/3 of shields and 1/3 of health, third hit take 2/3 of health. Simple. 2hk bladed weapons would be acceptable.