As a man who has utterly detested the default Infection settings in nearly every Halo game to date, I’m both excited and disappointed with the Hivemind gametype.
Excited because of the change up to the currently frustrating existing formula of one hit wonders (switch from Shotgun to AR and from OSK zombies to 2SK zombies) and disappointed because of the removal of AAs and the fact that radar is currently still enabled.
Your thoughts?
THANK GOD for the removal of AA’s!
Don’t like the sound of 2sk but then again I will have to reserve judgment till I play it. Sounds promising though.
> THANK GOD for the removal of AA’s!
All AAs or is it mainly about TP?
> As a man who has utterly detested the default Infection settings in nearly every Halo game to date, I’m both excited and disappointed with the Hivemind gametype.
>
> Excited because of the change up to the currently frustrating existing formula of one hit wonders (switch from Shotgun to AR and from OSK zombies to 2SK zombies) and disappointed because of the removal of AAs and the fact that radar is currently still enabled.
>
> Your thoughts?
The Motion Sensor is still enabled, but for Humans it’s 25m (Last Man 40m) and for the Flood it’s 40m. With the Flood’s fast movement speed, the sensor only gives you a second to react before the Flood are on top of you 
> > THANK GOD for the removal of AA’s!
>
> All AAs or is it mainly about TP?
All the Loadout AA’s are Off in Hivemind. You will only be able to use an AA if you find it on the map. (The Autosentry AA on Drillsite, for example.)
I’d been waiting for a discussion to crop up, to be honest.
The community begs for for a classic Infection gametype, we get a new gametype called Hivemind =/.
Why is it so hard to get something from 343 that was popular before their take over of Halo? At this point, the amount of effort that 343 is exerting to not replicate anything Bungie did, is becoming ridiculous.
> The community begs for for a classic Infection gametype, we get a new gametype called Hivemind =/.
>
> Why is it so hard to get something from 343 that was popular before their take over of Halo? At this point, the amount of effort that 343 is exerting to not replicate anything Bungie did, is becoming ridiculous.
Give Hivemind a fair chance at least, you may actually enjoy it.
I’d discussed Classic Infection with quite a few community members, and they shared their opinion; Humans were Overpowered in Infection, Flood are OP in the Flood gametype, neither is particularly fun for the victim. We decided the best course of action was to create a new experience.
> > The community begs for for a classic Infection gametype, we get a new gametype called Hivemind =/.
> >
> > Why is it so hard to get something from 343 that was popular before their take over of Halo? At this point, the amount of effort that 343 is exerting to not replicate anything Bungie did, is becoming ridiculous.
>
> Give Hivemind a fair chance at least, you may actually enjoy it.
>
> I’d discussed Classic Infection with quite a few community members, and they shared their opinion; Humans were Overpowered in Infection, Flood are OP in the Flood gametype, neither is particularly fun for the victim. We decided the best course of action was to create a new experience.
I will defiantly be giving Hivemind a chance, Infection was one of my favorite gametypes (over 3000 games in Reach) and Flood was giant disappointment, so a fresh gametype is welcome. However, I and I assume many many others would really like to play a classic infection gametype in Halo 4 MM.
As a parting point I would just like to point out that imbalance was part of the charm and fun of playing Infection. Infection was never made to be balanced and if you never heard that when taking input, you were talking to the wrong people.
I still want Infection. Almost every zombie movie ever made involves a 1 shot to the head. It’s a game I really enjoyed in H3 and Reach, H4 not at all. It’s not supposed to be balanced, it’s supposed to be fun. I’m very dissappointed that this gametype has been added before a classic like Infection. I’ll give it a chance but I don’t predict it’ll play better than flood, just different.
> The Motion Sensor is still enabled, but for Humans it’s 25m (Last Man 40m) and for the Flood it’s 40m. With the Flood’s fast movement speed, the sensor only gives you a second to react before the Flood are on top of you
That’s heartening.
Default MT makes it extremely hard to sneak up and flank enemies.
> All the Loadout AA’s are Off in Hivemind. You will only be able to use an AA if you find it on the map. (The Autosentry AA on Drillsite, for example.)
I knew that AAs had been turned off. I was asking what his dislike with AAs was. I know a lot of people disliked TP but I was wondering if the rest were tolerable.
AAs as PWs is also something I’m enjoying hearing about. Anything else placed as a PW or objects to pull Humans out of defending positions?
> I’d been waiting for a discussion to crop up, to be honest.
Shoulda PM’d me sooner.
I’ve been an, until late, outspoken member against the current incarnation of Infection and it’s dedication to the icons of the gametype.
> AAs as PWs is also something I’m enjoying hearing about. Anything else placed as a PW or objects to pull Humans out of defending positions?
Initial and Random Ordinances exist in this gamemode, they are a key part of the gameplay. They vary from map to map.
> It’s not supposed to be balanced, it’s supposed to be fun.
Fun and balance aren’t mutually exclusive.
If anything, imbalance can undermine fun. I certainly did not find it fun to die, repeatedly, trying to earn one kill, only to die mid-lunge to a Shotgun and have the guy behind me in the meat train that was the rush into Sword Base Red Lift steal it.
But you’re also missing the big picture. Infection, in any given snap shot, isn’t balanced. But overall across the entire game, it should be balanced and this balance is achieved through that shift from one team holding the advantage to the other.
Infection shouldn’t be the Duck Hunt gamemode that “everyone” loves. If people loved shooting sitting ducks all day long there’s another gametype for that: Firefight.
I am not a huge fan of Flood. However, I will certainly be giving Hivemind a fair go!
> > It’s not supposed to be balanced, it’s supposed to be fun.
>
> Fun and balance aren’t mutually exclusive.
>
> If anything, imbalance can undermine fun. I certainly did not find it fun to die, repeatedly, trying to earn one kill, only to die mid-lunge to a Shotgun and have the guy behind me in the meat train that was the rush into Sword Base Red Lift steal it.
>
> But you’re also missing the big picture. Infection, in any given snap shot, isn’t balanced. But overall across the entire game, it should be balanced and this balance is achieved through that shift from one team holding the advantage to the other.
>
> Infection shouldn’t be the Duck Hunt gamemode that “everyone” loves. If people loved shooting sitting ducks all day long there’s another gametype for that: Firefight.
People like infection because it’s imbalanced and fun , that playlist was very popular in halo reach.
I love flood mode on disc. A huge breather from the constant sprint into headshots from reach /: (though you can check my stats i certainly was a good infection player in reach as both sides) I enjoy flood mode because it’s a challenge now. It cuts the good players from the bad.
But OT of hivemind. It’s interesting. I never liked the idea of taking more then one hit to infect. And i’m also not very fond of the AR. But i’ll give it ago. As long as we never get anything like creeping death or creeping rockets i’ll probably enjoy it.
The removal of TP is gonna be fantastic imo. <—Gist of my long post lol
I’ve always thought that this AA should never have been in Flood. Just no… They done -Yoinked!- it up.
How is it related to classic Flood we know from the Halo saga? How is it related to a ‘zombie’ or ‘infected’? The only connection it has with something familiar is evade from Reach.
Fair enough 343 tried something new with the game-type and I love the new Flood model (sucks that survivors can’t have individual personal colours). However it has taken them far too long to react to all this fan backlash over such a hugely popular playlist, I think Reach and H3 living dead playlists rivalled the core slayer playlists in player numbers?.
The main issue with TP is that it makes the game far too easy for the Flood players because of the huge and fast distance coverage combined with its ‘snap lunge’ strike where you can RT during the thrust. Online with lag issues, you often find players just TP right into you, you blast them and both players die… Great 
When Alpha Zombies was put into Reach’s matchmaking everybody flocked to that over Infection mainly because evade was removed. Therefore, hopefully Hivemind should increase Flood’s popularity with this change alone.
The additional changes such as 2SK, AR’s and ordnance spawns sounds really good too. But time will tell how these turn out; however they do sound great for getting players to move around the map.
Scouting for ammo, (grenades?), weapons (I hope Shotguns/Scattershots can be salvaged?) and AA’s really adds a tense and risk/reward dynamic that Flood could do with. Flood could hide and ambush players who come looking for these goodies.
Thank you Alzarahn and others for updating Flood, looking forward to playing Hivemind and starting to enjoy infection again 
What do you think about this Flood/Hivemind game-type point allocation idea?
I think points for killing Flood as a survivor should be zero.
Instead you get 10 points for killing survivors, but surviving as a human nets you something like 50 points? And having all survivors killed off within the time limit nets the two Alpha Flood 30 points? Something like this would serve to better motivate the individual roles of…
At the end of the three rounds, most accumulated points wins. Simples. Would change the balance of play for the players that care, while those that don’t so much can carry on as usual?
Not sure that is exactly where I’d go, but I would like something that encourages humans to hide, instead of rush to center of map, spam shotty until dead, rush to the center of the map, swish/swish/stab until dead, repeat. Currently, whoever has the fastest reflexes/luck wins. At its core, the battle as a HUMAN is supposed to be about survival - the ZOMBIES are the ones who are supposed to be mindlessly rushing in.
Since I refuse to use exploits, I am usually the “Next-to-last man standing” with just a few kills, which means I don’t get the bonus, but don’t get a lot of time as a zombie to make it up. Welcome to 2nd/3rd place…
Edit: after rereading your post, I could see that getting pretty much what I was aiming for. Might have to trim the time by 10-15% to give survival a chance, but sounds good. Maybe the last 15-20 seconds go “Last Stand” for the whole group of humans? Chaos!
> People like infection because it’s imbalanced and fun , that playlist was very popular in halo reach.
Did you play during the time of the Sword Base ledge?
That was incredibly imbalanced. There was no fun to be had in dying repeatedly or earning such easy kills.
Why don`t we all just play the gametype? It’s available now. The maps are available too.
It would give us a better idea of what we`ll be dealing with.
> Why don`t we all just play the gametype? It’s available now. The maps are available too.
It would give us a better idea of what we`ll be dealing with.
The update is this monday