Hologram was an underpowered Armour Ability in Reach, in fact the least powerful in my opinion. As it is going to be in Halo 4, it could do with some improvements.
In Reach, I might have been fooled by Hologram once or twice a game if someone decided to use it. Its uses were few and far between, and my preferred use was to check if the way was clear. If someone is hiding around the corner, send out a hologram. The classic example is yellow lift on Swordbase. Send a Hologram in, see if it survives or if is sliced up by an Energy Sword. However, it sounds as if Forerunner vision will fill this niche, so Hologram has to find a new use.
Hologram is intended to work as a Decoy. You shoot the Hologram, I shoot you. Of course, there are various giveaways that you are facing a Hologram to the point where it is useless. Here are some of my problems with it and some proposed buffs/fixes.
It walks in a straight line
How often do you walk in a dead straight line, staring straight ahead, doing no other action? The fix for this is to make it move in a more realistic way. Obviously, the best solution would be to give a Hologram its own AI, sort of like a pacifist bot. However, this seems an unreasonable amount of work for 343 for one Armour Ability. So, I would use a scripted but seemingly random walk for the Hologram. Like assassinations in Reach, Holograms could have a selection of random animations for getting from A to B. Of course they are limited in number, but if 343 were to make the animations players moving along a straight line, but deviating from it slightly, looking around, a weapon reload as well as the various other actions that players do, it could fool more people. It would operate the same as in Reach, but would get to where you placed its endpoint in a more realistic way. Also, it is inevitable that if you aim a Hologram at a wall, it will stare at said wall. I would personally make it crouch once it reaches the wall and look around until it expires. Again, it’s more realistic.
It uses no Armour Ability
While not everyone uses an AA constantly, everyone has sprint in Halo 4. As such, I would prefer it if holograms could be made to sprint. Simply press the Sprint and Armour Ability buttons simultaneously, and your Hologram would sprint off. Again, if someone is more likely to sprint in a given situation, a sprinting hologram is more realistic and so more likely to fool someone.
It’s the same guy every time
In Reach, I have a Red Flaming Helmet. It’s awesome. But it’s awesome because it is distinctive. If I use that Armour Effect along with Hologram, players tend to remember that a Red Flaming Helmet is probably a Hologram. For Halo 4, I would make the Hologram randomly take on the appearance of any team member of the user. That way, it keeps the element of surprise.
It appears grey on the motion tracker
I would prefer it if it was Red. It would make it more likely to fool campers.
Those are my ideas for the moment. I thought about the ability to put multiple markers down for it to go to in order, but I figured things were getting a little complicated. Please add any of your own ideas, and thanks for reading.
TL,DR: Hologram was underpowered in Reach. It needs to behave more like an actual player in Halo 4.