Crazy theory time, well not totally crazy, but maybe a little.
So we’ve had Frankie state that these new spartan abilities as shown in the multiplayer trailer are base abilities that everyone can do such as hijacking, I however have doubts over this comparison otherwise we could have everyone ground-pounding and sliding everywhere and lets be honest, there are doubts over whether that could work.
Instead, I propose that these new abilities could very much function like ordnance did in Halo 4- DON’T STOP READING, I know what your thinking, just here me out.
Each player has a “ability meter”.
As players earn (or possibly lose) points, the meter goes up or down.
Once the meter is full, the player then get’s to pull off one special ability, this can be done by hitting a button or a button combo.
The meter restarts, and you go on your merry way after performing a double kill (or like me, go on your merry way without and kills and get your face ripped off as you turn a corner).
While similar to Ordnance, it has multiple advantages:
Not random- this speaks for itself.
Fair- everyone is able to perform the same abilities.
So what does everyone else think? It’s a sort of new feature that is new to Halo and hopefully doesn’t break the formula and can appeal to new players while hopefully remaining competitive.
It can be improved upon of course, maybe have a visual indicator to know when a players ability or thruster pack meter is full.
This is all theory of course, but until we actually see something all we can do is guess.
Well… maybe.
I don’t want to earn double kills, killjoys, and the whole lot of it just so I can slide under an overhang for two seconds and look cool.
But I can expand upon it, and combine an idea I had with your’s.
Stamina. Energy. Whatever you want to call it, but on our HUDs, we should have a stamina bar. Every time we sprint, slide, ground pound, yadda yadda, it goes down, and needs to regenerate. Certain abilities such as the ground pound would take much more stamina than just a slide.
Now I know you’re thinking, 'Well, where does my idea come into play?"
Earning certain medals, like multikills, killing sprees, assassinations, would bring the stamina bar up more quickly (it regens slooooow).
I could see this system working for some of the more offensive abilities, e.g. the ground pound and shoulder barge, but for sliding and the like? Seems rather convoluted and wasteful.
> Topic title should be renamed “How ‘Spartan Abilities’ Could Break the Game Just As Much As AAs and PODs Did.”
Possibly, depends on how 343 would implement them if my theory is true.
> They’re just new actions, dude. Like jumping, sprinting, and boarding. That’s all.
Still not so sure on this, the soldier tackle and the ground pound look a little too powerful to me to just be abilities that everyone can do straight away.
> > Topic title should be renamed “How ‘Spartan Abilities’ Could Break the Game Just As Much As AAs and PODs Did.”
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> Possibly, depends on how 343 would implement them if my theory is true.
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> > They’re just new actions, dude. Like jumping, sprinting, and boarding. That’s all.
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> <mark>Still not so sure on this, the soldier tackle and the ground pound look a little too powerful to me to just be abilities that everyone can do straight away.</mark>
The issue is that you’re assuming this is what they mean by Spartan Abilities
The Spartan tackle looks exactly like an Assassination that we have seen in previous titles and the “ground pound” is precisely what would happen if a Spartan landed on the ground from a decent height.
What we saw was a CGI trailer, not a gameplay trailer.
In Halo 3’s CGI, Chief was Sprinting - he never could in Halo 3’s gameplay
In Halo 4’s CGI, Chief used the built in Thruster pack on his armour - he never could do this in Halo 4’s gameplay.
> The issue is that you’re assuming this is what they mean by Spartan Abilities
A assumption yes, but a reasonable assumption, I don’t consider it to be a coincidence that they say “new spartan abilities” right before a spartan performs a ground pound, I also don’t think it’s a coincidence that both the shoulder tackle, slide, and ground pound all involve some use of the thruster pack.
> What we saw was a CGI trailer, not a gameplay trailer.
>
> In Halo 3’s CGI, Chief was Sprinting - he never could in Halo 3’s gameplay
> In Halo 4’s CGI, Chief used the built in Thruster pack on his armour - he never could do this in Halo 4’s gameplay.
Just because it is CGI does not mean it does not represent a gameplay element of some type, for example in the Halo 3 CGI trailer Chief used a Bubble Shield- in Halo 3, there was a Bubble Shield.
CGI trailers are not put together randomly, they are supposed to represent what gameplay could be like or tell us what the game is about.
Frank specifically compared these new abilities to hi-jacking vehicles. I think it’s likely that, as you have to be next to a vehicle to board it, location will have a key part in the mechanics of these abilities. I.E. you have to be at a certain height (Probably significantly higher than jump height) to ground pound.
I was actually thinking today about what the Spartan Abilities could be. I had an idea that they could be used in a similar fashion to how the equipment was used in Halo 3, they appeared on the map, you could carry one at a time, it’s a one time use. Obviously we’ve seen that ground pound one, perhaps it can be stronger the higher up you use it? Maybe negate fall damage? Send out an EMP? Push players/objects away? Who knows.
Another one i thought of, while highly unlikely, could be something of a Mobile Bubble. You activate it and it forms a type of bubble shield around you, moving with you. Could players enter this as they could before? Does it stop vehicles? Maybe…
What about something like Insta-Sprint, Tele-Sprint, or some sprint variant? Where you can be teleported a short distance, maybe guided by an outline or shape. Or you are just able to sprint for a short time.
Some kind of new equipment esque object like there was in Halo 3 could be interesting, and if done properly could certainly level out the playing field. It would be arena style, but with some new features/twists. Take a step back but create something new at the same time. And while you could have some of the same powers as Armor Abilities, they wouldnt be available at the start of a match, and they would be limited use, or one time use.
> > Topic title should be renamed “How ‘Spartan Abilities’ Could Break the Game Just As Much As AAs and PODs Did.”
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> Possibly, depends on how 343 would implement them if my theory is true.
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> > They’re just new actions, dude. Like jumping, sprinting, and boarding. That’s all.
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> Still not so sure on this, the <mark>soldier tackle</mark> and the ground pound look a little too powerful to me to just be abilities that everyone can do straight away.
It’s not like we can already tackle an enemy spartan to the ground or anything.
Something everybody needs to keep in mind. Is that this was a completely cinematic trailer. No actual game footage was used. So it’s very possible that any/all of the “moves” seen in this trailer could be just that, cinematic. And no indication of actual gameplay. For example, I very strongly believe that the “sliding” into cover thing, was just cinematic. The “tackle” that was seen is just an assassination. The “ground pound” however does look like something that will be in game. But that’s just one dudes opinion.
