While Halo Population has fluxed and lowered through Halo 4, I think I know a way raise the population for all Halo games including Halo 5. 343i needs to implement community playlists and even include them in regular rotation. Also having Forge map variant weekend playlists would be huge. I know the best time I have in H 3 was when Bungie offered a Forge map variant tournament style weekend with a chance to play the developers. Obviously I know this will require a lot of work but I feel this would go a long way towards raising Halo populations. Not saying Halo 5 needs it (played the Beta and loved it) BUT I feel it would enhance the experience. Questions, thoughts, suggestions? Im a loyal Halo fan so please, I want to hear community feedback. Sincerely,
Finalsite.
A naturally good idea, but firstly the main game needs to be good and fun first.
True and since 5 is not out yet, I cant make assumptions. This is for extending the life and population of the game and I do hope the vanilla game is great (I put 250$ on it lol)
I like the positive approach to the population problem! 
I’ve always thought that for Halo to compete with the “character persistence” model of Call of Duty, it needs to do more things to “wrap around” Halo’s classic competitive approach to make it more social. This could come in the form of automated tournaments, awesome clan support, a brilliant ranking/arena system, or totally new ideas that we’ve never seen, but the fact for most gamers is that Call of Duty is more satisfying to just jump into and play solo for hour or two. Halo needs to figure out game design methods to make competing online more fun.
Honestly, a custom games playlist is all i’d play if it exist. I feel like it should be separated into categories: Forge Slayer and Custom Games playlists. Ones just maps, the other is maps and or gametypes. Hopefully theyd just accept any good map and gametype submitted so I never play the same game twice.
Just make it competitive.
The campaign will only take it so far. In the end what keeps the game going is the pvp. If the pvp completely sucks this will be Halo 4 all over again.
Meh. After Reach, I’m done with repeating Forge maps in any type of map rotation (except Grifball.)
The fact that DLC maps will be free is already a great start on their part. If they keep adding in trinkets like REQ’s, then a healthy population should continue.
Thank you everyone for the positive responses to the thread!
Free DLC does help but I feel like Forge should only be an option if the maps are actually unique. I agree with a customs playlists but I feel there many need to be filters so that people get into custom games they want. Also, I feel there should be penalties for leaving games (a grey area I know but I think Halo needs it)