Fine Tuning Sprint for Halo 5
This is a rather precarious situation we Halo fans are in at the moment. The debate of sprint vs no-sprint settings has gone into overtime and it appears that sprint is locked in the game for Halo 5: Guardians. Many fans, Classic Purists, consider this to be a deal breaker and refuse to move from their extremist view that Sprint completely corrodes the foundation of Halo’s gameplay, rendering it absolutely broken. On the other end of the spectrum are the pro-sprint enthusiasts that insist that a AAA FPS title that does not feature sprint feels “dated” because of the seemingly sluggish movement mechanics. On one hand the purists want sprint completely removed, on the other hand the sprint enthusiasts want it to stay untouched. The best solution, stick to the middle ground.
Let’s face it, sprint is here to stay. Fighting for one extreme or the other in this debate is asinine at this point, and in seeking to balance sprint we all have to give and take a little. The purists will have to deal with sprint staying, but the enthusiasts will have to concede some minor nerfs to the mechanic. To understand the best way to nerf sprint, though, one must understand why the purists believe the mechanic to be broken, which will be listed below.
- Does not belong in a run & gun Arena Shooter (genre based argument)- Impedes gameplay by allowing players to escape bad decisions- Promotes campy game play as players can escape death easily and run to safety- Results in maps scaled up in size to accommodate faster movement- Promotes passive gameplay as the player’s gun is not at the ready- Creates chaos as players can move in unpredictable manner off spawn (get places too quickly)- Hurts objective gametypes where the objective runner is moving at a slower pace (CTF/Assault)- Empowers CQC weapons while stripping utility for mid-long range weapons- Lengthens average engagement times (players escaping), further slowing the gameAs you can see, there’s a pretty extensive list of negative factors associated with sprint being in an Arena Shooter such as Halo. Ideally, Halo would be a better game mechanically without it’s inclusion, but market focus groups in the industry believe that a AAA title can not gross the sales volume desired in today’s market without its inclusion, and thus it will be shoe horned into the game despite its detrimental externalities. With that said, it can be tweaked from its current form to lesson some of these grievances and help make the game better.
Now to list the arguments for sprint, as I do not want this to seem like a biased post against it.
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Sprinting feels good - I like being able to move faster- Sprint comes with risk vs reward - I exchange my ability to fight for my ability to move faster- Sprint allows for quick repositioning on maps - A player can quickly traverse the map to help out his team mate- Sprint helps players escape spawn traps - A player can quickly move out of a spawn trap and give his team mates new positions to spawn- Sprint is a required staple for AAA FPS titles - AAA Titles simply don’t sell well without sprint.
Please take note at this point that I am not decrying Halo 5 as a bad game by any means, and that I quite enjoy it currently, but I believe the future longevity is at risk if these issues with sprint are not addressed adequately. The following bullet points will detail my suggested fixes to make sprint a more functional mechanic for Halo 5: Guardians.
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Increase (quicken) Rate of Fire on the BR and DMR, shaving off ~0.1-0.2 seconds from their optimal kill times (TTK), while decreasing Aim Assist slightly to keep the Average Kill Time at its current yield.
This further empowers the individual making them more capable of finishing kills before a player can escape via sprint, as well as adding more skill depth to the over all game as the difference between Optimal TTK and Average TTK positively correlates with skill game.- Increase cool down on sprint’s use and shield recharge rate (nothing too substantial as it would nerf sprint too significantly and deter its use over all).
Makes it more difficult for players to abuse sprint in order to escape bad decisions, putting more emphasis on playing smart and added more depth to the game on the mental level.- Add a cool down to sprint after using the thruster (but not to thrust after sprint).
Makes it more difficult for players to abuse sprint in conjunction with another ability that has passive traits (thrust) to escape bad decisions.- Allow players to be shot out of sprint (kicked out of sprint) if they have not yet reached full velocity.
Makes it more difficult for players to abuse sprint in order to escape, and empowers the attacking player to finish their kills, resulting in a faster paced game.- Add a cool down off spawn to prevent players from sprinting.
Helps make the gameplay more predictable as knowledge of where players are spawning after death is a key piece of knowledge for constructing strategy. Additionally it helps Objective gameplay by lessening the disadvantage the objective holder is to the opposing team given that objective pushes at the high skill level coincide with having the opposing team down multiple players in order to secure a safer objective run.- Increase base movement speed by ~10% while keeping the current sprint speed (~125%) constant. This brings the difference in base speed and sprint speed within a 10-15% range.
This helps counter players reliance on sprint to traverse the upscaled maps, pursue kills as they run away, and lessons the chaos of the unpredictable element of players sprinting, resulting in a more structure game that rewards smart aggressive play over passive play.These changes that I’ve suggested do not alter sprint significantly, but at the same time will encourage changes in play styles that will benefit both the top level competitive players as well as the casual gamer. It will lessen the frustrations that sprint causes to players and benefit the game’s longevity as a multiplayer title.
I love Halo. I’ve been playing it religiously since my high school friends introduced me to it back in 2002. While I love Halo 5’s Beta so far, I’m worried for its future as a competitive title. Of course professional gamers will still flock to it because of the HCS series, as that’s the nature of the beast in E-Sports, but a sizeable demographic will abandon the game shortly after release just like they had in Halo 4. Please, please, please, I implore you to make these subtle changes to Halo!
Thank you for reading. Please feel free to comment and discuss below or on my Twitter page @SecretSchnitzel
Reported quit posting about sprint
I think it is perfect the way it is and I think most people who are complaining are either not using sprit to all of its power, or already had bad thoughts of it before they came into it. you are not even talk from both sides of it so if I can, I will speak for the other side.
- It speeds up gameplay which has always been a problem with the halo games and I could feel that inside halo MCC. It feels slow and I was actually getting bored playing multiplayer- chance of quick help out. My team mate is being shot. So I can run over there in little time to help him out and let his shied recover. - it does belong inside because it was in reach and everyone loved reached for what it was. People were complaining more about the armor lock then sprit and a lot of people laugh at us who chose sprint. - A lot of other great games have it inside of it and have done awesome. So it makes since for halo to have it.
the fact is that most people that complain about sprint just want a carbon copy of the halo 2 they loved and if halo wants to survive, it will not last the next gen
> 2533274868062286;3:
> I think it is perfect the way it is and I think most people who are complaining are either not using sprit to all of its power, or already had bad thoughts of it before they came into it. you are not even talk from both sides of it so if I can, I will speak for the other side.
>
> - It speeds up gameplay which has always been a problem with the halo games and I could feel that inside halo MCC. It feels slow and I was actually getting bored playing multiplayer
> - chance of quick help out. My team mate is being shot. So I can run over there in little time to help him out and let his shied recover.
> - it does belong inside because it was in reach and everyone loved reached for what it was. People were complaining more about the armor lock then sprit and a lot of people laugh at us who chose sprint.
> - A lot of other great games have it inside of it and have done awesome. So it makes since for halo to have it.
> the fact is that most people that complain about sprint just want a carbon copy of the halo 2 they loved and if halo wants to survive, it will not last the next gen
Did you even read the post? It literally isn’t calling for major changes… In fact, sprint is barely altered from its current form.
Also, sprint does not speed up game play. At all. The game only seems faster because sprint casts the illusion that faster movement makes a faster paced game, when in reality it results in expanded engagement and killtimes as players use sprint as a passive ability to escape from bad decisions.
Let me clarify for all you newcomers, I am NOT advocating sprint’s removal! I am NOT advocating it be nerfed to the point that it’s useless! I am advocating MINOR tweaks that will help appease BOTH SIDES of the discussion.
Since I didn’t adequately list some of the positive attributes of sprint, here goes…
- Sprinting feels good - I like being able to move faster- Sprint comes with risk vs reward - I exchange my ability to fight for my ability to move faster- Sprint allows for quick repositioning on maps - A player can quickly traverse the map to help out his team mate- Sprint helps players escape spawn traps - A player can quickly move out of a spawn trap and give his team mates new positions to spawn- Sprint is a required staple for AAA FPS titles - AAA Titles simply don’t sell well without sprint.
Now do I believe all of that? No. Do I believe all the arguments against Sprint? No. I am trying to take a middle ground approach to help find a VIABLE solution that should APPEASE BOTH SIDES.
Hate on the anti-sprint kids or the pro-sprint kids all you want, you’re not helping the problem. Taking extreme stances on this divisive mechanic is not helping resolve the issue. We all want Halo to succeed, but we need to understand that we need to make some concessions to what we want mechanically in the game. I’m at least trying to argue in favor of realistic alterations to sprint.
10/10 would read again! I also would like to see sprint become less of a defensive tool for escape.
> 2533274868062286;3:
> I think it is perfect the way it is and I think most people who are complaining are either not using sprit to all of its power, or already had bad thoughts of it before they came into it. you are not even talk from both sides of it so if I can, I will speak for the other side.
>
> - It speeds up gameplay which has always been a problem with the halo games and I could feel that inside halo MCC. It feels slow and I was actually getting bored playing multiplayer
> - chance of quick help out. My team mate is being shot. So I can run over there in little time to help him out and let his shied recover.
> - it does belong inside because it was in reach and everyone loved reached for what it was. People were complaining more about the armor lock then sprit and a lot of people laugh at us who chose sprint.
> - A lot of other great games have it inside of it and have done awesome. So it makes since for halo to have it.
> the fact is that most people that complain about sprint just want a carbon copy of the halo 2 they loved and if halo wants to survive, it will not last the next gen
It does not speed up gameplay! go play H1 in the MCC and tell me that game isn´t fast paced!
Quick help out should be provided through correct positioning of you next to your teammate or in a line of sight of his position and not because you hit a button and can just run up to him in a second.
Yeah everyone looooveed reach…
A lot of other games have a lot of mechanics that work because the game is build around them. Sprint isn´t working well in Halo due to you having shields!
Also please stop generalizing about how “everyone” wants a H2.
> 2533274795660102;2:
> Reported quit posting about sprint
That escalated quickly.
Abusing the report button is against the rules. FYI.
I am neutral when it comes to Sprint in Halo, but these suggestions look like they would work well with H5’s mechanics. One step to Guardians being a better game would to implement these changes, IMO.
<mark>Do not make nonconstructive posts or discuss forum moderation.</mark>
> 2533274796457055;7:
> > 2533274795660102;2:
> > Reported quit posting about sprint
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> That escalated quickly.
>
> Abusing the report button is against the rules. FYI.
So is reposting crap about the same -Yoink- that can be put under an already made thread about sprint.
& it’s not abuse if i’m reporting same subjects nice try.
do your job right & i wouldn’t have to report. I’ve never seen a forum where mods allow people to post 50+ threads about 1 subject. ex sprint
personally I think that shifting motion tracker to only blip people who are sprinting, thrusting, jumping, and clambering. This would put some additional benefit on traditional halo-esque movement while having a definitive trade-off penalty for the movement abilities.
Why do the anti sprint people have to be the ones who compromise? Their stance is that it is completely broken and can never ever work in Halo unless you change everything else(mainly kill times to COD level insta kill(which nobody wants)). That’s really hardline.
The pro sprint size just wants Halo to be faster. There are numerous ways to go about that without using sprint.
> 2533274868062286;3:
> - it does belong inside because it was in reach and everyone loved reach for what it was.
First off. LOL what?! Reach is probably, even above Halo 4, the most hated Halo game inside the Halo community.
Secondly, sprint works in the other popular shooters of the past gen because all of those games have very very quick kill times. Sprint works really well in conjunction with insta or near insta kill times. It does not work in shooters whose kill times are in the 1- 4 second range. Which is what Halo has.
> 2535441634768829;11:
> Why do the anti sprint people have to be the ones who compromise? Their stance is that it is completely broken and can never ever work in Halo unless you change everything else(mainly kill times to COD level insta kill(which nobody wants)). That’s really hardline.
>
> The pro sprint size just wants Halo to be faster. There are numerous ways to go about that without using sprint.
They need to compromise so we can have reasonable change that will improve the game. Unfortunately their stance is so far extreme that it won’t even be entertained, let alone executed. Their refusal to offer more rational options is making the rest of the movement that wants to see sprint tweaked for the better look bad.
My suggestions would both help improve the pace of the game through further empowering the individual with more skillful weapons and nerf the passive ability of sprint, while maintaining the benefits that so many claim sprint has. It’s a fair set of minor adjustments that would benefit both communities.
> 2533274795660102;9:
> > 2533274796457055;7:
> > > 2533274795660102;2:
> > > Reported quit posting about sprint
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> >
> >
> >
> > That escalated quickly.
> >
> > Abusing the report button is against the rules. FYI.
>
>
> So is reposting crap about the same -Yoink- that can be put under an already made thread about sprint.
>
> & it’s not abuse if i’m reporting same subjects nice try.
>
> do your job right & i wouldn’t have to report. I’ve never seen a forum where mods allow people to post 50+ threads about 1 subject. ex sprint
This warranted a new thread simply because it’s an entirely different approach on the subject. I’m not calling to get rid of sprint or nerf it to death, I’m making an appeal to reason that the two sides of this conflict try to make a reasonable attempt at coming to an agreeable consensus.
My idea for improving sprint is to make it use thrust mechanics, instead of having a flat out sprint, make all forward thrusts last longer then will allow players to move quickly across a large area(which is what sprint is intended for) on foot, while still be able to shoot, but since thrust is on a cd it would rpevent having a player run flatout a mile away from a engagement he just nearly lost, as he WOULD slow down after a few moments to let thust recharge.
> 2533274851697025;13:
> > 2535441634768829;11:
> > Why do the anti sprint people have to be the ones who compromise? Their stance is that it is completely broken and can never ever work in Halo unless you change everything else(mainly kill times to COD level insta kill(which nobody wants)). That’s really hardline.
> >
> > The pro sprint size just wants Halo to be faster. There are numerous ways to go about that without using sprint.
>
>
>
> They need to compromise so we can have reasonable change that will improve the game. Unfortunately their stance is so far extreme that it won’t even be entertained, let alone executed. Their refusal to offer more rational options is making the rest of the movement that wants to see sprint tweaked for the better look bad.
>
> My suggestions would both help improve the pace of the game through further empowering the individual with more skillful weapons and nerf the passive ability of sprint, while maintaining the benefits that so many claim sprint has. It’s a fair set of minor adjustments that would benefit both communities.
>
>
>
> > 2533274795660102;9:
> > > 2533274796457055;7:
> > > > 2533274795660102;2:
> > > > Reported quit posting about sprint
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > That escalated quickly.
> > >
> > > Abusing the report button is against the rules. FYI.
> >
> >
> >
> > So is reposting crap about the same -Yoink- that can be put under an already made thread about sprint.
> >
> > & it’s not abuse if i’m reporting same subjects nice try.
> >
> > do your job right & i wouldn’t have to report. I’ve never seen a forum where mods allow people to post 50+ threads about 1 subject. ex sprint
>
>
> This warranted a new thread simply because it’s an entirely different approach on the subject. I’m not calling to get rid of sprint or nerf it to death, I’m making an appeal to reason that the two sides of this conflict try to make a reasonable attempt at coming to an agreeable consensus.
The point is there’s 50+ other threads about sprint; which is outragous. Everyone wants their voice to be heard; i get that, but just because you’ve changed a few words around doesn’t make it nessicary to make a brand new thread about it.
> 2533274851697025;5:
> - Sprint is a required staple for AAA FPS titles - AAA Titles simply don’t sell well without sprint.
This assumption is based upon what exactly?
> 2533274851697025;13:
> > 2535441634768829;11:
> > Why do the anti sprint people have to be the ones who compromise? Their stance is that it is completely broken and can never ever work in Halo unless you change everything else(mainly kill times to COD level insta kill(which nobody wants)). That’s really hardline.
> >
> > The pro sprint size just wants Halo to be faster. There are numerous ways to go about that without using sprint.
>
>
>
> They need to compromise so we can have reasonable change that will improve the game. Unfortunately their stance is so far extreme that it won’t even be entertained, let alone executed. Their refusal to offer more rational options is making the rest of the movement that wants to see sprint tweaked for the better look bad.
>
> My suggestions would both help improve the pace of the game through further empowering the individual with more skillful weapons and nerf the passive ability of sprint, while maintaining the benefits that so many claim sprint has. It’s a fair set of minor adjustments that would benefit both communities.
You didn’t answer my question at all.
> 2533274794052092;14:
> My idea for improving sprint is to make it use thrust mechanics, instead of having a flat out sprint, make all forward thrusts last longer then will allow players to move quickly across a large area(which is what sprint is intended for) on foot, while still be able to shoot, but since thrust is on a cd it would rpevent having a player run flatout a mile away from a engagement he just nearly lost, as he WOULD slow down after a few moments to let thust recharge.
Interesting.
See OP. There’s a thousand ideas out there that are alternative to sprint.
The compromise Halo needs is not, “how can we agree on a way to make sprint work in Halo”. It’s “how can we make Halo faster without sprint.”
> 2535441634768829;16:
> > 2533274851697025;5:
> > - Sprint is a required staple for AAA FPS titles - AAA Titles simply don’t sell well without sprint.
>
>
> This assumption is based upon what exactly?
AAA Developers refusing to even entertain the notion of making a FPS without sprint? I don’t agree with it, granted, but I can’t think of why the devs are so opposed to non-sprint games given all the backlash and logical arguments against it.
Good post OP, I agree, at this point it’s just a waste of time to argue for sprints removal. It’s been here since Halo Reach despite repeated outcries, it’s here to stay. At some point people will realize this. Halo has sprint now. End of story.