I agree that I’d rather not have them at all, but since that’s not the answer you are looking for, and for the sake of conversation, here are my changes:
Thruster Pack
I like the idea of an evade ability, just make sure it’s useful. I had no issue with the one in Reach, so let’s hope this isn’t too useless now. It’s probably what I will personally be using since sprint is now standard.
Jetpack
Would make this for horizontal use only. Simply to bridge gaps, not for scaling walls or getting on top of places. When you hold the button, it just lets you hover in place for about 5 seconds. Sound lame? It’s still quite useful for making trick jumps, sprinting > jumping > jet packing would help you get quite a distance on your jump. It would also allow you to go from a higher ground to a lower ground easier as you feather it, gently lowering yourself to reduce fall damage.
The main plus, with it set this way, map flow is left in tact, enables tons of skill jump possibilities instead of diminishing them completely, and you won’t run into map exploitation with kill zones and all that. I think it would be far more useful and practical, fun, while easing the complaints amongst those such as myself who think it takes far too much away from map layout.
Hardlight Shield
I think it looks great in comparison to my issues with Armor Lock. Seems quite fair and balanced, useful but not unbeatable or overbearing, so I see nothing to change.
Hologram
I feel this is pretty useless, fun, but still useless. It was cool to trick your friends a few times in customs, but once you notice the tells(grey dot on radar, always running straight or standing still), and the fact that when you shoot it once it’s obvious it’s a hologram, it became too obvious and didn’t serve much purpose.
I would make it act like a computer A.I., just do no actual damage. Meaning, I would have it run out, stop, strafe, and shoot at enemies, but any bullets shot would do nothing and wouldn’t register. When shot I would also want it to take a few shots before it disappeared. Finally, have a red dot on the radar, or at least none at all, it’s supposed to fool them, not completely have a different color making it obvious.
Promethean Vision
Make this only one quick wave, as it spreads and passes a player it shows their outline for the second it passes them, and then it completely disappears. So it’s just a quick glimpse, no more than a second, as the wave moves over their body, and once it’s passed them they no longer are seen. Also, have it movement based, so that if a player stands still, it won’t give their position away. Have the recharge time be around 30 seconds. Holograms should show up if they are moving, and they look normal as I said they should be A.I. like. So yeah, definitely would make this less overpowered, but still useful.
Active Camo
I really think this should be on map, not an AA. However, sticking with the idea that these can be retoooled to better fit and not so overpowered…
I would make it so that it only lasts 7 seconds. You are invisible if you walk really slowly or stand still, but any normal speed or sprinting and you are pretty visible. You don’t show up on radar, there’s no jammer for the opponent, but your radar is gone while in use(the trade off being that you can’t be seen, but you can’t see your radar anymore either). Make the recharge rate about 20 seconds.
This would mainly make this a way to sneak up on someone when you know they’re in the next room, or to buy yourself a small window to hide or recover. Losing the jammer, remaining off their radar but losing yours, would make this less of an annoying AA to use and helps balance it. The 20 second recharge rate and 5 second usage is jus enough to make it worth it in the right usage, but not too abused(no standing up on rocks sniping without being seen).
Regen
Haven’t seen this used, but I don’t think it poses much of an issue, or at least it wasn’t terrible in Halo 3. Just make sure it doesn’t work super fast, and is more of a recovery tool than “you are invicible when you stand in here unless it’s a 1 hit kill weapon” like Halo 3 kinda had. Make it for after a fight, it can heal you in 3 seconds.
Auto Sentry
I don’t know enough on how this plays yet other than seeing it deployed, but it’s an auto turret, so it’s pretty self explanitory. It should be thrown down, have the strength of an Assault Rifle, and the strength of a human player to be destroyed. It’s stationary, so that wouldn’t be too difficult to blow up, but it could also make the difference in an objective or slayer game if someone isn’t paying attention, or is lured in by someone and the enemy is double teamed.
What do you guys think? Did I balance them to your liking? Ruin them? Let me know because personally, if they had to stay in the game, this is how I feel it should go.
