Innovative Ordinance

Games Halo 5: Guardians
1

So my friend had an idea for an ordinance change in Halo 5 and asked me to share it, so here goes:

> I just had a great idea for ordnance in Halo 5. How about, if your team accumulated 500pts in total, the highest-scoring player on the team would be able to choose from one of three options.
>
> 1. Marked Man (Slayer Symbol)
> Marked Man would put a kill marker above each enemy player’s head, along with a 15 second timer. If the player dies or the 15 seconds runs out, the marker disappears. The enemy is told they are marked by a “Carrying Flag” style message which says “MARKED” and the number of seconds to survive before becoming incognito again. To make this a more viable choice, each enemy’s weapon is shown next to their marker e;g: KILL (Rocket Launcher). This would be active for the whole team.
>
> 2. Invincibility
>
> Invinicibility would give the friendly team 10 seconds of invincibility. On the flip side, they would be marked on the enemy team’s HUD as AVOID, and the announcer would tell them that (x) team is invincible, and show a timer next to each avoid marker e;g: AVOID 5s.
>
> 3. Stealth
>
> Stealth will disable all traces of the friendly team from the enemy’s sight for 20 seconds. Here are the specifics.
>
> -Footstept dampened
> -Cannot be detected on Radar
> -Reticle of enemy team will not go red on a stationary Spartan of your team
> -Assassinations are quicker, and the body will disintegrate
> -No red X when enemy team member dies
>
> The team that earned stealth will not get camo though. The enemy team will be informed by the announcer the enemy team used stealth, and to watch their backs. If they are not killed in the 25 seconds, they earn a 25pt medal called “Vigilant”.
>
> How would this be for a better and more predictable ordnance system? You will always know what the enemy has and it is not random, as well as introducing NEW, BALANCED mechanics. Innovation not imitation.

Now I don’t entirely agree with everything (and I told them that) but I thought I’d get waypoints opinion on this.

Any thoughts?

2

Just to put it bluntly, this is terrible.

Invincibility, really? Do we NEED to have everyone using the Armor Lock glitch?

Marked Man is unnecessarily stupid. We have Radar and call outs, and communication with team mates would give you information on enemy weapons. We don’t need way-points over the enemy’s heads.

Stealth would just be broken. No red X when enemy team member dies? What?

These are not “NEW, BALANCED mechanics”, these are UNNECESSARY, IMBALANCED GIMMICKS, that I want NO game to have.

3

While I have to say they are interesting ideas, they’re not really my cup of tea. But please thank your friend for me its all ways a good thing when someone tries to come up with new ideas for the games.

4

So, A Friend came up with those ideas huh?

I had to do it.

But, jokes aside, i would rather have no ordnance in the next Halo game :confused:

5

Ordinance would be great for campaign or firefight but not for multiplayer.

I think the ordinance experience just didn’t work for matchmaking, and I’m not sure any modifications to it will make me like it any better. Sorry, 343, after ~11 months my final verdict is “dislike the concept”.

6

I prefer my Concept, and it is very balanced.

POD can return but only Powerups to be available as available choices.

  1. Overshield
  2. Active Camo (No longer AA)
  3. Speed Boost
  4. Damage Boost

Everyone gets the same choices, there are no Power Weapons to choose from. This is the most balanced POD you can have. And it doesn’t break game-play and most importantly IS NOT RANDOM. You know what your going to get.

7

I quite enjoy the concept of personal ordnance in Halo. Not in the traditional gameplay, mind you, but in modes like Infinity. It gives a sense of reward for your actions, which is a reason that Call of Duty’s formula is so addicting.

That said, the current system needs tweaks. I really think ordnance should be restricted to equipment (the less powerful variants), grenades, and ammo. This way, players still have to fight for and earn any on-map weapons and the more powerful equipment items.

8

I’d rather see ordnance go altogether, however if it were to stay, I think I could accept this (it’s certainly better than the current system). However I would make some tweaks. Invincibility would not be an option. I’d also reduce the time they last. If they are going to be handed out, it shouldn’t last long at all.

9

> I prefer my Concept, and it is very balanced.
>
> POD can return but only Powerups to be available as available choices.
>
> 1. Overshield
> 2. Active Camo (No longer AA)
> 3. Speed Boost
> 4. Damage Boost
>
> Everyone gets the same choices, there are no Power Weapons to choose from. This is the most balanced POD you can have. And it doesn’t break game-play and most importantly IS NOT RANDOM. You know what your going to get.

How is that not random? With only 3 ordnance slots and 4 options, 1 will get left out. That means one will randomly be selected to be not available. Plus, I don’t think you’ve grasped what people mean by random. You have no idea what people have (or if they even have them). With previous games, you knew that if Camo was gone, someone had it. With POD you have no idea when/where/who will have any of the 4 ordnance options.

It will be given at a random time in the game, to a person who hit a certain score at a random time in the game, in a random location on the map.

It is still random, and there is no way to remove the randomness from PODs.

10

> > I prefer my Concept, and it is very balanced.
> >
> > POD can return but only Powerups to be available as available choices.
> >
> > 1. Overshield
> > 2. Active Camo (No longer AA)
> > 3. Speed Boost
> > 4. Damage Boost
> >
> > Everyone gets the same choices, there are no Power Weapons to choose from. This is the most balanced POD you can have. And it doesn’t break game-play and most importantly IS NOT RANDOM. You know what your going to get.
>
> How is that not random? With only 3 ordnance slots and 4 options, 1 will get left out. That means one will randomly be selected to be not available. Plus, I don’t think you’ve grasped what people mean by random. You have no idea what people have (or if they even have them). With previous games, you knew that if Camo was gone, someone had it. With POD you have no idea when/where/who will have any of the 4 ordnance options.
>
> It will be given at a random time in the game, to a person who hit a certain score at a random time in the game, in a random location on the map.
>
> It is still random, and there is no way to remove the randomness from PODs.

Symmetrik you are forgetting that the reason you have only 3 choices is that the Up choice is for the re-roll option if you have the Re-Roll PERK selected.

As there are no perks, you then have 4 choices IE)
Up. Overshield
Left. Active Camo (No longer AA)
Right. Speed Boost
Down. Damage Boost

I never said my system was perfect, but it is much better than the current system. And this is just something I have recently thought off, no reason it can’t be improved so there is no Randomness.

Even if you remove POD, I think this would be great option to have for when you pickup a Powerup, and you could have it so that, each powerup location is set to a pacific powerup, but when you collect it, you have 2 seconds to change it or you just receive the default powerup.

So I guess my previous thought of pickup a powerup and choose when to use, would add a randomness, as players would not know who had it and when they would deploy it.

I’m just thinking idea on how it can be improved. My idea is not perfect, but is an improvement.

I guess you could have the player glow yellow or something, indicating they have a Powerup available. This would indicate Who had it.

But then, how is any different from Equipment/AA. Which most people seem to be happy with if they return as long as they are map pickups and not part of your loadout. You can’t see what they have, so that is also RANDOM.

11

> I’m just thinking idea on how it can be improved. My idea is not perfect, but is an improvement.
>
> I guess you could have the player glow yellow or something, indicating they have a Powerup available. This would indicate Who had it.
>
> But then, how is any different from Equipment/AA. Which most people seem to be happy with if they return as long as they are map pickups and not part of your loadout. You can’t see what they have, so that is also RANDOM.

The difference being that when there are AAs placed on the map, they are definite. You know what AA a player will pick up by being in this spot. Also, AAs should have a visible and identifiable way to distinguish what AA a player has (this is basically only done with Jetpack as it is).

12

Team Ordinance should earn powerful vehicles for BTB, such as a Scorpion or Mantis. This will ensure that the vehicle spawns do not dominate on maps such as Valhalla.

Also, Ordnance Drops should become personalized, but instead of selecting weapons so drop, you can select perks. These perks will stack up over time if you do not die and will allow players to spawn on an even playing field in terms of player traits.

13

> > I’m just thinking idea on how it can be improved. My idea is not perfect, but is an improvement.
> >
> > I guess you could have the player glow yellow or something, indicating they have a Powerup available. This would indicate Who had it.
> >
> > But then, how is any different from Equipment/AA. Which most people seem to be happy with if they return as long as they are map pickups and not part of your loadout. You can’t see what they have, so that is also RANDOM.
>
> The difference being that when there are AAs placed on the map, they are definite. You know what AA a player will pick up by being in this spot. Also, AAs should have a visible and identifiable way to distinguish what AA a player has (this is basically only done with Jetpack as it is).

It be nice if each AA/Equipment appeared on users leg or somewhere as a visual guide.

This is something 343 could try implement. It was one of the great things about Halo 3, was able to see players secondary weapon.

Not like Halo 2, you see them with a Sniper, so you sneak up to get an easy kill, only to see them change weapon at the last second to a shotty or rockets and get an easy kill on you. In Halo 3, you knowing the secondary weapon could make you change tactics.

So it be great, if we could see what AA/Equipment players had.

Think in REACH if you could see what people had AL, how many times you would not had tried to splatter them.

14

@Thomsy Aus

What our gripes with power-ups as ordnances are is that they are game play affecting items that alter your base traits to give you an advantage.

Such advantages should be controlled and fought for.

I can be a silly head all game without getting a single kill and get rewarded with something that gives me a huge advantage in 1v1 encounters.

Its not that your idea is bad. Its just Id prefer PoDs out of the game and power-ups returned to having to be contested and controlled. Otherwise they’d have to be vastly limited to how they work. Such as Halo 4’s instantly draining Overshield or maybe 10 seconds of camo. And that just defeats the purpose in mu opinion.

Also, I’d like to be able to change grenades without calling ordnance.

15

> Symmetrik you are forgetting that the reason you have only 3 choices is that the Up choice is for the re-roll option if you have the Re-Roll PERK selected.
>
> As there are no perks, you then have 4 choices IE)
> Up. Overshield
> Left. Active Camo (No longer AA)
> Right. Speed Boost
> Down. Damage Boost
>
> I never said my system was perfect, but it is much better than the current system. And this is just something I have recently thought off, no reason it can’t be improved so there is no Randomness.
>
> Even if you remove POD, I think this would be great option to have for when you pickup a Powerup, and you could have it so that, each powerup location is set to a pacific powerup, but when you collect it, you have 2 seconds to change it or you just receive the default powerup.
>
> So I guess my previous thought of pickup a powerup and choose when to use, would add a randomness, as players would not know who had it and when they would deploy it.
>
> I’m just thinking idea on how it can be improved. My idea is not perfect, but is an improvement.
>
> I guess you could have the player glow yellow or something, indicating they have a Powerup available. This would indicate Who had it.
>
> But then, how is any different from Equipment/AA. Which most people seem to be happy with if they return as long as they are map pickups and not part of your loadout. You can’t see what they have, so that is also RANDOM.

I did not know up was used- I thought it was used for something else and was unavailable to be used for ordnance. Having all 4 options available does decrease randomness. However, given the already over-cluttered HUD, I can’t say I’m fond of bringing the ordnance pop-up down to make room for the 4th option. We can’t remove the pop-up, so somehow we would have to make space for all 4 options to be shown around the d-pad icon. And as I said, the HUD is already cluttered.

As for your power-up idea, I can’t say I’m fond of that either. If you take a perfectly symmetrical map, and there is a power-up for each team, you could end up with each player picking differently. This disrupts the equal starts we just had. Now one team has an advantage just by pressing a button. Say a Speed boost spawn in each base, but one player turns it into a Damage boost. Now his team has a big advantage, right away.

As for Equipment & AAs, I’d like those simply because it is a far better system than we have now. If you notice that an AA is gone and someone is in the area, chances are they have, so you know to be more cautious. Frankly I’d prefer AAs to be gone altogether, as most are far too broken to ever be balanced. Promethean Vision, Jet Pack, Camo, Hardlight Shield, and Autosentry. Equipment would be my ideal on-map pick ups in this situation. Equipment was not as much of a “game-changer” as AAs. Really you could only get 4 in Matchmaking - Regen, Power Drain, Bubble Shield and Grav lift (Grav lift is much better than JP because it was rare, the maps in H3 didn’t give it a big opportunity to be useful, and it’s more team-oriented; think High Ground beach spawn) With the H3 EQMT, if you were smart about it, you could avoid the effects of it. It takes a second to throw the eqmt, so that gives you a second of them not shooting you. If you made a mistake, it would cost you. Equipment really only made a difference when someone makes a mistake. If you don’t rush the guy in the Bubble (or Regen), chances are he can’t kill you.

16

> > Symmetrik you are forgetting that the reason you have only 3 choices is that the Up choice is for the re-roll option if you have the Re-Roll PERK selected.
> >
> > As there are no perks, you then have 4 choices IE)
> > Up. Overshield
> > Left. Active Camo (No longer AA)
> > Right. Speed Boost
> > Down. Damage Boost
> >
> > I never said my system was perfect, but it is much better than the current system. And this is just something I have recently thought off, no reason it can’t be improved so there is no Randomness.
> >
> > Even if you remove POD, I think this would be great option to have for when you pickup a Powerup, and you could have it so that, each powerup location is set to a pacific powerup, but when you collect it, you have 2 seconds to change it or you just receive the default powerup.
> >
> > So I guess my previous thought of pickup a powerup and choose when to use, would add a randomness, as players would not know who had it and when they would deploy it.
> >
> > I’m just thinking idea on how it can be improved. My idea is not perfect, but is an improvement.
> >
> > I guess you could have the player glow yellow or something, indicating they have a Powerup available. This would indicate Who had it.
> >
> > But then, how is any different from Equipment/AA. Which most people seem to be happy with if they return as long as they are map pickups and not part of your loadout. You can’t see what they have, so that is also RANDOM.
>
> I did not know up was used- I thought it was used for something else and was unavailable to be used for ordnance. Having all 4 options available does decrease randomness. However, given the already over-cluttered HUD, I can’t say I’m fond of bringing the ordnance pop-up down to make room for the 4th option. We can’t remove the pop-up, so somehow we would have to make space for all 4 options to be shown around the d-pad icon. And as I said, the HUD is already cluttered.
>
> As for your power-up idea, I can’t say I’m fond of that either. If you take a perfectly symmetrical map, and there is a power-up for each team, you could end up with each player picking differently. This disrupts the equal starts we just had. Now one team has an advantage just by pressing a button. Say a Speed boost spawn in each base, but one player turns it into a Damage boost. Now his team has a big advantage, right away.
>
> As for Equipment & AAs, I’d like those simply because it is a far better system than we have now. If you notice that an AA is gone and someone is in the area, chances are they have, so you know to be more cautious. Frankly I’d prefer AAs to be gone altogether, as most are far too broken to ever be balanced. Promethean Vision, Jet Pack, Camo, Hardlight Shield, and Autosentry. Equipment would be my ideal on-map pick ups in this situation. Equipment was not as much of a “game-changer” as AAs. Really you could only get 4 in Matchmaking - Regen, Power Drain, Bubble Shield and Grav lift (Grav lift is much better than JP because it was rare, the maps in H3 didn’t give it a big opportunity to be useful, and it’s more team-oriented; think High Ground beach spawn) With the H3 EQMT, if you were smart about it, you could avoid the effects of it. It takes a second to throw the eqmt, so that gives you a second of them not shooting you. If you made a mistake, it would cost you. Equipment really only made a difference when someone makes a mistake. If you don’t rush the guy in the Bubble (or Regen), chances are he can’t kill you.

I agree with you Symmetrik, by having items as map pickups. This being Powerups/AA/Equipment.

Makes the game more balanced and removes randomness.

I my idea about POD, is just one way of improving them from what we have now. You could always change it to be grenade types or anything. As long as it was balanced.

The current POD system, where 1 player could get a Binary Rifle and another player a needler is totally unbalanced. POD are great if you get the weapon you want, but if your choices all suck. Then your POD is wasted. The current POD system is a FAIL.

And I guess the only best way to really improve POD is to remove them.

17

I think what we have here is a “violent agreement”.

The current ordnance system is terrible and needs to go.

Your idea is an improvement to the current system, I just don’t think it is the best option.

Complete removal would be my preference.

18

> And I guess the only best way to really improve POD is to remove them.

Perhaps in multiplayer, but in other applications such as Spartan Ops, Firefight, or Campaign, it could work in a sensible way. Although it should still be more limited in this regard. I see no harm in having sections of the Campaign where there are different ways to approach the situation and make it your own. This can be done by giving Master Chief (the player) an ordinance drop selection between, let’s say: a Sniper Rifle, a Rocket Launcher or Shotgun, and even something more exotic like a Chaingun, Missile Pod, or Flamethrower (UNSC Support weapons from Halo 3). The current method of “earning” PODs through kills/medals could be integrated into Spartan Ops and/or Firefight, giving players munitions/weapons to combat the massive or endless amounts of enemies.

Personal Ordinance isn’t bad when not in modes where players must combat each other, but rather injects options that lead to an increase in replayability of otherwise fairly repetitive modes (at nobody’s expense, unlike in multiplayer) . That said, if PODs were to return at any rate in Matchmaking, I’d like to see it only include the Chaingun, Missile Pod, and Flamethrower (at least you would know what you could be up against, they have clear disadvantages like reducing speed/disabling grenades and melee, and have somewhat specific intended roles).

19

> > And I guess the only best way to really improve POD is to remove them.
>
> Perhaps in multiplayer, but in other applications such as Spartan Ops, Firefight, or Campaign, it could work in a sensible way. Although it should still be more limited in this regard. I see no harm in having sections of the Campaign where there are different ways to approach the situation and make it your own. This can be done by giving Master Chief (the player) an ordinance drop selection between, let’s say: a Sniper Rifle, a Rocket Launcher or Shotgun, and even something more exotic like a Chaingun, Missile Pod, or Flamethrower (UNSC Support weapons from Halo 3). The current method of “earning” PODs through kills/medals could be integrated into Spartan Ops and/or Firefight, giving players munitions/weapons to combat the massive or endless amounts of enemies.
>
> Personal Ordinance isn’t bad when not in modes where players must combat each other, but rather injects options that lead to an increase in replayability of otherwise fairly repetitive modes (at nobody’s expense, unlike in multiplayer) . That said, if PODs were to return at any rate in Matchmaking, I’d like to see it only include the Chaingun, Missile Pod, and Flamethrower (at least you would know what you could be up against, they have clear disadvantages like reducing speed/disabling grenades and melee, and have somewhat specific intended roles).

I’d be okay with that, because the issue stems from inconsistency when you are the opponent. Because in Campaign, Spartan Ops, and Firefight the opponents are all AI controlled, there would be no issues.

20

> I’d be okay with that, because the issue stems from inconsistency when you are the opponent. Because in Campaign, Spartan Ops, and Firefight the opponents are all AI controlled, there would be no issues.

Exactly. PODs aren’t necessarily a bad addition/innovation, its just a matter of what you’re trying to add it to and to what extent.