First things first.
Mods please don’t lock this, it is talking about elites in the campaign story. The mega threads topic is for playing them in multiplayer.
So now that that’s out of the way… Ahem…
So I was replaying the campaign to get achievements and I started paying more attention to the cutscenes. I’ve noticed that the elites really can’t fight in hand to hand combat with Spartans anymore. Before when the covonent was an entire Armada the elites were a proud mighty warrior race, and were trained in all kinds of fighting styles and martial arts. During these times a single elite could take out an entire squad of marines or even 2-3 Spartans in combat with nothing but a sword: however, as the old covonent has fallen those fighting styles may be lost or Ju’l Mdama might not be teaching them to the current elites.
During the last cutscene at the end of Osiris its painfully obvious that the elites in the covonent aren’t as well trained warriors as they once were. Now they seem to rely on just swinging, where as before the elites were trained for almost any situation. So to sum it all up the elites in the story now adays just can’t fight like they use too.
Edit: btw I’m talking about lore wise not campaign A.I difficulty.
Eh, I think it just has more to do with the recruitment base. When the Sangheili were still under the Covenant, we always saw their best, most well-trained soldiers. This makes sense for two reasons: the selective nature of the Prophets, and the fact that the battles in the original trilogy were vital objectives for the Covenant to accomplish. As for our hinge-headed friends of the new Covenant in Halo 5, they are recruited with little to no discrimination. Jul’s Covenant faction needed numbers, and beggars can’t be choosers. These Elites are enlisted because of their loyalty and their piety, not their fighting skill, though we certainly still do see skilled fighters in this new Covenant. The hand-to-hand fight between Osiris and Jul’s guards is rather one-sided for both those reasons and the fact that Fireteam Osiris is a group of incredibly well-trained, smart, and equipped Spartan team. Jul was certainly a competent fighter, but he was a Shipmaster, first and foremost. He stood no chance against Locke.
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> Eh, I think it just has more to do with the recruitment base. When the Sangheili were still under the Covenant, we always saw their best, most well-trained soldiers. This makes sense for two reasons: the selective nature of the Prophets, and the fact that the battles in the original trilogy were vital objectives for the Covenant to accomplish. As for our hinge-headed friends of the new Covenant in Halo 5, they are recruited with little to no discrimination. Jul’s Covenant faction needed numbers, and beggars can’t be choosers. These Elites are enlisted because of their loyalty and their piety, not their fighting skill, though we certainly still do see skilled fighters in this new Covenant. The hand-to-hand fight between Osiris and Jul’s guards is rather one-sided for both those reasons and the fact that Fireteam Osiris is a group of incredibly well-trained, smart, and equipped Spartan team. Jul was certainly a competent fighter, but he was a Shipmaster, first and foremost. He stood no chance against Locke.
True it can be recruitment based since the new covonent is on the bare minimum. But is still the same that most elites can’t really fight that well anymore, even a minor back in the old trilogy could take out a spartan with over 20 years of experience, while Jul’s honor gaurds can’t even scratch one.
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> > 2533274900890786;2:
> > Eh, I think it just has more to do with the recruitment base. When the Sangheili were still under the Covenant, we always saw their best, most well-trained soldiers. This makes sense for two reasons: the selective nature of the Prophets, and the fact that the battles in the original trilogy were vital objectives for the Covenant to accomplish. As for our hinge-headed friends of the new Covenant in Halo 5, they are recruited with little to no discrimination. Jul’s Covenant faction needed numbers, and beggars can’t be choosers. These Elites are enlisted because of their loyalty and their piety, not their fighting skill, though we certainly still do see skilled fighters in this new Covenant. The hand-to-hand fight between Osiris and Jul’s guards is rather one-sided for both those reasons and the fact that Fireteam Osiris is a group of incredibly well-trained, smart, and equipped Spartan team. Jul was certainly a competent fighter, but he was a Shipmaster, first and foremost. He stood no chance against Locke.
>
>
> True it can be recruitment based since the new covonent is on the bare minimum. But is still the same that most elites can’t really fight that well anymore, even a minor back in the old trilogy could take out a spartan with over 20 years of experience, while Jul’s honor gaurds can’t even scratch one.
I think you’re holding the old Elites in too high of a regard. Where exactly have you seen that an Elite Minor could take down a Spartan? And what kind of Spartan are we talking about? Because any Spartan-II could take on dozens of low-ranked Elites.
About Jul’s honor guards, again I think the disparity lies more in the fact that Osiris, and Spartan-IVs in general, have simply advanced way beyond the Covenant now. After the Great Schism, all Covenant technological advancement immediately ceased. It allowed Humanity to blow right past them.
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> > > 2533274900890786;2:
> > > Eh, I think it just has more to do with the recruitment base. When the Sangheili were still under the Covenant, we always saw their best, most well-trained soldiers. This makes sense for two reasons: the selective nature of the Prophets, and the fact that the battles in the original trilogy were vital objectives for the Covenant to accomplish. As for our hinge-headed friends of the new Covenant in Halo 5, they are recruited with little to no discrimination. Jul’s Covenant faction needed numbers, and beggars can’t be choosers. These Elites are enlisted because of their loyalty and their piety, not their fighting skill, though we certainly still do see skilled fighters in this new Covenant. The hand-to-hand fight between Osiris and Jul’s guards is rather one-sided for both those reasons and the fact that Fireteam Osiris is a group of incredibly well-trained, smart, and equipped Spartan team. Jul was certainly a competent fighter, but he was a Shipmaster, first and foremost. He stood no chance against Locke.
> >
> >
> > True it can be recruitment based since the new covonent is on the bare minimum. But is still the same that most elites can’t really fight that well anymore, even a minor back in the old trilogy could take out a spartan with over 20 years of experience, while Jul’s honor gaurds can’t even scratch one.
>
>
> I think you’re holding the old Elites in too high of a regard. Where exactly have you seen that an Elite Minor could take down a Spartan? And what kind of Spartan are we talking about? Because any Spartan-II could take on dozens of low-ranked Elites.
>
> About Jul’s honor guards, again I think the disparity lies more in the fact that Osiris, and Spartan-IVs in general, have simply advanced way beyond the Covenant now. After the Great Schism, all Covenant technological advancement immediately ceased. It allowed Humanity to blow right past them.
OK I’ll give you that one.
Halo 5 campaign is probably the easiest in my opinion. Only challenge was warden really.
The only Elite the series has ever shown in hand to hand combat is the Arbiter when he takes on Miranda and Johnson.
So while the more may dictate otherwise, Jul’s crew could hair not be up to the arbiter’s level
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> The only Elite the series has ever shown in hand to hand combat is the Arbiter when he takes on Miranda and Johnson.
>
> So while the more may dictate otherwise, Jul’s crew could hair not be up to the arbiter’s level
Read the books and you see a little more hand to hand between the covonent and the spartan II’s
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> Halo 5 campaign is probably the easiest in my opinion. Only challenge was warden really.
Yeah depending on what you do it can definitely be easier. Luckily based on the update today they will be doing some tweaking to the difficulty to make elites harder next month.
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> > 2533274855658987;6:
> > Halo 5 campaign is probably the easiest in my opinion. Only challenge was warden really.
>
>
> Yeah depending on what you do it can definitely be easier. Luckily based on the update today they will be doing some tweaking to the difficulty to make elites harder next month.
No you two are mistaken I’m talking lore wise not difficulty of the A.I
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> > 2533274792942658;9:
> > > 2533274855658987;6:
> > > Halo 5 campaign is probably the easiest in my opinion. Only challenge was warden really.
> >
> >
> > Yeah depending on what you do it can definitely be easier. Luckily based on the update today they will be doing some tweaking to the difficulty to make elites harder next month.
>
>
> No you two are mistaken I’m talking lore wise not difficulty of the A.I
Gotcha. Well lore wise the arbiters forces are still very well trained I’d say. The difference is he understands how much the prophets held them back for thousands of years by denying them the ability to be anything but warriors. This is why the arbiter encourages agriculture, science, etc to advance the race in more than just combat. This is also one of the reasons the storm is against him because they believe it’s blasphemous.
Everybody who has replied to this thread, you might be “happy” to find out the amped up campaign recently. Read the newest of the news
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> Everybody who has replied to this thread, you might be “happy” to find out the amped up campaign recently. Read the newest of the news
No you are mistaken I’m talking about lore wise not campaign A.I difficulty.
Edit: oh hey how ya doing tutor 
Don’t forget about Fireteam Osiris’s plot armor.
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> Don’t forget about Fireteam Osiris’s plot armor.
Ah yes the armor of plot. But even then Ju’l doesn’t really know how to fight like the old elites did. Neither do any of the others really.
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> > 2533274808267977;7:
> > The only Elite the series has ever shown in hand to hand combat is the Arbiter when he takes on Miranda and Johnson.
> >
> > So while the more may dictate otherwise, Jul’s crew could hair not be up to the arbiter’s level
>
>
> Read the books and you see a little more hand to hand between the covonent and the spartan II’s
Or any extended cannon really.
Thel 'Lodamee (a Sangheili Major) had a good chance to kill Master Chief hand-to-hand in “The Package”, but was not given the proper chance.
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> The only Elite the series has ever shown in hand to hand combat is the Arbiter when he takes on Miranda and Johnson.
>
> So while the more may dictate otherwise, Jul’s crew could hair not be up to the arbiter’s level
There’s also the Arbiter from Halo Wars fighting Sgt. Forge.
That cut scene from Halo: Reach when the Elite Zealots show up and fight Noble Team should be the basis of their abilities.
Elites are like stromtroopers, you get told how badass they are but get made incompetant so the good guys always win. In one of the earlier books john very nearly got killed in a one on one iirc. An elite can tear even spartans apart but are made not to for story reasons, happens in all entertainment sadly.
Well 343i made Locke look good by making him kill jul mdama so easily. Which is a shame. I like Locke a lot. But jeez overkill with that fight scene lol