March Playlist Update Discussion

Games Other Halo
21

> • Anniversary Squad retired.
>
> Fret not! See Super Slayer added.

What? “Fret not, Super Slayer added?” That means nothing!

I personally love the Anniversary maps, but I’m not a fan of the Anniversary game types. Unlike a lot of the stubborn members on this forum, I love Halo: Reach and it’s sandbox. I also like most of the changes made with the TU (and I love how they’re getting rid of bleedthrough, now making the TU perfect in my eyes). I want to play Halo on the new maps, and I want to play with armor abilities, and I don’t want to deal with a 3 head shot killing overpowerd pistol. The only playlist where I could do this was in Anniversary Squad.

I was mad enough when 343 moved it from the top of the anniversary list and swapped it with classic (making the player count go down significantly). Now I can’t play standard TU gametypes like CTF or slayer on Battle Canyon or Solitary anymore unless I get lucky in the standard playlists (which, lets face it, will never happen)? I think that’s a little stupid.

Please 343, keep this playlist. Is anyone else with me?

22

I just hate the update.

But after readin the posts, and agreeing with all of them, I can already see how bad 343i will feel.

You just don’t go there and remove the good playlist and add and update the default ones, you even ruined the TU with the removal of bleedthrough.

As someone said, 10% speed for TU would’ve been the best thing you could’ve added in the update, and that alone could’ve overcomed the bad sides of the update.

Removing evade was a good move, I give you that, but how about the jetpack in arena???

23

I don’t even know how 343 could -Yoink- it up even more.

24

Bleedthrough was horrible for TU. In vanilla I rarely ever had trouble with double beatdowns, it’s nowhere near as prevalent as some of you make it out to be.

Removal of squad slayer is still annoying though, and I really don’t like the community maps for super slayer.

25

I see disappointment. It makes me happy. Trade off!

“I WILL EAT YOUR UNHAPPINESS!”

  • Caboose
26

Posted this in the Reach forum and was told to move it here:

For those who are not aware, with the March matchmaking update comes the removal of the playlist Squad Slayer. 343 did not give a reason for Squad’s removal but has attempted to justify it by adding “Super Slayer,” a copy of Team Slayer with the addition of the TU. If you ask me, 343 has made the wrong move here.

First of all, a few assumptions must be made about the new “Super Slayer” playlist. Considering the fact that 343 stated that Super Slayer is a “replica” of Team Slayer with TU changes added on, a few things can be inferred.

  1. Super Slayer will contain Armor Lock
  2. Super Slayer will contain all of Team Slayer’s community maps

These two factors will instantly sour the playlist for many of Squad Slayer’s biggest fans. Many players played Squad because it was the only was to avoid these two factors while still getting a Team Slayer-esque experience, and now that they have been added to Super Slayer - a playlist which is essentially Squad - these players will feel as if they have been slapped in the face.

Some may argue that armor lock has been nerfed and that therefore it is no longer as much of an issue. While nobody will argue the validity of this statement the fact remains that most Squad players prefer not having armor lock at all. It still presents the annoyance of having to stop gameplay to toss grenades at a stationary target, and ultimately causes gameplay to be slowed down and stale.

As for the community maps, there can really be no justification for including these. I have never seen a single post from somebody who asked for community maps to be added to Squad Slayer, so there really shouldn’t be any incentive to bring them in. Frankly, many of the maps are considered subpar by the majority of forum posters that I have seen discussing the subject, and yet they are still forced upon us.

The reason I bring these things up is because I feel as if 343 has done a bit of a disservice to the fans of this playlist. Where are we supposed to find a decent armor lock/community map-free game now? The only place to go is either Arena (which is still a very unbalanced playlist), Team Objective (Which isn’t even slayer), or MLG (Which has completely different settings from default). These are all very different experiences from the basic slayer that Squad presented, and as such many Squad fans will be reluctant to play these.

All of this leads me to my final point, which is really quite simple. “Super Slayer?” Really? I think 343 could have come up with a better name for this playlist, but alas, I will just have to feel silly every time I ask if someone wants to play it.

Hopefully someone from 343 sees this post and can sympathize with us Squad fans. I assume the change cannot currently be reversed, but the April matchmaking update can easily alleviate the current problems.

Anyway, thanks for reading, and please post your own thoughts on Squad Slayer’s removal.

27

> I’ll just stop playing this game, until things get better.
>
> This is the worst, update, ever…

Agreed. My birthday is near the end of March. I’ll take a couple of weeks off from Halo and hopefully the April Update will better things. Then hop back on after I buy myself tons of birthday crap.

28

All they had to do was this:

Bleedthrough has been removed on HEADSHOTS.
TU being applied to EVERY PLAYLIST including Campaign and Firefight (It’s called a TITLE update for a reason)
Arena now offers double credit jackpot all the time.
Joke Playlists such as Infection, Grifball and action sack variants are now WEEKEND only affairs (With double/triple credit jackpots)
New Arena maps
New MLG Maps and settings
BTB now includes heavy variant

and that’s it, wouldn’t that have been awesome?

29

Worst update I have seen.

Squad slayer is way too good to be removed.

And adding 110% speed for BTB heavies is just odd…I mean how did they not do that for ZB when it was released, or even the 85% bloom TU gametypes.

And ignoring Arena again is painful. Small, easy changes would make the playlist so much better and wouldn’t require much time at all.

30

> > I’m disappointed in the March update but “makes me sick”? Some of you posters need to stop with the theatrics. Make your opinions heard but remember that it is just a game.
>
> So you’re doing the, “This isn’t a big deal. Get over it.” thing.
>
>
> Guess what. For someone that actually cares what they are playing and actually takes note of what is good and bad about this game, these changes are a big deal.
>
> I honestly don’t see why I should play this game anymore after some of these changes.
>
>
> You can ignore what changed, but telling me that I shouldn’t care is crossing a line.

Forgot to give you a thank, I liked your post the most.

I also see no point for playing this game after these changes.

31

I dont really know what to say.

The feb update added TU to my fav playlist (rumble pit)
So I was kind of like, well I dont know what they’ll do next but I know it’ll be good.

now im hearing they are pulling bleedthrough and im like:
me: thats ok, just bullet bleed right?
343: no; all bleed.
me: war flashback sprintdouble melee sprint double melee

32

I really like how 343 has ignored the Arena every update other than the 85% bloom change. Seriously,

  • Jetpacks need to go. Abusing the map and making the whole point of map control pointless all thanks to jetpack.

  • Bloom. Why isn’t it zero bloom? I’d rather my encounters be based off of better aim and strafe, not luck.

  • Motivation. Why would I play Arena only for my rank to be reset at the end of every season? Why not have something like “Checkpoints”, where at the end of each season it records your final rank like it does currently but the following season you start at that rank.

33

I am really dissapointed

removing squad slayer?
REALLY?
WHAT THE HELL???
one of few good playlist in reach, with no armor lock,5vs5, searching system with players solo vs players solo, full partys vs full partys and TU.

“HURR LETS REMOVE IT AND ADD A PLAYLIST WITH 4VS4 AND WITH THE ARMOR LOCK HURR”

Worst update.

Thanks 343i for making halo reach worst than before.

I though 343i learned with the really bad job that bungie done with Reach, well i dont think this anymore, and i dont doubt that halo 4 will be a crap game like Reach.

Good job 343i.
Really good job.

34

Voted.

I’m fretting over here. Why? Because Bungie (All hail the Makers!) gave us this beautiful playlist as a haven from the armor lock fiesta of every other playlist. We were safe. We would sprint our tin -Yoinks!- off in squads of five completely safe from community made crap maps and one button safe mode.

Please, explain to us WHY Squad Slayer is being removed.

35

> > Oh yeah I almost forgot. You made Objective teams of 5.
> >
> > Why would you do that? How is that beneficial in any way?
>
> Reach does actually work better with 5v5, especially objective, and I won’t mind the change provided they add maps that suit it, like Affinity and Wayont.

I didn’t see anything that indicated that the maps that show up have changed.

Hooray for impossible gametypes like, CTF on Asylum.

36

instead of fixing arena, they add updates to stupid playlist like living dead, grifball, and action sack -_-

37

The worst update I have seen yet.

Instead of all these random changes that don’t really make much sense, why don’t you guys put some effort into The Arena? IMO that needs the most fixing.

Yeah some stuff is “cool” but evade being gone? makes no sense. teams of 5 in OBJ? makes no sense when 4 was just perfect, and now search times are going to be even longer. Bleedthrough gone? yeah it sucks for weapons in reach (-sniper), but with melees it is cool. IMO you should of kept it with melees but removed it from weapons/nades. I don’t like punching matches.

This new slayer thing, I don’t care about. Neither do I care about infection or grifball along with all that other stuff. It is for those who just wanna play around, as is action sack. Don’t make every playlist so casual that those who want a good game have nowhere to go. I feel you guys just took a hop in the opposite direction with this update.

IMO you guys are ignoring those of us with real experience in Halo and listening to all the casuals who really have no experience. I have seen countless “FIX ARENA” threads and it seems nobody acknowledges or even cares to listen to these valid complaints. Most of the good players don’t even come to these forums, and when they do they get banned for stating the truth. lol. I don’t come here often for very similar reasons.

Thanks for further ruining competitive Halo

<3 Avy

38

So, all I’m wondering is where I can play 2 flag on Battle Canyon. If someone can tell me this I will be happy.

39

> All they had to do was this:
>
> Bleedthrough has been removed on HEADSHOTS.
> TU being applied to EVERY PLAYLIST including Campaign and Firefight (It’s called a TITLE update for a reason)
> Arena now offers double credit jackpot all the time.
> Joke Playlists such as Infection, Grifball and action sack variants are now WEEKEND only affairs (With double/triple credit jackpots)
> New Arena maps
> New MLG Maps and settings
> BTB now includes heavy variant
>
> and that’s it, wouldn’t that have been awesome?

This is exactly what they needed to do, but they did the opposite…

I see myself playing more skyrim than Reach now.

40

Worst Update I have ever seen for Reach.