I like Sprinting as an automatically replenishing default ability, but I’m hoping that the additional Armor Abilities will be kind of like a mix between Halo 3 Equipment and Power-Ups, in that they’ll have to be sought after in game for picking-up and then they’ll come with a limited amount of energy (no automatic replenishing of necessary energy).
Hopefully, when an additional Armor Ability is picked-up a player will have to switch to using it’s benefit over their default Sprint ability by selecting it through the D-Pad (four possible additional armor abilities) and then by doing so the selected ability can be used with the previous “sprint” button and the Sprint ability will take the place of the additional Armor Ability on the D-Pad (visualized within a player’s HUD). Once these additional Armor Abilities are depleted of energy they will also disappear from a player’s HUD as a D-Pad optional ability to choose from and the Sprint ability will automatically become the player’s default ability again. Also, if a player was to use an additional Armor Ability for a specific task and then wanted to go back to using their Sprint ability then all they’d have to do is re-select the D-Pad button that the Sprint ability would now occupy when it replaced the selected additional Armor Ability.
A player should be able to replenish a nearly depleted additional Armor Ability or re-acquire one after fully depleting it by re-locating it in-game and picking it up. I think that by presenting the additional Armor Abilities with a set amount of stored energy that gets fully depleted through use their short-term benefits will be better balanced within Halo’s gameplay.
Examples:
Maybe the Jetpack will only have enough juice in it for 2 or 3 big boosts before being fully drained, thus allowing a player to get to specific areas or locations not normally reached or simply getting to higher ground faster then on foot, but not designed for consistent use.
Perhaps the Cloaking Device will only keep a player invisible for a specific period of time before becoming forever depleted, similar to what the Invisable Power-Up would provide, except it comes with the draw-back of causing a radar scrambling to all nearby radars, including it’s users.
The Hologram Device could have a cap on how many holograms it can produce before running out of energy, like maybe 5 total holograms can be produced before the device is discarded.
The Forerunner Vision also could have an energy meter which would get depleted as it was used.
The other thought I had in regards to these additional Armor Abilities was that maybe people had to find special energy canisters for pick-up in-game to make them temporarily work… a similar concept to my previous one except that the abilities would already exist within every character, but the proper energy canisters would have to be located and picked-up to make them temporarily work.
Basically, I just hope they seriously re-imagine how they work from what we got in Halo: Reach… by being unusable at the start of matches and restricting their use through limiting how many people can use them in-game at any particular time and for how long before they become exhausted.