Playlists...Social and Ranked

Games Halo Infinite
1

Now that we have a broad idea of settings for social and ranked matchmaking, I’ve seen some comments about what the playlist offering should be. This has been a major gripe of mine and of a lot of the community especially during 343’s stewardship of the series. So I think we all better get ahead of the conversation and start our suggestions now, rather than waiting until after release.

So without further delay my suggestion:

SOCIAL
For social matchmaking I think it’s best to move forward with a match composer like what we have in MCC rather than going back to searching specific playlists. If it can work for 6 different games, it should work even better for just one–perhaps with more options.

I think it will work well to have 3 rows of options just like MCC but with one modification:

Team Size: [ 4v4 / 12v12 / 1vALL / 2v2v2v2 ]

Starting loadout: [ Auto / Precision / Gametype Specific ]

Gametype: [ Slayer / Flag & Bomb / Zone Control / Asset Denial / Swat / Snipers / Infection / Action Sack ]

Obviously for certain team sizes some of the lower options will be grayed out. But the idea (if you’re unfamiliar) is you can select as many options simultaneously as are compatible with each other and the size of your party. Obviously more things could be added (maybe Grifball or Rocket Race for example) and I’m not opposed to any of that. The more the better for social at launch. Feel free to make suggestions.

RANKED
Ranked will still have traditional set playlists with the competitive settings shown off by 343. However I think it would be healthy for these lists to included more maps and gametypes on top of the limited list HCS might.

AREA (4v4)

DOUBLES (2v2)

FFA (free-for-all)

I think with a wide variety in social, it’s not necessary to have too many ranked playlists (but I do have some suggestions I will make further along in this post). As long as precision options exist in social (with radar and maybe a secondary) we have enough of a bridge from social to ranked. You can warm up for ranked with some social precision slayer or avoid objective if you aren’t feeling the mixed bag of ranked.

So the above is the minimum I think the game should launch with. And if there is no Social Composer, I think it’s essential for some precision options for 4v4 and BTB at least. But assuming all is as I suggest here are some more suggestions:

Ranked 4v4 Team Slayer
Team Slayer has always been a popular ranked playlist which offers players a soft entry into ranked. In Halo 3 it featured a hybrid loadout of a Battle Rifle and Assault Rifle together with Radar. However, I would consider making it only BRs with Radar unless the Battle Rifle is given an faster ROF and the Assault Rifle is given a range reduction via bloom and/or has its headshot modifier removed–otherwise I don’t think the weapons are compatible is a singular loadout.

Ranked 6v6 Squad Battle (vehicles enabled)
This is only a suggestion assuming there is a healthy amount of maps like Behemoth, which support vehicles for smaller team sizes. I think though Bazaar might manage this team size too. This list would have the same player settings as Team Slayer. So also a less hardcore mode included in ranked. But it would be targeted at filling the void left by BTB moving to larger team sizes and more chaotic design. This is for players who would like precision starts combined with vehicle combat and more traditional weapon spawns.

So those are my thoughts as of now. Happy to hear everyone else’s.

2

I think your idea is spot on

3

I hate reading…i like the ideas but they really need to add something new to make it exciting. This is just a basic halo game if it doesn’t add stuff like warzone, inavsion or something big. The game feels just about perfect but i would like something to make it stand out from other games. The sandbox is amazing so far so it definitely has the potential for anything.

4

I like the idea where you can select the option for different variants for Social such as AR/Sidekick or BR starts as well as from a list of gametypes. I’m curious how that would impact the searching for players wait time or equalizing the skills of each team. I haven’t played enough MCC matchmaking to know if those questions have been solved well or not.

5

> I like the idea where you can select the option for different variants for Social such as AR/Sidekick or BR starts as well as from a list of gametypes. I’m curious how that would impact the searching for players wait time or equalizing the skills of each team. I haven’t played enough MCC matchmaking to know if those questions have been solved well or not.

Some combinations are increasingly long and difficult to find games in.

If you want random it’s essentially impossible as you’ll end up in Halo 3 or Reach the majority of the time.

That’s the issue with too much choice, it stifles variety. Good for some reasons, bad for some reasons.

6

> 2535428598788379;2:
> I think your idea is spot on

Thanks!

> 2533274907398117;3:
> I hate reading…i like the ideas but they really need to add something new to make it exciting. This is just a basic halo game if it doesn’t add stuff like warzone, inavsion or something big. The game feels just about perfect but i would like something to make it stand out from other games. The sandbox is amazing so far so it definitely has the potential for anything.

…then I hope you like Battle Royale, because I’m 99% sure that’s the “big” new mode they have planned. I wouldn’t hate it, but firefight would be my preference.

> 2760465307323250;4:
> I like the idea where you can select the option for different variants for Social such as AR/Sidekick or BR starts as well as from a list of gametypes. I’m curious how that would impact the searching for players wait time or equalizing the skills of each team. I haven’t played enough MCC matchmaking to know if those questions have been solved well or not.

Well it’s really hard to say because in MCC instead of the BR or AR option they have 6 different titles. I think even if there are bad search times in some MCC searches, this is much more streamlined just by the nature of it being a single game. If some specific mixture of choices got especially slow, I wouldn’t be options being limited. Or you could consolidate all objectives into one option.

I think the key is to start with many options to gauge interest, rather than not enough and trying to guess what people might want.

> 2533274801036271;5:
> > …
>
> Some combinations are increasingly long and difficult to find games in.
>
> If you want random it’s essentially impossible as you’ll end up in Halo 3 or Reach the majority of the time.
>
> That’s the issue with too much choice, it stifles variety. Good for some reasons, bad for some reasons.

Hopefully being based around infinite rather than multiple titles, the composer will sustain more options with good queue times.

7

They should just put all the playlists in if they want to keep all the players.
Personally I would only play Team Snipers, but of course they will do the usual thing where they only keep a few playlists because of only 100 people playing the game. It would be more if they had what they wanted to play. It will also be free to play and cross platform, so player count shouldn’t be a problem.

I am also curious about what new they’re adding. Something that would have the same feeling as Battlefield, Battle Royale, Counter Strike / Valorant or Tarkov would be cool.

8

> 2533274801036271;5:
> > I like the idea where you can select the option for different variants for Social such as AR/Sidekick or BR starts as well as from a list of gametypes. I’m curious how that would impact the searching for players wait time or equalizing the skills of each team. I haven’t played enough MCC matchmaking to know if those questions have been solved well or not.
>
> Some combinations are increasingly long and difficult to find games in.
>
> If you want random it’s essentially impossible as you’ll end up in Halo 3 or Reach the majority of the time.
>
> That’s the issue with too much choice, it stifles variety. Good for some reasons, bad for some reasons.

So make tham play games thay don’t like? What’s to keep tham for just quitting Halo and not play anymore?

9

I like your suggestions; particularly the ranked 6v6 Squad Battle w/ vehicles. That would be pretty amazing. Maybe they could even include a clans/spartan teams feature as well like Halo 2 did, and you could only enter the playlist with players that were in that group/team. Of course concerns for playlist size might pop up, but if they make the playlist interesting enough and perhaps have separate challenges and rewards for spartan teams, it should stay populated well enough.

Only other thing I may disagree with is that I think they should have both a ranked HCS playlist and a Team Arena playlist. Yes, like you said, have a Ranked Team Slayer, but I think you still need that game mode that is competitive mainly in the sense of ranks w/ near default settings (few tweaks, no/altered radar, or rotating gametypes w/ diff starting weapons would be fine) to really bridge that gap between Social & Competitive. Even someone like me who most likely will be in the HCS playlist, I’d like a Ranked Team Arena too. I’d hope it terms of ‘sweatiness’ it would rank somewhere between the social & HCS playlists lol.

This is more personal preference, but I loathe Slayer games as well. So I hardly ever step foot in a Team Slayer playlist, but Arena/Objective/Mixed playlists I’m all for. Not saying ranked Team Slayer shouldn’t be there; but again, I think we need non-HCS ranked playists with objective gametypes. Hey if not Ranked Team Arena, maybe give us Ranked Team Objective.

10

I like your suggestions; particularly the ranked 6v6 Squad Battle w/ vehicles. That would be pretty amazing. Maybe they could even include a clans/spartan teams feature as well like Halo 2 did, and you could only enter the playlist with players that were in that group/team. Of course concerns for playlist player population might come up, but if they make the playlist interesting enough and perhaps have separate challenges and rewards for spartan teams, it should stay populated well enough.

Only other thing I may disagree with is that I think they should have both a ranked HCS playlist and a Team Arena playlist. Yes, like you said, have a Ranked Team Slayer, but I think you still need that game mode that is competitive mainly in the sense of ranks w/ near default settings (few tweaks, no/altered radar, or rotating gametypes w/ diff starting weapons would be fine) to really bridge that gap between Social & Competitive. Even someone like me who most likely will be in the HCS playlist, I’d like a Ranked Team Arena too. I’d hope it terms of ‘sweatiness’ it would rank somewhere between the social & HCS playlists lol.

This is more personal preference, but I loathe Slayer games as well. So I hardly ever step foot in a Team Slayer playlist, but Arena/Objective/Mixed playlists I’m all for. Not saying ranked Team Slayer shouldn’t be there; but again, I think we need non-HCS ranked playists with objective gametypes. Hey if not Ranked Team Arena, maybe give us Ranked Team Objective.

11

I think having 1v1, 2v2, 4v4, 6v6, 8v8, 12v12, and 14v14 would be nice if they are all done properly.

12

> 2533274822974388;7:
> They should just put all the playlists in if they want to keep all the players.
> Personally I would only play Team Snipers, but of course they will do the usual thing where they only keep a few playlists because of only 100 people playing the game. It would be more if they had what they wanted to play. It will also be free to play and cross platform, so player count shouldn’t be a problem.
>
> I am also curious about what new they’re adding. Something that would have the same feeling as Battlefield, Battle Royale, Counter Strike / Valorant or Tarkov would be cool.

I agree. Launch day they should have as many options as possible. In the past they have always limited themselves by starting with too few playlists. I’d rather they start with too many and then remove what’s absolutely unpopular, rather than have to guess what to add.

> 2800005839763819;8:
> > 2533274801036271;5:
> > > …
> >
> > Some combinations are increasingly long and difficult to find games in.
> >
> > If you want random it’s essentially impossible as you’ll end up in Halo 3 or Reach the majority of the time.
> >
> > That’s the issue with too much choice, it stifles variety. Good for some reasons, bad for some reasons.
>
> So make tham play games thay don’t like? What’s to keep tham for just quitting Halo and not play anymore?

That’s a good point. If you want a variety in a social composer, sometimes you’re just going to have to pick a less popular option on its own and stomach the longer queue time. But that’s not really a point against it, as that’s what you’d do with playlists anyway.

> 2533274800093485;9:
> I like your suggestions; particularly the ranked 6v6 Squad Battle w/ vehicles. That would be pretty amazing. Maybe they could even include a clans/spartan teams feature as well like Halo 2 did, and you could only enter the playlist with players that were in that group/team. Of course concerns for playlist size might pop up, but if they make the playlist interesting enough and perhaps have separate challenges and rewards for spartan teams, it should stay populated well enough.
>
> Only other thing I may disagree with is that I think they should have both a ranked HCS playlist and a Team Arena playlist. Yes, like you said, have a Ranked Team Slayer, but I think you still need that game mode that is competitive mainly in the sense of ranks w/ near default settings (few tweaks, no/altered radar, or rotating gametypes w/ diff starting weapons would be fine) to really bridge that gap between Social & Competitive. Even someone like me who most likely will be in the HCS playlist, I’d like a Ranked Team Arena too. I’d hope it terms of ‘sweatiness’ it would rank somewhere between the social & HCS playlists lol.
>
> This is more personal preference, but I loathe Slayer games as well. So I hardly ever step foot in a Team Slayer playlist, but Arena/Objective/Mixed playlists I’m all for. Not saying ranked Team Slayer shouldn’t be there; but again, I think we need non-HCS ranked playists with objective gametypes. Hey if not Ranked Team Arena, maybe give us Ranked Team Objective.

I could see Ranked Team Objective being a thing. It’s just for me I’d probably play the 6v6 playlist for more casual objective and HCS rules when I really wanted to try hard, so Team Objective would occupy a weird middle ground for me. I would definitely make it objective only though because if it included Slayer I think it would just have too much parody with whatever the HCS playlist ends up doing.

> 2533274884814417;11:
> I think having 1v1, 2v2, 4v4, 6v6, 8v8, 12v12, and 14v14 would be nice if they are all done properly.

When the largest common team size was 8v8 I remember advocating for 3v3v3v3 multi team returning so nearly every party size would be accounted for.

But I think what I’ve suggested accounts for all of those besides 1v1’s which have to be the easiest customs to set up if you are really into them. I guess it could be ranked. What are queue times like in MCC? That’s has 1v1s right? I’m just not so familiar with how popular they actually are.

Oh and I guess I didn’t include 14v14 but I don’t know if that’s something 343 is even designing for or not.

13

I like the idea only tweak i would make would be to add a Ranked Objective.