I wanted to offer 343i a recommendation for a change at Power-Up.
I’d like to start by saying I’m a big fan of how the Power-Ups work within Halo 5 in reference to them needing to be activated and that I hope future titles stick with this iteration. However, I admit I’m not a fan of the Damage Boost Power-Up because I feel it lacks authenticity within the game’s presented reality. All of the Power-Up animations demonstrate players placing a type of armor enhancer into their chest piece that results in a temporary advantage boost.
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The Active Camo Power-Up results in creating a refractive field around a player’s armor that provides optical masking (aka makes them transparent) for a brief period of time. By linking the power-up to the armor with its activation process I feel that 343i is able to re-enforce its authenticity and existence within the game’s reality. - The Overshield Power-Up results in a player gaining an extra amount of shielding (non-rechargeable) for a brief period of time. Again, by linking the power-up to the armor with its activation process I feel that 343i is able to re-enforce its authenticity and existence within the game’s reality. - The Speed Boost Power-Up results in a player gaining a temporary increase to movement, reloading, assassination and weapon switch speeds. This is another example of where linking the power-up to the armor with its activation process re-enforces its authenticity and existence within the game’s reality. Visually it could continue to be represented by a white-ish character armor highlight. - The Damage Boost Power-Up results in a player gaining a temporary Increase toward the damage dealt via melee attacks, weapons, grenades, and vehicles. This is a case where I don’t think the activation process makes much sense in how the power-up provides it’s benefits. How does putting a power-up into your armor lead to your actual weapons, grenades, or vehicles inflicting more damage? Unless all weapons are designed to discharge energy that can be drawn from your armor the power-up really doesn’t make any practical sense. UNSC weapons are pretty much all cartridge based which means that in order to gain a damage boost your character should be required to replace the ammunition being fired with something more deadly, but that’s not represented by the boost power-up. The concept of this power-up just doesn’t fit the reality trying to be created within the game which is why I’d like to see it removed.
I think there’s an opportunity to create a new Power-Up meant to replace both the misfit Damage Boost and the somewhat underwhelming Speed Boost. A Power-Up that fits the reality created within the game and provides these temporary benefits: -
Increased movement, reloading, assassination, and weapon switch speeds. (from Speed Boost) - Increased jump height. - Increased shield recharge and health recovery rates. - Increased melee damage and Ground Pound’s Area-of-Effect (AOE) damage-wise. Doesn’t allow 1HKs from the front, but does allow for 1 pistol body shot to finish an opponent. (kind of taken from Damage Boost) - Increased distance on Thruster evade and reduced the boost’s cool-down. - Quicker Ground Pound activation. - Ability to recharge shields while sprinting.Allow its timer to be comparable to the Damage & Speed Boosts.
I feel this type of Power-Up would be a reasonable option to put on maps when comparing its advantages to those provided by Overshields and Active Camo; plus, it makes a lot more plausible sense within the game since all of its benefits are linked to the armor. I wasn’t sure what to call it, but in carrying over a term from both the two Power-Ups it’s meant to replace I thought “Spartan Boost” or just “Boost” might be an ideal name for it.
Thoughts?