Halo Infinite is quickly coming upon us. Many are prepared to take the fight to the Banished on Zeta Halo and uncover the mystery of the UNSC’s defeat at the installation. One thing that has been on the minds of fans over the years since Halo 5 released is what the future holds for the Prometheans. Now, I understand the Prometheans are a controversial subject within the fandom. A lot of people felt they were out of place in terms of design, frustrating to fight, and fairly uninteresting in terms of their place in the narrative. Personally, I disagree with all three charges, but the Prometheans have been conspicuously absent whenever news about Infinite drops. Halo fan and Twitter user Crisperstorm has even kept count and on march 6th we reached 1000 days since Infinite’s reveal without any real news of the Prometheans possible presence. It may not be chilling news for a lot of people, most times it seems fans have a give it or take it attitude about whether the Prometheans should be around to begin with.
In terms of gameplay, I feel the Prometheans, with tweaks, offer unique gameplay challenges that enrich the battles players can have. Side note, I’m not an expert on gameplay, but after years of the same kind of dynamics the Covenant provided, the Prometheans new tactics felt like a breath of fresh air. There were issues, but I’ll propose a couple of ideas I’d suggest to improve them. Anyone with actual experience making games is free to say whether they’d work or not. - In terms of design, I enjoyed the break from traditional Forerunner design the Prometheans provided. Nothing wrong with the sharp angles, spires, monoliths, and weathered aesthetics of the Forerunners from Bungie’s day. But the Prometheans had that aspect of not looking quite right. They were organic looking, living in a sense. Given their origin from the diseased mind of the Didact, that made perfect sense. However, I will offer an idea on how to perhaps put them more in line with Infinite’s approach while still respecting the tragic nature of their creation. - In terms of narrative, the Prometheans have a plot thread that has yet to be resolved. I’ll explain more in the quick recap about the Prometheans that will follow, but there are living beings trapped within the Knight constructs. Worse still, they seemingly are aware of this fact judging by the behavior of the trapped Knight in Halo 5. This is something that needs resolution and simply tossing the Prometheans in the void just doesn’t fly to me.The potential fixes and reasons can be continued to read below. What do you think? Assume the Prometheans ARE returning. Let’s use our brains to get them to work rather than just throw ideas away.
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> Halo Infinite is quickly coming upon us. Many are prepared to take the fight to the Banished on Zeta Halo and uncover the mystery of the UNSC’s defeat at the installation. One thing that has been on the minds of fans over the years since Halo 5 released is what the future holds for the Prometheans. Now, I understand the Prometheans are a controversial subject within the fandom. A lot of people felt they were out of place in terms of design, frustrating to fight, and fairly uninteresting in terms of their place in the narrative. Personally, I disagree with all three charges, but the Prometheans have been conspicuously absent whenever news about Infinite drops. Halo fan and Twitter user Crisperstorm has even kept count and on march 6th we reached 1000 days since Infinite’s reveal without any real news of the Prometheans possible presence. It may not be chilling news for a lot of people, most times it seems fans have a give it or take it attitude about whether the Prometheans should be around to begin with.
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> - In terms of gameplay, I feel the Prometheans, with tweaks, offer unique gameplay challenges that enrich the battles players can have. Side note, I’m not an expert on gameplay, but after years of the same kind of dynamics the Covenant provided, the Prometheans new tactics felt like a breath of fresh air. There were issues, but I’ll propose a couple of ideas I’d suggest to improve them. Anyone with actual experience making games is free to say whether they’d work or not. - In terms of design, I enjoyed the break from traditional Forerunner design the Prometheans provided. Nothing wrong with the sharp angles, spires, monoliths, and weathered aesthetics of the Forerunners from Bungie’s day. But the Prometheans had that aspect of not looking quite right. They were organic looking, living in a sense. Given their origin from the diseased mind of the Didact, that made perfect sense. However, I will offer an idea on how to perhaps put them more in line with Infinite’s approach while still respecting the tragic nature of their creation. - In terms of narrative, the Prometheans have a plot thread that has yet to be resolved. I’ll explain more in the quick recap about the Prometheans that will follow, but there are living beings trapped within the Knight constructs. Worse still, they seemingly are aware of this fact judging by the behavior of the trapped Knight in Halo 5. This is something that needs resolution and simply tossing the Prometheans in the void just doesn’t fly to me.The potential fixes and reasons can be continued to read below. What do you think? Assume the Prometheans ARE returning. Let’s use our brains to get them to work rather than just throw ideas away.
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> Prometheans Reforged: Bringing Promethean Forces into Halo Infinite and Beyond
Aww, why the GT change, Doc?
In all seriousness though: I agree. The H4 Prometheans gameplay issues were indicative of a gameplay problem generally in that game rather than the cause of it outright, the changes made in Halo 5 were promising, but still left a lot to be desired. Soldiers’ only main difference from Elites was teleporting instead of dodging which is more annoying than anything else and the non-effectiveness of the noob-combo. If we’d had the introduction to Prometheans in nice wide open spaces where groups could be avoided more easily I think they’d have been received better, but because so much of H4 was in much more confined spaces, it made that so much more difficult. Gameplay-wise I actually think the roles are pretty decent:
Crawlers are much faster than grunts - more like skirmishers, but can easily overwhelm and aren’t helpless in CQC. I like H4 having some of them as snipers too - again more like skirmishers - Watchers were a really interesting role specialising in protection/repair of others. I also thought their H4 trick of summoning turrets/reinforcements was a nice added touch. I like that they’re not a one-shot kill too as then you’d not have a decision to make so much over dealing wit them first vs reducing incoming fire. - Soldiers, this is where it gets difficult. I don’t really know what their role is… they kinda just seem to do everything and the teleporting just gets annoying. - Knights: Halo 4 they were just bullet sponges, whereas Halo 5 a least gave them weakpoints, but they’re still stuck halfway between a Hunter (for those with Incineration cannons) and an old-style Brute (for those with smaller arms)In terms of how you bring the Prometheans back… I think Shadow of Reach gives us the answer: the Banished and the UNSC seem very keen on avoiding their conflict escalating to draw Cortana’s gaze. I sense when she does arrive, Prometheans may be in tow. That said: for all the bluster in Halo 5: I suspect she’s not got anywhere near as many Prometheans left by the time of Infinite through losses and the datapurges associated with them - as if she had limitless numbers why would she have needed the Guardians in the first place?
Cortana may have a way to replenish her forces given a little tease in 5. She said that any who opposed her would face the white hot wrath of the Created and be reformed in the image of the Created. Sounds like a threat of composition. Now, maybe there may not be any normal Composers left, but terminal in Halo 4 told us the way humans make Smart AIs is similar to how the Composer worked. Supercharge human AI creation tech with Forerunner stuff and I think Cortana could jerryrig a new kind of Composer.
I like the idea of the Prometheans from a narrative perspective, I’d really enjoy further exploration of them, truly.
However, personally, from a gameplay perspective, they’re just so boring and bland to fight, I like to use Midnight as the example of choice for this, it’s a pretty cool layout of a level and has some set pieces that are really engaging from what has come before in a Halo campaign, but the level falls flat with the combat against the Prometheans, Watchers are not a fun obstacle to overcome, they’re a constant annoyance that only provides the sentiment of “this is not a fun enemy to encounter, I will remove this from the current engagement as soon as possible because of just that”, Crawlers provide no substance in combat other than being mildly-irritating distractions from Knights & Watchers (an argument could probably be made that grunts serve the same purpose but I’d argue the mechanics of a Crawler devolve the engagement in comparison).
and Knights, I just don’t have an opinion on an enemy so bland, both Halo 4 & 5 versions of the enemy don’t really offer me an enjoyable engagement, just a large target to shoot and move on, I’d probably give Soldiers a pass for the reason that when I shoot one I don’t feel like the encounter was entirely uninspired, given that they’re basically Halo 4’s Knights but …tamed, and fair.
My personal changes would be pretty experimental, and probably wouldn’t serve much of a fix, instead exploring what might/might not work - starting with Knights, I’d have them serve a role similar to the Fireborne Baron from DOOM, they’d be more of an aggressive CQC enemy with a sword as their only weapon, I wouldn’t give them any ranged weapon whatsoever and instead have the Soldier dedicated to a ranged role, Watchers would be slowed slightly & be paired with a singular Promethean and provide their pairing with certain trait boosts making them the first weak-spot to exploit in an engagement
I don’t really know what I’d do with Crawlers, I might update the post in the future.
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> Cortana may have a way to replenish her forces given a little tease in 5. She said that any who opposed her would face the white hot wrath of the Created and be reformed in the image of the Created. Sounds like a threat of composition. Now, maybe there may not be any normal Composers left, but terminal in Halo 4 told us the way humans make Smart AIs is similar to how the Composer worked. Supercharge human AI creation tech with Forerunner stuff and I think Cortana could jerryrig a new kind of Composer.
That’s borderline terrifying, but good catch! Where is that quotation?
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> > Cortana may have a way to replenish her forces given a little tease in 5. She said that any who opposed her would face the white hot wrath of the Created and be reformed in the image of the Created. Sounds like a threat of composition. Now, maybe there may not be any normal Composers left, but terminal in Halo 4 told us the way humans make Smart AIs is similar to how the Composer worked. Supercharge human AI creation tech with Forerunner stuff and I think Cortana could jerryrig a new kind of Composer.
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> That’s borderline terrifying, but good catch! Where is that quotation?
The level Guardians:
Cortana: “For you, there will be great wrath. It will burn hot and consume you, and when you are gone, we will take that which remains, and we will remake it in our own image.”
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> > > Cortana may have a way to replenish her forces given a little tease in 5. She said that any who opposed her would face the white hot wrath of the Created and be reformed in the image of the Created. Sounds like a threat of composition. Now, maybe there may not be any normal Composers left, but terminal in Halo 4 told us the way humans make Smart AIs is similar to how the Composer worked. Supercharge human AI creation tech with Forerunner stuff and I think Cortana could jerryrig a new kind of Composer.
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> > That’s borderline terrifying, but good catch! Where is that quotation?
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> The level Guardians:
> - Cortana: “For you, there will be great wrath. It will burn hot and consume you, and when you are gone, we will take that which remains, and we will remake it in our own image.”
Much as it will hurt… I really need to get more familiar with the Halo 5 campaign. Haven’t touched it since achievement completing in July 2017. Little tidbits like that are critically important
I think Infinite, while focusing on bringing things back to a classic feel, holds a lot of potential to rewrite a lot of the organization and dynamics of literally every factions from the remaining humans, the created, the covenant and the Banished so I hope they tap into that potential in at least some regard.
It would be weird to don’t have prometheans in Halo Infinite, I think 343 didn’t talk about them because of theyr bad reputation. I’m sure they will appear, but not as often as in Halo 5.
I regret we didn’t see prometheans fight the floods, they were design for this in the begining. I hope we will see flood and prometheans in Infinite.