Info: this is a story DLC concept based around things I have heard in Reviews. the main focus is bringing back Marine driving and big vehicle set pieces.
Story: A surviving spartan, has gotten Master chiefs coms, and is requesting support apparently the banished are building a few scarabs on the ring. They need your help to push back and destroy the factories before the scarabs come on line.
New enemies/allies: Engineers, skitters
new weapons: bruteshot, fuel rod, m57 Pilum
New vehicles: Grizzly tank(unique found in a banished base used by a boss only two exist.), locust
Story: this will be based around 3 story missions and a large desert openworld area on the opposite side of the ring.
mission one: Spartan to chief
this mission starts with chief being dropped off at a FoB just after getting a distress signal from a spartan a marine states the signal is coming from just up the cliff. this mission is a cliff side battle to the top of the area fighting your way through jackal snipers and suprisingly a lot of banshees. The pilot unable to take you over the cliff do to an AA gun at the top. (destroyed at the end of the mission.)
Once you make it to the top, you enter into mission two almost instantly.
Mission two: Contact friendly
This is the second mission which happens just after you take out the AA gun, two friendly wasps will fly over head a third landing nearby this is the spartan that called for you.
He will explain that the banished have a scarab factory on the other side of this desert area, but they have been unable to breach it sense they lost contact with infinity. And they only have a bit before it is brought back online. He informs you the banished are using inslaved engineers and UNSC personel to build the thing, and it is upto you how to take this on.
this opens up the semi open world area this level has 3 main objectives, and 10 valor objectives, as well as a few propaganda towers. the main thing is the FoB at the start has two hogs, and a razorback, which you can see being dropped in via another pelican one at a time.
If you get into the razorback or one of the hogs, marines will get into another one of the hogs to follow you.
You can not do the final mission until completing the three main open world objectives which are as follows.
Locust point
info: a banished facility which has been building locusts from scrapped forerunner tech. two of such vehicles are hostile in it.
AA gun bravo
info: a second banished AA gun
lekgolo vats
info: a facility like the banished outposts in campaign. this one has a lot of hunters in it, including a few skitters (new enemy.)
Side objectives include
free engineers x2
info: engineers are being forced to dissemble or hack something free them or kill them to stop the banished. (either way you get valor). freeing them gives you something unique as engineers can repair vehicles and heal allies that are nearby as well as grant marines shields (new marine variant unlocked at max valor from the DLC)
free marines x4
info: standard event
propagana tower
info: standard event
named sanghelli merc
info: a sanghelli merc that drives a grizzly tank, it is painted with banished colors. this is a hard fight, requiring vehicle knowledge. good news is there is a second grizzly tank in the area.
Once the main objectives and any side objectives you like are done you can move to the second story bit.
Mission 3: the factory
info: this can be started at any point after you take down the AA gun and lekgolo vats, it is made a lot easier but taking out the locust facility but that isn’t required. the player starts the attack how ever they want hitting the outer walls, once chief breaches them allied tanks and wasps will start rolling in fighting with the banished vehicles around the facility. the player then goes through a rather linear open area destroying parts of the factory as the pilot drops of tanks and other goodies.
The mission sees you disabling 2 scarabs before they can be activated, but at the end a third is activated its AA rockets shooting down some wasps. the spartan form the start bailing out after theirs is hit. this is an infusion scarab, having 4 weakspots on it that must be destroyed for it to go into emergency state. Form there you board it via a grav lift bellow and take out 3 floors of hostiles. once you destroy the lekgolo core at the command center it falls and a cutscene happens.
new enemies
Engineer
info: we all know these from halo ODST, they are seen in this as a banished slave that has the ability to grant shields to any rank of soldier around them, as well as repair vehicles and heal lekgolo based enemies. all engineers have a slave station which if destroyed frees the engineer and allows it to join your side. after which it will grant shielding to nearby marines, and repair UNSC vehicles. On top of that marines given shields will have them forever if they break they will just return, these shields are weak though.
Skitter
info: about the size of a ghost these infantry are another version of lekgolo, this time in a vehicle frame instead of an armor frame. Skitters are fast moving able to climb walls, and are armed with either twin plasma cannons similar to a shade, or a plasma mortar similar to a wraith. they are hard to deal with but explosives take them out easily. they are also exposed on the top and joints so a good sniper can take them out.
new weapons
Bruteshot
returning from halo 2-3 this is a massive weapon larger then it was in the first two do to the banished using it using power armor. unlike before it is a heavy weapon 4 round mag and fires like a mortar in fact brutes with it will treat it like an indirect fire weapon aiming to hit targets from above instead of the side. marines can pick it up and will treat it like so as well.
fuelrod gun
returning from halo in general, this is mostly used by grunts, instead of being ammo based it is battery based as the banished have refined their use of infusion jells and know how to properly make the things, unlike the covenant who didn’t really understand their own guns. This makes grunts a heavy threat against vehicles. along with this you may see a few using spnkers so watch out.
m57 Pilum
returning from halo 5, this time it is treated as an AA weapon, not having the blast radius of the spnker but instead having the ability to lock onto air vehicles. it has a 3 clip which is fed via rather large disposable clips. To off set this, it has almost no blast radius, and requires a direct hit to kill a brute. though one rocket is enough to blow up a banshee.
vehicles
Locust
from halo wars and halo wars 2, this walker acts as a mobile hunter fuelrod gun, having both a stream fire mode and a plasma mortar mode. on top of that it also has shield which is rare for banished vehicles. that said once the shield is down it is easily destroyed by even 2 shots from sniper to the right locations.
player driven: YES
normal driver: Grunts or elites.
m850 Grizzly
Found with a boss elite driving one this is a 3 man crew tank which can support 6 more marines on its tracks. when found there is a hostile one with a crew of elites.
crew: driver (controls main cannon and co-axle mg) turret gunner (controls 360 degreee MG mounted to the top of the turret, and a set of rocket pods.) front gunner (standard tank gunner)
the grizzly isn’t something to laugh at, having a lot of fire power and armor, taking it down requires hits form a ton of explosives and smart play as it is twice the size of a scorpion, and instead of having a rear engine it has a front mounted engine. with the rear being an armory (similar to those at the FoBs)
player driven: yes
enemy drivers: a named elite, and 2 named jackals, pirates from after the human covenant war hired by the banished.
note: an audio log nearby would show the grizzlys are from the spirit of fire, and from the ark apparently the group managed to steal them from a human arms depot when the flood where unleashed on the ark.