Warthog Feedback From an Enthusiast

Games Halo Infinite
1

<strong>Disclaimer: I love this vehicle to my core, so the below post is extremely in-depth. Due to the character limit, I’ll be replying to the main post with additional feedback</strong>

Hello,

However odd this may seem, I am a Halo Warthog enthusiast. What do I mean by that? I mean I primarily play Halo to operate the Warthog (mostly as the designated driver). I have been a halo player since CE, and well versed in game mechanics, and would consider myself above average at the game. With that said, I would consider myself to be s-tier at driving and otherwise operating the Warthog. Many people do not quite understand how that’s possible, because, you just drive it right? Well, yes, but I could say that about any gun “you just shoot it right?”. The level of intricacy involved in being a superb Warthog driver is to not only understand the vehicle mechanics and the in-game physics which dictates how it works, but the awareness required to provide your main turret operator and especially the passenger a clear angle of attack, the familiarity of routes on any given map, and many other things.

To close out my interest in it and to punctuate my point, you’ve all experienced something like this; You see a Warthog and so does several other players. Everyone scrambles to get the gun, but you get it. Another player reluctantly hops in the driver seat (often holding the horn down) and starts to drive away. Within 10 seconds, you’ve already flipped once. This may happen again, or they simply continue getting stuck on objects. You sit there and are excited as you finally made it to combat aaaand… they drive you right into the fray with zero regard for your safety, their safety, or the safety of the vehicle. You promptly explode without getting a single kill or accomplishing a single objective and wasted several minutes of gameplay. I’m the player you want to come pick you up. With that said, I’d like to provide my insight into the current state of the Warthog within Halo Infinite, and the changes I believe should be implemented to improve the overall experience for the Warthog operators, and those who oppose them.

Overall, I feel like the Warthog is in an okay place. There are some fairly substantial problems that I’m hoping are addressed on some level otherwise this may be the weakest version of a Warthog in possible all Halo games. While I recommend some changes, I do not mean they should all be implemented. To get started, Warthog durability and defense is necessary for me to cover before moving to other areas because this impacts almost every other facet of the vehicle. Simply put, the Warthog has some major durability and defense problems. There are many things contributing towards this.

The body of the Warthog itself is extremely weak. Everything from small arms to power weapons and vehicles will absolutely shred this thing. I wasn’t able to do accurate testing on the number of shots per weapon to destroy the Warthog, but almost every weapon in the game can melt it. This is accentuated by being able to hit critical areas either doing more damage, or destroying wheels. Taking more damage/losing parts from hitting critical areas is actually fantastic and I fully support it. I think they did a great job ascetically when the Warthog is damaged, and especially with the wheels coming off and the subsequent loss of handling on the vehicle. My concern, is that the Warthog is already so weak, that hitting a critical area is overkill.

I won’t spend time discussing weapons/weapon balance because this is a topic that has been discussed many times before, other than to mention there are far too many power weapons/counters available to players to allow them to dominate an enemy Warthog. From my own memory, this seems to be the Halo with the most power weapons and/or counters available to players (at least, in this most recent BTB test). For anyone who has played, you know what I mean. They are absolutely everywhere. This especially includes the ravager. I believe it spawns naturally at four separate locations on the map. It is almost tailormade to decimate the Warthog and you will get shot with one in almost every engagement due to its availability. It shoots burst area of effect rounds that also push the vehicle. If you do manage to survive a 1 on 1 with a player using a ravager, you’ve almost certainly lost most of the durability on your Warthog. I do understand that in a straight up fight with almost every weapon the Warthog will win, but in realistic scenarios, it’s less frequent that you will get the first shot off at an enemy player while in the Warthog. Most smart players play cat and mouse and will wait for the vehicle to stop or the the gunner to look away to then get several unanswered shots off. Considering the frequency of spawns, you’re more likely to meet players with direct counters or power weapons in the first minute than not. Icing on the cake here is the very cool grappling hook (I honestly love it), but frankly, it makes hijacking the Warthog (and all vehicles) easier than it has ever been, adding insult to injury.

Continued Below

2

You also have to consider the Spartan players operating the vehicle. One of the weakest parts of any vehicle in all of Halo are the Spartans. The Warthog is designed as a very open vehicle with minimal protection for the Spartan players. I am inherently all for this and wouldn’t want to see it changed. It’s only an issue due to the Warthog being so weak on its own. Enemy players targeting the Warthog don’t really have any bad options. Hit the Warthog? Good. Hit the Spartan(s) in the Warthog? Good. It’s a win/win no matter where you hit the vehicle as even if you hit a non-critical area, you’re causing severe damage to the overall vehicle health. The Spartans have always been the optimal target to hit if you had a choice because they are by almost every metric weaker than the vehicles themselves when it comes to absorbing damage. Pouring salt in the wound is the ability to destroy the defensive plate mounted to the turret. The Warthog gunner is by far the most exposed overall. The saving grace for all Warthog gunners has always been that you can mitigate damage by facing towards your enemy. The shield and weapon itself block a fair amount of damage while still leaving the head and small sections exposed for counterplay (you’re almost completely exposed if you’re facing any direction except towards an enemy and in most situations there are more than one enemy present, requiring you to make a judgement call on which you will face/focus first). Now, the shield can be destroyed, removing one of the advantages to playing well.

Now, the durability concerns by themselves wouldn’t be as big of an issue if not for this; it is far too easy to disable the Warthog. A vehicle with this low of durability, with almost no protections to the occupants, simply cannot thrive in an environment where weapons/grenades/equipment are as available and as strong as they currently are. I’ve already mentioned this but there are way too many of these available. The most obvious being the well known over tuned “dynamo” grenades. These spawn at four places on the map, each giving two, with a low cooldown on replenishment. One of these things thrown remotely close to the vehicle shuts it down. The range on this thing is far too long. In addition, it also does a crazy amount of damage to the Spartans. So not only will it stop the vehicle, almost surely becoming target practice to all nearby enemy Spartans, but the grenade is also shredding the extremely exposed occupants.

I won’t cover all of the ways to disable the Warthog, but in all cases, it’s easier than it has ever been. In the last few Halo games, there were options to shut vehicles down, but they weren’t quite as easy. Primarily, the charged up plasma pistol. You had to charge it, exposing your location, but also it had a relatively slow travel time. I don’t know if they plan on adding this feature back onto the plasma pistol (or if it is a bug), but if you become able to disable Warthogs with a charged plasma pistol, it will be an absolute joke trying to drive one around with any sort of effectiveness. Rounding this point out, the duration of the stun on the Warthog lasts too long. If it’s this easy to disable, they have to reduce the amount of time you are disabled.

I’m not spending much time discussing the turret because I have no problems with it, all factors I’ve discussed remaining the same. The turret is beautiful in this game and certainly gets the job done. The major change from Halo 5 is that it lost the weapon bloom (which did allow player the accurately burst-fire at longer ranges) and that it no longer has the ability to overheat. Overall, it’s a buff from 5. Kill time feels good. I do like the precision element from 5, but I have no problem with this current iteration.

Continued Below

3

Moving away from the vehicles offensive and defensive abilities, the physics must be addressed. This is the most “floaty” version of the Warthog with the exception of Halo CE. If you are on any sort of incline, the vehicle wants to continue sliding downward. I understand that it would contribute to the vehicle sliding if you’re breaking from a moving state, but you start rolling even if you are parked on a hill and slightly flick your joystick. At times it seems the Warthog weighs almost nothing. This is exacerbated when hitting other vehicles or Spartans. I was able to detect almost no damage when ramming other vehicles. One of the risky maneuvers of a warthog has always been to ram another vehicle, which would damage the enemy vehicle while also damaging yours. In Infinite, it seems like it does no damage, but if it does, it’s minimal. Splattering Spartans also contributes here. I can never tell when I’m going to splatter a player, or if I’m just going to push them out of the way. Splattering Spartan players was very inconsistent from what I noticed.

One of, if not my biggest criticisms of the current Warthog, is the fact that jumping off of objects and landing correctly has become a joke. In my opinion, understanding how to jump/fall off objects was the most skill-intense part of being a driver. There are many techniques depending on what type of jump, how fast you’re moving, where you’re trying to land, etc. This current version allows you to quite literally change the orientation of the Warthog mid-air. One would think the Warthog has thrusters on it, allowing you to roll/pitch to your hearts desire. Almost any jump or fall you make now is almost guaranteed to allow you to land on your wheels, regardless of how you approached it. This is one of the biggest things that separated a good driver from a bad one. I’m fully aware that most other Halo games had some level of vehicle control in the air, but it was typically minimal compared to this. I don’t understand why it’s so pronounced in Halo Infinite. This contributes to the Warthog feeling like it has no weight, since you twist and twirl around in the air, defying physics.

On a positive note, they did a good job with the physics while on flat ground. The e-break is fantastic, allowing tight turns and quick maneuvers. The speed of the Warthog is not in a bad spot by itself, but combined with low durability, I believe they should make a combination of the acceleration, max speed, and turns more responsive to player input. The point here is that if the Warthog is going to be so easy to destroy or disable, you should at least allow the operators counterplay. If they made it more responsive and slightly faster, a good driver could at least have some control of the situation.

That covers most of my feedback without getting into more detail, so, what would I do about it if you asked me? There are many answers to this. Here is a list of proposed buffs:

  • Increase general durability for the body of the Warthog. What I mean by the body is the “health” of the vehicle. Pieces and components can come off, but ultimately, the heath of the Warthog must hit 0 before it will explode. I don’t think pieces breaking off or critical areas should be harder to do, but if they’re going to come off, it shouldn’t also explode so easily. At this point, a Ghost (which requires 1 player) is more difficult to kill than a Warthog (requiring at least 2 but up to 3in order to be effective) and the Ghost operator is more protected overall. - Reduce the amount of weapons that can disable vehicles, and/or reduce the amount of time a vehicle is disabled. This one is much harder to implement because it has implications for every other vehicle. If anything, I would be for having varied disable times based on the vehicle. Perhaps the Warthog would have a lower disable time compared to some of the other vehicles. Overall though, I do think the disabled time needs to be reduced for all vehicles. - Give some “weight” back to the Warthog. It’s far too “floaty” when driving it. It’s supposed to be an off road vehicle carrying Spartans and a turret, it should feel like it weighs more. - Drastically reduce the ability to move the orientation of the Warthog while in mid air. It’s the most unfortunate addition to this version of the Warthog. You lose some charm with it once you can fix so many of your own mistakes. So much of the fun with the Warthog is the uncertainty of flying off a jump or cliff.There are a ton of things you can tweak, but these are the big ones for me. If there are concerns about durability being too strong, I suggest using the Halo 5 version of the turret. Allow it to overheat and weapon bloom if the trigger is held. Both of those contribute to gunner awareness and reduce the ability to spam, which should make any durability buffs more palatable.

If you’ve made it this far, thank you for reading. I would love input and discussion around this as I’m very curious what others experience with the Warthog was.

TLDR: The Warthog is not durable enough, it’s too easy to disable, and the physics on it need to be tweaked as it has no weight and can be controlled like a spacecraft while in the air.

4

I agree that the warthog is off right now. I hope they are able to tweak the physics of it this late in development, at least I hope they reduce the counters and increase durability though. I got way tired of all the emping and skewering going on during this last flight.

5

> 2533274825006669;4:
> I agree that the warthog is off right now. I hope they are able to tweak the physics of it this late in development, at least I hope they reduce the counters and increase durability though. I got way tired of all the emping and skewering going on during this last flight.

Power weapons are absolutely too common. They’re less of a thing to fight over, and more of an upgrade system. It definitely messes with the vehicle sandbox. Every vehicle feels like a glass cannon because of this.

6

The power weapons issue is a direct result of 343 replacing the normal BTB mode with what is basically warzone minus the REQ system / base capture mechanic. The vehicles are all weak as ever and there are tons of power weapons on map, power weapons randomly dropping in and loot caves. Its a crying shame that 343 didnt just make this a new warzone mode with a new name and have it as its own thing while giving us vehicle vets the standard btb experience. I want the btb mode that has only a couple power weapons and all the vehicles from the get go on each side of the map on a predictable timer. Halo 5 343 completely replaced btb with warzone and it was not the experience BTB lovers want. They did the same with halo infinite unfortunately.

7

I fall into the category of liking to drive the hog, but everyone else in the vehicle wishing I had stayed back at base to play defense instead. Whenever my buddies and I come upon an available warthog, we climb in and shout “who wants a triple kill?”
Teach me the ways to strike fear and anger in the eyes of mine enemies with fearless puma driving skills.

8

Impeccable writing and thanks for the effort you put into these thoughts.

I have been into Halo since before some players were born LOL, so I might be more of a traditionalist…
To this day, I STILL believe H:CE (not PC port) had the best Vehicle balance and physics.

When I spawn, I want to feel like I have the ability to counter-respond to a Vehicle attacking me and my teammates. Halo 2 is a perfect example of how Vehicles got it wrong… Badly! In H:CE you could use timing and prediction to land a grenade near the Warthog’s driving path, flipping it, and flipping it in your favor. - You shouldn’t be required to search for the lone anti-Vehicle weapon on the map which could likely already be controlled by the enemy team; those things just shouldn’t be required. H2 was the source of what you are seeing with (too many) anti-Vehicle weapons on the map because of how bad the balance was. - And, I still think H2 was the best Halo, ironically.

Infinite’s Warthog seemed far more “floaty” than HCE, and, as you pointed out, it had to do with steering while in mid-air. It really did seem like an old unfinished version of the Warthog build. However, I think as far as rolling the Vehicle, I do think this should be a common thing if you don’t take your driving seriously. - I don’t think I ever flipped the Warthog cause I heard it was happening a lot for people, so I focused more on my paths taken. - By adding weight to keep the Warthog from flipping, it makes it less skillful and players can just drive however they want and not fear the risk of flipping.

I know we will never get HCE Vehicles again, so we can focus on what we have, which is “too many anti-Vehicle weapons” as well as durability of the Warthog to survive long enough to enjoy using it. A good balance for this would be the following:

  • Increase Frag Grenade’s explosion blast with physics to flip Warthogs (and Ghosts)
  • Remove the ability to destroy Vehicles 100% but leave destruction and functions impacted, and make it function longer until wheels are gone
  • Limit maps on anti-Vehicle weapons (only 1 heavy weapon if Frag Grenades work)
    (Note: I have neutral opinion on if PP should EMP Warthog, cause, as I have said, I am a traditionalist.)

Lastly, one thing that isn’t considered is that Fragmentation map was built like a Labyrinth with very limited pathways around enemy traffic. I have had my share of Halo 3 wheelman games where my gunner has 30-40 kills, and in order to do so, you needed to stay away from enemies; this kept you out of range of Energy Drains, PP, and grenades, essentially making you Overpowered with the Warthog. This was harder to do on the maps I experienced in the flight. Other maps could actually be more Warthog friendly.

All in all, if Warthogs are not a noticeable threat in a BTB or 4v4 game, I won’t be unhappy about it (I’m a traditionalist). But, I also see the side that wants it to be more commonly a threat in games (I was a decent Halo 3 driver).

Thanks.

9

This post deserves to be at the top of the board for a while just due to the effort put in. Thanks for putting in the time.

I’m definitely not a fan of the B(igger)TB as we tested in the flight for various reasons. Limited vehicle availability. The over abundance (and randomness) of weapons. The AR loadout.

But by far one of the biggest casualties from these changes is this laughably weak Warthog. The saddest part of this post is that even with it’s length I think there is much more that could be said on the matter. But thanks for summing it up.

10

> 2760465307323250;8:
> Impeccable writing and thanks for the effort you put into these thoughts.
>
> I have been into Halo since before some players were born LOL, so I might be more of a traditionalist…
> To this day, I STILL believe H:CE (not PC port) had the best Vehicle balance and physics.
>
> When I spawn, I want to feel like I have the ability to counter-respond to a Vehicle attacking me and my teammates. Halo 2 is a perfect example of how Vehicles got it wrong… Badly! In H:CE you could use timing and prediction to land a grenade near the Warthog’s driving path, flipping it, and flipping it in your favor. - You shouldn’t be required to search for the lone anti-Vehicle weapon on the map which could likely already be controlled by the enemy team; those things just shouldn’t be required. H2 was the source of what you are seeing with (too many) anti-Vehicle weapons on the map because of how bad the balance was. - And, I still think H2 was the best Halo, ironically.
>
> Infinite’s Warthog seemed far more “floaty” than HCE, and, as you pointed out, it had to do with steering while in mid-air. It really did seem like an old unfinished version of the Warthog build. However, I think as far as rolling the Vehicle, I do think this should be a common thing if you don’t take your driving seriously. - I don’t think I ever flipped the Warthog cause I heard it was happening a lot for people, so I focused more on my paths taken. - By adding weight to keep the Warthog from flipping, it makes it less skillful and players can just drive however they want and not fear the risk of flipping.
>
> I know we will never get HCE Vehicles again, so we can focus on what we have, which is “too many anti-Vehicle weapons” as well as durability of the Warthog to survive long enough to enjoy using it. A good balance for this would be the following:
> - Increase Frag Grenade’s explosion blast with physics to flip Warthogs (and Ghosts)
> - Remove the ability to destroy Vehicles 100% but leave destruction and functions impacted, and make it function longer until wheels are gone
> - Limit maps on anti-Vehicle weapons (only 1 heavy weapon if Frag Grenades work)
> (Note: I have neutral opinion on if PP should EMP Warthog, cause, as I have said, I am a traditionalist.)
>
> Lastly, one thing that isn’t considered is that Fragmentation map was built like a Labyrinth with very limited pathways around enemy traffic. I have had my share of Halo 3 wheelman games where my gunner has 30-40 kills, and in order to do so, you needed to stay away from enemies; this kept you out of range of Energy Drains, PP, and grenades, essentially making you Overpowered with the Warthog. This was harder to do on the maps I experienced in the flight. Other maps could actually be more Warthog friendly.
>
> All in all, if Warthogs are not a noticeable threat in a BTB or 4v4 game, I won’t be unhappy about it (I’m a traditionalist). But, I also see the side that wants it to be more commonly a threat in games (I was a decent Halo 3 driver).
>
> Thanks.

The kind words are much appreciated.

Interesting, yeah I fully understand people liking the CE vehicles the most. There is a certain charm about them that I remember gave me many good experiences, especially playing with my childhood best friend and some of the shenanigans we’d get into because of the vehicle physics and the Warthogs inability to explode. You could really make that thing take off it you wanted to. Just for the sake of it being more responsive I prefer a less floaty Warthog, but I am in alignment about the good parts of vehicle combat in CE.

I fully agree that the physics should be more responsive. The skill gap between drivers will likely now shrink. I’m concerned though that regardless of the physics or difficulty actually driving, the lack of durability and susceptibility to being disabled will, in the long run, cause players to instinctually avoid getting in a Warthog even if they can be the gunner. I already have a very hard time getting people to hop on. Often in the last flight, I would drive around the base where people would spawn spamming the horn for a minute or two before finding someone willing to get in. I almost don’t blame them. I have had a hard enough time doing work in that thing, so I can’t blame anyone from not wanting to get in. Especially considering the typical caliber of player driving.

11

> 2533274833576927;9:
> This post deserves to be at the top of the board for a while just due to the effort put in. Thanks for putting in the time.
>
> I’m definitely not a fan of the B(igger)TB as we tested in the flight for various reasons. Limited vehicle availability. The over abundance (and randomness) of weapons. The AR loadout.
>
> But by far one of the biggest casualties from these changes is this laughably weak Warthog. The saddest part of this post is that even with it’s length I think there is much more that could be said on the matter. But thanks for summing it up.

I appreciate it and no problem, I love the vehicle and this franchise so I felt it had to be said.

I agree there is much more to discuss, but in your opinion, what are some of the bigger issues I hadn’t mentioned? Did you spend a lot of time in it, or do you mostly have general observations from it? I am extremely interested in those who have a lot of experience combating an enemy Warthog on foot, since I typically would spend 90% of my time driving in it and not necessarily fighting one while on foot. I certainly did fight them on foot, and found that not only was it easy to deal with, it often felt like a free double/triple kill since I’d frequently just have a power weapon/counter since they’re so prevalent.

12

> 2533274810045423;3:
> One of, if not my biggest criticisms of the current Warthog, is the fact that jumping off of objects and landing correctly has become a joke. In my opinion, understanding how to jump/fall off objects was the most skill-intense part of being a driver. There are many techniques depending on what type of jump, how fast you’re moving, where you’re trying to land, etc. This current version allows you to quite literally change the orientation of the Warthog mid-air. One would think the Warthog has thrusters on it, allowing you to roll/pitch to your hearts desire. Almost any jump or fall you make now is almost guaranteed to allow you to land on your wheels, regardless of how you approached it. This is one of the biggest things that separated a good driver from a bad one. I’m fully aware that most other Halo games had some level of vehicle control in the air, but it was typically minimal compared to this. I don’t understand why it’s so pronounced in Halo Infinite. This contributes to the Warthog feeling like it has no weight, since you twist and twirl around in the air, defying physics.

Thanks so much for your post. I am very, very concerned about the current state of the Warthog. I think think a bit more can be said about this part, though, because it misses the actual problem by a hair.

It IS true that the Warthog seems to respond more quickly to player input in the air, but this is actually a superficial change that hides the reality that players actually have LESS control than in past games. This is because they seem to have employed some kind of heavy self-leveling. You can’t really push the Warthog PAST the level position with player input. On the ground and in the air, the Warthog tries to stay super level (even sometimes automatically flipping completely over when not even piloted). It just SEEMS like you have more control because it rotates faster when you enter an input, but the amount you can actually rotate the Warthog has a low ceiling. In Halo 5, for example, you actually had a lot of directional influence in air (at that point, the most in the series), but the directional influence is more subtle. You don’t rotate quite as quickly, but there is nothing stopping you from pushing a roll as far as you want, meaning that you can get flipped and MANUALLY correct by leaning into or out of the roll. You can hit a jump, and by continually pressing an input, you can actually manually initiate a full forward roll. You can even land upright on a single wheel and use acquired skill to save the flip. These kinds of maneuvers are impossible in Infinite, because of the auto-leveling (and in some cases, what feels like wheel magnetism). The problem is DEFINITELY not that players have too much control. In fact, they might have less than ever before, but this is cleverly masked by super responsive superficial air control (that doesn’t actually do very much in the face of the auto-leveling).

13

> 2533274810045423;11:
> > 2533274833576927;9:
> > …
>
> I appreciate it and no problem, I love the vehicle and this franchise so I felt it had to be said.
>
> I agree there is much more to discuss, but in your opinion, what are some of the bigger issues I hadn’t mentioned? Did you spend a lot of time in it, or do you mostly have general observations from it? I am extremely interested in those who have a lot of experience combating an enemy Warthog on foot, since I typically would spend 90% of my time driving in it and not necessarily fighting one while on foot. I certainly did fight them on foot, and found that not only was it easy to deal with, it often felt like a free double/triple kill since I’d frequently just have a power weapon/counter since they’re so prevalent.

I think Jorkman about covered anything I could add. I think a vast group in the community is calling for more Warthog health. But I think the issue is more nuanced than that. Handling. Weight. Control. These things matter just as much.

Thanks again for posting.

14

Wow… And here I thought I knew a thing or two about warthogs. You pretty much covered anything I could possibly say, thanks for all the hard work!

From one hog enthusiast to another!

15

As a Nascar pro nightmare driver the problems i’m having is the floatyness, not being able to roll or control the roll with breaking, and most of all the durability and visual indicators of Durability i swear the Hog just explodes immediately even when the blast danger sound just started

its just odd that the main vehicle of the UNSC isnt more useful…if the warthog is this weak imagine how quickly the support hog will blow up…

also can vehicles not auto Ebrake park themselves after driving max speed and then getting out… how am I supposed to trick the enemy into thinking I’m dead in the Warthog if when I bail the Hog parks itself instead of rolling forward Ghost rider style, did 343 forget momentum exists?

16

100% agree. You got it right on the dot.

17

I feel like this is a good representation of how wonky the wathog is right now. Also it’s just hilarious.

Vehicles in general just feel weaker to me… like is there anything the skewer just doesn’t instantly decimate?

I agree that controlling them feels too easy as well. It echos the feeling of armor specializations from H4.

18

> 2535466172439828;14:
> Wow… And here I thought I knew a thing or two about warthogs. You pretty much covered anything I could possibly say, thanks for all the hard work!
>
> From one hog enthusiast to another!

Of course, there’s too few of us friend!

Respect.

19

> 2533274796415676;12:
> > 2533274810045423;3:
> > One of, if not my biggest criticisms of the current Warthog, is the fact that jumping off of objects and landing correctly has become a joke. In my opinion, understanding how to jump/fall off objects was the most skill-intense part of being a driver. There are many techniques depending on what type of jump, how fast you’re moving, where you’re trying to land, etc. This current version allows you to quite literally change the orientation of the Warthog mid-air. One would think the Warthog has thrusters on it, allowing you to roll/pitch to your hearts desire. Almost any jump or fall you make now is almost guaranteed to allow you to land on your wheels, regardless of how you approached it. This is one of the biggest things that separated a good driver from a bad one. I’m fully aware that most other Halo games had some level of vehicle control in the air, but it was typically minimal compared to this. I don’t understand why it’s so pronounced in Halo Infinite. This contributes to the Warthog feeling like it has no weight, since you twist and twirl around in the air, defying physics.
>
> Thanks so much for your post. I am very, very concerned about the current state of the Warthog. I think think a bit more can be said about this part, though, because it misses the actual problem by a hair.
>
> It IS true that the Warthog seems to respond more quickly to player input in the air, but this is actually a superficial change that hides the reality that players actually have LESS control than in past games. This is because they seem to have employed some kind of heavy self-leveling. You can’t really push the Warthog PAST the level position with player input. On the ground and in the air, the Warthog tries to stay super level (even sometimes automatically flipping completely over when not even piloted). It just SEEMS like you have more control because it rotates faster when you enter an input, but the amount you can actually rotate the Warthog has a low ceiling. In Halo 5, for example, you actually had a lot of directional influence in air (at that point, the most in the series), but the directional influence is more subtle. You don’t rotate quite as quickly, but there is nothing stopping you from pushing a roll as far as you want, meaning that you can get flipped and MANUALLY correct by leaning into or out of the roll. You can hit a jump, and by continually pressing an input, you can actually manually initiate a full forward roll. You can even land upright on a single wheel and use acquired skill to save the flip. These kinds of maneuvers are impossible in Infinite, because of the auto-leveling (and in some cases, what feels like wheel magnetism). The problem is DEFINITELY not that players have too much control. In fact, they might have less than ever before, but this is cleverly masked by super responsive superficial air control (that doesn’t actually do very much in the face of the auto-leveling).

You make a very good point. I will have to do more testing once the game is out and I have another opportunity to use the Warthog to assess this. The main issue I have with how quickly it responds to player input and the speed in which it rotates is from a skill perspective. If it’s true they’ve put a cap on it, that exacerbates the issue. It helps leave the Warthog in a level position so you can’t mess up and overcorrect, but also lets you turn it very quickly if you made a mistake off of a jump. Again, I didn’t do much testing on this specifically and so I hadn’t picked this out in particular. I was mostly in awe and audibly said out loud “this is ridiculous” followed by a laugh whenever I was in the air, it was very distracting lol. Thanks for bringing this to my attention.

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All I gotta say is thank the Halo gods for not allowing turret cooldown to come back.