> Although I don’t agree with all the other changes being implemented in this TU, I can see the reasons why they are being made, and wouldn’t argue for or against them.
>
> (For you TL;DR folks, the important points are bolded, though this change will be DEVASTATING to Reach balance and I encourage you read the whole thing to see the big picture.)
>
> That is not the case with the shield bleed. Shield bleed at a cursory glance seems to be something good for the game, I mean, why wouldn’t the extra damage go through, right?
>
> Well, here’s the main issue, and why it’s absolutely damaging to have it brought back. Halo is based on, as Bungie has so eloquently put it, the “Golden Tripod” of halo combat: Grenades, Melee, and Guns. The interplay between the three is ESSENTIAL to what makes Halo Halo. Shield bleed, however, absolutely cripples melee as a viable option for combat with the way Reach handles melee combat.
>
> In Halo 1, without Xboxlive to compensate for, there was no melee lunge, it was pure reflexes (occasionally a little lag from the LAN cable, but not really a big deal). Therefore, if someone got the drop on you, you could turn a fight around with clever use of melee and grenades. That’s a huge part of what makes Halo what it is. In any other shooter, you’re shot dead before you can respond. Being able to do meaningful things in response to being shot creates the gameplay of halo.
>
> So Bungie releases Halo 2. Anyone who played this game as much as I can, can attest to the terrible effect of latency on gameplay, affecting the shotgun (More affectionately known then as the Slotgun due to its randomness). But the real problem was it’s effect on melee combat. In most cases, reflexes mattered, but not as much as being host. Host advantage conferred winning melee combat rights to whoever had it. Bungie realized how terrible this was, and though they couldn’t fix it for Halo 2, it was a lesson learned to be applied to…
>
> Halo 3. In Halo 3, Bungie made a major blunder in the way they handled Melee combat. To compensate for the Host Advantage problem in Halo 2, they created the counterattack window, a timeframe in which you can counterattack the enemy for the same damage. This Was, and still is for those of you who play Halo 3, probably the worst part of the game. Initially, if you had even 1 more bullet than they did, it was a guaranteed win. The counterattack window removed all ability to use melee as a comeback method. This results in the incidents where, seemingly at random, two people would run at each other, AR’s Blazing, only to find one more of your opponents bullets hit, so you find yourself respawning, while he finds himself shieldless, but with a free kill.
>
> Bungie “fixed” this by making the damage difference higher, so the result would be less random and more predictable. This means, if you had more shots in on the opponent, you’ll live, they’ll die. The problem with this fix is it completely annihilated any use of melee as a comeback tool. The opponent doesn’t even need to have reflexes or be competent, their melee will hit, and will cancel yours, and you will die. This leads to stale gameplay, as when your shot, your only option is to run away, since you cannot count on melee combat as a trump card.
> Some people have the belief that “I shot first, I should win, obviously” Well, then in what sense should there even be shields? As I stated earlier, Halo gameplay, what makes halo unique, is that in Halo combat, you have time to react to being attacked. What keeps halo balanced is having meaningful actions to take when confronted. If you’re unable to comeback if you’re shot first, you may as well just die when the first shot hits. Remove shields and play Swat.
>
> Bungie knew they had to fix this problem for reach. They couldn’t go back to the terrible host advantage of 2, but they couldn’t keep the stale “Melee always favors the winner” system either. The compromise, the way they found to keep melee relevant, and most importantly, to fix the golden tripod of halo combat broken in 3, was to make shields absorb the extra damage.
>
> It isn’t consistent with the other halo games, because Bungie finally found the way to make Melee combat NOT become a host advantage fest, and to not be stale. It required innovative thinking, and the result was the shield absorbing the extra damage. It’s THE SINGLE REASON why it exists in classic reach; it puts melee back in a place MORE CONSISTANT with its use and behavior in Halo 1 and Halo 2. Halo 3 was the outlier, and it was because of the melee tie system. The shield no bleed was a compromise to keep the melee tie system, and to have ‘classic’ halo combat.
>
> And lets be honest, how often does the extra 3 damage from your DMR shot matter? The fact is the shield bleed function PRIMARILY functions in relation to Melee combat. Switching it in this way will be incredibly damaging to Reach gameplay.
>
> The short version is, Lack of shield bleed is the only thing keeping the “Tie” melee system created to solve host advantage in halo 3 from having all sorts of other negative impacts. It was a very elegant solution which put melee back in a position where it was a viable answer for the person behind. Adding in bleed will simply remove one more tool from the person who needs them most.
>
> I IMPLORE YOU, 343 INDUSTRIES, IF YOU CARE ABOUT THE GAMEPLAY OF HALO: REACH, UNDERSTAND HOW DAMAGING THIS CHANGE REALLY IS.
>
> I understand at this point due to the politics of XBL and updates and whatnot it’s probably far, far too late to stop this change, but I’m hoping that you’ll see fit to revert it.
You just blew my mind! You are so right.