Why we NEED equal starts in Halo 5

Games Halo 5: Guardians
1

I’ve been thinking about it recently, and I’m sure if your think about it too you’ll agree. We cannot have a Classic/Infinity split, it will divide the population to much and brings up issues like map development for each. That being said, Halo has always (well usually) been an arena shooter. That was what it was known for and that is what made it popular, it had a niche. If 343i is unwilling to make Halo an arena shooter again because it won’t do well in todays market, they shouldn’t be. Remember that we still have tons of Halo players waiting for an arena Halo again, you can’t expect CoD players to stop playing CoD for a watered down knock off. We don’t need loadouts, we need Halo. Equal starts also makes things a lot easier developmentally, you don’t have to design loadout systems or make maps suited for loadout combat. With equal starts all you need to really worry about is map flow, power weapon placement, etc. This way maps can be great instead of compromised. You will also have a higher population in matchmaking 343i, check it out

Halo 3: 100,000+

Halo 4 : 25-30k

Lets get Halo 5 up to speed, base it around fair and equal starts like in the good old days of Halo and really get Halo back on track. You can do this 343, it will make life a lot easier for you.

2

Limited loadouts can work I think. Keep in mind I’m a huge proponent of going back to Halo 3 and then building from that play style for Halo 5.

Primary: battle rifle or carbine (DMR and LR are on map)
Secondary: Assault rifle, storm rifle, or magnum
Grenade: Frag

Granted that’s almost stripped down enough to not make it worth implementing, but I look at that and see options that don’t undermine balance off spawn.

3

> Limited loadouts can work I think. Keep in mind I’m a huge proponent of going back to Halo 3 and then building from that play style for Halo 5.
>
> Primary: battle rifle or carbine (DMR and LR are on map)
> Secondary: Assault rifle, storm rifle, or magnum
> Grenade: Frag
>
> Granted that’s almost stripped down enough to not make it worth implementing, but I look at that and see options that don’t undermine balance off spawn.

Yeah I believe limited loadouts can adhere to equal starts.

When I think of equal starts, I think of equal power and as long as weapons which have a balance of power and range are used, then I can’t see a problem.
I hope for the same system that you’ve just suggested, where players can start with BR or Carbine etc.
I think the biggest threat to equal starts is actually Armor Abilities, because they are so different from each other that they give players advantages in different situations, so those should be on the map.

As long as weapons which aren’t in loadouts are placed on the maps (Plasma Pistol, Boltshot etc.), then all the variety and choice is still there.

4

> Limited loadouts can work I think. Keep in mind I’m a huge proponent of going back to Halo 3 and then building from that play style for Halo 5.
>
> Primary: battle rifle or carbine (DMR and LR are on map)
> Secondary: Assault rifle, storm rifle, or magnum
> Grenade: Frag
>
> Granted that’s almost stripped down enough to not make it worth implementing, but I look at that and see options that don’t undermine balance off spawn.

Well yeah that would probably work fine but honestly it’s so stripped down we might as well make it equal

5

I think Reach had it right.

AA’s where the only things a player could choose in normal game modes.
It added diversity for me

And special loadouts are in games like invasion to help the player in different combat situations.

343 should keep personnel loadouts in firefight, campaign and spartan ops( without the perk of course) to the persons preferred combat.

6

> Limited loadouts can work I think. Keep in mind I’m a huge proponent of going back to Halo 3 and then building from that play style for Halo 5.
>
> Primary: battle rifle or carbine (DMR and LR are on map)
> Secondary: Assault rifle, storm rifle, or magnum
> Grenade: Frag
>
> Granted that’s almost stripped down enough to not make it worth implementing, but I look at that and see options that don’t undermine balance off spawn.

I find myself agreeing with this completely. I like the variety that Loadouts give to the player, but many of its options create a large imbalance that ruin the game for me (and many others).

Being able to pick between the BR and Carbine as a Primary, and the AR, Storm Rifle and Magnum as a Secondary still gives players a balanced, equal starting point, yet there’s still a bit of variety that allows us to tweak our playstyle a bit to our liking.

7

I just don’t get why people say that having both Legendary and Infinity off the bat would splinter the community. Clearly, it is already split and trying to appeal to half of it won’t solve the issue.

Your stats pertaining to Halo 3’s population are also a bit irrelevant, since Halo 3 released before CoD blew up. Making Halo 5 similar to Halo 3 will make the loud minorities happy, but it will not get Halo 5 100,000 player population.

I believe we should have some sort of split. 343i is comprised of hundreds of experienced developers and I’m sure they can tackle the issues that splitting the multiplayer will create (such as map design) and reap the benefits of a split multiplayer experience that has something for everyone.

To those that believe Halo 5 will return to it’s roots with even starts and the likes as the only gameplay option in multiplayer… You’re fooling yourself. That is never going to happen. NEVER. 343i has stepped beyond the point of no return and Infinity will return in Halo 5 in some shape or form (hopefully an extremely improved and less random/ridiculous/unbalanced). As a Legendary supporter, I think the best we can hope for is a split multiplayer.

8

Once again, I find myself agreeing with everything Jazzii Man has said.
Your proposed loadout fix is great!

Converting Armor Abilities to on-map pickups opens up so many possibilities.
For example:
Thruster Pack can send a player flying 15-20m and it would still be balanced.

You have my support.

9

> I just don’t get why people say that having both Legendary and Infinity off the bat would splinter the community. Clearly, it is already split and trying to appeal to half of it won’t solve the issue.

I buy Halo because I want a competitive, skill-based game with good maps that has both the physical elements of reaction time/twitchiness but more importantly the mental aspects of team communication, strategy, out-thinking your opponent in 1v1 combat, using the map and learning how to jump, move around the map in interesting ways that throws your opponent off.

I have instant respect for guys who learn how to duck headshots, know to jump the right way when shields are down, who can properly strafe in unique ways, and who can take me by surprise directionally, or have a really good map ownership strategy with team communication. These are guys that excel at Classic play, the guys I look up to.

I have zero respect for guys who sprint around with swords or kill me at medium range in half a second by spamming me with a SAW, invisible snipers, boltshot campers who quit out of games, people who sprint away the minute you have the first shot on them, people who nade your face with plasmas because they loaded out on their instant respawn. These guys loove Infinity because it’s easy mode. They don’t think. They are, in a word, morons.

In H4 343 pissed off all the Classic guys with no maps and broken gameplay, all the easy mode guys got bored of 2 maps and an unfinished game and left a week later to play Black Ops 2, and OMG all of a sudden your population disappeared. Now you’re left with a bunch of Classic people hoping to god they fix stuff but mostly too used to using loadouts to switch back to gameplay that doesn’t use them, and the remaining guys like Infinity. I don’t know what the ratio is, but it sure seems like Infinity Slayer is more popular, and that’s only because it’s what people are used to playing from day 1.

Honestly, I spent so much time learning how to play with a jet pack or other loadouts that when I load into a Slayer Pro game it’s hard to adjust, which is why I don’t vote for it that often. That doesn’t mean Slayer Pro is the worse game, though.

That’s why IMO splitting the community is bad. Sprinting is actually fun. People got used to it. It is also incredibly uncompetitive as it works now because of netcode and the bullet magnetism required to shoot a guy sprinting.

Jet packing is fun. It breaks map control aspects and again the speed of movement makes lag a problem, so you need more bullet magnetism and it’s uncompetitive but fun.

You give players both options in H5, I guarantee the population will erode quickly like it did in H4.

10

> I just don’t get why people say that having both Legendary and Infinity off the bat would splinter the community. Clearly, it is already split and trying to appeal to half of it won’t solve the issue.

A misunderstanding of the problems on your behalf may be the cause of that.

I don’t want to go into detail here, but attempting to cater the game to all players is highly likely to create a situation where neither side is actually catered to, to the extent that an AAA game should do.

By splitting the game, maps and playlists between two almost entirely different types of gameplay, the team will essentially be creating two games in one.
Unless of course they only give each side half the normal amount of maps, half the normal amount of playlists and half the amount of time and energy than would be required to create a satisfactory and complete gaming experience.

When considering how much work goes into only one side of the game, how can we expect them to miraculously create two sides.

> Your stats pertaining to Halo 3’s population are also a bit irrelevant, since Halo 3 released before CoD blew up. Making Halo 5 similar to Halo 3 will make the loud minorities happy, but it will not get Halo 5 100,000 player population.

You speak about the “loud minority” as if they are the only people in the fanbase who hold the opinions which they are loud about.
Also, you simply cannot assert whether or not making core gameplay similar to Halo 3 will give rise to a “100,000 player population”. We just do not know.

What we do know, is that Halo has only ever been successful with online numbers (by Halo standards) when it adhered to its roots, and that Halo has only ever had less and less success with online numbers when the gameplay strayed from Halo’s roots.
That is surely something to keep in mind when thinking about claiming that bringing back Halo 3’s core is definitely not a good move for the games popularity.

> I believe we should have some sort of split. 343i is comprised of hundreds of experienced developers and I’m sure they can tackle the issues that splitting the multiplayer will create (such as map design) and reap the benefits of a split multiplayer experience that has something for everyone.

The truth is, you are not “sure” about that. Much has been done to explain why it is highly unlikely that 343 could achieve anything of the sort, and very little has been done to explain otherwise.

> To those that believe Halo 5 will return to it’s roots with even starts and the likes as the only gameplay option in multiplayer… You’re fooling yourself. That is never going to happen. NEVER.

Oh really? Can I borrow your crystal ball for the weekend?

> 343i has stepped beyond the point of no return and Infinity will return in Halo 5 in some shape or form (hopefully an extremely improved and less random/ridiculous/unbalanced). As a Legendary supporter, I think the best we can hope for is a split multiplayer.

Well, all you’re doing here is using words that carry little meaning.

“point of no return” - What on Earth does that even mean in this context? Obviously it isn’t the point of no return, because it would not be at all impossible for them to revert back.

11

Nah, I like loadouts

12

They should not split gameplay into classic and infinity.

They should build off of Reach if they want to continue down the path of Infinity settings, meaning they need pre-set loadouts.

Here is my idea:

Pre set loadouts for 5 distinct characters, each character has their unique perks and primary weapon. Players don’t spawn with a secondary weapon and spawn only with a frag grenade. AA’s are either map pick ups or in the form of ordinance which is rewarded by killstreaks which RESET upon death. Every character has their own criteria for killstreaks and own unique AA’s abilities that are made available through killstreaks.

Base movement should be faster

Press Y to holster/remove your weapon and you then automatically sprint/climb/board vehicles etc…so to change weapons you have to press the Y button twice.

So there is no sprint button, but if you put away your weapon you move much faster. When your weapon is lowered you can melee faster as well.

Here are the 5 loadout weapons, and you can use your imagination for unique perks/killstreaks etc for each character. The AA’s and rewards would be much more powerful than what we have now so you could get creative with them since they aren’t default abilities off of spawn.

Assault Rifle
BR
DMR
Pistol
SMG

Obviously weapons like the SMG and pistol would be buffed from previous versions that we remember.

Thoughts?

13

Do tell me what is so criminally wrong with being able to spawn with an AR instead of a BR? Or with a Suppressor instead of an AR?

How does this destroy the Arena gameplay?

14

> Do tell me what is so criminally wrong with being able to spawn with an AR instead of a BR? Or with a Suppressor instead of an AR?
>
> How does this destroy the Arena gameplay?

you’ll actually note that the OP and I already discussed and agreed that limited loadouts aren’t problematic. =D

15

> > Do tell me what is so criminally wrong with being able to spawn with an AR instead of a BR? Or with a Suppressor instead of an AR?
> >
> > How does this destroy the Arena gameplay?
>
> you’ll actually note that the OP and I already discussed and agreed that limited loadouts aren’t problematic. =D

That’ll teach me to be lazy and just read the OP.

Did this discussion also extend to AAs?

16

> Did this discussion also extend to AAs?

A little bit, yeah.

There are quite a few regular posters in this thread that think armor abilities should be placed on map with limited “fuel.”

17

Well, IMO. I don’t want to have equal starts, however, what 343i needs to do, in order to satisfy both sides of the field, they need to have two separate playlists, one Classic Settings (basically everything from Halo CE to Halo 3) and Infinity Settings (Basically everything in Halo 4).

18

> > Did this discussion also extend to AAs?
>
> A little bit, yeah.
>
> There are quite a few regular posters in this thread that think armor abilities should be placed on map with limited “fuel.”

I can see that for some of them.

Stuff like Hologram as a pickup?

19

> > > Did this discussion also extend to AAs?
> >
> > A little bit, yeah.
> >
> > There are quite a few regular posters in this thread that think armor abilities should be placed on map with limited “fuel.”
>
> I can see that for some of them.
>
> Stuff like Hologram as a pickup?

Heck, as long as the hologram showed up yellow on the radar I wouldn’t have my feelings hurt about it being off spawn.

But yeah. Have a jet pack (limited fuel) on a remake of High Ground instead of the grav lift. You get the idea.

20

>

Have you played legendary slayer and/or seen the gameplay video of no sprint gameplay? And if so do you think it plays better and similar to halo 3?