Your Firefight ideas?

Games Other Halo
1

Hey guys… have you ever wanted to play as a Grunt? Or a Hunter? Well read on and maybe we can make it happen…

With the fairly recent announcement of the new Firefight map “Installation 04” at Halo Fest, it made me think of a few ideas as to what we could have in the future. Installation 04 has one thing that no other Firefight map has, AI Allies. While playing on the map, ODSTs will help defend the area with you. It’s a simple idea, but it sounds awesome.

When Halo Reach came out, we found out that Firefight had been improved a lot since it’s debut in Halo 3: ODST. There were loads of new customisation options. One of the really cool, but not often used, features is the Versus option. In versus mode, the players who would change to the “Blue” team would become Elites, and fight along side the Covenant Forces. Now combine this feature with Installation 04’s AI ODSTs, and you could have a little skirmish game, like a mini version of Halo Wars.

The sad part is is that Versus Firefight hardly gets played, and that Firefight overall doesn’t have the “Survive as long as you can” type of feel.

Now, I think it’s a bit too late to drastically change Reach’s Firefight, but there’s always Halo 4, which comes out next year.

Very soon there are 2 games coming out. One of them is Gears of War 3. Now in Gears of War 2 Epic games added Horde mode. Basicly a survival game mode like Firefight. Now in Gears 3, Epic have upgraded Horde mode a lot compared to Gears 2. You can now place turrets, barricades and buy special weapons. There are boss rounds similar to Firefight too, though the enemies are a lot bigger and tougher (Imagine fighting a Scarab in Firefight?).

They have also added something called “Beast Mode”. Kind of like a reverse Horde Mode. In this mode you play as the Locust (The “bad guys”) and fight AI Humans. The really cool part about this is the fact that you can play as different creatures rather than re-skinned players with normal abilities. You start of with a low amount of Tokens (money) and can only unlock the weakest creatures, but as you gain points, you can unlock the tougher Locust creatures.

Now, the other game, Modern Warfare 3 (blasphemy, I know) also has a Survival Mode. In Survival Mode you can buy weapons and equipment, but you can also buy allies to fight along side you.

A lot of these ideas wouldn’t work or feel right in Halo (Buyable Barricades for example), but a lot of them would fit it perfectly.

Imagine this. You start of a Firefight game and you find yourself with 3 other Spartans and a squad of Marines. There are buyable weapons and ammo caches around the defendable area. There is a radio station (or something similar) which lets you buy a weapon drop, Marines, ODSTs or Vehicles which would get dropped in for you to use. Then the drop ships come in. On the other side of the map, the Grunts and Jackals start getting dropped off. 4 of the Grunts are controlled by players (4 v 4). The Grunts won’t be able to take on the Spartans but they’ve got a chance of killing a few of the Marines and getting some points (Maybe 500 points per Marine?). After getting some points they can unlock the next Species (Jackal) and then so on until they can become a Hunter. Maybe something like this:

250 Grunt
500 Jackal
750 Jackal Sniper
750 Drone
1000 Elite
1000 Brute
1500 Hunter

Anyway, it’s a pretty rough idea and I doubt it’d happen, but I’ve always wanted to play as some of the other Covenant species. Maybe there could just be a Custom Game option to play as the other species? We can only hope.

Obviously a lot of this is based off of other games and I’m not sure if we’ll even see any of the “Covenant” species in the game (Firefight isn’t really canon so anything could happen I suppose). A lot of this would probably have to be changed in order for it to work. Anyway, if you’ve managed to read this far then thank you for you’re time and hopefuly we can get a discussion going on and get some more ideas.

343 are watching, so keep it clean.

2

If this were to happen, or even be considered, it would be amazing if this idea were to be implemented into Halo 4. I mean, if Gears of War 3 can do it, why not Halo 4? Especially since 343 Industries still has plenty of time to add this into Firefight’s infrastructure (if Halo 4 even has Firefight). I’ve always wanted to play as a part of the Covenant ever since the days of Halo 2.

3

Firefight forge. Start with a flat desert like surface. You add defensive buildings, and some nature elements (grass, trees, rocks, etc.), and put weapon drop areas. Then, just like forge put where the enemies spawn (i.e., where they will jump to from the Spirit/Phantom, or just where they will spawn if the dropships are turned off). Also, a Covenant version of the Target Locator, reskinned to have a more Covenant feel. When used, it calls in a mini Glassing beam to cover roughly the same area as the explosions cover from the Human one. Instead of saying “Telemetry received, on standby”, It says “Coordinates received, we shall burn their hides!” in an Elite voice when used. Also, only Elites and Brutes can use it, to balance it out. Also, Flood.

4

> Firefight forge. Start with a flat desert like surface. You add defensive buildings, and some nature elements (grass, trees, rocks, etc.), and put weapon drop areas. Then, just like forge put where the enemies spawn (i.e., where they will jump to from the Spirit/Phantom, or just where they will spawn if the dropships are turned off). Also, a Covenant version of the Target Locator, reskinned to have a more Covenant feel. When used, it calls in a mini Glassing beam to cover roughly the same area as the explosions cover from the Human one. Instead of saying “Telemetry received, on standby”, It says “Coordinates received, we shall burn their hides!” in an Elite voice when used. Also, only Elites and Brutes can use it, to balance it out. Also, Flood.

I’d love Firefight Forge so much. We can only hope. Also I like that Glassing Beam Idea. I think the Flood should be used in Infection in some way, though Flood Firefight would be awesome. Imagine playing as a Pure Form! I guess we’ll just have to wait and see what enemies in the game.

5

A 1-vs-1 or 2-vs-2 mode with bots (which is what Installation 04’s ODST and the Covies in FF Versus actually are) would be awesome. Even more so if you could issue simple commands to your bots:

  • Guard: Stay at a certain location and engage hostiles coming into range yet without pursuing them.

  • Attack: Engage the nearest enemy or group of enemies and keep doing so.

  • Protect: Stay close to the player and engage hostiles coming too close and/or attacking the player.

This would also allow for some objective games. Just imagine Beachhead where the Elite players have to steal a flag/core located at the Spartans’ initial spawn point and get it back to the beach where a dropship is waiting like in Invasion. The one or two Spartan players and their ODST bots defend it, the Elite player(s) and their Covie bots attack.

6

I like all of your ideas and all I hope is 343 doesn’t let you unlock achivements with custom settings which is unfair and takes away from the survival feel. However, playing as covenant seems like a good idea and I hope it gets in.

7

> I like all of your ideas and all I hope is 343 doesn’t let you unlock achivements with custom settings which is unfair and takes away from the survival feel. However, playing as covenant seems like a good idea and I hope it gets in.

Yeah, Achievements need to be a bit more difficult to get (Like the Vidmaster Achievements). Also, x GangsterNo1 x, I like the command idea.

8

Ha, it’s abit of an Oxymoron " Halo: Reach’s ‘Achievements’ ".

9

whoever agrees with me on the way achivements should be unlocked should help me tell 343 about this flaw. Lets not let Halo 4 firefight go down the drain by letting you use cheat codes to unlock achivements. Everyone who agrees with me should leave feedback about this flaw on the Oficial Halo feedback thread and get the word out !

10

> whoever agrees with me on the way achivements should be unlocked should help me tell 343 about this flaw. Lets not let Halo 4 firefight go down the drain by letting you use cheat codes to unlock achivements. Everyone who agrees with me should leave feedback about this flaw on the Oficial Halo feedback thread and get the word out !

Indubitally, good sir. I second your motion. Just as long as the achievements for said Firefight are not completely impossible, such as getting 1,000,000 points on Legenadry without dying. That was obviously to promote the Firefight game options. One more thing, put Firefight Versus into matchmaking, Preferably Firefight Limited.

11

> Hey guys… have you ever wanted to play as a Grunt? Or a Hunter? Well read on and maybe we can make it happen…
>
> With the fairly recent announcement of the new Firefight map “Installation 04” at Halo Fest, it made me think of a few ideas as to what we could have in the future. Installation 04 has one thing that no other Firefight map has, AI Allies. While playing on the map, ODSTs will help defend the area with you. It’s a simple idea, but it sounds awesome.
>
> When Halo Reach came out, we found out that Firefight had been improved a lot since it’s debut in Halo 3: ODST. There were loads of new customisation options. One of the really cool, but not often used, features is the Versus option. In versus mode, the players who would change to the “Blue” team would become Elites, and fight along side the Covenant Forces. Now combine this feature with Installation 04’s AI ODSTs, and you could have a little skirmish game, like a mini version of Halo Wars.
>
> The sad part is is that Versus Firefight hardly gets played, and that Firefight overall doesn’t have the “Survive as long as you can” type of feel.
>
> Now, I think it’s a bit too late to drastically change Reach’s Firefight, but there’s always Halo 4, which comes out next year.
>
> Very soon there are 2 games coming out. One of them is Gears of War 3. Now in Gears of War 2 Epic games added Horde mode. Basicly a survival game mode like Firefight. Now in Gears 3, Epic have upgraded Horde mode a lot compared to Gears 2. You can now place turrets, barricades and buy special weapons. There are boss rounds similar to Firefight too, though the enemies are a lot bigger and tougher (Imagine fighting a Scarab in Firefight?).
>
> They have also added something called “Beast Mode”. Kind of like a reverse Horde Mode. In this mode you play as the Locust (The “bad guys”) and fight AI Humans. The really cool part about this is the fact that you can play as different creatures rather than re-skinned players with normal abilities. You start of with a low amount of Tokens (money) and can only unlock the weakest creatures, but as you gain points, you can unlock the tougher Locust creatures.
>
> Now, the other game, Modern Warfare 3 (blasphemy, I know) also has a Survival Mode. In Survival Mode you can buy weapons and equipment, but you can also buy allies to fight along side you.
>
> A lot of these ideas wouldn’t work or feel right in Halo (Buyable Barricades for example), but a lot of them would fit it perfectly.
>
> Imagine this. You start of a Firefight game and you find yourself with 3 other Spartans and a squad of Marines. There are buyable weapons and ammo caches around the defendable area. There is a radio station (or something similar) which lets you buy a weapon drop, Marines, ODSTs or Vehicles which would get dropped in for you to use. Then the drop ships come in. On the other side of the map, the Grunts and Jackals start getting dropped off. 4 of the Grunts are controlled by players (4 v 4). The Grunts won’t be able to take on the Spartans but they’ve got a chance of killing a few of the Marines and getting some points (Maybe 500 points per Marine?). After getting some points they can unlock the next Species (Jackal) and then so on until they can become a Hunter. Maybe something like this:
>
> 250 Grunt
> 500 Jackal
> 750 Jackal Sniper
> 750 Drone
> 1000 Elite
> 1000 Brute
> 1500 Hunter
>
> Anyway, it’s a pretty rough idea and I doubt it’d happen, but I’ve always wanted to play as some of the other Covenant species. Maybe there could just be a Custom Game option to play as the other species? We can only hope.
>
> Obviously a lot of this is based off of other games and I’m not sure if we’ll even see any of the “Covenant” species in the game (Firefight isn’t really canon so anything could happen I suppose). A lot of this would probably have to be changed in order for it to work. Anyway, if you’ve managed to read this far then thank you for you’re time and hopefuly we can get a discussion going on and get some more ideas.
>
> 343 are watching, so keep it clean.

You’re idea seems great, but there is a few flaws:

-Grunts are extremely easy to kill. They go down in like two hits and if you’re not careful, it can be difficult getting a kill, unless their opponents are grunts themselves and have the same health as them.
-Jackals are the same thing. It’ll take two hits to kill them. Also, they are TOO slow and are unable to wield certain weapons.
-Jackal Snipers will be good if the player is placed at a far distance AWAY from the opponents and is able to wield sniping weapons such as the beam rifle.
-Drones are the same as grunts jackals. Even though it would be cool to fly, you can still die with a few hits.

The rest is good. I especially want to play as a brute and a hunter. I don’t mind having marines on my team because it was my dream to be fighting marines. I’m sick of always being on the UNSC side. Stupid Bungie is too lazy to make a covenant game.

12

Yes! I love this idea i would be so happy if we could play as the covenat in the next Halo. Even if we only played as the Skirmishers or the Elites that would be good enough. Plus add Scarabs defintely to Firefight and Forge evryone i talk to want more Scarabs in the Halo series, Sacarbs are awesome.

13

I completely agree sir. I and many of my Halo friends have shared your exact ideas for Firefight for a long time. Calling in weapons drops and UNSC reinforcements was an especially good idea. Forge Firefight was also a great idea I share with you. Amazing suggestions and I hope 343 will take them seriously.

14

I also think that the Covenant should have specific armor abilities they could use. For example, Elites can only use Evade, Brutes could only use Armor Lock, Drones can only use Jetpack, Grunts and Jackals use Sprint. Hunters, being the walking tanks they are, don’t use armor abilites, instead they act like they’re carrying support weapons, meaning you go into third person mode, move slower than normal, can’t carry other weapons or objectives, and have a weapon that has the charging time of a Spartan Laser, and about the power of the Halo CE Assault Cannon. Another thing on the way more ranks are unlocked, every time a point barrier is reached, a new loadout is unlocked, until Hunters. To make it even more realistic, on the Spartan side, the armor you customize yourself to wear affects how you perform. ie, if you wear the Pilot helmet, you gain the abilites of a Spartan III, meaning you have no shields, but you spawn with active camo, and short range weapons. If you wear the scout helmet, you spawn with a sniper rifle and and limited health, because snipers need as little to weigh them down as possible, and that includes armor. Finally, if you wear the Mark VI helmet, you gain Halo 3-esque jump height, higher health, you spawn with an Assault Rifle and DMR/BR, and so on. Each helmet/armor piece has its own affects on gaming. It may or may not affect regular multiplayer, but at least firefight.

15

> Firefight forge. Start with a flat desert like surface. You add defensive buildings, and some nature elements (grass, trees, rocks, etc.), and put weapon drop areas. Then, just like forge put where the enemies spawn (i.e., where they will jump to from the Spirit/Phantom, or just where they will spawn if the dropships are turned off). Also, a Covenant version of the Target Locator, reskinned to have a more Covenant feel. When used, it calls in a mini Glassing beam to cover roughly the same area as the explosions cover from the Human one. Instead of saying “Telemetry received, on standby”, It says “Coordinates received, we shall burn their hides!” in an Elite voice when used. Also, only Elites and Brutes can use it, to balance it out. Also, Flood.

While its a great idea the idea of a “Firefight Forge” seems out of the question due to a lack of adaptability in the AI. What I mean by that is AI are programmed to fit a specific map i.e. the AI models only go where there programmed to. Without that Ai would just run on endlessly and phase through the entire map, so unless you want to make your own game and try coding so it was possible your outta luck, but hey I could be wrong.

16

> > Hey guys… have you ever wanted to play as a Grunt? Or a Hunter? Well read on and maybe we can make it happen…
> >
> > With the fairly recent announcement of the new Firefight map “Installation 04” at Halo Fest, it made me think of a few ideas as to what we could have in the future. Installation 04 has one thing that no other Firefight map has, AI Allies. While playing on the map, ODSTs will help defend the area with you. It’s a simple idea, but it sounds awesome.
> >
> > When Halo Reach came out, we found out that Firefight had been improved a lot since it’s debut in Halo 3: ODST. There were loads of new customisation options. One of the really cool, but not often used, features is the Versus option. In versus mode, the players who would change to the “Blue” team would become Elites, and fight along side the Covenant Forces. Now combine this feature with Installation 04’s AI ODSTs, and you could have a little skirmish game, like a mini version of Halo Wars.
> >
> > The sad part is is that Versus Firefight hardly gets played, and that Firefight overall doesn’t have the “Survive as long as you can” type of feel.
> >
> > Now, I think it’s a bit too late to drastically change Reach’s Firefight, but there’s always Halo 4, which comes out next year.
> >
> > Very soon there are 2 games coming out. One of them is Gears of War 3. Now in Gears of War 2 Epic games added Horde mode. Basicly a survival game mode like Firefight. Now in Gears 3, Epic have upgraded Horde mode a lot compared to Gears 2. You can now place turrets, barricades and buy special weapons. There are boss rounds similar to Firefight too, though the enemies are a lot bigger and tougher (Imagine fighting a Scarab in Firefight?).
> >
> > They have also added something called “Beast Mode”. Kind of like a reverse Horde Mode. In this mode you play as the Locust (The “bad guys”) and fight AI Humans. The really cool part about this is the fact that you can play as different creatures rather than re-skinned players with normal abilities. You start of with a low amount of Tokens (money) and can only unlock the weakest creatures, but as you gain points, you can unlock the tougher Locust creatures.
> >
> > Now, the other game, Modern Warfare 3 (blasphemy, I know) also has a Survival Mode. In Survival Mode you can buy weapons and equipment, but you can also buy allies to fight along side you.
> >
> > A lot of these ideas wouldn’t work or feel right in Halo (Buyable Barricades for example), but a lot of them would fit it perfectly.
> >
> > Imagine this. You start of a Firefight game and you find yourself with 3 other Spartans and a squad of Marines. There are buyable weapons and ammo caches around the defendable area. There is a radio station (or something similar) which lets you buy a weapon drop, Marines, ODSTs or Vehicles which would get dropped in for you to use. Then the drop ships come in. On the other side of the map, the Grunts and Jackals start getting dropped off. 4 of the Grunts are controlled by players (4 v 4). The Grunts won’t be able to take on the Spartans but they’ve got a chance of killing a few of the Marines and getting some points (Maybe 500 points per Marine?). After getting some points they can unlock the next Species (Jackal) and then so on until they can become a Hunter. Maybe something like this:
> >
> > 250 Grunt
> > 500 Jackal
> > 750 Jackal Sniper
> > 750 Drone
> > 1000 Elite
> > 1000 Brute
> > 1500 Hunter
> >
> > Anyway, it’s a pretty rough idea and I doubt it’d happen, but I’ve always wanted to play as some of the other Covenant species. Maybe there could just be a Custom Game option to play as the other species? We can only hope.
> >
> > Obviously a lot of this is based off of other games and I’m not sure if we’ll even see any of the “Covenant” species in the game (Firefight isn’t really canon so anything could happen I suppose). A lot of this would probably have to be changed in order for it to work. Anyway, if you’ve managed to read this far then thank you for you’re time and hopefuly we can get a discussion going on and get some more ideas.
> >
> > 343 are watching, so keep it clean.
>
> You’re idea seems great, but there is a few flaws:
>
> -Grunts are extremely easy to kill. They go down in like two hits and if you’re not careful, it can be difficult getting a kill, unless their opponents are grunts themselves and have the same health as them.
> -Jackals are the same thing. It’ll take two hits to kill them. Also, they are TOO slow and are unable to wield certain weapons.
> -Jackal Snipers will be good if the player is placed at a far distance AWAY from the opponents and is able to wield sniping weapons such as the beam rifle.
> -Drones are the same as grunts jackals. Even though it would be cool to fly, you can still die with a few hits.
>
> The rest is good. I especially want to play as a brute and a hunter. I don’t mind having marines on my team because it was my dream to be fighting marines. I’m sick of always being on the UNSC side. Stupid Bungie is too lazy to make a covenant game.

If you were able to control a small squad of Grunts (lets say about 4) and have a third person camera angle around the group. Also, I do realise this is a rough idea, but IMO the point sytem should be more varied to account for the different ranks the Covenant species has i.e. Brute Chieftan, Elite General.

17

One last thing (probably not). A good idea would be to have seperate Firefight voices for Elites or Brutes. Elite Firfight voices could be the Arbiter or Rtas 'Vadum. Brutes could be Tartarus.

18

> One last thing (probably not). A good idea would be to have seperate Firefight voices for Elites or Brutes. Elite Firfight voices could be the Arbiter or Rtas 'Vadum. Brutes could be Tartarus.

I don’t like the idea of aliens speaking english, its not believable.

19

> > One last thing (probably not). A good idea would be to have seperate Firefight voices for Elites or Brutes. Elite Firfight voices could be the Arbiter or Rtas 'Vadum. Brutes could be Tartarus.
>
> I don’t like the idea of aliens speaking english, its not believable.

I’m saying it would only be hearable if you were playing on the Covenant side. A humorous thing to do would be for the Covenant to speak English while playing as them, but the Humans speak their correspondent Covenant species language (ie Marines would sound like Grunts, ODSTs would sound like Jackals, etc). This obviously applies oppositely to playing as humans. Don’t hate on me for it. I don’t even like the idea.