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Halo |OT15| Beta-tested, GAF approved

I'm pretty sure I was still high when I doodled this out so bear with me here if it's any weirder than usual. Revised another rank among Promethean Knights:

THE PROMETHEAN KNIGHT HACKER

OR

SAVE THE LAST DANCE FOR OVERDOZIZ

Keep in mind that in my ideal campaign for these guys to work, each Knight form would have an individual, one-on-one encounter to first introduce them. It'll get to points later on in the campaign where you're getting strong enough weapons or maybe even upgrades that you can handle multiple Knights at once, but on your first encounters they'll probably be noticeably more like minibosses.

Hacker Forms are double entendres - the canon justification here is that, later on into the war, Prometheans were already being dumped into hyper-dense prosthetic combat suits even after "dying," meaning you'd be having a singular consciousness (let's just call them "digital souls" for now) hopping rapidly from body after body upon death against the Flood and occasionally humans. Leaving that much destroyed scrap around would be heavily impractical for infantry combat or retreating, so Hacker Forms were introduced fairly late into the Forerunner-Flood war in an attempt to gather information and clear battlefields, essentially working a permanent graveyard shift. Using the four eye module things mounted to its face, it surveys the area for weapons, vehicles, allies - any interactive equipment, basically - and "scans" it fairly briefly, and proceeds to destroy it. The destruction is surprisingly peaceful while in its ambient form - its wings, in an almost fairy-like fashion, will flutter around the scanned target and gently dismantle it causing the whole Promethean "derezz" effect. After successfully destroying a target it moves on; its pathfinding AI when ambient is intentionally simple to save you some trouble in harder encounters. It can only "see" what the dots touch, which is a good thing because it means you might just be able to assassinate it. If it does spot you, however...

oVUoleG.png

Spotting you will cause it to berserk - it is undoubtedly the most aggressive enemy in the game, emitting an incredibly shrill metallic drone and making a beeline for you, performing a variety of elaborate movements with its hardlight blades. Its armaments are incredibly lethal with significant range when angered - its "wings" convert into a full Hardlight Halberd per each "arm" and its proto-arms turn into "Hardlight Machetes" mostly designed to cover the back of the beast. The easiest way to describe its movement is... well, the way Grievous moves in the animated Clone Wars series. Something like that. It is the only Knight to have legs consisting completely of floating parts, designed for the highest possible agility and flexibility. It also allows it to crouch into a more reserved stance before springing into the air in a large, vertical lunge, designed for getting to players at higher ground or following someone upwards. Or, alternatively, pouncing on unfortunate victims.

Similar to the whole "mining tools are even deadlier on people than rocks" revelation in Dead Space, as a last-ditch effort, the Didact programmed a failsafe into Hackers where if they spotted organic life (at this point Hackers were being deployed alongside 100% artificial Prometheans) they would attack in a frenzy and attempt to eviscerate and "dispose of" whatever they saw, in most cases Flood.

As a bonus, it's without a doubt the most visible and "flamboyant" of the Knights due to its fighting style and luminous parts - it's intended as a warning. If you see hazy, twitchy limelights off in the distance, you know not to let yourself get caught by it. It will be fooled by Holograms pretty easily, and in co-op they have AI that will scale to deal with multiple intelligent targets; they move in a chess-like Knight fashion, however, with three steps forward and one step to the side, so players should take this into account accordingly.

Note that they're immune to the stun effect on the Gravity Gauntlet, and that'll just piss them off even more. If you have either an Energy Sword or a Hardlight Halberd, they'll have a noticeable change in behavior, similar to the way Grunts panic if you pull out a Gravity Hammer in 3. Rather than make a blind charge, it will instead behave a little more like a Brute Chieftan for a bit of fanservice, deciding instead to duel you honorably. If this does happen, literally all other Promethean AI will cease fire or focus on other targets because the Forerunners are honorable dudes. And as a balance measure. The last thing you need is to get pinged by about 50 Promethean units while you're in the midst of fist-fighting motherfucking Promethean Grievous. If you kill it with a melee attack somehow, all Promethean units will retreat either by teleporting or attempting to flee.

Your first encounter with one would be in a very low-lit area with a mostly linear hallway with few places to hide, meaning you'd have to take care of it fast. It has the health of an average Knight, with the exception of taking twice the amount of melees to be killed (as it's designed for CQC).

LMnyX5f.png


Successfully killing the bastard will reward you with a Hardlight Halberd with 250% normal ammo - 250 battery, in other words. In co-op Campaign, it'll drop three Hardlight Halberds instead so you and all your buddies can just try and pike everything to death.
 

E1Dav1d

Neo Member
I think that even though the TU updates very few big things it does cover a few that the community was very vocal about. Plus with all the playlist updating and tweaks just about every week I think they are doing a great job. Terrible launch, great recovery so far.
 

Havok

Member
I'm not sure why this was pitched as a balance patch when almost everything on there is a bu fix. Not that fixing bugs is a bad thing, but it wasn't really presented that way when they spoke about it.

I cannot fathom why Random Transport is being given the spotlight in that Spartan Ops playlist when it's one of the worst missions in the season.

Why is Team Objective getting snubbed with Majestic's release? Landfall could be a good King map but instead they put it in three Slayer-only situations?
 
I'm not sure why this was pitched as a balance patch when almost everything on there is a bu fix. Not that fixing bugs is a bad thing, but it wasn't presented that way at all.

I cannot fathom why Random Transport is being given the spotlight in that Spartan Ops playlist when it's one of the worst missions in the season.

I think there's a potential Achievement on that mission.
 

FyreWulff

Member
Wait, hold, I think I counted the WUs the wrong way.

edit: yeah I did, I accidentally halved them I think. checking.

FIXING BRB

edit2: nope I counted it correctly. NEVERMIND

it's late.
 

Havok

Member
I think there's a potential Achievement on that mission.
The only achievement that appears on that map to my knowledge is on the mission Hacksaw, which is a much, much better mission than Random Transport.

Edit: No One Left Behind appears on Hacksaw, nothing is attached to Random Transport except a pile of misery.
 
I'm not sure why this was pitched as a balance patch when almost everything on there is a bu fix. Not that fixing bugs is a bad thing, but it wasn't really presented that way when they spoke about it.

I cannot fathom why Random Transport is being given the spotlight in that Spartan Ops playlist when it's one of the worst missions in the season.

Why is Team Objective getting snubbed with Majestic's release? Landfall could be a good King map but instead they put it in three Slayer-only situations?

I agree.. just consistently poor marketing with this game.

No wonder Extraction wasn't a playlist because of that game winning glitch. Also, that map pack barely features any gametypes that interest me. Infinity Slayer? Is IS with Team Throwdown settings yet..? I feel like this game is getting messier and tighter at the same time.

destiny.gif


Destiny sniper reload animation from the PS4 announcement

Destiny looks like the baby of Halo and Mass Effect.

People complain about Boltshot and that 343 isn't doing anything about it despite it being one of the largest problems in the entire sandbox.
343 does something about it.
People still complain.

Oh well, I guess you can't please everybody.

Can it still kill in one shot from a decent range?
Is it still a Shotgun you can spawn with?
 

Fotos

Member
People complain about Boltshot and that 343 isn't doing anything about it despite it being one of the largest problems in the entire sandbox.
343 does something about it.
People still complain.

Oh well, I guess you can't please everybody.

People are still mad because it is still a 1-shot kill weapon that is more powerful than certain power weapons.
 

E1Dav1d

Neo Member
THqG0IJ.jpg


10 feet = 1 World Unit , .1 unit = 1 foot

While the distance obviously needed nerfing I think the biggest fix to the Boltshot would be not being able to control when it fires. That's how I thought it worked when it was first announced and was terribly disappointed when I discovered that you could release it sooner once it was charged. If you had to learn the timing and keep it on the enemy till it shot, it would be much more balanced.
 

Tashi

343i Lead Esports Producer
The wording of the Boltshot nerf is odd isn't it?

"Reduced the range of the Boltshot’s damage scaling over distance"

Damage scaling over distance. What does that mean? Will it be more difficult to get 1 shot kills even in its new range?
 

CyReN

Member
stuff from the launch

BUGS, GLITCHES, AND MISSING FEATURES

Game Announcements (Multikills, Sprees, etc.) Are Not Made In Theatre Clips
-When you create a clip from a full film, the announcer no longer is audible.

LAN Profiles Don't Have Everything Unlocked
-This is key for events and competitions. Without the ability to create custom classes using all of the game elements, events are forced to use predetermined loadouts or force players to bring their own profiles.

Lack of Precision Forge Controls
-Reach's Forge controls allowed players to move objects slower and more precisely when holding in the Left Analog Stick. Additionally, players were able to zoom in on objects with the Right Stick to get a better handling of their precision movements. These controls have been removed without explanation.

Waypoints: X for Dead Teammates + More Distinguishable Colors For When Teammate is Shooting / Getting Shot
-Another feature that has been removed without explanation.

Grifball "Ball Arm Time" Is Bugged
-Setting the Arm Time to any other setting than Instant does not actually change the Arm Time.

Lack of Party Indicators In Matchmaking
-Another feature that has been removed without explanation.

Party Details Tell Significantly Less Details in Halo 4
-Another feature that has been removed without explanation.

Cannot Move While Having The Scoreboard Up
-Another feature that has been removed without explanation. Players in past Halo games could bring up the scoreboard and still move their player around. In Halo 4, pulling up the scoreboard negates any ability to move your character.

Setting Ammo Count for Battery-Based Weapons in Forge Does Nothing
-Changing Ammo Count for batter-based weapons hasn't had an effect every since Forge was introduced in Halo 3. Surprising to see this bug make its way into another game.

Weapons De-spawning Too Quickly If Not An Ordnance Weapon Or When Dropped After Death
-Players have noticed that weapons are despawning at a ridiculously quick rate after they have been dropped in comparison to past Halo games. This makes drop-spawning weapons (which creates static weapon spawns) a very inefficient method to spawning weapons.

Games Beginning With No Players On Opposing Team
-Games will sometimes begin with no players on one of the teams. This usually occurs when an entire team backs out after a game or the game after a game has ended because the entire team quit out. This bug is costing players Double XP games.

Alphabetical Order For Active Rosters
-Really confusing when you try to look for specific players through your Active Roster. Essentially forces you to just scroll through the entire Active Roster to find players.

Tactical and Support Packages Earned Through Specializations Are Not Options In Custom Games
-It seems very unneccesarry for these to not be included as options in custom games. Things like Rogue, Stealth, etc. are very desirable for Custom Games.

Cannot Change Max Player Count of Lobby Once a Player Joins
-Very annoying bug. Requires the leader to leave the party and make a new one to set a new Max Player Count.

Impact, Erosion, and Ravine Dynamic Lighting Bugs
-All of the Forge pallets lose the dynamic lighting feature when a certain amount of objects/budget is used.

Forge Pieces With Invisible Barriers, and Other Various Piece Glitches
-Some pieces, like the Tower, 3 Story and some of the Rock pieces have invisible barriers that block shots coming in and out. When walking on a Wall, Coliseum (especially on Erosion) players appear to be in a floating state where their legs are raise as if they are jumping, and glide across the floor.

Object Shifting in Forge
-Forge maps are sometimes subjected to massive shifting on nearly every piece when loaded up. This occurs regardless of whether or not pieces are "locked" or not.

Trait Zone Properties Aren't Set To Default Options
-When accessing the Trait Zone Properties in Forge, many of the options are already set on very random settings, which makes it very tedious to use and set up Trait Zones.

Bugged Assassinations
-Players have experienced very buggy assassinations, sometimes allowing their player to navigate out of the assassination animation and kill the player assassinating them.

Setting Respawn Time in Slayer, Infinity Slayer, KotH and Oddball Gametypes Does Not Negate Instant Respawn
-Instant Respawn is always an option to players during a game no matter what the Respawn Duration setting is set to.

Bugged Flag Physics
-The Flag in CTF will sometimes get caught in map geometry and players aren't able to pick up the Flag.

Inability To Set Ammo Amount on Initial or Random Ordnance
-In Halo 3 and Halo: Reach, you were always allowed to set the amount of ammo weapons would spawn with. When spawning weapons through Ordnance, you do not have this option any more. This is especially an issue with Initial Ordnance.

Ordnance UI Displaying Incorrect Weapon
-In some cases, Ordnance UI will display the incorrect weapon. The most common cases are Frag Grenades having a Spartan Laser indicator and Rocket Launchers having Needler indicators.

Camo Crouch Glitch + Boltshot/Camo
-A glitch exists where players using Camo will not have their blue dots show up on the Radar if they time their crouch properly. Additionally, charging up the Boltshot does not take a player out of Camo.

Starting Ammo + Weapon Despawn Rate Issues + No Ammo On Map
-The amount of ammo you start with, the fact that there are no weapons on the map, and the quick rate of weapon despawning leaves many players with low/no ammo. Maybe spawn players with one additional clip and/or allow weapons longer times before despawning.

Feel free to add any bugs or dire fixes needed.



SUGGESTED SANDBOX ADJUSTMENTS

BR - Remove/tighten the spread. Make the gun a four shot-kill (four bursts of three).
DMR - Shorten the Aim Assist ranges. Decrease bullet magnetism. Remove bloom (little to no effect).
Shotgun - Reduce range and/or tighten spread.
Scattershot - Remove random damage output element.
Railgun - Make more consistent. Either remove splash damage capabilities and make it a hit-or-miss type gun, or increase spash damage capabilities so that shooting at/near the feet or at surround areas produces more consistent damage outputs.
Carbine - Increase shots-to-kill by one or two bullets.
Beam Rifle - Reduce/remove the Aim Assist when unscoped.
Needler - Slightly decrease projectile speed.
Concussion Rifle - Remove the "stun".
Boltshot - Plenty of ideas in this thread.
Frag Grenades - Slightly increase the damage cone.
Pulse Grenades - Increase damage rate and damage output of the "pulse field". Increase time the grenade lasts.
Thruster Pack - Increase distance traveled and/or remove 3rd person animation.
Promethean Vision - Decrease scanning speed and/or recharge rate.
Jet Pack - Reduce max usage and/or decrease recharge rate. Increase acceleration to compensate.
Hardlight Shield - Reduce max usage. Increase walking speed when deployed to compensate.
Active Camoflauge - Increase usage rate when crouched significantly and/or decrease max usage. Increase recharge rate to compensate.
Auto Sentry - Increase rate of fire and/or increase damage output and/or increase Sentry health and/or increase recharge rate.
Regeneration Field - Remove visual distortion (players reporting headaches from using Regeneration Field).



SUGGESTED CUSTOM GAME OPTION ADDITIONS

General
-option to disable Sprint
-restriction lists (ability to dictate which Primaries, Secondaries, AAs, Support and Tactical Packages can't be used)
-option that is Bottomless Clip that doesn't also give you infinite ammo
-ability to dictate Traits for each loadout
-Race. Pretty please?

CTF
-option to turn off auto-pickup
-option for flag-juggling
-1 Flag, 3 Flag, and Neutral Flag support
-Stockpile support/sub-gametype

Oddball
-Ball Throwing toggle

Flood
-Allow alternate weapons for the Flood
-Ability to change loadouts
-Safe Haven support

Regicide
-Juggernaut support/sub-gametype
 

J10

Banned
People complain about Boltshot and that 343 isn't doing anything about it despite it being one of the largest problems in the entire sandbox.
343 does something about it.
People still complain.

Oh well, I guess you can't please everybody.

It's a shotgun. It didn't need to be nerfed. It needed to not be allowed in loadouts. Maybe they can't make that happen for technical reasons, so they figured nerfing it was the next best thing.
 

lybertyboy

Thinks the Evil Empire is just misunderstood.
Eh, I picked that mission cause I love the beginning where you are launched out of the portal right into the middle of the enemies. Also, it would've been rude to stack it with only my missions. :)

Regarding TU concerns about sandbox balancing, dun worry. We'll have more info in the coming weeks. Unfortunately I really can't say more than that right now.
 

Toa TAK

Banned
Eh, I picked that mission cause I love the beginning where you are launched out of the portal right into the middle of the enemies. Also, it would've been rude to stack it with only my missions. :)

tu

That mission is memorable for me because of that beginning alone. Fun stuff.
 

Havok

Member
Eh, I picked that mission cause I love the beginning where you are launched out of the portal right into the middle of the enemies. Also, it would've been rude to stack it with only my missions. :)

tu
That's the biggest reason I don't like it, really. You get launched onto that structure and are immediately pinged by the three jackal snipers there and even if you survive you're at the mercy of that Elite General who is standing right next to you. I know you have that invulnerability for a second when you land, but they hit you so quickly that I died almost immediately my first time playing. I play solo so that probably colors my perception of it, but I really didn't enjoy my time with it. Later on when a bunch of enemies got dropped onto my head from a drop pod because I was standing on the center structure like a sane person instead of wandering around on the ground floor, that didn't help.
 

enzo_gt

tagged by Blackace
Can it still kill in one shot from a decent range?
Is it still a Shotgun you can spawn with?
Well, spawning with a OHKO weapon isn't a problem as long as it's situational and restrictive enough that it does not dominate or overlap ranges with other weapons.

Looking at the picture comparison above now, I don't think it's enough of a nerf, but the scaling over distance may be enough to balance it into it's own niche. It's not unfathomable that nerfing the range and scaling over distance could make people feel it's useless if you need to be right up on someone for it to work. I don't think people have used it post-nerf enough to make a judgment and do not care much for acknowledging progress after asking for it for so long.
 
Eh, I picked that mission cause I love the beginning where you are launched out of the portal right into the middle of the enemies. Also, it would've been rude to stack it with only my missions. :)

Regarding TU concerns about sandbox balancing, dun worry. We'll have more info in the coming weeks. Unfortunately I really can't say more than that right now.

I'm loving the more frequent/personal communication from you guys, good stuff. Everything from what you're doing now to those little comments Frankie leaves in bs angel's funnily-written bulletins.

That's the biggest reason I don't like it, really. You get launched onto that structure and are immediately pinged by the three jackal snipers there and even if you survive you're at the mercy of that Elite General who is standing right next to you. I know you have that invulnerability for a second when you land, but they hit you so quickly that I died almost immediately my first time playing. I play solo so that probably colors my perception of it, but I really didn't enjoy my time with it. Later on when a bunch of enemies got dropped onto my head from a drop pod because I was standing on the center structure like a sane person instead of wandering around on the ground floor, that didn't help.

That's why I personally liked it; it felt different and you're thrown right into chaos from the beginning.
 
No waypoint fixes for CTF/Regicide/Flood? No other customs updates? Unless they're planning on a massive DLC, seems like Halo 4 will never have the options of the previous games. Back to Reach.
 
Is Majestic maps not in Team Throwdown or did I just read it wrong?

I think you read it right. My guess is Throwdown would require those maps to get some tweaks which we will probably see a few weeks after they are out in the wild.

Or 343 may be waiting to see what the adoption rate is amongst Throwdown players so as to avoid wasting time on tailoring maps for a playlist that nobody would play them in anyways.
 

Madness

Member
Rumble Pro sounds great. As for the TU, I had a feeling it would be like this. Some people thought they could fundamentally change so much after launch, it's just not possible nor cost feasible.

Here's hoping a slayer pro variant with no personal ordnance at all is implemented. Stick with allies only radar so we can at least somehow know if they died close by.
 

Tashi

343i Lead Esports Producer
I think you read it right. My guess is Throwdown would require those maps to get some tweaks which we will probably see a few weeks after they are out in the wild.

Or 343 may be waiting to see what the adoption rate is amongst Throwdown players so as to avoid wasting time on tailoring maps for a playlist that nobody would play them in anyways.

My guess is the former.
 

blamite

Member
Title update is super lame. At this rate I'd ve ery surprised if over a quarter of the games glaring issues will be fixed.

Mostly unrelated: At this rate I'm probably end up getting a PS4 way before I get a 720.
 

blamite

Member
Also I feel the need to point out that we were told online File Shares would be up by the end of February. There's one week left to make it happen and we have zero word on what's going on.

This isn't looking good.
 
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