I agree, I was joking
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Halo: Reach |OT7| What are They to Say Now?
- Thread starter The Librarian
- Start date
Gabotron ES
Member
I hated 3's ranking system and how you had to be locked into certain ranked playlists in order to continue ranking up.
Adding ranks per playlist was also a neat idea.
Adding ranks per playlist was also a neat idea.
If a game had a number rank on 360 from 2005 to about 2008, it was a Trueskill rank. Gears, Rock Band, Burnout, you name it, visible trueskill.
The military rank (Corporal, General, etc) has always supposed to be an indicator of longevity or general experience with the game, and it's never been used for skill matching. You also could never lose your military rank in Halo 3 once you earned it. All they really did for Reach was unhook your military rank being limited by your highest rank in the assortment of ranked playlists.
Trueskill already does this for Reach. Each playlist has it's own TS rank. All Halo 3 playlists, even the Social ones, had TS ranks, they were just invisible.
And locking players down to Officer because they don't want to sit and grind one playlist to max trueskill wasn't very fun either. And once you got 50, you didn't need to go into that playlist ever again and knowing you were a 50 was useless in other lists. As you said, a player might be good at one list but not another, so why do I care what their rank from another list is?
EXP based systems are currently here to stay, and publishers are going to want them in a first person shooter because they feel that's what makes them sell. I don't really get why it just isn't enough to beat the other team without them having to lose even more. It wasn't fun to slog through a 20 minute Neutral Bomb 0-0 game in Halo 3 and have nothing to show for it. Teams of randoms would go up 1-0 then hold the bomb on a remote part of the map just to secure that one experience point. In Reach people aren't trying to metagame their ranks all the time anymore. You do gain a win bonus already.
Halo 2 could show EXP bars because it was ELO. They just mapped out ranges and then displayed a bar to show your position between the range points. Trueskill based games (ie, every 360 game besides EA games and MMOs) cannot use bars for ranks because the algorithm has no idea how 'close' you are to ranking up or down. It is completely dependent on who it finds for you to play with. If you are on the bottom of the pregame lobby in Halo 3 you are more likely to rank up than if you're on the top because the players on the bottom are expected to lose.
Pure unmangled Trueskill also jumps wildly up and down as it finds your rank, hence why Halo 3 mangled it to simulate rank progression. This is why they make you play a minimum # of games in Arena before they show your division; after 30 games Trueskill has a fairly good idea of your skill level and it also prevents people from alting accounts until they get a lucky game streak into a 50. One person was able to alt in Halo 3 until they got a 50 in 24 games. At that point a "50" means nothing. Onyx means something in Reach.
I imagine Halo 4 is going to have some sort of "ranked", but not with Halo 3's method of doing it.
One element of the Halo 3 system I liked was the per-playlist experience rank, wish Reach had something like that for it's playlists.
Yes. but it's not using a very strict version of it. It's definitely below the strictness of Halo 3 ranked and both of those are below the strictness of Reach's Arena.
Exactly. True skill alone isn't enough to produce unpredictable, competitive matches. The 1-50 system wasn't simply True skill, visualised. It used True Skill, sure, but it also slapped on your proficiency with the specific game in question.
Going into a Social match in Halo 3 was completely different to entering a Ranked one. Social matches were hilariously easy, opponents were completely mismatched, and as a result the game wasn't as fun.
Matches in Reach aren't half as competitive as they were in high level Halo 3. Sure, True Skill is working away in the background somewhere, but there's no visualisation of this, there's no public link between you and your teammates, so when one of them goes -15 it feels like the game has defeated you, rather than your opponent.
I wouldn't oppose unlocking the two systems, so players can reach a high overall experience rank, as long as their skill rank was still visible, front and centre.
I treat Halo as a competitive sport. I'm well aware that this isn't how everyone treats it, and that's perfectly fine with me, but when I play Halo I want to test myself by playing against people around my skill level so I can beat them and ultimately improve my own ability.
It's like playing a sport. And if you couldn't objectively evaluate and compare the ability of one team over another in a sport, then it wouldn't be interesting. If teams in a sport played simply "for the fun of it" and there were no overall consequences or ramifications, then it wouldn't be half as interesting. This is the same approach I take with Halo, or at least I did with 2 and 3.
I don't just want to accumulate arbitrary points based on the pre-requisite that I participate, I want to be rewarded based on my ability to master the games mechanics. Otherwise I may as well go outside and kick a football against a wall for hours.
I agree that the system needs work, but why can't 343i perfect the system to prevent such shortcuts, rather than abandon it altogether. And a 50 in Halo 3 did mean something, you could tell when a player had legitimately achieved a 50, and when they'd gamed the system.
An Onyx in Reach means little, to me personally anyway. It means you've sat on your Xbox for hours on end. And that's about it. There's no personal achievement in just playing. Just grinding away at the Challenges, or playing Firefight over and over, or being on a 15 game loss streak in multiplayer yet still progressing towards that much coveted Onyx.
I don't have that sort of time to commit. I want to log onto Halo for a few games in the evening and feel like I've achieved something. Feel like I'm constantly being tested against people of a similar ability. Constantly improving.
thezerofire
Banned
very very very very very not-strict version. I've put like 3 days into MW3 so far (not really proud of that) but I still get matched up with kids in their third game ever of it. It would be nice if it was more strict.
Captain Blood
Member
I have spent drastically less time playing Reach than I did Halo 3. It is crazy.
Marcus Lehto is rejoining Bungie.
http://halo.bungie.org/news.html?item=35391
http://twitter.com/#!/game_fabricator/status/153864846482489346
http://halo.bungie.org/news.html?item=35391
http://twitter.com/#!/game_fabricator/status/153864846482489346
Ran into a group of recruits in Squad Battle last night.
Makes me wonder if they want these new kids to stop playing the game, lol
K
kittens
Unconfirmed Member
Awesome news.
Yup, very glad to hear this. I have long admired his work.
A27_StarWolf
Banned
Good to hear!
now get ready for some sarcastic comments from people who don't like Reach.
biosnake20
Member
Yes. A name I recognize is joining a game developer I recognize.
So serious. This is nice.
Steelyuhas
Member
Because that's how it was in CE, and because it's a first person shooter. There once was a time in Halo when melee was the most powerful weapon in the game.
So Halo CE isn't Halo?
That is very very cool.
Good to hear.
Bregmann Roche
Member
There are things I like about Reach. Marcus is at least partially responsible for all of those things. I was disappointed when he left Bungie. Hopefully during his break he developed a healthy disdain for bloom, slow movement speed, and non-floaty jumps.
I kind of prefer the more powerful melee, but I barely have any melee kills; its nice for it to be there when I need it.
Spartans that can punch through tanks should probably be able to punch through a fellow Spartan pretty easily
Just curious, but what were some of the additions he was behind? We all know sage was behind the abomination that is bloom (and plenty of other terrible things).
Spartans that can punch through tanks should probably be able to punch through a fellow Spartan pretty easily
Just curious, but what were some of the additions he was behind? We all know sage was behind the abomination that is bloom (and plenty of other terrible things).
ElRenoRaven
Member
OH HELL FUCKING YEA!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Steelyuhas
Member
He was the creative director of the game, so I'm sure a lot of things in the game were his ideas/initiatives.
Tha Robbertster
Member
Awesome news! I was watching the first Reach vidoc yesterday and it reminded me that he left Bungie which kinda sucked. Great news that he's coming back again.
Grenades and melee both had a viable role in CE.
No. Everyone needs to adapt, not us.
I know that, I was just wondering if he meant anything specific.
How does anyone like bloom?
I mean, I can understand the bleedthrough argument, but not much else(I wouldn't mind melee only bleedthrough, but I'm not going to complain about it). Do people really like invulnerable armor lock?
Steelyuhas
Member
That's true, but it also had more of an emphasis or strength on weapons than the past couple of Halo games.
K
kittens
Unconfirmed Member
I love the Anniversary Squad playlist, but holy shit, I'm not happy to be playing against armor lockers again. I raged so hard on Battle Canyon yesterday.
Played Reach yesterday
I loved all the times I was killed by a person who sprinted up to me, melee'd, and then grenaded.
He literally used AA's, Melee's, and Grenades to kill me. Didn't fire his gun.
The Real Napsta
Member
Is it really 4? I thought it was 3. Like Halo CE was.
Captain Blood
Member
I think I still owe you a couple rounds of Trenched haha.
Steelyuhas
Member
Pretty sure it is 3, although I would never attempt a triple melee lol so I'm not completely sure.
Bregmann Roche
Member
I like the direction that the campaign took: the environments, the characters, the aesthetic, the cinematics. My only real nitpicks are with very specific story choices (one needle rifle shot? Really???) and I still enjoy the campaign even including those choices. I am not as bothered as some people are by inconsistencies with the canon.
I like armor abilities as they are implemented in the single player experience (where you almost always start with sprint and then find pickups at certain points in the level).
I like all of the new weapons in the game although I take issue with how they are balanced for the multiplayer experience (bloom, mega grenades) but that is a sandbox issue.
I like the vehicles but I hate the way they are implemented in multiplayer. This is a sandbox issue as well.
There are a lot of things in Reach that I like. Marcus would've been involved at some level in all of those things (save, perhaps the sandbox stuff). We bitch about Reach a lot in this thread, but the truth of the matter is, the game has a lot of great qualities.
The stuff that makes Reach feel "ok" instead of "great" for me (grenade strength, vehicle combat, loadouts) could all be stuff that Marcus supported, but it isn't stuff that he's directly responsible for.
tl;dr version:
For me, Reach is Anne Hathaway: pretty great at first, then good as long as you take some breaks, but really annoying when you start to spend every night with her. Marcus did her body, hair, and makeup, but Sage did her personality. Sorry Anne.
Gabotron ES
Member
I have already played more Reach than 3, what I mostly play now is Invasion but I'll start playing some BTB now that it's 85% bloom. Heavies will also make for the lack of maps.
Edit: Sanctuary's LD version looks fantastic.
Haha yea, I can get behind quite a few of the changes as well, but some of the (mostly sandbox)design decisions just leave me a bit sour.
The canon inconsistency make me rage tho
Games of Versus played by me on matchmaking:
Halo 3 - 6472 (4.15 avg per day since it came out; 5.98 avg games per day while it was the go-to Halo till 9/14/2010)
Halo Reach - 2031 (4.25 avg per day since it came out)
I should play less Reach if I intend to be making a point a few years from now of how much hated it and how little I played it.
Halo 3 - 6472 (4.15 avg per day since it came out; 5.98 avg games per day while it was the go-to Halo till 9/14/2010)
Halo Reach - 2031 (4.25 avg per day since it came out)
I should play less Reach if I intend to be making a point a few years from now of how much hated it and how little I played it.
ncsuDuncan
Member
Marcus is coming back? Awesome news! Such a nice guy.
I never did get around to making a video walkthrough of Count dHouen.
All i have is the spooky loadout cam video and a 4 pic slideshow.
I hope people enjoy my take on Countdown. It's nice to have something other than a Grifball map in Matchmaking.
The Henery
Member
Dude, just give it up already. There's no point in wheeling this tired out excuse out every time somebody criticizes skill matching in Reach. Why? Because at some point in the loosening of 'trueskill' it ceases to become a system for making matches, as in, the teams playing each other are matched in terms of skill. Reach doesn't search based on skill, it searches based on ping distances and speed in my experience. The loosened 'trueskill' should be called something else as it certainly isn't a skill matching system.
FyreWulff said:
The EXP per playlist system was great in Halo 3 because it co-existed with the skill rank. It also gave you something to aim for in each playlist outside of skill rank. There's no reason to go to a purely EXP based system.
Also, objective holding happens just as much in Reach. More credits and all that.
It really doesn't. In fact it means less than fuck all. You can't see it outside of one playlist, in the post game lobby and nobody plays the playlist to boot.
Remember when Luke Timmins said ""Oh you were Gold last season" and that meant something" in a pre-Reach vidoc? Who here has actually said something like that? Having a 45-50 in Halo 3 meant something. Nothing means anything in Reach.
I will be very, very disappointed if Halo 4 doesn't feature 1-50 or something decently equivalent.
I'm still down to play more whenever
Agreed.
Your percentile within a certain division, and a division badge, should appear on your name-bar; then it might actually mean something.
'Rank' being tied to one (divisive at best) playlist means no one cares about it. If you were ranked in each playlist, or overall, it would be much better, imo.
bobs...onGaf
Member
Having an overall rank to work for was nice, the only downside was the fact that people cheated to get it. But so what? With good anti cheating measures they cant mess up your matches, so they can just boost amongst themselves. In which case they aint harming anyone.
That said, with Reach just generally being an uncompetitive game and the general flaws in the Arena system, I wouldn't touch ranked gameplay. Even if the Arena ranking system was intergrated more into the game (like showing your rank in the pre game lobby), it just wouldnt be worth it.
You need a good game AND a good system. Im not excusing the Arena, because its not a good system, but even if Reach did have a good system it would probably be just as underplayed. Just as I think the Arena would have thrived if Reach was fun to play competitively.
That said, with Reach just generally being an uncompetitive game and the general flaws in the Arena system, I wouldn't touch ranked gameplay. Even if the Arena ranking system was intergrated more into the game (like showing your rank in the pre game lobby), it just wouldnt be worth it.
You need a good game AND a good system. Im not excusing the Arena, because its not a good system, but even if Reach did have a good system it would probably be just as underplayed. Just as I think the Arena would have thrived if Reach was fun to play competitively.
I would actually say that is the problem, they catered to the people who didn't like or play much of 3; in a way that they are rather enjoying this game and play it more, versus the people who like the gameplay of 3 and totally alienated them with their NEW game play mechanics.. hurting the games sustained user base in the process.
Captain Blood
Member
What was your Halo 3 avg games per day at the point in its life cycle that Reach is currently at?
bobs...onGaf
Member
I pm'd this to him to avoid really bitching about Reach in here, but its relevant so screw it:
For me, I found that customs where generally at least as/ and in most cases far more competitive than matchmaking could be, whilst actually providing a good connection, (with the right friends, all guys that played to win, had a laugh and lived locally). Because of that I played a ton more customs than I did matchmaking for pretty extended periods. I still played a ton of matchmaking but customs are where I had the most fun.
No it isn't, it's a game that is just loved more by casual players.
That too.
9/1/11-12/31/11 I played 88 games of Reach
9/1/08-12/31/08 I played 796 games of Halo 3
EDIT: lol
What the hell kind of dates are those
Wouldn't know how to calculate since I don't know how to get anything but total lifetime number of games, but I imagine the difference should be massive, and so will be the one after all is said and gone and Reach becomes a thing of the past with the release of Halo 4. I was very addicted to H3 for years and I feel like I've barely played Reach this past first year of its life.