Support NeoGAF

[Hawk269]

Can anyone on Xbox One check the in-game Store and see if it shows the $2.99 Blitz Pack? I was playing on my PC the day before yesterday and it appears in the in-game PC Store, but last night when I was on my Xbox One, it did not show the $2.99 Blitz pack, only the initial ones that were up prior the early access.

Since I am playing on both platforms, I have noticed a bit more lag and more disconnects on the PC version than on Xbox One. Still some lag on Xbox One, especially at times when trying cycle cards, but just seems a little more sensitive on PC.

 

[Leyasu]

Is skirmish just a scenario mode?

And can you online coop it?

 

[Gravemind IV]

Nope. FFA and a multi-team type playlist would be cool and hopefully 343 consider adding it down the line.

Ah, that's a damn shame. I dig duking it out in a good old FFA, even with AI.

Was rewatching some cutscenes aaaand..

Spoiler

It's funny how much Jerome and Isabel remind me of what Master Chief and Cortana were in 1-3.

 

[SmartWaffles]

Is skirmish just a scenario mode?

And can you online coop it?

Just goo'ol play a match vs AI or a player. And yes you can coop it.

 

[Caayn]

It seems like you cant level up by just playing skirmish or firefight so that will translate in not leveling up to get better cards etc.

This is probably my biggest announce. Playing Firefight, Skirmish or with two buddies against the AI in the online playlist will result you getting nothing, zip, nada.

Also when do you get card packs? There's no in-game currency you can use to buy them. I've noticed that you get them through completing campaign missions (first time only?) and levelling up.

Can anyone on Xbox One check the in-game Store and see if it shows the $2.99 Blitz Pack? I was playing on my PC the day before yesterday and it appears in the in-game PC Store, but last night when I was on my Xbox One, it did not show the $2.99 Blitz pack, only the initial ones that were up prior the early access.

Since I am playing on both platforms, I have noticed a bit more lag and more disconnects on the PC version than on Xbox One. Still some lag on Xbox One, especially at times when trying cycle cards, but just seems a little more sensitive on PC.

On the XB1 I have the following packs that I can buy through the in-game store.

3x €2,99
10x €8,99
23x €19,99
47x €39,99
135x €99,99

 

[R aka Bon]

Just finished the campaign...

Spoiler

It was a very fun ride I must say, very great build up towards the end, and several climactic moments that were all satisfying to experience.

I thought the story was very cohesive and it managed to introduce both interesting protagonists and a fierce antagonist (Atriox is seriously badass.)

I am not gonna comment on the RTS side of things as much, since I don't have much experience with the genre.
I found the unit and factions to be very diverse, and I also enjoyed what the different leaders brought to the table in the MP modes.
I do wish there were more base building or base customisation options however, to make each base feel more unique and different, to keep it interesting and varied.
The menu for using leader powers is not the most responsive as well.
And at last I wish there were more zoom options.

For story, what was Prof. Anders trying to do with the Halo ring?
Why did Isabel feel the need to anger the sentinel on the ark, couldn't she just have done some magic and destroyed it herself, as she was in control of the ship?
Also if Anders' ring is the one Cortana finds at the end of H5 legendary ending, why does Cortana not go for the Ark and build her own halo rings. And can anyone build a Halo ring now?
Thx in advance

 

[Toa TAK]

Having a lot of fun with the multiplayer and Blitz modes. Really dig the various voice overs from each leader. My team lost in my first Rumble match and Anders went "We did our best.. they were just a little... better." lol Thanks for the confidence boost.

 

[Theorry]

Yeah Blitz is pretty great. Its just quick and building a deck of cards just has something that feels always good to do. Main MP is great also. But sometimes i dont want a 45 min match you know.
Love Forge is Warthog card.

 

[Leyasu]

Just goo'ol play a match vs AI or a player. And yes you can coop it.

Thanks. I'll finish the campaign before trying out ev

 

[Fuchsdh]

Spoiler

For story, what was Prof. Anders trying to do with the Halo ring?
Why did Isabel feel the need to anger the sentinel on the ark, couldn't she just have done some magic and destroyed it herself, as she was in control of the ship?
Also if Anders' ring is the one Cortana finds at the end of H5 legendary ending, why does Cortana not go for the Ark and build her own halo rings. And can anyone build a Halo ring now?
Thx in advance

To answer your questions:

Spoiler

With no immediate way to figure out how to reactivate the portal back to Earth, Anders wanted to use the replacement Halo ring being constructed; the rings can only be deployed to set locations, but getting sent to Soell (the location of the first Halo ring from Combat Evolved) would mean they were close enough to Reach and humanity to get a beacon out and it not take years and years.)

As to Isabel, what they were trying to do was destroy the assault carrier by aggravating the Sentinels. Why they couldn't just destroy it with the particle cannon alone is an open question which I believe comes down to "rule of cool".

We don't really know if the ring Cortana seems to activate is the one Anders is on. However, it doesn't seem like building a Halo is a button-press easy. The Ark is apparently always working on a Halo in the forge as a contingency, but since they just used it it will presumably be months before another Halo capable of firing would be ready (assuming that the Ark still has the materials necessary.) It's also unclear if a human AI would be able to control the Ark that effectively, although given Cortana's ability to tap into the Domain it would probably be a matter of time.

 

[Werd]

Haven't seen many thoughts on Strongholds, like it? Had fun sieging up spots with Kodiaks + anti-air support, spread out to avoid leader power insta-death.

I think the game does a good job of having modes that actually play very differently rather than just being small tweaks.

Also had the glitch I mentioned early of both optional and sub-objectives showing as 0 out of X on the mission screen and not counting for the achievement either, now for 4 of the 10 missions I've done (here comes the power spam on 11). The last two were missions I saved and quit half-way through so could be related. Still have my skulls though which I want to help with legendary.

 

[Tecnniqe]

The par time on "The Signal" is insane.

Do everything perfectly and best I've got is 3:04 out of 3:00. Am I missing a shortcut or something?

cut scenes eat away like 40sec and you can't skip them...

 

[sam777]

I just won a Blitz match 200-0 woop, I managed the game pretty well though, it was also the fist Blitz match that I had won. There should achievement for that.

 

[B3N1]

This freezing has happened to me at least 3 times today. The duration is totally random, sometimes it's short, but one took like 20-30 seconds. At least I didn't end up on the dashboard, right?

UI Keeps getting better

 

[R aka Bon]

Thx Fuchsdh

I just got xp for winning against the AI in Multiplayer, which i don't remember getting yesterday when playing that mode, odd.

 

[JaggedSac]

This game really does not like resuming from a power down.

 

[Lom1lo]

Lol at those Leader Powers. Playing against ai in matchmaking, this violet glassing beam kills just everything ans it moves so fast that you cant escape -.-

 

[Tecnniqe]

Lol at those Leader Powers. Playing against ai in matchmaking, this violet glassing beam kills just everything ans it moves so fast that you cant escape -.-

custom games with no leader powers is so much better imo.

However you gain nothing from it exp or card wise.

 

[Lom1lo]

custom games with no leader powers is so much better imo.

However you gain nothing from it exp or card wise.

Well I think they are cool, but some are too op.

 

[Tecnniqe]

Well I think they are cool, but some are too op.

Well the super weapon ones need longer cooldown and the time between the visual effect and the time before they hits need some adjusting (MAC and Archer more specifically) along with beam move speed so you can outrun them.

As a result I kinda find them ruining it more than adding, even with some of the cooler ones and the passives.


Also Blitz got some balance issues. Spartans are WAY OP, especially the rush card.

 

[SpartanSlayer117]

Well the super weapon ones need longer cooldown and the time between the visual effect and the time before they hits need some adjusting (MAC and Archer more specifically) along with beam move speed so you can outrun them.

As a result I kinda find them ruining it more than adding, even with some of the cooler ones and the passives.

I'm really hoping they tone down the leader powers, it's ruining what would otherwise be pretty cool battles.

I'm having extremely frequent desync issues with all my friends on 3v3's and crash to dash on 2v2's. Also taking away the fricking pelican transport as a standard ability and giving it only to Forge is such a stupid thing.

Last but not least, what the hell did they do to Cutter...nowhere near as fun as Halo Wars 1 Cutter, so extremely disappointed with this since he is my main Leader.

Game is great and i encourage anyone that is on the fence to get it but it needs some balancing and attention fast.

 

[Werd]

Did they ever say if the card drop rate is the same in the launch as it was during the beta?

If it is I'm getting a lot less lucky. Still a decent rate but I miss my Elite Honor Guard.

 

[Gravemind IV]

Ok so if I understand correctly.. there is no way to simply look for a matchmade game with a format of your choice? I mean.. the only thing I can find is 'Rumble' and that seems to be a random amount of people with a random mode (domination, strongholds or deathmatch I guess).

I can't even get through the searching part right now. But that would be a huge disappointment. I noticed that there wasn't a custom games list, and I was able to invite a friend for a 1vs1 earlier, but having no list of custom games and no specific matchmaking is really gonna eat in the longevity for me.

 

[Ade]

Ok so if I understand correctly.. there is no way to simply look for a matchmade game with a format of your choice? I mean.. the only thing I can find is 'Rumble' and that seems to be a random amount of people with a random mode (domination, strongholds or deathmatch I guess).

I can't even get through the searching part right now. But that would be a huge disappointment. I noticed that there wasn't a custom games list, and I was able to invite a friend for a 1vs1 earlier, but having no list of custom games and no specific matchmaking is really gonna eat in the longevity for me.

Multiplayer then find match. Menu across the top, not the big tiles.

 

[NMFried]

For anyone interested, we're giving away a copy of Halo Wars DE on my podcast's Twitter.

https://twitter.com/SHAssemblyLine/status/833429116108075013

 

[RoKKeR]

I think I'm probably 2/3 of the way through the campaign and man, these cutscenes are just phenomenal. Story has also kept my interest thus far.

 

[SpartanSlayer117]

So after playing the game for a while now, i noticed that sometimes when i would create a building, the construction would not begin. Which of course adds to the clunkier controls compared to Halo Wars 1.

I found that the problem is that if you open up the menu to create a building and just press the A button in the middle the menu actually disappears.

So if you open up the menu and quickly tap the direction of the building with the joystick and press A while it's selected and let go of the joystick for just a fraction of a second, the stick will reset to the middle and you are actually pressing A on the middle of the menu, which makes the menu disappear and gives you the impresion that your selection went through.

This is very easy to reproduce, try it.

So solid fix for this, remove the ability to make the menu dissapear by pressing A in the middle of the menu, only make menu disappear after selection really went through or by pressing B like in Halo Wars 1.

 

[aEku]

it makes me sad that the campaign was over after 7 hours.. i dont see value changing difficulty level.

 

[Danny 117]

Love the banter between Jerome and Isabel. Hell I actually loved all 3 of the Spartans. Dare I say they had more personality than most of the spartans in Halo 5.
More of Red team, please.

 

[Gravemind IV]

Multiplayer then find match. Menu across the top, not the big tiles.

Oh wow, I did not expect that. Kind of strange to have a small word in the upper left corner be clickable while having this gigantic Rumble tile front and center.

In other words.. had my first matchmade 1vs1. My Anders versus. Shipmaster. Full on Sentinel on Banshee action. The Retriever actually buckled fairly quickly under his (what I presume to be upgraded) Banshees. HOWEVER.. throw in a legion of fully upgraded Protector Sentinels and a Condor backed up by a few Nightingale and you pretty much roll all over him.

It was actually kinda sad to see how fast his Scarab got torn apart by that fleet of ships.

 

[Memory]

Thx Fuchsdh

I just got xp for winning against the AI in Multiplayer, which i don't remember getting yesterday when playing that mode, odd.

What settings did you use? I've yet to get exp from the AI. Maybe its because I keep playing 2v2?

It also sucks I don't seem to be getting exp from Firefight either. Since you can't play blitz vs the AI, getting new cards for Firefight is even harder.

 

[depward]

I'm enjoying this but still being a bit overwhelmed. Haven't played an RTS since command and conquer generals

 

[DeadOnions]

I'm now getting the issue of wins counting as losses. The first few hours I had no issues but now it's like the longer I play the buggier it gets.

Edit: Getting network issues aswell. Really bringing in the losses now. It's funny though as Blitz I have only lost connection once and have a 13 played/9 won stat whereas mp I have 4/13 aa two wins didn't count and I have lost connection twice.

I know the stats don't matter but it's still annoying.

 

[zeox]

just had an INCREDIBLE 35 minute 1v1 (unsc v unsc) match where I held a sentinel rush and continued to hold on by the skin of my teeth until I eventually won the match. Man, for all the problems and bugs this game has, it is still REALLY good.
I just hope they iron out the bugs asap!

 

[Forerunner]

Some of these missions on Legendary are just straight up bullshit.

 

[Easy Breezy]

Can there be an option to not get Strongholds? Absolutely hate it.

 

[m23]

Oh man that cutscene I just saw...so good.

 

[CyReN]

Has anybody game not loaded the next mission for campaign? Back to back missions now I've gotten caught in the loading screen and have to replay the end of the previous mission.

 

[Defect]

Why isn't Halo Wars Definitive edition available for me to download on the windows store?

 

[ffejeromdiks]

Love the banter between Jerome and Isabel. Hell I actually loved all 3 of the Spartans. Dare I say they had more personality than most of the spartans in Halo 5.
More of Red team, please.

I was saying this about Halo Wars compared to H3 back in the day. For whatever reason the wars teams are better at portraying Spartans than any of the legit Halo devs, pretty odd. They seem more in line with the spartans of the deep lore than the actual in-game spartans we're used to by now.

 

[Forerunner]

I missed the par time for From the Deep because

Spoiler

the bitch ass Scarab kept going back in the water.

 

[Spasm]

Oh man that cutscene I just saw...so good.

Let me guess, the one at the end of Under the Dark (mission 9)? I just barely watched it. One of the best pieces of Halo related media ever!

 

[Hawk269]

More bugs. I was playing Blitz and it said I leveled up from Level 5 to Level 6, then I started another match and finished it and it was said I was back to Level 5 with about 1/4 of the experience bar left. I already leveled, but somehow the game lost it or something. So I play another Blitz map, then it says I am Level 7. I showed my wife and she was wondering how I went from 6 to 7 after one match. So after all that, I back out of the menu to discover I am back to Level 5 and had to play another match and then it finally locked me into Level 6. I lost a Blitz pack because you get one when you level up and according to the game I leveled to 6 twice and it showed me at level 7 once.

Oh and I was trying to finish the Weeklies and Deathmatch was not fun, leader powers are WAY overpowered. They need to be nerfed and not only in the damage they cause but the amount of time/resources are needed to obtain them. I think Technique said it before, game is a lot more fun without the leader powers as they stand right now.

Really loving the game, but these bugs are just getting in the way of the enjoyment. Losing time, Blitz Cards and bizarre shit. When playing the game, my partner sent me resources, the game tells me he sent me resources, but on my screen in text it says "Hawk269 has sent you energy". How in f**k do I send my self resources? Game was not ready to release even though I wanted it 6 months ago. Just way too many issues across the board.

They have an incredible base that if they fix the bugs and do some balancing it would be fantastic, in addition to 2-3 more campaign missions, but damn it is such a shame that a game has so much potential but ruined by the bugs and shitting balancing. But fuck, I still am loving the game!!!! Very frustrating! lol

 

[m23]

Let me guess, the one at the end of Under the Dark (mission 9)? I just barely watched it. One of the best pieces of Halo related media ever!

Yep. So good. Gave me so many feels from the old Halo books.

 

[Hatefilled Vengeance]

I won a copy from that Verizon NYC contest the other day. I've only messed around with multiplayer stuff so far, but enjoying it a surprising amount. Even though I'm pretty terrible at it so far.

 

[Louis Cyphre]

I'm still plugging away with the first game since I never played it. Having a lot of fun and amazed how good it plays and how great it looks on the PC. Hoping it runs ok for Halo Wars 2.

This is the second game I bought that uses the Xbox app and it loads so much faster than Forza Horizon 3.

 

[Sydle]

Just got through the first mission and I love the presentation thus far. Very much looking forward to playing this out and seeing the story through.

 

[Hawk269]

I'm still plugging away with the first game since I never played it. Having a lot of fun and amazed how good it plays and how great it looks on the PC. Hoping it runs ok for Halo Wars 2.

This is the second game I bought that uses the Xbox app and it loads so much faster than Forza Horizon 3.

Visually, Halo Wars 2 looks pretty fantastic. I have been playing it on both Xbox One and PC at 4k/60fps and it is great looking on both, of course a lot better on the pc at that resolution. HW1 was no slouch, but HW2 really takes it to another level with the amount of effects and detail in the units. Kind of wish it supported HDR because some of the explosions would be fantastic in HDR.

 

[Louis Cyphre]

Visually, Halo Wars 2 looks pretty fantastic. I have been playing it on both Xbox One and PC at 4k/60fps and it is great looking on both, of course a lot better on the pc at that resolution. HW1 was no slouch, but HW2 really takes it to another level with the amount of effects and detail in the units. Kind of wish it supported HDR because some of the explosions would be fantastic in HDR.

I'm so far behind in what my PC is capable of. I just have a regular 1080p monitor but I do plan on upgrading my CPU. HDR from what I have read makes a huge difference in movies so I can just imagine in games too. Could they add HDR in an update?

 

[Grisby]

Getting here near the end of the game.

What's everyone's favorite MP mode? I might dip my toes into one or two tonight to try out. I keep getting cards for Blitz so I supposed that will be the first.

I'd like to just get another player and we go f up some AI dudes.

I think I'm probably 2/3 of the way through the campaign and man, these cutscenes are just phenomenal. Story has also kept my interest thus far.

Yeah, I love the idea of this old ship pulling through as a family.

Great Blur stuff.