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Remember R E A C H |OT2|

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Hemorrhage is Blood Gulch, and Blood Gulch was a map designed for Halo: CE. What did Halo: CE have that Halo: Reach doesn't? Pistols, active cammouflauge and over shields. Rockets in middle. There were also two warp-points that originate at each base and end in the front right area of the team's territory.

All of these details make a huge difference in how the zone is experienced. It didn't matter if you had a sniper on a perch because any team with a brain would know that teamwork between two or more can take him/her out with their pistols in three shots. Wide open space in the middle? That's what team cover is for. You have your cover on perches, or you always try to 2v1 opponents. You didn't even have to use your warthog for field fire; you could just set it on the warp point exit to prevent a flag carrier escape.

It's not the map design in Halo: Reach that's terrible. It's the map's implementation into a game with assets that shouldn't be present for the map but are (wraiths, banshees, ghosts, dmrs) and assets that aren't in the game but should be present (pistols, scorpion tanks, over shield and active camo).
 

Slightly Live

Dirty tag dodger
Striker said:
Bullshit. I lost count how many times I've helped aid my teammates in holding down the center along with the Laser to manhandle opposing teams Banshee, Warthog, and by golly, the infantry. Why does a supposed primary anti-vehicle weapon have such annihilation over infantry? Whoever controls the Laser, controls the map. That was basic Valhalla 101. The Laser is what broke the map. I didn't care for the map in general. It was good, but it was surrounded by awful other BTB maps like Sandtrap and Rat's Nest.

Standoff was another map that was held hostage with the Spartan Laser. Whoever maintained its control was more than often the victor. With the Laser, you can stop opposing Warthog's in its tracks relatively easy, and with no Sniper on the map, it made camping tons easier for whoever held onto it. That team can then run amuck with their Warthog destroying those hopeless souls who spawned by the helipad or invis spawn.

As for your rant on the "broken geometry", I can just safely say I disagree, and that I'm sorry you feel that way. In no shape or form do I care if I'm front and center with another person in a DMR/Neddle Rifle/Pistol gunfire. The layout is quite fine for me and I have had no issues with the rocks on the red side.

I think your Valhalla example shows how the Laser was successful as a secondary objective - it helped hold the hill, the primary objective for controlling the map and winning.

Your second example with Standoff is much more demonstrative of how unbalanced the Laser could be in Halo 3 and I fully agree about how strongly it influenced that map in particular but that's beside the point at hand here.

My list of issues with Hemorrage goes beyond the "broken geometry" - which I detailed in my previous post. I fully believe that each point I raised is objective rather than subjective. Each point reflects valid technical and comparative issues, which I'd be willing to defend, that, in my opinion, proves Hemorrage is technically an inferior map to Valhalla and considerably so.

For Reach, I was expecting the next evolution of the basic design not a fanboy pleasing recreation of a technically irrelevant relic.

Tempest may be what I was wanting and the sooner we learn more about it the better.
 
I think it's pretty sad how my favorite Halo map of all time just doesn't work well for Reach.

Hemorrhage was my most anticipated map pre-release, but now it's actually one of my least favorite maps to play on.

Bungie seriously needs to give BTB (and vehicles!) more love. I'm sick of playing on Boneyard and Spire (which don't work well for anything but Invasion). Hemorrhage is just unbalanced, and the other maps like Boardwalk and Countdown shouldn't even be in BTB.

I know they're releasing 2 large maps in the Noble Map Pack, but I really hope they find some good BTB maps made by the Community and put them in.
 

GhaleonEB

Member
LAUGHTREY said:
That's why there are vehicles, it's easier to get to those elevated spots.
I don't think you understood the problem I described, or at least not as I described it. Did you watch the video? I got sniped from the other side of the map trying to get into the vehicle so that I could flee to the cover of the edges. If a map does not even let a team get into cover in the first place, that's a problem.

That said, the sentence actually describes the problem perfectly: it is important to get to the edges post-haste, because the rest of the map is not usable.

The only way to dominate the whole map from one of those paths is with a sniper too...and isn't that a good thing? I'd rather snipe on a map like Hemo than something like Paradiso where the sightlines are so short you could get snuck up on at any time.
No, it is a terrible thing, unless you want to have an all-snipers map. I don't understand how being able to kill anyone from anywhere on a map from the sniper perch can ever be considered a good thing. A large map like Hemorrhage should encourage all of its play space to be utilized. The design instead encourages 1) snipers to take up a specific sniper position and 2) everyone else to clear out of the center of the map in order to avoid the hail of fire from the edges. The net result is vehicles rule the middle, and even when they don't infantry will get destroyed unless they are on the outer edges. Snipers should be situationally useful, not the dominant weapon. Otherwise, it counters the entire rest of the sandbox.

If you are a player without a sniper rifle, and you spawn in your base and the other team has a sniper watching the base, your recourse is:

  • Step outside and die.
  • Hope someone on your team has a sniper rifle and can take out their sniper.
  • Hide until the game is over or until the sniper is out of bullets or killed.

(I choose a fourth option: don't play the game type.)

That in my view is a broken map. You might like that style of play, and that's fine, but I think it's very poor map design and hate playing on it.
Devolution said:
Hemorraghe is Blood Gulch, and Blood Gulch was a map designed for Halo: CE. What did Halo: CE have that Halo: Reach doesn't? Pistols, active cammouflauge and over shields. Rockets in middle. There were also two warp-points that originate at each base and end in the front right area of the team's territory.

All of these details make a huge difference in how the zone is experienced. It didn't matter if you had a sniper on a perch because any team with a brain would know that teamwork between two or more can take him/her out with their pistols in three shots. Wide open space in the middle? That's what team cover is for. You have your cover on perches, or you always try to 2v1 opponents. You didn't even have to use your warthog for field fire; you could just set it on the warp point exit to prevent a flag carrier escape.

It's not the map design in Halo: Reach that's terrible. It's the map's implementation into a game with assets that shouldn't be present for the map but are (wraiths, banshees, ghosts, dmrs) and assets that aren't in the game but should be present (pistols, scorpion tanks, over shield and active camo).
This is plausable, my experience on the Gulch in Halo 1 was minimal. I can only really speak to how it plays in Reach.
 

Slightly Live

Dirty tag dodger
Dax01 said:
Hrm. I thought any sniper-only gametypes were removed with the addition of a Team Snipers playlist? I just came across a game of BTB Snipers.

Nope.

Gametypes

Big Team Slayer
BTB Snipers
Elite Slayer
Team Headhunter
1 Flag CTF
Multiflag CTF
Stockpile
Territories

Another good reason for me not to play BTB until it's gone.
 

Dug

Banned
Zeouterlimits said:
op1smo.gif
 

Striker

Member
Dani said:
I think your Valhalla example shows how the Laser was successful as a secondary objective - it helped hold the hill, the primary objective for controlling the map and winning.

Your second example with Standoff is much more demonstrative of how unbalanced the Laser could be in Halo 3 and I fully agree about how strongly it influenced that map in particular but that's beside the point at hand here.

My list of issues with Hemorrage goes beyond the "broken geometry" - which I detailed in my previous post. I fully believe that each point I raised is objective rather than subjective. Each point reflects valid technical and comparative issues, which I'd be willing to defend, that, in my opinion, proves Hemorrage is technically an inferior map to Valhalla and considerably so.
The Laser played the prominent role in every Valhalla game, at least for my experience. The displeasure of this weapon influencing every decision should not be hindering on how a map plays. It broke the flow tremendously in Standoff, and in Valhalla, deemed the vehicles useless if you did not gain control.

As for Hemorrhage, the map is more balanced and firm with the Scorpion removed. My only complaint for it right now is adding a Plasma Pistol to each teleporter receive node and also replacing the Plasma Launcher in the middle to the Rocket Launcher. I have not checked on certain vehicle spawn times, but it does seem like the Revanent, for example, seems to return quite too fast. While it isn't very strong, it still causes havoc at the bases with its strong evasive-ness and close-quarters power.

For Reach, I was expecting the next evolution of the basic design not a fanboy pleasing recreation of a technically irrelevant relic.

Tempest may be what I was wanting and the sooner we learn more about it the better.
I, too, am curious about Tempest. It looked to be like a 1-sided map, but then again, I couldn't tell too much from the photos Bungie provided. Hopefully more is shed on that and Breakpoint soon.

re: BTB playlist

So many Slayer oriented gametypes. Headhunter falls under this, as well, so why is there so many? Why is Multi-Bomb not involved? It was ignored in Halo 3, as well. :\
 
GhaleonEB said:
If you are a player without a sniper rifle, and you spawn in your base and the other team has a sniper watching the base, your recourse is:

  • Step outside and die.
  • Hope someone on your team has a sniper rifle and can take out their sniper.
  • Hide until the game is over or until the sniper is out of bullets or killed.

You forgot the two preferred options of the Xbox Live Community:

-Teamkill like a champion
-Quitacular!

BTB seems the playlist most likely to benefit from Forge World maps. It'll happen right?
 

MrBig

Member
Striker said:
I, too, am curious about Tempest. It looked to be like a 1-sided map, but then again, I couldn't tell too much from the photos Bungie provided. Hopefully more is shed on that and Breakpoint soon.
I can't wait to see that video Brian was talking about. Tempest looks like its going to be the best team map in reach. And invasion certainly is getting stale. Breakpoint looks like its going to be good but we need forge maps in there.
 

Jedeye Sniv

Banned
Striker said:
If Hemorrhage is "broken" because of the Scorpion, then Valhalla was shattered beyond belief because of the Spartan Laser. Like Laughtrey said, the tank being used in an open course was broken, not the map itself. At least the Scorpion has gotten changed, whereas everybody in MM had to put up with the Laser for three years in a crunched canyon.

Disagree with this so much. Maybe I didn't play enough high level H3 (thank god, something about 'high level' play is just so wanky and po-faced, it always turns me right off) but I never found the Laser to be a problem on Valhalla. A decent team can make mincemeat of someone in the time it takes to charge for a single shot. The rocket pods were a much more effective and fun anti-vehicle weapon, and the laser is a little inconsistent as an anti infantry weapon. But then again I think Valhalla was a brilliant map so take my opinion with a grain of salt.

The Scorpion on Hemorrhage is the dumbest thing I can think of though, so glad it was removed.
 

Kuroyume

Banned
Dani said:
Nope.

Gametypes

Big Team Slayer
BTB Snipers
Elite Slayer
Team Headhunter
1 Flag CTF
Multiflag CTF
Stockpile
Territories

Another good reason for me not to play BTB until it's gone.

I would rather see Team Headhunter go away before Snipers. I do want to see Snipers go away though just because it's so fucking slow and boring. That's both in Halo 3 and Reach... Wierd because I liked it in Halo 2. Headhunter... Shit, I thought I could stay away from it by not stepping into Rumble Pit but no it's in BTB too... :(
 

MrBig

Member
I love it when people spend more time strafing around the sniper spawn waiting for it to come back on hemo than actually playing the game.
 

LAUGHTREY

Modesty becomes a woman
GhaleonEB said:
I don't think you understood the problem I described, or at least not as I described it. Did you watch the video? I got sniped from the other side of the map trying to get into the vehicle so that I could flee to the cover of the edges. If a map does not even let a team get into cover in the first place, that's a problem.

That said, the sentence actually describes the problem perfectly: it is important to get to the edges post-haste, because the rest of the map is not usable.


No, it is a terrible thing, unless you want to have an all-snipers map. I don't understand how being able to kill anyone from anywhere on a map from the sniper perch can ever be considered a good thing. A large map like Hemorrhage should encourage all of its play space to be utilized. The design instead encourages 1) snipers to take up a specific sniper position and 2) everyone else to clear out of the center of the map in order to avoid the hail of fire from the edges. The net result is vehicles rule the middle, and even when they don't infantry will get destroyed unless they are on the outer edges. Snipers should be situationally useful, not the dominant weapon. Otherwise, it counters the entire rest of the sandbox.

If you are a player without a sniper rifle, and you spawn in your base and the other team has a sniper watching the base, your recourse is:

  • Step outside and die.
  • Hope someone on your team has a sniper rifle and can take out their sniper.
  • Hide until the game is over or until the sniper is out of bullets or killed.

(I choose a fourth option: don't play the game type.)

That in my view is a broken map. You might like that style of play, and that's fine, but I think it's very poor map design and hate playing on it.

This is plausable, my experience on the Gulch in Halo 1 was minimal. I can only really speak to how it plays in Reach.


To be fair, in that video you didn't move for a good 3-4 seconds. It doesn't matter what you're doing or what map you're on, if you hold still for that long you're probably going to be sniped.

I've killed people with my DMR or at least scared the sniper away long enough to do something many times on that map, from blue base to red cliff. There's also the teleporter which brings you close enough to get magnetism on a sniper up there too.

Map is fine, only problem is the Vehicle respawn times are too short.


Also, Neogaf gets second fiddle news feed and 2old2play gets up top. :|
 

Levi

Banned
Finally hit Captain! I think I was WO3 for a month. :/ Promptly wasted my credits on the ODST shoulders. Fuck yeah.
 

Deadly Cyclone

Pride of Iowa State
Deadly Cyclone said:
Question, I have been seeing these random posters in Reach for a while now scattered through campaign and multiplayer. I know Powerhouse has one in the upstairs of the bath house and in campaign in the first mission where you defend the guys in front of a garage, there is one in there.

Anyone know what they are for?

Quoted for new pages, anyone seen these?
 

MrBig

Member
VsRobot said:
Finally hit Captain! I think I was WO3 for a month. :/ Promptly wasted my credits on the ODST shoulders. Fuck yeah.
lttp
all the cool kids are lt colonel grade 3
better catch up :lol
Deadly Cyclone said:
Quoted for new pages, anyone seen these?
They're probably just posters. Like in tf2.
 

Raide

Member
Yum! All Challenges done in 4 Fire Fight games. Must be the first time I have done the 4 Dailies. I always end up missing one of them. :lol
 

MrBig

Member
I think I'm getting worse at reach. Last week I went +30 in btb or invasion easily. This week I don't think I've gone above +10 with more than 15 kills. Doubt I'll get the weekly :(
 
MrBig said:
I think I'm getting worse at reach. Last week I went +30 in btb or invasion easily. This week I don't think I've gone above +10 with more than 15 kills. Doubt I'll get the weekly :(

Multi-team or Rumble Pit for the weekly. Obviously you'll have to do an objective in RP to get 30 kills and it's still preferential to get KoH or Oddball in Multi as well to make it easier in case you actually get a decent teammate that gets beyond 20 kills. Doesn't get much easier than oddball on zealot.
 

ElRenoRaven

Member
The laser was and always will be bullshit. That's why I removed it from every damn map in the game along with adding flame grenades and flame thrower on Halo 3. lol I've never liked it. Hell in halo 2 rocket lock on was just as big bullshit too. Luckily it's lock on in Reach is how it should have been then. Air Vehicles only and limited tracking.

Taking out a vehicle should feel like you accomplished something. That's the biggest thing that the original Halo got right was vehicles and how they were handled. Even though it's gotten better with Halo 3 and Reach I still miss the days of Halo 1's vehicles, their handling, and other quarks of theirs.

Speaking of that btw anyone else find that the driver in a warthog when vehicles are set to indestructable can't be hurt at all a bit odd? That can't be intended.
 

Oozer3993

Member
Self Induced said:
I just realized when I kill someone with a headshot sometimes it reads "____ was killed by a self induced headshot."

Sweet.

:lol

I used to go into LAN games in Halo 2 with the name "You." So when I killed some one, other people would see "You killed Pepito." I'd like to think I managed to trick a couple people into thinking they had pulled off a miracle kill.
 
Not trying to troll Halo or anything, but.

I was kinda hyped into this purchase, and I'm pissed I didn't just save my cash for Vanquish.

Team Slayer is my Halo drug, and I have to say I'm pretty tired of it. In fact, I'm actually clamoring to play the old Halo 3 maps, but I traded my copy of ODST for this :( I'm too good, it's boring winning all the time and it just feels so hollow, I was tired of the gameplay of a brand new game. That says something to me about how stale the formula has grown years and years later.

I'm just bored completely with Halo the day I purchased Reach. I have no desire to do campaign, either. Whereas I played through the campaign of Lost Planet 2 5 times. I know many will laugh, but I feel Lost Planet 2 was so fresh and awesome compared to Reach. In my opinion, LP2 is a far better game by every metric (I will get quoted and mocked surly, but it's how I feel).

Honestly let down at the map selection, and the fact that 3 of the maps are just generic Forge World mockups of the real thing. I know functionally they are fine, but they just feel cheap and generic. I'd have killed for actual, you know, work to have gone into making them look original and authentic. The remake of the Halo 2 board with the wood, now that is how you remake a map. Don't give me some crappy blue and grey Forge mockup, give me some pretty textures and lighting to work with Bungie. If the map packs contain more Forge mockups, there is no way I will buy them.

Another thing. Visually people pimp this as much better looking that Halo 3, but I'm not seeing it. In fact, I really miss the awesome lighting of Halo 3. In contrast the maps are bigger and the level of geometry much greater, but I'd have taken a resolution dive if it meant Halo 3 level lighting (which is still fantastic years later). Game still has jaggies and I can't tell a damn difference between the native 720p versus 680p of the last game, but the difference in lighting and the reliance on canned lighting really stands out to me.
 

StuBurns

Banned
It's fair enough to be disappointed but is the campaign stale or have you not played it? Both can't be true.

It is the same thing for the most part, but I think it's the best it's been done so far, and I guess as someone who has only played each game's campaign a couple of times, and barely played any multiplayer, it's always been long enough that I'm ready for more when they roll around.

Reach is by far the best the series has been so far, at least in terms of the campaign.
 

Brolic Gaoler

formerly Alienshogun
Oozer3993 said:
:lol

I used to go into LAN games in Halo 2 with the name "You." So when I killed some one, other people would see "You killed Pepito." I'd like to think I managed to trick a couple people into thinking they had pulled off a miracle kill.


Not as clever, the "you" has been used as long as multiplayer FPS has.

Self induced on the other hand, that's clever.
 
Arpharmd B said:
Not trying to troll Halo or anything, but.

I was kinda hyped into this purchase, and I'm pissed I didn't just save my cash for Vanquish.

Team Slayer is my Halo drug, and I have to say I'm pretty tired of it. In fact, I'm actually clamoring to play the old Halo 3 maps, but I traded my copy of ODST for this :( I'm too good, it's boring winning all the time and it just feels so hollow, I was tired of the gameplay of a brand new game. That says something to me about how stale the formula has grown years and years later.

I'm just bored completely with Halo the day I purchased Reach. I have no desire to do campaign, either. Whereas I played through the campaign of Lost Planet 2 5 times. I know many will laugh, but I feel Lost Planet 2 was so fresh and awesome compared to Reach. In my opinion, LP2 is a far better game by every metric (I will get quoted and mocked surly, but it's how I feel).

Honestly let down at the map selection, and the fact that 3 of the maps are just generic Forge World mockups of the real thing. I know functionally they are fine, but they just feel cheap and generic. I'd have killed for actual, you know, work to have gone into making them look original and authentic. The remake of the Halo 2 board with the wood, now that is how you remake a map. Don't give me some crappy blue and grey Forge mockup, give me some pretty textures and lighting to work with Bungie. If the map packs contain more Forge mockups, there is no way I will buy them.

Another thing. Visually people pimp this as much better looking that Halo 3, but I'm not seeing it. In fact, I really miss the awesome lighting of Halo 3. In contrast the maps are bigger and the level of geometry much greater, but I'd have taken a resolution dive if it meant Halo 3 level lighting (which is still fantastic years later). Game still has jaggies and I can't tell a damn difference between the native 720p versus 680p of the last game, but the difference in lighting and the reliance on canned lighting really stands out to me.
Certainly don't think you're trolling. Can we see your profile to see how good you are at Team Slayer, that you've been winning all the time?
Have you been playing any Arena? That's Team Slayer, with an even more competitive angle.
You don't actually say what's wrong with the campaign? The Lost Planet 2 thing... uh.. well.. to each their own. Calling that Lost Planet 2 uh.. singleplayer experience a campaign is kind of crazy to me. But good for you that you got that much out of it.
The few forge maps.. you don't actually mention how they play. While I agree it does grate on the fun of playing on the same style'd map repeatedly, I'd rather have them than not. It's a question of resources, and I'm happy to have them than have less maps with original settings.
Think the lighting is fine (perhaps not as good) and the game looks beautiful, so just difference of opinion.

Very different to problems I'd have with the game (and I do have them).
 

GhaleonEB

Member
LAUGHTREY said:
To be fair, in that video you didn't move for a good 3-4 seconds. It doesn't matter what you're doing or what map you're on, if you hold still for that long you're probably going to be sniped.
Again, you're missing my point: a sniper on the other side of the map should not be able to shoot someone on the other team at their own base climbing onto a vehicle at the spawn location.

What you are saying is, had I not waited a couple seconds for my team mate to get on the Mongoose, I might have had a chance to get into cover. What I'm saying is, a map where you can't even wait a couple seconds for your team mate to get on the Mongoose for fear of getting sniped is a bad map.

The problem is not that I waited a few seconds. The problem is that I could be shot while waiting. I lack the capacity to say this more plainly, so I'll drop it now. :lol
 

LAUGHTREY

Modesty becomes a woman
I still don't get it, It's one thing to not be able to retaliate at the sniper on the perch. That's totally stupid. It's another to have that DMR in your hands and still die to him.


Snipers are long range weapons, that's what they do. They get up high and take out people from half a map away before anyone knew what hit them.
 

FourDoor

Member
All this talk of Hemorrhage being broken, has anyone seen any modified versions of the map by the community? I'm assuming not since most people are too busy recreating their own remakes and whatnot.

I wonder how the map would play with one large wall in the middle of the map ala great wall of China design. It would provide a line of sight break for the snipers and provide a new high ground to fight over.
 

Domino Theory

Crystal Dynamics
Grimm Fandango said:
On the Cage it's the worst. I think that map needs some serious re-tooling.

I don't get The Cage's existence, tbh.

In the same ViDoc The Cage was shown, Lockout and Wizard were shown as well. Why aren't those two maps in MM? Hell, why aren't they even on the disc?
 

Slightly Live

Dirty tag dodger
LAUGHTREY said:
I still don't get it, It's one thing to not be able to retaliate at the sniper on the perch. That's totally stupid. It's another to have that DMR in your hands and still die to him.


Snipers are long range weapons, that's what they do. They get up high and take out people from half a map away before anyone knew what hit them.

But a sniper a few feet from his own base should not be able to snipe anyone on the map, particularly players at their own base, from one single, broken vantage point. The sight line for the particular position of this sniper in this example is horribly unfair and gives too much of an advantage. The sniper can take a few steps backwards and be completely immune from returning fire from the entire enemy team and three quarters of the map.

Anyways...

Domino Theory said:
In the same ViDoc The Cage was shown, Lockout and Wizard were shown as well. Why aren't those two maps in MM? Hell, why aren't they even on the disc?

This.
 

Willeth

Member
I made a thing!

It's called Icarus, and it's a modified version of Infection that always starts with one human. This human spawns in a soft kill zone and has to get into a Falcon immediately and fly around in restricted airspace (marked by floating cones).

The rest of the players are directly below, with infinite plasma pistols, standard jetpack, and a thirst for brains. Whoever knocks the Falcon out of the sky and into the killzone that's between the platform and the airspace gets to feast on their grey matter (and gets two points). If the pilot somehow manages to survive for three minutes among the streams of plasma being spat at them, they get to see another day, and net five points.

Five rounds, lots of hilarity. Download the gametype and its accompanying map, Zenith, here.

Disclaimer: Zenith might need a bit of tweaking to add some initial spawns, maybe make the airspace killzones more obvious and maybe despawn the initial Falcon platform and killzone, but I'll let you guys decide if they're necessary.
 
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