Esorath

TU - Competitve - Non ranked - DMR Starts always AA include - Sprint/Hologram/Bubble Shield Enclosed and Uncaged removed from all competitve playlists Adding in Unanchored - Removed Bungie's Asylum - Added Community's remake of Asylum Team Slayer - 4v4 going to 50 Squad Battle/Squad Objective - 5v5 75 kills / objective Team Snipers - 4v4 - updated taking out uncaged adding in select adding in Shotty Snipers Swat - 4v4 - taking out uncaged/sword base Team Objective - 4v4 FFA - 10 minute to top score Mix of DMR/Slayer Pro Vanilla - Casual - non ranked - Mix DMR/Non DMR starts All AA available including Bubble shield - minus evade Team Slayer - 4v4 to 50 Big Team Battle - 8v8 100 Swat - 4v4 to 50 Multi-Team - 4 teams of 2!!! Invasion - 8v8 Rumble Pit - grab bag of games Action Sack - 4v4 grab bag of mini games including griffball / rocket race Elite Playlists - 4v4 mix of slayer and objectives for the Elites TU - Arena - Ranked - Tweaked Arena Settings AA's should be included on map - Start with sprint Arena - Pro gametype added - DMR Starts 1 Frag Sprint No radar no powerweapons Arena Slayer - 4v4 to 50 MLG - 4v4/objective Arena Doubles - 2v2 to 25 Updates to gameplay would include - Nerfed Grenades - 75% damage from grenades - Blast radius to 80% 80% Bloom - Just feels right Weapon placement on maps tweaked Jetpack will not start to recharge until touching ground. Unsure about the living dead playlist - i assume it would be in casuals but unsure if it would take on the TU settings. I would add more living dead or zombie gametypes.

One thing that balanced the h3 and h2 vehicles was the map itself. At all times in H3 there was a way to take down the vehicles. Power weapons on the map balanced the air vehicles as well as having the power drains and plasma pistols. to me it comes down the the maps most of the time. maybe thats just the level designer in me.

@Twin I don't see where he said anything about the matchmaking system. Not sure what your going on about that. I agree that vehicles are fine in Reach and that the DMR isn't hitscan. Easy dude

Very nicely done. I think that two things you mentioned could be related, and had they been fixed that might have fixed Reach. The maps in Reach do not play to the DMR's power. The DMR - like you said - is super powerful because of it being hitscan. But I think the DMR can work as a primary weapon if the maps catered to that need. They did not cater to it, and it has failed. One more thing I think you forgot to mention is the ranking system failed once you have bought everything in the armory. There is little to no reason to keep playing anymore. I've unlocked everything. I've achieved top 5% gold in Arena without the hope of achieving Onyx without a better more full team, therefore I have "beaten" halo reach's multiplayer. I never felt like I was done in H3's multiplayer. I finally reached a 47 in Team Slayer and was satisfied to be a Brig. You also brought up the maps. And it is not only the remakes that don't work, it is the lack of effort overall in the multiplayer maps that really brought me down. Not counting the map packs from 343 because I enjoy nearly all of them. But the campaign based multiplayer maps that were strewn about in Reach. I admit some of them work. i.e. Zealot and possibly countdown. This is mainly due to how their construction in campaign was planned to be a map in multiplayer. Another thing you did not mention was the AAs. Maybe this was on purpose, maybe not. But I think had the AA's been pickups on certain maps such as camo/overshield was on h3 I think everything would have been changed. This was not done and the start of every player spawn allows the pick of their "class". The maps could not include this because they were ripped straight from campaign and probably some producer told the poor Multiplayer level designer to "make it work" with weapon placement. Halo was always better in my opinion because everyone started with the same advantages and disadvantages. Reach destroyed that formula because now everyone has separate advantages etc. The class formula might have worked had it been done similar to elite slayer's class system. The advantages and disadvantages not only lie in the AA you choose, but the weapons that you are given as well. To make it more clear - this is how I would place a class system using the AA in Team Slayer. Sprint - DMR Pistol 1 Frag Armor Lock - Assault Rifle Pistol 1 Frag Jet Pack - Assault Rifle 1 Frag Camo - Dmr Assault Rifle 1 Frag Hologram DMR Assault Rifle 2 Frags Even though this has never been tested, I feel that AA's on carefully built maps but smart level designers could have made Reach phenomenal.

Yes

As you can see my playlist suggestion includes that choice, so I am right there with you. But making the TU not available in some playlists that some might consider more competitive than others seems ridiculous to me. And adding the TU to more casual playlists seems ridiculous as well. Hence my suggestion to split the playlists so that we can have everything we want. Our cake and eat it, too one might say. My playlist suggestions ,mind you, have the EXACT same amount of lists there are now....

I hate to say this Twin because I usually agree with most of what you say, even though I am a highly competitive player. BUT When I said that I didn't like the sword in team doubles, I was told numerous times to adapt. If we all take a step back and look at it, this isn't OUR game. We as a community are not updating and patching and fixing this game. It is 343's game now. We need to accept where they are taking this game. We can suggest and ***** and moan and complain all we want, but in the end, 343 is going to do what they want to do. One thing people have to understand is, yes 343 is in the consumer pleasing business of game development. But that doesn't mean that everyone can be pleased. Reach was a giant splash into the calm ocean that was the Halo series. I admit, I have had my troubles with Reach too. I rarely remember being griefed by one weapon so much in Halo 3. (energy sword, i hate you) But that doesn't mean I can just dictate what I want this game to be. 343 is doing what it can for the community. We need to be patient, perhaps even so far as to wait for Halo 4. NOW my suggestion is that we separate the casuals from the competitive. The casuals hate playing with competitive types, and the competitive types hate playing with casuals. I think that we need to add the TU to competitive type playlists, and keep the Vanilla settings for casuals. my playlists would be as follows. TU - Competitve - Non ranked - DMR Starts always AA include - Sprint/Hologram/Bubble Shield Enclosed and Uncaged removed from all competitve playlists Adding in Unanchored - Removed Bungie's Asylum - Added Community's remake of Asylum Team Slayer - 4v4 going to 50 Squad Battle/Squad Objective - 5v5 75 kills / objective Team Snipers - 4v4 - updated taking out uncaged adding in select adding in Shotty Snipers Swat - 4v4 - taking out uncaged/sword base Team Objective - 4v4 FFA - 10 minute to top score Mix of DMR/Slayer Pro Vanilla - Casual - non ranked - Mix DMR/Non DMR starts All AA available including Bubble shield - minus evade Team Slayer - 4v4 to 50 Big Team Battle - 8v8 100 Swat - 4v4 to 50 Multi-Team - 4 teams of 2!!! Invasion - 8v8 Rumble Pit - grab bag of games Action Sack - 4v4 grab bag of mini games including griffball / rocket race Elite Playlists - 4v4 mix of slayer and objectives for the Elites TU - Arena - Ranked - Tweaked Arena Settings AA's should be included on map - Start with sprint Arena - Pro gametype added - DMR Starts 1 Frag Sprint No radar no powerweapons Arena Slayer - 4v4 to 50 MLG - 4v4/objective Arena Doubles - 2v2 to 25 Updates to gameplay would include - Nerfed Grenades - 75% damage from grenades - Blast radius to 80% 80% Bloom - Just feels right Weapon placement on maps tweaked Jetpack will not start to recharge until touching ground. Unsure about the living dead playlist - i assume it would be in casuals but unsure if it would take on the TU settings. I would add more living dead or zombie gametypes.

Offline credits earn faster than online credits. This was done to create a reason for people to keep playing if they didn't have xbox live. So basically people have two profiles at the same time or ranks/ offline and online. I guarantee if you start your profile without signing into xbox live - so you are only local - those missing credits and rank will magically come back while you are offline. This isn't a bug or anything to panic about, just how the credit system works offline/online. (this is all based on personal experience and no deep knowledge of how bungie created their system, Jester or TwinReaper will know more if I have overstated anything)

I think the fact that one person could horde power weapons is a bad thing/bad weapon placement. Weapons need to be spread evenly across the map. That being said, the weapon placement in Reach IS weak. There is no risk/reward system for power weapons. All power weapons are placed in places that they can be used instantly rather than the player needing to take them to a place of use. As a rule of thumb, I think that power weapons should not be placed in a position of power. (of course there are exceptions to the rule, there are some weapon placed in the correct areas) I personally think that Reach has a power weapon problem. A lot of the maps have a TON of power weapons on them. Let us compare a Reach map to a H3 map really quick. Sword Base - Construct. Both Assymetric. Both of these maps are vertical based maps that use control of top/control of lifts. Halo: Reach Sword Base has Sword/Shotgun/Sniper/Grenade Launcher. Sword is in an enclosed room 2nd Floor. Shotgun is in an enclosed room 3rd Floor. Power weapons in a place they are instantly useful. H3 Construct had Sniper/Laser/Sword. Reach has more power weapons. That is a power weapon per player on a 4v4. H3 has 3 power weapons spread out. Sniper is out on a ledge middle of the map. Risk Sword is the back on the bridge out. Risk. I hope that we can get more variants of the maps with better weapon layouts one day, but until that day, I'm sticking in double team/squad slayer.

http://minecraftarchitecture.weebly.com/ for anyone interested

Here is the thing, trailers and even teaser trailers take so much extra work it is ridiculous. The writing, the clues that usually are in halo trailers, the amount of polish, the rendering of all the shots, and then the re-rendering because something screwed up, it is just too much to worry about. Having worked in the game industry for the past 3 years, trailers are the last thing on a busy developers mind. Sure it is important to promote your game, but only at the right time. Alot of stuff that are used in trailers are not in game assets so it takes away from the art team from making the actual game. I also think we are used to Bungie basically giving us everything they have with weekly updates that there is no real surprise anymore about the game itself. This is a new company with new ways of doing things and we have to accept that. So yes, a trailer would have been awesome. A trailer that took time away from the art team, the producers time, and everyone else's attention from the main game would have been not so awesome. I'd rather them focus on the game than focus on a fancy trailer.

plus Doesn't make any sense to me. How can you claim 343 isn't listening to the community as a whole's preference if it is "almost sure that every player will prefer this"? Doing things to make the majority happy is usually the best option because you cannot please everyone. I don't think you can blame anyone but yourself for not having "the option of playing with a little of variety" if you don't alter your own behavior such as sticking to one gametype. my suggestion? try playing invasion, almost always objective types. try playing team objective - always objective types. try getting friends together to sway the voting. this doesn't have to be actual friends, just talk to people in the match that agree with you and team up with them. try playing any other playlist to get a variety of play. I usually do multi-team or squad slayer. I know it isn't what you want to hear but thats how some of these things go.

Here is the thing about your playlist argument. I for one, love the changes 343 has implemented into Reach, and I love both Reach and H3. I play in playlists that don't have the updates because of the playlist itself. I play team doubles, this has un-altered reach gameplay. I would like the TU settings in this playlist, but I still play it because of the playlist itself. It is not fair to judge how one feels about the TU based on what playlist they play in because people play in playlists for more than 1 reason.

no THIS is cheating