Planet Etrius

At first I didn't really see the difference between the SMG and the AR, but later on I started to go for it when it was around. In order to get the most experience of Halo games you need to learn to appreciate and use detail as an asset in your gameplay.

Armorlock annoys me too sometimes and I do wish the campaign was more replayable and better. Other than some other non game play related issues I don't have a problem with Reach. I think people are exaggerating though that Reach was only sub par because it changed. A lot of people did just get tired of Halo's "inability" to change. As a community we need to try to be as clear to our producers as possible and try to avoid hard cliches like "Halo should not change at all.". While I do understand the value it's trying get at its purpose should be to guide progress openly and not restrict.

I am so glad Bungie decided to make Reach a stand alone title. Finally something new, and I just love the new additions like the AAs, loadouts, and Forge possibilities. I'm kind of indifferent about bloom though. Anyway what do you think?

FF Infection=beast

I'm primarily for more visor and armor colors.

Maybe for christmas

Though this is something I would like to return in at least forge and customs.

wtf?

http://halofanon.wik...eration_Program check it

For extra time to hype this one up? Yes. So many people left.

yes yes yes yes and yes

meh Joking. Yeah I did like my dual wield combos in H2 and Halo3. IDK I'm kind of indifferent, but actually if that makes them bring back a SMG or something like it then heck yea!

I posted this originally in response to another topic and I thought what I had could be pretty legit and I decided to go deeper into it. I was saying how originally I was all for perks and what not in Halo Reach but ultimately I found it wasn't enough change for my taste, and the way in which the change happened blew away much of the fan base. So I decided to re-analyze what happened with Reach and what Halo is "really about" more critically. As critically as I can at least. The original post is as follows: This was all me too brotha, but unfortunately it seems that the conservatives rule the fanbase. And I seriously now think that they may love this game and be more passionate about it than us. They really may know whats best. I do agree that Halo should keep innovating, but the truth is what happened with Reach wasn't enough and at the same it screwed over so many fans. One of the things about Halo is that it's a game where you make the game and you provide the in depth experience. You provide the details in your play style for the gameplay. You are the perk. So I think the best way for Halo to go gameplay wise is to focus on things that directly build off the key points of its core: Weapons (includes grenades) Bonus Gameplay Aesthetics (can branch into weapons or map control) Map Control Those are really the only three. And you may see how equipment in Halo 3 did branch off in the aesthetics department. Dual wielding also did so in aesthetics and weapons as well. The man cannon added a new dimension to map control. So I do agree that Halo should go big or leave the scene. We need to be careful about how we do it though. End Original Post I posted this in response to "*********" (hold on I'll look up the name). What I meant was what happened with Reach wasn't enough and at the same time maybe it did go in a misguided direction. So now I'm thinking with these as the "Ultimately Subjective Truths" or things that I see as fact do to the reasoning that ultimately no matter which viewpoint you see it from, they can ultimately be simplified into an ultimately generic "subjective objective" truth. Like the saying "Life is what you make of it.". So let's examine them. I say these 3 are the ultimate core because obviously many people believe weapons, grenades, and map control are the core of Halo. I just put grenades in with weapons and replaced it with a new layer, "Gameplay Aesthetics",. Gameplay aesthetics often play into either weapons or map control. For example equipment in Halo 3 played a bit into the weapons category with the trip mine, and energy drain. They could also be used for map control like the gravity lift. They were also bonuses in their own category like the regenerator and bubble shield. Dual wielding in Halo 2 also played into the weapons category. I'm going to add a outer core and I will now call the three that I just talked about the "gameplay layer". The outer core is composed of items on map, consistent enviroment, and "equal initial player palette". Now let's look at Reach. At first I had absolutely no problem with the title gameplay wise, and I still really don't except I will admit armor-lock does get pretty annoying sometimes. That's about it though. I wish the campaign were more impressive, and I still don't completely understand if my connection or the game is responsible for my lag in games at times (upstream bandwith?). I only going to focus on gameplay though. So why was the community in such a uproar with Reach? Let's look at my "Ultimate Core" of Halo. Where do armor abilities fit in? They're not intended to be directly used as weapons, most of the time. One of them fits into map control, but let's just call a rule here. Anything that is useable by the player as some kind of equipment or acts in loadout form is considered a gameplay aesthetic. Now how does this play into the other two gameplay layers? Sprint, evade, active camo,...let's throw in armor lock, and hologram are bonuses. That makes jetpack the only one that really plays into any of the other two categories, map control,. Now back to weapons and the armor abilities. Sprint and evade are designed to do 2 things which are to increase speed, and increase capability to close distances with ease and quickness. Any other factors come from the players use of it. Many people may not have a problem with this, but according to my attempt to articulate the hardcore fanbase we have a huge prblem and it's in "equal initial player palette", and items on map. The rule is, if a product in one branch of Halo contradicts another="failure". Now let's look at jet pack, armor-lock, and active camo: Jet Pack "Kills"-Map Control, and includes issues of sprint and evade Armor Lock "Kills"-Weapons, and includes issues of sprint and evade Active Camo "Kills"-same issues as evade and sprint Hologram I'm gonna say it's a harmless bonus Now Loadouts? "Kills"-equal initial player palette, items on map, and part of the point of map control Armor abilities just are not the same as equipment. They are a entirely new bonus and only contradict the other branches. Same thing with loadouts. I think what I'm getting at is that it's not impossible for Halo to evolve, but we should be careful about how we do it. And change should almost always build off of these 6 core aspects and not directly contradict each other. Note: I know this is kind of sketchy and I missed a couple things. Like how the bubble shield in Halo 3 had the exact same function as armor-lock with some differences. It really just depends on how the community reacts. The design of the gameplay aesthetic is really important too.

At the same time I have to say this makes absolutely no sense to me. You say changes like purely the idea of armor abilities by themselves may have ruined Halo? Just so inflexible.

This was all me too brotha, but unfortunately it seems that the conservatives rule the fanbase. And I seriously now think that they may love this game and be more passionate about it than us. They really may know whats best. I do agree that Halo should keep innovating, but the truth is what happened with Reach wasn't enough and at the same it screwed over so many fans. One of the things about Halo is that it's a game where you make the game and you provide the in depth experience. You provide the details in your play style for the gameplay. You are the perk. So I think the best way for Halo to go gameplay wise is to focus on things that directly build off the key points of its core: Weapons (includes grenades) Bonus Gameplay Aesthetics (can branch into weapons or map control) Map Control Those are really the only three. And you may see how equipment in Halo 3 did branch off in the aesthetics department. Dual wielding also did so in aesthetics and weapons as well. The man cannon added a new dimension to map control. So I do agree that Halo should go big or leave the scene. We need to be careful about how we do it though.

I didn't figure out Halo 3 for some time, but I didn't really care much. If I had to pick one I'd guess Halo 3 because you are pretty much overshadowed by if you win or lose (how your team does).

I personally am pretty indifferent, but I do like the idea of credits and the armory. I have my own idea of a system I'd like.

Well now I know why no one replied to my last thread. I really didn't mind any changes to Halo Reach and I still don't really. I still only generically know how the ranking system has changed. I never really looked into it too much. I'm not compettitive sabby.

I'd like forgeable infection. I talked about having infection firefight style a couple of times before too. I've always like infection most and a dedicated featureful gametype like invasion sounds cool.

I made a thread about something like this. I'm trying to put something out that'll make everyone happy, and I'm k with 1-50 too.

hmmmm... legit horizontal rankings IDK its just been on my mind. And maybe specialist ranks like "Petty Officer" and "Reclaimer". If it were a weapon it'd be the ODST SMG or something like it. And elephants back at least in forge. Honestly though I'm fine with whatever happens as long as the community doesn't fall apart and get all pissy like with Reach =(

Elephant. Some kind of fortress vehicle like it. Chopper and a 5 seater falcon at least in forge mode =D and the other covenant air vehicle that's used in CE and Reach, I forgot the name of it

This is just something I've been thinking about lately and it's still more of a conceptual sketch that I'm working out as I go along. Basically what I'm going for is the Halo 3 true skill system, with the addition of commendations, and horizontal rankings based on grades. So for a rough sketch it would be something like. Your rank is based on your highest skill predominantly, but you can also level up by experience and commendations. Your grade is based on your highest competence or consistency. Your highest competence is how often you perform at the base skill level or higher of your current rank. So say for every 3 games in a row played within a playlist at or above the base skill level for your rank you will earn a grade for that rank. Now leveling down in grades should be something like for every game you play below the skill level within a streak of 3 games then the amount of games you need to play at or above skill level increases by how many sub par games you played. So if you play 2 out of the 3 games below skill level then that means you you now have to play the 3rd game and 2 more games at or above skill level in order to level up 1 grade. If you play 3 games in a row below skill level then you level down by 1 grade. Your grade won't take into account the skill of who you play because your grade is your level of competence. Which means your ability to perform at your skill rank in a range of circumstances whether that mean adapting by using a machine gun turrent to level the pros or going all out with vehicles. By default the game should do its best to place you with players no more than 3 ranks apart and no more than 4 grades of difference. There are a total of 15 grades. For every time you level up in vertical rank your grade decreases by 3, but you can never get negative grades either by leveling up or playing bad games. If you're a level 10 Sergeant then you will be a level 7 warrant officer (whatever the next rank is). So grades between ranks would also relate to each other by levels of 3. Now how you rank up in your actual rank would be the same as you do in Halo 3 true skill but with a Reach twist in the experience system. I believe the trueskill system in Halo 3 was that for every game you win you gain one experience and for every game you lose you lose one? I think the ratios there were different. And there is also your sigma which is as high as possible and your actual skill level which is where you're actually being ranked at right? So your sigma is constantly decreasing by every game you play and once your rank and sigma meet this is your True Skill? Please correct me if I'm wrong. So what I'm thinking is that we keep the win lose experience, but now add in commendations in this way. These commendations would track experience, skill progression, and which rank you stood out most at. Skill / experience commendations work like the commendation counters in Halo Reach. They count how many kills of certain types, and feats you pull off in matchmaking, but with a new addition. The ratings they show: onyx, gold, silver, and iron would work on a different principle. They would rank themselves based on which group of ranks those feats and kills were done in with the highest percentage. Like this: Commendation: Heavy Weapons (Iron)Recruit to Sergeant:5% (Silver)Sergeant to Major:30% (Gold)Major to Colonel:40% (Onyx)Colonel to General:25% So in this case this person would have gold in Heavy Weapons. Maybe this could also demote second accounts or at least old account generals from crushing newer players because they may want to save racking up their commendations for later ranks. Commendation rating constantly changes as you level up and earn more for different ranks. Again remember this is all a rough sketch and feel free to sight any nessesary improvements, additions, and things that are best to cut out as you see nessesary. Now for the next part of how you can vertically rank up. We've talked about experience now I want to introduce skill points and "choosing when you rank up" vertically. Skill points or rating points you can also call them would be the accumulation of ratings earned in games. Each vertical rank would require a certain amount of experience (not commendations) and skill points in order to level up. The amount of experience required should be experientially and proportionately more than the amount of skill points. You will automatically level up once the amount of experience needed is aquired. However once you gain the amount of skill points needed to rank up you will be able to choose when that happens by having the option to do a challenge or vidmaster when you have enough skill points. Once completed you will rank up. Of course the chances of this really getting in word for word or at all are slim, but it's always fun to imagine right? I haven't seen anyone else post anything similar to this either and it's even more unlikely for specific ideas to get in. I'm really just trying to experiment with getting as many people from both "conservative" and "liberal" sides of Halo to maybe accept something equally. And maybe there could be something like depending a specific grade reached for a rank you can earn a specialist rank. Like if you're a grade 10 Sergeant then you would become a Petty Officer.

lol thanks

Okay now I am not the best with seeing the whole picture nor do I have keen sense of detail. I may be a bit of a Halo radical and I see that now. I didn't hate Reach and still don't, but I don't think it was the best Halo either. I honestly believe that many of the reasons the "core fan base" say they hate Reach for are actually in hindsight only coincidental affected aspects that are made to branch off from the real issues. And I believe one of those is that Reach wasn't really part of the epic and familiar trilogy we know and love. Reach on its own honestly didn't impress me much as a story I admit. Maybe it was a little sketchy because Bungie was kind of taking a leap of faith even though I am one of the many that promoted this. I still thought Reach had a great campaign the first time I played through, but it just lacked diversity or at least a feel of different scenarios. I think the main issue is that in truth Reach is like a entirely new IP in spirit and it failed to capture us like CE. It was like trying to breed a new and nostalgic feel in a evolved body, but that role is already cemented in CE. It is a prequel and was intended to stand alone from the other games. It didn't inherent the legacy and energy from the other games naturally. It truly had to be built from the ground up in that sense and this is what we missed. Maybe it would have been 5xs more impressive if it was Halo 4 and we were still with chief. If we were going with some passed on energy from previous games, but it wasn't. It was a stand alone title and relative to the cohesive glory of the other games it just didn't match up. And it didn't grab us like CE did when it kicked off the trilogy. But now I'm not going to try to rant about campaign or even about other aspects of Halo because like I said before I am not the best with details and seeing the whole picture. I don't hate Reach so I'm not going to rant anyway. I want to say hi and I hope to post some idea and discussion threads later on and get along with this community, and just observe the creative bomb rush of activity on these forums.