Halo Bulletin 4-17-13

If you noticed that last week's was missing, well it's because I didn't really think there was much news to report on. Just a description of what weapon classes they'll be tweaking. This week we get a nice steaming pile of new info for us to dive into.

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AGL

If you are into pro gaming, Arena Gaming League had a tournament this past weekend in Nashville. You can catch a recap of the games on Their Twitch.tv channel

Weapon Tweaks

The big news this week is on the front of weapon tweaks. BS Angel makes it clear that these are not final, or as not final as a final change could be. Or something. Anyways here is a breakdown of what we might tentatively be seeing in terms of weapon changes.

Precision:
Battle Rifle: Four shot kill (was five) and a reduced rate of fire. Overall a reduction in kill time.

Light Rifle: Range that reticle turns red (Auto-aim enables when the reticle is red) now matches DMR range

Carbine: Seven shots to kill (was eight). More rewarding for players who master the Carbine

DMR: No nerfs!

For me this is pretty exciting news. There's been lots of call for the DMR to be nerfed, which I thought was the wrong direction. I'm excited to see they had the same viewpoint and instead buffed up the other precision weapons. The BR returning to a 4 shot is very exciting and should make it feel much more like the Halo 2 and 3 BR we knew and loved. The light rifle buff should help a litle, but I still think hip fire shooting needs more of a buff. The carbine drop is also exciting and should bring that gun into the acceptable primary weapons group.

Automatic:

AR, Suppressor, and Storm Rifle are receiving damage boosts, but a reduction in auto-aim. Up close they'll be more deadly, but requiring more accuracy to use effectively. This should be an interesting tweak since now it feels harder to miss with the assault rifle than it is to actually hit someone at range. I hope the Storm rifle also receives an accuracy boost to bring it on part with the AR and Suppressor.

Vehicles:

Warthog and Mantis chain guns are tentatively receiving a damage boost. Which, as most gunners know, is desperately needed.

Power Weapons:
Beam Rifle is slated to have a reduction in Auto-aim assist. Which should hopefully bring it on scale with the Human Sniper Rifle. I'm a little sad to see this go as the Beam Rifle is a headshot machine, but it just doesn't fit with the other sniper. I'm hoping this will bring it into Team Snipers as a permanent secondary.

Matchmaking Updates:

This week's matchmaking updates brings us changes to Team Regicide and Grifball. Team Regicide will stay its own unique playlist and not merge into the Rumble Pit list. It will apparently also have different game types to make the playlist more varied. Map changes include the removal of Complex, and the addition of Landfall, Dispatch, Simplex, and Scythe.

Grfiball game types will be more properly aligned so Grifball and Grifball pro have the same player trait settings (except ball pickup). They're also doing some tweaks to the maps to remove bugs and glitches, as well as some new visual aesthetics.

Multi-team slayer gets a slight change from 30 kills to win, to 50. This returns to a more traditional Halo 3 style multi-team slayer.


That just about wraps it up for the Halo Bulletin from this week. As always please give it a read

Have a good week! I'll be in Vegas this weekend, Woo!

-Vincent

 

Like having the flood sprint instead of just faster, or letting them be slightly slower in general, or just no(or less powerful) thruster pack, or them you know holding a gun.

If I could change up the Flood playlist:

1. Shorten the thrusting distance in Flood matchmaking
2. Slightly shorten the lunge distance
3. Allow weapon pick up
4. ADD IN MORE MAPS
5. Maybe allow personal ordnance

 

DMR doesn't need a nerf. The rest need a buff.

But if the end result is them being even, Im open for anything.

 

My only current concern with the DMR as of after these changes is how powerful it is vs. vehicles. It just doesn't seem fair how the DMR acts as a power-weapon against all vehicles.

That is a good point; I'm fine with a buff for all the weapons to level the playing field, but that doesn't address this. Also the effective distance of the DMR is part of the problem. Even after this buff, the BR won't dominate at the same long rages as the DMR. Part of the problem with the DMR is that you don't need a Sniper rifle to shoot across the map, making large maps play differently that in previous Halos. Now I think these changes will be great, but it will be interesting to see if it has the unintended consequences of decreasing vehicle longevity, and more powerful weapons making it even deadlier to cross the open areas.

 

Alright, I like these updates, but they really don't change anything, they make me even more better. With Carbine I get atleast 17 kills, Lightrifle: 16, BR:17 and DMR:14. I absolutely can not use the DMR, but I can use the Carbine and BR better.

 

Good to know that 343 are listening to their customers. First forge island, now better weapon balance.

 

BOOYA!!! My freaking carbine will now proceed to destroy all of you!!

 

How do you do a pic link?

 

How do you do a pic link?

There should be a chain at the top when you post highlight some think then put the link it the box, click insert and the highlighted text has the link.

 

Scythe is being put into Regicide? That's news to me.

Really glad they are changing BR to 4SK.