Halo 3 Forum
This topic has moved here: Subject: The Only BR Thread
  • Subject: The Only BR Thread
Subject: The Only BR Thread

Posted by: RoninX136
Honestly no I don't rush for power weapons like anyone else. I fight for a while then I pick what weapons I want to fit the situation of the battle. And if I take down someone that has a power weapon then I will claim it, instead of fighting to pick it up where it spawns.
Last I checked, Halo 3s gameplay is structured around the repetitious process of seeing your enemy, followed by immediately engaging in a brief battle with your enemy...as opposed to what you do, which sounds like seeing your enemy, spending 5 minutes running back to the shotgun spawn, and then realizing that he has moved/been killed/won the match already.

I'm going to give you some friendly advice. Start trying to control the power weapons off of their spawns. It's much easier to get control of rockets when a guy isn't firing them at you. ;)

  • 12.12.2008 8:05 PM PDT

風 Swift as the wind
林 Quiet as the forest
火 Conquer like the fire
山 Steady as the mountain

Posted by: Nokterne
Posted by: RoninX136
Honestly no I don't rush for power weapons like anyone else. I fight for a while then I pick what weapons I want to fit the situation of the battle. And if I take down someone that has a power weapon then I will claim it, instead of fighting to pick it up where it spawns.
Last I checked, Halo 3s gameplay is structured around the repetitious process of seeing your enemy, followed by immediately engaging in a brief battle with your enemy...as opposed to what you do, which sounds like seeing your enemy, spending 5 minutes running back to the shotgun spawn, and then realizing that he has moved/been killed/won the match already.

I'm going to give you some friendly advice. Start trying to control the power weapons off of their spawns. It's much easier to get control of rockets when a guy isn't firing them at you. ;)


Believe me I would much rather brawl with what I can find when I find it as opposed to hording the power weapons like alot of people.

  • 12.13.2008 7:36 AM PDT
  • gamertag:
  • user homepage:
  • last post: 01.01.0001 12:00 AM PDT

I can't begin to count how many times I've been beaten by a BR as opposed to an assault rifle and vice versa. It's truly a beautiful killing tool.

  • 12.13.2008 4:08 PM PDT

Hey! What up? I'm "TCProphetSlayer" a teenager that <3 LOVES <3 the Halo series ever since I played it back in 2004 after one of my friends got it and brought it to school. I then wieseled my way into coming over to his house to play it :D ...goooood times :)
Love, "TC"

ditto

  • 12.13.2008 6:34 PM PDT

Call me Reach.

WHY can't you guys get this through your incredibly thick skulls?

THE BR IS NOT GOING TO CHANGE.


I don't even understand why this thread is even alive. It's called beating a dead horse.

[Edited on 12.13.2008 8:51 PM PST]

  • 12.13.2008 8:50 PM PDT

Posted by: RoninX136
Believe me I would much rather brawl with what I can find when I find it as opposed to hording the power weapons like a lot of people.
Then keep doing that if you wish...just don't expect to win that many matches.

  • 12.14.2008 5:53 PM PDT

Posted by: SpartanT1g3r
WHY can't you guys get this through your incredibly thick skulls?

THE BR IS NOT GOING TO CHANGE.


I don't even understand why this thread is even alive. It's called beating a dead horse.
Does it bother you? How has this thread affected you negatively? What exactly is causing you to take offence at discussion over one of the most important weapons in the game?

  • 12.14.2008 5:55 PM PDT
  • gamertag:
  • user homepage:
  • last post: 01.01.0001 12:00 AM PDT

Ive read this thread for a little while now and i see both sides of this argument and i think people arent listining to others. Most people here on BOTH sides, MLG( or Competitive) players and Casual players, seriously need to stop and think about what their saying. Their are alot af arguments and i hope i will adress all of them while writing this thread.

First of all their has ben alot of contriversy (Sp?) about a man named Dan.
I personally have no clue what went on but from my understanding Dan said something about B.net and then B.net called him out and posted something talking about him. First off Dan should of said anything in the first place unless what he said was a stuctured post and not "OmG BunGie USEsss HaXorZ WtF HAX i HaTez U BunaGe" But even if he did or not Bungie should not have said anything negative back about him. Many people will say well he said stuff about bungie so we will say stuff about him but the main thing here is that Bungie is a COMPANY. Bungie should have said anything back about him because that is common coutesy and they just arent a bounch of kids in middle school but since i dont know what really happened i cant really say anything.

I guess i should start off talking about the Br by Confronting the Argument of Realisticallity.
Many people will say that this game is pretty realistic because there are simple laws of phisics like Gravity and motion but what alot of people dont understand is that this game takes place in the year 2500 or something (no offence to anyone who is a big Halo world fan) and that by that year i think most problems faced in the Br argument will have been fixed. For example take the Spread of the Br.Many will say that when you shoot a wepon there will be recoil and you cant shoot perfectly stright but in my opinion and in the opinion of the "MLG" i think that a person wearing a 2 ton suit of armor (sorry if i am wrong again) and has been biologically enhanced will have the strength to hold back a 3 shot burst.

Moving on to the argument of the wepon being to universaly overpowered.
Many People will say that in halo 3 or any game for that matter you can just have a single omnipowerful wepon such as the requested BR. Many say that you cant have a wepon where you 4 shot a guy across sandtrap and you cant have a wepon that will kill someone before they can even lunge at you but that is not what the MLG community is asking Bungie to do. Yes the MLG community is asking to bring back the H2 Br or something close to it but others dont understand how this will effect the game. Some people may think that bringing back the H2 BR will make sniping impossible because the sniper will be dead before they pull the trigger but that is not what will happen. What will happen is that the guy will the sniper will easily kill the guy with the BR if they are from a moderate range because by the time the BR guy pulls the trigger at 2x zoom 4 times the guy with the Sniper will have easily killed him by pulling the trigger at 10x Zoom only 2 times. There is still the factor of the unzooming when you get shot but that is where the skill factor comes in. The at close range there will be people saying with the H2 BR close range wepons will go away but they wont. Close range wepons are best use in spots where you can camp or easily charge an enemy without them being able to run away. If someone with a Shotgun is 1 to 1.5 foundary squares away from someone with a Br against a wall then the person with the shotgun will win. As the guy with the BR starts to shoot the guy with the shot gun will also start to shoot. by the time they are touching the guy with the shot gun will have shot about 3 times from a couple of feet back easily killing the guy who only shot the Br 3 times because as the range between them decreases the shotgun damage increases derastically. And Another thing people understand is the far range of the shot gun. I want you to go into a game and shoot a shotgun from about 1 to 2 foundary squares away and look at how much damage you are dooing from that range.

The 3rd and probably biggest issue is the issue of consistancy between games.
If you look at a chart showing the amount of people who played H1 and are MLG players and the amount of people who played H1 and are casual players you will see that the difference is about 10 to 1 of MLG H1 players to Casual H1 players. The main reason that this is so important is that H1 and H2 are compleatly different than H3. Back in H1 the Pistol was a 3 shot kill which even myself thought was a little overpowered. In H2 (post patch) the Br was a perfect 4 shot kill and that ment that if you were standing across a sandtrap sized map you could 4 shot someone even though it was super hard for your eves to focus at that range. But then in Halo 3 the game just compleatly changed and obviously people were mad that something that they love just stoped working as it used to. I think that everyone here would be mad if something you love just changed after years of being perfect to you and many casual gamers just dont understand that. the issue would be nearly as big with as many arguments if the chang wasnt so big between games. Many people are saying "the BR was mad for midrange and it has its flaws" but the thing was IT WASNT LIKE THAT BEFORE and i have to highlight that just so people understand that no matter the issue with the Br its that the BR wasnt like that.

And Finnaly one of the most Misinterpereted issues is why the MLG community even bothers.
I think most of the posts on this thread say something like "Get over it they wont change the BR" but yet The MLG community keeps trying. Its not because they are A holes its because they care about the game their playing. Most people on these fourms have to like the game atleast a little to be here but lets say tomarrow Bungie threw out all of the wepons and all you could use was a BR with no beatdowns and no grenades. Some people wouldnt care but alot would be angry and the same senario would happen in reverse. there would be people quiting and their would be oline protest so dont hate on someone just because they would rather have the game they love be like it used to instead of taking a derrastic turn for the worse.



Anyways these are just my ideas so you can flame all you want but im just typing this because i like H3

GT: x Aperture x

  • 12.14.2008 6:01 PM PDT

Multiplayer Gameplay
Halo:CE------------------Reach--------Halo2-----------------H alo3
Campaign Experience
Reach----Halo:CE-----------------ODST-----Halo2---------Halo3

Glad that Halo 3 garbage is dead, thanks to Reach.
Unfreakenbelievable!!

^^^^^^ Just a few comments... ^^^^^^

I'm trying not to sound too rude, but your excess of grammatical and spelling errors distracts from your points you try to make. If you lack the knowledge, there are various online resources and Word has a grammar and spell checker. Also, rereading your post before you submit helps. Along with that, try to avoid massive blocks of text as it makes it hard on the eyes and some people will just skip over it. Just trying to help in the friendliest way possible.

Posted by: GuyThatKilldU
The "controversy," as you so put it, with Dan was that one of his threads got "accidentally" locked/deleted, which really pissed him off. So he went on the mlgpro.com forums and let some frustration out in a thread, which included words that are replaced by "-blam-" here at bungie.net. Anyway, apparently Lukems found it and tried to be funny, as he does at times, by putting it in one of the Weekly Updates. Dan's threads are mostly structured and thought out, although he tends to be very outspoken and sarcastic at times. Many Bungie.net users tend to disagree with him and think he is childish, but if your interested in his Podcasts about his opinions toward Bungie and other games like GOW2 then go here... http://gamerscnr.blogspot.com/

As for the BR...
I honestly don't care anymore. It is what it is, which is probably why I'm playing GOW2. But, I will say one thing. People rarely say they want a BR similar to its Halo 2's design. Most are willing to compromise and allow for a wide spread as long as the randomness is decreased. The Halo 2 design had too much bullet assist. Personally, I would play nothing but Halo 3 if the BR was a single-shot and had no randomness. The Magnum was the one weapon that kept me playing for so long, until I got fed up with all the randomness and the bad bullet registration. Right now, BR headshots are way too easy which is why I prefer single shot weapons. Oh well, Bungie has moved into another direction with their latest game of the series, but at least Halo:Combat Evolved gave me some good times.

[Edited on 12.14.2008 10:51 PM PST]

  • 12.14.2008 10:44 PM PDT

The BR is overpowered. It should kill in 15 shots in my opinion.

  • 12.15.2008 12:26 AM PDT

To Bungie:

http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=ekF3zkB1aFc

Merry Christmas

much love

  • 12.15.2008 2:23 AM PDT

Posted by: Kevin2468838
The BR is overpowered. It should kill in 15 shots in my opinion.


It does unlesss your host. Usually.

  • 12.15.2008 3:00 AM PDT

Heero Yuy: My enemies are those who try to kill me and those who stand in my way.

Dekar: I hate to brag, but my skills with the sword are immortal.

Posted by: TyEbOi777
I don't see why people complain about the BR when it is their own fault for lack of skill.


Because people are immature and never want to admit they are less than perfect and think that they should be the awesomeness they believe they are. But I'm generalizing, and nothing I say should be taken as canon on people's thought patterns, only what I say about my own thoughts should be canon, lol.

  • 12.15.2008 3:06 AM PDT

Heero Yuy: My enemies are those who try to kill me and those who stand in my way.

Dekar: I hate to brag, but my skills with the sword are immortal.

Btw, I love me some BR, its my greatest Tool of Destruction, followed by the AR and my Elite fist. Basically, I don't care what I have or what my objective, be it Slaying or Capturing, on whatever map, I play, I never know, I may have fun.

  • 12.15.2008 3:10 AM PDT

We have to accept facts that Bungie Studios is no longer the same development team from Halo Combat Evolved. That studio lost probably 45% of its team when they started working on Halo 2, and then even more when they started work on Halo 3.

If you goto www.mobygames.com, just search for the Halo games and look for the cast in each game, meaning, who made the game. The lead designer changed for all three games. The multiplayer lead changed for all three games, and the gameplay designer changed for all three games. Now in my opinion, that's a dumb move, but I guess in the console gaming industry people come and go, and I'm sure that people shared a lot of differences from Halo CE to Halo 2, and then to Halo 3.

I know that specific people in Bungie right now that did work back on HCE do not actually like HCE. They think it's horribly balanced and overpowered, blah blah blah. The facts are that the game is a superb classic and that its gameplay has yet to be repeated in any other game...a close second is Shadowrun. But isn't it ironic that Shadowrun is designed by the former lead designer of Halo Combat Evolved? Yes, it's John Howard, the former HCE lead designer who made Shadowrun and said several times in different interviews before SR came out that he wanted to use gameplay mechanics and principles from the HCE days, because that is what he felt worked.

But back to the BR topic, it's honestly a mute issue right now and it's worthless for any of us to really speak out about it because it's simply not going to do anything or change any Bungie designer's mind. They have a completely different agenda at hand than what gamers actually want in their video games...specifically their Halo. I could sit here all day and write a report of why Halo CE gameplay is 10x better than Halo 3 or Halo 2, but in return it won't mean anything because the response will always be, "That's not what our designers want in the game."

I've seen the gaming industry change for the worse over the past 10 years. I've played video games since I was 4 with my first Atari 2600, and then NES, etc...all the way up to the Xbox 360. Guys like Sirlin, www.sirlin.net, are who we really need in this industry making games. He is a former Super Street Fighter 2 champion who totally re-designed Super Street Fighter 2 with tournament play in mind. Now he realizes that your typical average gamer who goes on the XBLA and downloads his game isn't going to attend tournaments, but that's not the point. The point is when you take a game and re-balance it for tournament's sake, you have a great game, you have a BALANCED game that is fun and fair to everyone regardless of skill levels.

My friends and I can play SSF2 all night long against one another and have a great time. I can be confident in my own ability to play the game at my highest possible skill level. I also do not have to worry about the game throwing in some random move or some random damage generator, or some other act of randomness to so-called, give the other guy a chance or tilt the game in favor of the loser, etc... Instead, at the end of each fight whether I win or lose, I know that I simply got out played by my opponent...he didn't have a crutch provided by the game, he didn't take advantage of some in-game exploit, he didn't get the better end of the deal on some in-game randomness mechanic, no, instead, he simply used his own brain and out-played me, fair and square.

That's not the case anymore in Halo, with things like Bullet Refunding, you're 4-shot kill is completely luck now. But even if you're hosting where you don't get bullet refunding, you now have to put up with random BR spread, which provided by Bungie's Weekly update....isn't as random as we think right? No, instead you have to guess whether the game is gonna let you get that kill or not, essentially bringing the meta-game down to luck rather than Player A simply out played Player B.

Gaming isn't getting any better either. Recent designer for Super Smash Brothers Brawl on the Nintendo Wii said that he intentionally put in random-tripping elements so that regardless of player's skill levels, it's OKAY for a noob to beat up on a veteran player because he feels that the game shouldn't be just about winning...it should be about two players having fun regardless of the outcome. Well it's funny...since when is it fun to just randomally lose because the game decided that this time you're gonna lose? Who's idea of fun is that? The designer? Oh wait...I forgot, I'm suppose to be having someone else's fun...not my own. My bad.

We're in a gaming drought right now and until some rain comes along to wash out these crappy game designers of your Bungies, Infinity Wards, Epic Games, and Ubisofts....we're going to continue to get garbage games where someone's idea of "fun" is constantly being forced upon us...the gamers.

  • 12.15.2008 7:07 AM PDT
  • gamertag:
  • user homepage:
  • last post: 01.01.0001 12:00 AM PDT

Posted by: dan91bauer
That's not the case anymore in Halo, with things like Bullet Refunding, you're 4-shot kill is completely luck now. But even if you're hosting where you don't get bullet refunding, you now have to put up with random BR spread, which provided by Bungie's Weekly update....isn't as random as we think right? No, instead you have to guess whether the game is gonna let you get that kill or not, essentially bringing the meta-game down to luck rather than Player A simply out played Player B.

Gaming isn't getting any better either. Recent designer for Super Smash Brothers Brawl on the Nintendo Wii said that he intentionally put in random-tripping elements so that regardless of player's skill levels, it's OKAY for a noob to beat up on a veteran player because he feels that the game shouldn't be just about winning...it should be about two players having fun regardless of the outcome. Well it's funny...since when is it fun to just randomally lose because the game decided that this time you're gonna lose? Who's idea of fun is that? The designer? Oh wait...I forgot, I'm suppose to be having someone else's fun...not my own. My bad.

We're in a gaming drought right now and until some rain comes along to wash out these crappy game designers of your Bungies, Infinity Wards, Epic Games, and Ubisofts....we're going to continue to get garbage games where someone's idea of "fun" is constantly being forced upon us...the gamers.

Amazing Dan, simply amazing.

  • 12.15.2008 8:12 AM PDT

!

Battle Rifles are OverPowerd. Bungie powered them up in the beginning of halo 3 because of the whiners who were good at halo 2 just because they used br. Well they got there way again and now halo 3 is unbearable at times. Granted the new BR is not as popular as it was in halo 2. But that is only because of the return of AR. If BUNGIE is going to change any thing about BR they should change it back to the way it was(which was completely balanced with the other guns in halo 3) in the beginning of halo 3. They have made it too easy for a BR wielder. I Have gotten 3 hit kills before.... and its been done to me loads of times. BR needs to be toned down. They are doing the exact same thing to halo 3 that they did to halo 2(ruining it).

[Edited on 12.15.2008 11:07 AM PST]

  • 12.15.2008 9:28 AM PDT

MY LOVE FOR YOU IS LIKE A TRUCK...
Posted by: Langley
--on another note, I think MLG Chewhatever is an idiot.

Posted by: Achronos
There is a reason I am user ID 1 and my account creation date is before this site came online.

Why are you even still here Dan? Do you just simply enjoy complaining when you even admit that it will do nothing? You are the quintessential definition of insanity. You keep doing the same action and expect a different response than before. It's not going to happen and I'm glad that you've finally got around to realizing it won't change. But of course that won't stop you from making a hundreds of posts on various websites and complaining none the less.

You can keep touting your John Howard and your Shadowrun but they are nothing but remnants of a dying breed in video games. The landscape has changed dramatically in the past several years and it's no longer a niche market like it used to be. While you can keep complaining about how the new developers aren't making the game to YOUR whims but it won't change the fact that your expectations are now unreasonable in regards to how the market has changed. It also won't change the fact that vast majority of people are still happy with Halo 3. They still play it constantly and they are still having fun with it. While they might not like every aspect of the game (even I don't like ever aspect of the game) they don't let that make or break the game for them. They play it for what they like and if they don't like it there are more than enough other games out there that they can spend their time on. Hell, find a group of people that are as obsessed with HCE as you are and bring back XBC for all I care. No one is stopping you.

But lets get a few things straight here. HCE was unbalanced in regards to weapons. Even the diehard HCE fan realizes that. It's because of that unbalanced weapon that they like the game. They like the ability of an unbalanced weapon to supersede other weapons if they are "more skilled" with it. While some call that "balanced", others (such as myself and Bungie) don't. They don't like the fact that one weapon will provide you with a win in about 90% of your encounters. I certainly don't. Because then the game simply becomes who can control that/those weapons. When that because further unbalanced people see the only way to correct the unbalance is to start everyone with that weapon. However, that doesn't fix the weapons balance problem it only puts it on the forefront because now everyone is forced to use that unbalanced weapon in order to compete. Now let's fast forward to H3. That skill-dominant weapon still exists in H3. It's just not the M6D or the BR. It's the sniper rifle. One that is limited by it's utility and it's availability. That's always been the problem with the M6D and the BR. They aren't terribly hard to use. They have large clips, high rates of fire, can kill quickly, and they were for the most part readily available. Quite the opposite of the sniper rifle. A weapon that is able to dominate the opposing team should never be readily available. Which is why the rockets aren't. Which is why the sniper isn't. They are held in check by their respective characteristics. The M6D certainly wasn't. The H2 BR certainly wasn't.

The next thing (and I'm getting extremely tired of writing this) is that all 3 Halo games by default have NOT been "competitive". Look at the default for Halo 3. It's AR/M6G starts. Not terribly "competitive". In H2, it was SMG or PR start. Not terribly "competitive". In HCE it was mostly AR starts with a few others (like PP on Prisoner). Not exactly my definition of "competitive". Now if you want to argue that HCE gave you more/better options for a more "competitive" game than that's a different argument than I'm making. What I'm saying is that the weapon start for all 3 Halo games have never been what many consider "competitive" today. While we'll never be sure, I still argue that the 1 (single, only, exclusive) default setting for Team Slayer in HCE would have been used more than the rest (if MM existed back then) and that gametype had a built-in penalty to help balance the better players versus the worse players. The only Team Slayer gametype in HCE is not "competitive". I still consider HCE a more "competitive" game than the other 2 Halos because of fall damage and non-regenerating health (and slight player speed) but other than that I understand that not a whole lot has changed in 7 years especially not how the game is played in en mass. In HCE the M6D wasn't even on a few maps and on the others it was very rare. So then again this "skill-determinate" weapon wouldn't have even been much of a factor back then. I don't see how HCE is this tremendously skill-based game when the HCE Plasma Rifle is more of a "noob" weapon than the H3 Assault Rifle. Seriously? A weapon that makes it even easier to melee people (even when compared to the H3 AR!)?

So guess what. It's because of your distorted view of HCE and your subsequent expectations based upon that that you see this supposed huge change in Bungie. Many of us, we don't. We don't see a huge "dumbing" down of the series because HCE was not that much more "skillful". Maybe eventually you'll get a game that gives you full custom game options so you can change weapons to behave however you want. But that game isn't going to be Halo 3 and I'd be very surprised if it's a game from Bungie. Which I'm glad that you've finally come to grips with or at least it seems you have. And while constructive criticism is always welcomed and appreciated I don't think your's has been that in a very very long time. So move on. Move on to Shadowrun or UT3 or whatever other game you're saying this month is better than Halo. Move onto another community that doesn't see you as a constant pain in the ass. Move on so I don't spend 15 minutes typing out rebuttals to things I shouldn't have to say. Or reading ridiculous threads talking about "optimize the netcode Bungie". Or constantly arguing about the finer points of internet gaming architectures when you don't know the first thing about them. We aren't going back to TCP. Get used to it.

I'm tired Dan. I'm tired of doing this. And if you're actually as old as you say you are I'd hope you'd be tired of this too. I'm sorry that you're not happy with H3. Many of us are (for the most part). I hope you find a game out there that gives you the same feeling you had for HCE. I just certainly don't see it happening again, or really any time soon.

Happy Holidays.

~B.B.

[Edited on 12.15.2008 9:44 AM PST]

  • 12.15.2008 9:41 AM PDT

Posted by: BerserkerBarage
Why are you even still here Dan? Do you just simply enjoy complaining when you even admit that it will do nothing? You are the quintessential definition of insanity. You keep doing the same action and expect a different response than before. It's not going to happen and I'm glad that you've finally got around to realizing it won't change. But of course that won't stop you from making a hundreds of posts on various websites and complaining none the less.


Why are you still here? You post with an air of superiority and with the pretense that you are aloof, and above all this, yet you still post a counter to every one of Dan's posts, repeating the same things you always repeat. At least posts like Dan's are aimed at improving the game, not simply posting an ill-informed rebuttal for the sake of arguments. Why are you so against changing the game? You admitted it wasn't perfect? Why such animosity towards anyone looking for a better game?

Posted by: BerserkerBarage
It also won't change the fact that vast majority of people are still happy with Halo 3. They still play it constantly and they are still having fun with it. While they might not like every aspect of the game (even I don't like ever aspect of the game) they don't let that make or break the game for them. They play it for what they like and if they don't like it there are more than enough other games out there that they can spend their time on. Hell, find a group of people that are as obsessed with HCE as you are and bring back XBC for all I care. No one is stopping you.

Posted by: BerserkerBarage
But lets get a few things straight here. HCE was unbalanced in regards to weapons. Even the diehard HCE fan realizes that. It's because of that unbalanced weapon that they like the game. They like the ability of an unbalanced weapon to supersede other weapons if they are "more skilled" with it. While some call that "balanced", others (such as myself and Bungie) don't. They don't like the fact that one weapon will provide you with a win in about 90% of your encounters. I certainly don't. Because then the game simply becomes who can control that/those weapons. When that because further unbalanced people see the only way to correct the unbalance is to start everyone with that weapon. However, that doesn't fix the weapons balance problem it only puts it on the forefront because now everyone is forced to use that unbalanced weapon in order to compete.


Unbalanced? The M6D was middle of the road in terms of power. The sniper rifle, melee, rocket launcher, shotgun, and plasma grenade all killed in one hit; the M6D took 3, and that required a headshot. That’s half of the weapons in the game that had more power than the pistol. You think it was unbalanced because it was overused, and that is a result of the openness of the levels, not the power of the weapon.

Regardless, the M6D took vastly more skill than any weapon from Halo 3. A three-shot kill was not a common thing, even among the most elite players. The M6D pistol never "provided" a win in 90% of the situations, it allowed a win in the 90% of encounters, if the player was more skilled than their opponent. What is more balanced than victory being dependent upon player ability?

The fact that you think the game relied on who controlled one weapon the entire game is evidence of how little you know about the game. Every weapon, save the needler, was used in competitive Halo CE play. I'm not here to give you a lesson on Halo CE, but stop trying to use blatantly false misconceptions to argue a point.

Posted by: BerserkerBarage
Now let's fast forward to H3. That skill-dominant weapon still exists in H3. It's just not the M6D or the BR. It's the sniper rifle. One that is limited by it's utility and it's availability. That's always been the problem with the M6D and the BR. They aren't terribly hard to use. They have large clips, high rates of fire, can kill quickly, and they were for the most part readily available. Quite the opposite of the sniper rifle. A weapon that is able to dominate the opposing team should never be readily available. Which is why the rockets aren't. Which is why the sniper isn't. They are held in check by their respective characteristics. The M6D certainly wasn't. The H2 BR certainly wasn't.


So wait, its now balanced to only give one or two players the ability to effectively and quickly kill their opponents from either far away (as with the sniper) or with little effort (as with the RL)? That’s an odd balance. That would be like giving two players on a football team pads and having the rest of them in boxers. The M6D was the most skill-dependent weapon in any Halo game, save for the Halo CE sniper rifle. The fact that you refer to it as being not "terribly hard to use" goes again to show that you lack the experience necessary to even be debating this topic with the fervor you currently do.

I'm going to let you in on a little secret: the Sniper Rifle was still a power weapon in Halo CE, the Rockets were still a power weapon in Halo CE, the Shotgun was still a preferred weapon in Halo CE, the Plasma Rifle was still a preferred weapon in Halo CE, heck, even the AR was preferred in some cases. Everyone started with a weapon that allowed them, provided they were skilled players, to be effective in almost every situation. However, in every situation, there was another weapon that was a better choice.

The M6D pistol was only able to dominate an entire team if the player was incredibly skilled and was playing against poor opponents. Even then, that’s not unbalanced, that’s life. If someone is better than you, they should win. That’s how it works. This is a video game in which players compete against each other. It shouldn't be rock-paper-scissors.


Posted by: BerserkerBarage
So guess what. It's because of your distorted view of HCE and your subsequent expectations based upon that that you see this supposed huge change in Bungie. Many of us, we don't. We don't see a huge "dumbing" down of the series because HCE was not that much more "skillful".


You're arguing from blatant ignorance. HCE was not much more skillful? Are you kidding me? You don't see a huge "dumbing" down of the series because you lack the insight to see it, not because it doesn't exist.

[quote]Posted by: BerserkerBarage
Maybe eventually you'll get a game that gives you full custom game options so you can change weapons to behave however you want. But that game isn't going to be Halo 3 and I'd be very surprised if it's a game from Bungie. Which I'm glad that you've finally come to grips with or at least it seems you have. And while constructive criticism is always welcomed and appreciated I don't think your's has been that in a very very long time. So move on. Move on to Shadowrun or UT3 or whatever other game you're saying this month is better than Halo. Move onto another community that doesn't see you as a constant pain in the ass. Move on so I don't spend 15 minutes typing out rebuttals to things I shouldn't have to say. Or reading ridiculous threads talking about "optimize the netcode Bungie". Or constantly arguing about the finer points of internet gaming architectures when you don't know the first thing about them. We aren't going back to TCP. Get used to it.

I'm tired Dan. I'm tired of doing this. And if you're actually as old as you say you are I'd hope you'd be tired of this too. I'm sorry that you're not happy with H3. Many of us are (for the most part). I hope you find a game out there that gives you the same feeling you had for HCE. I just certainly don't see it happening again, or really any time soon.

Happy Holidays.

~B.B.


You are content with games not reaching their full potential, some of us aren't, especially when we've been given a taste of how it should be.

  • 12.15.2008 11:02 AM PDT

Beserker, do yourself a favor and don't read my posts. I'm sure there is an ignore function on these forums where you can block all content that comes from my typing fingers.

But if you want to argue what's good design and what's not, you should know that Halo 3 is ultimately failed game design.

I've been doing some research on randomness in games, there's all kinds of degrees of randomness that I have been able to learn.

Examples: Minesweeper on the PC...that game, despite one's skill of eliminating the mines, can and might eventually come down to a 50.50 guess of which square to flag and which one to clear. Regardless of how good one is...that final move will be 50.50 resulting in a win or a loss. If you lose, did you lose because you suck? Nope. If you win, do you win because you were skilled? Nope. You could argue...well you got that far to where you had to make the final move and it resulted in a 50.50 chance...so your odds were pretty good in that favor.

Another example would be Poker, game about odds.

Slot Machines, games about pure luck and odds, scratch off tickets, hell...playing your local state lottery, total luck...if you win...does that mean you're skilled at choosing lottery balls?

Then there's the other example of randomness in most of todays shooters...that didn't really exist in the past ones, but has come up more frequently in todays next-gen shooters. It's the cone of spread on these weapons.

Now a game like Shadowrun which i praise a lot does actually have a great deal of randomness, i.e., the pistol. The pistol has a small crosshair and within that crosshair is the limit at which a pistol shot will go...it may go straight, it may goto the very end of the circle...but within it's non-bloom it will fire somewhere inside that circle. So...in order to increase one's odds...it would be wise to have that entire circle fill up the player model's face right? That's balance but still using a degree of randomness.

In Halo 3 however, that's not that case, especially with the BR, it's suppose to be a medium to long range weapon. But referring to Luke's weekly update on the BR, the 1 shot has a 0-.15 degree of randomness, the 3rd shot has a 0-.38 degree of randomness, and the 2nd shot is somewhere inbetween those two numerical values, lets say as an example .25

Now when we take two players, one being the best in the world, and the other being someone who just bought the game, lets put them into a straight up BR duel. Is it fair for the noob to kill the pro when we know for a fact that the pro can aim better, out-strafe better, just simply out play better the noob? Is it fair for the noob to win? Is that balanced? Is that good game design?

And here's the ticker dude, this happens in other games too, COD, UT, Gears of War, etc.... A lot of these new shooters are implementing degrees of randomness not with just the crosshairs of how a gun reacts in the game, but with specific items, settings in-game, mechanics, etc...

Quake 3 Arena is probably one of the BEST shooters out there that doesn't really have any randomness at all, at least none that will allow a random scrub be able to defeat a pro.

But my friend just told me on the phone, there is an element of PLAYER CONTROLLER randomness...which is basically called LUCK. In a Quake 3 match, lets say that a scrub just so happened to have the railgun, rockets, and shotgun. At some moment the scrub had his rockets out, but his drink fell over onto his keyboard, and by some sheer luck, it hit a key which then switched his weapon to the railgun, then by some reflex from the drink spilling, he hit his mouse button to fire a weapon on-screen, and the railgun he now had in his hand fired...and at that same exact moment, he turned the corner and the pro was right there and he killed him......did the game do that or did the player do that? The player did that. What's the odds of that repeating itself? VERRRRRRRY RARE.

Now...backtrack to Halo 3's BR. How many times do you think the BR's spread can account for a player's poor aim and give him the upperhand in a battle? Is that player-controlled randomness or is it being controlled by the game? It's being controlled by the game.

That kind of randomness shouldn't be programmed into shooters at all, not under any circumstance, or any reason.

[

  • 12.15.2008 12:19 PM PDT

MY LOVE FOR YOU IS LIKE A TRUCK...
Posted by: Langley
--on another note, I think MLG Chewhatever is an idiot.

Posted by: Achronos
There is a reason I am user ID 1 and my account creation date is before this site came online.

Posted by: TheBigShow
Why are you still here? You post with an air of superiority and with the pretense that you are aloof, and above all this, yet you still post a counter to every one of Dan's posts, repeating the same things you always repeat. At least posts like Dan's are aimed at improving the game, not simply posting an ill-informed rebuttal for the sake of arguments. Why are you so against changing the game? You admitted it wasn't perfect? Why such animosity towards anyone looking for a better game?


I'm still here because people like Dan still think that they are improving the game for others. That's ridiculous. He's improving the game towards how he sees it. Not to how others see it. Not even to how Bungie sees it. It's Bungie's game. You never own it. You never have anything other than a simple software license. So if he doesn't like the game? Go elsewhere. Do something else. If he's really 28 years old he should have better things to do with his time than consistently complain about a video game on an internet website. It's not like he has a vested interest in the game. The reason why I keep replying to Dan is because no one else will. They all see him as the joke that he is. The problem with that is that when no one tells him that he's wrong it seems like people are agreeing with him. That's not something I'm content to let happen. I don't have a problem with changing the game and your strawmen arguments are getting tiresome. I have a problem with changing the game from something it's never been. I played HCE from the day the original Xbox came out to even past the release of Halo 2. Your insinuations that I don't understand the game or haven't played it enough to understand is getting pathetic and annoying. And it seems to be the crux of your argument against how I view HCE. I do admit that Halo 3 isn't perfect. I also understand that what I find imperfect with the game doesn't have to be changed. I don't like the melee in H3 before or after the "patch". I also understand that it's NOT CHANGING so to keep complaining about it is pointless, futile, and frankly annoying. Dan seems still incapable of such clarity. He thinks that crusading a case that he knows will never happen is still somehow appreciated. There is constructive criticism and there is what Dan does. They are quite opposite.

Unbalanced? The M6D was middle of the road in terms of power. The sniper rifle, melee, rocket launcher, shotgun, and plasma grenade all killed in one hit; the M6D took 3, and that required a headshot. That’s half of the weapons in the game that had more power than the pistol. You think it was unbalanced because it was overused, and that is a result of the openness of the levels, not the power of the weapon.

Simply arguing that the M6D was unbalanced because it was overused is a poor argument. Sure there are other weapons in HCE that are more powerful than the M6D. I'm not arguing that so I'm very confused why you would try to argue against that. However the "raw" power of a weapon isn't it's only feature. Accessibility, total effective range, ease of use, rate of fire, amount of kills per clip, total amount of clips to be carried, reticule size all contribute to how a weapon is balanced. The M6D is all superior to every other weapon you listed in that rebuttal in those regards. Unless you want to say that 2 people are standing next to each other so a rocket or plasma grenade kills both of them. So if you want to take the short-sighted naive way at looking at the M6D then yeah it's the middle of the road in terms of simple power. However, those "power" weapons you listed (sans melee) all have checks and balances against them, the M6D simply didn't.

Regardless, the M6D took vastly more skill than any weapon from Halo 3. A three-shot kill was not a common thing, even among the most elite players. The M6D pistol never "provided" a win in 90% of the situations, it allowed a win in the 90% of encounters, if the player was more skilled than their opponent. What is more balanced than victory being dependent upon player ability?

Are we really down to arguing word choice and semantics? Fine, the M6D allowed for a win in 90% of encounters. Why really use other weapons when 90% of the time all you'll need is the M6D? And why is the M6D balanced when it's the only weapon in HCE that in 90% of encounters you can be victorious? Quite simply it's not balanced. There is no other weapon in HCE that even if you are superbly skilled that you can have a 90% chance with. Not even the HCE sniper rifle. And even if you consider the Sniper it is still more balanced than the M6D because of it's other weapon traits. Bungie has said countless times that part of their weapons balance is the fact that you're restrained to only 2 weapons. When a specific gun can effectively out-preform all other weapons except for 10% of the time it's pretty obvious where the imbalance lies.

The fact that you think the game relied on who controlled one weapon the entire game is evidence of how little you know about the game. Every weapon, save the needler, was used in competitive Halo CE play. I'm not here to give you a lesson on Halo CE, but stop trying to use blatantly false misconceptions to argue a point.

I'm quite aware that almost all weapons were used in "competitive" HCE play. I also know that people were "god-like" with their ability to use a plasma pistol better than a plasma rifle. I also know that the single-most weapon that was used to differentiate skill in HCE was the M6D. Even more than the Sniper rifle even though it's a more "skillful weapon". I'm also not so ridiculously stupid to try to argue an exception as the rule. Which apparently you seem unable to. To say that MLG players used a variety of weapons at the professional level does not mean that the majority of HCE players did. I'm not here to give you a lesson in logic but apparently you need it. From my experience as well as the experience of others as personified by the forums it is quite apparent that the M6D was the most used weapon in HCE. If you have conclusive data to the contrary, I'd love for you to show it. While I don't like anecdotal evidence, I guess that what we're going on unless you have a better source.

So wait, its now balanced to only give one or two players the ability to effectively and quickly kill their opponents from either far away (as with the sniper) or with little effort (as with the RL)? That’s an odd balance. That would be like giving two players on a football team pads and having the rest of them in boxers. The M6D was the most skill-dependent weapon in any Halo game, save for the Halo CE sniper rifle. The fact that you refer to it as being not "terribly hard to use" goes again to show that you lack the experience necessary to even be debating this topic with the fervor you currently do.

What a terrible analogy. Really? That was the best you could come up with? Regardless, are you really going to equivocate the M6D to a power weapon? I thought it wasn't a power weapon. Isn't that what you argued only a couple paragraphs ago? Regardless, the thing is with "power weapons" is that they are extremely limited by their other weapon traits.

And like it or not the M6D isn't very hard to use. It has a large reticule (almost the size of the HCE shotgun's), a high rate of fire, a large clip, fast reload, and it doesn't take many shots to kill someone (~6sk on average). Inside of 30 meters (as measured by the Sniper scope) it doesn't even require additional leading of shots. Put reticule on opponent and pull trigger until dead. Add in the fact that the M6D has a total range of up to 120 meters (again as measured by the Sniper scope) it allows almost unlimited effectiveness. Now what I didn't say was that the M6D is easy to "master". Outside of the sniper rifle it is the hardest weapon to effectively "master". And that's all for the same reasons. And you can keep saying that I somehow lack the experience to talk about HCE but it doesn't change anything that I'm saying.

The M6D pistol was only able to dominate an entire team if the player was incredibly skilled and was playing against poor opponents. Even then, that’s not unbalanced, that’s life. If someone is better than you, they should win. That’s how it works. This is a video game in which players compete against each other. It shouldn't be rock-paper-scissors.

Yeah, rock-paper-scissors is fair. Making it rock-paper-atom bomb where it almost never loses and is better than the other two 90% of the time isn't.


You're arguing from blatant ignorance. HCE was not much more skillful? Are you kidding me? You don't see a huge "dumbing" down of the series because you lack the insight to see it, not because it doesn't exist.


No, I agree that certain aspects of the game have been "dumbed down". I just don't have a problem with it or not to the point where it breaks the game for me. I don't have a problem with auto-aim/bullet magnetism/melee because they are necessary for the stability of an online game. And I'm getting very tired of the whole "you lack the insight" bull-blam!-. I played HCE just as much if not more than you. Trying to peddle that you somehow know more about the game than I do is getting old quickly. The whole "arrogant, aloof" crap right?


You are content with games not reaching their full potential, some of us aren't, especially when we've been given a taste of how it should be.


Christ what a joke. "Full potential"? Nothing is ever "full potential". No game is ever perfect. Saying you prefer HCE over H3 is a waste of space.

~B.B.

[Edited on 12.15.2008 12:33 PM PST]

  • 12.15.2008 12:28 PM PDT

MY LOVE FOR YOU IS LIKE A TRUCK...
Posted by: Langley
--on another note, I think MLG Chewhatever is an idiot.

Posted by: Achronos
There is a reason I am user ID 1 and my account creation date is before this site came online.

Okay Dan, simple question since I'm suppose to be ignoring your posts.

If a noob and a pro are fighting in Shadowrun and both are strafing with the pistol and the noob kills the pro because of the random value of his reticule bloom, is that fair? I'm assuming the pistol has reticule bloom in Shadowrun since I haven't played it in months. Substitute rifle or SMG if you prefer.

There are tons of games out there where a "noob" can beat a pro and it's fair. Chris Moneymaker in Poker is a relatively good recent example. You're right, there are plenty of games of odds. All of the ones you listed are good examples. I'd imagine a "pro" player is able to use those odds in order to put the game more in their favor. However, there are simply times where that is impossible and the game simply comes down to pure luck. Just like poker, just like minesweeper, and just like Halo 3. If poker is an unfair game I suggest never moving to Nevada.

Bungie made a game where a good player can put the odds in their favor. They can get better at their aim. They can get better at their strafe. They can use a wide variety of things to increase the odds of their victory. However, there are times where you just get unlucky but that doesn't de facto make the game unfair. It just makes it a game. Which is still what we are talking about here. A game.

~B.B.



[Edited on 12.15.2008 12:45 PM PST]

  • 12.15.2008 12:43 PM PDT
  • gamertag:
  • user homepage:
  • last post: 01.01.0001 12:00 AM PDT

I wrote a big wall of text, but decided the two main idiots in this thread would probably just make up retarded, ignorant rebuttals. So I dumbed it down for everyone:

Everyone in this thread is a moron.

[Edited on 12.15.2008 12:58 PM PST]

  • 12.15.2008 12:57 PM PDT