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Subject: Revealing the secrets of Halo 1.
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Well, I guess since the game is like 6 years old it is ok to reveal some of the secrets that people are finally starting to learn anyeay. I hope that this post enhances game play for everyone. For the noobs, you should really learn this stuff because all of the best players in the world are doing all of it all the time. Seriously. And its NOT CHEATING. For all the leets, hopefully this will make things a little tougher on you. This will be a somewhat incomplete list but it is a start. I will continue to edit and update, please feel free to add to it if you can.

In order of most importance:

#1 - TIMING: Get a timer! Everything that respawns in Halo 1 revolves around a timer and most of it is on 30 second to one minute intervals. IF you can afford it get a talking timer (Type talking timer in any search engine). They are usually around $20 and they tell you exactly when stuff is coming back.
Exapmles: On Battle Creek, the O/S and CAMO come back every minute on the minute no matter what - the snipers come back every 30 secs and the rockets every 2 minutes. Don't you think that stuff is good to know? It's very similar on every map. Priz is exactly the same spawn times. Chill out the camo and rockets come back every 2 minutes and the O/S every minute. Dammy: CAMO and O/S every minute Rockets every 2 minutes - you will have to figure the rest out.
Note: These times are for TS only. Many maps have different powerups for CTF and different times so you will have to learn them like we did.

#2: XXY - This button combo allows you to pocket reload any weapon. For those of you that don't do this all I can say is OMG. Example: You are sniping and someone starts pistoling you. You run out of sniper and they are from long range. Instead of risking dying while reloading your sniper Hit XXY on the controller. This allows you to reload your sniper while you are shooting the pistol. Note: Pocket reload takes just as long to reload your weapon as it normally takes to reload, so you can't do it instantly you have to wait until the reload animation is finished. Another cool sidenote is that if you watch this on split screen the animation shows MC reloading his weapon on your screen but on his screen it shows him holding his other weapon. YES YOU CAN EVEN DO THIS WITH ROCKETS!!!

#3: Quick Camo - A very subtle but important trick. If you notice that when you are camo it takes a longer time to go back to camo after shooting certain weapons you are right. Certain weapons have the ability to allow you to go back to camo instantly as oppossed to taking a few seconds. Quick camo weapons are Shotgun, Plasma, and Assault Rifle. After shooting one bullet you instantly go camo'd again. Slow camo weapons are Rockets, Sniper and Pistol. So whenever you have camo be sure to always have a quick camo weapon. The beauty of this trick is that when you are shooting one of the slow camo weapons after you shoot if you switch to the quick camo weapon you are instantly camo'd again. It sounds weird but lets think of it another way. Let's say you have rockets and a pistol on a medium but open map, like derelict. If you have rockets and pistol you have no quick camo weapon. It's effective as long as you arent' shooting anyone but as soon as you start shooting you are exposed. So instead, pick up a shotgun and drop the pistol. You can creep up on someone and shotgun them or rocket them from farther away an instantly become invisible again by swithcing over. Or you can do pistol and plasma rifle. Shoot a couple of plasma shots first to drop their shields or freeze them. Then hide for a second and pop and and get a one shot kill with the pistol, or toss a nade and kill them that way. Try it, I promise you will end up with more kills and less deaths every time!

#4: Grenade tricks/weapon tricks: Blowing weapons to your self can be HUGE! You can hide somewhere discreet to get the weapon instead of exposinbg yourself. A good example is rockets on Hang'em - get a bad spawn at red base? You can grenade the rockets to yourself from their easlily! Try it! Also grenade jump can be very effective ways of getting to stuff or surprising people - a good example of this is Battle Creek - grenade jump up to the base on the opposite side of the rock or concrete - your opponent will never expect you coming from that direction! I can go on and on with this one - on chill out its very easy to grenade the rockets down from almost anywhere in the main 2 rooms, and on Battle Creek you can grenade the rockets down right to you from several areas of the map. ON HeH you can also blow down the top powerup from several areas or grenade the sniper to yourself. Try this and you will find tons of ways to get yourself an advantage. Also, try grabbing weapons through the floor. On some maps certain weapons can be picked up through the floor - examples - Rockets on Hang em and Prisoner, Sniper on derelict. Try thinking of some weapons you might be able to grab from the floor on other maps.


#5: Smart spawning - Some maps can really screw you with spawns, but if you know a few tricks, you can get your teammate a great spwan everytime. Hate spawning at red on HeH? If you stand just below the blue pistol area in the red tombstones your partner will spawn up at Blue pistol! Hate spawning down on Prisoner? Stand in the room on the ground that is just below the overshield. If you stand in the corner of the room fathest away from the windows area of the third floor (Below the overshield) you will get your partner spawned up next to the overshield. Or if you stand just outside the ladder room on the first floor by the wall they will spawn up in the third floor red room. Lots of ways to give yourself and your team better spawns, so that you don't get spawn killed all the time.

#6: Spawn control: Another important aspect of the game is controlling spawn points of your foes. For example in 2v2 TS usually you will spawn close to your teammate. SO to control a map like hang em high, just keep killing one guy and leave the other one alive so that they continue to spawn down at red. In CTF Longest you can keep them spawning by the flag all day if everyone is standing outside the base area. Just keep throwing greandes in their and if anyone comes out, pop em!

#7: 3 shot kill - I guess this really should be closer to the top but I thought it was a little obvious. If you don't know by now the pistol is a 3 shot kill. 2 shots anywhere and one in the head. Or 5 shots to any part of the body. Stop using the assault rifle and start getting good with the pistol.

#8: Map Control: It is very important to control certain areas of many maps. A good example is TS damantion. By controlling the red base, you control all access to you. There are only 2 ways to get there - up the ramp or through the teleporter. If you are ahead and your opponent wants to win, they have to come to you. These two areas are very easy to cover because of how "tunnelled" they are. Its like a death trap going throught the warp or up the ramp, so make it be a death trap. Make them wish they never even came through. Another great example is the camo room on chill out. Only 2 ways in but lots of ways out.

#9: Flag tossing: In halo 1 the flag flies a LONG LONG LONG way. A great example of this is when you are red team on Hang em High. If you toss the flag correctly it will bounce all the way from the top of blue base to the bottom of red base. It's an easy cap if you can get it around the corner. Also you can grenade jump up from the tombstone behind red, but it is extremely hard and you must practice it alot, but it is possible.

#10: Double melee - This is a fun one, and my personal favorite. When you melee someone quickly throw a grenade and then melee again. You can land both melees and hit them with the grenade for an easy kill if you do it right. But be careful this can be very reckless and cost you your life and your team's.

Well, I think I will do just a top ten for now. There are lots of others like blocking teleporters, infinite ammo, etc, but some of those are considered cheats as oppossed to just great tricks. Feel free to add to the list and give credit to those who deserve it. I wasn't a pioneer of many of these ideas. The first people we saw use XXY was the Ogres and Darkman was the one who revolutionized Halo with some of the timing stuff but I don't know who all came up with some of this other stuff. Have fun and let me know what you think!

  • 01.11.2006 11:45 AM PDT
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Prophet is once again bringing enlightenment to the masses. Your tips may be wasted here though, the BG CTF n***s that reside in these forums will surely flame you to death for bringing that "Elitest BS Tactics" to these forums. "How dare you talk about spawn killing, that's CHEATING!".

Good post though.

Don't say the "N" word if you can help it please.
-Jim


[Edited on 1/12/2006 by GameJunkieJim]

  • 01.11.2006 2:05 PM PDT
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LOL Yes, I am afraid it is wasted but I still cling to the hope that someday we will have another game as good or better than Halo 1, and just as addicting.

  • 01.11.2006 2:37 PM PDT
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most of these tricks you can also see being done in a video by the GTC, you can download it here:
http://rapidshare.de/files/8148854/BasicEssentials.mov.html

  • 01.11.2006 4:14 PM PDT
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Nice post.

  • 01.12.2006 2:36 AM PDT

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Nice.
(Except for the timer, I gotta personal beef with outside help.)

  • 01.12.2006 7:50 AM PDT
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Well, the way i see it, Bungie is who developed the game based on timing, and they even give you a coundown timer in Halo 2, so why would using a timer be cheating? You can watch a clock with a minute hand as far as that goes.

  • 01.12.2006 10:08 AM PDT
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Posted by: GameJunkieJim
Nice.
(Except for the timer, I gotta personal beef with outside help.)


you dont even really need a timer, it helps with when things are EXACTLY coming back, but as long as you know what spawns when (ie, at chillout, everything at beginning spawns, then over shielld, then everything, then over shield, etc) you should be able to set up for it and get ready for it to come back

but if youre going to start playing with good people, youre going to need a timer and know exactly when things are coming back, or else you will get dominated

[Edited on 1/12/2006]

  • 01.12.2006 6:30 PM PDT

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Yeah don't get me wrong, I'm totally cool with memory timing, I just don't wanna see a watch or laptop anywhere nearby.


Did you mention that the flashlight nullifies the Active Camo?

  • 01.13.2006 10:04 AM PDT
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haha only non-skilled people use timers... *viciously starts slapping large bulge on side of shorts* I almost considered doing timing on halo2 to get an edge on my friends, but couldn't be bothered. My tactics just reply on camping, surprise and changing between the two very quickly to confuse stupid enemies =) it always works on our 6 player systemlinks on burial mounds... tactics go in cycles.

[Edited on 1/18/2006 by GameJunkieJim]

  • 01.13.2006 3:42 PM PDT
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Dumbest post ever. So all the pros of the world are non-skilled for timing?

[Edited on 1/18/2006 by GameJunkieJim]

  • 01.17.2006 8:21 PM PDT

Bungie is the best.

Simple as that.

u sed the "n" word, dont!

  • 01.18.2006 3:28 AM PDT

Great post. It's good to see such enthusiasm for Halo : Combat Evolved still around.

And yeah, the timing thing. I personally would be happy if no games where you can time the respawns were ever made ever again. The whole concept of doing that just seems incorrigibly lame to me. Now, I do think the respawn system of Halo 1 is fairer than that of it's sequel. But frankly I've always wanted to see a more random element to the spawns. It'd force you not to rely on them and I think that's a good thing.

  • 01.18.2006 5:55 AM PDT

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Posted by: XO Prophet
Dumbest post ever. So all the pros of the world are non-skilled for timing?


In my opinion, it takes WAY more skill to mentally time than to use a device that does it for you.

Mentally Timing = Player Skill
Device Timing = Device Skill

  • 01.18.2006 10:19 AM PDT
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Posted by: GameJunkieJim
Posted by: XO Prophet
Dumbest post ever. So all the pros of the world are non-skilled for timing?


In my opinion, it takes WAY more skill to mentally time than to use a device that does it for you.

Mentally Timing = Player Skill
Device Timing = Device Skill


For mentally timing, it does take some skill, but to say that relying on a timer is using the devices skill I think is illogical. If you play alot on xbc against very skilled people, they use the timers to completely set up for a particular weapon's/powerup's respawn, they don't just grab it as they go like most people would use a timer for. They use the timer to know exactly when it is coming back to the second so they can perfect their whoring and completely be ready for others who may try to be setting up for the same weapon's/powerup's respawn.

Posted by: RhythmKiller
Great post. It's good to see such enthusiasm for Halo : Combat Evolved still around.

And yeah, the timing thing. I personally would be happy if no games where you can time the respawns were ever made ever again. The whole concept of doing that just seems incorrigibly lame to me. Now, I do think the respawn system of Halo 1 is fairer than that of it's sequel. But frankly I've always wanted to see a more random element to the spawns. It'd force you not to rely on them and I think that's a good thing.


That would take out an entire skill factor in halo. If you didn't know when the powerups/weapons were coming back, it would just be chance and luck that you stumble across it. Even if you were set up to get the next powerup/weapon, you would have to be lucky to get it in time before the other team got lucky and stumbled across another powerup/weapon in the map.

  • 01.18.2006 2:41 PM PDT
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Timing is a big part of halo, especially on-line. Halo1's weapon respawn is just great, gives an equal opportunity to both team to get weapons and powerups.

Here's some nade vids..

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4433694317538700253& amp;q=Halo+1

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=5379986021828464497&a mp;q=Halo+1

  • 01.18.2006 4:18 PM PDT
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My big tip, crouch and crouch often...not crouch-walking, just a quick crouch like when you hump. Especially when people are gonna be looking for a headshot (around hallways, spawns...). Throw a crouch in with your strafes. People will miss and you will look like a ninja.

[Edited on 1/18/2006]

  • 01.18.2006 8:14 PM PDT
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Yes esecially in head to head pistol battles where your foe is aiming for your head.

  • 01.18.2006 8:40 PM PDT

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I wouldn't say it was illogical. They can make the same plans around a mentally timed game and look all that much better to me. I respect your opinion, but I'll probably never agree with outside devices being used.

  • 01.19.2006 10:53 AM PDT
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So why is that different than the clock in Halo 2? The clock was included in Halo 1 it just isn't visible.

  • 01.19.2006 2:50 PM PDT
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Lets say your pistoling an enemy and you empty your clip before killing him. Press (X) Twice then just one (Y) so that you can finish him with your assault rifle or whatever you have. Then, say you empty an entire AR clip on him and you need a reloaded weapon fast to combat the next enemy. Switch back to your pistol that was reloading while you were fighting. Almost every time you switch weapons, try and make it a habit of XXY (backpack) reloading. It'll help you from time to time. Also I believe an example is in the video Angrysk8r posted....which isn't working for me ... I'll try to find a working version of it.

http://www.thatweasel.tv/video/GTC_BasicEssentials.mov

awesome video


[Edited on 1/19/2006]

  • 01.19.2006 7:57 PM PDT
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Yeah its very simple just quicky press xx and then y. Give your weapon the same amount of time to reload it and then switch back over and its called a pocket reload or backpack reload.

  • 01.23.2006 10:09 AM PDT
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o yea, i forgot

silent reload: XXB (pressed fastly)
silent weapon switch: YB
silent reload and weapon switch: XXYB

  • 01.23.2006 3:09 PM PDT

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