Halo 5: Guardians Discussion

[Shekkles]

 It's a mesh-up of ideas and clear evidence that 343 doesn't have a single vision for this series and it shows not only to us, but to everyone that has played this game. Players may not talk about it, but they unconsciously saw it and they stopped playing it and went to a game that does have a unified vision.

 

That is just an A+ summary of this game. Really well said mate.

[Mr Grim]

But you're missing the fundamental difference between FPS and fighting game - range. You could put 100 button combos in Halo and you'd still get the majority of your kills with a gun because its the nature of the genre.

I mean the majority of skill gap, more so than how the game plays, meta was a poor choice of terminology.

[Vetoed]

Mods, plz save this thread :cry:

 

Another tip to improve the game

With how fast the population is shrinking each day, it's becoming harder and harder for high ranks to find any matches. 343 really need to make champion from top 200 to top 500 OR allow onyx to match champions. I'm sure people will take that over making 20 new accounts/never find games again.

CSR means less than you think when it comes to Matchmaking.

 

The game uses an MMR system in the background to match you up with players. It's for the most part based on your W/L and (I'm assuming) your W/L against specific people as well. For example, in Rumble Rockets I couldn't find a games with a mere 12 matches because I had won all of them 1st place and most people had a few losses in it due to its random nature. I was Onyx ~1550 unable to match with people for hours until I ended up getting a fortunate match the next day, which I had to lose on purpose to help get more games later on because I wanted the Champion.

 

Another proof would be how certain Champions with win rates around 10 to 15% in FFA have no problem whatsoever finding matches, but on a new account with a good win rate (~50% or 95% if counting 4th place+ as a win) I can't find matches at Onyx ~2100.

 

Changing the amount of Champions per playlist will not do much except further devalue the meaning of Champion in a crumbling population. The Matchmaking parameters are just far too strict for no reason at all. There's also a clear discrepancy between how much certain wins boost your MMR vs. how much it boosts your CSR. For that reason, you end up with a mismatched MMR and CSR and it's possible to be unable to find games much before what would make sense (not that it should ever make sense not to find games).

 

TL;DR - 343 tried to make ranked MM far too competitive instead of taking inspiration from Halo 3 (once again) which nailed the ranked/social experience to near perfection. Halo 3 would have been perfect if the ranks didn't allow stupid amounts of boosting, deranking, and smurfing, which the current ranking system prevents for the most part.

 

P.S. The no-deranking part of the current system is kinda stupid if the game will allow people to place in the highest division right off the bat...

 

I'll see if I can make a video covering all the issues and potential solutions. There's a lot of stuff to go over, so I don't wanna miss something.

[xSociety]

Can you elaborate? Pistol vs Br vs DMR vs lightrifle can all outshoot each other and are designed for specific ranges.

 

In the automatics the assault rifle is the weakest, but has the longest effective range. SMG is mid range but stronger than the AR and the storm rifle is even a shorter range but even stronger than the SMG. If pro players are inclined to believe all the guns can be used optimally, although the storm rifle is the strongest for sure and is probably the one that could use a slight nerf, then I'd be inclined to believe them. They are better than all of us at the game so when it comes to in game mechanics they tend to have a good grasp of things. 

There is no correlation between being a pro at the game and understanding what makes a good Halo game. It has been proven time and time again. Whether it be Reach's bloom or Halo 4 in general. 

 

Automatics being viable is not something we should strive for, period. If they have to be viable, the utility weapon needs to wipe it's ass with them if used properly, that is definitely NOT the case with Halo 5. 

 

Having better "utility" guns on the map is also not a good thing for multiple reasons that have been laid out plenty here. 

 

Edit: At what range exactly does a Pistol beat the BR, LR, or the Carbine with two equally skilled players or are you just repeating the Halo 5 hype video before release?  

[TheIcePrincess]

Can you elaborate? Pistol vs Br vs DMR vs lightrifle can all outshoot each other and are designed for specific ranges.

 

In the automatics the assault rifle is the weakest, but has the longest effective range. SMG is mid range but stronger than the AR and the storm rifle is even a shorter range but even stronger than the SMG. If pro players are inclined to believe all the guns can be used optimally, although the storm rifle is the strongest for sure and is probably the one that could use a slight nerf, then I'd be inclined to believe them. They are better than all of us at the game so when it comes to in game mechanics they tend to have a good grasp of things. 

This is a hard subject for me to explain, especially now (Really tired, sorry). I think @@Cursed Lemon, or @@jeromesix could easily fill in what I'm thinking. They know a helluva lot on balance.

[Cursed Lemon]

Halo's problem has never been about "imbalances" (once the settings were cleaned up). That's not the issue. 

 

The problem with H2-H4 is that the utility weapon was too weak. The problem with H5 is that the pistol isn't a utility weapon. 

 

A utility weapon in the hands of a spawning player is one of the fundamental characteristics that differentiates Halo from other shooters. Halo 5 is fucking with that concept. 

[throoper]

There is no correlation between being a pro at the game and understanding what makes a good Halo game. It has been proven time and time again. Whether it be Reach's bloom or Halo 4 in general. 

 

Automatics being viable is not something we should strive for, period. If they have to be viable, the utility weapon needs to wipe it's ass with them if used properly, that is definitely NOT the case with Halo 5. 

 

Having better "utility" guns on the map is also not a good thing for multiple reasons that have been laid out plenty here. 

 

Edit: At what range exactly does a Pistol beat the BR, LR, or the Carbine with two equally skilled players or are you just repeating the Halo 5 hype video before release?  

 

It isnt about range as much as it is about who shoots first. short to mid range with those guns equally skilled players - assuming good players who can shoot - first shot matters way more than which gun you have because the kill time on all of them is the same. 

[cookies4you]

This thread is a shitstorm.

[Vetoed]

Had a long talk with Josh Menke tonight (the dude who worked on not just Halo 5's but WOW, SC2 and Blops 2/3 ranks and MM). As expected, he can't do much for the ranking system except inform some people about what's going on (he stopped working at 343 before the beta was out). However, he did tell me that the game is supposed to have a fallback parameter (or at least, was supposed to when he still worked there) where the game matches you with whoever it can find before the search times out and kicks people back at the Matchmaking menu. It seems obvious enough that the game doesn't do that and it's the main reason why people end up with search times that can take up to hours – it's not actual searching for hours straight, it just cycles the same small pool/skill range over and over – instead of ending up with a match that's a bit off skill-wise, but at least, it's a match.

 

Most people I've talked to would agree that it's better to give high level players an occasional easier match, even if it means not getting as much progress CSR-wise than it is not to give them matches at all. As for the weaker players, sure, it might not be as fun, but it's a good learning experience. It doesn't have to be punishing on their rank, and will happen far less often than most people think. For example, someone at Diamond tends not to search for longer than 1 minute, so the odds of matching high level opponents are VERY slim, whereas high level opponents might cycle through a team of Diamonds (or lower) here and there, but is almost guaranteed never to match the same team again since the player pool at that level is huge. I think it would be a fair solution.

 

An alternate solution is just to make it so the search expands forever without timing people out until it provides them with a match. This solution would provide closer matches skill-wise, but might result in search times that can go over 5 minutes (up to 10 or further?). The difference versus this and what we have now is that the search would never reset and force players to cycle the same skill range over and over while hoping for the best. Imagining search times around 10 minutes is something I consider a bit excessive, but some people might disagree. It's another option though.

 

One last thing is that I was right to assume that MMR (hidden Matchmaking Rating which decides who matches who) progresses a lot faster than CSR does. So "by design", it forces some people to match opponents far higher skilled than what their CSR would lead to think. This, however, can lead to issues such as long search times at unexpected levels (like me who couldn't find matches being Onyx 1550 and 12 for 12 undefeated) but also people getting pushed far too high during/after their placement matches, and being placed in a division where they don't belong and can't derank out of, resulting in very poor performance and frustrating matches for the said people. A potential solution would just be to make it so MMR progresses a bit slower than it does now.

 

Anyhow, there's a lot of stuff to cover here, and I think it'd be best for me to make a video on it and go over it as clearly as possible to expose the issues to as many people as possible (and perhaps get 343's attention as well). As of right now, I'd estimate that 98% of the population doesn't have an actual problem with Matchmaking times. The few people who are aware of it are the ones who watch high level players' streams and videos. If we want a solution to happen fast, I think it's important to put it out there. Otherwise, the game doesn't have a bright future waiting ahead.

 

I'm hoping I can work on this tomorrow morning.

 

EDIT: went back over this and corrected a lot of mistakes.

[Brad Pitt]

You know, I had a really long post typed up about how fucking awful this game is but I'm just gonna say one sentence. This game sucks fat cock. Fuck this company they are fucking awful.  Big team is a fucking joke, arena is a fucking joke, everything about this game is a fucking joke. This game is atrocious.

Amen.

[T0rM3nTeD]

Please, for the fucking love of everything that is holy, increase the quit penalties. Dramatically. Extremely dramatically. Going in with a party of 1 as a platinum-ish rank is awful. I'm talking like 12 hour ban for one quit. This is just getting worse and worse.

[cookies4you]

Please, for the fucking love of everything that is holy, increase the quit penalties. Dramatically. Extremely dramatically. Going in with a party of 1 as a platinum-ish rank is awful. I'm talking like 12 hour ban for one quit. This is just getting worse and worse.

12 hours is too excessive for a single quit.

 

At the very least, 5-10 minutes with increasing penalties up to a day ban and the ability to rejoin a game for players who get disconnected.

[ABearInTheWoods]

@@MrGreenWithAGun

 

Well done, I applaud you.

[thdyingbreed]

WALL OF TEXT

Did you by happen too ask him why you can be placed into the highest division after placement matches yet you can't deran out of them...I'd seriously like to know why anyone thought that was a good idea.   

[xxcloud7xx]

We started talking about the game in general and kept it lighthearted to begin with. The guns are balanced there really isn't an argument against that, almost all the guns have equal kill times when used optimally so almost every single gun in the game could be used in a competitive sense.

 

These guys talk about the tweaks they want to see for the game to be competitive as the episode goes on, definitely recommend you hear these guys out - they get paid to play this game for a reason. 

Sorry I really don't want to listen to what any modern Halo "pro" has to say because a lot of them aren't Halo purists and they don't even understand the fundamentals of the game. Even if some of them are Halo purists and understand the fundamentals of the game I doubt that they are able to properly articulate what appropriate changes should be made to Halo 5 so that the game can reach it's maximum competitive potential.

 

Do Halo pros even care about the competitive merit/integrity of Halo 5? If they did then they would probably be advocating for changes to the game that are similar to these http://teambeyond.net/forum/topic/10991-how-to-improve-h5-arena/ and not advocating to keep radar/motion tracker in competitive play.

 

It seems to me that these so called Halo "pros" only care about how many twitch viewers that the game can get and the fact that they can make lots of money by being good at the game. They would probably compromise the competitive merit/integrity of Halo in a heart beat if their careers depended on it.

[Exidrion]

Halo's problem has never been about "imbalances" (once the settings were cleaned up). That's not the issue. 

 

The problem with H2-H4 is that the utility weapon was too weak. The problem with H5 is that the pistol isn't a utility weapon. 

 

A utility weapon in the hands of a spawning player is one of the fundamental characteristics that differentiates Halo from other shooters. Halo 5 is fucking with that concept. 

 

Define "utility weapon", because I don't see how it's not one when compared to h2-h4. I'm not even trying to fight you, I just don't understand what you mean.

 

Seems a whole hell of a lot more useful than halo 2's SMG or Halo 3's AR/Pistol. I feel like we finally got a decent starting weapon. All people did off spawn was rush for a better weapon.

[Lambo]

My question is, why do I have to play against full teams way more than I can play against other solo searchers. I am a 1500 Onyx in Team Arena now. It takes me 2 seconds to find a game. Tell me what you want, but the game doesnt even look into party sizes at all.

 

The skill matching is a complete joke as well. Yesterday I played a solo game (yes my friends stopped playing) of Arena and this was the match up:

 

Me: Onyx 1500

Red 1: Diamond 5

Red 2: Diamond 2

Red 3: Diamond 2

 

vs

 

Blue 1: Onyx 1971

Blue 2: Onyx 1959

Blue 3: Onyx 1826

Blue 4: Onyx 1610

 

Can someone explain me how the fuck this is a fair match up? I mean, if I have to play against such people, fine I take the challenge. But give me at least some other Onyx teammates and not Diamond 2s. Their worst player (rank wise) has clearly a higher rank than our best. And dont forget that they were probably a full team as well.

 

This game is unplayable alone and its a part of the reason why its dying so quick. The H3 1-50 was far from perfect and I dont want to start arguing about ranking systems and their flaws. All I know is, I could start a game of H3 on level 45-50 and expect a fair game, even when searching alone.

[Twis7ed]

Define "utility weapon", because I don't see how it's not one when compared to h2-h4. I'm not even trying to fight you, I just don't understand what you mean.

 

Seems a whole hell of a lot more useful than halo 2's SMG or Halo 3's AR/Pistol. I feel like we finally got a decent starting weapon. All people did off spawn was rush for a better weapon.

People are talking about the BR when they refer to Halo 2 and 3s utility weapon. I know Halo 2 was SMG start for awhile and Halo 3 was AR/Pistol start, but we all tend to remember BR starts in matchmaking and tournaments.

 

Halo 5's pistol is definitely better than SMG/AR starts. However, it's weaker than the BR from past Halo games.

 

A perfect utility weapon is the Halo 1 pistol. You stand a fighting chance against any other weapon and you never spawn at a significant disadvantage. In Halo 5, the pistol gets beat at range against every other rifle, and for the most part, is underpowered against rifles at medium/close range. It's 20x harder to use and only kills a millisecond quicker if you hit every single shot to the head.

 

BR starts came a lot later in Halo 2, and I can't remember when they came in Halo 3...there might have been BR start gametypes at launch. But yeah, we are talking about the BR when we refer to Halo 2 and 3s utility weapon, even though it didn't start off that way.

[xxcloud7xx]

Define "utility weapon", because I don't see how it's not one when compared to h2-h4. I'm not even trying to fight you, I just don't understand what you mean.

 

Seems a whole hell of a lot more useful than halo 2's SMG or Halo 3's AR/Pistol. I feel like we finally got a decent starting weapon. All people did off spawn was rush for a better weapon.

Halo CE's pistol is the epitome of what a utility weapon should be like in Halo. A utility weapon should empower players off spawn so that they can defend themselves from various situations and from various distances. An ideal utility weapon helps balance out the entire weapon sandbox by empowering individual players off spawn.

 

Halo 5's pistol currently doesn't fit the role of what a utility weapon should be like in Halo. It's not rewarding players proportionately for the amount of skill it takes to use. It is also not strong enough to be able to empower players off spawn so that they can defend themselves from the rest of the weapon sandbox. The pistol in Halo 5 gets outclassed by the AR, storm rifle, and SMG at close range, it gets outclassed at mid range by the BR and Carbine, and it get's outclassed by the LR, DMR, and sniper at long range. Therefore the pistol in Halo 5 needs to be buffed so it can become a proper utility weapon. 

[Il Meanbean lI]

Halo 5 is sterile and completely devoid of anything remotely interesting. People who play it only do so because it's what's currently being played, not because of any merit the game itsself has.

Well this is utter bullshit.

 

I play 5 because it's some of the most fun I've had playing Halo since well, ever. I've had Fallout 4 sitting on my desk for a week or so and I just keep coming back to 5 instead. It's not perfect but it's still awesome.

[Dysphoria]

Had a long talk with Josh Menke tonight (the dude who worked on not just Halo 5's but WOW, SC2 and Blops 2/3

 

How did he do Bo3 system? It doesn't even have a division system, its a simple W/L exp system the most simple and least complex of them all. Aren't division systems his signature thing to do? 

[xxcloud7xx]

Well this is utter bullshit.

 

I play 5 because it's some of the most fun I've had playing Halo since well, ever. I've had Fallout 4 sitting on my desk for a week or so and I just keep coming back to 5 instead. It's not perfect but it's still awesome.

Damn I'm envious of that. I've only put maybe a max total of two hours into playing Halo 5 because I'm not currently interested in playing the game while it's in this type of condition. Ever since I started playing Halo CE on MCC the enjoyment level that I use to get from playing the other Halo games has dwindled. I've become really jaded towards the other Halo games.

[Moa]

Quick, the mods are sleeping. Break all the rules...

 

Yeah, don't do that. A few users have just been banned for it. Next time don't join in on the 'discussion', just report it and ignore it.

[Vetoed]

Did you by happen too ask him why you can be placed into the highest division after placement matches yet you can't deran out of them...I'd seriously like to know why anyone thought that was a good idea.   

He designed the division system and MMR stuff. What 343 did with the rest is up to them. Keep in mind he hasn't been at 343 since BEFORE the beta, and a lot of discretionary changes have been made since.

 

And while I agree it's not a good idea, pointing fingers isn't as useful as finding solutions.

 

How did he do Bo3 system? It doesn't even have a division system, its a simple W/L exp system the most simple and least complex of them all. Aren't division systems his signature thing to do? 

I didn't ask because I have no interest in BO3... and regardless, I'd like to think he didn't have a say on everything. There's no saying whether he designed it from scratch or what. I'm just aware he worked on it, and most likely contributed a lot to Matchmaking algorithms.

[Ghostie]

Halo's problem has never been about "imbalances" (once the settings were cleaned up). That's not the issue. 

 

The problem with H2-H4 is that the utility weapon was too weak. The problem with H5 is that the pistol isn't a utility weapon. 

 

A utility weapon in the hands of a spawning player is one of the fundamental characteristics that differentiates Halo from other shooters. Halo 5 is fucking with that concept. 

Random question: how well do you think Sprint would work in a CE-style game?