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Well I am trying to avoid sounding like a hater, but back when I had an Xbox, Halo 1's singleplayer was the only one I really enjoyed and replayed. The others? Powered through once and then forgot about them, really.

The multiplayer though? Awesome. I don't think it's been equalled and certainly not by a PC title. I'm not saying that Halo is the ultimate online fps, but it nails what I'd call the 'gladiatorial' niche; I think its closest competitor is Section 8. Fun power armoured combat in which competitors can take their share of damage.

In contrast to that you've got your Battlefield 'sandbox' and your CoD 'fast paced tactical zomg I go down in a couple of hits'.


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(I think that Battlefield and CoD rule their respective niches; think of it as an FPS tripartite... or possible... err... quadpartite(?) if I throw ArmA in there? )


I never played Reach but if Bungee was able to produce the abomination that was Halo 3's plot, then I am sure an outsourced developer can do worse.

You have to remember, 343 studio's has been working with bungie on all the halo titles since the very start, this is just the first time they get to take the reigns. The staff they have assembled isn't anything to scoff at either, theres lots of ace developers working there.

Besides Halo 3 left us with a cliffhanger anyway, so we always knew there was gonna be new one. (if you finish it on legendary you get to see the MC put himself in cryo)

I just hope they take note of the books and continue where the forerunner saga is gonna leave us, cause so far, that series is awesome.

Ya as Soladrin said, 343 has been their the whole time, and there is people from Bungie working on Halo 4 with 343 from what I hear.

This is actually not unusual for Bungie. Bungie likes making a few games and then they move on. It's what they do.

Of course, anyone who thinks this isn't Microsoft milking the cash cow needs a reality check. Halo made the XBox sell. It's the flag ship game. An XBox without Halo has what? Gears? It's like Nintendo without Mario games.

I doubt reach was a prequel done for the fans, cause it completely fethed over existing canon about the fall of reach.

It did worse than that. Fall of Reach, The Flood, First Strike, and Ghosts of Onyx were all contradicted in various ways, effectively retconning the entire EU. Contact Harvest was always shaky, and Grasslands took what was left and tore it to pieces cause Travis apparently likes taking things and screwing them up for the hell of it (I think she's just being whiny cause Lucas hosed her commandos so she has to find another universe to gak up).

P.S. As you can tell I have some issues

Haha yeah.

Anyway, isn't that what every franchise does? It's pretty much becoming the definition of a franchise. To be milked!

But of course. Likewise, anyone who thinks milking a franchise is inherently a bad thing also needs a reality check It really depends how you define "milking." If its just making sequels as long as they sell, then I fail to see the problem. That's par for the course. Its when the "milking" begins to be to the detriment of the series that I think people need to worry (glares at Call of Duty) but Halo hasn't reached that point. Most complaints about the series can be applied to all FPS games or are just silly. EDIT: Or amount to counter-hype which has nothing to do with how good the game is.

Yeah I agree. I don't really see it as milking unless you start following sonic's footsteps.

Soladrin wrote:Yeah I agree. I don't really see it as milking unless you start following sonic's footsteps.

Or Mario's...

The Mario games are still fairly good. I mean, lets give credit where its due. For a company that's essentially been remaking Super Mario 64 for the last 15 years, they've managed to keep the quality pretty damn high

Yeah, sonic on the other hand...

Soladrin wrote:You have to remember, 343 studio's has been working with bungie on all the halo titles since the very start, this is just the first time they get to take the reigns. The staff they have assembled isn't anything to scoff at either, theres lots of ace developers working there.

Besides Halo 3 left us with a cliffhanger anyway, so we always knew there was gonna be new one. (if you finish it on legendary you get to see the MC put himself in cryo)

I just hope they take note of the books and continue where the forerunner saga is gonna leave us, cause so far, that series is awesome.

If you wait til after the credits you also see the ship drifting in space toward a forerunner world. So yeah it was pretty clear they were going to carry on. Also, logically, there are still six halo rings, five of which have monitors, an unknown number of shield worlds/other stuff and who knows how many flood kept for research purposes. So, the only thing the series resolved was breaking up the covenant and briefly stopping the flood.

In fairness.
After reading the books you kinda get the idea that if humanity had unlimited access to 1 intact covenant ship (Which they do by the end of Halo 3) then it's a matter of time before they start ruining people's day.
So the implications for humanity after Halo 3 are huge... and it only gets worse for the covenant or the flood.

bombboy1252 wrote:I'm more looking forward to see Bungies new project more than Halo 4

After three games of disappointment Bungie can't claim the sort of respect with me that, say, I take for granted with Bioware (Dragonage 2 excepting) or Bethesda. So unless they impress me on a new projects merits then I've cleaned my hands.


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purplefood wrote:In fairness.
After reading the books you kinda get the idea that if humanity had unlimited access to 1 intact covenant ship (Which they do by the end of Halo 3) then it's a matter of time before they start ruining people's day.
So the implications for humanity after Halo 3 are huge... and it only gets worse for the covenant or the flood.

True, but the books also make it paramountly clear that if any of the Covenant had training, didn't have a medieval notion of tactics and put simply didn't act like total idiots then the balance would probably be maintained. Honestly, every book, when they weren't saying how awesome Spartans were they were saying how stupid and backward the Covenant are. Despite the fact they are winning this war. Its like the author played Halo 1, saw the AI waddling around randomly in the open without supporting eachother and just decided thats how they must be in real life.

Totalwar1402 wrote:

bombboy1252 wrote:I'm more looking forward to see Bungies new project more than Halo 4

After three games of disappointment Bungie can't claim the sort of respect with me that, say, I take for granted with Bioware (Dragonage 2 excepting) or Bethesda. So unless they impress me on a new projects merits then I've cleaned my hands.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

purplefood wrote:In fairness.
After reading the books you kinda get the idea that if humanity had unlimited access to 1 intact covenant ship (Which they do by the end of Halo 3) then it's a matter of time before they start ruining people's day.
So the implications for humanity after Halo 3 are huge... and it only gets worse for the covenant or the flood.

True, but the books also make it paramountly clear that if any of the Covenant had training, didn't have a medieval notion of tactics and put simply didn't act like total idiots then the balance would probably be maintained. Honestly, every book, when they weren't saying how awesome Spartans were they were saying how stupid and backward the Covenant are. Despite the fact they are winning this war. Its like the author played Halo 1, saw the AI waddling around randomly in the open without supporting eachother and just decided thats how they must be in real life.

Don't agree there. The whole weakness of the covenant, was their religious doctrine. Technology was only to be adapted by prophets (and engineers), their entire reason for war is a big fat lie. Their actual graps of technology is limited, because unlike humanity, they had forerunner gizmo's from the start on their planets (prophets and elites). Where as humanity made everything they have themselves, and therefore have a much deeper understanding of the actual workings of technology. Your best example for this is comparing a Covenant AI with a Human AI. Human AI's made the cov's look like wind up toys.

The reason the war went so badly for us was pretty much the difference in technology and numbers. The covanant always outnumbered us. And they had total air superiority. If you look at all the background stuff, you'll notice that almost all ground engagements were being won by humans, unless they were facing a force that was vastly numericaly superior. The problem is, if humans won a battle, the covvies would just orbital bombardlement the gak out of the area and move on.

If human ships had shield technology, thing's would've looked a lot different.

Oh btw, theres another Ark around too, a great Ark. It made the rings that are 30.000km in diameter, as opposed to the 10k km ones like installation 04.

Nope, have to disagree, they really went further than just implying that. For example:

in The Fall of Reach they appear with their entire fleet in fron of the defence guns when they have the ability to go wherever they want in slip-space but were incapable of having their own AI tell them this.

in Ghosts of Onyx the whole elite fleet wanders into a nuclear minefield because they don't bother using their sensors

in The Flood, a hundred ghosts charge into a formation of marines across open ground and are blown to bits. Even though the opponent is deploying in square like some 18th century army. Which was just, just wrong.

Ghosts of Onyx the covenant don't learn to provide failsafes to prevent an attacker turning the air supply off despite the cheif having done this to capture a battleship in the previous game. The book even highlights this point.

First Strike, the whole covenant fleet rushes out to kill the UNSC admiral on said captured battleship, rushing out because he goes Cole Train on them before self destructing the ship and destroying all of them including a High Charity type ship.

Thats not religion. Even the most blind faith in tradition can only make you so stupid, this just implies that they lack common sense and any notion of what their stuff does. Its like, despite being thousands of years old, having been put in a life or death situation where they have to make use of every resource to stay alive they still act like you got a medieval knight from the past and handed him a plasma rifle and energy shields. No, that just makes no sense. IMO, I may be an atheist myself, but the opinion that religion makes you dumb/incapable of change is a relatively recent concept and is woefully ignorant of the fact that most generals, soldiers, statesmen etc throughout history were religious to some extent. It simply didn't impact their thinking to the extent implied and I think its a tired cliche in literature.

Oh, and 40k gets away with it for two reasons.

1-40k doesn't have any pretense of taking itself seriously as sci fi. It is just Grimdark.

2-They aren't completely stupid and at least the have the excuse that most of their gods do exist in some form in the verse itself.

That's not a trailer.....its an animatic of the concept art.

@Totalwar1402 The square formation would of been the best tactical thing for them to do. Ghosts are like the cavalry of Halo.

Toastedandy wrote:That's not a trailer.....its an animatic of the concept art.

@Totalwar1402 The square formation would of been the best tactical thing for them to do. Ghosts are like the cavalry of Halo.

You've played multiplayer right? Cavalry don't shoot back and can't splatter you. I believe a soul drinkers novel made it very clear what happens if you deploy in square and the army has anything above a musket or whats charging you can push through your bayonets. I imagine a khorne berserker has much the same impact as a charging ghost....

Maybe with thrice the amount of spontaneous eviseration that is.

Oh, I thought it was an official trailer just with the way it was put together and edited; plus the thing at the end. They also used this medium in the anniversary terminals so I was more taken to assume it was them. Hmph ah well, good video.

In Ghosts of Onyx the whole elite fleet wanders into a nuclear minefield because they don't bother using their sensors

No. They picked up a nova bomb (dozens of nukes in a single giant warhead) and didn't know what it was until its timer went off.

in The Fall of Reach they appear with their entire fleet in fron of the defence guns when they have the ability to go wherever they want in slip-space but were incapable of having their own AI tell them this.

The Covenant had never encountered a world as heavily defended as Reach and slip space is dangerous (even for the Covenant) near the gravitational fields of planets. Its not covered much (it's actually ignored in the games) but humans have to leave a star system to make slip space work.

in The Flood, a hundred ghosts charge into a formation of marines across open ground and are blown to bits. Even though the opponent is deploying in square like some 18th century army. Which was just, just wrong.

Yeah but they deployed their Wraiths with more sense.

Ghosts of Onyx the covenant don't learn to provide failsafes to prevent an attacker turning the air supply off despite the cheif having done this to capture a battleship in the previous game

The Covenant had no knowledge that Chief took a ship in that manner and Cortana was the one to vented all the air and bypassed the safeties. Plus, the whole failure to innovate thing kind of plays in.

The Covenant weren't exactly a war race. Sure they had elements of a warrior culture, but compare them, a culture that has fought no major galactic wars against external threats in thousands of years to humanity who have been fighting war almost non-stop for roughly the same period of time. You also have to consider the Covenant's over confidence.

The Covenant culture was a feudal society that hadn't evolved in a very long time. Is it really that realistic? No. This is fiction lets not be ridiculous but Halo is hardly the first sci-fi series to use this humans who struggle and evolve vs others who don't dynamic. Its a fairly standard sci-fi convention. Religious fanatacism wasn't their real problem. Their probably was an absurdly orthodox outlook on problem solving and a failure to innovate.

Completly ninja-ed...
Well played LordofHats...
Well played...

Totalwar1402 wrote:

Toastedandy wrote:That's not a trailer.....its an animatic of the concept art.

@Totalwar1402 The square formation would of been the best tactical thing for them to do. Ghosts are like the cavalry of Halo.

You've played multiplayer right? Cavalry don't shoot back and can't splatter you. I believe a soul drinkers novel made it very clear what happens if you deploy in square and the army has anything above a musket or whats charging you can push through your bayonets. I imagine a khorne berserker has much the same impact as a charging ghost....

Maybe with thrice the amount of spontaneous eviseration that is.

Oh, I thought it was an official trailer just with the way it was put together and edited; plus the thing at the end. They also used this medium in the anniversary terminals so I was more taken to assume it was them. Hmph ah well, good video.

Well I've played plenty of Napoleon total war and Halo. Cavalry have being shooting back since as early as the Scythians. Square formation with a well drilled firing teams can beat anything that relies on confusion, speed and maneuverability. Ghosts cant go head on with anything except a mass of undisciplined soldiers in anything other than a square formation (Like basically any halo game). Can You think of any other tactic to use?

Totalwar1402 wrote:Nope, have to disagree, they really went further than just implying that. For example:

in The Fall of Reach they appear with their entire fleet in fron of the defence guns when they have the ability to go wherever they want in slip-space but were incapable of having their own AI tell them this.

in Ghosts of Onyx the whole elite fleet wanders into a nuclear minefield because they don't bother using their sensors

in The Flood, a hundred ghosts charge into a formation of marines across open ground and are blown to bits. Even though the opponent is deploying in square like some 18th century army. Which was just, just wrong.

Ghosts of Onyx the covenant don't learn to provide failsafes to prevent an attacker turning the air supply off despite the cheif having done this to capture a battleship in the previous game. The book even highlights this point.

First Strike, the whole covenant fleet rushes out to kill the UNSC admiral on said captured battleship, rushing out because he goes Cole Train on them before self destructing the ship and destroying all of them including a High Charity type ship.

Thats not religion. Even the most blind faith in tradition can only make you so stupid, this just implies that they lack common sense and any notion of what their stuff does. Its like, despite being thousands of years old, having been put in a life or death situation where they have to make use of every resource to stay alive they still act like you got a medieval knight from the past and handed him a plasma rifle and energy shields. No, that just makes no sense. IMO, I may be an atheist myself, but the opinion that religion makes you dumb/incapable of change is a relatively recent concept and is woefully ignorant of the fact that most generals, soldiers, statesmen etc throughout history were religious to some extent. It simply didn't impact their thinking to the extent implied and I think its a tired cliche in literature.

Oh, and 40k gets away with it for two reasons.

1-40k doesn't have any pretense of taking itself seriously as sci fi. It is just Grimdark.

2-They aren't completely stupid and at least the have the excuse that most of their gods do exist in some form in the verse itself.

Oh I aree. But you have to keep in mind that Elites are the supreme military commanders ( or at least used to be ). And it's been noted many times that they value honour and tradition over everything else. Which explains a lot of their idiocity, though not all of it. It's pretty much like WWII in a sci-fi setting. Blitzkrieg versus traditional tactics.

Toastedandy wrote:

Totalwar1402 wrote:

Toastedandy wrote:That's not a trailer.....its an animatic of the concept art.

@Totalwar1402 The square formation would of been the best tactical thing for them to do. Ghosts are like the cavalry of Halo.

You've played multiplayer right? Cavalry don't shoot back and can't splatter you. I believe a soul drinkers novel made it very clear what happens if you deploy in square and the army has anything above a musket or whats charging you can push through your bayonets. I imagine a khorne berserker has much the same impact as a charging ghost....

Maybe with thrice the amount of spontaneous eviseration that is.

Oh, I thought it was an official trailer just with the way it was put together and edited; plus the thing at the end. They also used this medium in the anniversary terminals so I was more taken to assume it was them. Hmph ah well, good video.

Well I've played plenty of Napoleon total war and Halo. Cavalry have being shooting back since as early as the Scythians. Square formation with a well drilled firing teams can beat anything that relies on confusion, speed and maneuverability. Ghosts cant go head on with anything except a mass of undisciplined soldiers in anything other than a square formation (Like basically any halo game). Can You think of any other tactic to use?

Trys to keep serious face...

The square was meant to counter charging heavy cavalry with lance and sabre. Most european armies never encountered the sort of massed horse archer army ala Mongols until they were equiped with long range repeating rifles and the like which could outshoot a fella with a composite bow. The only exception I can think of is the Russians in Siberia during the 16th/17th century but they were mainly against disorganized tribes and not the fully fledged Khanates further south. Drill, is only neccesary when you fire by volley with single fire weapons to maintain a continuous barrage of fire upon the enemy. By the year 2553 the UNSC has developed automatic assault rifles with 64 bullets per gun that can be reliably shot at a considerable range . This invalidates any advantage to be gained by 'drill'. The other advantage in square was keeping the enemy back with a wall of bayonets. Which would not stop a charging ghost. They thus present a giant splatter spree to any attacking ghost. The obvious thing to do, would be to deploy in elevated uneven ground in skirmish formation, preferably with a clear view of the enemy and just shoot down at them. No firepower would be lost and you wouldn't present a gigantic target to the ghosts plasma cannons. All one hundred of them.


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LordofHats wrote:[The Covenant weren't exactly a war race. Sure they had elements of a warrior culture, but compare them, a culture that has fought no major galactic wars against external threats in thousands of years to humanity who have been fighting war almost non-stop for roughly the same period of time. You also have to consider the Covenant's over confidence.

The Covenant culture was a feudal society that hadn't evolved in a very long time. Is it really that realistic? No. This is fiction lets not be ridiculous but Halo is hardly the first sci-fi series to use this humans who struggle and evolve vs others who don't dynamic. Its a fairly standard sci-fi convention. Religious fanatacism wasn't their real problem. Their probably was an absurdly orthodox outlook on problem solving and a failure to innovate.

So they're Imperial China then?

I know, that same human exceptionalism in literature is one of the few things I didn't like about Mass Effect. It seemed so obnoxious and counter-intuitive to the series moral point. Its also probably something I like about 40k, it doesn't force the humans are awesome in every way idea down your throat. Their empire is dying and has regressed to the point of near madness.

The ghosts would not be able to charge the Marines or they'd be annhialated by fire.
Even the assault rifle has a good chance of killing a ghost pilot and ghosts are fairly short range.
So a square formation would force them to do exactly what cavalry did and instead of charging them they would have to make runs against the square and pick them off one by one whereas no matter what direction the ghosts came from the marines would always be able to present fire.
Not perfect but still okay...
A skirmish formation would be okay but unless you wiped out all of the ghosts on the first pass you would be spread out and easy prey for the ghosts...

That's my fairly amatuer opinion on that.


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Totalwar1402 wrote:

So they're Imperial China then?

I know, that same human exceptionalism in literature is one of the few things I didn't like about Mass Effect. It seemed so obnoxious and counter-intuitive to the series moral point. Its also probably something I like about 40k, it doesn't force the humans are awesome in every way idea down your throat. Their empire is dying and has regressed to the point of near madness.

In fairness the novels put a decent point across.
Humans are losing.
In Ghosts of Onyx you see they are doing so badly they are using child soldiers on suicide missions. Their objective isn't a fixed mission such as kill x or capture y. It's go over there and kill as many of the covenant before you die. To me that shows a humanity willing to do anything to fight extinction. Humanity in Halo is presented as both positive and negative, the bright bits are bright but the dark bits are dark...

purplefood wrote:The ghosts would not be able to charge the Marines or they'd be annhialated by fire.
Even the assault rifle has a good chance of killing a ghost pilot and ghosts are fairly short range.
So a square formation would force them to do exactly what cavalry did and instead of charging them they would have to make runs against the square and pick them off one by one whereas no matter what direction the ghosts came from the marines would always be able to present fire.
Not perfect but still okay...
A skirmish formation would be okay but unless you wiped out all of the ghosts on the first pass you would be spread out and easy prey for the ghosts...

That's my fairly amatuer opinion on that.

If you were on elevated rocks they wouldn't be able to charge you. Its actually what you do in the multiplayer, you get off level ground when fighting ghosts or where they're so cramped in they can't actually charge you/can be boarded.

True, they might get blown up in a charge, but the ghosts could, and should, have shot back. Without the heavy shields and armor of a spartan those marines would have turned into molten clumps pretty quickly. In the open in ranks it would be impossible to miss and even the chief can only last a couple of seconds under fire from one, not a hundred, of those things. Also the assault rifle isn't the DMR or battle rifle or even what a real life assault rifle can do and is also a very short range gun. If fired by burst they wouldn't have the power to blow up the ghosts and the front shields the pilot. You can only kill the pilot of a ghost if he flies past you or you get him in the side. Thats before you consider the fact that clumping up like that makes you vulnerable to other arms the covenant could bring to bear, banshees, wraiths and hunters etc which makes deploying like that an unneccesaryly silly risk. Just my fairly amatuerish opinion.

Im rather scared that the pistol grenade thing is going to turn the game into COD. Seems like a noob tube, but as long as you still don't get to choose what your starting weapons are, multiplayer will still be fun. Looking foreward to storyline. Very interested in seeing where they go with it since the covenant is broken and the flood has vanished to the shadows for the most part. Wonder how long Cheifs been in stasis as well.

Totalwar1402 wrote:

purplefood wrote:The ghosts would not be able to charge the Marines or they'd be annhialated by fire.
Even the assault rifle has a good chance of killing a ghost pilot and ghosts are fairly short range.
So a square formation would force them to do exactly what cavalry did and instead of charging them they would have to make runs against the square and pick them off one by one whereas no matter what direction the ghosts came from the marines would always be able to present fire.
Not perfect but still okay...
A skirmish formation would be okay but unless you wiped out all of the ghosts on the first pass you would be spread out and easy prey for the ghosts...

That's my fairly amatuer opinion on that.

If you were on elevated rocks they wouldn't be able to charge you. Its actually what you do in the multiplayer, you get off level ground when fighting ghosts or where they're so cramped in they can't actually charge you/can be boarded.

True, they might get blown up in a charge, but the ghosts could, and should, have shot back. Without the heavy shields and armor of a spartan those marines would have turned into molten clumps pretty quickly. In the open in ranks it would be impossible to miss and even the chief can only last a couple of seconds under fire from one, not a hundred, of those things. Also the assault rifle isn't the DMR or battle rifle or even what a real life assault rifle can do and is also a very short range gun. If fired by burst they wouldn't have the power to blow up the ghosts and the front shields the pilot. You can only kill the pilot of a ghost if he flies past you or you get him in the side. Thats before you consider the fact that clumping up like that makes you vulnerable to other arms the covenant could bring to bear, banshees, wraiths and hunters etc which makes deploying like that an unneccesaryly silly risk. Just my fairly amatuerish opinion.

You can't climb on rocks if there are no rocks...
If the ghosts were boosting they couldn't fire back.
The assault rifle in game is AFAIK very toned down to what it is in-universe. IIRC it has plenty of power and accuracy behind it, with a few buddies a marine could easily take out a ghost pilot which in Flood were grunts...

Totalwar1402 wrote:

Toastedandy wrote:

Totalwar1402 wrote:

Toastedandy wrote:That's not a trailer.....its an animatic of the concept art.

@Totalwar1402 The square formation would of been the best tactical thing for them to do. Ghosts are like the cavalry of Halo.

You've played multiplayer right? Cavalry don't shoot back and can't splatter you. I believe a soul drinkers novel made it very clear what happens if you deploy in square and the army has anything above a musket or whats charging you can push through your bayonets. I imagine a khorne berserker has much the same impact as a charging ghost....

Maybe with thrice the amount of spontaneous eviseration that is.

Oh, I thought it was an official trailer just with the way it was put together and edited; plus the thing at the end. They also used this medium in the anniversary terminals so I was more taken to assume it was them. Hmph ah well, good video.

Well I've played plenty of Napoleon total war and Halo. Cavalry have being shooting back since as early as the Scythians. Square formation with a well drilled firing teams can beat anything that relies on confusion, speed and maneuverability. Ghosts cant go head on with anything except a mass of undisciplined soldiers in anything other than a square formation (Like basically any halo game). Can You think of any other tactic to use?

Trys to keep serious face...

The square was meant to counter charging heavy cavalry with lance and sabre. Most european armies never encountered the sort of massed horse archer army ala Mongols until they were equiped with long range repeating rifles and the like which could outshoot a fella with a composite bow. The only exception I can think of is the Russians in Siberia during the 16th/17th century but they were mainly against disorganized tribes and not the fully fledged Khanates further south. Drill, is only neccesary when you fire by volley with single fire weapons to maintain a continuous barrage of fire upon the enemy. By the year 2553 the UNSC has developed automatic assault rifles with 64 bullets per gun that can be reliably shot at a considerable range . This invalidates any advantage to be gained by 'drill'. The other advantage in square was keeping the enemy back with a wall of bayonets. Which would not stop a charging ghost. They thus present a giant splatter spree to any attacking ghost. The obvious thing to do, would be to deploy in elevated uneven ground in skirmish formation, preferably with a clear view of the enemy and just shoot down at them. No firepower would be lost and you wouldn't present a gigantic target to the ghosts plasma cannons. All one hundred of them.

I never read the book, or any halo fiction for that matter. I'm only trying to defend the use of a solid tactic.

You seem to imagine once a ghost is destroyed, it disappears immediately or after a short time (like the game) But in reality (or fiction?) the casualties sustained by the mass fire of the UNSC's guns (Which I presume have superior range) would cause bodies and wrecks to build up in front of the fragile ghosts, thus hindering their speed and impact. So an all out charge is out of the question, as they would be gunned down to an ineffective number. If the ghosts try and surround the UNSC, then they will face the same obstacle on all sides.
The only effective way of breaking a square formation is with artillery, infantry or a combined Infantry and cavalry offensive.
Play a total war game before you diss the square formation. It sounds to me to be the most effective tactic to use in that situation.

If they did use a skirmishing strategy, and had access to higher, more defensible ground (Again I never read the book so I would appreciate and elaboration) then they could easily isolate and pick of the UNSC protecting the flank and eventually cut them away easily.

Square formation in action against charge:




Mass cavelry charge against infantry in a basic line (It would be MUCH more effective against skirmisher formation)

purplefood wrote:The ghosts would not be able to charge the Marines or they'd be annhialated by fire.
Even the assault rifle has a good chance of killing a ghost pilot and ghosts are fairly short range.
So a square formation would force them to do exactly what cavalry did and instead of charging them they would have to make runs against the square and pick them off one by one whereas no matter what direction the ghosts came from the marines would always be able to present fire.
Not perfect but still okay...
A skirmish formation would be okay but unless you wiped out all of the ghosts on the first pass you would be spread out and easy prey for the ghosts...

That's my fairly amatuer opinion on that.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Totalwar1402 wrote:

So they're Imperial China then?

I know, that same human exceptionalism in literature is one of the few things I didn't like about Mass Effect. It seemed so obnoxious and counter-intuitive to the series moral point. Its also probably something I like about 40k, it doesn't force the humans are awesome in every way idea down your throat. Their empire is dying and has regressed to the point of near madness.

In fairness the novels put a decent point across.
Humans are losing.
In Ghosts of Onyx you see they are doing so badly they are using child soldiers on suicide missions. Their objective isn't a fixed mission such as kill x or capture y. It's go over there and kill as many of the covenant before you die. To me that shows a humanity willing to do anything to fight extinction. Humanity in Halo is presented as both positive and negative, the bright bits are bright but the dark bits are dark...

Losing? They have a funny way of showing it! (happy laugh)

Reminds me of the (sorry if you don't know reference) Wars of Light and Shadow book series where the Clansmen are meant to be losing in the background, yet every battle scene is of them butchering with ease the Alliance army which outnumbers them 10;1. Theres a fine line between noble and heroic sacrifice against overwhelming odds and stormtrooper syndrome where you just don't get that vibe. Ghosts of Onyx was one of those books for me.

Trouble is the Spartans weren't created to fight the Covenant but for the Earth based government to sow terror among insurrectionists by having a force of invincible soldiers. For which Halsley and co commited and excused acts of utter barbarism. Which I think was also out of touch with what Halo is like in the games. Theres never any hint that the UNSC is bad, like you get in the books; in fact they're whiter than white as it were.


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Razorspirit wrote:Im rather scared that the pistol grenade thing is going to turn the game into COD. Seems like a noob tube, but as long as you still don't get to choose what your starting weapons are, multiplayer will still be fun. Looking foreward to storyline. Very interested in seeing where they go with it since the covenant is broken and the flood has vanished to the shadows for the most part. Wonder how long Cheifs been in stasis as well.

DMR/Battle rifle is Halo's noob tube IMO since you can easily beat any other equiped soldier with the possible exception of the sniper rifle with range and a good shot. Doubt one weapon would be that bad. Remember the grenade launcher?

You never got the sense humanity was losing?
Humanity has been beaten back to just their inner colonies.
Earth itself was besieged and partially taken.
Spartans (Besides Master Chief) were pretty much dying all over the shop.
The UNSC doesn't seem bad in the books because it's a bit pre-occupied with trying to live...

Balance. They inflict a hundred to one casulaties (guesstimate) in every battle BEFORE you add the Spartans. Thats not a last stand, thats a rolling massacre.

They talk as if they're losing, but its not really shown in the battle scene and the most epic ones have the UNSC shockingly triumphant in nearly all cases. Including the fleet battles despite them claiming a Covenant ship can beat three UNSC vessels of the same class; BEFORE you consider that the UNSC has next to no cruisers whilst the aliens have whole fleets of those monsters that dwarf every UNSC ship.