March MM update

Disregard Slayer, acquire objectives.

 

In certain cases (not often though) I think there are exceptions. Tempest isn't great for Slayer since it promotes such a passive approach, but I feel that flag alleviates this a decent amount. Base camping is effective, but it's one of those maps where a strong, well executed push (especially if a well driven hog is worked in) is effective enough for it to be hella fun.

But by and large I do agree, just that Tempest always springs to mind and a map that plays flag much better than Slayer, kinda like Narrows I guess, but more extreme.

 

Are you talking about 5 or 6 players or 8? BTB on Tempest is too crowded. There are multiple paths to approach the base but there are too few spawn points and they are mostly right behind the flag, afew seconds away. I wouldn't be surprised if two good teams (accurate DMRs) could keep each other from crossing the middle. The fact that there are no six player (except for invasion) playlists now that premium battle is long gone makes tempest an almost useless map. I wish that I had seen highlands every time tempest was chosen.

As for removal of bleedthrough, one doesn't have to count AR shots for an AR+melee, but now the AR is as useless as it always was because the melee combo takes longer. I don't mind, though, I never use it. Melees in general seem useless because the already dominant headshot weapon users will just backpedal and headshot instead of meleeing to die or lose shields themselves. I never bought the arguments against bullet bleedthrough, which to me seems to matter less. If you're almost one- shot, I don't see why you would be contemplating a voluntary engagement. If so, I guess to help a teammate who is distracting a lone enemy, it's a difference of uncertainty of one shot to kill you, and that's the case when you are between less than full shields Pre-TU and close to 1/4 shields. If you shoot someone in the body and their shields pop because they were damaged before, there is only a one-shot difference in the kill time there too. Just aim for the head for your next shot.

I never encountered the sprint double melee when I used to play small map playlists more often.

I've seen the 343 forums- I'm afraid that there's no non-bullshit to find. There are only extremely stupid posts and very stupid posts. Bloom, bleedthrough, how appropriate a certain AA is- the "winner" of the argument according to those threads depends on which side the very stupid posts happen to come down on.

 

I'm talking about the rare occasions which it came up in Squad/TO, as well as when Premium Battle existed. You're right that it's not really that useful now, but even when there were potential playlists for it to shine in, it still rarely got played, just think it was a waste because it was really solid when played with the right gametypes. Until Ridgline (which, in this and all senses is vastly superior), it was the best implementation of Hog play in to Reach, which is actually kinda sad now that I think about it.

 

Tempest is the worst Reach map. Every time it comes up I quit out.

 

Yeah, but in Tempest's defence, you're wrong.

 

One or two flag on Tempest with competitive teams is actually quite fun. I could take or leave it as a slayer map though... it plays slayer very weirdly.

 

In some senses that's the point. Shooters you can pick up and understand/be decent at within an hour are ten a penny nowadays, it's nice to see that some people are still making twitch shooters.

 

People hiding on/behind rocks the entire match? No thanks. The map is way too stand-offish.

 

I do wish they'd provided a bit more in terms of instruction, though. I'm still not sure how mutators work in terms of which ones come up and why, what the tiers and pips etc. mean in the mutator selection screen. The way the screen shifts colour with mutators is also far from self explanatory, and I've pretty much no idea how the medals/ranks work.

 

I turned that off, twas annoying as hell.

 

The map with the Strength in the middle that you "mancannon" to is my favorite by far. Great for 1v1s and 2v2s. Small, easy to learn and great flow.
There's a CTF map that's kind of like Elongation as well, but curvy... That one is a blast. Outcrop I think it might be called?
A few of the maps are overly complex and misses in my opinion... But I'm loving the game over all.

And have I mentioned how smooth and sexy the movement feels?

 

OK, starting a thread for this game, lol.

EDIT: Or I'll just bump another thread.

 

Do we actually know the maps/varients that were added to BTB yet? If so could someone link to that information?

 

I, too, would like to know this. I'm curious if Amatesaru (sp?) got in. Best heavy map I played on for sure.