Forging 101: Advanced Guide To Respawns By Devinish OK ladies and gents, this is everything I know about spawns in the game of Halo 3. Prepare for a long and detailed read. Also, keep in mind, this is just my theory, which (dare I say) may be wrong (but I doubt it). Respawn Areas Probably the some of the most mystical and intriguing things about the spawn system in Halo 3 are the respawn areas. If various spawn points are placed in a respawn area, they act like a joined unit. If something happens inside of the respawn area, it will affect all of the included spawn points. This is called the spawn point's "weight." Weight refers to the probability that a player will spawn there. Here are the factors that contribute to a spawn point's weight, followed by the estimated weight of each factor: Friendlies nearby +100 Enemies nearby -100 Deaths nearby -500 (for 20 seconds [unknown decay rate]) Spawn order (guessing +250?) All of these things influence a players spawn, so in the following scenarios, we are going to calculate where a player is probably going to spawn. In the following images, the Light Blue circles, are respawn points. Yellow boxes are respawn areas. Red circles are Enemies Blue circles are Friendlies. What point will the player probably spawn on? Because the enemy is in Area "A," he will influence the weight of points "1" and "2." Because the Friendly in in area "B," he will influence points "1" and "3." Making our total look like this: He will probably spawn on point "3." (Note the use of "probably," meaning "'most likely," not "always.") Where will the player probably spawn this time? Note the use of an additional respawn area, area "C," which is inclusive of all the respawn points. Because the Enemy is in areas "A" and "C," he will count twice on points "1" and "2," and once on point "3." Here is our final weight: If you are still following me, then you are on the right track. If not, it doesn't get any easier from here... What do the numbers look like this time? Figure it out yet? Note that points "2" and "3" have equal weights, meaning they have equal probabilities of spawning the next player, while point "1" is slightly less. Where is the most probably spawn this time? Remember, if a player is in 2 areas, he counts twice! This is the exact same answer as the first problem, because Area "C" includes both the enemy and the friendly, they cancel each other out. The Red X means the player has recently died there. A dead teammate has a weight of -500. OK, here is where things get confusing. Where is the most likely place for the player to respawn? To calculate this, make sure you count each player, and dead player for each area they are in. You might want to write this one down! If you got that answer for all the spawn points, then you are already very knowledgeable in the Halo 3 spawn system. But can you figure out this one? Tricky, tricky... Because of the overwhelming negative influence in the spawn areas, the player will probably spawn outside, at the point with 0 weight. Respawn Points Respawn points by themselves seem relatively harmless. But each and every individual one has a radius of influence. This radius is estimated to be about 7.5 meters. So if there are two spawn points within 7.5m of one another, that area will act very much like a respawn area. All of the same properties apply here, with the same values. So let's go through a few more examples with these new orange circles Keep in mind that the game is played in three dimensional space, and as such, my "circles of influence" actually represent "spheres of influence." Where will the player most likely spawn, taking into account the radii of influence? Because he is in the circle for point "2," which is inclusive of point "1," his weight will also count for point "1." He has an equally likely chance of spawning anywhere but point "2." See if you can tackle this one. Remember to count twice for players in more than one area. Here is a really tricky one. It will recap everything we have learned so far. If you get this, then you have an amazing comprehension of the respawn system in Halo 3. Take everything into account, friends, foes, and dead teammates. This is why you sometimes spawn right behind/in front of enemies. If you didn't get the answer, figure out why. I'll be watching this thread, to answer questions. I learned most of this from my own experimenting, research, and forging. My Map/gametype UNSC Range1/WeaponsTraining uses most of this stuff in action. Check it out here.
Spawn Order I purposefully excluded spawn orders from the previous calculations, as there is much debate over this topic. Here is what I have found in my experimenting... "Spawn Order" doesn't always mean the order in which players will spawn. Instead, it puts a base weight on the point that should be "next." This doesn't necessarily mean they will spawn there, however. Use this visual guide as a reference, not fact, as my numbers for this one were educated guesstimates.
Very confusing but also very helpful. I could have never thought of something so complex. The most I didn't understand was spawn order, though, why would #2 have less influance than #'s 1 and 3 if he didn't die in any of them?
Well, I always figured it worked like this, but this just sums it up into a clean, organized, and easy to understand guide for the rest of the forgers. Excellent work; the numeric values really help to make it easier to predict spawn locations, but I would recommend revising the visuals so that it's easier to tell the spawn areas apart. Perhaps color each one differently.
Devinish, that is an absolutely amazing spawn guide! But how do traits like "attackers" and "defenders" affect respawn areas? Obviously they add influence points based on team, but just how much? And also, I'm assuming that "neutral" respawn areas simply group spawn points, correct? So that way, someone standing in a neutral respawn area affects all of the points within it.
WOW you get mad props for this it explains the basics pretty throughly please do all of us average people some slack and dont explain team respawns and flag stuff it might make my brain fry anyway this helps so much if you understand and im sure it works from tons of experience from yourself thank you Dev