Pegasi makes another torrent of points The first part: You're forgetting that you also have an AA. If it's sprint, run to cover away from the radar blip, or easy ambush points where a team-mate might be (same for evade). If it's Jetpack, jump down or up a level and ignore them. If it's camo, go invisible, then the team-mate won't be able to kill you before you kill the armour locker at least. Hologram lets you put one next to the armour locker, then run round a corner (or out of a line of sight) and shoot from a distance and/or cover. Drop shield lets you create your own cover, heal if your health is low, and counter both enemies. And armour lock works well too. Throw a grenade as they come out of lock, then go into armour lock yourself. That's just one way to use armour lock to counter his AL. In fact, not only does the grenade tactic work for whatever armour ability you have, this can happen regardless of the AAs used: -His teammate could have the jetpack AA and launch up to (or down, or over) your position and kill you - He could have a drop shield and you could be some distance away - The team-mate could be invisible and lying in wait for an assassination - The team-mate could evade/sprint to their ally's aid - The player you're fighting could have a hologram, which you could melee by accident, landing them with the vital second it requires to score a kill These all result in them being one point up. If you keep a cool head and assess the situation properly (is there a vehicle about to run me down? will my secondary weapon be effective now? maybe I should make use of my own armour ability?), you are more likely to not let that extra one point go to the enemy. Having said that, armour lock does require some tweaks. I agree 100% that AL shouldn't allow shields to recharge beneath it. Failing that, the plasma burst should affect the armour lockers' shields also and remove them. Also, you should be able to use AL in bursts, like you said. I saw three vehicles die in a row to a guy they were trying to splatter. Yeah, the last two were stupid for trying to run him down, but it still shouldn't have been allwed to happen. Their stupidity may have been the main reason that we lost the game. I believe that AL shouldn't be able to be used within 4 seconds of each burst, to stop this instant vehicle death barrier trick from occurring all the time. One last thing: in case none of you know about this: when you armour lock, you can still disarm a bomb as you are in armour lock. Once you're in position to disarm the bomb, there is absolutely NOTHING the other team can do to stop you disarming the bomb. This needs to be fixed somehow, either by pausing or resetting the 'disarm' meter while you're in AL when you're disarming a bomb. Because this exploit has unfairly caused players to lose games. Other than that though, I think armour lock should stay.
I'm not really forgetting it, I use Sprint almost exclusively. When you say I should sprint away, you seem to be making the same assumption as the v2 basher on the MLG forums, in that as soon as someone starts sprinting they're somehow invulnerable to fire. In the example I outlined above, I did sprint away in an attempt to get to bottom Powerhouse, but was cleaned up since my health and shields had already had to last for 2 battles. Even then, one of the original points in this thread was that, even if this is the answer, it basically means that AL serves to negate encounters and leave the person who did better up until that point (otherwise the other guy probably wouldn't have AL'd) suddenly in the worse position but without a kill. Perhaps only using Sprint is my downfall, but even if I could select a different AA to counter this, AL and Drop Shield are really only the two viable solutions to what I was talking about. Movement based AA's will get you to cover faster, but unless you're close enough to said cover to make it there before the enemy can fire a couple of shots, you'll still likely die from being one shot. It creates a defensive cycle of second guessing with AA selection that I'm not too fond of, and AL is the most powerful premise for second guessing within the defensive set. I get what you're saying, the balancing of counter AA choice, and I think it's valid, except that the choices you're talking about here only counter the followup to the AA guy, whereas the other aspects of AA (melee negating, shot negating, AA then nade, basically all types of AA spamming) ie. the direct effects of AL, can't really be countered except by doing the same thing (which, as I've stated before, is not a counter. If you have to use something to counter it, then it can be only be countered by itself and therefore technically has no counter). Sorry, but in most cases, getting jumped by an enemy who is full shields, full clip, whilst you're down in both those senses from just having been involved in a battle which is negated, is not offset by 'keeping a cool head'. Eh, not really saying it should totally go. I wouldn't be sad, since I think that entire premise of it is to give players who have made a bad decision or have been out skilled a second chance. As I've said before, some of my objection to its existence in the first place comes from me being a competitive player, and the fact that AL exists solely to negate skill difference. But I also accept that Reach does not exist solely to cater to competitive players, far from it, and so AL has a fair place in the game. I just think it could be better balanced to give players a helping hand without being so easy to abuse, even by higher skilled players once they realise its certain big advantages.
If it didn't unstick grenades (grenades after you've gone into AL still do diddly) and you couldn't melee straight after coming out, it'd be balanced. ATM its just a "Get out of jail free card" or a "**** you button" depending on how much it annoys you.
Armor Lock is an unbalanced ability when compared to other abilities. It requires less coordination than other abilities when trying to combat nade spam. (In this sense I'm saying that the player must remove themselves from harm's way unless they have AL, that's a metal tactic that is taken away with the option of AL and replaced with an easier tactic to avoid grenades) I'm not opposed to AL's use here though since nades are pretty ridiculously powerful and it serves as a great counter to rockets and vehicles. However, it still is unbalanced in allowing players temporary invincibility where as other abilities can't counter vehicles or high explosives. AL ruins the halo experience and takes out any real form of competition. AL has also been detrimental to objective gametypes, there is simply no reason why someone can't use sprint, evade, jetpack, or even camo inside of a hill or territory. They had to counteract AL and Drop Shield so it has affected other abilities as well. The thing that people really love, I think, about Halo is that you come into combat in an even fight (excluding player positioning and weapon control) and the better man leaves. AL ruins that. It's exploitable and it doesn't take any real amount of thought or skill to use. It takes less skill using armor lock than it does to camp a corner in CoD. Both are on about the same brain wavelength. I would love to see it go from arena. No other ability can can you out of a bad situation as in sword vs. al, shotty vs. al, nade spam vs. al, rockets vs. al, vehicles vs. al, getting out dmr'd vs. al, etc. I mean if you think AL is fair in and of itself at leave give the other abilities a boost. Add cheap routes exclusive for jet packing or make sprint faster with a melee bonus or make evade have four uses in it's life span. Just add some ridiculous things to those to make them balanced vs. al.
That's like saying that Jet Pack isn't balanced because you can fly while in other AAs you cannot. So is Jet Pack unbalanced in your opinion?
No, because in all fairness to what an FPS is, it's out shooting your opponent. Flying up in the air affects your aim just as much as it does your opponents, but you have the added height advantage and he's able to strafe. Jetpack does have tactical moves, but in combat (and that's the key) it isn't any more imbalanced than sprint or evade. He can fly away or I could sprint away, but there isn't anything to prevent a stop in combat other than his or my choice of player positioning prior to combat. Armor Lock is imbalanced because it prevents damage that would be dealt to you. A jet pack does not and maps can be built to balance them out. The Pit would play perfectly fine with Jetpacks and it would be balanced, so long as the rooms above the objective were blocked off. So, no it's not like I'm saying Armor Lock is imbalanced because it's different, it's because it's superior to every other armor ability in almost every tactical way and where it does not it doesn't matter.
A while ago, I would have disagreed with this, but now I really am starting to jump on the bandwagon and say that Armor Lock needs to be changed. I'm sure Bungie will do it, because of the large outcry from the community, and the fact Reach population is decreasing. In the TU1 patch, my suggestion would actually add a whole new depth to Armor Lock, and is actually quite clever: Instead of adding the 'frost' effect when someone exits Armor Lock, make them vulnerable right when AL is over and delaying the Armor lock user's ability to shoot or move by about 1 second. Adding the delay to the user of Armor Lock would add a whole new tactical depth to the Armor Ability. Instead of simply delaying the battle by five seconds, the player would be required to have a teammate assist him, or else he would be more vulnerable by the player who is already going to kill him. tl;dr: Remove the frost effect and add a delay to the Armor Lock user's ability to move or shoot.
I've been referred to this thread to state my opinion. Earlier last week, I had an idiot claim the BR is overpowering; Now I'm having idiots complaing the Armor Lock ability is overpowering. WRONG. You start a game, you decide what ability you choose to use. I like Armor Lock, I understand it's uses, and it's disadvantages. So first, I'll list those... Advantages: You can survive any amount of damage in a given time (+3) You can EMP vehicles (+1) Disadvantaes: There is a slight duration from holding the Action button to the ability actually working. With lag, this duration increases effectively reducing the abilities effectiveness in the situation. (0, for benefit of the doubt and connection free games) You cannot use the ability in the air. (-1) You cannot shoot immediately on exiting the armor ability. (-1) You can only use it twice during one charge. (-1) You are completely Immobile. (-1) Now... to address these properly. I'll use scenarios. Armor Lock can momentarily save you from ALL damage. You use the ability someone throws a grenade, you get a rejection for staying alive through damage (+1). You use the ability and someone melee's you (+1), you survive and have a chance to EMP their shields (+1). The Armor lock can also destroy vehicles if used correctly as the vehicle is essentially boosting into a solid wall (+1, for benefit of the doubt), which causes damage to you anyway... so this is no major advantage, it's more down to enemy player stupidity. This is the only Armor Ability that cannot be used mid air (-1). If you are fighting against any number of enemies... the majority of people include jumps in their strafes. The amount of times I've jumped then lost all my shields and before I've landed I've been killed due to not being able to use Armor Lock, has probably got a higher tally count than how many rejections I've actually received. Not only can it not be used mid-air, like for instance whilst falling, but it also makes you completely stationary (-1). You cannot retreat. So as much as everyone complains. You're still a sitting duck unless you can get a team mate to assist you (+1 for generating teamwork, -1 for slowing gameplay) You can only use it Twice in one charge (-1) and even if you don't fully use your first use, it automatically resets your counter to half way, preventing your second from having any extended use you lost in your first. (-1) Whilst exiting Armor Lock, you can't shoot as fast as you can take damage, meaning you are STILL vulnerable when leaving. The duration is also not long enough to charge all your shields, it is only long enough to start the recharge process, to which taking the first shot of damage cancels the whole recharge timer anyway. (-2) You can however, Melee an opponent if they are foolish enough to come into your range (+1, for benefit of the doubt... again) As this AA starts a 3rd person animation, the game needs to be in exact synch to successfully work at the time of pressing the function button. However, as we all know, Xbox Live isn't in perfect Synch and Lag is always a common issue on Matchmaking... the worse the connection you have, the worse this ability is. (0) Final Balance of Advantage/Disadvantage score: -1 So by this scoring system, it's disadvantages outweigh it's advantages, and that's by being generous and giving the perk a +3 for its ability to withstand 3 types of damage.
I dont think you're accounting for all of AL's benefits. For instance- yes, EMP Vehicles Yes, Invulnerbale However, also- 3-You release a discharge when you come out of armor lock, which takes down opponents shields, allowing you to armor lock, and then melee instantly to kill. 4- Armor Lock doesn't just EMP vehicles, but you can completely destroy them when hit 5-Theres the combination of throwing a grenade down, Armor locking, and then coming out when opponents are near. 6-This doesn't happen enough to count, but it is possible that when going into armor, you can be hit by a sniper bullet, and have it ricochet and kill an enemy. Again, nearly never happens, but I have seen it once.
Each of those points were addressed by the scoring system in the scenarios. I the EMP vehicles and EMP'ing players is the same effect. Destroying the vehicles, is opposing enemy stupidity as addressed.... You run head on into a wall, you take damage.. run head on into a wall (Person in armour lock) you take damge... And no I didn't include the AL ricochet, but I also didn't include other minor disadvantages for Armor Lock, like the it recharges slower than other abilities, or it's useage time is lower than other abilities. I also didn't understand point 5 at all... Why throw a grenade down then enter armor lock and come out? That's just grenading yourself? :S
Do you really think that prefacing your argument with a condescending and frankly rude comment like that is the best way forward? Ok, now for the ones you missed. You get a momentary burst of 10 sens when you exit AL due to the pan around feature, meaning you can melee someone directly behind you as you exit before your spartan model has even had time to turn around. This makes melee counters to AL on exit near useless, and leaves nades as the main damage dealer to someone exiting AL. You can also EMP enemies, and 'frost' their movement speed if they melee you in AL. You can also recharge shields during AL, not only that but the instant you enter it, it seems to reset the damage timer for shield recharge meaning that you'll actually be up on shields against your opponent if you were both one shot when you went in to AL. Actually, in my experience lag helps the activation time. I've had people survive rockets etc. with AL before their fist has even hit the ground. Also, your post suggests that you use AL a decent amount, yet you say it has 2 uses per charge? I think you'll find it's 3, which is one more than the number of grenades you have off spawn, and one more than the number of rockets in a clip, I made a post about this play-off earlier in the thread, and how it enables an AL player to nullify both of these explosive damage dealers and still have a single burst left. I take no real issue with your points here, though I'd like to take this opportunity to disagree with your rather black and white approach to numerical balancing (the whole +1/-1 thing). It's far more complex than a simple + and - approach can account for, and the idea of adding and subtracting these points (even past the ones you missed, and the ones I've doubtless missed tbh since Halo is so deep and situational) falls short of actually communicating the complex nature of balance in a game like this. To put your arguments forward is fair enough, but to put a number next to each, add them all up at the end and thrust empirical truth on to your conclusion as a result, is far from the most logical approach to discussion. Technically Sprint can be used mid air . Or at least it can't be activated mid air, which is more the point. However, I get what you're saying. But then you talk about choosing your AL based on the way you're going to play, and for this point it's fair to account for jumping being a bad idea when you're one shot/low shields if you're going to rely on AL to protect you. Playstyle should adapt, and this is a very small adaption imo. Even then, a given player spends a small proportion of a given game in the air, so I feel that this point is somewhat overplayed. I disagree with your +1 for team work, since it actually allows poorer teamwork (worse setups in terms of covering allies, and slower response time from said team mates) to have the same effect as solid team work. Actually, scratch that, an even BETTER effect since the 5 second duration allows for a cleanup from an ally and the AL player to remain alive afterwards. I get double teamed by a callout a reasonable amount in Halo, but I can keep my head and keep my shot on the guy I was fighting to go for a trade, instead of getting distracted and dying without a kill. However, AL negates this. Again, previously in this thread I made a post with an example of exactly this. I basically out-DMR'd 2 fully shielded opponents in quick succession (quick enough so that my single shield had to survive through both), both of whom then AL'd and their third team mate cleaned me up. I was the better player by far (barring their ability to press the AA button when things got hot...) yet died without getting any kills. In the vein of your numerical approach, -1,000,000 Again, bursting it to survive nades, rocks, or even that last shot, gives you THREE uses per charge. It's still long enough to shoot your one shot opponent before they can get off the 2 accurate shots needed to kill you, thus the AL player has the upper hand (or rather, is given the upper hand as opposed to having earned it) over their opponent. From massive amounts of experience, disagree. Like I said above, activation time is not worsened by connection all the time, not even most of the time in my experience. Even then, the activation time is so short it's not true, it's less than the throw+fuse time on a frag even from insanely close range, less than the travel time of a rocket even from very close range. Whilst we're on the subject of explosives, do you really think that having an 'undo button' as far as stickies are concerned is fair? Cause I sure as hell don't. Even accepting your numerical balance system (which I don't), the ability to withstand damage that should have killed you is the difference between living and dying, I'm sorry but +3 is not even close to generous. The fact is that AL slows gameplay. It often turns what should be (at best) an out-DMR etc. or (at worst) a kill trade, in to a death for the non AL player and escape for the AL player. You can argue that they can't move and are thus a sitting duck all you like, but even without a team mate called in to help them, sitting around for 5 seconds whilst they chill in AL leaves you massively vulnerable, not to mention having to outshoot them again when they exit due to their gift of a free recharge. It rewards a poor team play more than a solid team play (one which doesn't need the 5 extra seconds given by AL to cover a team mate, and requires quick switching to avoid a trade rather than just allowing the weaker player who would be involved in this trade to sit there, invulnerable, whilst his fully shielded team mate cleans up the weak opponent), and promotes caution and reserved, gameslowing play over skill to win the day. How many people do you see AL'ing after a battle just to recharge their shields without having to duck in to cover? I see a good number, just like I see plenty of players who notice something on their radar that they're even slightly afraid of and drop in to AL even if they're full shields. Sneaky and aware enough to get the jump one someone such that by the time they notice you're likely shots up or in a position to outplay them? Not anymore, cause they can just herp a derp their x button and undo all your work. In short, it rewards a lack of skill and hurts the more skilled player in about 90% of its useable scenarios. It's not just about benefits and downsides, but about how much skill is required to gain how much of a benefit. This is where the problem really lies with AL, it serves pretty much only as a crutch to help someone who was outskilled or outstrategised. Why else do you think bad players gravitate to it and, frankly, need it to do as well as they do, and good players abuse the hell out of it?
No, throw a grenade down, wait for it to explode then come out, lol. Make more sense? and I would still count being able to destroying vehicles as a bonus. After all, splatterring is a common technique used by drivers of vehicles. And it's not like you'd run into a person that has armor lock active. It's just usually too late.
After what nearly lasted 3 hours of arguing over skype, we kind of realised something: The whole Armour Lock balance issue is only Slayer related in places like Arena where it's abused. Overall, throughout the game, there are numerous gametypes where Armour Lock is utterly useless, like KOTH for example. You have to run to a hill and hold it. With an inability to use any AAs inside the hill zone, AL only slows you down in reaching the hill in the first place making choosing it a pointless tactic as opposed to any movement enhancing AAs. It's also not very effective really in any objective gametypes as you're essentially slowing yourself down in regards to reaching the objective in terms of preventing your death. And we all know that in Objective gametypes, Losing teams are often the teams that have the much higher + K/D ratio as they aren't concentrating entirely on the objective and more on Slaying the enemy team. As points were raised in the argument, we came to some mild agreements that AL is more effective in most situations, but those situations only commonly reside in Slayer games. However, if you play a spread of Gametypes (Like myself) you realise that depending on the gametype/map/strategy you choose, you have to pick the appropriate armor ability to combat it. The balance of the ability itself, also relies heavily on the players ability to use it. As every player can use an Ability at the wrong time, it's about having the knowledge and timing to use it at the right time.
I use Armor Lock very rarely and when i do it's just when the enemey is hogging too much vehicles and power weapons. I once destroyed 2 Ghost and one Banshee in one life by using Armor Lock. No more spawn killing for you, stupid Banshee! I use Armor Lock very rarely and when i do it's just when the enemey is hogging too much vehicles and power weapons. I once destroyed 2 Ghost and one Banshee in one life by using Armor Lock. No more spawn killing for you, stupid Banshee!
Personally - after playing a lot more matchmaking I've come around a bit on armor lock. I still think it's needlessly overpowered and some of the features should be nerfed (most importantly, being able to pan around and re-orient yourself contrary to your actual player model position is stupid; sticky rejection is beyond stupid; and the burst method shouldn't be so easy to use and take advantage of). However, I rarely run into armor lockers that I don't slaughter... albeit a few seconds later than I want to. Most of these guys are bad at team play to begin with so when they go into lock, they're frequently nowhere near a teammate. So yes, it slows the game down, but all you have to do is wait them out, for the most part. You will occasionally see a more adept armor locker and/or a guy who is better at team play, but the majority of them (like the majority of all Halo players, and maybe even more so here) are not good with it, which somewhat negates its usefulness. I rarely use AL myself any more - mostly in big team battle when the enemy is rampaging around our base with vehicles, and occasionally in team slayer if we're getting pounded and I feel like I need to change up my strategy. But generally I find I get much more use, and a greater advantage, out of several other armor abilities. Jet pack is probably my most used - getting to a good position faster, or attacking from an unexpected location, is very much more helpful to me than surviving an occasional grenade. I will say though that when you see a coordinated team ALL using armor lock, it is extremely annoying, and they tend to do very well. But I run into this far, far less than I run into randoms with a lone wolf mentality who just use it to try (and fail) to survive fights they were outclassed in. edit - I did want to weigh in on the lag issue. Lag can be both helpful and hurtful when it comes to armor lock. I've played in several big team games where I switched off to AL to try to take out enemy ghosts or revenants that were rampaging around our base. As you know, properly destroying enemy vehicles with AL is all about timing. Where lag can really hurt you is when a vehicle is rushing you, you go into lock (and even see the animation start and the shield light up) - but you get splattered anyway. It's hard to time this right when the game is apparently lying to you about the vehicle's position. But it can go the other way as well.
I'm going to pretend I read all the posts in this thread and disagree with 96% of them. I've seen armor lock used in all kinds of different scenarios and anyway I look at it, I can never see it as being "overpowered". This is because I know how to approach one (or more) players using armor lock. Just give them their distance and when they come out, pop em' in the skull. Easy as that. What I really hate about armor lock, has nothing to do with the AA itself, but more with the people who ***** about it CONSTANTLY. These are the same people who will come in here and say it's overpowered. It's not. In fact, most people I know who ***** about, are the ones who do the least to avoid it. By this I mean the people who, when they see a player armor lock, they insist on standing right next to them, waiting for them to come out. And then they freak out because they get EMP'd and punched immediately. I understand it all comes down to opinions, but honestly, most of the people who complain don't even try to avoid it in the first place. Besides, AL gives you plenty of signs to let you know when someone's coming out of it. And as far as using it in bursts go, I find that those are the EASIEST to deal with. Simply because their disabling themselves which gives you even more time to counter. As far as I'm concerned, AL has way more cons than pros.
/thread I CONSTANTLY use Armor lock, because I love trolling, and because its good if you know how to use it. Same with ALL the other AAs.
Armor lock only has one feature that makes it overpowered: Shield recharge. I don't want to have to use all my grenades to assure someones shields are down when I lowered them 15 seconds ago anyway. Also: I personally think Armor Lock shouldn't even BE in Team Slayer, simply because It ruins map flow and game flow. It's fine in BTB and other playlists, but not in TS. People AL'ing every time their shields get popped is just frustrating, but it's easily dealt with.
Shields don't recharge if you pressure them enough to instantly use AL. If someone can get away while one shot, then they deserve to have their shields recharge.