How many people have honestly gotten this medal in Reach? Or rather, how many people actually know this is still even a medal? I ask this because it seems as if the majority of people in Matchmaking have no idea that you can still 1 hit kill with a simple melee to the back. I know the difference between holding and tapping the melee button is small enough that an accidental assassination is often the cause of a lost kill or unnecessary death, but I barely ever get actually backsmacked anymore. Is the draw of the animation really that strong to some people, or is the possibility of a quick 1hk genuinely not known amongst the majority of the MM population?
I have 80 beat downs and 62 assassinations in competitive. For me it all depends on the situation. If we're under fire, go for the quick beat down and escape. If it appears to be clear... go for the full animation. No sense in going for full animation when under fire... chances are it will get yoinked and you'll lose the kill.
I personally always avoid using the animation (I tell a lie, I have 14 assassinations, but at least 7 of those are from friends playing on my account and others from daily challenges etc, and that's compared to 613 beatdowns), but that's a personal think because I just dislike the feeling of being immobile for that time. I agree with you in principle, and know others who think the same way, but do you know what I mean about barely ever seeing beatdowns from your average MM joe?
I really don't even like the animations. They take too long, and get me killed. I know I can tap it and it won't do the animation, but that doesn't work sometimes.
Definitely... it's like watching Wresting. Everyone doing special moves for show. Get the kill and move on. Then again, everyone has their own motivation for playing.
Certainly true, and I'm not trying to bash on people who like them, tbh I think they look pretty badass it's just that it makes me feel powerless more than anything, like I said. I just can't shake this feeling that most people do it because they don't even know about tapping the button, and that they likely hold to do regular melees as well. There are so many times where there was no way in hell the person assassinating me was going to get through the animation without getting yoinked or us both dying, in fact most of the time I get assassinated in FFA that's the case. Watching your kill be stolen from you can't be that fun ... can it?
The only time I actually go for the assassination animation is when I'm paying customs (or a game of matchmaking in which i stop caring) and want to rub it into one of my comrades faces. If I'm ever playing anything highly competitive, it is almost always a terrible decision to go for the extended assassination. All it actually accomplishes is calling attention to yourself while completely immobile, allowing others to line up a few easy headshots or a nicely placed sticky grenade.
I think it's the appeal of seeing your kill stabbed in the head/chest/balls. It's definitely more visually spectacular than a simple punch in the bum. Personally, I do it for effect if i'm not in the middle of a firefight. The air assassination is the exception, because it's very quick.
I do have a tendency to do more animated assassinations in Invasion, but it's a lot easier to pull them off since one team is always coming towards the other. It's usually my way of saying, "Don't come this way."
My button is sticky.... 90% of the time I press it and it instantly goes into the assassination, without regard for my actual want. I die a lot that way :/
Without looking up my stats, I would guess I'm about half and half. In other words I know the difference and use it. If I do a full assassination, it's usually in a situation where it won't get me killed (one exception being the other day, when my retarded teammate whipped a plasma grenade at the enemy I was assassinating, seemingly in a mad panic - no one else was nearby either). The reason I do it is both for the internal satisfaction and the psychological effect. I don't know about you, but I hate the helpless feeling of being assassinated and the idea that I let someone get the drop on me; therefore I do it to other people to get them off their game, make them a little mad or put it in their heads that they need to pay me back somehow. Certain things in Halo have always made people play badly, rage quit, betray their teammates, mad rush over and over into a danger area, etc. - the equivalent of putting a poker player on tilt - and they tend to be things like getting stuck by a plasma grenade, getting killed by someone camping, getting spawn-killed, and the like. Anything that is inherently improbable, cheap, or demasculating. Well, getting assassinated has to be near the top of that list - not only did someone get the jump on you, but they get to hold you in place for a couple seconds while showing off with your helpless body. It's like a kill with a built-in teabag. edit - I checked my stats and I'm at 48 assassinations and 34 beatdowns. Not quite 50/50 but close enough for rock.
166 in multiplayer matchmaking. it does seem to happen less often. thousands of pummels though. so what used to be a beatdown is now a pummel, what was once assassination is now beat down btw i'd rather have them called smack or smackdown than pummels. eh.
I'm aware that it's optional and there's absolutely no tactical justification for going for the full animation but I always try to do it anyway. I always play Halo with little personal measures of success that only I know about... it helps me cope with my negative k/d ratio. Check out how many Firebirds I have and be jealous! (136) Assassinations as opposed to Beat Downs helps me accept the situation realistically, I don't have to suspend disbelief as much, which is always good in my opinion. What I mean is that I have a hard time believing that a high-caliber sniper round through the torso is less of a bother than being high-fived in the back. With the animations, the kill is "explained". I'm aware that this makes no sense in the context of highly-competitive play, but it makes sense for a casual gamer like me.
It all depends on the situation. In the middle of enemies, I go for the quick backsmack, in a potentially dangerous area where I won't likely get killed I go for the jumping headsmash (quick assassination), when everyone will see it, I make a show of a full spin-him-around-and-stab-in-the-chest assassination, so yes I have gotten that medal and know it exists.
I beat down dudes twice as much as I assassinate. But I'm a very close-quarters type of player so melee kills are how I roll.
Psh, 188 assassinations? You guys fail. I have over five hundred But I completely agree with el megapwn. I turn halo into a psychological game for the other team as much as a skill game, and I don't often lose either. When you can get the other players emotional and stressed out, they tend to panic more often and make more mistakes. It of course leads to some clutch plays against me, but the majority of the time it ends up with doing much more good than hard. I think about the game waaaay too much when I play it
Well Bungie's intention was not only to amuse the simple-minded, but to make it almost like a subtle "teabag" to make people somewhat disturbed and annoyed that they are helplessly being stabbed as the player is forced to watch their character get mutilated. I always feel that an Assassination is simply worth slightly more cR (yet am not truly sure if it is) so I go for it if the situation allows me to do so safely.
I also thought they put it in for screen shots and machinima for same reason when you die sometimes you do a little animation like "falling to your knees arms down then falling on stomach doing a push up action while holding gun forward like your trying to shoot while shaking then collapsing" . All that little stuff helps a lot with screen shots and machinima. But tactically game wise it can draw person/s in to kill you if you know you gonna die and know back ups coming with a grenade spam or to just to slow them down a little and possible still kill them because at full health takes while to kill you so a punch and grenade usually can kill them but most time better not to do it. My button isn't sticky but even when trying not to it happens, guess I'm just slow at taken finger off button because it only has like milliseconds to decide if your gonna do it or not.