• Roadmap
• Enemy numbers
• Getting variations of a save
• Getting a delayed tunnel checkpoint

Even if you normally play Halo on Legendary, take my advice and use Heroic or lower for this battle - at least until you know what you're letting yourself in for!

Start off with the basic plan. It won't give you any Marines, but it's relatively simple and will get you used to the way things work. When you've had enough solo battling, move on to the business of Marine support. It takes a lot more work to set things up, but it's worth it. You'll find that I give two plans there; one for giving you a small squad, and a more complicated plan for a large squad. Both plans include a description of how to create a good base save that covers the bulk of the work, making it easy to then produce multiple finished battles featuring different squad arrangements and so on. That's definitely the way to work. The basic plan doesn't bother to concern itself with a base save as there isn't so much to vary battle-wise. Besides which, if you've got a base save for Marine battling, you can also use it for creating solo battles, as Marines can always be eliminated before proceeding.

The rest of this page gives some general advice. No need to read it yet; you can just get on with that basic plan I mentioned. But do make sure to read the section on Getting variations of a save sometime, as it describes an easy method of widening your battle experiences.

I think I'm safe in saying that this battle is the biggest available in the entire game. On Legendary you can get an amazing 87 enemies, on Heroic 77, and on Normal or Easy 73. You won't necessarily want such high numbers though, as the accompanying framerate slowdown can degrade the battle experience quite a lot, especially when a mass of enemies are close up (thus having to be rendered in more detail). It should also be mentioned that when battling alongside a large squad of Marines, you'll normally have killed most of the enemies that spawn in the twin bridges area, to ease the set-up work. You therefore won't have such high enemy numbers; probably no more than 56 on Heroic, but that's still plenty! However, here's a full breakdown.

Enemy breakdown

Expressed as 'Elites + Jackals + Grunts + Hunters', the potential number N of enemies breaks down as follows:

Here's where all these enemies come from:

As in the spiral path megabattle (and throughout the game I expect), the split between nasty red Elites and the softer blue Elites is randomized but with a possible bias one way or the other. Legendary has a strong bias towards reds, Heroic shows no obvious bias either way, Normal shows some bias towards blues, and Easy has a strong bias towards blues.

Probably a few less in practice

With a decent amount of effort you can certainly get close to the maximum in practice, when creating a solo battle or one with a small squad of Marines. However, you can easily lose a few enemies from friendly fire when trying to tempt them through the underpass. That's partly down to how idiotic the Covenant are feeling today, but you can minimize losses by being thoughtful and patient. I've got everyone through ok on Heroic at least once.

Free-roamers and territorials

In the battle, all enemies that came through from the spiral path area seem to be free-roaming, i.e. free to chase you about. So are some of the enemies triggered in the twin bridges area, but others are 'territorial', limited to their own particular territories when on foot. Territorials are sensible candidates for elimination if you're keen to minimize framerate slowdown in the battling. After all, they usually won't be playing much part in the main battling where you're defending against an attacking horde, yet they'll still be a drain on the game's processing power (though only minimally, when distant).

If you want to eliminate territorials, the best time to do most of it is before enemies have come through from the spiral path area. There seem to be eleven territorials: four Grunts in the second group that spawns (a gunner spawns with them but is free-roaming), the Ghost pilots and Banshee pilot, the two Grunts intended to man Shades near the door, and the two door Elites. If you're not quite sure who's who, just see who follows your Banshee, then blast the rest.

Usually I'm battling alongside a large squad of Marines, and most enemies that spawn in the twin bridges area have been eliminated. There are usually no territorials except maybe the door Elites. However, when I do have a few territorials around, it's been good fun polishing them off at the end of the battle; typically with vicious streams of needles, and the more needles the better! It's a nice bit of leisurely fun in comparison to what's gone before. It's also entertaining to watch them get dealt with by a bunch of Marines when you've got plenty of bozo-power left.

Grunt gaggles

If you're interested in having a huge gaggle of Grunts chasing you around, on Legendary you could get a gaggle of 31, bearing in mind that 7 of the possible 38 Grunts are territorial and thus logically separate (even though they could sometimes be near the free-roamers). On Heroic you could get 30 (plus 6 territorials), and on Normal and Easy 29 (plus 5 territorials). 31 is not quite the largest gaggle in the game however, as you can get 32 in the dustbowl megabattle.

You can easily tweak a finished save to get a variation that plays quite differently, complete with a convenient new starting checkpoint; namely a delayed tunnel checkpoint, or door checkpoint if you haven't already had it. You could just play this variation for a while (leaving the original save intact), or you could actually save the checkpoint to make it permanent. It's an easy way of broadening your battle experiences. Here are the main adjustments I'm thinking of. You could make multiple adjustments before getting your checkpoint.

Enemy layout

You can adjust the initial enemy layout to make for different battle dynamics. Trigger your checkpoint first, and keep it delayed with Banshee firing. Fly around to draw the enemy to where you want them. When you're happy with the layout, stop firing so you can finally get the checkpoint. You'll need to be sufficiently distant from the enemy before you can get it though, as the game will still delay the checkpoint while it considers you under threat. You could just ascend higher. Or you could fly to a distant defence position, potentially to get a checkpoint as you arrive, giving minimal delay between your starting checkpoint and the actual fighting. Nice!

In particular you can use this method to start off with the enemy concentrated in a particular area, either to make for a more intense attack when you land, or to encourage the enemy to attack from a particular direction. However, even doing something as simple as getting everyone a bit further up the battlefield can make quite a difference to the battling. Left to their own devices, a lot of enemies tend to settle in a depression at the start of the battlefield, and they can take quite a while to head into battle. Indeed, the enemy attack can sometimes feel like a two-wave affair, with quite a gap between waves. If you've moved enemies away from the start though, so they're at least out of that depression, you'll probably get a more even and intense attack.

Actually, if you're simply interested in getting the enemy to move a bit further up the battlefield, there's a quirky way of doing it without even flying in. Land on the ledge next to the underpass roof, or hover low over the ledge. The effect is quite dramatic. You'll see the enemy immediately starting to move up the field. They seem to go about as far as the Shade platform, settling in a thick line across the field.

Another typical aspect of battle is that lots of fast-moving Elites arrive first, with lesser enemies trailing behind. It's particularly noticeable when defending deep, as there's more time for Elites to outstrip the slower movers. You could potentially alter that dynamic by arranging for the slower movers to start off closer to the defence position. Here's the idea. Get all enemies in a bunch, well towards your planned defence position, then quickly fly to the start of the battlefield. After a few seconds the enemy becomes drawn out, with lots of Elites at the head of the pursuit, hence furthest from your defence position. You're now ready to get your delayed checkpoint. The slower movers will have a head start in the attack charge.

Enemy selection

You can do some enemy selection by whittling out certain enemies, typically by landing on the underpass roof and sniping. I like to have a spare rifle already waiting up there to cover this eventuality. For example you might fancy getting rid of the Hunters, or maybe you want to weed out a few Elites to make things a touch easier, or maybe you fancy the novelty of just battling against Grunts and Jackals. Selecting your personnel like this can allow you to use tactics that might not normally be viable (e.g. seeing if you can survive with just a pistol and grenades).

Squad adjustment

If you've got Marines, you may be able to make some adjustments to the squad, or adjust aspects of the defence arrangement. You could adjust the position of a supporting hog by flying in, moving it, then flying back out quick before enemies get too close. If the hog is behind a blockade, you could also adjust how it's manned; e.g. get a different gunner, just for a change in the vocals.

Another type of adjustment is to actually eliminate some or all of your squad, e.g. with Banshee fire or distant sniping. You may be declared a traitor of course, but that won't matter if you're eliminating the whole squad to go solo. If you leave some alive, you'll potentially have covies and Marines after your blood. Nasty!

Rock geometry

You can adjust the size and shape of the rocks in the battlefield. Remember, rock geometry gets randomized each time you cross the loading point after the underground bridge. You'll necessarily be crossing it if coming back from triggering a tunnel checkpoint of course.

A change in rock geometry can make quite a difference in certain locations, and may make some new defence tactics possible. For example, a rock that was previously too large to shoot over may now be just right. Or, a huge rock that you like to get yourself perched on top of may now offer better cover due to how it's shaped on top. If you don't like the look of things when you return to the battlefield, there's nothing to stop you going back to get things randomized again. Simply keep re-crossing the loading point until you're happy.

Throughout the later stages of creating a battle, there's always the option of going back over the underground bridge to trigger a tunnel checkpoint which you can then delay by Banshee firing until you return, getting the checkpoint in some desired spot. This can be a good idea before a tricky bit of work, so that if things don't go well enough, you can revert for another go without losing earlier work; and so that you'll be able to make repeated attempts with minimal delay. But there are a few things to keep in mind.

Keep Marines away from the enemy

When you fly off, make sure no Marines are going to follow you far enough to start tangling with enemies in the spiral path area. Typically you'd have the underpass exit blocked with a Ghost to stop Marines coming back through. Actually though, it also suffices to lead them into the back half of the twin bridges area before flying off. They won't chase far; they stop once you're sufficiently distant.

Rock geometry gets randomized

Rock geometry will get randomized afresh, namely as you cross the loading point on your return from the triggering. This may or may not be important to you at the present time. The main two occasions on which you'll potentially be interested in rock geometry are (1) when you plan on getting Marines into a pen by backing a hog over a conveniently low rock, and (2) when getting the final rock geometry for your battle (e.g. you might like certain rocks to be low enough to shoot over).

Marines may lose awareness of you, but there's a fix

When you get back to the Marines, you may find that they've strangely lost awareness of you. As part of that, they're not interested in boarding a hog - which would usually prevent you being able to pen them. They won't even dive clear if you drive a hog at them; it's like they simply don't see you or the hog, although they're still drawn in your direction. I suspect all this is a glitchy side-effect of going back through the loading point and returning. Fortunately however, there seems to be an easy fix. If you briefly get the attention of the enemy (probably now behind a blockade in the spiral path area), that seems to do the trick, and you can now pick up Marines in the hog if you want. I often make a point of getting the attention of the enemy as I return. But try not to give Jackals too big a shock, as they tend to let off involuntary blasts which can kill or damage their colleagues. Admittedly it's always hilarious to see a Grunt go down from a stray plasma ball, but here you want to keep your enemies alive for the later battle.

Ditto with trough passage Elites

I experienced something similar with the two trough passage Elites. After penning the Marines, I went to get a tunnel checkpoint so I wouldn't lose my penning work if anything went wrong later. When I returned and triggered the passage Elites, they didn't seem to know I was there, even if I went right up to bop one on the nose and shout "Yoo-hoo! Cyborg in town!". I was unable to lure them my way, and one of them started getting drawn towards the Marines. Bad news! But I found that if I took a moment to get the attention of the spiral path enemies on my return, this trouble didn't occur.

Possible enemy disappearance?

There was one time when I'd assembled a particularly huge crowd in the twin bridges area on Legendary (mainly as an experiment), and had also lured a Hunter along from the underground bridge area to see if I could get him to participate in the battle (it didn't work). I flew back for a tunnel checkpoint, but returned to find that all the enemies had vanished! I suspect that the disappearance occurred at the loading point. But whether it was due to the game deciding it was under too much strain with the masses of enemy, or whether it was something to do with having the Hunter along from the earlier load zone, I don't know.

© 2004-2010 by Rockslider