Plateau nexus hold-out

This is a plan I introduced with one of the battles in BCM658. Below the Marine plateau there's a general meeting of avenues, in an area where most of the Marines were initially situated (a few remained up top). For the sake of having a convenient reference term, I'm calling that general area the 'plateau nexus'.

The plan is simply to try and hold out there. But because of how the covies are likely to flood in from multiple avenues and engage you at close-quarters, it can be very hard to survive. Potentially almost suicidal in fact. Be prepared to shovel lots of grenades near the start, that's my first bit of advice. You may be facing quite a rush of Elites!

Actually, things might be more manageable if you use a far area horde set-up, which may reduce the number of avenues they approach from. But I haven't explored that yet. I've only used a standard set-up, and as you'll see in the aforementioned movie, it was really a desperate scramble to survive. It's a wonder that my unarmoured chain-gunner, namely Sergeant Johnson, was still breathing at the end!

There's a big rock in the middle of the nexus, below the overhang of the plateau, and that can provide major cover, forcing many covies to have to come around the corners to get at you. You could park your Warthog behind it, which can give the gunner some chance of survival. From that location he'll also have a nice line of sight towards one of the key avenues the covies use, namely a narrow passage between the island plateau and a large rock (seen in some of the pictures here).

Mind you, Grunts will be rather keen to grenade the hog, so you have to watch out for that. Turn your back for a few seconds and you could easily hear "Down in front!" or suchlike. And BLAM! - there goes your chain-gun support.

Having the support of a chain-gunner is definitely recommended though, at least if the enemy arrival dynamic is anything like as difficult to deal with as I've experienced so far.

Weapon considerations

For this struggle I'd recommend plasma weapons as being the most suitable. You'll be doing a lot of close-range work, and both of them are good for that. If you don't initially have any, you should soon be able to pick some up. Of course, the AR is good for close-range work too, and can be very satisfying; but it's not as powerful or precise. A needler can be used to good effect, but it's relatively slow to work, and feels clumsy when it comes to melee, something you might be doing quite a bit of.