Reach was the best halo, it was the halo vision best realized. Everything else besides CE was saturated with marketing bs. Brutes were made weak because the deluge of noob players were simply bad fps gamers. In Reach, the elites are relentless, intelligent, and extremely threatening. They also don't speak English. Worst decision, they made the enemies in halo speak English to pander to dumb players who would buy the game in droves.
@@RStell-wt5qr while Reach did a great job with the covenant species, making them challenging without making them too frustrating, I would say its weapon sandbox was subpar compared to other halos. It had less guns and vehicles than halo 3 yet a larger portion if them were redundant and useless. Still one of my favorite halo campaigns though.
It would also force the players to be careful which enemies they shot at. Like, the chieftain is the biggest threat, but all hell will break loose when you kill him.
I find that Grunts in Halo 3 are incredibly smart and aggressive. The Brutes usually stand back while the Grunts try to rush me and push me out of cover. On a many occasions, I've experienced Grunt Majors attacking me by themselves while their Grunt Minors try to flank. They usually end up dying quickly, but it's fascinating to see. Truly some courageous little bastards.
The regenerator also heals health damage and can "heal" or repair damaged armor that hasn't been destroyed yet. The brutes are still incredibly susceptible to precision weapons once their armor is destroyed, but they can effectively take more hits to the body because of the health regen.
Thank you. It irritates me that throughout the video brutes are framed as equal to the elites when that is NOT the case at all, they were never supposed to be an equal replacement. The prophets had their hands forced by the fact that the elites were too intelligent and kept catching on to the fact that the Great Journey was a lie.
@@jackllewellyn746 they’re certainly not equals but they’re not supposed to be complete pushovers. I felt more threatened by grunts in halo 3 than I did the brutes.
I definitely feel as though the berserking ANIMATIONS should more closely resemble those of Halo 2, giving them a more intimidating stance and more feral rage, if you get what I’m saying.
King Ky96 Nah the brutes were not meant to be that watered down and boring like they are in halo 3, the brutes in halo 2 although unfinished they were far more menacing especially their berserk.
I think it says enough about brutes that I've played Halo 3 over dozens of times and never realized or cared about the difference between minors and majors
Those kill animations of the brutes killing humans were brutal. Also the one where the elites with the energy sword killing the brute with the brute slapping him was funny
m.th-cam.com/video/73WHyolxD9Y/w-d-xo.html This is the video where the clips came from, there are others but this is the most well known one. Sorry took so long to reply lol.
He was playing on easy or normal for H3, while legendary and heroic on CE and H2. I've done the tests myself and Brutes do take way more damage than what's showcase in the video.
@@Elzimbabwe. I mean there still pathetic even on legendary. Seriously the minute you get a br or carbine most of the brute become easy targets and their armour is still quite pathetic on legendary. The only brutes that are a threat are ones with brute shots and choppers due to their insane dps output and the fact they can flip your vehicle quite easily.
For the sake of science I wish you had said what difficulty all this was done on. Definitely think you should do a full comparison on ODST brutes vs 3 brutes. Really sweet first vid man keep it up!
@@oceanman9216 I only played 3 on Heroic recently and the armour shred seems about right to my experience. Grab a plasma rifle or two and the shields dissipate.
i always felt like halo 3 was best played with the skulls that increase health and make all enemies max rank, I cant remember the names of the 2 skulls, but that was always my favorite way to play halo 3 on heroic or legendary. Sometimes the cowbell lol.
I don't think that. Various Chieftains were hard to kill, like the one with gravity hammer in the Crowd's Nest, that's why Halo 3 has the most balanced campaign in terms of difficult, like Halo 3 ODST or Halo CE. And what you can say about the broken path on Tsavo Highway? There are a bunch of motherfucking brutes killing you so much if you do not collect all the fuel rod guns to give them to your marines. IDK, I enjoyed the gampelay in Halo 3 so good, the mechanics need to be changed a little bit in order to have something challenging but difficult at the same time without loosing the fun.
@@naxxodrop You're mistaking the game accommodating your skill level by becoming significantly easier with "balance." Halo CE is the most balanced legendary. Halo 3 labeled its heroic as legendary and called it a day.
@A.A.Ron Davis The only challenging part of Crows Nest are the Brutes that spam ohk fuel rods at the end, which is cheap difficulty. If you have to turn skulls on to have a challenge, something went terribly wrong.
Yeah I thought the same as you. Blue = easy, Gold = hard, chieftain is clearly identifiable. I think Bungie made the correct choice here as most people will just see the colors and blue brutes (which are the most common) just have more variety.
I never liked how their armor would just fall off. Like how is that even considered to be armor If it falls off after a few shots. You think the covenant would have gave them something stronger. And I'm sure their are lore reasons but why? Elites were like fighting yourself because the shields recharged.
It's combat feedback, my dude. When an elite's shield bursts, you know you've done critical damage and need to finish them off. When a brute's armour shatters, you know you've done critical damage and need to finish them off. Don't take everything as literal, things are done to make combat feel more satisfying and visceral. Look at the Promethean Knights in 4; there is no visual or audio indicator that you're doing damage until they literally just die, and they feel so unsatisfying to fight. If Brute armour didn't break, you'd just whack away at them until they fell over, it'd be crap.
@@0lionheart The brutes armor falling off makes it too easy as a gameplay and threat issue compared to elites. Also an elite shield burst is different from brute's armor falling apart. With the elites, they either evade / take cover or get aggressive quickly. Meanwhile there shields can recharge. With brutes armor falling off, they are considered dead since they can no longer get protection back. Since they just stand there staggered or do a slow berserk animation when broken it's always easy for a headshot or an assassination. The brutes were too easy. I think for combat feedback, they should make the armor fall apart, but at least have them still have their helmets on until you shoot it off. Similar to fighting the Chieftains. Also, there is a damage indicator for Knights where they do a stagger animation and blue burst of energy comes out of them which indicates their "shields" are broken. But it's so subtle and so stupidly unnoticeable that I don't blame anyone for not seeing it.
@@0lionheart ? Knight's in 4 have blue shields that get brighter, as damage stacks up. They have shield break animations, and idk about audio cues for shield break, but there definitely is a visual indicator for shield breaks. I mean it's pretty noticeable later on in the game when knights are a orange color.
@@Elbalisco they do, but it's far less noticable then the elite or brutes glow as they are getting shot at, I never know if the shield of a knight will pop at the next bullet or in two more clips, they really aren't fun to shoot at.
@@SunnyMitten in some areas they are massively improved and if you you use bullet weapon they feel just right (except with the BR} but if you have a berserk rifle you can shred their shield and finish them of with your choice of a magnum, mauler or spiker. Ruby on the small chance that you are reading this please nerf the berserk rifle I know it fun to use but it’s a straight up power weapon whose only downside is rarely relevant because dual wield weapons are limited only by the least accurate gun. Take the plasma rifle as an example which when deal wielded with Mauler, Spiker, and Smg runs into one of two problems 1. You are at medium range and you are firing only your plasma rifle at which point you are just forfeiting grenade use and you should abandon your other weapon 2. Your in close quarters and would be better of using the Beraerker rifle.
I do really miss being able to recognize the Covenant ranks from afar - seeing white or gold armor on an Elite made me both uneasy and excited. But with the Brutes in Halo 3, I barely notice any differences with the higher-ranking Brutes compared to their subordinates. They're all about equally easy to kill, with the exception of the War Chieftain, and even they aren't that bad.
Minor, major, captain, captain major captain ultra, ultra, stalker chieftain, war chief tracker and jumppack, halo 3 odst also introduced major and ultra jumppack brutes
Personally, I definitely agree with your analysis. One thing which I really didn’t like about the Brutes was the fact that the Minors would usually go down with a single melee hit after their power armor was destroyed. This bothered me immensely because, well, aren’t they supposed to be really strong and tough without relying on defenses like the Elites had to? They sorely needed a fairly significant base health buff.
I appreciate your analysis but I would like to offer a few counters. 1. Brutes don't need a threatening berzerk because the suicide grunt now fills that role. 2. Every weapon being good at stripping shields is a sign of good weapon balancing. Would you rather return to the Halo 2 Style where only the battle rifle and swords are useful? 3. Brutes having better shields that recharge would make them the same as fighting elites which would be boring. Lore wise, they are less well trained and had inferior equipment to the elites.
I disagree with the balancing, just because every gun can do something doesn’t make it balanced, it makes it unbalanced, because if every gun can do it then that takes away a feature of why I would use a certain gun.
I don't think giving the brutes recharging shields would make them the same as fighting elites if you fix their core ai and behaviours, brutes aren't meant to act like elites, I feel like the brutes should have recharging shields while still being noticeably weaker than your own and the elites, while still being able to use the recharging to further their aggresive behaviour and style, and another thing is that Halo 3 is after the elites are out of the covenant, so why would the brutes be less equipped, wouldn't the covenant want to make their now leading soldiers as strong as their previous ones if not stronger?
@@zombiecarnivore That's the thing. If you add more guns to a sandbox they will get repetitive over time. There are only so many ways to send a projectile to an enemy. After halo reach, no unique guns were added to the series. Nerfing a gun to "give another gun room to fulfil that role" would be to micromanage the player and force the will of the Devs on them. Don't force me to use plasma against an elite, what if i want to riddle him with bullets?
A few counters to your counters: 1. They chose to give that behavior to the Grunts, when they could've given it to the Brutes instead. That would have satisfied both parties. 2. I think that weapons should be a lot like rock-paper-scissors. Some weapons need to be better at specific things than others. Any gun should be able to do the job, but some should be better at it than others (either due to their ammo capacity, range, fire-rate, or damage-types). Otherwise, there's no point to having different guns other than window-dressing, and certainly no reason to put thought into what guns to grab. 3. I agree with this.
The only thing I can agree with in the video is that the berserk forms should be stronger and their base health slightly higher. Surprisingly the mythic skull feels like how they should tank damage.
Thank you for this video! It inspired me to make my mod: Halo 3 Brute Revamp. I reduced the number of ranks and made each rank a distinct color. I also made berserking brutes more of a threat by making their helmet remain intact when their shield breaks. You have to break the helmet before you can headshot them. The mod is on Nexus, if you're interested. Thanks again for the inspiration!
I’ve seen a few people bring it up very briefly, but not once have I seen a fully dedicated video to this topic. Very informative, clean and follow along video. I genuinely feel like you’ve touched on everything that I’ve seen before and then some. Really good video!
Since most of the other Brute ranks aren't shared with the Elites as it is, I would argue for renaming the Minor to something like "Brute Hunter" or "Brute Tracker," to keep in-line with their pack mentality. For the same reason I personally wouldn't create a Brute Zealot rank, although if you wanted something similar I can see "Brute Fanatic" or "Brute Devoted" working. I like the idea of Zealot being an Elite-only designation. Otherwise I agree with most of what you've said. The Brutes are far and away one of my least favorite parts of Halo 3 because of how easy to kill they are, although I do feel like Chieftains are a bit broken in the opposite direction (that said, I've never tried melee fighting them). You make a great point about the armor colors; honestly I had no idea there even *were* different grades of Chieftain, or that the blue guys who follow them around weren't just regular Minors. Halo and Halo 2 had very clear and easy to read ranks for each Covenant species and it baffles me they didn't do that here.
I have a similar issue when I look at 343's elites. To me they feel like a dumbed down version of what we had in the 1st trilogy. Their armors kind of blend together, they seem awkward and just unbecoming of elites. Hope both enemies get the makeover they deserve for infinite.
@@spunchles2781 I would rather them be quicker on melee but the trade off being they don't one shot you. Brutes should definitely be able to though, but I feel like they shouldn't be as fast in terms of melee.
@@infernaldaedra i think halo 1-3 and reach had the best looking elites Halo 2A elites just looked so damn bad, espicially with thier circular helmets, i loved how elites helmets in halo 2 looked so damn sharp and agile And halo reach had the best looking elites of all, and that ultra omfg if rtas is going to appear in infinite, he MUST wear that armor
Well with MCC on steam, We can finally mod the colors of Armored brutes. I saw a green armored brute from a Halo 3 mod called Sierra 117 overhaul or something.
Don't completely remove flinch for higher ranks, I think that the frequency of them flinching should be changed. Like 80-100% for minors, 40-50% for captains, 10-25% for captain majors, and 1-5% for chieftains.
I agree with all your arguments, but still i always found the H3/ODST Brutes to be the most fun and pleasant enemies to kill. Let's see how Infinite will handle the Brutes.
judging from what we've seen so far, they look pretty cool, especially the drop pod brutes. having individual armour pieces fall off is super cool, and the normal brutes dont look too shabby either.
I agree. The Brutes in Halo 2 are appropriately tough to kill, but they’re just so tedious to fight and bullet spongey that I just don’t find them as fun to fight as the 3 and Reach Brutes.
I mean the problem with having this discussion is that most people who genuinely enjoyed fighting the brutes plays on lower than heroic most of the time and enjoy popping that armor and then laying waste to them. They're not fun to face on a difficulty aspect but sure, they're satisfying to kill if that's the only part of enemy design you care about. So at the end of the day it's a really difficult problem to solve since they seem to work for the casual audience but not the hardcore. And one side isn't more important than the other. I personally hate the brutes in Halo3 and i only play the games on legendary. My favorite brutes has to be reach but halo 2 is close behind by the sheer terror i got when i saw them.
Meanwhile in the future, Halo Infinite’s Brutes are actually pretty damn fun to fight. Sort of a mix between 2 and 3’s with a bit of Reach in the blend.
another difference between 2 & 3 brutes is the size/position of the head in halo 2 they have very small heads which blend into their body making it a harder target as opposed to the brutes in 3 which stand bolt upright. Also dual wielding; elites could do it in halo 2 and even some in reach! why can't brutes dual wield their spikers even though masterchief can?
Those gameplay vids of the Brutes wrecking shit around 3:00 are awesome! Especially the one against the Hunter. And the perpetual spinning dodge video was hilarious. I love this format in general. It's entertaining and highlights all your points perfectly.
You should make a video discussing how SPV3 does Brutes right! They're not just elite clones because in SPV3 you fight both, like Reach. Their armor doesn't come back, but they're much more aggressive, unless hanging back with a carbine. You really don't wanna melee them either, and there's typically only one or two brutes per squad with plenty of grunts and jackals to fill the rest of the ranks. Only the higher ranking brutes have energy shields which makes them a substantial and immediately indentifiable threat. Those shields won't return if destroyed, but their strength is akin to an Elite Ultra's, taking multiple clips of your weapon to destroy.
Awesome video glad someone brought these boys up. Imo flaws with Halo 3 Brutes 1. All Brutes have shield Break Berserk and not Last man Berserk. 2. Their Melee Damage and cone is too low. 3 Their Melee Leap Velocity is way too slow. 4. The difference between Ranks is abysmal. 5. Power armor lacks shield flares in 3. Still better than Reach Brutes
I think the Reach brutes are fine (at least in terms of game design, maybe not lore) because they aren't the strongest, toughest enemies in the game, like they are in Halo 3. In Reach, the regular brutes (the ones without energy shields) are like the second tier of enemies, below elites (and shielded brutes). In Halo 3, the brutes are the top tier of enemies and as a result, should be a little harder to deal with than they are in the game. Basically, in Reach, it's fine that you can fight brutes basically the same way you fight grunts, just with more health, since there are still elites for an added challenge. In Halo 3, this is definitely a bigger issue since there are no other enemies beyond the brute level.
Funny enough I think that the Brute charge in Reach was actually done better than in 3. Instead of putting their weapons away and awkwardly strafing towards you the Brutes in Reach run towards you in a straight line while firing their weapons and don't stop until they are in melee range. I've actually died many times on Legendary because I lost sight of a Brute while fighting other enemies only to have that Brute show up behind me and kill me, and this behavior could affect any Brute if another Brute in their pack was killed next to them, regardless of how much health they still had which meant that a lot of times they charged you at full health.
Which difficulty level are you on when demonstrating the Brutes' gameplay weaknesses? Edit- A few disagreements: I like boosting the health of all Brutes and making them more aggressive, but overall I think that Bungie got the lower ranks right in most ways. Brutes are supposed to be more numerous and more expendable than Elites, so I like the Minors and Majors having pop-off armor and fairly weak shields. It would be cool if higher ranks, like Bodyguard, Captains, and above, had regenerating shields just so they're taken more seriously. The prevalence of blue armor is a real problem, though I like the number of ranks in the Brute hierarchy- it helps to sell them as actually having a chain of command big enough to fight real battles. Visually, I would like it if they went away from the one-color armor like the Elites and gave Brutes armor with multiple colors to denote rank. Like, Minor is all blue, Major is blue with red markings, Captain is all red, Captain Major is red with gold markings, etc.
@@ebr8308 I posted a different comment critiquing the video but those halo 3 clips were definitely not on legendary, while your Halo 2 and CE clips obviously were. If you make more videos please be clear on what difficulty you are showing examples on.
@@ebr8308 Im sorry. But the clip at 5:20 says otherwise. I have played Halo 3 a totsl of 5 times on Legendary (4 OG, 1 MCC), and the second melee hit from that Brute Captian would jave killed you. When you entered the Barracks ealier, you would have been spotted and shot at almost IMMEDIATELY if this was Legendary. This is definitely Normal difficulty
@@Cameron088 Yea, and notice how when it changes to legendairy clips of him fighting elites, suddenly all his skill is gone, he is shooting the body of the elite and seems to be holding back, seems to suddenly have terrible aim and makes horrible combat choices, as if its his first time playing halo and has little skill in shooters. Then brute clip comes and suddenly hes super accurate with head shots and running circles around enemies.
One thing hat bothered me was how once they lost their armor all but the chieftains and war chieftains looked the same, losing their cool helmets. It would have been nice if they retained their helmets once losing their power armor, with captains still being immune to headshots until they were shot off.
An excellent breakdown, a shame that it didn’t garner more attention. But hey, you caught the attention of both Ruby and Vadam 👀 I’ll be sure to thank you when their brutes are beating me into a bloody pulp.
“There really is no threat” continues to loose half his health in a couple shots and I mostly agree with everything here some minor things I didn’t agree with are there looks to be a difficulty difference and maybe once you shoot off there chest piece or something then the energy shield will stop regent get but that’s also when they’ll charge you
It definitely looks like he's playing on normal for halo 3 and legendary when he brings up any other game (given how fast he dies in 2 and CE when they're shown) Also I don't remember the battle rifle being very good at breaking brute armor on higher difficulties but that could be me misremembering
@@kadirgarib3459 if what he said abaut Cunts geting a buff then they shoud be placed in small numbers, cuz on legendary geting 3 of them to charge u is a death sentance (with his buffs). Plus in Halo 3 odst most broken unit is a Jakal prove me wrong....
Solid vid! subbed! That was a sticking point for me for Halo 3, enemies didn't feel intimidating. None of the Brutes had anything on the sword Zealots in Combat Evolved!
@fantasticmoose They weren't difficult though, not if you were prepared to retreat, or kept track of what weapons dropped behind you, and navigated the environment to get more space between you & them. Difficulty isn't inherently a good thing, but the Zealots were, and honestly it sounds like you just need to git good.
@fantasticmoose The areas are never 'that' tight & confined that you can't maneuver, jump over obstacles & make them run round things. The one hit kill & their dogged pursuit of you makes them more menacing, so the stakes are higher. But their movement is pretty predictable, so you can win by superior movement and tactics even if you are surprised. Truth & Reconciliation is a slog when you first get inside the ship, but it's hardly representative of every encounter, and you can still jump on crates, on the wraith .etc & put some distance between you and them. Also since they're camo, they're unprotected from bullet weapons. The "more dynamic" movement of the brutes is just them thrashing around, they're rarely in confined spaces so you can just put a handful of precision shots in their head from medium-long range. That's far more one-dimensional to me.
I think it's a bit of your nostalgia talking, sure the og sword elite were intimidating back in the days because we were all starting to play Halo but when Halo 3 came out we were already all much better and no longer intimidate by them, if anything I was happy to toy with them even on legendary, making them fall off a bridge or stuff like that.
I've been playing Halo 3 for over ten years and had no clue there was an Ultra rank for the Brutes, and people say 343's rank design's are hard to tell apart.
Im actually perfectly fine with them. I prefer them over halo 2, and I disagree that the elites in h2 should have a one hit kill, even at full shields.
Yeah, if any elite can one hit you with melee, then what's the point of sword elites? The energy sword isn't doing any extra damage at that point, and sword elites just become elites who can't shoot.
What little we've seen of Halo Infinite seems to suggest more aggressive and visually distinct Brutes with destructible kinetic armor while energy shields remain exclusive to Elites. It's another element that makes me hopeful for Infinite turning out to be the quintessential Halo experience
They've still got a bit of work to do, though. That one Brute that got stuck with a grenade and then used it's jump-pack right in front of the player, thus getting stuck in an awkward animation for _way_ too long has me nervous.
Watches you dying to elites... Considering I'm doing the Halo trilogy LASO run, I think I now know what PTSD flashbacks are like. I have a feeling Halo 3 will be a lot less "Brute-al" (har har).
I'm currently doing a Halo 2 Legendary run myself. Elites are assholes and Ultras are the worst of a bad lot (doesn't help that I've needed to restart Cairo Station for the umpteenth time after I duffed it up). Zealots are a sad sick joke though, I mean really, all you need is plenty of room to backpedal, a precision weapon and a sufficiently charged plasma pistol.
Great video, man! Can’t believe you only have 2 subscribers. Actually- consider that three. I think your strongest points are in the AI behavior and armor/ranking system that bungie set up. Most of the time I can’t decipher what brute I’m fight unless it’s a Chieftan, or a Captain Major. They’re all way too similar looking to immediately just say “oh, yeah, that’s a major!” or “got a captain and a bodyguard, let’s take them out!”. You made some great points in this video, and I’d love to see more from you.
the Brute's weak shields and bloated health make this weird combat loop where the plasma weapons are completely useless because of how shoddy their shields are, the bullet damage automatics are only good against shields because they do so little damage to the brutes bodies, and melee and headshots are WAY too good.
I thought brutes in halo 3 were going to be evolved versions of halo 2 brutes, which were an absolute pain in the ASS. But they weren’t. They came out extremely lackluster and boring.
I always thought the brutes were flimsy and too easy to fight all these changes sounds dope and spot on in the problems would love to see some reworked H3 brutes in action
I think you are right. Halo CE NAILED the visual appearance of ranks with the color codes!!! I think there should have only been.... Brute Minors with no armor and only a blue helmet using only spikers, Brute Majors still wear their Halo 3 armor but now with bright candy red armor color and use ONLY red plasma rifles, Brute Ultras with their H3 armor in a bright candy purple color, and use spikers, red plasma rifles, Carbines and rarely fuel rod guns. For Brute Captains, no more different Captain ranks, i'd make just- 1 rank of Captain, and they would be dark maroon red in color like the vidoc WITH a captain flag high on their back like in H2 and they use only brute shots or fuel rod guns. Keep the jump packers the same in ODST, The stalker keep the same except now they can ONLY use red plasma rifles or Maulers. The Brute body guards is where my serious changes occur, Where I would take the normal Brute chieftain armor, paint it bright shiny metallic silver in color and make them wear that but with purple markings and lights all over it. Bodyguards would be seen to take cover and be even more battlefield savy than a Captain and ONLY found alongside a chieftain like you said BUT they will only ever be seen using Brute Shots or Maulers(or even stolen elite energy swords where they will run at you with it in H3 berserk mode with it). they also never go H2 berserk unless the chieftain dies. And then for the Chieftains, I would condense it so there is no more 2 Chieftain ranks, only 1 rank of "Chieftain" seen wearing the War Chieftains armor now painted bright gold and now only ever use Plasma cannons or gravity hammers. Edit: For the berserker mode, Ithink the Halo 3 berserker mode should have only been used by Brutes of the first 3 ranks i mentioned who lost their armor or shields.. but the Halo 2 berserk mode should have been used by any Brute who isnt a chieftain if they're the last surviving Brute in specifically a brute pack OR when their chieftain around them dies. Give them all a health buff to be more similar in health hp to H2 brutes by basically having the idea of the mythic skull always being on as the default, and there's my idea of perfectted Halo 3 Brutes and how they should be made if a good company were to ever make a H3 anniversary.
I think it’s good that the player had time to react to the brutes attacks unlike, the reach elite kicking your teeth in in less than a second that you can’t fucking see coming.
Dude, this video was great! I clicked on it to watch for a minute out of curiosity, fully expecting to close it after a couple minutes. I didn't think this topic would really work for a near half-hour video, but there was a lot of interesting stuff in here. Fully agree with your proposed changes through. I didn't even realize there was a difference between bodyguards and captains/minors or jetpack and majors
Those "shields" used by Brutes works differently from actual shields. The brutes use electro-reactive about. When hit by a projectile, it'll run enough current through said projectile to vaporize it.
@@uberx2447 okay and? Still didn’t change the fact that no matter what Halo, a plasma pistol and a precision weapon makes shielded enemies a lot more easier
Idk why this got recommended to me, haven't touched halo or watched any halo related video's since halo 3. Thank you so much for reminding me of the greatest times I've ever had. Much love ❤
I like to head cannon this as the covenant desperately trying to put the brutes where the elites stood, but the technology that was designed and perfected for generations had to be redesigned for the brutes. Strong, Regenerating shields were too difficult with time constraints and the lack of high charity. So the prophets hoped that putting at least something on them would give the grunts a morale boost and they could just use strength of numbers. maybe the brutes are slow and bad at shooting when shielded because the tech is uncomfortable and forces them to stand upright? And they’re slow and dumb in melee for the same reason. but if this were the case, the shield going down should have made the really dangerous, and maybe the helmet should have stayed on longer to stop the headshot.
Great video, love to see more people criticize enemy design in Bungie's Halo campaigns more. They all get judged with nostalgia goggles superglued on, imo. The main issue that every Halo after CE had with it's enemy design was that enemies were: - Much easier to headshot, to the point of taking zero effort to do so. Compare this to CE elites, where consistently headshotting them on the first try was actually somewhat difficult. - Extremely sluggish, moving very little while shooting. CE's elites strafed and moved all over the damn place while moving towards you and shooting at you, and it made gunfights a lot more difficult and requiring thought on the player's end. - Extremely non-aggressive. Halo CE elites would generally pursue the player to the far ends of the Earth. See the first tower defense section on "Halo", where the elites will quite literally rush up the spire and overrun it after being dropped by the spirit dropships if you don't kill them quickly. - Can be beaten in CQC with minimal difficulty. Halo CE elites would constantly move and the player could not lunge towards them with the melee, so it had to be used carefully or else the player would waste precious moments recovering from the animation, while the enemy either ran comfortably out of melee range or simply counter meleed and killed the player.
These are the general issues plaguing Elite/Brute enemies in post-CE Halo campaigns, on the enemy design end of things (though the weapons sandbox is also quite badly designed in basically every Bungie title after CE). All of these should be fixed in Infinite. Enemies are a ton more fun to fight when they're an actual challenge to kill. Brutes, in my opinion, are stronger, faster, more aggressive and tougher overall, but dumber and more easily confused. This would, in my opinion, serve as a distinct principle of design from Elites. - Brutes move around 115%-130% faster than elites, depending on their rank. They move around even more than elites in combat, and their headbobbing animation is even more extreme than that of elites. - Brute headshot regions are slightly smaller then elites, enough to make a noticeable difficulty in headshotting them. - Instead of almost circle-strafing around the player like CE elites' movement patterns, Brutes will take more direct, straight paths towards the player. While they approach the player in an-overall relatively straight line, they will move in zigzagging patterns to throw off the player's aim. - Standard brute melee not from weapons with boosted melee damage, will strip the player's shields and take half their health. The melee is delivered when the brute is within a radius of 3-4 meters from the player, and it is a faster melee than those of elites. However, it is a lateral strike unlike an Elite's vertical strike, and can be dodged with a well timed jump (while an Elite's can with a well-timed strafe to the left or right). - Brutes have 3 aggression states: Normal, angered, and berserk. Normal brutes behave as discussed above. A brute will become enraged when he is alive for over 20 seconds and his armor has taken over 70% damage, or when his commanding officer is killed. Brutes in this stage will fire longer, less accurate bursts, and have an expanded melee radius with a newer long-range jumping melee attack, like that of CE flood. In this stage, a melee hit will instantly kill. The berserk state is triggered when less than 50% of the brutes from the original group are left alive. In this state, a brute's speed is boosted by 20%. His melee radius is even larger than before. He will relentlessly charge at the player while shooting even longer-yet-more-inaccurate bursts, and will not stop to pause even for a moment while rushing at the player. Not even gunfire can stun the brute in this state. - War Chieftain brutes behave similarly to a berserk brute. They have the highest base speed, in addition to the boost that brutes receive once enraged (so about 150% the speed of an Elite). They have energy shields with the strength of a major elite, the health of a minor brute, and helmet armor that can only be shot off with sniper rifles. They are armed by default with a gravity hammer. For their ranged melee attacks, they will pounce on the player from a distance. For their close ranged melee attacks, they will attempt to slam their hammer into the player in a fast animation. - There are 5 ranks: Minor, Major, Captain, War Chieftain, and Stealth.
1) Nope. In Halo CE, elites used to freeze for 2-3 seconds after being stripped of their shields, working themselves up and being literally the easiest target(a non-moving one) for headshots. At least the brutes rampage near-instantly, and Halo Reach elites don't freeze up like their CE counterparts did. 2) Brutes have far more health than Elites do. If you had a shotgun, it could take 2-3 point blank shots AFTER their shields have been stripped to kill them. If they moved just as fast, and assuming you weren't going for a noob-combo/needler supercombine, it'd be damn near impossible to kill them. But as a counter, I'd say that CQC is a bit too easy now - which promotes run and gun gameplay, which is Halo's forte, and the absence of which is many people's biggest problem with Halo 5. 3) Agreed. All AI seems to freeze up and not exit a certain boundary within which they operate. 4)Agreed.
1) Their roar animation was triggered by stripping their shields and almost all of their health, not just by stripping their shields. Even elites standing still in CE are way harder to headshot than in any successive game, mostly because the pistol in CE has zero bullet magnetism and no hitscan. 2) That's another two separate issues that compound, poorly thought out amounts of enemy health and poor sandbox design. I was referring specifically to elites in this regard, but this also applies to Brutes. In general, mobile and hard-to-hit targets are the most rewarding and difficult to kill. Make a strong and effective sandbox, but also make enemies threatening and evasive. Glad we agree on the rest. Halo's PVE formula is the most versatile version of the traditional arena FPS. There's unlimited potential for future designers.
This is an amazing well put video. It brings up valid points, all of which I agree with. Ruby of blues halo 3 rebalanced mod really helps with the colour distinction. Earned a sub!
There's reason for the naming convention brute and elites, they're both deadly, but in different ways, and they're AI should reflect that, the brutes should be scarier and more aggressive when fighting up close than a distance, assassinations should stay to reward stealth for those who you can manage to pull it off, but punching should feel like a brick wall, especially the higher the rank is, but not unviable, I do think the brute shields should be weaker than elites and the armor shred mechanic should stay, to make the brutes feel different than fighting an elite, but it wouldn't hurt to make some changes to the brute shield or health to make them more of a threat, their ranks are an absolute mess, and you can't tell at a glance what there ranks are, something that was never a problem until 3, and the last thing elites have always been the player equal, excluding ODST, the brutes are not and should not ever be the players equal
True. They indeed have some issues. I think they are one of the parts of Halo that have never found their true idetity. They always get redesigned in every game they are in and seem like a poor substitute for Elites. The idea of them being immune to headshots is interesing with them wearing some really heavy armor. The issue was that they needed a more standard unit to face so they had to fill the role of the main infantry on top of being bosses. I think we can find a good middle ground with them in some way, surely.
Agreed with everything that was said about the brutes in halo 3, I thought I was bugging when I felt that the brutes were far stronger and more intimidating in halo 2, especially their berserk mode, they were so fast , relentless and powerful. Halo 3 watered them down way to much.
This is part of the reason why I think halo 2 is the best halo. The brutes, elites, hunters, and all the others were perfect. And also the vehicles were perfect to. The closest you can get to the health of halo 2 brutes in halo 3 brutes is if you turn on the mythic skull. Halo 2 brutes (and everything else characters, vehicles, and guns) are hands down the best.
you raised a lot of good points and agree with them but some i also see why they had to be the way they are. The colour 100% agree, there was no real way to clearly tell what rank you were versing or even notice the difference. I only found out by looking at lore that the brute majors were actually ultras i was fighting...but didnt even tell the difference in gameplay style. Elites even if you couldnt see the colour you could feel the difference when versing them. But why the didnt leave the bullet sponge brutes in was simply to make the play still feel like a super soldier, the H2 btutes were just too brutal and forced you to use only specif weapons limiting the experience (try killing one with a Plasma pistol or magnum). Still think that some like the body guards and ultras should have been more akin to H2 brutes to give a sense of caution. Like the minors stay the way they are, captains always using stronger weapons and utlras using maulers, fuel rods, bruteshots and hammers and when they berserk making it like H2 and letting them berserk with their armour.
I agree with you entirely EXCEPT, i think the brutes should have more weapon variety, and I think the lower the rank, the chance of berserking should be smaller to mimic the elites at least at earlier levels in the game being easier and more familiar and make them increasingly more divergent from the elites the farther up the chain you go, ALSO in return I think you should make elites more powerful like in halo 2 to compensate, so when there are brute versus elite encounters they aren’t demolished, because the elites in halo 3 also feel nerfed as well. Also I prefer the purple major color becomes the standard minor color because I like indigo more than blue :3
Great video! I'd also add the distinguishing feature of different hair for each rank. 2 somewhat had this variation, with higher ranks having lighter hair. In 3, once you remove the armor, all the brutes look the same with the puny mohawk-goatee combo and black underarmor hiding everything else. Anyways, keep up the good work. I'd love to see a series like this for other enemies as well
Imo For the packs of brutes the play style should feel like fighting a defensive line in football they should feel like a steady wall closing in on you. Consistent damage and singled targets with some speed and smart placement should be encouraged from the player. Maybe don't make their armor stronger, but rechargeable so it's encouraged to track specific targets to open holes in the space. We should be scared of them but able to make them look stupid like this, with consistency and some smart placement and equipment(make us more dependent on those explosives you gave us so much of) For the balanced squads the smaller units should be jackals with high damage to close the playable space, and grunts for flank, with the brute officer acting as the finisher, like the team is setting him up to get to you, with their spikers or melee, or mauler. More of a basketball type play.
I have a theory. What if Halo 3 was made this easy cuz Halo 2 LASO was notoriously unfair. Halo 3's skulls fix nearly every issue with the Brutes, but still leaves enough room for it not to be an absolute nightmare like 2 was. I wonder if it was intentional to make the game more accessible. Tldr: halo 3 with skulls is just halo 2 standard, so its easier.
Ce elite and halo 3 brute are the same for me they both have weird AI even if halo ce and 3 are m'y favorite because of the vehicule combat and the flood. Nice video it made me realize brute badass armor made me forget that they were less savage then halo 2.
I agree with almost everything you said EXCEPT for your complaints that there are too many Brutes while simultaneously saying they're too easy to fight. That's like complaining about there being too many Grunts. Having many weak enemies to fight is basic game design.
The berserk rage is basically what makes a brute a brute. The fact that they nerfed it so hard in halo 3 kinda stings. Functionally all it accomplished was it made them line up a nice headshot for you after you popped their armour. My recommended changes: 1. More tanky 2. Only the helmet pops off (functionally just a "negate 1 or 2 headshots" effect), and headshots are just extra damage, no insta-kill. 3. Bigger helmets take more damage to pop off. 4. During standard behaviour, randomly but frequently gives an animation / audio cue (something like "hiding will not save you"), then advances on your position, triggering nearby brutes & grunts to follow 5. Stun only happens if you punch them in the back (not an insta-kill, and works on all brutes) 6. Punching them triggers berserk 7. Standing next to a berserking ally triggers berserk (glorious domino effect that plays up the pack mentality) 8. Berserk randomizes between a zig zagging advance, a halo2 style bull rush, a big jump + ground smash, and throwing around objects in the environment (shuffling cover & throwing things at you) 9. Stealth brutes attempt to open with melee attack. 10. High ranking brute death screams cause cause all nearby brutes to go berserk. 11. Chieftans can make the death scream once they hit half health. 12. As per halo2 rules, the last brute standing always berserks. Basically, brutes would spearhead the advance and engage you up close and all go berserk if you punch one or drop their commander. Leaving you in melee range with multiple brutes as gunts shower you with crossfire. Making them functionally different not just as ennemies but as commanders.
I kind of wished the brute bodyguards got a shield like the hunter. I mean they are meant to protect the chieftain, and he's got a great melee weapon. If that guy had a phalanx of brutes capable of bouncing sniper rounds that would actually be terrifying
They're weak on all difficulties, they're sluggish, unaggressive enemies which don't like to take cover and stand in the open to fire at you. You can literally clear an entire pack of Brutes, Chieftains included, by just keeping your distance and firing at them with a BR or Carbine on Legendary difficulty and the only counter they have to this is to deploy a gimmicky bubble shield which eventually expires. Fighting them one on one is an even bigger joke since you can easily back-step and smack them in the back. The only difficult Brutes in H3 are the ones with Brute Shots as they can fire at you at close range without damaging themselves for whatever reason, and these can be cheesed from a distance as well.
@@TheMasterMind144 it’s not like the same can be said about halo 2 as well. A simple maneuver while berserking followed by a back smack is a great way to take out brutes, either that, or 5 headshots with a carbine.
I love Halo, and as a fan of the series, I never even took notice of any of the flaws you have taken the time to point out here. Nonetheless, you make some very valid points. I think the video game industry suffers from the same plague that every other industry in our world does. Rushed production. I work as an aerospace assembly mechanic building parts for Boeing Aircraft, and I can tell you first-hand that this is the case with Aerospace. Manufacturers of anything would rather rush out a substandard product quickly, rather than take the time to do it right.
wow! really informative video. Been playing Halo 3 since release and never really noticed these things. Halo 2s were too spongy and Halo 3s aren't spongy enough. Reach could have fixed this but oh well.
Great video. I never noticed when I was younger, but the halo 3 brutes are ridiculous 🤣 I think your analysis/changes are spot on. I like the brutes overall, the were best in Halo 2. With their fur, they provided a nice deviation from the normal reptile skin the rest of the covenant have.
![[LIVE] : ONE ลุมพินี 88 | คู่เอก "ป้อมเพชร vs อัสลามจอน"](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/1ZqTVVbMgbo/mqdefault.jpg)
I like the editing :) I assume you took inspiration from my style?
Thank you! Really dig your videos and you're one of my fav TH-camrs. I appreciate the acknowledgment!
EBR keep it up man
Reach was the best halo, it was the halo vision best realized. Everything else besides CE was saturated with marketing bs. Brutes were made weak because the deluge of noob players were simply bad fps gamers. In Reach, the elites are relentless, intelligent, and extremely threatening. They also don't speak English. Worst decision, they made the enemies in halo speak English to pander to dumb players who would buy the game in droves.
@@RStell-wt5qr you could add “in my opinion” because reach is objectively not the best Halo lol
@@RStell-wt5qr while Reach did a great job with the covenant species, making them challenging without making them too frustrating, I would say its weapon sandbox was subpar compared to other halos. It had less guns and vehicles than halo 3 yet a larger portion if them were redundant and useless. Still one of my favorite halo campaigns though.
Could you imagine if all the Brutes berserk when a chieftain is killed? Actually would be terrifying.
WANNA HUG!?!
It would also force the players to be careful which enemies they shot at. Like, the chieftain is the biggest threat, but all hell will break loose when you kill him.
@@cymond
or just equip a power drain and mop them up
That would be brilliant ai tactics
@@volition142 please 🥺
I find that Grunts in Halo 3 are incredibly smart and aggressive. The Brutes usually stand back while the Grunts try to rush me and push me out of cover. On a many occasions, I've experienced Grunt Majors attacking me by themselves while their Grunt Minors try to flank. They usually end up dying quickly, but it's fascinating to see. Truly some courageous little bastards.
that's grunts for ya and it's what their for. Brutes are the opposite of elites and don't believe in honor(or at least the correct way)
@@commanderthorn8600 they have an honor system, just very primitive
Those Suicidal Grunts kill me more then I like to admit.
Halo 3 had the most grunts on screen so it was always fun to kill them
@@shrekt8386 yeah in a way
I love the fact that brutes throw down a shield regen when no covenant have regenerating shields
I always wondered why they did that...
The regenerator also heals health damage and can "heal" or repair damaged armor that hasn't been destroyed yet.
The brutes are still incredibly susceptible to precision weapons once their armor is destroyed, but they can effectively take more hits to the body because of the health regen.
i thought the regen also healed health
If u played laso you’ll be glad that they do
Elites shields regen even after they're broken, do they not?
"Shipmaster they outnumber us three to one"
"Then it is an even fight"
Thank you. It irritates me that throughout the video brutes are framed as equal to the elites when that is NOT the case at all, they were never supposed to be an equal replacement. The prophets had their hands forced by the fact that the elites were too intelligent and kept catching on to the fact that the Great Journey was a lie.
@@jackllewellyn746 they’re certainly not equals but they’re not supposed to be complete pushovers. I felt more threatened by grunts in halo 3 than I did the brutes.
I mean it’s pretty obvious in every halo where there are brutes you face more of them at once compared to elites.
@@SneedRemembrancer I guess thats to balance out the fact that they don't have shields
He was right, its an even fight given how weak the brutes are.
I definitely feel as though the berserking ANIMATIONS should more closely resemble those of Halo 2, giving them a more intimidating stance and more feral rage, if you get what I’m saying.
Bungie hated the halo 2 brutes as they weren't finished with them. They were meant to play as the halo 3 brutes
@@ahsoka_polo yeah but halo 3 brutes in general are very boring to fight
Not to mention just way to easy to kill
@@pyrecorsomething2216 that's your opinion, I had fun fighting them.
King Ky96 Nah the brutes were not meant to be that watered down and boring like they are in halo 3, the brutes in halo 2 although unfinished they were far more menacing especially their berserk.
I think it says enough about brutes that I've played Halo 3 over dozens of times and never realized or cared about the difference between minors and majors
U never noticed the difference cause they were all just as weak
@@trotterphone4713 well chieftain have the only difference especially if they got a turret or hammer.
Those kill animations of the brutes killing humans were brutal. Also the one where the elites with the energy sword killing the brute with the brute slapping him was funny
Those where from a video that came as free DLC from for H3 called
'E tu Brute?'
Could probably find it on YT somewhere.
@@icefisher9072 wait really
m.th-cam.com/video/73WHyolxD9Y/w-d-xo.html
This is the video where the clips came from, there are others but this is the most well known one. Sorry took so long to reply lol.
@@icefisher9072 thank you very much kind TH-camr
Ikr?! The one literally ripping a humans arms off was crazy.
Grunts with shields in Reach were tougher than H3 Brutes
He was playing on easy or normal for H3, while legendary and heroic on CE and H2. I've done the tests myself and Brutes do take way more damage than what's showcase in the video.
@@Elzimbabwe. oh wow, thanks for thr information!
@@Elzimbabwe. I mean there still pathetic even on legendary. Seriously the minute you get a br or carbine most of the brute become easy targets and their armour is still quite pathetic on legendary. The only brutes that are a threat are ones with brute shots and choppers due to their insane dps output and the fact they can flip your vehicle quite easily.
@@Elzimbabwe. I don't think so even on normal in halo 2 they do a lot of damage and take quite a few hits also the halo 3 brutes shield is a joke.
@@MidanMagistrate just ignore him.
For the sake of science I wish you had said what difficulty all this was done on. Definitely think you should do a full comparison on ODST brutes vs 3 brutes. Really sweet first vid man keep it up!
From my own halo expire in I would say he is either in normal or heroic, no way legendary
@@oceanman9216 I only played 3 on Heroic recently and the armour shred seems about right to my experience. Grab a plasma rifle or two and the shields dissipate.
@@saltytattie833 it definitely looks like normal difficulty
@@oceanman9216 he was definitely playing Halo 2 on Legendary, elites can one shot melee only on Legendary.
@@SirFeatureCreature nah Legendary is a joke on Halo 3 compared too 2 and 1
Anybody else had their mind blown by the plasma grenade + jumping over the brute strategy?
Like... _It could have saved my life so many bloody times._
Haha I wish I knew that when I was 9 years old😂😂😂
I'm really good at sticking brutes that's all I know lol
Let's just say I'm gonna be using this video as a reference point for something. Nice work!
Oh man... if Reach Evolved is anything to go by, "something" is my most forward looked to game project of the next year
Halo 3 evolved baby
Cant wait!
Oh hellll yea
Make sure you cover Difficulty Game Setting Damage/Health Ratios. I’m half way through here and not seeing a thing about it
Worst part is that brutes are this easy on legendary.
i always felt like halo 3 was best played with the skulls that increase health and make all enemies max rank, I cant remember the names of the 2 skulls, but that was always my favorite way to play halo 3 on heroic or legendary. Sometimes the cowbell lol.
I don't think that. Various Chieftains were hard to kill, like the one with gravity hammer in the Crowd's Nest, that's why Halo 3 has the most balanced campaign in terms of difficult, like Halo 3 ODST or Halo CE. And what you can say about the broken path on Tsavo Highway? There are a bunch of motherfucking brutes killing you so much if you do not collect all the fuel rod guns to give them to your marines.
IDK, I enjoyed the gampelay in Halo 3 so good, the mechanics need to be changed a little bit in order to have something challenging but difficult at the same time without loosing the fun.
Id say I fear brutes much more on odst
@@naxxodrop You're mistaking the game accommodating your skill level by becoming significantly easier with "balance." Halo CE is the most balanced legendary. Halo 3 labeled its heroic as legendary and called it a day.
@A.A.Ron Davis The only challenging part of Crows Nest are the Brutes that spam ohk fuel rods at the end, which is cheap difficulty. If you have to turn skulls on to have a challenge, something went terribly wrong.
When you started listing off rank all I was thinking was: "Wait, there is more than just the 3 brute ranks?" *Blue, Gold, and Black in my mind*
I barely noticed at all too.
@A.A.Ron Davis Ultra? I only thought they had minors, majors, Captain, chieftain, spec ops, jump pack, and that’s all in the games
@A.A.Ron Davis oh ok
Yeah I thought the same as you. Blue = easy, Gold = hard, chieftain is clearly identifiable. I think Bungie made the correct choice here as most people will just see the colors and blue brutes (which are the most common) just have more variety.
Black?
I never liked how their armor would just fall off. Like how is that even considered to be armor If it falls off after a few shots. You think the covenant would have gave them something stronger. And I'm sure their are lore reasons but why? Elites were like fighting yourself because the shields recharged.
It's combat feedback, my dude. When an elite's shield bursts, you know you've done critical damage and need to finish them off. When a brute's armour shatters, you know you've done critical damage and need to finish them off. Don't take everything as literal, things are done to make combat feel more satisfying and visceral.
Look at the Promethean Knights in 4; there is no visual or audio indicator that you're doing damage until they literally just die, and they feel so unsatisfying to fight. If Brute armour didn't break, you'd just whack away at them until they fell over, it'd be crap.
@@0lionheart The brutes armor falling off makes it too easy as a gameplay and threat issue compared to elites. Also an elite shield burst is different from brute's armor falling apart. With the elites, they either evade / take cover or get aggressive quickly. Meanwhile there shields can recharge. With brutes armor falling off, they are considered dead since they can no longer get protection back. Since they just stand there staggered or do a slow berserk animation when broken it's always easy for a headshot or an assassination. The brutes were too easy. I think for combat feedback, they should make the armor fall apart, but at least have them still have their helmets on until you shoot it off. Similar to fighting the Chieftains.
Also, there is a damage indicator for Knights where they do a stagger animation and blue burst of energy comes out of them which indicates their "shields" are broken. But it's so subtle and so stupidly unnoticeable that I don't blame anyone for not seeing it.
@@0lionheart ? Knight's in 4 have blue shields that get brighter, as damage stacks up. They have shield break animations, and idk about audio cues for shield break, but there definitely is a visual indicator for shield breaks. I mean it's pretty noticeable later on in the game when knights are a orange color.
@@Elbalisco they do, but it's far less noticable then the elite or brutes glow as they are getting shot at, I never know if the shield of a knight will pop at the next bullet or in two more clips, they really aren't fun to shoot at.
@@Elbalisco Their face shields also pop and the skulls underneath become visible.
Great video my man. Modding Halo 3 is gonna be tons of fun.
Can't wait to see stuff from you and vengeful
yesss I was hoping you would see this!
Damn right. Who else thinks Halo 3 would be perfect to mod into 40k?
You gonna make brutes good again?
@@SunnyMitten in some areas they are massively improved and if you you use bullet weapon they feel just right (except with the BR} but if you have a berserk rifle you can shred their shield and finish them of with your choice of a magnum, mauler or spiker. Ruby on the small chance that you are reading this please nerf the berserk rifle I know it fun to use but it’s a straight up power weapon whose only downside is rarely relevant because dual wield weapons are limited only by the least accurate gun. Take the plasma rifle as an example which when deal wielded with Mauler, Spiker, and Smg runs into one of two problems 1. You are at medium range and you are firing only your plasma rifle at which point you are just forfeiting grenade use and you should abandon your other weapon 2. Your in close quarters and would be better of using the Beraerker rifle.
I do really miss being able to recognize the Covenant ranks from afar - seeing white or gold armor on an Elite made me both uneasy and excited. But with the Brutes in Halo 3, I barely notice any differences with the higher-ranking Brutes compared to their subordinates. They're all about equally easy to kill, with the exception of the War Chieftain, and even they aren't that bad.
I honestly think that if they took the brutes from 2 and 3 and landed somewhere in the middle the brutes would have been so much better
Pretty much just reach brutes
@@thesenate3728 they're too dumb sadly
@@thesenate3728I still think halo reach and the most balanced ai
I didn't even know Brute Bodyguards were a distinct rank, they're almost indistinguishable from Captain Ultras :/
They love BLUE.
i thought they were all minors because i couldn't tell the difference lol
same, i didn't know they were a thing till now
Imma be honest, i had no clue that there were so many ranks, i just had blue armor, jumpers, stalkers, gold boys, cheifs
Reach goes insane on the ranks. There's like 5 or 6 different types of elites alone. Same with the grunts
Minor, major, captain, captain major captain ultra, ultra, stalker chieftain, war chief tracker and jumppack, halo 3 odst also introduced major and ultra jumppack brutes
Personally, I definitely agree with your analysis.
One thing which I really didn’t like about the Brutes was the fact that the Minors would usually go down with a single melee hit after their power armor was destroyed. This bothered me immensely because, well, aren’t they supposed to be really strong and tough without relying on defenses like the Elites had to? They sorely needed a fairly significant base health buff.
I appreciate your analysis but I would like to offer a few counters.
1. Brutes don't need a threatening berzerk because the suicide grunt now fills that role.
2. Every weapon being good at stripping shields is a sign of good weapon balancing. Would you rather return to the Halo 2 Style where only the battle rifle and swords are useful?
3. Brutes having better shields that recharge would make them the same as fighting elites which would be boring. Lore wise, they are less well trained and had inferior equipment to the elites.
I disagree with the balancing, just because every gun can do something doesn’t make it balanced, it makes it unbalanced, because if every gun can do it then that takes away a feature of why I would use a certain gun.
I don't think giving the brutes recharging shields would make them the same as fighting elites if you fix their core ai and behaviours, brutes aren't meant to act like elites, I feel like the brutes should have recharging shields while still being noticeably weaker than your own and the elites, while still being able to use the recharging to further their aggresive behaviour and style, and another thing is that Halo 3 is after the elites are out of the covenant, so why would the brutes be less equipped, wouldn't the covenant want to make their now leading soldiers as strong as their previous ones if not stronger?
@@zombiecarnivore That's the thing. If you add more guns to a sandbox they will get repetitive over time. There are only so many ways to send a projectile to an enemy. After halo reach, no unique guns were added to the series. Nerfing a gun to "give another gun room to fulfil that role" would be to micromanage the player and force the will of the Devs on them. Don't force me to use plasma against an elite, what if i want to riddle him with bullets?
A few counters to your counters:
1. They chose to give that behavior to the Grunts, when they could've given it to the Brutes instead. That would have satisfied both parties.
2. I think that weapons should be a lot like rock-paper-scissors. Some weapons need to be better at specific things than others. Any gun should be able to do the job, but some should be better at it than others (either due to their ammo capacity, range, fire-rate, or damage-types). Otherwise, there's no point to having different guns other than window-dressing, and certainly no reason to put thought into what guns to grab.
3. I agree with this.
The only thing I can agree with in the video is that the berserk forms should be stronger and their base health slightly higher. Surprisingly the mythic skull feels like how they should tank damage.
Thank you for this video! It inspired me to make my mod: Halo 3 Brute Revamp. I reduced the number of ranks and made each rank a distinct color. I also made berserking brutes more of a threat by making their helmet remain intact when their shield breaks. You have to break the helmet before you can headshot them. The mod is on Nexus, if you're interested. Thanks again for the inspiration!
I’ve seen a few people bring it up very briefly, but not once have I seen a fully dedicated video to this topic. Very informative, clean and follow along video. I genuinely feel like you’ve touched on everything that I’ve seen before and then some. Really good video!
Since most of the other Brute ranks aren't shared with the Elites as it is, I would argue for renaming the Minor to something like "Brute Hunter" or "Brute Tracker," to keep in-line with their pack mentality. For the same reason I personally wouldn't create a Brute Zealot rank, although if you wanted something similar I can see "Brute Fanatic" or "Brute Devoted" working. I like the idea of Zealot being an Elite-only designation.
Otherwise I agree with most of what you've said. The Brutes are far and away one of my least favorite parts of Halo 3 because of how easy to kill they are, although I do feel like Chieftains are a bit broken in the opposite direction (that said, I've never tried melee fighting them). You make a great point about the armor colors; honestly I had no idea there even *were* different grades of Chieftain, or that the blue guys who follow them around weren't just regular Minors. Halo and Halo 2 had very clear and easy to read ranks for each Covenant species and it baffles me they didn't do that here.
I have a similar issue when I look at 343's elites. To me they feel like a dumbed down version of what we had in the 1st trilogy. Their armors kind of blend together, they seem awkward and just unbecoming of elites. Hope both enemies get the makeover they deserve for infinite.
Ever since Reach the Elites melee you in not even a second
@@spunchles2781 I would rather them be quicker on melee but the trade off being they don't one shot you. Brutes should definitely be able to though, but I feel like they shouldn't be as fast in terms of melee.
The elites in halo infinite might actually be my favorite design honestly.
@@infernaldaedra I need to see more before I say that. From what I have seen this is the best iteration of them by 343 aside from h2A.
@@infernaldaedra i think halo 1-3 and reach had the best looking elites
Halo 2A elites just looked so damn bad, espicially with thier circular helmets, i loved how elites helmets in halo 2 looked so damn sharp and agile
And halo reach had the best looking elites of all, and that ultra omfg if rtas is going to appear in infinite, he MUST wear that armor
I'm just sad we didn't get to see the red armor brute we saw in the trailer
Don’t worry in infinite they’re bringing it back!
Look the comics.
There have a special brute with red armor in the covenant.
Well with MCC on steam, We can finally mod the colors of Armored brutes. I saw a green armored brute from a Halo 3 mod called Sierra 117 overhaul or something.
Can you do a video like "did Reach improve the Elites" compared to older games?
Great idea!
Concussion rifle elites were a mistake lol
@@halinaqi2194 Concussion rifle ultras were practically boss battles even on heroic.
@@halinaqi2194 Thank you for triggering my PTSD
*boot kick instakill*
Don't completely remove flinch for higher ranks, I think that the frequency of them flinching should be changed. Like 80-100% for minors, 40-50% for captains, 10-25% for captain majors, and 1-5% for chieftains.
I agree with all your arguments, but still i always found the H3/ODST Brutes to be the most fun and pleasant enemies to kill. Let's see how Infinite will handle the Brutes.
💯
judging from what we've seen so far, they look pretty cool, especially the drop pod brutes. having individual armour pieces fall off is super cool, and the normal brutes dont look too shabby either.
I agree. The Brutes in Halo 2 are appropriately tough to kill, but they’re just so tedious to fight and bullet spongey that I just don’t find them as fun to fight as the 3 and Reach Brutes.
I mean the problem with having this discussion is that most people who genuinely enjoyed fighting the brutes plays on lower than heroic most of the time and enjoy popping that armor and then laying waste to them.
They're not fun to face on a difficulty aspect but sure, they're satisfying to kill if that's the only part of enemy design you care about. So at the end of the day it's a really difficult problem to solve since they seem to work for the casual audience but not the hardcore. And one side isn't more important than the other. I personally hate the brutes in Halo3 and i only play the games on legendary.
My favorite brutes has to be reach but halo 2 is close behind by the sheer terror i got when i saw them.
@@starcraft2own I agree
I kinda like the halo 2 brutes mechanic yes they are extremely hard but that’s what they are ``brutes”
I've always felt like the brutes in 3 we're off. Thanks for deep diving it!
Meanwhile in the future, Halo Infinite’s Brutes are actually pretty damn fun to fight. Sort of a mix between 2 and 3’s with a bit of Reach in the blend.
The tilt, mythic, and tough luck skulls really helped my girlfriend and me keep the brutes challenging (and more like the ones in Halo 2). Lol
same!!
This
another difference between 2 & 3 brutes is the size/position of the head in halo 2 they have very small heads which blend into their body making it a harder target as opposed to the brutes in 3 which stand bolt upright.
Also dual wielding; elites could do it in halo 2 and even some in reach! why can't brutes dual wield their spikers even though masterchief can?
In the first Halo 3 ODST trailer there's also a Brute dual wielding
Those gameplay vids of the Brutes wrecking shit around 3:00 are awesome! Especially the one against the Hunter. And the perpetual spinning dodge video was hilarious.
I love this format in general. It's entertaining and highlights all your points perfectly.
This is wonderfully inspiring. Ive been trying to design enemies recently, and this helps
You should make a video discussing how SPV3 does Brutes right! They're not just elite clones because in SPV3 you fight both, like Reach. Their armor doesn't come back, but they're much more aggressive, unless hanging back with a carbine. You really don't wanna melee them either, and there's typically only one or two brutes per squad with plenty of grunts and jackals to fill the rest of the ranks. Only the higher ranking brutes have energy shields which makes them a substantial and immediately indentifiable threat. Those shields won't return if destroyed, but their strength is akin to an Elite Ultra's, taking multiple clips of your weapon to destroy.
I'll look into them!
I love the added detail of the song brutes. Great vid
Awesome video glad someone brought these boys up.
Imo flaws with Halo 3 Brutes 1. All Brutes have shield Break Berserk and not Last man Berserk. 2. Their Melee Damage and cone is too low. 3 Their Melee Leap Velocity is way too slow. 4. The difference between Ranks is abysmal. 5. Power armor lacks shield flares in 3. Still better than Reach Brutes
I think the Reach brutes are fine (at least in terms of game design, maybe not lore) because they aren't the strongest, toughest enemies in the game, like they are in Halo 3. In Reach, the regular brutes (the ones without energy shields) are like the second tier of enemies, below elites (and shielded brutes). In Halo 3, the brutes are the top tier of enemies and as a result, should be a little harder to deal with than they are in the game.
Basically, in Reach, it's fine that you can fight brutes basically the same way you fight grunts, just with more health, since there are still elites for an added challenge. In Halo 3, this is definitely a bigger issue since there are no other enemies beyond the brute level.
Funny enough I think that the Brute charge in Reach was actually done better than in 3. Instead of putting their weapons away and awkwardly strafing towards you the Brutes in Reach run towards you in a straight line while firing their weapons and don't stop until they are in melee range. I've actually died many times on Legendary because I lost sight of a Brute while fighting other enemies only to have that Brute show up behind me and kill me, and this behavior could affect any Brute if another Brute in their pack was killed next to them, regardless of how much health they still had which meant that a lot of times they charged you at full health.
Also in Reach the Brutes couldn't be easily assasinated.
wow didnt realize there was such an issue with brutes in 3 and i distinctly remember how much fun and intimidating they were in ODST
Which difficulty level are you on when demonstrating the Brutes' gameplay weaknesses?
Edit- A few disagreements:
I like boosting the health of all Brutes and making them more aggressive, but overall I think that Bungie got the lower ranks right in most ways. Brutes are supposed to be more numerous and more expendable than Elites, so I like the Minors and Majors having pop-off armor and fairly weak shields. It would be cool if higher ranks, like Bodyguard, Captains, and above, had regenerating shields just so they're taken more seriously.
The prevalence of blue armor is a real problem, though I like the number of ranks in the Brute hierarchy- it helps to sell them as actually having a chain of command big enough to fight real battles. Visually, I would like it if they went away from the one-color armor like the Elites and gave Brutes armor with multiple colors to denote rank. Like, Minor is all blue, Major is blue with red markings, Captain is all red, Captain Major is red with gold markings, etc.
I played on Legendary, with a couple clips on heroic. 100% agree with you on the ranks having different colors
@@ebr8308 I posted a different comment critiquing the video but those halo 3 clips were definitely not on legendary, while your Halo 2 and CE clips obviously were. If you make more videos please be clear on what difficulty you are showing examples on.
@@ebr8308
Im sorry. But the clip at 5:20 says otherwise. I have played Halo 3 a totsl of 5 times on Legendary (4 OG, 1 MCC), and the second melee hit from that Brute Captian would jave killed you. When you entered the Barracks ealier, you would have been spotted and shot at almost IMMEDIATELY if this was Legendary. This is definitely Normal difficulty
@@Cameron088 Yea, and notice how when it changes to legendairy clips of him fighting elites, suddenly all his skill is gone, he is shooting the body of the elite and seems to be holding back, seems to suddenly have terrible aim and makes horrible combat choices, as if its his first time playing halo and has little skill in shooters. Then brute clip comes and suddenly hes super accurate with head shots and running circles around enemies.
They did most of this when they made ODST
One thing hat bothered me was how once they lost their armor all but the chieftains and war chieftains looked the same, losing their cool helmets. It would have been nice if they retained their helmets once losing their power armor, with captains still being immune to headshots until they were shot off.
An excellent breakdown, a shame that it didn’t garner more attention. But hey, you caught the attention of both Ruby and Vadam 👀
I’ll be sure to thank you when their brutes are beating me into a bloody pulp.
Not just Vadam and Ruby, but also Late Night Gaming as well.
“There really is no threat” continues to loose half his health in a couple shots and I mostly agree with everything here some minor things I didn’t agree with are there looks to be a difficulty difference and maybe once you shoot off there chest piece or something then the energy shield will stop regent get but that’s also when they’ll charge you
It definitely looks like he's playing on normal for halo 3 and legendary when he brings up any other game (given how fast he dies in 2 and CE when they're shown)
Also I don't remember the battle rifle being very good at breaking brute armor on higher difficulties but that could be me misremembering
It’s a common tactic that channels like these use to compare enemy 'threat level' in video games.
@@kadirgarib3459
Unless they are getting hit in the head, yes, the Br is weak
@@kadirgarib3459 if what he said abaut Cunts geting a buff then they shoud be placed in small numbers, cuz on legendary geting 3 of them to charge u is a death sentance (with his buffs). Plus in Halo 3 odst most broken unit is a Jakal prove me wrong....
Solid vid! subbed!
That was a sticking point for me for Halo 3, enemies didn't feel intimidating. None of the Brutes had anything on the sword Zealots in Combat Evolved!
Clement Moraschi actually hammer chieftains scare me because I suck at circle strafing behind them to assassinate them.
@fantasticmoose They weren't difficult though, not if you were prepared to retreat, or kept track of what weapons dropped behind you, and navigated the environment to get more space between you & them.
Difficulty isn't inherently a good thing, but the Zealots were, and honestly it sounds like you just need to git good.
@@bennettfender1546 sure but they were still big softies compared to elites, even though their armour does a lot of talk, talk is all they're full of.
@fantasticmoose The areas are never 'that' tight & confined that you can't maneuver, jump over obstacles & make them run round things. The one hit kill & their dogged pursuit of you makes them more menacing, so the stakes are higher. But their movement is pretty predictable, so you can win by superior movement and tactics even if you are surprised. Truth & Reconciliation is a slog when you first get inside the ship, but it's hardly representative of every encounter, and you can still jump on crates, on the wraith .etc & put some distance between you and them. Also since they're camo, they're unprotected from bullet weapons.
The "more dynamic" movement of the brutes is just them thrashing around, they're rarely in confined spaces so you can just put a handful of precision shots in their head from medium-long range. That's far more one-dimensional to me.
I think it's a bit of your nostalgia talking, sure the og sword elite were intimidating back in the days because we were all starting to play Halo but when Halo 3 came out we were already all much better and no longer intimidate by them, if anything I was happy to toy with them even on legendary, making them fall off a bridge or stuff like that.
The only thing I have to say is that brutes in H3 can beserk with Armor on. Rarely but possible
Yeah, it happens occasionally. Mostly when I kill a number of brutes in close proximity to each other.
@@Xaxp yeah, I happens if you stick a brute near them too. Like super close
@@derekmensch3601 late reply, but when fighting the war chieftain or any brute just dodge their shots till they start raging with armor on
I've been playing Halo 3 for over ten years and had no clue there was an Ultra rank for the Brutes, and people say 343's rank design's are hard to tell apart.
I always felt that halo 3 brutes were the most fun enemy type out of any halo game to fight
Frankly hadn't thought about issues with the brutes since the game came out other than the permanently destroyed armor. Lot of food for thought.
Im actually perfectly fine with them. I prefer them over halo 2, and I disagree that the elites in h2 should have a one hit kill, even at full shields.
I feel the same way
Perfectly fine, but u cant argue against these facts
I think it's fun... Unless you're the Arbiter and you accidentally walk into an Elite in mid melee attack.
Yeah, if any elite can one hit you with melee, then what's the point of sword elites? The energy sword isn't doing any extra damage at that point, and sword elites just become elites who can't shoot.
What little we've seen of Halo Infinite seems to suggest more aggressive and visually distinct Brutes with destructible kinetic armor while energy shields remain exclusive to Elites. It's another element that makes me hopeful for Infinite turning out to be the quintessential Halo experience
I think Infinites Brutes are going are to be really fun to fight
They've still got a bit of work to do, though. That one Brute that got stuck with a grenade and then used it's jump-pack right in front of the player, thus getting stuck in an awkward animation for _way_ too long has me nervous.
@@Mega-Brick My old boy from Google + Days, hello.
@@Ankylosaurus_mangiventris Greetings.
They seem better but the berserk brutes seemed really slow hope they change that
Watches you dying to elites... Considering I'm doing the Halo trilogy LASO run, I think I now know what PTSD flashbacks are like. I have a feeling Halo 3 will be a lot less "Brute-al" (har har).
I'm currently doing a Halo 2 Legendary run myself. Elites are assholes and Ultras are the worst of a bad lot (doesn't help that I've needed to restart Cairo Station for the umpteenth time after I duffed it up). Zealots are a sad sick joke though, I mean really, all you need is plenty of room to backpedal, a precision weapon and a sufficiently charged plasma pistol.
Great video, man! Can’t believe you only have 2 subscribers. Actually- consider that three. I think your strongest points are in the AI behavior and armor/ranking system that bungie set up. Most of the time I can’t decipher what brute I’m fight unless it’s a Chieftan, or a Captain Major. They’re all way too similar looking to immediately just say “oh, yeah, that’s a major!” or “got a captain and a bodyguard, let’s take them out!”. You made some great points in this video, and I’d love to see more from you.
the Brute's weak shields and bloated health make this weird combat loop where the plasma weapons are completely useless because of how shoddy their shields are, the bullet damage automatics are only good against shields because they do so little damage to the brutes bodies, and melee and headshots are WAY too good.
Probably because they were down graded to being elites rather than the raging apes they were in halo 2.
my theory is that the xbox 360 could load more enemies on screen, so instead of having less brutes but stronger there is more but weaker
So wait, you're telling me gold brutes weren't the highest rank except for the chieftain?
yes, for some reason bungie made the bizarre decision to make captain minors and captain ultras nearly identical.
“Oh no my armor is gone let me throw down a regen. That’ll stop the headsho-..” - Brutes in Halo 3
I thought brutes in halo 3 were going to be evolved versions of halo 2 brutes, which were an absolute pain in the ASS.
But they weren’t. They came out extremely lackluster and boring.
I always thought the brutes were flimsy and too easy to fight all these changes sounds dope and spot on in the problems would love to see some reworked H3 brutes in action
I think you are right.
Halo CE NAILED the visual appearance of ranks with the color codes!!!
I think there should have only been.... Brute Minors with no armor and only a blue helmet using only spikers,
Brute Majors still wear their Halo 3 armor but now with bright candy red armor color and use ONLY red plasma rifles,
Brute Ultras with their H3 armor in a bright candy purple color, and use spikers, red plasma rifles, Carbines and rarely fuel rod guns.
For Brute Captains, no more different Captain ranks, i'd make just- 1 rank of Captain, and they would be dark maroon red in color like the vidoc WITH a captain flag high on their back like in H2 and they use only brute shots or fuel rod guns.
Keep the jump packers the same in ODST,
The stalker keep the same except now they can ONLY use red plasma rifles or Maulers.
The Brute body guards is where my serious changes occur, Where I would take the normal Brute chieftain armor, paint it bright shiny metallic silver in color and make them wear that but with purple markings and lights all over it. Bodyguards would be seen to take cover and be even more battlefield savy than a Captain and ONLY found alongside a chieftain like you said BUT they will only ever be seen using Brute Shots or Maulers(or even stolen elite energy swords where they will run at you with it in H3 berserk mode with it). they also never go H2 berserk unless the chieftain dies.
And then for the Chieftains, I would condense it so there is no more 2 Chieftain ranks, only 1 rank of "Chieftain" seen wearing the War Chieftains armor now painted bright gold and now only ever use Plasma cannons or gravity hammers.
Edit: For the berserker mode, Ithink the Halo 3 berserker mode should have only been used by Brutes of the first 3 ranks i mentioned who lost their armor or shields.. but the Halo 2 berserk mode should have been used by any Brute who isnt a chieftain if they're the last surviving Brute in specifically a brute pack OR when their chieftain around them dies. Give them all a health buff to be more similar in health hp to H2 brutes by basically having the idea of the mythic skull always being on as the default, and there's my idea of perfectted Halo 3 Brutes and how they should be made if a good company were to ever make a H3 anniversary.
Would be crazy if brutes could pick up helmets that were knocked off and use them again
I think it’s good that the player had time to react to the brutes attacks unlike, the reach elite kicking your teeth in in less than a second that you can’t fucking see coming.
Here before it gets recommended to everybody
Dude, this video was great! I clicked on it to watch for a minute out of curiosity, fully expecting to close it after a couple minutes. I didn't think this topic would really work for a near half-hour video, but there was a lot of interesting stuff in here.
Fully agree with your proposed changes through. I didn't even realize there was a difference between bodyguards and captains/minors or jetpack and majors
Those "shields" used by Brutes works differently from actual shields. The brutes use electro-reactive about. When hit by a projectile, it'll run enough current through said projectile to vaporize it.
Doesn’t seem like you played this on legendary. Stun don’t exist on that difficulty m8 their shield too tough
Im currently doing a legendary playthrough. Stun definitely exists on brutes. Only chieftains are immune
Even mythic is kinda a joke if you use plasma weapons with a percision weapon
@@uberx2447 that can literally be said in any halo game
@@weebtrash3376 halo reach's elites were wayyy more agile than brutes were iirc
@@uberx2447 okay and? Still didn’t change the fact that no matter what Halo, a plasma pistol and a precision weapon makes shielded enemies a lot more easier
Idk why this got recommended to me, haven't touched halo or watched any halo related video's since halo 3. Thank you so much for reminding me of the greatest times I've ever had. Much love ❤
I like to head cannon this as the covenant desperately trying to put the brutes where the elites stood, but the technology that was designed and perfected for generations had to be redesigned for the brutes. Strong, Regenerating shields were too difficult with time constraints and the lack of high charity. So the prophets hoped that putting at least something on them would give the grunts a morale boost and they could just use strength of numbers. maybe the brutes are slow and bad at shooting when shielded because the tech is uncomfortable and forces them to stand upright? And they’re slow and dumb in melee for the same reason. but if this were the case, the shield going down should have made the really dangerous, and maybe the helmet should have stayed on longer to stop the headshot.
that's basically my headcanon too.
Great video, love to see more people criticize enemy design in Bungie's Halo campaigns more. They all get judged with nostalgia goggles superglued on, imo.
The main issue that every Halo after CE had with it's enemy design was that enemies were:
- Much easier to headshot, to the point of taking zero effort to do so. Compare this to CE elites, where consistently headshotting them on the first try was actually somewhat difficult.
- Extremely sluggish, moving very little while shooting. CE's elites strafed and moved all over the damn place while moving towards you and shooting at you, and it made gunfights a lot more difficult and requiring thought on the player's end.
- Extremely non-aggressive. Halo CE elites would generally pursue the player to the far ends of the Earth. See the first tower defense section on "Halo", where the elites will quite literally rush up the spire and overrun it after being dropped by the spirit dropships if you don't kill them quickly.
- Can be beaten in CQC with minimal difficulty. Halo CE elites would constantly move and the player could not lunge towards them with the melee, so it had to be used carefully or else the player would waste precious moments recovering from the animation, while the enemy either ran comfortably out of melee range or simply counter meleed and killed the player.
These are the general issues plaguing Elite/Brute enemies in post-CE Halo campaigns, on the enemy design end of things (though the weapons sandbox is also quite badly designed in basically every Bungie title after CE).
All of these should be fixed in Infinite. Enemies are a ton more fun to fight when they're an actual challenge to kill.
Brutes, in my opinion, are stronger, faster, more aggressive and tougher overall, but dumber and more easily confused. This would, in my opinion, serve as a distinct principle of design from Elites.
- Brutes move around 115%-130% faster than elites, depending on their rank. They move around even more than elites in combat, and their headbobbing animation is even more extreme than that of elites.
- Brute headshot regions are slightly smaller then elites, enough to make a noticeable difficulty in headshotting them.
- Instead of almost circle-strafing around the player like CE elites' movement patterns, Brutes will take more direct, straight paths towards the player. While they approach the player in an-overall relatively straight line, they will move in zigzagging patterns to throw off the player's aim.
- Standard brute melee not from weapons with boosted melee damage, will strip the player's shields and take half their health. The melee is delivered when the brute is within a radius of 3-4 meters from the player, and it is a faster melee than those of elites. However, it is a lateral strike unlike an Elite's vertical strike, and can be dodged with a well timed jump (while an Elite's can with a well-timed strafe to the left or right).
- Brutes have 3 aggression states: Normal, angered, and berserk. Normal brutes behave as discussed above. A brute will become enraged when he is alive for over 20 seconds and his armor has taken over 70% damage, or when his commanding officer is killed. Brutes in this stage will fire longer, less accurate bursts, and have an expanded melee radius with a newer long-range jumping melee attack, like that of CE flood. In this stage, a melee hit will instantly kill. The berserk state is triggered when less than 50% of the brutes from the original group are left alive. In this state, a brute's speed is boosted by 20%. His melee radius is even larger than before. He will relentlessly charge at the player while shooting even longer-yet-more-inaccurate bursts, and will not stop to pause even for a moment while rushing at the player. Not even gunfire can stun the brute in this state.
- War Chieftain brutes behave similarly to a berserk brute. They have the highest base speed, in addition to the boost that brutes receive once enraged (so about 150% the speed of an Elite). They have energy shields with the strength of a major elite, the health of a minor brute, and helmet armor that can only be shot off with sniper rifles. They are armed by default with a gravity hammer. For their ranged melee attacks, they will pounce on the player from a distance. For their close ranged melee attacks, they will attempt to slam their hammer into the player in a fast animation.
- There are 5 ranks: Minor, Major, Captain, War Chieftain, and Stealth.
TLDR; your favorite Halo game is CE and nothing comes close to it for you
@@Serocco In implementation? Yeah.
I like Bungie Halo campaigns, but I think they all have enormous wasted potential.
1) Nope. In Halo CE, elites used to freeze for 2-3 seconds after being stripped of their shields, working themselves up and being literally the easiest target(a non-moving one) for headshots. At least the brutes rampage near-instantly, and Halo Reach elites don't freeze up like their CE counterparts did.
2) Brutes have far more health than Elites do. If you had a shotgun, it could take 2-3 point blank shots AFTER their shields have been stripped to kill them. If they moved just as fast, and assuming you weren't going for a noob-combo/needler supercombine, it'd be damn near impossible to kill them. But as a counter, I'd say that CQC is a bit too easy now - which promotes run and gun gameplay, which is Halo's forte, and the absence of which is many people's biggest problem with Halo 5.
3) Agreed. All AI seems to freeze up and not exit a certain boundary within which they operate.
4)Agreed.
1) Their roar animation was triggered by stripping their shields and almost all of their health, not just by stripping their shields. Even elites standing still in CE are way harder to headshot than in any successive game, mostly because the pistol in CE has zero bullet magnetism and no hitscan.
2) That's another two separate issues that compound, poorly thought out amounts of enemy health and poor sandbox design. I was referring specifically to elites in this regard, but this also applies to Brutes.
In general, mobile and hard-to-hit targets are the most rewarding and difficult to kill. Make a strong and effective sandbox, but also make enemies threatening and evasive.
Glad we agree on the rest. Halo's PVE formula is the most versatile version of the traditional arena FPS. There's unlimited potential for future designers.
Brutes in H2 were some of the most nervewrecking things to fight. When you heard that loud beserk roar, the panic got real
“Did they bring the whole family.” This video is amazing!
This is an amazing well put video. It brings up valid points, all of which I agree with. Ruby of blues halo 3 rebalanced mod really helps with the colour distinction. Earned a sub!
There's reason for the naming convention brute and elites, they're both deadly, but in different ways, and they're AI should reflect that, the brutes should be scarier and more aggressive when fighting up close than a distance, assassinations should stay to reward stealth for those who you can manage to pull it off, but punching should feel like a brick wall, especially the higher the rank is, but not unviable, I do think the brute shields should be weaker than elites and the armor shred mechanic should stay, to make the brutes feel different than fighting an elite, but it wouldn't hurt to make some changes to the brute shield or health to make them more of a threat, their ranks are an absolute mess, and you can't tell at a glance what there ranks are, something that was never a problem until 3, and the last thing elites have always been the player equal, excluding ODST, the brutes are not and should not ever be the players equal
True. They indeed have some issues. I think they are one of the parts of Halo that have never found their true idetity. They always get redesigned in every game they are in and seem like a poor substitute for Elites. The idea of them being immune to headshots is interesing with them wearing some really heavy armor. The issue was that they needed a more standard unit to face so they had to fill the role of the main infantry on top of being bosses. I think we can find a good middle ground with them in some way, surely.
Agreed with everything that was said about the brutes in halo 3, I thought I was bugging when I felt that the brutes were far stronger and more intimidating in halo 2, especially their berserk mode, they were so fast , relentless and powerful. Halo 3 watered them down way to much.
This is part of the reason why I think halo 2 is the best halo. The brutes, elites, hunters, and all the others were perfect. And also the vehicles were perfect to. The closest you can get to the health of halo 2 brutes in halo 3 brutes is if you turn on the mythic skull. Halo 2 brutes (and everything else characters, vehicles, and guns) are hands down the best.
you raised a lot of good points and agree with them but some i also see why they had to be the way they are.
The colour 100% agree, there was no real way to clearly tell what rank you were versing or even notice the difference. I only found out by looking at lore that the brute majors were actually ultras i was fighting...but didnt even tell the difference in gameplay style. Elites even if you couldnt see the colour you could feel the difference when versing them.
But why the didnt leave the bullet sponge brutes in was simply to make the play still feel like a super soldier, the H2 btutes were just too brutal and forced you to use only specif weapons limiting the experience (try killing one with a Plasma pistol or magnum).
Still think that some like the body guards and ultras should have been more akin to H2 brutes to give a sense of caution. Like the minors stay the way they are, captains always using stronger weapons and utlras using maulers, fuel rods, bruteshots and hammers and when they berserk making it like H2 and letting them berserk with their armour.
Before watching this video:
*WHAT IS THIS HERESY*
After watching this video:
*The prophets have blinded us all no longer!*
I agree with you entirely EXCEPT, i think the brutes should have more weapon variety, and I think the lower the rank, the chance of berserking should be smaller to mimic the elites at least at earlier levels in the game being easier and more familiar and make them increasingly more divergent from the elites the farther up the chain you go, ALSO in return I think you should make elites more powerful like in halo 2 to compensate, so when there are brute versus elite encounters they aren’t demolished, because the elites in halo 3 also feel nerfed as well. Also I prefer the purple major color becomes the standard minor color because I like indigo more than blue :3
Great video! I'd also add the distinguishing feature of different hair for each rank. 2 somewhat had this variation, with higher ranks having lighter hair. In 3, once you remove the armor, all the brutes look the same with the puny mohawk-goatee combo and black underarmor hiding everything else.
Anyways, keep up the good work. I'd love to see a series like this for other enemies as well
I have been saying this for the longest, thank u for giving us a voice
“You could die trying to melee an elite in Halo 2” meanwhile he has plenty of opportunities to melee that elite from behind but doesn’t.
So... his point is to be disregarded?
@@benb9151 no, but I think his point is less important than he thinks it is
Imo
For the packs of brutes the play style should feel like fighting a defensive line in football they should feel like a steady wall closing in on you. Consistent damage and singled targets with some speed and smart placement should be encouraged from the player. Maybe don't make their armor stronger, but rechargeable so it's encouraged to track specific targets to open holes in the space. We should be scared of them but able to make them look stupid like this, with consistency and some smart placement and equipment(make us more dependent on those explosives you gave us so much of)
For the balanced squads the smaller units should be jackals with high damage to close the playable space, and grunts for flank, with the brute officer acting as the finisher, like the team is setting him up to get to you, with their spikers or melee, or mauler. More of a basketball type play.
I have a theory.
What if Halo 3 was made this easy cuz Halo 2 LASO was notoriously unfair. Halo 3's skulls fix nearly every issue with the Brutes, but still leaves enough room for it not to be an absolute nightmare like 2 was.
I wonder if it was intentional to make the game more accessible.
Tldr: halo 3 with skulls is just halo 2 standard, so its easier.
Ce elite and halo 3 brute are the same for me they both have weird AI even if halo ce and 3 are m'y favorite because of the vehicule combat and the flood. Nice video it made me realize brute badass armor made me forget that they were less savage then halo 2.
I agree with almost everything you said EXCEPT for your complaints that there are too many Brutes while simultaneously saying they're too easy to fight. That's like complaining about there being too many Grunts.
Having many weak enemies to fight is basic game design.
Don’t forget that In harder difficulties Brutes get stronger. But yet are still weak.
Brute the embodiment of a 8 year old having a temper tantrum until you give it a few hits to show who's boss
The berserk rage is basically what makes a brute a brute. The fact that they nerfed it so hard in halo 3 kinda stings. Functionally all it accomplished was it made them line up a nice headshot for you after you popped their armour.
My recommended changes:
1. More tanky
2. Only the helmet pops off (functionally just a "negate 1 or 2 headshots" effect), and headshots are just extra damage, no insta-kill.
3. Bigger helmets take more damage to pop off.
4. During standard behaviour, randomly but frequently gives an animation / audio cue (something like "hiding will not save you"), then advances on your position, triggering nearby brutes & grunts to follow
5. Stun only happens if you punch them in the back (not an insta-kill, and works on all brutes)
6. Punching them triggers berserk
7. Standing next to a berserking ally triggers berserk (glorious domino effect that plays up the pack mentality)
8. Berserk randomizes between a zig zagging advance, a halo2 style bull rush, a big jump + ground smash, and throwing around objects in the environment (shuffling cover & throwing things at you)
9. Stealth brutes attempt to open with melee attack.
10. High ranking brute death screams cause cause all nearby brutes to go berserk.
11. Chieftans can make the death scream once they hit half health.
12. As per halo2 rules, the last brute standing always berserks.
Basically, brutes would spearhead the advance and engage you up close and all go berserk if you punch one or drop their commander. Leaving you in melee range with multiple brutes as gunts shower you with crossfire. Making them functionally different not just as ennemies but as commanders.
That would be a bit OP if brutes appeared as frequently as they do in halo 3. Maybe cut the numbers in encounters down a bit but make them all tougher
I kind of wished the brute bodyguards got a shield like the hunter. I mean they are meant to protect the chieftain, and he's got a great melee weapon. If that guy had a phalanx of brutes capable of bouncing sniper rounds that would actually be terrifying
Op: plays halo 3/2 on different difficulties
Also op: BrUtes arE TOo WeAk in HaLo 33333
Gald I'm not the only one who noticed that glaring flaw.
nahh he was playing legdary on both or at least heroic
Ive played h3 on legendary and even with all skulls on the brutes are weak asf
They're weak on all difficulties, they're sluggish, unaggressive enemies which don't like to take cover and stand in the open to fire at you. You can literally clear an entire pack of Brutes, Chieftains included, by just keeping your distance and firing at them with a BR or Carbine on Legendary difficulty and the only counter they have to this is to deploy a gimmicky bubble shield which eventually expires. Fighting them one on one is an even bigger joke since you can easily back-step and smack them in the back. The only difficult Brutes in H3 are the ones with Brute Shots as they can fire at you at close range without damaging themselves for whatever reason, and these can be cheesed from a distance as well.
@@TheMasterMind144 it’s not like the same can be said about halo 2 as well. A simple maneuver while berserking followed by a back smack is a great way to take out brutes, either that, or 5 headshots with a carbine.
I love Halo, and as a fan of the series, I never even took notice of any of the flaws you have taken the time to point out here. Nonetheless, you make some very valid points. I think the video game industry suffers from the same plague that every other industry in our world does. Rushed production. I work as an aerospace assembly mechanic building parts for Boeing Aircraft, and I can tell you first-hand that this is the case with Aerospace. Manufacturers of anything would rather rush out a substandard product quickly, rather than take the time to do it right.
wow! really informative video. Been playing Halo 3 since release and never really noticed these things. Halo 2s were too spongy and Halo 3s aren't spongy enough. Reach could have fixed this but oh well.
Good video. I've always felt like halo 3's enemies aren't as good especially brutes
So giving the brutes some type of character was their ultimate downfall😂
yup lol
The Halo 3 Brutes are feeling like Halo 2 Elites with a worse A.I and armor.
Great video. I never noticed when I was younger, but the halo 3 brutes are ridiculous 🤣 I think your analysis/changes are spot on. I like the brutes overall, the were best in Halo 2. With their fur, they provided a nice deviation from the normal reptile skin the rest of the covenant have.
The brute melee dance is how I Regen my shields in laso though.
I didn't even know bodyguard, ultra, major, and war chieftain exist.