Abbreviations.
For use in the guide, online or even casual speech (read: xbc). These are used very frequently:
PP- Plasma Pistol
PR- Plasma Rifle
AR- Assault Rifle
Rox- Rocket
Cloak/Camo/Invis- Active Camoflauge
OS/OV- Oversheild
Gg- Good game
GW- Glass walls (a hack)
dammy- Damnation
HH/HEH- Hang em High
CO- Chill out
priz- Prisoner
derey/dere- Derelict
wiz- Wizard
bg- blood gultch
sw- sidewinder
ratty- Rat Race
BC/creek- Battle Creek
pn- practice noob
p- partner
random- random spawn
2box- an xbox on a LAN with 2 people on it
#box- people use 3box and 4box to describe one xbox with that many people on one screen

Obvious Tips:
>You spawn with a pistol as a secondary weapon, use it!
>Whore powerups and power weapons if you are playing competitively.
>Playing split screen with a partner in 2v2 or 4box for 4v4 helps immensely. Screenwatch and communicate for best teamwork.
>Make up call outs for your partner, if you can't be original just use the color of the base and the weapon spawn it's near: such as RED PISTOL.
>Watch gameplays for tricks and play offhost on xbc.
>Be careful rushing/charging, if someone you are chasing runs through a portal it's not a great idea to follow them.
>Flanking, trapping, and double teaming someone are efficient ways to get an easy kill.
>Don't stand still sniping, or at all!
>2x scope with sniper needs to be used 95% of the time. Hang em High from back top blue to back red may be one of the few exceptions where 10x is better.
>Shoot rockets at the ground, body shots are very hard to hit. Jumping helps. Also, close range, shoot a wall or shoot behind so you don't kill yourself.
>Don't use needler.
>Team score is what matters, first to 50 wins, good luck.


Button Glitches, default settings.

Weapons Glitches

Double Melee: B, L, B
In depth: Melee someone, wait for them to take damage then throw a grenade and feel free to melee again as fast as you want. The important thing is to make sure the first melee hits before throwing a grenade because if you are too fast then only the 2nd will count.
Backpack Reload: X, X, Y
In depth: Press reload twice then switch weapons. This will let your weapon reload while you have the other weapon out. So you are never in a reloading situation under fire. It's commonly used with rockets because of the huge reload time.
Silent Reload: X, B, X
In depth: You press reload followed by a melee then reload again. You can press this as fast as you want and it will work, you reload silently. It's only really useful in 1v1s where sound matters.
Silent Switch Weapon: Y + B
In depth: While you take a weapon out melee. This will keep it silent, it's helpful if you are behind someone and they could hear you pull out rockets. People do this on spawn, too. In team games be careful meleeing on spawns, make sure your partner isn't standing in front of a spawn.

Basic Essentials : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O5txDJoCzBw
This video explains a few strafing patterns, spawn melees, backpack reloading, double meleeing, crouch jumping, crouching fall damage, surviving stickies, and grenade jumping.
Advanced Essentials : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EWfzq...eature=related
This video shows some useful jumps, quick camo, doubling up on powerups, nading weapons to yourself, basic teamwork, and basic spawning.

Timing

Timing is what almost everyone does at a competitive level. The purpose is to keep track of powerups and weapon spawns during a game, as well as how long your camo is lasting among other things. Timers can be as simple as a stopwatch, however, most players use a talking timer (www.talkingtimer.com or check ebay) or a computer timing program(http://files.filefront.com/PC+Timerz.../fileinfo.html).
If you have a stopwatch put it on a mode that has it count up. If you are using a talking timer set it to 1:00, voice on, repeat. PC Timers are pre-set for you.
Start any timer right before the game starts, in the system link menu it will count down from 30 by 6s so when it says "Loading Level" wait a moment then start it. A little practice and you will figure out when to get it exact.

Here the the respawn times for each map. It may seem like a lot but in general you can assume camo and oversheild are coming up every minute and rockets comes up every 2 minutes. Weapons come up every 30 seconds. This is not true for all maps, though.

Battle Creek
Assault Rifle - 0:30
Needler - 0:30
Plasma Rifle - 0:30
Sniper Rifle - 0:30
Active Camo - 1:00
Overshield - 1:00
Rocket Launcher - 2:00
Frag Grenades - 3:00
Plasma Grenades - 3:00

Blood Gulch
Assault Rifle - 0:30
Needler - 0:30
Pistol - 0:30
Plasma Rifle - 0:30
Shotgun - 0:30
Overshield - 1:00
Rocket Launcher - 1:30
Sniper Rifle - 2:00
Active Camo - 3:00

Boarding Action
Plasma Rifle - 0:30
Shotgun - 0:30
Sniper Rifle - 0:30
Active Camo - 1:00
Overshield - 1:00
Frag Grenades - 3:00
Health Pack - 3:00
Plasma Grenades - 3:00
Rocket Launcher - 3:00

Chill Out
Assault Rifle - 0:30
Needler - 0:30
Pistol - 0:30
Plasma Rifle - 0:30
Shotgun - 0:30
Overshield - 1:00
Sniper Rifle - 1:00
Active Camo - 2:00
Rocket Launcher - 2:00

Chiron
Active Camo - 0:45
Assault Rifle - 0:45
Frag Grenades - 0:45
Health Pack - 0:45
Overshield - 0:45
Pistol - 0:45
Plasma Grenades - 0:45
Plasma Pistol - 0:45
Plasma Rifle - 0:45
Rocket Launcher - 0:45
Shotgun - 0:45

Damnation
Assault Rifle - 0:30
Frag Grenades - 0:30
Health Pack - 0:30
Pistol - 0:30
Plasma Pistol - 0:30
Plasma Rifle - 0:30
Shotgun - 0:30
Sniper Rifle - 0:30
Active Camo - 1:00
Overshield - 1:00
Rocket Launcher - 2:00
Plasma Grenade - 3:00

Derelict
Rocket Launcher - 0:30
Sniper Rifle - 0:30
Active Camo - 1:00
Overshield - 1:00
Plasma Grenades - 3:00

Hang 'em High
Assault Rifle - 0:30
Frag Grenades - 0:30
Health Pack - 0:30
Needler - 0:30
Pistol - 0:30
Plasma Grenades - 0:30
Plasma Rifle - 0:30
Shotgun - 0:30
Sniper Rifle - 0:30
Active Camo - 1:00
Rocket Launcher - 2:00
Overshield - 3:00

Longest
Frag Grenades - 0:30
Health Pack - 0:30
Pistol - 0:30
Plasma Rifle - 0:30
Shotgun - 0:30
Active Camo - 1:00
Assault Rifle - 1:00
Overshield - 1:00
Plasma Grenades - 3:00

Prisoner
Assault Rifle - 0:30
Frag Grenades - 0:30
Plasma Rifle - 0:30
Sniper Rifle - 0:30
Active Camo - 1:00
Overshield - 1:00
Rocket Launcher - 2:00
Plasma Grenades - 3:00

Rat Race
Assault Rifle - 0:30
Frag Grenades - 0:30
Pistol - 0:30
Plasma Rifle - 0:30
Shotgun - 0:30
Overshield - 1:00
Active Camo - 1:30
Plasma Grenades - 2:00

Sidewinder
Assault Rifle - 0:30
Frag Grenades - 0:30
Needler - 0:30
Pistol - 0:30
Plasma Pistol - 0:30
Plasma Rifle - 0:30
Shotgun - 0:30
Sniper Rifle - 0:30
Active Camo - 1:00
Health Pack - 1:00
Overshield - 1:00
Rocket Launcher - 2:00

Wizard
Assault Rifle - 0:30
Health Pack - 0:30
Needler - 0:30
Pistol - 0:30
Plasma Rifle - 0:30
Active Camo - 1:00
Overshield - 1:00

Quick Camo: This is shown in the essentials videos quite nicely. When you get camo it takes some time to go completely invisible, the same holds true if you are shooting then stop, you take time to go fully invis again. Quick camo lets you get instantly back into cloak. There are two ways to do it:
1. Using AR/PR/Shotgun/PP - Pick up camo and shoot one bullet from any of these guns for quick camo. Also, if you are shooting and stop then switch to any of these guns for quick camo. Also, if you get shot your camo becomes "lit up" and you can be seen, shoot a bullet and switch to any of these weapons to go back to invisible quickly.
2. Using Pistol- Pick up camo and shoot one bullet from your pistol and switch to AR for quick camo. This is better becuase a pistol shot blends into the game better than an AR bullet. Example, 2v2 Hang em High, the opponent doens't know you are at camo spawn but hears the AR, he then can deduce that you are there. If you shoot a rocket or sniper shot to go quickly camo again switch to AR/PR/Shotgun/PP after you shoot.


Teleporter Blocking:
This ones simple, if you walk back as soon as you’ve teleported through a 2-way TP, you can block some one from coming through the same way you did for a limited time - we all know that. But if you jump as some one is trying to force there way though, the game no longer registers you as blocking the TP, and lets the enemy though. So you wait for the whitening of your screen that signals some one trying to force there way through, jump, and press melee, and the game lets the enemy through into a nasty back-wack. People do get wise to this and come through backwards, so you may want to launch a full on assault as soon as you jump just in case - or double bluff and face the other way ect.


Canceling a misfire (jump glitch):
Once you jump in the air, if you rotate in the air more than 90 degrees, your bullets fire to the side, not where you are aiming, known as a misfire or a jump glitch. However, if you melee before you shoot it will stop the glitch for as long as the character animation of the melee continues. The pistol's melee character animation is best for this, as it is quite lengthy. So when you're in the air simply press melee, swap to rockets and fire. This trick is vital if you plan to jump and use rockets .
Joshnote: Misfires seem rare to me with rockets. They do happen though, I think a higher sensitivty makes them more likely. Learning this will stop that 1 rocket suicide you get a game.


Descoping:
It is often better to double tap Y do take away the scope on the sniper or pistol. If you get hit by a shot just before you try to descope conventionally, you will end up rescoped. This can happen multiple times in a row, and while you're frigging around trying to lose your scope, you getting your ass kicked. Just double tap Y. Another idea is to learn to pistol long range unscoped. A lot of people find it easier in a pistol battle to scope in and if you get knocked out of scope don't scope back in. This way you don't screw yourself.


Oddball chuck:
A good tactic at close range with the oddball is to chuck it at the enemy. Because it their character automatically picks up the ball when it comes into contact, they have to waist precious time dropping it before they can shoot you.
Also, in 4v4 oddball if you put oddball on a portal exit the other team usually rushes through and doesn't expect to pick it up. Easy kill.

Avoiding picking up the flag/oddball:
The flag and oddball are picked up automatically, and can interfere with any fights your currently in. If you hold the L-trigger down however it doesn’t pick it up. This is a good counter for the oddball chuck.

Gametypes and MLG
Although gametypes can be however the player wants, to have fun, companies such as MLG and AGP have standardized a few rules that are followed by most good players at tournaments and on xbc. To make the games click on Slayer Pro (or the gametype it says) and switch those settings. Then rename it and save. They are as follows:

*Free For All

Settings
1. All Settings listed below are those that are not default for Slayer Pro.
2. Respawn time is 5 seconds
3. Suicide Penalty is 10 seconds for all games.
4. Radar is on

*1v1
Settings
1. All settings listed below are not default for Slayer Pro.
2. Respawn time is 3 seconds/instant.
3. Suicide Penalty is 5 seconds for all games.
4. Kills to Win: 15
5. Radar is on (wizard only) Radar is off for all others, which IS default

*2v2

Settings
1. All Settings listed below are those that are not default for Team Slayer.
2. Death Bonus and Kill Penalty are off for all games.
3. Radar is off for all games.
4. Respawn time is 5 seconds for all games.
5. Suicide penalty is 10 seconds for all games.
6. Equipment is Generic for all games.
7. All games will be played to 50 kills.

*4v4
Settings
1. All Settings listed below and next to the game types are those that are not default for the specific game type (Team Slayer, CTF Pro, Team Ball, or Team King).
2. Death Bonus and Kill Penalty are off for all games.
3. Radar is off with the exception of Battle Creek CTF Pro.
4. Respawn Time is 10 Seconds with the exception of Team Slayer (5 Seconds).
5. Suicide penalty is 10 seconds for all games.
6. Equipment is Generic.
8. Team King and Team Ball games are 5 Minutes to Win with the exception of Team Ball Damnation Reverse Tag (10 Minutes).
9. CTF Pro games are 3 captures to win with the exception of both variations of Wizard CTF Pro (5 Captures).

Maps:
All maps are acceptable to play Halo on, but these are recommended as they are standard on xbc and tournements.

*FFA
Derelict, MLG AND AGP
Rat Race, AGP
Battle Creek, AGP
Wizard, 4 player FFA map
Most FFAs are played on derelict now, for fairness and balance.

*1v1
Wizard, MLG AND WCG
Prisoner, MLG AND WCG
Longest, MLG AND WCG
Derelict, WCG
Battle Creek, WCG
Chill Out, WCG
Most 1v1s are played on wizard only now, however Prisoner and Longest have been proven to be fair competitive 1v1 maps. Also, WCG rules involve weapon set to be on CUSTOM.

*2v2
Chill Out
Prisoner
Damnation
Hang Em High
Battle Creek , this top tear of maps are most competitive for 2v2

Derelict
Wizard
Longest
Rat Race , this second tear of maps are competitive yet have some disadvantages making them hard for comebacks or offhost

*4v4
CTF Pro
Damnation
Wizard-Pistols Weapon Set
Wizard
Rat Race
Hang ‘Em High
Longest
Derelict
Battle Creek

Team Ball
Longest
Chill Out
Damnation-Reverse Tag-2 Balls

Team King
Battle Creek
Derelict-Pistols Weapon Set
Damnation

Those are tournament maps from 06 tournaments, but be creative here. Almost any 4v4 gametype with generic weapon spawns can be fun and competitive. Stay away from blood gultch, sidewinder, and chiron.

Team Strategies:
Okay, so your 2v2ing on your split screen 2box, with a timer. Here are more helpful things to do to win games.

Chill Out- Rocket is the msot important weapon on this map. It's 2minute spawn. Double teaming this isn't a bad idea, be careful to stand on the spawn because from camo room people can kill you easily. Camo and OS are nice ways to counter a rocket and should be taken if possible. Common camping places are pink room and shotgun room. The camo room/pink room only has 2 obvious ways in, one is the portal, and the other is the walway from rocket room. People tend to put rocket guy guarding one side and a PR/sniper/shotgun guy guarding another side. Be careful rushing portal when they have a strat like this set up. One sneaky but dangeorus way to break in is grenading yourself up from dark hallway and jumping through the window. Another common set up is shotgun room. One person can stand on portal and watch the back door and the other can guard top hall and OS spawn from a number of different places. The best way to break into this strat is arguably from the needler top hall.

Prisoner- Top is key here. Many of the kills will be on spawns. Controlling OS and top is very important. Rocket camo is easy to get here but harder to get it up top. Watch out for spawns and camo rocket and this map can be very fast. Sniping and pistoling are dominant on prisoner. Standing on and nading top spawns is encouraged, explained later in detail, and dropping to bottom is discouraged. But there are strategic advantages to dropping to confuse or flank someone, also for rocket.

Damnation- This map has a 1 minute camo and a 2minute rocket, as well as OS. Rocket and camo can be naded to many places. Things to try are getting camo then going for rocket. OS is less effective here because as you nade up with it you are usually under severe pressure. Jumping for camo is risky because if they have rockets chances are the rocket guy is guarding camo spawn. Nading camo down if you don't have top control is helpful. If you do have top try to nade camo to yourself and if they already have rockets, sneak it for kills. Staying top and watching portal, spawns, and green room are possible.

HH- Camo is most important here, it's a 1:00 powerup so it's always eventful. If you can manage to survive with a camo, your options include getting rocket, getting top powerup, getting sniper, and getting top blue. They all have advantages, rocket to top blue is not a bad idea at all. =) A few positions for a controlling team to have are top blue pistol, top blue, and lesserly top red. A combination of any of these is good for almost complete control, especially if one has camo. If you don't have camo some tricks are spam shooting the jump up to rockets, or spam shooting the top powerup (if camo) around 45 seconds after camo spawn. Usually if they go top power they will crouch there for a new camo.

BC- Camo is very hard to get here. Focus on getting a camo and nading rocket to yourself. One person on a base roof and a partner whoring rocket/camo is a usual strategy. Without powerups here try to hide in bases or double team the guy on the roof for a few frags. Sniping isn't a bad plan. Some mistakes people make are going up sniper ladders, easy kill, and going through portals. Generally, a portal is a bad idea if you don't know whos on the other side.

Derey- a 30 second rocket spawn makes keeping top much easier than normal maps. 2 people split up on top, sniping, rocketing, and whoring camo OS is vital. You can not win derelict from the bottom. If you find yourself on the bottom, try to spawn yoru partner top or double team someone. Throw nades at rocket side and have one port for a double team kill.

Wizard- whore powerups and PR

Other map strategies vary greatly, videos will help show these in better detail.

You CAN use programs to communicate in Halo 1 despite the lack of built in chat. Any PC gamer probably knows about Teamspeak. Check these sites for other programs. You need a mic and speakers, or a headset.
teamspeak- www.goteamspeak.com/ <-- Free.
skype- www.skype.com/ <-- Free. This lets you have small group or 1 on 1 calls with other skype users.
Vent- www.ventrilo.com/ <-- Free. This is great for small teams to chat and you and your p can join seperate areas within 1 server that only let selected people listen.
Remember, if your LANing you can just use your mouth. Make sure both players understand and agree on a language to use. English is recommended.

Gameplay Videos, helpful videos:

BSik's Nade Guide Video: http://halo3forum.com/video/9/9/halo_video_entry.html

Halo-Pro's gameplays: http://www.halo-pro.com/cgi/h1vids.php
_Suggested watching_ from halo pro is: Ogres 2v2 at HH, Tsquared at dammy, Winter WonderLAN, TDT vs StK AGP Chill Out game, 14 months of carnage.

Rockets through walls glitch: http://gameroom.mlgpro.com/view/b0u9RjS9zto.html I'm not sure if you can use these very well but if you want to spam off a few drpwnrockets go ahead.


Spawning
This is a huge part of competitive multiplayer. Spawns are based on 3 things, partner's position, opponent's position, and luck. The thing you can control out of those three is partner position, so that's where the focus of spawning is! The following video shows top screens being team 1, and bottom screens being team 2. When team 1 has a player die, depending on where his partner is standing a spawn is set in stone by the game. The exceptions to this are if the opponent is standing on that spawn, essentially, blocking it. Then the partner spawns randomly (luck). Another exception are set random spawns. On many maps, standing in a certain place can spawn your partner randomly. This is good because you confuse your opponent, and they can't get spawn killed. Another aspect of spawns is spawn killing. Everything before this has been about stopping your partner from getting spawn killed, but you can spawn kill too. If you look at your opponents position, when his partner is on spawn, you can nade the spawn they are
supposed to get for an easy kill. Or watch it with rockets. Also, if you have map control and your opponent's partner is on spawn, it's sometimes smart to not go for a double kill but keep them spawning where they are for map control. Examples of this are not killing both partners so they can keep spawning at red base on hang em, or on bottom at prisoner. It can be risky though.

Random Spawns: http://gameroom.mlgpro.com/view/32tMmvPPLWI.html
Top Spawns: http://www.halomega.com/halo-ce/2115...-pictures.html (First 2 posts, it's all my info.)

Knowing top spawns and randoms is important for winning a 2v2 game. Also, predicting where your opponent may top spawn his partner and nading it or blocking it can help your team out greatly. 4v4 has a set spawn system that I am still trying to figure out 5 years after Halo has been out.

For a link to some pictures I made and an explanation in a great format try this link: http://www.halownage.com/halo-ce/132...-tutorial.html
I drew out the pictures over a year ago so they are a bit outdated. My spawn video covers the randoms you need, this helps though.

CAMPAIGN
**OFFICIAL! Halo 1 Button Combos/Glitches** This thread shows many good campaign tricks. It also shows a cheat for infinate ammo, never use this in multiplayer! It's illegal at tournaments and it is looked down upon strongly at LANs and xbc.

If you want to be considered good it's probably too late. You can still jump in, though. Anyone can get good with all this information if they play a lot of xbc for 3 or 4 months. Find kids locally that you can LAN with and go to a tournament. That's all you can do, gl gg hf. PM me for any needed updates or videos. I'll add them or possibly make them. THE_oldy gave me a few new ones. Thanks man.


Anyone can use this info without any reference to this thread/site. It should be common knowledge for everyone with a halo disc.

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Holly s**t...

Basic? Are you kidding?

2 Threads in the same day on Halo CE...awesome.


And josh, i have never seen you here...ever. Long time, no see i guess would be approate.

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Well, basically everything that B SiK has yet to put in his thread.

You two should combine forces.

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Now thats an idea.
That would almost rival ChrisIsTwisted's thread on Pirating.


If only someone would do the same for halo 2 and halo 3, for all these bad kids who play zombies and glitch.

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when have you been mod? You can merge them if you want, retitle it or something.
This is basic haha. I've had this in notepad for probably 4 months. I just brushed it up and put it on h2f.

nevermind:

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Good sh.t Josh. Now if only someone could teach me how to play XBC with all the latency.

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The basic and advanced essential videos are "forbidden". I've already seen them, but for those that haven't, someone might want to upload the vids somewhere else because they're very helpful.

Nicely done on the thread, josh.

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Holy sh.t this is amazing :O nice job

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Only one thing.... the silent weapon switch doesn't work. When you pull out a shotty/rockets/ whatever, and hit B, you won't here any noise (except for the melee) on your screen, but if an opponent is close enough to you, they will still hear the noise of whatever weapon you pull out.

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Coach of Final Boss.