The Low Down on the Battle Rifle

A few years back, the Staff and I played a lot of splitscreen Slayer matches of Halo 2 (Xbox), and while the games were close, I often griped about his excessive use of the Battle Rifle, calling it cheap. Of course, he'd counter by commenting on how it took skill to shoot me in the head all the way across the map, and I couldn't really come up with any kind of a counter-argument.

Now, years later and after the launch of Halo 3, Bungie has discussed the Battle Rifle in detail in yesterday's Weekly Update, and they've confirmed what I said all along: That the Battle Rifle was "Arguably too lethal."

So I was right, and the Staff really is a no-skill cheap lamer (but that's okay Telly, we still wuves you, even though you suxorz!!!!!1111!!!111!!!1!1!!1).

In simplified terms, in Halo 2, all you needed to do was get your reticule on your target, and if you fired when it was red, you'd instantly hit your opponent, no matter how far away they were; there was no actual bullet traveling or target tracking involved. Instant hit, near instant kill.

For Halo 3, the Battle Rifle has been revised where beyond a certain distance, it will no longer instant hit and you do need to track and "lead" your target, and the second and third bullets in the three shot burst are no longer as accurate. What this has done is changed the Battle Rifle from the all purpose, over-powered killer to an excellent medium range weapon and long range anti-sniper weapon (since hitting the sniper will prevent him/her from using their scope). Up close, you'll want to use another weapon like the Assault Rifle, and at long ranges, you'll want to use something like the Sniper Rifle.

For a very detailed assessment of the Staff's L337 cheapness, you can read the full article here.

pwned.