Key Points
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Confidence in utilizing advanced tech in Halo Infinite separates great players from good ones.
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Recharge's high ground will kick your ass if you don't use cover effectively.
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Good comms are like a power weapon — when you use them well, you wipe the floor with the other team.
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Every top player achievement shares one thing in common: discipline.
Halo Infinite’s reputation contrasts rather sharply with previous series entries. It's easily among the most technical, especially in terms of movement. The game slows down the pace of Halo 5 but adds enhanced speed mechanics with equipment pickups. It isn't as complicated as popular battle royales and extraction shooters, but its mechanics are arguably the deepest on the market.
Here are some suggestions for weapon mastery gameplay, movement techniques tips, map awareness tracking, and what you need to practice to master free-to-play multiplayer in Halo Infinite.
Learn the Weapons: Advanced Mechanics
Halo Infinite’s sandbox is arguably the best in the franchise, so it's essential for top players to learn movement and mechanics. Exploiting movement mechanics is not only key to surviving Halo Infinite but dominating it, too.
Learn which guns are best in any given scenario by checking out HaloHype’s full sandbox breakdown.
Now to discuss aiming. As one-half of the core features of any shooter, where you place your shots is the difference between winning and losing a fight.
Shyway, a respected Halo commentator and analyst, offers five movement techniques tips to improve your aim and positioning in competitive modes:
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Shoot bots. An underrated method for building muscle memory, Training Mode in Halo Infinite helps you learn guns, memorize map layouts, and practice callouts. Warm up with 15 to 30 minutes of shooting bots before every competitive game session!
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Aim with your strafe. No matter what controller or input you use, there are fundamentals to hitting your shots. Study your opponents' movements and mirror them. Time your shots. As the fight develops, your movement can save your life.
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Master micro-adjustments. As hinted at before, tiny adjustments make heads click and send opponents back to the death screen, gaining you the upper hand in the match. Figure out what's comfortable (and ergonomic) for your control scheme. Comfort and strength go hand-in-hand here, pun fully intended.
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Have confidence! Confidence is an essential element in any competition. The difference between a great player and a good player is self-confidence. If you aren't stepping up, taking calculated risks, and playing for your teammates, Infinite isn't for you, simple as that.
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Study up. Watch back your matches in Theater mode, watch professional players, and imagine yourself in their shoes. Shyway even recommends holding a controller while you watch, acting out what you'd do in their given scenario.
"Try to feel it and translate it into a controller in your mind," Shyway says in the above video. "I find this process is easier to do the better you are at the game, and you'll get better over time. It’' statistically proven to help you improve faster, so try it."
Study up and get familiar with what weapons you have at your disposal, including advanced tech mechanics like skill jumps and curb-sliding. Accounts like Shyway's and other professional players' are excellent resources for studying these advanced techniques and experimenting with play style preferences. You outmaneuver your opponents in close fights when you practice strafing, jumping, and crouch-sliding.
Practice Movement and Use Cover
Designers typically style Infinite’s maps for competitive use. Season 3: Echoes Within brought Cliffhanger, Chasm, and Oasis into the map rotation, which favor more casual play, but the competitive rotation punishes poor map positioning. In these cases, you must use cover spots to mitigate enemy sightlines and stray 'nades.
Take the map Recharge, for instance. Recharge is multi-tiered, meaning that sightlines don't just go along the y-axis. The high ground tilts the scales in a skilled team's favor. Cover advantages strategy on Recharge amounts to one thing: Avoid the center of the map as much as possible.
Say you have enemy Shocks (Shock Rifles) at Top Turbine, the portion of the map next to Stronghold Alpha, highlighted above in blue, but covering the center of the map and a portion of Batteries. If you have to contest someone entering Stronghold Alpha from either top or bottom Elevator side, you don't have a lot of coverage options.
However, if you move with advanced tech and time it right, you can duck behind a stairwell or a pillar before the Shock Rifle zaps your head off. Case in point, cover advantages strategy prevents enemy teams from stacking up the slay count and mitigates your frustration from frequent visits to the death screen.
Communicate With Teammates
Just as in any relationship, communication with teammates is critical to success in Halo Infinite. Even players in Big Team Battle use voice and text chat to call plays or rage at their teammates to blow up the enemy Scorpion that's on a Running Riot. (Everyone's been there.)
A great example of successful team comms is with OpTic Gaming, reigning HCS Champions. In this video, FormaL, APG, Lucid, and Trippy chat in a frenzy, (don't be afraid to slow the vid down to understand callouts) calling weapon and enemy spawns, what rotations to make, what FaZe players are low, when to slow down their pace, and when to amp up the pressure on FaZe.
Voice and text chat, communication with teammates, and weapon mastery gameplay result in top player achievement. OpTic proves that.
Keep an Eye on the Map
Along with implementing proper communication, learn map layouts and callouts for every mode and how they fit into your play style. Map awareness tracking, when used properly, turns unwinnable fights into landside wins. Take Streets, the map in the above OpTic Gaming example. ATM is where the Bulldog spawns, and if you've been on the receiving end of that shotgun, you understand why your team needs to control the spawn.
The M41 SPNKr is the power weapon of choice for Streets. Because it spawns in the dead center of the map, it's prone to BR75 shootouts from both tower positions. The team in possession of the Bulldog from the ATM side is a mixup in those fights, especially in the hands of a skilled flanker. If a team possesses the Bulldog, the Stalker Rifle, and SPNKr rockets, they're in command of Streets because they know the map.
Experiment With Different Loadouts
Halo Infinite offers a variety of customization loadout options. It's important to clarify that the term “loadout” means something very different in Halo Infinite than it does in Halo: Reach or Halo 4. Loadouts, in a technical sense, are nonexistent — you spawn with what the playlist determines. Customization loadout options are back in the main menu, meaning you have access to the weapon's colors and attachments. These in no way shape the outcome of gameplay.
What weapon combinations you use in a fight control the outcome. Streets has the SPNKr and Bulldog, Recharge has the Shock Rifle and Active Camo, and Live Fire has the Sniper Rifle and Overshield. Experimenting with play style preferences is something every Infinite player naturally does, but if you want to be the best, become skilled with every weapon and piece of equipment. Otherwise, someone who's more skilled will take your spot at the top.
Practice, Practice, Practice: Get in the Reps
Top play achievement in Halo Infinite comes from practice. It doesn't matter whether you play Legendary All Skulls On (LASO) campaign or speedrun, or whether you want to get to Onyx on Ranked — mastering Halo Infinite takes practice and dedication. Sacrifice the time and put in the work because as much as you love the game, someone else might love it and play it more. It's not always about the competition, but you must outwork everyone else to be the best.
Committing to a dedicated practice routine, whether you warm up with bots before grinding in ranked modes, practice curb sliding while listening to podcasts, or hop in Fiesta to get practice with all weapons, is what the greats do. They develop a dedicated practice routine, stick to it, and reap the success that comes.
For some, just getting into Onyx is enough. For others, it's an HCS roster spot. For the best, it's winning championships. Choose the pain of discipline or the pain of regret. If you choose the former, then you better get in the reps!
It's Time To Finish the Fight
Halo Infinite, and the historic series it represents, has something for everybody. Whatever Halo micro-communities you find yourself in, your passion and dedication to this storied franchise are appreciated and cherished by thousands. Remember to keep active in the game, get in your reps, engage with other community members, and above all, have a blast doing it.
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