Setting:Halo

This is a /v/ related article, which we tolerate because it's relevant and/or popular on /tg/... or we just can't be bothered to delete it.

This page is needs images. Help plz.

Hardcorez

Halo is a vidyagame series exclusively released for the ECKSBAWKS, ECKSBAWKS 360 and to the PC. The series was developed by Bungie, though Microsoft has bought the rights to the game. The Halo universe is pretty massive, with all sorts of media ranging from video games and graphic novels to action figures and a series of short movies released to DVD. It became famous for being the game that saved ECKSBAWKS from doing an Atari Jaguar by identifying an untapped new market of loud, stupid fratboys, and was the only reason anyone would even want to buy an ECKSBAWKS console. Its storyline is pretty much a copy of your everyday generic sci-fi storyline you can think of with a multiplayer that isn't too original either. It's also famous for its FUCKING cliffhangers.

/Tg/ isn't big on Halo and topics pertaining to Halo will normally be saged, trolled, told to go to /v/, or some combination therein. On /v/ however, Halo is.....still widely hated, then again /v/ hates video games in general.

Setting

The Halo universe takes place in the 26th century. Mankind, led by the United Nations Space Command (UNSC), has developed its own crude faster-than-light drive (the Shaw-Fujiwara Drive) and finally colonized other worlds. At its height, human civilization occupies nearly 800 planets, forming a ring of outer colonies and rings of inner colonies with Earth as its capital. This is not what they're talking about when they say Halo, mind you.

Sometime in the year 2525 (believed to be roughly half past three), an agricultural world in the outer colonies, creatively named Harvest, is attacked by an unknown force. In the succeeding months, all attempts to make contact, or even defend against the alien forces are met with swift destruction. It is not long before more colonies are wiped out.

The unknown menace finally identifies itself as the Covenant, a coalition of several alien races bent on destroying humanity. At first they seem to be doing this because that's just what aliens do, but later on, it is discovered that the story is somewhat deeper. Apparently humans are the descendants of an ancient super-advanced alien race called the Forerunners.

This made the Covenant kinda jealous, because it was them who first discovered the Forerunner technology, adapted it to their own, and finally started worshipping the Forerunners. Apparently, knowing that your gods had a favorite, finding out that it isn't you, and finding out that it's instead the species that invented truck balls upset them just a little. So, back to glassing. It's not long before the UNSC military, and humanity itself, finds out that it is being pwned. Clearly the only solution to this would be infantry in clever armour with a name in allcaps. This leads to the SPARTAN II program, humanity's last hope.

The SPARTAN II program

You have been called upon to serve, you will be trained... and you will become the best we can make of you. You will be the protectors of Earth and all her colonies.
— Dr. Catherine Halsey, founder of the program, to the young SPARTAN-II recruits

The Spartan II program was originally a super soldier project intended to fight increasing terrorist and rebel threats throughout UNSC space. It was masterminded by genius geneticist Dr. Catherine Halser who is a fucken HAWT MILF who is the founder and former director of the the project. She and her team visited practically all 800 planets in human space, trying to find children who matched the exact psychological and genetic profile of Big Boss that would accept her newly-developed super soldier treatments. In the end, over 300 children were selected for the program but only 150 were actually abducted due to budget constraints. Those that were abducted were replaced with clones so the families would never know they went missing. It is unclear why nobody pointed out this pointlessly angsty backstory would probably result in all of them turning evil like in every other game where this sort of thing is tried, or asked how a fighting force of 150 would be useful to an alliance with five times that number of planets.

The child-recruits were brought to a secret, heavily fortified military world called Reach. They were trained, given numbers instead of names, beaten, retrained, mindfucked, trained some more, and in general subjected to the kind of treatment someone who's half-watched parts of Full Metal Jacket thinks of as military training. Finally, the children, now in their late teens, were cleared for biological enhancement. Using the latest experimental treatments, the 150 were pumped full of drugs that induced their muscles to grow, enriched their blood, and increase their brain processing to the point some of them even knew how to set up a TiVo. They were surgically modified to give them superior eye sight, hearing, and ceramic skeletons. The procedures were so dangerous that over half of the remaining recruits were lost in the surgeries. Only about 33 of the original 150 survived the experimental augmentation procedure program that would've utterly crippled all those without the proper genetics (which makes you wonder how this process was developed to begin with). The result, however, were the Spartan IIs, who had a laundry list of biologically unlikely abilities. On the other hand, severe psychological issues result in them thinking all objects are exactly the same size for inventory purposes, from a rocket launcher to a pistol. This makes day-to-day life difficult, as they stand confused in front of their dresser trying to figure out whether to drop their car keys or wallet in order to put on their clothes.

Later, the super soldiers were finally given their signature green armor, a prototype powered suit called MJOLNIR (the second choice, as ALLCAPS was already taken). The suit added mechanically unlikely abilities to their biologically unlikely abilities, and canonically weighed a metric ton. Despite that it doesn't make people sink into the ground or fall through every staircase in the universe, thus showing Halo's fluff writers have no fucking clue what they're talking about.

Over the course of the fluff, the Spartans are sent into several missions that even the UNSC elite forces (the Orbital Drop Shock Troopers or ODST) can't go in. Basically, the Spartans Get Shit Done. By the time the Covenant starts to attack human worlds, the Spartan IIs have been in service for nearly a decade and they are quickly redeployed with the new MJOLNIR Mark-V armor, each complete with a reverse-engineered personal shield stolen from the Covenant. Almost all of them then die since in game (and even in some fluff) their armour provides slightly less protection than lingerie and the shield goes down if a space lizard sneezes on them. The rest of the fluff was apparently played on a secret super-easy difficulty where you defeat every enemy in the game with your penis in the first ten minutes.

UNSC Marines

"When I die please bury me deep! Place an MA5 down by my feet! Don't cry for me, don't shed a tear! Just pack my box with PT gear! 'Cuz one early morning 'bout zero five! The ground will rumble, there'll be lightning in the sky! Don't you worry, don't come undone! It's just my ghost on a PT run!"
— UNSC marching song

No, we're not referring to the jihading space Nazis, these are your everyday cannon-fodder from the UNSC who in fluff meet fates similar of the mobile infantry in the first Starship Troopers movie or your typical Imperial Guardsman. In Crunch, they vary from scripted death-by-anything to being able to laugh off multiple Fuel Rod Gun hits.

The Covenant

The Covenant are a coalition of quasi-religious alien civilizations that are far more technologically advanced that humans. They venerate and worship the Forerunners and are known to utilize some forerunner technology for their own means, giving them a colossal fleet of ships that outmatches the UNSC Navy. They are composed of the following:

• Grunts: 3-ft tall Cannon fodder/comic relief. They die like bitches.

• Jackals: Cannon fodder with energy shields. The literal roundshield type. A little tougher, and armed with Plasma pistols that can sear even through MJOLNIR armor. But they still die like bitches.

• Elites: Lizardmen IIIIIINNNN SPAAAAAACE! But without tails (they dropped them during development, because they had a... bad idea about where to keep those tails when Elites drove tanks). Forms the slightly more intelligent branch of the Covenant. As their name states, they are the Covenant's elite soldiery, armored with ancient ritual energy swords and armor able to cloak. Like the Jackals, the Elites are also equipped with Energy Shields, but these cover their whole body, just like those on your armour.

• Hunters: Some odd combination of worm/alien/giant thingy. They stand nearly 10 feet tall, but are actually a hive collection of worm-like aliens fusing together to form 1 giant thing. A single hunter is armored from head to toe in overlapping tank-class plate armor, vulnerable only to fire from heavy weapons and handguns. They are armed with powerful Fuel Rod Guns that can take out anything up to light armored vehicles in fluff and can deal anything up to minor damage to NPC Marines in the game.

• Brutes: Slightly intelligent Yeti/Cave Troll/Gorilla-like creatures......IIIIIINNN SPAAAAACE! Reputedly, they are the only race in the Covenant that had developed super advanced technology through constant warfare - namely, nukes - then became a space-faring race, then nuked their own civilization back to the stone age, only to claw their way back up to space-faring again...AND LEARNED NOTHING FROM THE EXPERIENCE (that is canon, verbatim). They later replace the Elites as the standing go-to force of the Covenant, and bodyguards of the Prophets, forcing the Elites into exile. WTF?

• The Prophets: They form the leadership cadre of the Covenant, claiming that they alone know the truth purpose the Forerunners had for them, leading the Covenant in a spiritual-militaristic philosophy called 'The Great Journey'. It was the Prophets whom discovered that Humanity was the genetic descendants of the Forerunners, and declared humans as a threat to The Great Journey.

Also, our only edge is that the Covenant actually think that tinkering with the advanced technology they dug up from the olden days is HERESY... ensuring that we can improve on it. It is often noted amongst mutual fans of Warhammer 40k and Halo that the Covenant closely resemble the Tau from Warhammer 40k as their philosophies are somewhat similar except that the Tau are Commies and predominantly Asians, while the Covenant are religious nuts with a little African and Brazilian thrown into the Asian mix. Also, Warhammer Fantasy fans might notice strong parallels to the Lizardmen, who are lead by the Prophet-like Slann and rule over three different races- the Grunt-like Skinks, the Elite-like Sauruses, and the Brute-like Kroxigors.

Battles with the Covenant by the humans have often resulted in catastrophic losses on the human side. On the ground, UNSC Marines, armored divisions, and Spartans can hold their own against their technologically superior foe, but it is a different story in space. Naval engagements almost always results in the obliteration of all human ships. The energy weapons of the Covenant ships are able to melt right through the meter-thick battle-plating of human warships. The only chance the Navy has are nuclear ordinances and massive slow-firing Coilguns called MACs (Magnetic Accelerator Cannons) that fling 600-ton Ferric-Tungsten rounds, able to break Covenant ships in half. Sadly we do not have enough of them, since each ship is only equipped with one or two of these.

The Flood

The other antagonists are "The Flood". A race of silly bouncing potatoes that exist only to infest other lifeforms and OMNOMNOMNOM them. They are more or less a viral form of the Star Trek Borg, and make you spout gross stuff and serve their hive mind if they touch you. They were the ancient enemy of the Forerunners and why the Forerunners built the Halo devices. Battles with the Flood destroyed the Forerunner civilization, as the flood could infest their own people and technology to use against them.

Finally, with all their massive fleets defeated, and all their soldiers massacred, the Forerunners committed mass suicide on a galactic scale to prevent more of their people and other fledgling civilizations from falling prey to the Flood, depriving the Flood of its essential hosts and food sources. The flood was finally died off due to starvation and were defeated...sorta. Small pockets of them hid themselves in the Halo devices waiting for the day the new civilizations would rise so that they might feed again.

This shows the Forerunners were completely incompetent and if The Flood hadn't come along they'd probably have been eaten by a swarm of rats eventually anyway.

Notable Quotes from Sergeant Major Johnson

"Men, here's where we show those split-chin, squid-head sons-of-bitches, that they could not have picked a worse enemy than the Human race! We are going to blow the hell out of those dumb bugs until we don't have anything left to shoot them with! AND THEN, WE ARE GOING TO STRANGLE THEM WITH THEIR OWN LIVING GUTS!"

-*-*-*-

Cortana: "The message just repeats...'Regret', 'Regret', 'Regret'."
Capt. Miranda Keyes: "Any idea what it means?"
Sgt. Johnson: "Dear humanity, We regret bein' alien bastards! We regret comin' to Earth! And we most definitely regret that the Corps just blew up our raggedy-ass fleet!!"
Marines with Johnson: "Hurrah!"

-*-*-*-

"Then listen up! When I joined the Corps, we didn't have any fancy shmancy Tanks. We had sticks! Two sticks and a rock for a whole platoon! And we had to share the rock... Buck up, boy! You are one very lucky marine."

-*-*-*-

"We lead those dumb bugs out to the middle of nowhere to keep them from getting their filthy claws on Earth. But, we stumbled onto something they're so hot for that they are scramblin' over each other to get it! Well, I don't care if it's God's own Anti-Son-of-a-Bitch machine, or a giant hula-hoop, we're not going to let them have it! What we will let them have is a belly full of lead and a pool of their own blood to drown in! Am I right, Marines!?"

-*-*-*-

Arbiter: "We must go, the Brutes have our scent."
Sgt. Johnson: "Then they must love the smell of Testosterone."

Warhammer 40k and Halo comparison

It's rather like that.

Spartan vs Space Marine in close combat debate

Seeing this kind of argument in a thread anywhere is sure to invoke RAGE of the umpteenth degree, guaranteed. The majority of arguments in favor of the SPARTANS neglect to let the opposition use an Independent Character; they consistently use Master Chief as the base of comparison to your average Space Marine. Which is at least a 125-150pt character against a 16pt Marine. Not a very fair assessment at all indeed.

This is a very sensitive topic and the authors of this page go into it with much hesitation. Nonetheless the subject has been brought up and must be address with as close to fair-play as possible. Basically this is your average Spartan ported into 40k:

WS 3 / BS 5 / S 4 / T 4 / W 1 / I 4 / A 1 / Ld 8 / Sv 4+/5++

Composition

3 Spartan-IIs
1 Spartan-II Squad Leader

Unit Type

Infanty

Wargear

• MJOLNIR Armor
• MA5C Assault Rifle
• Combat Knife
• Frag Grenades (Offensive)

Special Rules

• At All Costs - As per their tactical doctrines, Spartans are combat veterans of independent action and deep infiltration missions. They may spend weeks, if not months behind enemy lines while disrupting enemy movements even against insurmountable odds. They are psychologically conditioned to deal with such odds to achieve victory. Spartans gain the Stubborn rule from the Warhammer 40k Core Rulebook.
• Shoot First, Ask Later - Though trained in hand-to-hand, compared to other races who train constantly in it Spartans are rather poor at CQ combat. Spartans specialize in range tactics, as the majority of UNSC weapons are range-based and incorporated into their training. They prefer not to engage powerful enemies head-on. Even in points of being trapped into melee, Spartans will more often than not, disengage from it to use their range weapons. Spartans gain the Hit & Run rule from the Warhammer 40k Core Rulebook.
• Interface Targeting - MJOLNIR is not simply a suit of advanced armor, it is a battlefield processor with a sophisticated Neural interface, which can even be used to interface with AIs. In Warhammer 40k terms, such tech is at the very start of the Dark Age of technology. MJOLNIR's default up-link systems are so effective that if a weapon possesses electronic targeting, the suit's systems allows the wielder to interface directly with the targeting reticule of the weapon. Spartan wireless interface program their targeting systems so as to merge flawlessly with UNSC weapons, giving way to a precision of firing and accuracy that is as superhuman as the rest of the Spartan himself. The Spartan gain +1 to his Ballistics Skill (BS) when wielding weapons from the Spartan Armory already incorporated above in their stat line.

Options:

• May Include up to 4 additional Spartan-IIs for 18 points per Model
• Any model in the squad may take an Onboard AI for 3 points per Model
• For every 4 models in a squad, one model may replace their MA5C Rifle with one of the following:
  • M90 CAWS (Shotgun)...............................6 points per Model
  • SRS99D-S2 AM (Sniper Rifle)..................10 points per Model
  • M41 SSR MAV/AW (Missile Launcher)........15 points per Model

SPARTAN ARMORY

---

• MJOLNIR Armor - Created parallel to the SPARTAN-II Program, the MJOLNIR Armor is a sealed system, capable of extravehicular activity or operations in toxic atmosphere. Weighing over half a metric ton, the armor's shell is constructed in overlapping layers of Titanium-A plating and highly durable ballistic alloys of remarkable strength. It has even been augmented with a refractive coating capable of dispersing a limited amount of energy weapon strikes. The suit contains a gel-filled layer underneath a thick black armored bodysuit, which is then covered over-all by a thicker alloyed shell. The gel layer regulates temperature and can reactively change its density, allowing for unparalleled impact abortion. The inner skinsuit is made of a moisture-absorbing synthetic material linked to an environment control computer and the occupant's neural interface. Unique to the first Spartan IIs, their suits sports no heraldry or identifying marks, but rather bland militant colors, nor even wrappings and scriptures of religion, symbolizing that the Spartan IIs are not fanatics or zealots fighting for a cause, they are simply soldiers, machines of war. The Spartan gains 4+ Armor Save.
  • MJOLNIR armor is equipped with a full-body, recharging, energy shield that was reverse-engineered from captured alien technology. The finest human scientists worked for almost two decades before they finally succeeded in cracking the technology used to create resilient energy fields that could stop solid and energy strikes dead. The shield itself is utterly transparent and does not hinder sight in any way but briefly flashes a greenish-gold color when hit. The Spartan II gains a 5+ Invulnerability Save.

• Onboard AI - All MJOLNIR Mk V models or better feature a complex crystalline matrix within their neural interface, which Cortana likened in structure to the computer systems of the Pillar of Autumn, a souped-up variant of the 1100 meter Halcyon-class almost-cruiser, and which has far more processing power and vast extra capabilities available only to a truly sentient machine. An AI construct increases tactical awareness, provides an indespensable guide, serving almost as a co-pilot and navigator, and multiplies the Spartan's already phenomal reflexes five-fold. A Spartan equipped with an Onboard AI increases their Initiative value by 1.

• MA5C Assault Rifle - The MA5C has an attached electronics suite that provides information on rounds remaining in the magazine, compass heading, and capable of wireless up-link with MJOLNIR systems for incredibly improved accuracy. Made of Titanium Alloy and Polymers, the rifle performs well in a variety of environments. Having a rate of fire of 650 rounds a minute, and chambering the old-school M118 7.62x51mm NATO Armor Piercing, Full Metal Jacket Rounds, the MA5C is fully capable of a withering barrage whilst even in motion or on a charge. Though lacking strength and stopping power, these rounds are designed to pierce most conventional ballistic body armor.
  • It has have following stats: Range 24" / Strength 3 / AP - / Type Rapid Fire

• M90 Shotgun - is a pump-action, magazine-fed, dual tubular non-detachable type weapon. It uses the Soellkraft 8-Gauge Magnum Shotgun Shell, an incredibly large round capable of phenomenal stopping power.
  • It has have following stats: Range 12" / Strength 4 / AP - / Type Assault 2

• Sniper Rifle S99D-S2 AM - A.K.A. the "SR System 99D-S2 Anti-Matériel", it is a semi-automatic UNSC sniper rifle that fires 14.5 x 114mm APFSDS (Armor-Piercing Fin-Stabilized Discarding Sabot, with a tungsten or depleted uranium core) from a 4-round magazine. As a sniper rifle, it is fitted with a 5x and 10x optic that shows real time images in infrared vision when not looking through it. When looking through it, the scope shows a target's distance and elevation. The rifle is so powerful it even can be used effectively to fire at light armored vehicles.
  • It has have following stats: Range 36" / Strength 5 / AP 3 (When firing at vehicles, the rifle adds D3 to its Armor penetration value) / Type Heavy 1, Sniper

• M41 Rocket Launcher - A.K.A. The "M41 SSR" fires 102mm HEAP (High Explosive Armor Piercing) shaped charge rockets. The launcher sports a 2x scope and can fire rockets over long distances with devastating accuracy, and its two launch tubes allow the wielder to fire two rockets before needing to reload. The rocket launcher spreads a huge amount of damage over a large area. It is capable of taking out entire groups of infantry at any range and can kill both the passengers and crew of nearly any vehicle.
  • It has have following stats: Range 42" / Strength 8 / AP 3 / Type Heavy 2

See Also

• 1R0QU012
  • The CC Debate, in which rage ensues

• This guy (who actually tried to make a reasonable Spartan II 40k approximation, with accompanying plausible fluff. Beware tl;dr is present). From which the Spartan Armory (listed above) was derived.