A jamboree of spectacular fun, courtesy of Halo's hidden catapult!

(7:51) Level 5 ('Assault on the Control Room') on Heroic. I showed a few force-launches from the bottom of the entry chamber in BCM242, but that was just a quick taster. Now here's a dedicated movie at last. Two minutes of set-up work showing how to get a handy launch checkpoint, then five and a half minutes of high-velocity spectacle - and there's more to come! As before, I'm not using thrust. All the power comes from the barrier force, pushing the Banshee up. It's Halo's hidden catapult!

Released July 18th 2017, gameplay recorded July 12th-17th 2017.

00:02 (Checkpointing) This two-minute clip is fairly self-explanatory but let me add a few remarks.

What checkpoint did I delay? It's not too important, but I delayed the bridge checkpoint (after saving a delayed tunnel checkpoint nearby). The advantage is, it's the closest possible checkpoint trigger. That minimizes retry time in the event that you fail the Ghost descent or whatever.

How did I get the Ghost to barrier level? See BCM242 for an example. But nowadays I have a more specific strategy for the Ghost blasting. I aim for my first blast to get it to barrier level or to the level of the bottom ring. That usually doesn't take long.

There's plenty of time to reach the bottom in the Ghost, but if you're slow and you hear the fuel rod shot going off, you can always start firing with the Ghost to maintain the checkpoint delay. Actually you could do without the slo-mo shot entirely, and use Ghost firing to maintain the checkpoint delay all the way down; but using a slo-mo shot is easier.

Give consideration to the final location and angling of the Banshee. Best not have it too close to the column or the edges, or you may have trouble colliding with stuff when launching. At 2:05 I look up to try and judge whether the Banshee's position is ok.

It's best to have full health for the launching, to help you survive impacts and landings, but somehow I forgot about topping up with a medkit. Oops!

02:17 (Launching begins) The launches were all done with that created save, except for one which was done with a similar save. I won't comment on all the launches, but I'll pick out a few specific aspects.

02:46 (Speedy fuel rod shot) Here's the first clip showing a speedy fuel rod shot. There's another at 3:14, and then at 3:50 I do one when angled downwards - and the shot still heads up at high speed!

03:22 (Tagging) You can have fun with tagging, as seen in these two clips. I needed two tags because one wasn't enough to destroy the Banshee. There are two more clips at 3:59, then at 5:07 there are three where I get tricksy and intercept a plasma. Notice how MC's death cry is sometimes comically adjusted in tone, when the Banshee is angled up. Some of my clips were selected specifically with that comedy in mind.

04:32 (Odd clip out) This is the one launch which used a different but similar save. I wanted to include it because it's funny. I put it after the clip which showed moving the Banshee nearer to the column, because it highlights the danger of getting too near the column.

05:46 (Rocketing my own Banshee) Amusing huh? It's surprising how quickly the Banshee catches up those rockets. Sometime I'll have to try getting the Banshee likewise destroyed by a plasma ball fired from a plasma pistol. Maybe you'll see that in a later movie.

06:29 (Through the ceiling) I've passed through the ceiling before - see BCM225 and BCM226 - so it was natural to see if I could also do it with force-launching. And after a while, it worked! This clip shows my first successful landing on the ceiling (I'd passed through it a few times beforehand, and gone higher, leading to death). Another example follows. I reckon I'm getting bumped through by the Banshee. But when angling up like this, the success rate for getting through is low. You need some luck.

06:51 (Angling down is better) You can get much better success rate by angling down to end up getting cleanly shunted through - and I got onto panels that way as well.

07:33 (How about going higher?) The final clip shows me getting some pretty good height above the ceiling, which obviously leads to the question of how high you can go. Well, see the next movie!

Closing remarks If you're wondering about the term 'deep' force-launching, that's what I'm calling it when launching from the bottom - as opposed to the launching I did in BCM232, which I'll term 'shallow' force-launching (shallow because you're only a short way below the barrier). I think I'm going to have to write a whole article on this force-launching business, there are so many facets. At present there's just a bit of coverage in my entry chamber article.

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