Time to polish up your needler, for the explosive 'arc of death'!

(6:16) Level 2 ('Halo') on Legendary. This shows how to set up the 'arc of death' scenario I described in 2005. Basically you end up with a bunch of covies hanging back along an arc and standing amid loose plasmas, waiting to be slaughtered. It's an explosive business, and needler heaven! I used Legendary here because you get the most dropped plasmas and the most covies (15), but it's pretty severe combat-wise. I've included some demo play but the main carnage will come in the next movie, so stay tuned!

Released November 14th 2018, gameplay recorded November 9th-13th 2018.

00:02 (Setting up) I've detailed the set-up work in my newly revised article, so I won't repeat instructions here. I'll just comment on a few specifics. At the start I'm bringing along an extra weapon, besides my full needler and pistol. Namely, a full plasma rifle from a Banshee pilot.

00:14 I help the covies kill my allies, and it's over nice and fast. Usually it takes longer, especially killing the two crewmen who keep taking cover.

00:56 Covie killing and weapon collecting begins. With this initial group I use the tactic of leaving just a needler Grunt alive, making it pretty easy to do collecting, even though using Legendary. He hurts me a bit, but it doesn't matter because I can use a medkit while up on the structure. After a while I kill him to get the next dropship.

02:21 Here you see me completing a group of three full needlers. But with the arrival of dropship 2 - the troops from which are shown in the subsequent clip - I got a fourth needler, which I then kept with me. In regard to my layout of spare weapons, I put the covie weapons near the wall but had the AR separate, near the rock. I put the extra pistol quite far back, as I wasn't anticipating needing it much.

02:30 Slaying the final Grunt from dropship 3, I'm close to the structure so I take the opportunity to do a late top-up on pistol ammo, judging that I'll have time to get back safely before dropship 4 descends. I ended up having over ten seconds to spare, so it worked out fine. It was only a luxury though; I could've made do with the spare full pistol I already had.

02:40 Here I retreat to safety until the dropship 4 Elites retreat to the arc. But in an insert clip I illustrate the danger of hanging around at the cover rock; the covies can briefly advance. On a bad day you might even get attacked around both sides!

03:06 Back at the cover rock I reduce the covies to only two, triggering the final dropships. I left two Grunts, though I could just as well have had two Elites if I wanted. Note that when I turn my back on the arc, some bodies get removed from near the rock on the right. Some plasmas too I think. Really I should've kept the arc in sight, to prevent grenade loss. Then my save might've had a few more lying around, for chain reactions.

At 3:22 you can briefly see most of my spare weapons. In retrospect I wish I'd made the plasma pistol more separate for easier selection. In later playing I was occasionally picking up the plasma rifle by mistake.

03:44 Here you see the dropship 5 troops arriving. A short while later the dropship 6 guys turn up, and then I get and save my delayed checkpoint. Total set-up time as measured from when I dropped down into the area: about 11 minutes. There are 4 Elites, 10 Grunts and 1 Jackal.

One thing not mentioned in the movie is that the troops from ships 2 and 3 sometimes fail to come to the arc. I didn't want to get sidetracked into explaining that potential hiccup. See my article.

03:55 (Demo play) Here's a fairly action-packed demo play of the save, with a big chain reaction quite early on. Later there's a close call with a raging Elite, who I though had died. The sound of his plasma pistol alerts me and I improvise with a needling trick. Rather dangerous on Legendary, but I escape with two health bars. Right at the end you begin to hear some intercom chatter, and a checkpoint was due.

04:53 (Eliminating music) Later I modified a copy of my save as shown here, to form a new save in which the music is over and no checkpoint is due after wiping out the covies. An easy job of waiting around and getting a new delayed checkpoint from the chatter sign-off. I could've got the checkpoint a bit earlier (when the troops had all arrived), but elected to wait until the Pelican was off in the distance.

Incidentally, I also adjusted my layout of spare weapons a bit. The main thing there was, I didn't really like the AR where it originally was, because its icon kept flashing up on my HUD when I was fighting - and I'd only rarely want to use it. So I moved it against the wall, where it would be more out of the way.

05:21 (Music-free demo play) Another demo play to finish, this time with my music-free save.

Closing remarks I'm glad to finally be giving this old topic the movie treatment at last. I'd wanted to for ages, but kept putting it off as it felt like a daunting task, plus I knew I'd need to spend a bit of time getting re-acquainted with it. Next instalment coming up soon!

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