New possibilities in gunner fun, by using a higher difficulty level…

(6:33) Level 2 ('Halo') on Heroic. New development in Warthog catapulting. I had a bit of gunner fun with Stacker in the last movie, on Easy, but I've now realised that Heroic is much better, as he can better survive the 2-grenade boost. You're no longer restricted to having to tag the hog. This makes for a lot more fun and much more control. Check out the new possibilities in this Stacker launching extravaganza - including an outrageous stunt at the end!

Released August 16th 2019, gameplay recorded August 10th-14th 2019.

00:02 (Setting up) To start with I show the final part of my new set-up. This time I get the hog more closely in line with the Pelican's path (previously it was a bit off-centre to the right). Another difference is that I've got four plasmas and one frag, which is ideal (see my article). One other thing: this time I've got full health, not that it matters much. 24 catapults follow, and I'll comment on each of them.

00:26 A fairly basic catapult to begin with. The hog lands neatly upright on the hilltop a good way off, and Stacker is fine.

00:42 Another basic catapult, but this time to the bottom of the valley. Stacker dies, unsurprisingly.

00:58 With those two simple examples done, I start to spice things up a bit. And of course, tagging the hog is a fine way to do that. This example features an appealing view of Stacker falling through the air against the backdrop of the ring. The clearly broken ring, that is. I guess Bungie never expected you to be up on this hilltop to see the break.

01:10 A comedy clip, obviously. The hog goes almost straight up, and I'm a bit too close when it comes back down!

01:25 (Stacker survival, upper valley) The hog gets catapulted almost horizontally, heading for the upper valley, and Stacker survives. The key to survival was that the hog didn't head upwards much. If it had, he likely would've died in mid-air from falling.

01:40 Another tag. The hog is initially rolling through the air, then the bang makes it spin even faster.

01:53 In setting things up, I deliberately left this Jackal alive in case he might provide a bit of fun. Here's one little example I got. I had a few other plays where Stacker actually survived to the ground and got into hostilities with that guy.

02:14 (Lucky Stacker tag) Here I was trying to tag the hog, but by chance I got Stacker. This was the first time that happened. He bails and goes boom.

02:29 I spent some time trying to get nice zoomed views of the hog suffering a plasma blast from tagging. This is one of my better examples, and as a bonus I manage to snipe Stacker's body as it falls.

02:42 Sometimes when Stacker survived a catapult, I had fun trying to tag him. This is one such case. I had various longer plays involving such fun but they would've slowed the movie down a lot, so I ended up only using a couple of the shorter plays, such as this one.

03:01 Occasionally I got killed by the hog as it scuffed along the ground. There was already one such example in the previous movie, but I've also got two amusing examples in this movie.

03:10 Another nice zoomed view of the hog suffering a tag blast. Then it goes spinning through the air before hitting the edge of the hilltop and vanishing over the edge.

03:21 (Deliberate Stacker tag) Another Stacker tag, but this time I'm going for it on purpose, using a precision routine. After throwing my boost grenades at a particular spot, I move away slightly to avoid getting blasted, then throw towards a particular bit of cloud. With this routine I was able to tag him quite often. This is one of the better ones, visually. Stacker bails as usual, and gets quite separated from the hog before going bang.

03:33 (Far hill) With the aid of a tag, I sometimes got the hog and/or Stacker's body to the hilltop across the valley. In this example I settle my sniper view on the hog as it slowly slides down and off the edge, but as you may've spotted, Stacker's body landed on the hilltop too, higher up.

03:52 I spent quite a while trying to get Stacker onto the adjacent small plateau, but it was hard. However, I quite often got him close, and he ended up perched on the cliff, such as in this example. Looks too steep for him to grip, but somehow he does it. I have a bit of fun tagging him.

04:17 A simple steep catapult from the end of my first day of recording. Two things I like about this one are the dramatic view of the Pelican as it passes overhead, and then the ending.

04:33 (Stacker sniped) Towards the end of my work on the movie, I finally put some effort into trying to snipe Stacker out of the airborne hog. A rather difficult task, but definitely something I wanted to include. I eventually managed a handful of successes, and this is the one I liked best. The hog and Stacker are seen quite well against the pinkish planet, and then you see him falling for a good few seconds.

04:46 A second example of me getting killed by low-flying hog. Pretty violent too! Hog wasn't taking any prisoners. You can just catch sight of the Jackal at the end.

04:55 (Deliberate Stacker tag) Again I'm using my precise routine for tagging Stacker. Comically, he gets blasted almost straight down into the cliffside area.

05:06 (Yo, Johnson!) In setting things up, I was using an old base save for doing stuff in the second half of the level, in which I was emerging into the valley with two Marines, one of which was Johnson. I deliberately left those guys behind in the valley, in case the hog might later land nearby and it might be amusing. In this case, Stacker's body settles very close to Johnson and I use it for a bit of comedy, as Johnson receives a sniper round from out of the blue.

05:29 Another zoomed view of the hog suffering a tag blast - and I also manage to snipe Stacker's body.

05:41 (Lucky Stacker tag) Final Stacker tag of the movie. This one was obtained by luck, prior to developing a precision routine for obtaining them deliberately. The outcome is very unusual. He appears to get killed as he bails - presumably because of some freakish contact with the spinning hog - and he drops two frags, which then get detonated by the plasma. This is the only time such a thing happened, out of more than fifty Stacker tags.

05:53 One last hog tag. I like the view at the end, as Stacker disappears; and then there's a crashing sound from the hog.

06:05 (Second bounce) This bounce trick parallels the ending of BCM371 of course, but this time I've got Stacker on board and he even survives the trip, with the hog landing neatly back on the hilltop, wheels down. Rather nice. It was a trick I had to work at, needless to say. I managed one other example, but this one was nicer.

Closing remarks As with the previous movie, I did a ton of gameplay and got a large number of good clips along the way, resulting in quite an arduous time trying to pick out and edit the best ones together. It's good to get this marathon job out at last. There's actually a whole aspect I've omitted though, deciding to cover it separately. Namely, times when Stacker gets ejected from the hog. I've got a load of footage of that, so that's going to be my next project.

When using my sniper rifle for getting high-magnification views, I realised that it would be better to have a higher look sensitivity, so I could track the hog better. I was using my usual look sensitivity setting of 5, but often couldn't keep pace with the hog as it fell, or with Stacker's body. For consistency, I stuck with it and just did the best I could. But at a later date, I might revisit the topic with a higher look sensitivity which allows me to track things better, and which would be more conducive to doing sniping.

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