Using the jail Phantom
Posted July 9th 2011, expanded soon after
Setting up
In the final area of the level, a Phantom is triggered when you get sufficiently near the dam's pump station. It deposits troops just outside the 'jail' in which Johnson is being held prisoner and departs a few seconds later. But here's the thing. You can actually reach it to take advantage of it in various ways, such as stealing a plasma cannon, going for a ride to distant hills outside normal bounds, and even performing mid-air transfers to other Phantoms!
I recommend using Easy for all this fun. On higher difficulties things become rather less workable, though you might be ok for some of it on Normal. If you want a full Brute shot I suggest starting from rally point alpha or earlier. If you start from rally point bravo there are a couple of Brutes in the crashed Pelican area who have Brute shots, but you probably wouldn't end up with a full one.
Reaching the jail roof
The key bit of set-up play is to reach the jail roof with at least a few seconds to spare before the Phantom departs. I suggest going along the passageway via the doorway where you see 'PUMP STATION'. Typically you'd get at least one checkpoint somewhere between triggering the Phantom and emerging on the far side, making for convenient replaying of the various bits of fun. In particular there's a checkpoint associated with the triggering of the Phantom, and although it may initially be delayed by enemy threat, you might get it in the passageway having become sufficiently obscured.
At the jail there are various easy routes onto the roof. If you're approaching along the upper level at the back you can jump straight onto it, though there's also a wooden crate at the back corner which you could jump onto first if you like. From either the upper or lower level, you can hop onto a red metal awning on the side, then onto the roof. For obvious reasons you might want to kill the Phantom's right gunner on your way to the jail or once you're on the roof. All this is no trouble on Easy.
Departure variation
There's some variation in how long the Phantom takes before departing, so sometimes you'll have a bit more time than others when you get there. Doing some timing in Theater mode, it seemed to me that there were two cases. Either the Phantom leaves 'early' or 'late', and there's about 5 seconds difference.
Basic fun
Here I'll give the various bits of fun I described in the original version of the article, plus a newer bit about the stealing lots of plasma cannons.
Stealing the right cannon quick
For a first bit of fun, how about promptly stealing the near-side (right) plasma cannon? To man it, kill the gunner then jump across, turning as if anticipating your firing position behind the cannon, and holding down RB as you near it. If you're not turned well enough you tend not to get the manning prompt, and in that case you'd fall through to the ground. Hit B to detach it. Because the gun's platform is insubstantial you'll either fall to the ground or - if trying to move in the appropriate direction - the roof. It's okay to kill the gunner explosively by the way (I like using a Brute shot), as the cannon mount seems to be indestructible. Mind you, blasts will also move the ship away a little.
You've now got some handy heavy weaponry to help fight the enemy horde wherever you wish. You could use it to tackle bypassed enemies who may now be swarming near the jail or closing in fast (enemies from the other side of the river will have been triggered into heading here), or you could save it for when you're heading back after freeing Johnson. One idea for the latter is to go back along the passageway to attack from the original side.
Staying aboard on the right cannon
Instead of detaching the right cannon, you could stay on it and fire down on enemies. Mind you, the camera gets blocked by the Phantom's side when you're pointed in certain directions, so the experience isn't entirely satisfactory. If you bypassed most enemies during your run to the roof, you'll also be under heavy fire. On Easy you should manage to stay alive ok, but it seems unlikely on Normal or higher unless perhaps you've nabbed an invincibility gizmo from the chieftain.
When the ship departs you can continue firing at enemies for a while, but just past the dam you reach an invisible elastic barrier which the game wants to keep you within. The ship would normally fly through unaffected, but because you're on the cannon it gets stopped, sort of straining against it. At this point you're facing the wrong way (back towards the start) and the fun is pretty much over. If you release or detach the cannon, you'll fall to a watery death while the ship flies off on its usual path.
Getting inside the ship - and then onto either cannon
You can get inside the ship by leaping off the roof close to the edge. It's pretty easy, but if you misjudge it and fall to the ground you may still have time for another go. Part of the Phantom's side is insubstantial, letting you pass through, so there's a wider target area than you might think. You can jump through the section to the right of the cannon if you wish. Once on deck, neither gunner can fire at you, so you don't need to worry about that. Of course, you may already have killed the right gunner to make your approach safer.
You can subsequently man either of the cannons by killing the gunner (if still alive) then running forth while holding RB down. Originally I thought you couldn't move back from a cannon onto the deck, because every time I tried releasing or detaching it I fell through the platform, even when trying the obvious idea of quickly jumping back. However, it turned out that I'd just been getting the jump timing wrong. There's a small window of opportunity when a jump will take effect. However, instead of trying to get that timing right, it's easier to just mash the jump button fast, so that one of your presses is likely to occur in the window. That's the method I read about when doing some searching at High Impact Halo. While holding the movement joystick back, release or detach the cannon and mash the jump button (i.e. press repeatedly at high rate).
Inside the ship there there are a few invisible walls, and you can see enemy reinforcements materialize if you look up in the right place - and if you were early enough of course.
Riding to the dam
If you reach the deck and try to stay there when the ship departs, you can expect to slide around and end up falling out some point, while the ship heads off into the distance. A watery death is one outcome, but another is that you land on the dam, from where you could launch a fresh attack. If you want to take a trip back to the dam though, it's best to man a cannon so you've got full control over when you leave the ship, namely by releasing or detaching the cannon. In the latter case (detaching), you also end up with a cannon!
Note: if you plan to man the right cannon, it could be best to wait on the deck until the ship starts moving or is about to start, otherwise you might get killed from the pressure of enemy fire.
Shipboard gunning with the left cannon
If you get onto the deck then man the left cannon, you probably won't have any enemies to shoot at to begin with, but when the ship departs and ends up stalled just past the dam, you'll have a view back towards the jail and part of the dam, and should have plenty to shoot at if you bypassed most enemies (though as before, the camera gets blocked in certain directions). When you grab the cannon though, don't be holding a large weapon (Brute shot, battle rifle, sniper rifle, carbine, and especially not a hammer) else it'll obscure your third-person sight of the enemy.
Stealing both cannons
It's possible to steal both of the cannons if you're quick. First man the nearest one and detach it as you try to move towards the roof, so you end up there. Drop it onto the roof or the ground, then board the ship and man the other cannon. From here you have a couple of options.
One option is to detach it before the ship departs. When doing that you'll need to be trying to move away from the river or you'll end up in it. If you dropped the first cannon on the ground, you might now enjoy a close-up wholesale slaughtering spree. If you dropped the first cannon on the roof though, you could potentially jump up with the other one to attack from up there instead. On Easy, slaughtering covies from the roof is pretty good fun I have to say. My favourite weapon up there would be a Brute shot though.
The other option is wait for the ship to depart, then detach the cannon so you land with it on the dam.
Whichever option you use, you can potentially then move the cannons to wherever you like, for use after freeing Johnson. In particular you could set things up for slaughtering covies on the dam, though moving a cannon any significant distance is likely to be problematic on anything but Easy if there are lots of enemies still around.
Stealing lots of cannons!
Several days later, that previous subsection is a bit of a joke to me now. What I failed to notice is that when you rip a cannon off this ship, another magically appears in its place! It's just like the one I described in Plasma cannon jamboree, and I'm beginning to wonder if things might be like this for all Phantoms whose cannons can't be blown off (a trait which I think may signal indestructibility). It means you can quickly steal lots of cannons if you like. Detach one then quickly hit RB to grab its replacement. Repeat, and you can quickly have a nice collection. However, the game sometimes removes detached cannons when you're not looking, so you can't rely on them still being there when you want them.
With a pile of cannons assembled on the broken bridge outside the jail, I was wondering if I could destroy one of the final two Phantoms. However, I think they can only be destroyed by Hocus. I gave the first arrival all I could, but the best I could do was blow all its cannons off.
On the Phantom's roof
Fancy a ride on the Phantom's roof? You can get up with some boost from a Brute shot. Go to the roof corner nearest the front of the ship (you can stand on the slightly raised rim if you like) and have your back to the nose area. Jump up and backwards and quickly fire so the blast gives you extra boost. With practice you can quite reliably end up on or near the nose. As an alternative to using a Brute shot for boost, there's also the hammer if you killed the chieftain.
You'll slide off the Phantom's roof at some point, with potentially damp consequences, but if you can manage to stay on long enough you can end up on the dam. Indeed, that makes a nice challenge. I suspect it's even possible to reach the metal framework extending from the pump station, judging by how close the nose passes, but it would probably require a well-timed leap.
When you look at things in Theater mode, you may see that you weren't exactly on the Phantom's roof. In places there can be a massive gap between your feet and the visible surface of the ship, as if you're standing on an invisible outer surface.
Jailbreak fun
Shortly after posting the original version of the article, I realized that if you're super-efficient it's possible to free Johnson before boarding the Phantom. The great thing about this is that it triggers two new Phantoms for the final battle, giving rise to a whole lot of new fun including the possibility of spectacular mid-air transfers (Phantom to Phantom), all of which I'll cover in this section.
The first way I was freeing Johnson was to reach the roof quickly then shatter the skylight with a Brute shot and drop through, freeing him on the way down. But actually you can do things with comparable speed by entering through the doorway, especially bearing in mind that you don't have to go all the way to the plasma shield to deactivate it. So take your pick. Once you've freed him, exit and turn right to hop onto the power unit on the side, then to the roof to get aboard. There's potentially enough time even if the ship only drops one wave of troops. The number of waves depends on how much you've thinned out the covies; see Bad drop-off by the jail Phantom for more detail on that. Now I'll list the fun you can have.
Colliding Phantoms
The first thing I'll mention is that the jail Phantom potentially bumps one or both of the arriving Phantoms, which can be amusing to see in Theater mode or to watch from the ground sometime when you choose not to snag a ride. Impacts can be rather vigorous, depending on the timing. Evidently the flight path scripting wasn't expecting the jail Phantom to be around when the new ships arrived.
Dropping onto the dam for a close-up brawl
Now you're aboard the Phantom, the most obvious thing to do is let yourself drop to the dam to get an exceptionally early start slaughtering covies there. You'll potentially have them attacking from both sides and you'll also be targeted by multiple plasma cannons, though on the plus side you might have a cannon yourself. The chieftain's invincibility gizmo could be critical for surviving an all-out brawl here on Easy, depending on how many enemies you left alive earlier. If you want it in advance rather than relying on killing him on the dam, one way is to snipe him while he's still near the jail, shortly after he roughs Johnson up. In a save I got, it's lying near the power unit and I pick it up automatically after exiting the jail, so it doesn't cost me any time. Perfect!
Dropping onto the metal framework
Instead of dropping onto the dam itself, it's possible to drop onto the metal framework extending from the pump station (the framework you can jump down onto through a window in normal play). Actually, even if you land on the dam you could potentially get up there fairly quick with a grenade jump off a buttress, covie attention notwithstanding. It's a nice place to attack enemies from, but here's something else you can do from there. After killing the nearby gunner of the Phantom dropping covies on the dam, it's possible to leap across to man his cannon! You could always detach it of course, dropping to the dam to continue from there. If you stay manning it instead, Hocus will eventually blow you out of the sky.
Dropping onto the pump station roof
Another drop possibility is to end up dropped on the roof of the pump station at the start of the dam. Woo-hoo! I'd never been up there before. Very nice view indeed - I was in two minds as to whether to rain down destruction or just admire things! However, I think the opportunity for landing there is dependent on a suitable collision between your Phantom and another, bumping you higher than normal (I'll take a look in Theater mode next time to see what goes on), so it's not something you can plan. The best you can do is be alert to taking the opportunity should it arise.
Dropping onto the dam Phantom
Yet another drop possibility now, and rather a spectacular one. The ship which drops troops on the dam can pass underneath you so that if you release or detach a cannon to let yourself drop at the right moment, you can land on top, thus performing a mid-air transfer! The best cannon to be manning is the left one, as you're much less likely to get a transfer opportunity with the right - though I have done it from there. Things vary from play to play, but on the left cannon I was finding that I usually had a chance. Aim to drop on the front half of the ship (the second one), to increase your chance of getting stabilized on it rather than skimming off. I later found that it's also possible to drop from the jail Phantom's roof, as long as it doesn't depart too early (there's some variation remember). I count that as harder, but it sure looks good in Theater mode.
You can fire from on top for a while, and there's also the option of dropping to the dam. The ship soon moves back from the dam and it's actually possible to stay on top if you're careful, but you'll be forced onto the nose by an invisible wall which most of the ship moves behind (part of the player boundary I assume). In due course the ship gets rocketed by the ever thoughtful Hocus, which is likely to send you flying before the ship explodes. However, there was one time when the initial salvo merely dislodged me. By chance I landed on a piece of the other Phantom floating on the surface of the water, and glided serenely along on it for a while before it sank and took me with it. The game gave me a checkpoint just as I was sinking. Oh great!
There's one other idea I had in connection with being on top of the dam Phantom. Sometimes the other new Phantom takes station tantalizingly close after dropping its troops, and perhaps it's possible to transfer to it with a jump, boosted by a Brute shot blast or hammer. This second transfer would be a neat trick but I've not managed it so far.
Dropping onto the pump station Phantom
We're not quite done with the mid-air transfer business yet. As long as the jail Phantom doesn't depart too late, it's possible to drop onto the first new Phantom (which drops troops back at the initial pump station area), namely from the roof of the jail Phantom. The transfer may also be possible from a cannon but it looks less viable because you're lower down and with a rather obscured view.
Here's how my transfer went in detail. I got onto the jail Phantom's roof quickly and moved to the top of the hump. The ship moved towards the dam while rotating slowly anticlockwise and rising somewhat, and I made the transfer by backing off its right side. At that point the ship was not quite parallel with the dam yet, nor quite over it, and the new ship had been diverted underneath. I'd switched invincibility on in case of a heavy impact (earlier I'd been killed by impact), but this time I landed quite nicely. It felt relatively easy to get secure and remain on top. I subsequently did some shooting and grenading from the hump. When Hocus arrived I was expecting to get killed, but the rocket salvos to the front of the ship were well away from me. It sank back and down and exploded just in front of the dam, at which point there was extreme framerate slowdown. I was briefly supported by a piece of the roof and was able to take a few steps along it to end up alive on the dam. Woo-hoo!
While making attempts at this transfer, there was one time when my impact with the new Phantom knocked me over to the area where it was about to deposit troops, and with the aid of invincibility I survived. So that's something else you might like to try for.
Gunner to gunner
One little thing you can do on the jail Phantom's left cannon is fire on the gunner of the second Phantom when passing close by. I took a look at this in Theater mode and got a great view of myself and a Grunt just a few metres away, with cannons levelled at one another. Amusing.
Staying aboard
If you choose to simply remain aboard the jail Phantom to the bitter end and you're on the left cannon, watch out when the Pelican arrives. After destroying the usual two Phantoms, it'll rocket yours too. It doesn't destroy the ship which is apparently indestructible (not even its cannons can be blown off), but it sure as hell puts an end to you! Thanks a lot Hocus! The Phantom will then fly off on its usual path, now it's finally rid of its cyborg cargo.
If you were instead manning the right cannon however, you get protected from the Pelican's repeated salvos plus small-arms fire from allies, and it's a stalemate situation. I took a look at things in Theater mode and there was a Marine firing his spiker my way. When he boarded the Pelican he continued firing, but now in his static seated pose with weapon pointed down. The spikes still came my way though the Pelican! The gunner on the back was trying to get his gun pointed my way but couldn't, and meanwhile Arby was firing a carbine at the Phantom. Geez, doesn't anyone realize there's a cyborg aboard this thing?
Through the barrier!
In the Basic fun section I said that if you try to stay on the deck, you can expect to end up sliding out at some point. The main trouble there is the elastic barrier past the dam, which seems to force you out every time if you're still aboard at that point. Several days on from my original posting however, I've found a way to get through, which may be a first for single-player (though I know there's a co-op method going back to maybe 2007, in which one player mans a cannon to stop the ship at the barrier, and then lets go).
Departure alteration method
When making its drop, the ship isn't quite parallel to the river. It's pointing inland a little, but when it departs after rising, it likes to rotate left. It does that quite slowly as it moves towards the dam, practically flying backwards to begin with, and typically it hits the barrier at a rather oblique angle as the rotation continues. With nothing to properly brace yourself against, you get pushed out of the right side. Here's the thing though. If you give the ship some sort of nudge before it rises to depart, you can encourage it to rotate right rather than left. In that case the ship doesn't pull back to the dam so quickly. It gets its turning done much earlier and reaches the barrier pretty much square on, giving you a good chance of staying aboard. In fact, even if the ship rotated left after all, the nudge can sometimes cause a noticeably different flight, maybe resulting in the ship being more square on at the barrier; so you might still get through even in that case. But a right turn is definitely best.
So, what sort of nudge will cause a right turn? If you have Cowbell on, the quickest reliable method I found (when arriving in good time) is to fire two Brute shot rounds from the deck's front right to its rear left. That's quite convenient because you can be at your firing spot as you land on the deck, having jumped through the insubstantial siding to the right of the cannon. Another quick method is to fire four rounds from the middle back of the deck to the front left (note: using three only worked sometimes). With Cowbell off, try 12 Brute shot rounds from front right to rear left, all before the ship rises. For me that worked more often than not. Once the ship is rising to depart, I recommend standing at the middle back of the deck.
You'll still need a bit of skill to stay aboard near the barrier. There's a time when the ship is slanted right and you experience significant push in that direction, and that's the critical bit. I recommend facing the right exit for this. Anticipate the push and start to backpedal to begin to counteract it. The steeper the slant, the more severe your counteraction will need to be - and the higher the risk of going backwards out the left! With a bit of practice though, a success rate upwards of 50% might be attained.
Note: Just before flying off, the ship rises and moves to roughly its usual departure position, except it tends to be a metre or two higher than normal. So it's interesting that the nudge can nevertheless affect things.
Two things that didn't work
Before coming up with that departure alteration method, there were two other things I tried, which I saw in a forum thread at High Impact Halo. Someone wanted to know if it was possible to ride through the barrier, and a respondent gave two options. One was to be manning a cannon, and when the ship has stopped at the barrier, release with the back-jump method I mentioned earlier. But the ship always left me behind, gone before I could get back inside. The other option was to man a cannon just as you're about to reach the barrier, but I found it impossible to reach a cannon due to being forced back. Maybe those options are viable for some rideable Phantoms (I'm not familiar with them all yet), but they don't seem to be for this one.
The flight after the barrier
Once you're safely through you've got various options. The simplest is to just stay on the deck. In that case you'll find that the ship eventually vanishes, leaving you to fall onto a grassy hillside. Along the way however, the ship may pause for quite a while, apparently confused by obstructions. Quite weird. You could also jump out to land safely before the ship vanishes. If it gets held up as mentioned, watch out for cannon fire. Maybe you'll get some from a gunner too if you've left any alive. Actually it's quite funny killing a gunner in mid flight. I like how he almost instantly disappears from sight with his rapidly dwindling cry.
Phantom flipping
If you man a cannon before the ship vanishes (just run forth holding RB), the ship eventually 'dies' and falls to the hillside, which leads to considerable fun. Remarkably, hitting RB nearby causes it to 'flip'. There's no onscreen prompt but it's reminiscent of flipping other objects. This one is a good deal bigger than most though! At times it can be completely off the ground, so it's pretty spectacular. The best aspect however, is that if you're near the ship when you flip it, it can send you flying. If your trajectory is sufficiently low you can survive, and in Theater mode you may see dust patches as you scuff along to a halt. If you go high expect to die in mid-air, even if you've got invincibility turned on. Great stuff.
Also, have fun seeing how far back to the dam area you can get the Phantom. I got it as far as where the scenery extends down to the river, but at that point the ship went down the cliffside and into the water. Ah well, better luck next time eh?
Note: If you free Johnson before taking your ride, it's possible to get a checkpoint for the start of your flipping fun - ideal for getting yourself launched repeatedly or whatever. With the Phantom dead on the hillside, just wait until you get the checkpoint for the destruction of the final Phantom by Hocus.
Exploring
You've also got a massive area to explore, though maybe you've already done so by getting onto this hillside with another method. Watch out for the cyborg trap! Big hole in the ground. Also check out the thunderstorm in the distance, complete with lightning.
Fun with covies
From the hillside you can do some extremely long-range sniping on covies in the dam area, or you could head back there and deliver a spot of cyborg justice from above perhaps. Lots of opportunities there.
If you managed to free Johnson before taking your ride (which is difficult because you need to do your ship nudging early enough to cause a right turn), it's also possible to be in the final phase of the battle now, giving you the opportunity to snipe lots of covies on the bridge as Johnson & co fight there. You'll also get a novel view of the final two Phantoms getting destroyed by Hocus. Even from long distance though, those Phantom destructions may get accompanied by the bad framerate slowdown which can be such a blot on that final battle in normal play. It's also annoying that a checkpoint is triggered by each destruction. One of Halo 3's worst design aspects for me is its penchant for giving you frequent checkpoints, which typically eliminates the possibility of reverting to replay a battle (unless you do some jumping to get them cancelled - but that's a pain).