{"id":13920,"date":"2014-04-23T22:56:44","date_gmt":"2014-04-24T03:56:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/halofanforlife.com\/?p=13920"},"modified":"2014-04-23T22:56:44","modified_gmt":"2014-04-24T03:56:44","slug":"the-halo-bulletin-4-23-14","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/halofanforlife.com\/?p=13920","title":{"rendered":"The Halo Bulletin 4-23-14"},"content":{"rendered":"

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As I\u2019ve written before, holidays are pretty\u00a0fantastic\u00a0at 343. Sometimes we have unlimited amounts of Lucky Charms, other times we get\u00a0custom Halo valentines<\/a>.\u00a0Most times, there is a lot of delicious homemade food. This past Tuesday was Earth Day, and as you may have guessed, it was a pretty big deal here at 343. Sitting on each desk on Tuesday morning was a little surprise in the form of a custom-made trading card.\u00a0It is worth noting here that the cards were made from 100% recycled paper.<\/p>\n

The franchise team put together a collection of eight trading cards, each featuring a planet from the Halo universe, and gave each employee a random card. This made everyone excited, and also made some people want\u00a0all\u00a0<\/em>of the cards. I may or may not be one of those people. The planet I received was Earth \u2013 good place to start, I thought. I quickly looked around at neighboring desks to see which cards my co-workers had received, and immediately stared going through my inventory of Halo figures, dogtags, and other trinkets for items to barter with. Others were a bit more direct, and started negotiating trades on an email chain with the entire studio. This is when I knew things were gonna get serious.<\/p>\n

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By the end of the day, I had traded a set of Halo 4 Infinity dog tags for Sanghelios (URS IV), and was lucky enough to nab a Te (SVIR V) in exchange for a future favor. I realize this may have been a questionable decision, but I really wanted the card. At the time of this writing, I am still actively searching for the remaining five Earth Day 2014 Halo trading cards. I will find them.<\/p>\n

HFFL:<\/strong> Heh, glad to see the collecting bug has bitten Bravo! Now he is one of us! Well, me anyway…<\/span><\/p>\n

This week, we\u2019ve got a new issue of Halo: Escalation, a (heavy) Halo 4 Matchmaking update, and more. Let\u2019s chat!<\/p>\n

Matchmaking Playlist Update<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

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As we mentioned last week, we have some new stuff coming on the Halo 4 playlist front. This weekend will be the last chance to play Ninja Assassins during this rotation, so if you\u2019d like to grab some final screenshots or save the game type off to your hard drive, hop into Matchmaking. We\u2019re glad to see that the playlist was so popular as it became one of Halo 4\u2019s most popular Free-for-All playlists. Moving forward, we\u2019ll look to create additional unique and refined experiences for featured playlists, and there may even be a spot for a Ninja Assassins style gameplay in a permanent Matchmaking playlist. Speaking of bringing back game types, we\u2019re excited that Heavies will be returning to Halo 4 Matchmaking this coming Monday in a pretty big way.<\/p>\n

Heavies<\/span><\/p>\n

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Heavies was one of Halo 4\u2019s most popular featured playlists. There\u2019s something special about Spartans, heavy vehicles, and heavy weapons meeting in the middle of a wide open battlefield, and we\u2019re not surprised that the playlist was so frequented. We\u2019ve been listening to your feedback, and over the past week, we\u2019ve been doing some additional game type testing to prepare the playlist for its own spot in Halo 4 Matchmaking. Additionally, we added Heavies CTF into the game type rotation. As of Monday, Heavies will have a dedicated playlist, and the Ricochet playlist will be removed as we move the Ricochet game type into existing playlists.<\/p>\n

HFFL:<\/strong> YES! Heavies to be permanent!!!! Now maybe I can finish those dang Scorpion kills for my commendations! And what is this? Ricochet to be absorbed into another playlist? I love the game type, but agree that it should merge with another. I hope if goes to Grifball. Then maybe call that playlist: BALLS!<\/strong> LOL J\/K. (not kidding)<\/span><\/p>\n

The following game types will be available in the playlist:<\/p>\n