Beginner’s Guide To Halo 5 Arena and Warzone – 13 Tips and Tricks To Get The Best Start

Halo 5 multiplayer delivers some of the most intense and finely-tuned action on next-gen consoles. With Arena presenting some of the best multiplayer ever seen in the series, and Warzone offering a truly unique first-person shooters experience, players will be spoilt for choice when it comes to finding modes that suit their style of play. However, there are some tips that you can take into battle that will help keep you in the fight to turn the tide in your favour. Take a look at VideoGamer’s beginner’s tips to take down the enemy Spartans.

How to recover health and shield

If you’ve just survived a shootout against an opponent, you should go and find somewhere to hide and allow your shield and health to recover. If you sprint following combat, your health won’t fill back up.

At the top of the screen you’ll notice a yellow bar. This is essentially a countdown timer for when your vitals will begin to replenish. Sprinting will stop this bar depleting, so crouching and remaining immobile will allow your health to recover the quickest. However, this leaves you vulnerable to other enemies, so make sure you find a safe place to do so.

Note that in some modes, like Breakout, your health and shields don’t recover during a round.

Don’t underestimate the power weapons

At the start of any Arena match, there’ll be a bunch of weapons littered around the map, while it can be tempting to go straight for the sniper rifles and rocket launchers, don’t ignore weapons like Needlers and Boltshots.

These weapons can still make a big difference in a dogfight, so don’t overlook them if you find one.

Travel in pairs

Never travel alone in multiplayer. If you’re running around solo and stumble across more than one opponent, you’re guaranteed to lose the fight. Halo 5 is a very well-balanced multiplayer game, so sticking together as a team can help turn the odds in your favour.

How to use grenades

In matches like Capture the Flag or Strongholds, where a large group of players will tend to cluster in certain areas of the map throughout the match, you can make the most of this knowledge and Halo 5’s grenades by chucking them into these locations. Grenades are incredibly powerful, and have a wide area-of-effect. More often than not, if you time it right, you’ll find yourself getting at least one or two “Hail Mary” kills per game.

Turn off assassination animations

In your control options, there’s the choice to “Disable Assassinations”, switch this to “on”. Although the assassinations look cool, they can take up to 5 seconds to complete, and you’re locked in that animation, which leaves you vulnerable to fire from other enemies. While it’s nice to sneak up behind and break the neck of an enemy Spartan, it’s stupid if it means you get shot down by their teammates.

Don’t Quit

343 Industries has sought to punish players who quit early. Those who persistently quit matches will be banned from matchmaking, which means it will be much harder to find games, especially against opponents of similar skill. Also, as there’s no join-in-progress, quitting means that the delicate balance of the tie is ruined for the other players, and you’ll leave your team at a massive disadvantage.

The game also punishes players who sit idle, so make sure that when you’re playing Halo 5, you’re playing Halo 5.

Aim for the head

Aiming for the head versus aiming for the body or legs makes a massive difference in Halo. The default aim sensitivity makes it easier to shift your aim up without over-adjusting and moving off-target completely, so always try to aim high and do more damage with every bullet.

In Warzone, stay out of the open

Wandering around the open battlefield, especially when close to an enemy-controlled zone, is asking for trouble. Try to move from cover-to-cover (behind rocks, in tunnels, amongst clusters of trees etc.) in order to obscure line-of-sight of your opponents’ aim, enemies whom you potentially may not even see.

Don’t sell all of your Requisition Pack items

When you open a new Requisition Pack, it can be tempting to sell lesser-quality items like the Mongoose, especially as they start to stock up. But in Warzone Assault, you’ll find yourself using Req items with much more frequency than in standard Warzone, so make sure you have a decent stock of each item in your collection.

Don’t worry about earning RP unless in Warzone

While you earn small amounts or Requisition Points in Arena, you earn significantly more from a single match of Warzone. While it’s fun to unlock Requisition Packs and see what goodies you unlock, if you prefer playing Arena, then focus on this and only worry about your RP balance when playing Warzone. You’ll begin to earn loads of points when you play the mode.

Plus you’ll still earn Requisition Packs in Arena through performance and ranking up.

Don’t stress about your performance until you’re ranked

Your first ten matches in any playlist in the Arena are used to judge your skill. You’ll be matched with opponents of varying ability in order to judge which playlist rank best suits your skills. Don’t worry if you have one particularly bad game amongst these ten, the judgement is based on win/loss of the whole team, too. Once you have these ten matches, you’ll find that the balance is much more even and games will be much closer.

In Warzone, EVERYONE is after the AI bosses

AI bosses are not only a great opportunity to score points for your team, they’re also a good chance to kill enemy Spartans. When an AI boss appears in Warzone, be mindful of the fact that everyone wants to kill it. Don’t focus all your attention on the boss, keep your eyes on the terrain and see if enemies from the other team have left themselves exposed while trying to kill the boss, and take them out while you’re there.

Warzone is not Slayer

You need to remember that Warzone is not a big game of Team Deathmatch. You need to be completing objectives and looking to take enemy-controlled zones in order to score points. You’ll notice that killing enemy Spartans doesn’t score that many points, whereas killing bosses and legendaries does. You can have the most amount of Spartan kills on your team and still finish mid-table.

Be a team player in Warzone if you want to score the most points, and more importantly, earn the most amount of RP and XP from each game.