Halo Infinite’s New Event Is Your Reason To Redownload The Game

Screenshot: 343 industries

Maybe you have maxed the battle pass. Maybe you are distracted by the embarrassment wealth in the game at present. Whatever the reason, if you’ve bounced back to Halo Infinite, there’s an immediate reason to come back: the “Tactical operations” Event.

Tactical Ops, which started last Tuesday and will run through next Tuesday, is the latest limited-time event for 343 Industries’ multiplayer shooter. While the event is active, you’ll find Halo Infinite’s Tactical Slayer (née SWAT) playlist – in which two teams of four battle it out with no shields and no movement trackers – got a little makeover. .

Historically, Tactical Slayer starts players off with the Burst Combat Rifle. For Tactical Ops, you may also come across modal variants that see players start with the Companion Gun or Mangler. (Starting tomorrow, the event will introduce variants based on the Commando and Stalker Rifle, two new Halo weapons.) Luckily, since neither weapon is great within range, the size launch site map medium is not included in the rotation.

The two new variants are extremely fun and have revitalized the tactical killer mode. Matches in the sidekick version play out with the pop, pop, pop of a John Wick fight scene – players shoot frantically from the hip in hopes of a headshot. Meanwhile, mangler-based rounds are all-out chaotic brawls. The mangler – who you may know as kryptonite for professional Halo players– has serious bullet drop, which makes headshots more of an imprecise art than an exact science. But the mangler also only needs two body hits to kill, so that’s more often than not the best strategy. For the first time in Halo history, Tactical Slayer doesn’t rely on headshots.

Read more: Halo Infinite Players To 343: Skip the Pros, Don’t Nerf the Best Gun

Halo players have had nearly two decades to hone their skills with the Combat Shotgun. (It was first introduced in Halo 2 in 2004.) Now, Tactical Slayer is no longer a disciplined aiming contest. It is a measure of who has the keenest instincts or the biggest and clearest television. If you see an opponent first, you win. If they see you first, they win. The result is a game mode that, as the name suggests, is all about playing tactically: knowing the maps well, memorizing the best vantage points and hiding places, and moving carefully between them.

The Tactical Ops builds of Tactical Slayer, however, are anything but tactical. Since both weapons are ineffective at range, you can run around without risking getting caught by someone you haven’t even seen halfway through the map. You can run through levels in groups of two, three, or even four without triggering a multikill for the enemy team. In fact, since the sidekick and mangler can easily take down an opponent with body shots, that’s the smart move – roaming the maps like a pack of hounds, rather than the lone wolf approach encouraged by the typical tactical killer. All of this comes with a refreshingly silly Tactical Ops cadence not present in the standard BR-only release. More of this, please!

Like with all Halo Infinite eventsyes you can win a multitude of cosmetic options to meet challenges related to tactical operations. Much of the gear is actually pretty damn cool, including an amethyst-colored visor and a set of gloves that look like Iron Man’s repulsors. But even if there is no special equipment, these tactical killer variants, much like the attrition mode of the previous event only, are fun enough to stick around for good. Hey, Halo Infinite could use the extra playlists.