Huge Halo 5 update adds Forge mode, maps, and weapons

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Forge mode wasn’t ready in time for Halo 5: Guardians‘ launch, but it’s here now. The map creation sandbox debuts with some 1,700 objects and will continue to change as 343 Industries takes in feedback from players. Knowing how ridiculously good people have gotten with these tools in prior games, I bet we’ll see a bunch of impressive stuff out of the holiday break.

Today’s “Cartographer’s Gift” update also adds SPNKr rocket launchers, several maps (one for Warzone, one for Overgrowth, and two for Big Team Battle), and more in-depth control options. Well, that, and a ton of other smaller but still important things. Plus fixes for existing content.

You can read the full notes below or head to the blog post for pictures and a fancy layout.

Cartographer’s Gift [Halo Waypoint]

New Features and Content:

Forge is now available!
Added a basic implementation of File Browser. Players can now bookmark and share custom maps and modes through Active Roster, by following (or become friends with) a player.
Over 30 new REQs including weapons, armor, emblems, and more have been added.
Battle of Noctus map added to Warzone.
Overgrowth map added to Arena.
Entombed and Antifreeze maps added to Big Team Battle.

Commendations and Service Record for Spartan Companies have been added, and can be tracked on Halo Channel and HaloWaypoint.com.
Social playlists have been added (Big Team Battle and Holiday Social).
Holiday Doubles playlist added (ranked).
Advanced controller setting options have been added, including controls for aim acceleration as well as deadzone controls. These settings are automatically set to the previous defaults you’ve been playing on. Full details here.
Seasons for ranked playlists have been added; The January 2016 Season begins today.
Enabled the ability to purchase multiple gold REQ Packs in one single purchase, several of which include free bonus packs. (These will be coming online within the next few days).

Multiplayer:

FFA playlist reduced to 6 players from 8 players.
Fixed the Warzone Assault armory exploit
Replaced Scorpion on Recurve with Gauss Warthog.
Removed Mantis from Guillotine and added a Warthog for each team.
Fixed spawning bug that sometimes spawned a player on Red team in the Blue base on Deadlock at the start of a match.
Fixed an issue where players could escape Gambol’s normal play boundaries.

Added interactive switches to Deadlock to control window shutters and doors for each base.
Fixed a bug in Breakout that awarded kills after the flag has been captured.
Add Flag Grabs statistic to the post-game carnage report.
Fixed a Free-For-All bug where kills were shown in scoreboard rather than score.
Added medal for melee’s performed to an enemy’s back.
Added in-game text for Flag Driver medal.

Campaign:

Improved stability when joining a Fireteam’s Campaign mission in progress.
Joining a Fireteam’s Campaign mission in progress will no long force all Fireteam members back to the character select screen.
Fixed a bug on Guardians that hindered a player’s movement if they’ve died and were unable to complete the mission.

Ranking:

Adjusted CSR placements for SWAT and FFA playlists.
Fixed bugs surrounding players being placed too high across all playlists.

User Interface:

Lobby:

Amount of REQ Points and number of unopened REQ packs will be visible during intermission and in Lobby.
Fixed bug around Fireteam sorting – The Fireteam Leader will now be displayed at the top followed by his or her team in alphabetical order by Gamertag. For Custom Games, all other teams will be grouped together and then sorted alphabetically as well.

Active Roster:

Friend Status will now be visible from the Friends list so you can see what your friends are doing in Halo 5: Guardians.
Fixed bug around Friend sorting so it sorts online and offline friends alphabetically.

Spartan Hub / REQs:

REQ Rarity and Description will be visible for all REQs when opening a REQ pack or browsing your Collection whether you own it or not.
REQ Energy Cost will also be displayed for all REQs when opening a REQ pack or browsing your REQ Collection.

Spectate / Theater:

Added hidden controls to change player POV for up to 8 players in the match. Holding left trigger will enable the use of the d-pad and ABXY face buttons to change player POV on the fly. Players are mapped to buttons alphabetically.
Added ability to change player POV from the Scoreboard. Press the View button to bring up the Scoreboard; use d-pad to navigate and A-button to select a POV.
Fixed bug aroundPlayer POV Selector sorting. It will now sort by team, and then alphabetically by Gamertag.
Fixed bug around controls for Zooming while in Free Cam.
Fixed bug around not being able to hide the Player POV Selector in some cases when toggling UI visibility.
Fixed a bug where ending a theater film placed players into a solo campaign lobby
Added ability to play and pause film while UI is hidden using the A button.

HUD:

The location callout will now appear when dead, spectating, in Smart-Link, etc.
The Highest Score per Column in the in-game Scoreboard will have a visual callout allowing you to see very quickly which player has the most kills, most assists, and least deaths.

Controls: