Played the new LTM this evening for awhile. Think it's kind of interesting, but I'm not sure how I feel, which is weird as I thought I'd really like it considering Halo is probably my favorite FPS multiplayer game. It kind of felt like the purple+ armors were more rare, but it's probably just that I didn't know the locations they spawned.
Not sure how to feel about the Evo Shields. I think the initial handicap is quite brutal and makes them pretty much not worth wearing. It takes quite a bit of damage to get them to viability (purple equivalent). Then to push them into Red is even more damage, to where it feels like it's not even really worth shooting for just to add 25 hp. And then it just feels like I'd rather have gold armor anyway rather than 125 shield hp, because you can get back into the fight more quickly, and I think that's more valuable than just having 25 more hp overall. Though if someone is a Gibraltar main, it might be more worth it, especially coupled with his dome shield buff.
I think the inventory change, in particular the move to 1 nade per slot, was a pretty good call and something that needed to happen for awhile. The nade spam at times was definitely obnoxious, and I feel that they should definitely be more of a highly situational, tactical decision rather than something people horde then spam. I have to think this nade change cascades to decrease the need for Wattsons, which would be another benefit.
I think the lower ammo counts and heals per stacks is also good, though the healing item change was definitely throwing me off. Just from the little I played, it did feel like I was running around with less healing items overall, which is probably good.
Overall, the meta shakeup seems like it could be pretty good for the game at first blush in my opinion.
