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Halo 2 ODSTs

With the history and equipment of the ODSTs having been extensively elaborated on by now, I'm still more than a little bugged about the absense of many references to the ODST character in Halo 2. As different as they were in appearance to the now traditional standard, one can't help but wonder why they've taken the shaft so quickly. Allow me to elaborate. A common misconception is that the ODSTs in Halo 2 wore an early version of the ODST Battle Armor in H3, H3: ODST, and the various Legend episodes / comics / promotional materials. Some consider it retconned or noncanon since H3: ODST takes place at the same time as H2. Some don't even know there was a difference. I'm here to set that record straight.

The ODSTs in Halo 2 wore identical fatigues as the normal marines at the time. It was cloth, not a vaccuum suit. These fatigues are black and white, but other than that, the seams, the pockets, the camo pattern, and the protective elbow pads are exactly the same. This is a huge difference from the vaccuum protective suit of normal ODSTs. There are many other similarities between regular marines and Helljumpers in H2 too. The shoulder plates are similar. The ODST helmet is a modified version of the normal helmet with only a visor and chinguard added to encapsulate the head. Differences include gloves and the huge shin guards used by those ODSTs. These H2 versions also wear a bulky ballistic vest different from the standard marine chestpiece. So now that we have disproved the rumor that this armor is vaccuum-rated, it can be inferred that with all the similarities, this armor could also likely be allowed to be worn by normal marines and may even have olve-drab colored variations. In fact, Gretchen (Dutch's wife), in the ODST comics, has a green H2 ODST helmet and H2 marine chestpiece in a flashback frame.

So why wouldn't thse ODSTs utilize vaccuum suits after hot-dropping in to combat via HEV? Much like the normally-armored ODSTs in Combat Evolved, it's unknown. It is interesting to note that all of the ODSTs in H2 may have came from In Amber Clad though. Maybe that's all they were supplied with? At any rate, I hope to start a discussion here about possibly adding a little more information about this variant of the ODST BDU. It's certainly not the same and fills a completely different role and function than the vaccuum-rated body armor suit. --Nerfherder1428 20:12, April 25, 2010 (UTC)

"The armour worn by the Marines and ODSTs was designed to look as if it was produced by the same culture as the Chief's MJOLNIR powered assault armour, if not necessarily the same manufacturer"

— Art of Halo 3

The Art of Halo 3 supports the assertion that Bungie simply retconned everything from H:CE and H2, and decided to make sure everything in the Halo Universe has a meaning to their existence, hence why there's massive "absense of many references to the ODST character in Halo 2". In other words, they want to make everything in the Halo Universe to have a purpose and not purely for gameplay/eye-candy sake like they did in H2. That is also why Bungie had to scrap the old ODST BBA in Halo 2 and update it visually in H3 and technically in H3: ODST. Supporting this statement is also the concept art of the H3's ODSTs and the evolution of their BBA (a concept art of H2's ODST BBA that eventually evolved into the BBA that we see today in H3) that can be seen in the Art of Halo 3 (Page 8).- 5əb'7aŋk^(7alk) 20:42, April 25, 2010 (UTC)

ODSTs in Gameplay

This is something unclear: are the ODSTs in gameplay any different from the marines, graphics excluded? Should this then be mentioned in the Marines (Gameplay) page or should they have their own? Just asking.

PotatoBird 20:15, September 1, 2010 (UTC)

ODST Recruitment

The article says that ODSTs are recruited from the special forces branches of all the military services. But the only other special forces units I can find are Spartan. What other branches are there? Iceman117 21:35, July 3, 2010 (UTC)

Presumable the Army, Air Force, Navy and regular Marine Corps maintain their own special forces. Then there are the special forces of the various human countries and colonies, including civilian special forces. -- Specops306 ^{Autocrat Qur'a 'Morhek} 04:31, August 27, 2010 (UTC)

ORION

Why was the trivia about ODSTs being based on the ORION project removed? It came straight from Halo: Reach Datapad # 11. Whats the reasoning, it's something not many folks are likely to know and relates to this article very directly. SpartanSeries2 04:10, September 19, 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, I put it in there and someone has deleted it. The ODST is based off of the ORION project and this information is in the Halo: Reach game which is part of the actual story. Bugkill 16:11, September 20, 2010 (UTC)