The Package/Walkthrough

Template:Walkthrough Infobox This is a walkthrough for the Halo: Reach level The Package. It is written for play at the Legendary difficulty, but contains notes for lower difficulties. This is the ninth level of Halo: Reach. For this mission you are joined by Noble Team. Your Mission is destroy Sword Base to keep valuable information out of Covenant Hands. Or is it?. Your initial loadout for this mission is your trusty MA37 Assault Rifle and the M392 Designated Marksman Rifle. It is important to note that as this walkthrough at the Legendary difficulty, all strengths of enemies reflected are at the Legendary level.

Torch And Burn (Mission Start)

Smoke 'Em If You Got 'Em

Before you run forward, grab your DMR and zoom in. Look at your enemies. You have two Shade turrets, two Ghosts (though one may be hidden at first it is there) a sniper in the Deployable lookout tower with a Focus Rifle and a plethora of Grunts with Fuel Rod Guns. Now you can go in and pick off your enemies at your leisure but if you want to make the next section a cake walk you'll have to do this fast, to keep your soldiers alive as long as possible. There is a building directly in front of you and you can enter from the back right side. This will bring you into a room that has decent cover and good vantage points for killing. turn to the right and move until you can see the low ground Shade. You should be able to easily snipe the Grunt in it before anything else starts. Turn left and quickly move to take the sniper in the Tower before he can really start on your troops. The next one is a little harder. The high ground turret is going to focus on you. At this point it is easiest to kill the grunt inside aim a little high of the center line and take out the Grunt with a head shot. You'd think the next move would be the Ghosts, but it's not. Concentrate on killing all the Grunts with Fuel Rod Guns. They'll do the most splash damage and kill your guys faster than the Ghosts. If the opportunity arises quickly headshot the drivers of the Ghosts. Since these Ghosts are driven by Grunts, their methane tanks stick up over the cowling of the Ghost. Hit the methane tank with a few bullets and the Grunt will die. Before you advance have a look around the Tower and in it. You can grab the Focus Rifle for your Assault Rifle. If you have only one soldier left don't do anything with him, but if you have more than one you can give one or more Fuel Rod Guns. Make sure to leave at least one with regular weapons.

My Gun Is Bigger Than Your Gun

You will advance and find a Scorpion Main Battle Tank. The reason you left one of your ODST's without a Fuel Rod Gun was so that he will man the turret, if everyone has a Fuel Rod Gun, they just sit on the treads. While it is advantageous to have many Fuel Rod Guns, should your Scorpion take damage they are the first to die, where if you have someone in the turret they will last much longer and be able to provide constant support. Your Scorpion is like every vehicle, destructible and extra assistance will keep you intact for a greater period of time than on your own. Hop in. Your ODST's will hop on the treads or the machine gun turret. Destroy the tower in front of you, but don't move just yet. Traverse the turret to spot another lookout tower between two rocks. Fire at the tower to destroy it and ease your progress. Start moving down the road. A Shade emplacement is on your right, near where the second lookout tower was. Kill it quick, then proceed. The Scorpion is powerful but it's quite fragile for a tank. Try to avoid taking damage if at all possible. At the far end of the road here is another Shade and various baddies. Destroy the Shade first, then bombard the ground troops at range. Make sure any Elites are dead before proceeding. Although the Scorpion's shells are more accurate than the Wraith, the tank has a large dead zone where the main gun can't target enemies. If any Elites get close, you can easily be hijacked and killed. As you come to the turn you will be faced with several Ghosts, which you should blow into tiny little pieces. Proceed along the road and you will see the first of the AA batteries you need to kill. Stay in the tank, there's no need to go inside the AA guns this time. Pound both into oblivion with the Scorpion's main gun. Once one of the AA batteries is dead you will be attacked by Banshees. Line up with the turret and let fly, one hit will take out a Banshee. You will need to lead your shots slightly at long range, the Scorpion's cannon does not fire hit-scan projectiles. The few ground enemies here will be slaughtered by friendly Falcons once the AA turrets are down. Proceed along the road. Another deployable lookout tower will be in your way, destroy it and advance. The Grunts on this tower are equipped with Fuel Rod Guns and can survive the destruction of the tower so be careful. There will be an outcropping of rocks here with more Ghosts for you to send flipping into the air. The terrain makes targeting them a bit irritating. Hang back until they expose themselves, then snipe them with the main gun. Now before you advance, it is important to note how to do it. One way will almost certainly render you without ground transport and with a high probability of being dead, the other should provide you with just enough of an advance that you can engage without getting slaughtered. Go around the rocks clockwise, do NOT go through them. This will leave you enough declination for your cannon to engage the Revenant in front of you. There is a Fuel Rod Shade on an outcrop directly behind the Revenant at your 12 o'clock, destroy it quickly before it notices you. The Shades in this section (there are four) are hard to spot if they aren't firing. Look for the muzzle flashes and follow the projectiles to discover their locations. At your 2 o'clock is a standard Shade that is probably firing at the Falcons helping you out; destroy it as well. To the left of this Shade, at approximately 1 o'clock, is a second standard Shade. It's much farther away, so give it a few rounds to ensure its destruction. DO NOT move past the wall on your left yet. Once you've dealt with the Revenant and the first three Shades, turn your turret to the 10 o'clock high position and slowly advance. There is another Fuel Rod Shade up on the ridge across from you. It's hard to notice until it starts shooting at you, because it's so far away and blends well with the landscape, but it is directly to the right of some maroon containers. If you're lucky, it will be shooting at your Falcons and you can kill it easily before it fires at you. Line up your shot and plaster the area with shells. If you see green, retreat! The Fuel Rod Shade will destroy the Scorpion very quickly if it hits you. Rinse and repeat, eventually you'll kill it. then pull out and turn left. There will be a Revenant hovering near the door of the base, destroy it. Hop out of your Scorpion and go under the wall into the base.

Latchkey (Rally Point Alpha)

This Used To Be Such A Nice Neighborhood

Bring out your DMR. Rejoin your team and help clear the exterior. Then head into the Garage, there are a couple of Plasma Turrets here. Term them and grab one. head to the right between the trucks and you'll find some ammo for your DMR. Head up and you'll come to a room with some Armor Locks, swap your sprint for now. There are going to be many Kig-yar in this room as you go up there are Majors, Minors and Snipers. Term them all with your DMR and move forward. As the top is the snipers' Focus Rifle which may have more ammo than yours, grab it and reload your DMR from the case on the right. Grab your sprint from the bottom because in a little bit it's going to be handy. head out and your going to come to the same large room you had to fight to the top in ONI: Sword Base, only now it looks like the day after a Superbowl victory party, only more charred. There are a number of Cloaked Spec-Ops Elites here. Wait for your team to reveal them and then finish them off. A Elite General will come out. Use your Focus Rifle to cook him crispy golden. Laugh with Glee at the ease of this mission and move on to detonate the facility.

This Cave Is Not A Natural Formation (Rally Point Bravo)

The Lady Gave Us A Job To Do

Well, that sucked. Thought you were getting off easy huh? Not a chance. Get a move on, run over to the door (you kept the sprint for a reason. Load up your DMR off the Wall and if you want grab a M6G Pistol for your Focus Rifle, but if you're still over 50% you may want to keep it. Grab a Jet Pack off the wall and head away from the door to get to work. Activate the turrets using your jump jet to stay in the rocks for a straight line, in this order D, A, B, C then you have a choice to make. Choice A is to take the easy way out. Choice B is a little tougher, but Oh, so rewarding.

A. Ring Of Fire

Don't rejoin your buddies after activating the fourth turret. stay in the rocks between turrets B and C and pick off whatever you can see and hopping out only to reactivate the turrets creating a circle of death that will quickly annihilate the Covenant forces. Eventually you'll get to the point where there's a Wraith dropped to your left. Snipe the turret operator and then board and hijack it. Now drive around and kill everyone. Enjoy the carnage. Go to the door and head in. Another method is to go activate the turrets and retreat. Grab a Grenade Launcher and wait for a Banshee to attack you. EMP it and steal it. Fly high. Drop bombs. Laugh maniacally. Keep in mind that this strategy is only really plausible early in the fight when the Wraith isn't bombarding you and the turrets have the attention of the infantry. If you wait, hijacking a Banshee gets much harder.

B. Remember the Alamo

Once the last Turret is active go back to the defensive position at the door. Hold fast against the vast hordes of Grunts, Jackals, Brutes and Elites that assault. There is enough ammo and equipment at the door to hold off five times the number of enemies that appear here. You can use the Spartan Laser to finish off the General with the Energy Sword and open the door. Unfortunately because of your position, exiting to rearm turrets is problematic, as death is a distinct possibility. Stay in and use your DMR and the Grenade Launcher to kill. Once the General is down, Dr. Halsey will call for you to enter the lab.

Legendary Notes

• The Scorpion is not invincible, don't take chances, fire lots of rounds into the areas ahead of you to clear them out. Especially if you don't have support troops on the turret and treads.
• Watch for the explosive canisters, you can detonate them to help clear enemies in certain areas or they can kill you.
• There's plenty of DMR ammo here, you can pretty much complete the level using only your DMR.
• Your squad is ruthlessly efficient in the open spaces, let them stay to the front and bear the brunt of the attacks while you sit back and pick off the enemies that they leave weakened and stunned.
• When in the cave, if you choose to defend the door, stay under the center in order to avoid being killed by Wraith Plasma or Phantom cannons.
• If you can hijack a Banshee (as suggested by Emile-A239) you can strafe and clear the areas really quickly.
• Good Skulls here are Catch, Thunderstorm, Tilt, Black Eye and Cloud. They make this level infinitely more challenging and leave you feeling like a god when you finish.
• The Hologram can be an valuable aid in distracting the Jackals.
• Using a Plasma Pistol to overcome shielding can increase your effectiveness for those who have difficulty with accuracy, or those short on ammunition.

Notes for Lower Difficulties

• The only real difference between approaching this level on lower difficulties is that you can get away with jetting around, reactivating turrets during the firefights to assist in the killing.

Statistics

Achievements

• Tank Beats Everything- Reach ONI: Sword Base with your Scorpion intact on the Legendary Difficulty. There are many ways to achieve this, depending on your individual strengths as a player. You can use a second vehicle to complete then go back, you can walk (although this is really long and not reccomended) or just play through and use the tank as effectively as possible. One of the easier achievements to earn.

Preceded by New Alexandria

Halo Reach Campaign Walkthrough for: The Package

Succeeded by The Pillar of Autumn