Halo Infinite December Mid-Season Update – Patch Notes

Updated: December 19, 2023

New Features

This update brings new content, numerous bug fixes, and several new features to Halo Infinite. For a full list of this update’s bug fixes, see the Resolved Issues section below. New features and content included in this update are:

New Multiplayer Mode: Firefight: King of the Hill

A new variant of the Firefight multiplayer game mode, which was first introduced in Halo 3: ODST, is now available in Halo Infinite Matchmaking and Custom Games. In Firefight: King of the Hill, a team of players must battle against Banished forces to capture and maintain control of a zone. Skulls, which act as gameplay modifiers, can be earned or lost when capturing the hill. To learn more about the Firefight: King of the Hill mode, visit the "Firefight: King of the Hill Preview" blog on Halo Waypoint.

Alongside this update, the Normal and Heroic difficulty variants of Firefight: King of the hill are now available as standalone matchmaking playlists. These playlists contain the same nine maps, including an all-new map based on the House of Reckoning from the Halo Infinite Campaign. The full map list for these playlists is as follows:

• Behemoth
• Deadlock
• Exiled
• House of Reckoning
• Kusini Bay
• Launch Site
• Live Fire
• Oasis
• Vallaheim

The Firefight: King of the Hill playlists will also serve as a testbed for a new networking model in Halo Infinite. The development team will be monitoring backend metrics, Halo Support bug report tickets, and player feedback to determine how this new networking model is working. If you encounter any issues in the Firefight playlists that may be network related, please submit a ticket so the development team can investigate! For more information on this change, visit the "December Mid-Season Update Preview" blog on Halo Waypoint.

Artwork for Firefight: King of the Hill on Heroic difficulty, which depicts a group of Spartans fighting Banished forces in the House of Reckoning. The artwork for the Normal variant features a smaller wave of Banished enemies.

New Equipment: Repair Field

When deployed, the Repair Field equipment sticks to a surface then creates a spherical zone in which both players and vehicles are healed. The Repair Field can stick onto vehicles, Spartans, and most environmental surfaces. In modes that feature revive orbs, such as Firefight: King of the Hill or Attrition, the Repair Field will revive any downed players in its radius.

In all situations, the Repair Field heals Spartans and vehicles regardless of team affiliation. In other words, a misplaced Repair Field can help the enemy team more than the player's team. When playing against enemy AI, the Repair Field will also heal nearby enemies, but it will not revive any AI enemies. 

The Repair Field emits a green sphere effect which highlights any vehicles or players it is currently healing.

The Repair Field is only available in Halo Infinite Multiplayer and will spawn on Equipment Pads placed throughout various maps, including existing maps released prior to Season 5. The Repair Field is also available in Custom Games, Forge, and Academy's Training Mode.

Customs Browser: Fireteam Joining and Other Improvements

If enough player slots are open, Fireteam Leaders can now bring their Fireteam with them when joining a match listed in the Customs Browser menu. This will allow groups of players to join Customs Browser sessions without needing to leave their existing Fireteam.

When a Fireteam joins a Customs Browser session, their Fireteam will merge into that session's Fireteam. This means that the joining group will not be able to leave together and that the Fireteam Leader of the joined match now manages their Fireteam.

In addition to the above Fireteam changes, a number of issues related to joining Customs Browser sessions have been addressed:

• Players are now less likely to see an error when joining session after the Halo Infinite development team makes a backend service update.
• Players will now receive a more specific error message when joining sessions that have since been filled by other players.
• Joining a session that has since been deactivated will now result in an error message.

Note: Custom Games support a maximum of 24 players and 4 Observers, for a total of 28 players in a single match. When joining a Customs Browser session, Fireteam Leaders should select a match that has enough open slots out of 24 possible players, not 28 players. Observers cannot be added to an in-progress Customs Browser session, so attempting to join a near-capacity match with a maximum player count of 28 may result in an error message saying that the match is full. 

Forge Mode Improvements

Bosses and High Value Targets as Enemy AI

The following bosses and High Value Targets from the Halo Infinite Campaign can now be added to Forge maps:

• Arthoc
• Balkarus
• Barroth
• Bassus
• Bipbap
• Briglard
• Chak 'Lok
• En 'Geddon
• Escharum
• Harbinger
• Hyperius
• Ik'Novus the Devourer
• Inka 'Saham
• Jega 'Rdomnai
• Myriad
• Okro 'Vagaduun
• Ordo 'Mal
• Skimmer Alpha
• Thav 'Sebarim
• Tovarus
• Tremonius
• Writh Kul
• Zeretus

Screenshot of Bipbap, Writh Kul, and Tremonius on the multiplayer map Oasis.

Skull nodes

Skulls, which originally acted as gameplay modifiers in the Halo Infinite Campaign, can now be added to Halo Infinite multiplayer maps via Forge's Node Graph menu. The full list of supported Skulls includes:

• Bandana: Grants unlimited weapon ammo and grenades, and removes equipment cooldown.
• Black Eye: Your shields only recharge when you melee enemies.
• Blind: Heads-up display (HUD) and weapon do not display onscreen.
• Boom: Doubles explosion radius.
• Catch: Enemies throw and drop more grenades.
• Cowbell: Acceleration from explosions is increased.
• Famine: Weapons dropped by enemies have half the ammo they normally would.
• Fog: Disables motion tracker.
• Grunt Birthday Party: Grunt headshots lead to glorious celebrations.
• IWHBYD: Rare combat dialogue becomes more common.
• Mythic: Enemies have increased health.
• Thunderstorm: Upgrades the rank of most enemies.

Screenshot of a Node Graph using a couple of the new Skull nodes: the Get Skull Enabled node and the Skull node.

The nodes listed below are now available for use in Script Brains and can be found in the Node Browser's Skulls folder:

• Cast to Skull
• Compare Skulls
• Declare Skull Variable
• Get Skull Enabled
• Set Skull Enabled
• Set Skull Variable
• Skull

Team-based Auto Turrets 

The Auto Turret object will now attack players according to its Team option. This option can be set when placing the Auto Turret on a Forge map, or it can be changed during gameplay via a Script Brain. Alongside the addition of Enemy AI in Season 5, this change gives Forge creators more flexibility in creating experiences that utilize the Auto-Turret.

Screenshot of an Auto Turret object in Forge with the Team option visible. 

Scalable Blocker Objects

Blocker objects can now be scaled to different sizes. This change will allow map creators to place less blockers on their map and thus improve performance.

Global Material Swatches for Forge Objects

All Forge objects now have a large list of material swatches. This allows older objects to utilize newer materials, and regions that were previously incompatible with tiling materials to now use them.

Infection Custom Game Improvements

Several new options have been added to the Custom Games Mode Editor menu for the Infection game mode. These options will allow players to further customize the mode and use it as a base for other types of game modes. Use the accordion below to view all of the new options added to Infection.

In addition to the new Custom Game options above, the following quality-of-life changes have been implemented for Infection:

• Players can now use and customize the Big Team Battle version of Infection in Custom Games. This mode was previously only available in a rotational Combat Workshop playlist in October 2023.
• Points awarded to the Last Spartan Standing for killing Infected now pop up alongside their medals.
• Survivors will no longer receive a betrayal score penalty when they are killed by an Infected player and kill an Infected player in quick succession.

Ranked Multiplayer Changes

Demotion Protection

When a player moves up to the next rank tier, they will now have three "protected" matches where a loss will not return them to their previous rank. Competitive Skill Rank (CSR) points can still be gained and lost during these three matches; however, players cannot drop below the minimum threshold for their new rank until the three protected matches are completed.

This change only applies to rank tiers, such as Silver, Gold, or Platinum, and does not apply to sub-tiers such as Silver I, Silver II, etc.

Penalty Changes for Uneven Ranked Matches

This update introduces a new layer of protection for players whose teammates leave an in-progress Ranked match. If you were on a Fireteam with the player who left the match, you will lose 5 CSR points upon losing or leaving the match. If the player who left the match was not on your Fireteam, you will lose 0 CSR points upon losing or leaving that match. Additionally, all players (regardless of team or previous Fireteam members) who leave an uneven Ranked match after the first player leaves will not be at risk of an automated matchmaking ban. In effect, only the players who were in a Fireteam with the first player to leave will be penalized. 

The CSR rewards will remain the same for the winning team, regardless of how many players leave the match or which team the leaving players were on. Additionally, the penalties for the first player to leave the match are unchanged: they will lose 15 CSR points and, if they have left multiple Ranked matches recently, an automatic temporary ban from matchmaking.

Ranked Extraction Game Mode Changes

The Ranked variant of the Extraction game mode introduced in Season 5 has been updated. Starting with this update, players in a Ranked Extraction match will notice the following changes:

• Players can no longer hear the enemy team converting the Extraction Device from any position on the map. The Extraction Device itself now emits an audio cue, so players must remain nearby to hear whether enemies are converting the Extraction Device.
• The heads-up display (HUD) element showing the current progress of the Extraction Device's activation or conversion is no longer visible in the Ranked Extraction variant. This will require players to have a direct line-of-sight on the capture zone to know whether an enemy is activating or converting the Extraction Device.

Screenshot of a player activating the Extraction Device on the multiplayer map Catalyst. 

Additional Multi-Core Coatings

As in the Season 5 Update, several Coatings released prior to this update can now be used on any Armor, Weapon, or Vehicle Core. Expand the accordion below to view the full list of updated Coatings, which contains 94 Armor Coatings, 45 Weapon Coatings, and 24 Vehicle Coatings.

Resolved Issues and Bug Fixes

Many improvements come from Halo Insider and Halo Support tickets submitted by our community. Thank you for participating and please keep submitting tickets!

Halo Support tickets help the team here at 343 Industries understand what issues you would like to see addressed in future Halo Infinite updates. The development team is actively working on a variety of game updates and improvements based on both player feedback and bug report tickets.

If you experience a crash in Halo Infinite, please include as much of the following information as possible:

• Step-by-step instructions on what caused the crash. The more specific, the better!
• Attach an up-to-date DxDiagfile. To create a DxDiagfile, type "dxdiag" into the Start menu's search bar, press the Enter key, then click "Save All Information" when the DirectX Diagnostic Tool pops up.
• Include the Problem Report from the Control Panel app. To find this, open the Control Panel and enter "problem reports" in the search bar. Click "View all problem reports" then locate the recent Halo Infinite report. Double click on this Halo Infinite entry then use the "Copy to clipboard" button near the bottom of the window. Finally, paste this text into your ticket's comments.

Global

• Improved stability for Halo Infinite on both Xbox consoles and PC. 

Xbox consoles

• Fixed a crash related to terrain geometry, which was the top crash for Xbox Series X and Series S consoles after the Season 5 update.
• Minor performance improvements for Performance Graphics Quality mode on Xbox Series X and Series S consoles.

Multiplayer

Gameplay

• The Extraction Device will no longer move if it is successfully planted at the same time as the planting player is killed.
• The Extraction Device's visual effects are no longer visible when it is being planted by a player using the Active Camo equipment.
• Players will no longer become stuck in an animation if they clamber up a ledge at the same time they cancel planting the Extraction Device.
• Players can no longer activate their equipment while converting the enemy team's Extraction Device.
• Extraction Devices can no longer be planted on top of unpiloted vehicles.
• Removing and re-depositing Power Seeds in Stockpile will no longer award extra score.
  • Alongside this change, the updated version of Stockpile tested via the Combat Workshop playlist in September has been added into the Big Team Battle matchmaking playlist.
• In the Infection game mode, the Last Spartan Standing waypoint will no longer disappear if the final Spartan activates the Active Camo Power Equipment.
• The Untainted medal will now be awarded consistently to Survivors who survive final round of an Infection match.
• The multiplayer announcer will now say "Fiesta" during the intro sequence for a Big Team Battle match using the Fiesta game mode.
• In Escalation Slayer, kills made with the previous weapon loadout during the 10-second window before moving on to the next weapon level now count for half of a point.
• Players can no longer access unintended areas outside of the playable space on the maps Cliffhanger and Streets.
• Vehicles no longer spawn when playing the Last Spartan Standing mode on the map Scarr.
• Capture Zones now appear consistently when playing the Dodgeball or Attrition game modes on the maps Streets and Aquarius.
• The Drop Wall and Grappleshot equipment are now less likely to clip through a wall when being dropped by a player.
• The Drop Weapon binding will now allow players to drop a Fusion Coil they've picked up.

Menus

• Reduced instances of getting “Unable to join” errors when joining sessions via the Customs Browser menu.
• Switching between the main menu's tabs no longer results in missing lighting or effects in the Play tab.
• The backgrounds of the Multiplayer and Match Details menus will now load in more consistently.
  
• Map thumbnail images now appear consistently in the Match History menu.
  
• The preview images for the Hero rank reward moment are now consistently fully visible.
  

Custom Games

• Players can now set base and power equipment to have infinite charges during Custom Game matches.
• The AI Difficulty option in the Custom Game Mode Editor menu now aligns with the Easy to Legendary difficulty range used in Halo campaigns.
• A Health Recharge Multiplier is now available when editing the King of the Hill game mode in the Custom Game Mode Editor menu.
• Forge debug messages related to AI spawning failures will no longer appear in the killfeed during Custom Games.
• Alpha Infected players who spawn with a non-default weapon will now be able to fire their weapon consistently.
• When setting up an Attrition or Elimination match in the Custom Game menus, disabling the Revive Allies or the Danger Zone options will now correctly result in those mode features being disabled in that match.
• Various Last Spartan Standing mode features will now work more consistently in Custom Game sessions.

Customization

• Players' Spartan Voiceprint selection will no longer revert to the default Voiceprint when Halo Infinite is relaunched.
• Equipping the Brushfire, Shadow Drift, Watery Grave or the Warped Sky Armor Coatings to the Mark VII or Eaglestrike Armor Cores alongside the Yokai or Locus helmets will no longer result in a "Profile Sync" error message.
• Applying an Armor Emblem to one of the new Mark VII Armor Kits added in the Season 5 update then changing the Emblem Palette to a non-default option will no longer result in the Armor Kit being unequipped.
• The Weapon Coatings listed below no longer display an unintended white stripe when equipped to the MK50 Sidekick
  • Zeta Sky
  • Whispered Sky
  • HCS Winter

Visuals

• The Bandit Evo's scope is now consistently visible upon being picked up from the ground or a Weapon Rack.
• Lighting on Forge maps now remains consistent across match restarts.
• The first-person sprint animation now plays more consistently.
• Heads-up display (HUD) elements for the Quantum Translocator equipment no longer appear to briefly flash on-screen when picking up other equipment items.
• When the Shadow Quality video setting is set to Low, the position of shadows now updates consistently when rotating a Spartan in the Armor Hall menu.
• On-screen prompts and messages, such as tutorial messages in the Academy and multiplayer respawn timers, will now be cleared from the heads-up display more consistently.

Theater & Observer Mode

• Players using the Free camera perspective are no longer forced into a player's perspective when the match's intro sequence is complete.
• The OBJ column on the Observer Scoreboard will now update appropriately in the Extraction game mode.

Forge

• Unpublished Forge files no longer show that version 001 has been published.
• Location volumes can now be named on the Permafrost canvas.
• Improved handling of map saves triggered in quick succession, which should result in less save errors when editing maps.
• The Elite Bloodblade weapon can be spawned via the Weapon Pad, Weapon Rack, and Weapon Trunk objects.
• The Bandit Evo weapon can now be referenced in various Script Brain nodes.
• Compatible AI units can now use the Bandit Evo weapon.
• Enemy AI will now take damage from dynamo grenades in Custom Games.
• AI units onboard incoming Phantoms will no longer appear to flash into view at their final dropoff location.
• The "Get [any] Variable" and "Set [any] Variable" nodes are now compatible with AI units in Object scope.
• AI Spawners will now automatically connect to a map file's NavMesh.
• Building a map's NavMesh is now less likely to result in a crash.
• The Damage Object node can now damage all Fusion Coil variants as well as the Auto Turret object.
• The number of available Custom Equipment uses will now update consistently on players' heads-up display (HUD).
• Players in Edit Mode are now less likely to experience desync or jitter when navigating the camera through objects.
• Moving FX objects is now less likely to result in their lighting becoming detached from their actual position in the map.
• When playing with a mouse and keyboard, dragging a multi-select box over the Move, Rotate, or Scale axes no longer results in the Controls Helper menu flickering.
• Selections of multiple objects which intersect with one another can now be moved at the same time more consistently.
• Node names within the Node Browser menu will no longer appear as debug text.
• Script Brains using the following nodes can now move FX objects in Custom Games: Move Object to Transform, Translate Object to Point, Rotate Object to Point.
• Script Brains using the Generic Zone Control State node can now be run without issue.

Known Issues

With this update, the team has added multiple new issues to our Known Issues lists:

Multiplayer

• After completing a Firefight match, players' enemy AI kills do not count towards the Kill stat in the Post-Game Carnage Report (PGCR).
• The Firefight: King of the Hill playlists do not reward Featured Playlist bonus XP upon match completion, and some Kill stat changes do not apply towards Challenges. 
  • The XP rewards for Firefight were tuned according to this behavior, so no XP is being missed while these playlists are featured.
• The image for the weekly Ultimate Challenge reward does not appear in the Challenges menu. 
  • The News carousel on Halo Infinite's main menu will contain an image of the current Ultimate Challenge reward. Alternatively, stay tuned to @Halo on Twitter as each week's Ultimate Challenge reward is shared there as well.
• In Firefight: King of the Hill matches, players driving a vehicle do not receive score rewards or medals when their passengers kill enemy AI units.
• Players with locked Battle Passes and Operation Passes that are incomplete will receive a "Congratulations" message after finishing a multiplayer match if all of their unlocked Passes are completed.
• The multiplayer announcer voiceover may not play when the Ninja medal is awarded.
• When reviving a player with the Repair Field equipment, the deploying player’s weapon may appear to rest. This does not affect the weapon’s ability to fire or deal damage to enemies.
• If the Repair Field equipment is activated and stuck to a Spartan, that Spartan's voice line may indicate that they were stuck by a Plasma Grenade.
• Downed players do not receive any indication on the user interface (UI) when they are being revived by the Repair Field equipment.
• In some instances, vehicles will retain their damage visual effects after being repaired to full health with the Repair Field equipment.
• In Observer mode, some vehicles may flash multiple times when fully healed by the Repair Field equipment.
• When playing in languages other than English, the descriptions for some Firefight: King of the Hill options in the Custom Game Mode Editor menu may appear in English.
• When playing a Forge map with the AI difficulty node set to Legendary, any 343 bots on the enemy team will deal increased damage to players regardless of the Bot Difficulty setting's value.
• When playing a Firefight mode on the map Forest, enemy AI can become stuck on objects.
• Some visor patterns appear rotated when equipped on the following helmets:
  • Brawler
  • Volant
  • Air Assault
  • M199X
  • Rampart
  • War Master
• When a player activates the Quantum Translocator equipment on the map Argyle, the visual effects around the edge of the screen may not be visible.
• The Elite Bloodblade remains visible to other players after the player wielding it activates the Active Camo power equipment.
• Players using an AMD RX 5000 or 6000 series graphics card on PC will experience a crash when viewing the "About Battle Passes" menu or when selecting the "December Update" news item on the main menu. A future Halo Infinite update will restore access to this menu for the affected graphics cards.

Forge

• Equipping Escharum with a non-default weapon may cause the AI to become unable to attack.
• If a Prefab with a Script Brain is created then an additional instance of that prefab is placed onto the map via the Object Browser menu, the nodes within the Script Brain will become attached to the map file. When this issue occurs, the nodes attached to the map file cannot be removed and a new map file must be created.
  • Workaround: create Prefabs with a Script Brain on a blank map file then add the completed Prefab to the intended map file.

More Information About This Update

Many platforms automatically update games. To manually update or verify your game is up to date, follow the steps included in our How to Update Halo Infinite article.

Forge file versions older than 30 days may be automatically deleted. Exceptions include:

• The 10 most recent versions will never be deleted.
• Published versions will never be deleted.
• Locked versions will never be deleted.
  • Up to 30 different versions can be locked per Forge file.

To lock Forge file versions, follow the steps below:

1. Navigate to the Community tab of the main menu.
2. Select My Files.
3. Select a file to view its Details menu. 
4. Scroll down on the lefthand side menu and select Version History.
5. To lock a file version, highlight a version in the Version History menu then select Lock on the righthand menu. 

To learn more Halo Infinite and its development process, check out the following resources on Halo Support or Halo Waypoint:

• @HaloSupport on Twitter
• Halo Infinite Matchmaking Playlists
• Halo Gear Rewards | Season 5
• Halo Infinite Player Guide
• Halo Infinite Support Glossary
• Frequently Asked Questions for Halo Infinite
• PC hardware specs and drivers for Halo Infinite
• Halo Spartan Code

Join the Halo Insider program for the chance to see new features before they’re released publicly and, if you’ve encountered a bug in-game, submit a Halo Support ticket so that the development team can investigate the issue. Thank you to all Halo Insiders and ticket submitters for their bug reports and feedback!

Further Resources

• If you experience problems with your Xbox console or Game Pass, Xbox Support can help you.
• If you have problems with your account, Microsoft, or Xbox purchases, Microsoft Support can help you.
• If you have problems with other purchases, please contact the retailer you purchased your game from.
• If you experience a problem in Steam that is not an in-game issue, please contact Steam Support.
• If you want a chance to participate in future Halo flights, sign up for the Halo Insider Program.