Covenant Weapons

Originally by: Matthew Rorie (Updated by: Andre Segers)

Plasma Pistol (Dual Wield in Multiplayer)

The plasma pistol is the most basic weapon in the Covenent armory, but it's still going to be more worthwhile to you than the default USNC pistol. The plasma pistol fires energy bolts at your enemies, and more rapidly than the pistol does. Each individual bolt does a light amount of damage, making this default firing method useful only against weak enemies like Grunts.

However, if you press and hold the trigger, you can charge the plasma pistol and fire a supercharged burst of energy. This can be used to instantly drop the shields on a target, allowing you to finish them off by switching to another, more powerful weapon, like the battle rifle. This attack has light homing capabilities, so it'll usually hit an enemy unless they actually try to dodge away from it. You can keep the trigger depressed as long as you like, but the longer you hold it down, the more energy you'll drain from the battery reserves. This doesn't result in a super-charged weapon; it just means that you lose ammo. Each charged shot automatically drains 10 ammo from the weapon anyway, so if you can't fire these charged shots quickly, you'll probably only manage to get a couple of them off before running out of ammo.

Carbine

As far as light ranged weapons go, the carbine is a decent tool for taking down distant, lightly armored enemies. There isn't much to say about it: when you fire, a round will quickly travel to your target. The fire is almost perfectly accurate at any range, and you can fire the weapon while scoped. Unfortunately, the carbine does fairly light damage, so you'll need a lot of shots to take down anything hardier than a Grunt. The rate of fire is also somewhat limited, so if you have the choice, you'll probably want to use a battle rifle instead of the carbine. If you need distance fire, however, and nothing better is available, the accuracy of the carbine will be good to have.

Plasma Rifle (Dual Wield in Multiplayer)

Another iconic Halo weapon, the Plasma Rifle will be a trusty weapon in the hands of any soldier. It rapidly fires plasma bolts at your targets, causing their shields to fall just as rapidly. It won't do as much damage against flesh as a bullet-based weapon would, but it'll still finish them off quickly, especially if you can find a pair of them to dual-wield. Just keep in mind that firing them for too long will cause them to overheat, and you'll have to wait a few seconds for them to cool down before you can fire again, leaving you quite vulnerable.

Brute Spiker (Dual Wield in Multiplayer)

The Brute spiker is something of a baby version of the Brute shot, at least in appearance; it has the same curved blade on the underside. However, it fires in a much different manner. Instead of firing grenades, it fires spikes which pierce your foes and deal damage. It fires rapidly, and can be dual-wielded, making it the Covenant counterpart to the USNC submachinegun, and it has enough rounds in a clip (40) to allow it to be fired for five or six straight seconds without needing to be reloaded. It's a decent weapon, but requires you to be pretty close to your targets to hit them, due to the spread of gunfire.

Needler

The needler is back in Halo ODST, and as powerful as ever, at least in the campaign mode. The needler fires multiple small explosive strikes that will home in on a target if fired in their general direction. Spikes do a bit of damage on impact, but then explode a few seconds later, causing a great deal more damage to the target and anyone nearby. One of the prime benefits of this method of firing is that you can unload an entire clip of needles pretty rapidly, letting you fire on a Brute before ducking back under cover. Both the rate of fire and reload rate are very fast here, meaning that you can unload a lot of damage pretty quickly, but that you'll run out of ammo pretty quickly.

The needler is a bit more useful in singleplayer than in multiplayer, since your enemies will be more likely to stand still and let you shoot them, while in multiplayer you will probably only want to use this in close-range combat against enemies that have nowhere to hide, which is a situation that won't occur very often. Note also that the needles will burn themselves out after a hundred feet or so, making this weapon useless at long ranges.

Brute Shot

The favored weapons of the Brutes, the brute shot is a portable grenade launcher that can deal explosive damage over a small area of effect when fired. Unfortunately, the area of effect is very small, so you can't expect to take out multiple enemies with this weapon unless you're firing into a group of Grunts. Against larger enemies, brute shot grenades can be useful to blast the armor off of Brutes, but it can be difficult to hit enemies at any decent range due to the slowness of the grenades in the air. If you must use the Brute shot, try to aim downwards at enemies below you to ensure that they have a better chance of taking splash damage from it. Note that although the grenades appear to fly in a straight line, they will actually dip into a slight arc if fired at extremely distant targets.

The brute shot does possess a mighty blade attachment that will let you kill almost any enemy in one melee blow, excepting Brutes themselves. If you find yourself in a melee situation, this isn't a bad weapon to have handy, but keep in mind that firing grenades at short range will damage you as well, since you'll be in the area of effect.