Editing Setting:Halo (section)

===Ground Command===
[[File:Covenant_Attack_Blog_1.jpg|400px|left|thumb|A typical skirmish in Ground Command.]]
For the battles centered around the ground, Ground Command seems to be more feasibly plausible in fluff terms. What we know is that both factions are going to be incredibly dropship focused, meaning that the implementation and usage of dropships like the Pelican and Phantom are going to be crucial for tactical victory. Models for both factions are small enough to be converted into other tabletop games, although the UNSC personnel (who are meant to be regular humans) are a tad bit taller than a Space Marine.

In terms of detailed gameplay, movement phase is similar to Fleet Battles. However Ground Command also has two key gaming spaces: Pre-Game and In-Game. The former refers to the Strategic/RTS part of the game and latter to the Action/FPS part of the game. Essentially, Pre-Game allows players to flex their RTS muscles, building their Forces strategically to complete their chosen missions. In general play, all scenarios are encouraged to be rolled PRIOR to Forces being chosen, so players can go away and plot their enemy’s eventual demise. This gives the game a planned-outcome-feel since players have had time to reflect on the mission to hand and have brought the right tools for the job. 

Choosing a Force is a simple process that uses the Build Rating (BR) and Maximum Force Value (MFV) methods that was introduced in Halo: Fleet Battles. Like H:FB, Ground Command also use the ideas of Standard and Specialist Battle Groups. The former will be used multiple times by players, whereas the latter will be limited in their use, commonly limited to only one per force. Battle Groups have Units that are call Requisites which in turn gain access to Optional Units. Requisites MUST be taken for a Battle Group to be considered game legal. These vary from Battle Group to Battle Group. For example, an ODST Battle Group MUST take ODST Units as Requisites, whereas a UNSC Army Mechanized Battle Group MUST take Riflemen Units. Requisites are, however, deliberately kept to the bare minimum needed to represent the nature of their Battle Group to uphold flexibility allowing players to find new and innovative combinations to field. 

Once Requisites have been taken, players have a number of Optional Build Rating points to spend in each of the following categories: Infantry Units, Armored Units and Air Units. The points available will vary depending on the Battle Group chosen, giving certain Battle Groups greater access to some types of Unit, or may even skip using a Unit type altogether. For example, a Covenant Spectral Host Battle Group (Elite Ghost Units optional Air Support) allows a Covenant player to not have any Infantry and instead field lots of fast attack Ghosts with Elite drivers. This is a Specialist Battle Group and is limited to one per force. It is static in its requisites but can have access to a Flyer if a player wants to spend the BR and Points to add it their Force.

A UNSC Standard Armored Battle Group only has Armored Units as Requisites. A player can still add some Infantry if they want, or even add Flyer Units, or they could just spend all of their points on Armour and as this is a Standard Battle Group a player can take several in their Force if they so choose. All of this leads to an incredibly flexible force building mechanic that gives the game great longevity. There will be literally thousands of combinations available, giving players the chance to execute their plans in a prepared way. The Build Rating of a model (Element as it is called in the game) and a Unit (a collection of Elements) is what translates to Victory Points. It is a simple method and allows games to be won by destroying Units of Infantry, destroying Armored models, shooting down Flyers, capturing Objectives, killing Characters and etc. 

In terms of building a terrain and setting, Ground Command's terrain  is placed using mutual consent to encourage the construction of fair and reasonable battlefields. The rules of Terrain are binary to make it simple to use and fast to play with – for example, you can or you can’t move through it; you can or you can’t shoot through it, or a combination of both. This makes Terrain nice and simple to play with, but still gives players a strategic view of the battlefield and allows for a planned route of advancement. Terrain ranges from simple Supply Drops to large structures like the Covenant Stealth Pylon. 

Similar to Fleet Battles, Ground Command has commanders for the players to choose from and is played similarly to its space counterpart. So in summary:

*Forces are made up of Battle Groups, which can be of varying types: UNSC Mechanized Battle Groups, Hunting Host Battle Groups, Armored Battle Groups, and so on.
*Inside each Battle Group are Requisite Units that must be taken, then Build Rating limits are set to allow players to add in Optional Units later.
*Forces can and should be made up of multiple Battle Groups.
*In narrative play, all Forces should be chosen after the Scenario is determined, allowing players to tailor their lists to fight out the mission.
*Terrain is placed by mutual consent and is designed for simple use and quick gameplay. There is a table generator included if mutual consent proves difficult.
*In Halo: Ground Command players have access to Generic Force Commanders that cost considerably less than narrative named Commanders. These Generic Force Commanders have Standard Orders and a Factional Order. They are the only Commander available in competitive play.

These is just the Pre-Game. Now it is the In-Game phase. As with Halo: Fleet Battles, the '''Halo Dice''' is used in conjunction with the Firepower Rating Table to control modifiers and drive the statistics in the game. Both games start with players using a default of Firepower Rating 4 with the Rating modifying up and down accordingly. This means that when rolling Halo Dice, a result of 2 (or Spartan Exploding 6 for example) counts as two hits, a result of 1 result counts as one hit, a Miss result can be re-rolled if you have rolled any 2s, and the Skull result is a definite miss. Some weapons will provide a positive bonus to the Firepower Rating whereas Terrain conditions and Scenario effects generally cause the Firepower Rating to suffer a negative penalty. The faces of the Dice in Ground Command are Fail, Miss, Success and Exploding. Than there are the '''Tokens'''. In Ground Command there are three available tokens, these are: Activated (placed when a Unit Activates or attempts a Reaction), Damage (for when an attack equals or exceeds a value on a Damage Track) and Cooldown (which is used to represent a situation where a weapon or even an entire Unit cannot fire). There is also the '''Statistic Profiles''' which are used as a simple visual presentation mechanic to show players the various statistics used by Units on their statistic cards. These cards will be large enough to fit in your hand and will have all pertinent rules (as well as paraphrased notations about Loadouts) on them, making Unit reference in Halo: Ground Command quick and very simple. Also like Fleet Battles, Ground Command issues '''Command Dice''' for commanders on the battlefield to drive the Command & Control side of the game. The Command/Attack/Defense symbols allow players to execute orders from their Force Commander’s Data Sheet that can often be the difference between success and failure in battle. 

Then there is the '''Reaction Fire''' which is how Ground Command tries to translate the FPS element into tabletop. In order for it to work, Ground Command have created a Reaction Statistic for every Element in order to allow the game to represent a persistent form of overwatch where every Unit on the table is assumed to be engaged in the battle at all times. The Reaction Statistic has two numbers shown as X / Y on a Unit’s Profile. The X number is used if a Unit has not yet been Activated, and the Y number is used if a Unit has already been Activated. If a player wants to react to an enemy Unit’s activation, the player makes a 2D6 dice roll, adds or subtracts any modifiers and hopes they match or exceed the relevant number, if they do, they get to fire in their opponent’s activation, either at the start of a Unit’s movement or at the end. 

Attempting a Reaction is not without risk, however, as you are only permitted to attempt a single reaction to an enemy Unit’s activation and whether you succeed or fail the reacting Unit gains an Activation Marker as a result. This means a player has to choose wisely which Unit will be used to React to the enemy. Sometimes it is better to React with a Unit that has already gone, especially if the Unit has a good Y-React number. For example, UNSC Warthogs excel at this, creating mobile mini-fire-bases upon which the UNSC can base their advance/defense tactics. It may also be the case that a player is unwilling to React, as it will affect their ability to surge forwards (since making a Reaction attempt gives a Unit an Activation Marker that effectively halts any chance of performing a Movement Action). In a massed battle game, where you could literally have hundreds of miniatures on the tabletop and large numbers of Armor and Flyers, you suddenly have the intensity of an FPS, where no Unit is ever truly safe. This means that even if your opponent has already activated a Unit, the Unit isn’t actually out of the game.

As you might expect, not everything has the same React X/Y. A Spartan who are the elites for the UNSC, might be capable of multiple feats of arms in a turn, firing in all directions as he/she attempts to defend a wounded soldier. A ponderous pair of Hunters are, however, far more measured and lumbering, taking time to line up shots and gear themselves for combat. This is represented by the Spartan having a React Score of 5/6, whereas a Hunter Unit is limited to 10/13. 

In terms of weapons. Ground Command issue '''Small Arms'''. They are not, however, always the same in the game. For example Small Arms, when in the hands of Grunts, have one set of Small Arms Stats, and a different set of stats when used by Elites. This makes the game flow smoothly and gives each faction diversity without the minutiae of looking directly into the hands of each and every model. That is not to say that all weapons are in this category. Certain Units can upgrade one or more of their bases to be specific Fire Teams, like Grunts wielding Fuel Rod Cannons, UNSC Troopers manning HMGs, etc.

This brings us on to '''Weapon Loadouts'''. The majority of weapons in the game, including Small Arms, normally have at least one Loadout. A Loadout is a custom rule that enhances a weapon. It could be as simple as Suppression (+1) in the case of UNSC Small Arms or Point Blank in the case of Covenant Small Arms, to more complex Loadouts such as Devastating, Pinpoint, Indirect Fire, and so on. Each of these Loadouts is summarized on a Unit’s Statistic Card and detailed in the core rulebook for ease of reference. The variation of the Weapon Loadouts thus leads us to '''The Weapon Spread'''. Here each and every weapon, if you are willing to shoot it long enough can technically destroy anything in-game when it comes to Halo. This means that the game has to come up with a new system for weapons that allows for this incredible flexibility. So the Weapon Spread System is designed to do exactly that. The Weapon Spread divides the Attack Dice available to a Weapon into three distinct categories, each citing the weapon’s effectiveness against a specific target. 

*Anti-Personnel (AP) refers to a weapon’s ability to damage Infantry targets.
*Anti-Tank (AT) refers to a weapons ability to damage Armoured targets.
*Anti-Air (AA) refers to a weapons ability to damage Flying targets.

When firing, Ground Command uses a combination mechanic (the same as in Halo: Fleet Battles) so a Unit of 4 Bases of Grunts shooting at a Unit of UNSC Riflemen in the open (always a bad thing for the UNSC) would roll 2+2+2+2 = 8x Halo Dice using Firepower Rating 5 (the best they can get!). From this roll the Grunts would expect to get about 6 Hits, which should, on average, kill 2 Bases of UNSC Riflemen. In terms of '''Melee''',  each element rolls a number of Halo Dice equal to their Melee Statistic, but unlike Ranged Attacks, all players are looking to do is roll Skulls – all other results are ignored. Roll a Skull and you automatically do a point of Damage (or in the case of Melee vs Vehicles, 2x Skulls for a point of Damage). Heroic Saves can be attempted after that, but essentially that’s as complicated as Melee gets. If each side rolls the same number of Skulls in a round of Melee, the survivors keep fighting until someone wins – or until both sides are wiped out. Once one side is declared the winner, the loser is pushed back, leaving both sides free to React as normal. Lastly, like Fleet Battles, there is the '''End phase''' in which it is used to tally up scored Victory Points for the Game Turn. Victory Points (VPs) are generated by destroying enemy Units, where their Build Rating directly translates to VPs. VPs can also be scored according to the conditions stated in any particular scenario you might be playing. For example, the Assassination Mission from the core rulebook gives bonus VPs points for taking out anything with the Commanding Presence Loadout, whilst the Take and Hold Scenario gives additional VPs for holding Placed Objectives (usually Buildings of importance on the battlefield). The Scenarios all last a certain number of Game Turns, after which the person who has scored the most Victory Points wins.

Last but not least, we cannot forget Flyers which are crucial for tactical victory in Ground Command. In Ground Command all flying vehicles are separated into two categories: Hover Flyers and Air Support Mission Flyers.

'''Hover Flyers''' are treated in the same way as any other battlefield Unit, moving shooting, reacting in the same way as any other model. They are targeted using a weapon’s Anti-Air (AA) Statistic and tend to be fast moving and pretty aggressive in their use. Examples of these include Banshees or Falcons, which may be seen operating in Units with more than one model, or be individuals, depending on their Build Rating and the Battle Group they are part of.

'''Air Support Mission Flyers''' tend to be far larger than their standard Hover counterparts, dominating the sky with their bulk and durability. These Flyers are simply too large to remain on the table turn to turn, and instead resolve their movement, the execution of their chosen mission and extraction in a simple strafing method. Examples of these flyers include the UNSC Pelican and Covenant Phantom.

When using an Air Support Mission Flyers, players activate the model in the same way as any other Unit, declaring a Mission type for the Flyer. This Mission will have an attached Victory Points cost, which is given to the enemy directly after the Mission is announced. This give-and-take aspect to Air Support Mission Flyers makes the taking of these large models very balanced – you get a huge reward, but your opponent gets a strategic bonus if you saturate the battlefield with too many. This means that protracted use of aerial assets will cause a drain on the player’s chances of winning an outright victory, but execution of these Missions will often be vital for continued success in the combat operation. So balancing if, when and how you bring in your Air Support Mission Flyers is a skill that will take time for players to develop. There are a variety of Missions available to Flyers of this type. Combat Drop Missions allow players to bring in reserves. Supply Drop Missions allow the placement of a Supply Drop Marker that increases the Reaction Statistics of all friendly ground models within range. Ground Attack Missions allow you to target ground Units with increased effect. Reinforcement Missions allow you to bring a damaged Unit of Infantry (and in some cases Armor) back up to full strength, and Air Patrols allow you to place your Flyer ‘on-station’, ready to intercept enemy flyers when they activate.