Authors: rifte gifle and JerZ Phenom
Recommended players: 10-16

Download map here: Reach
Download gametype here: Invasion Repel

Written by Indra .P

0642hours, August 30,2552 (Military Calendar)
\Reach, Firebase Bravo
Only two hours ago it was announced that the covenant had found the location of Reach. Lieutenant Flores prayed it wouldn't come to this, but in the dark corners of his mind, he knew it was bound to happen sooner or later. The Covenant had destroyed and glassed almost every single Outer Colony planet that finding Reach was just a matter of time. No matter, he wouldn't let them glass his home world like every other planet. Not on his watch.

Overhead, the sun had just begun to rise and shine light over the petrified terrain. The morning sky flashed vibrant colors as a massive naval battle took place. The covenant ships outnumbered their own three to one. Even with the help of the super MAC guns, in the end Flores knew that some covenant ships would pass Reach's defences and some would get on the ground. It was up to his platoon and him to make sure that they didn't get near the evac station Bravo, a mere four klicks away from their location.

Lieutenant Flores looked over the firebase from his watchtower. He could see his marines preparing for anything to come; vehicles being refuelled, weapons stacked and collected. Good, Lieutenant Flores thought, pleased that the situation was under control. Aside from the 70 trained men in his platoon, Firebase Bravo's arsenal was a force to be reckoned with. Several warthogs, two scorpion battle tanks, dozens of missiles and a full armoury. As a last resort, there was also a Fury tac-nuke- the closest thing the UNSC had to a nuclear grenade. It was small, compact and delivered just under a megaton yield of punch. He prayed that he wouldn't need to use it today.

"Sir," Platoon Sergeant Bennett announced over the walkie talkie. "look up; we've got company."

Shit, is it covenant? Flores immediately stood up. He leaned against the railing of his watch tower ten meters above the ground and saw every marine stare at the sky. A tiny teardrop slowly approached their location, increasing in size every second. As it approached closer, Flores knew immediately it was a Covenant cruiser. Flores' heart pounded in his chest. Two kilometres long, able to glass planets and capable of dropping in thousands of covenant troops into battle at any given time. This ship however, looked like it had just gone through hell. Bright blue flames blazed on several decks of the ship; its shields appeared to be nonexistent and massive dents and holes ran across the ship. It hovered just 40 meters off the ground only 200 meters away from Firebase Bravo. Flores didn't even need to give the order.

The entire base was in action as the marines prepped to engage the covenant. Warthogs and Scorpions roared to life as they were brought to the front of the firebase. Flores rapidly descended from his watchtower. He grabbed an MA37 assault rifle, three grenades and an M6 sidearm from the armoury. He double timed towards the front of the base where his platoon was already bunkered down behind cover in buildings and behind concrete slabs. He approached Platoon Sergeant Bennett, in cover behind a concrete block and crouched down beside him.

"Status?" Flores asked.

"They haven't done anything yet sir. We'll be ready to open fire on them as soon as they drop in." Bennett replied. "Bastards won't even know what hit 'em."

Why haven't they fired at us yet, Flores thought. The massive plasma guns onboard the ship could quickly turn the entire base to paste. So was the ship essentially crippled?
A blue light illuminated to life from the ship's underside and hundreds of covenant ground forces rapidly descended from the gravity lift. The marines raised their weapons and watched as at least a hundred grunts, dozens of jackals, a legion of elites and several ghosts float down slowly. Loud battle cries erupted from the covenant ground force as they thundered towards the Firebase.

"Open fire!" Flores barked. His marines fired in unison. The deafening sounds of the battle tanks in close proximity of Flores deafened his ears, but he continued to fire. Screams of pain and rage emitted from the covenant as they fell and were thrown away by bullets and explosives. Coloured blood and gore streamed across the terrain. Flores took aim at a group of grunts, huddled, panicking and unsure what to do in the heat of the chaos. Flores fired till his clips was empty and then primed a fragmentation grenade and threw it at the enemy while they were still bunched up. The tanks rockets made short work of the ghosts but the hundred other covenant that had survived and made it closer to the base however, took cover using the terrain and returned fire. Bullets, plasma rounds and purple needler shards danced in the air between the two opposing sides. Three warthog armoured jeeps sped around the combat, flanking the covenant forces and opening fire with their chain guns, literally tearing the covenant apart. The rest of the platoon charged into battle, mowing down the remaining covenant forces.

They cheered a victory cry, with very few casualties on their side. but Lieutenant Flores knew it would be short lived. This couldn't have been all of it, could it? A moment later, the gravity lift flashed once more as more covenant poured onto the battlefield. There were even more this time around; two covenant wraith tanks hummed to life as they landed. Overhead, several banshee fliers came out of the ship's titanic hangars. Flores' heart dropped as he stared in fear at the covenant forces. How could a single marine platoon defend against this onslaught? Still, he had to try. If the evac station was overrun, it would mean the death of thousands of civilians.

"Open fire!" Flores commanded.

The wraiths opened a volley of brilliant plasma that burned through the air and detonated upon impact. It slammed into one of the tanks and melted its hardened titanium armour instantly. Scores of marines were burned from the onslaught of plasma from the enemy. Warthogs rushed into the scene in a desperate attempt to reduce the covenants numbers, but were shortly destroyed by a barrage plasma fire. Flores saw men with wielding SAM missile launchers fire at the banshees overhead. The missile impacted a flier and it crashed into two other ones while the flames buffeted other banshee fliers. The three destroyed aircrafts landed in a smouldering heap.
A hunter pair took aim at the second tank and fired their twin fuel rod cannons.
"Get down!" Flores screamed at PC Bennett who was reloading his rifle.
They sprinted and ducked behind a building, its concrete walls already peppered with scorch marks. The remaining scorpion tank melted and exploded from the combined fuel rod fire. Flores breathed heavily. His ammo was diminishing as were his men. Almost half of them were KIA and options were extremely limited. Flores risked a peek to observe the battlefield and watched as elites began cutting his men to pieces with their energy swords. It was a horrific sight. Flores thought about the situation tactically. Balancing the lives of his men against the thousand others, it was clear what needed to be done.

He motioned a wounded marine taking cover three meters to his right behind a downed warthog to come over to him. The marine nodded and paced quickly as he could over to Flores, one hand at his raw, burned side and the other firing an SMG. The marine took cover with Flores and Bennett.

"Sir?" He questioned.

"What's your name, soldier?" Bennett replied with a question.

"Private James Michael, sir."

"I need you to go back to base, get to the radio station and call HQ to tell them that Firebase Bravo has been overrun. Tell them that evac-station Bravo needs to wrap up their evacuation ASAP. Advise them that we-"

Before Flores could finish, he glimpsed at a group of grunts waddling by his position. One of them saw him, surprised and fired its needler. The three men instinctively ducked for cover elsewhere, but Bennett was shot in the thigh by a needle shard. Bennett fell to the ground, and it detonated seconds later. Flores turned around and watched as the Platoon Sergeant was brutally grazed by consecutive plasma bolts from the other grunts . He and James immediately fired their MA37 until he heard a clack, signifying that he was out of ammo. Flores pulled out his sidearm and shot the remaining grunts. He ran back to Bennett but already knew it was too late. The majority of his body was burnt a midnight black; his armour had melted and dripped onto the coarse sand. Black blood pooled from holes in his thigh and chest where inside, charred bones remained. Flores turned away from the man with despair, took the remaining ammo of his rifle and led James back to their cover.

"Tell them we're using the Fury tac." Flores finished.

James stood there, frozen for a moment staring at Flores and what he had said, but then nodded and replied, "Yes sir."

"Good. Now, move it. Double time!"

The two ran in opposite directions. James to the COM station, Flores to the armoury. The sounds of gunfire were decreasing, replaced by human shrieks of pain. Flores opened the door of the armoury. It was eerily quiet inside, the shelves were almost all bare. As Flores turned a corner he saw a dead human body on the ground. It was sliced clean in half; red blood smeared the walls and shelves. Flores raised his rifle and looked around the room for any sign of danger. He made his way quickly and cautiously to the secure room containing the tac-nuke. He started to enter a code to open the door, but saw in the corner of his eyes an elite; standing eight feet tall in red armour wielding an energy sword. The elite must have seen him too, because it gave a vicious snarl and marched towards him.

Flores hastily opened the door; his heart beating like machine gun fire. The titanium door opened and he entered, shutting the door behind him. He could hear the elite bellow in anger outside the room. It slashed the door with its sword, attempting to break its way in. Flores ran to the warhead placed inside a metal box. He quickly entered the activation code and primed it to fire with the click of a button.

Flores sighed with relief. One last thing to do. Pushing the activation button was all that he needed to do. It would destroy everything in a kilometre radius- including the covenant in the area and their ship. He sat down cross legged and leaned against the cold meter thick titanium walls of the room. He prayed that Private James had sent the message to HQ. A hunter now stood outside the door trying to get through. It slammed its massive shield against the door, denting it with one vicious blow.

Flores felt a pain of regret as he sat there with the warhead in his hands. He knew the sacrifices when he had joined the corps. He never had time for friends, never settled down to start a family. This war had consumed his life, but this was the life that he chose. He chose this life in hopes of salvation for his species. The hunter pounded the titanium door once more, successfully knocking it down this time. The entire armoury shook and it entered the confined room, starting down at him. Flores pressed the Fury tac-nuke's activation button. Mission accomplished. He smiled and shut his eyes. Even with his eyes closed, everything turned white.

Well, I hope you enjoyed my little back story for the map. Originally, Reach was not Reach at all. It started as a simple aesthetic map I started on long ago of a covenant ship floating above the sandbox main tier, called the Redemption. After completion, I lost interest and asked JerZ Phenom to help me finish the rest of the map(the city underneath) with whatever objects we had left. Not only did he do that, but he made extremely bumpy areas of the map... not so bumpy and his help was definitely appreciated. Realizing that this map still had a few objects left (like 8 or 10) we decided to make it playable. Surprised at how well it played with the limited budget and objects, we kept the gametype, tweaked it a bit and is what you see now.

The way Invasion Repel on Reach is meant to be played is fairly straight forward; there are two teams, humans and elites. They kill each other and the game either ends at 8 minutes or whenever one team reaches 50. The base gametype is VIP and the VIP is a medic for the human team. While he can die, don't expect your health to pop back up anytime soon. Vehicles spawn later in the game.

Game video
YouTube - Invasion repel on Reach by rifte gifle & JerZ Phenom

Playing the map

Honor rules
Sad to say, there is one honor rule. Teams are not allowed to drive the other teams vehicles. You may destroy and hijacks them, but please don't drive them and use them to kill the other team (e.g. Elites can't drive tanks, Marines can't drive banshee). It just makes the game more fun.

Overview of the playing field

Marines
Oh, by the way, did we mention you were marines? While you're not as strong and fast as elites and need a medic to regain health, what you lack in traits you have in ordnance.

Elites
Strong, fast, and better than the humans in ever possible way, you will drop from your ship, the Redemption. You can't pick up weapons in the beggining until you die, but don't fret- you're equipped with an energy sword and a plasma pistol, easily enough to destroy the humans. After a certain amount of time, a custom powerup will spawn at the front of the ship turning you into the zealot. You're gold and the biggest bad ass mother fuc*** for 90 seconds. You can't drive vehicles, but that's hardly necessary.

The hangar of the Redemption. A wraith and banshee will spawn later into the game.

Screenshots

In case you missed it.
Download map here: Reach
Download gametype here: Invasion Repel