Getting the par score on the Halo 3 levels is about finding the right combination of difficulty, skulls, and time to achieve a multiplier that will get you to 25,000 points. Because this is the case, there are many combinations that can be done that will push you to 25k. I have written guides for every level, but keep in mind that these are methods that worked for me and that I think will work for the majority of players. I avoided the higher difficulties and stuck to using the easy skulls in my guides. Furthermore, you will be playing solo for all of these, because score is not cumulative between co-op players.
MULTIPLIER OVERVIEW: Easy is worth 0.25x. You should never play on easy when going for score.
Normal is worth 1.00x. Many of the levels can be done on normal if you have skulls on and/or get a decent time multiplier. Most of my guides are written for normal difficulty.
Heroic is worth 2.00x. A couple levels are actually easier to achieve par score on heroic than normal.
Legendary is worth 4.00x. That's quite a boost, but I wanted to avoid the frustration.
SKULLSBlack Eye - Shields only recharge when you melee.
Avoid using this one, as it not only provides a little boost in score but also makes the game needlessly difficult.
Blind - HUD and weapon are invisible.
You'll definitely want to see your HUD. Avoid this.
Catch - Enemies throw more grenades.
This mostly applies to grunts, making them more of a threat. You can use this without penalty on flood levels. I tend to avoid this one if I can on other levels, because the grenades can be overwhelming and mess you up.
Famine – Weapons dropped by AI will have half ammo.
Weapons that are scripted will still have the normal amount of ammo. When using this skull in my guides, I will try to mention where more ammo or weapons can be found. One of the ‘easy’ skulls.
Fog - No motion tracker.
You should try to be familiar enough with the level and where enemies spawn so that this won't be a handicap.
Iron - Dying restarts the level.
This sounds like a terrible one to have if it wasn't for the fact that you can save and quit, then resume the level with points intact. Doing this will reset your killstreak, however, meaning you'll get less points per kill until you build it back up again! Also, your time does not reset to what it was at the checkpoint, so it's best to avoid dying.
Mythic - Enemies have more health.
Avoid this. More health means more danger and more time to take to kill.
Thunderstorm - Upgrades enemy rank.
Avoid this one. It's not as bad on flood levels, though, because all it does is increase the number of shielded elite flood.
Tilt - Enemy resistances and weaknesses are increased.
Plasma will dominate shields and armor but won't do anything to flesh, while projectiles will do more damage to flesh but might as well be BBs against shields and armor. Generally avoid this.
Tough Luck - Enemies dodge more, brutes have a tendency to berserk, and grunts flee less.
Sidestepping grenades can be annoying, but brutes can easily be dispatched with melees. One of the ‘easy’ skulls.
TIME MULTIPLIER:For every level where you want to meet par time, put your scoring and HUD options to competitive score. This will display your score during the game with the time multiplier already applied. You'll start off with a 3.00x boost, but once you go past par time, you'll notice the score drop. This is because the multiplier is decreasing the longer it takes to finish the mission. If you don't plan on needing or meeting the time boost, keep you settings on "score".
When highlighting missions in the menu, you can see the par time requirement. All missions are either 15 minutes or 20. Depending on the mission, the par time will either come naturally or essentially require a speedrun. If my guide for a particular mission requires a good time, I will provide tips to get through certain areas hastily.
The time multiplier will never go under 1.00x. I have, however, noticed that if you take very long to finish a mission, you will stop getting points for kills but the score you got will remain intact.
TIPS YOU CAN ALWAYS APPLY:-Getting kills without dying builds up your killstreak and earns you more points. Multikills also give you slightly more points. Credit to SchiZoPHreNiikz for reminding me to include this.
-Destroying covenant vehicles, occupied or not, will give you points.
-If you have enough firepower, destroying phantoms will give you a lot of points.
-If you’re driving and your AI ally gets a kill either in the passenger seat or a turret, you get the points.
-When combating the flood, corpses brought to life by the flood and reanimated corpses will give you points. Meaning you can allow an infection form to infect a corpse, kill it and get points, and if it’s still intact, allow another infection form to take it over and kill it again for even more points.
- The four easy skulls are Famine, Fog, Iron, and Tough Luck. With flood, add Catch and Thunderstorm.
-Know the level you are playing. Know where enemies spawn, know where objectives are, know where to find power weapons, know where the door to the next area is and when it opens, and know what you have to do to trigger a spawn/cutscene/objective or anything that keeps you from continuing the level. It is advisable to do many of the other level-specific achievements before you attempt par score, as it will get you familiar with the levels. If you go for par score on your first playthrough, you’re gonna have a bad time.
-With the Iron skull active, you can save and quit as soon as you die and resume the level with points intact. It will reset your killstreak and your time will be at what it was when you died, though.
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ALWAYS WATCH THE END CUTSCENE. Several times, skipping the final cutscene resulted in no achievement unlocking.
ACHIEVEMENT GUIDES:At the moment of posting the only guides written are by me, Almighty Jei. They may or may not be the top solution in the future.
If you are having trouble with a particular level you can switch it up a bit. If you think you can handle having an extra skull on, use it! Not meeting the par time? Turn the difficulty up, add some skulls, ignore the time and take it slow, killing everything you can. With my methods, I often ended up with far more score than I needed, so you can probably turn off a skull on some levels and still be fine. The scores and times I got should be within the guides, so you can be the judge.
Practice makes perfect!
FINAL NOTE:Unfortunately, the par score achievements in this game be can stubborn about unlocking. Personally, I had to play through the final level several times for the achievement to unlock. You may want to wait for a patch if you don't feel like testing your luck.