Legendary

"You face opponents who have never known defeat, who laugh in alien tongues at your efforts to survive. This is suicide."

- Description from Halo: Combat Evolved and Halo 2.

"Tremble as teeming hordes of invincible alien monsters punish the slightest error with instant death... again and again."

- Description from Halo 3.

Legendary is the highest and most difficult setting of campaign game play on Halo: Combat Evolved, Halo 2, Halo 3 and Halo Wars, except for Bungie-made Mythic Difficulty on Halo 3 and Mythic difficulty on Halo 2.

Summary
It is symbolized by an Elite's skull with a bullet-hole of the left side of its head, with two crossed UNSC Standard Issue Combat Knives and the shield bearing the Marathon symbol. It is unclear why, as the Elites are no longer your enemies, the Legendary symbol in Halo 3 still shows an Elite with a bullet hole, but perhaps Bungie thought the original was better, or didn't want to swap it out for a Brute skull. It is regarded as a challenge for even veteran players, as allies are frequently useless except for diversions, and overwhelming enemy firepower and superior numbers often force one to play cautiously and conservatively. Enemies are extremely strong, while you and your allies' strength is extremely low. Legendary on Halo 2 can be described as "Trial and Error." Completing the campaign on Legendary in the Halo Trilogy generally unlocks an additional ending to the story.

Legendary was also the name of the highest difficulty setting in Bungie's Myth series, in which it had the following flavor text: "You will brave the army of a commander who has never known defeat, and the piled dead will reach the heavens; but should you succeed, in an age not yet dawned you will be spoken of as a god!"

Halo: Combat Evolved
In the first Halo game, the differences between Legendary and other settings is relatively numeric. The player does not face unique or different enemies, they just face more enemies who are harder to defeat. Many of the same strategies that work on other settings work on Legendary in this game, except that the player has to be extremely careful of their own weaknesses. This is where the Plasma-Pistol/Human-Pistol combo comes in handy - also frequently known as: the classic Noob Combo.

General Differences

 * Master Chief's Shields are half their "Normal" power. A few hits will drain them completely.
 * Enemy shields are double their normal strength.
 * Extremely weakened health meter. One melee from an enemy in front of you will drain six health bars.
 * Master Chief's shields charge faster - twice as fast as Normal. So does everyone else's.
 * Enemy health meters are double their normal strength.
 * Elites - Twice as many Elites appear as on the "Normal" setting. Major Elites are encountered at a ratio of about 1 of every 3 Elites encountered. An area that had two Minor Elites in Normal mode will have 4-5 Elites in Legendary, with 1-2 of them being Majors. Their shields can take 28 shots from an Assault Rifle before lowering.
 * Grunts - Twice as many Grunts appear than on the "Normal" setting. Around half of the Grunts encountered are Major Grunts.
 * Grenades - Enemy Grunts and Elites throw grenades frequently, much faster and almost always accurately. The grenades' timers are cut in half.
 * Firing Rate - All enemies fire their weapons much faster and more accurately. In particular, Jackals will fire long streams of 10-15 shots with high accuracy. Jackals will also charge their Plasma Pistols much more often.
 * Agility - All enemies move much faster and will almost never allow a player to stick them with grenades. Elites will often do their dodging maneuver immediately if hit, making it very difficult to make consistent hits on them to drain their shields.
 * Stealth Elites are always encountered in packs of 4-6, with few exceptions (like on the second or third circular room of Assault on the Control Room, with a pack of Grunts, and ONE, always one, stealth Elite).
 * Flood are now armed 90 percent of the time. Their deadly melee attacks will drain shields by half. Many more of them wield Shotguns and Rocket Launchers than before.
 * Allies - Marines are virtually useless. They will constantly be stuck with grenades, and most are easily killed by the enemy's increased rate of fire, returning fire only inflicting minimal damage on enemies. Their AI is increased significantly, to little effect.
 * Zealots - Zealots appear more frequently throughout the game. It takes 21 shots from a pistol just to remove their shields.

Specific Differences

 * Pillar of Autumn (Level)
 * The player does not go through the controls section at the beginning of the level, the game assuming that anyone choosing the highest difficulty level has gone through it before. Instead, they will wake up and leave the cryo section immediately.
 * Johnson's speech changes in the beginning of the level.
 * The player has immediate access to the motion tracker and grenades.
 * 343 Guilty Spark (Level)
 * The Shotgun is no longer available early on in the game. The only way to pick it up is to kill a Combat Form that was holding one, or from one of the dead Marines from the third room with an energy bridge.
 * The Maw (Level)
 * The player only has 5 minutes to get to the Longsword fighter after destroying the Pillar of Autumn's engine core, instead of the usual 6 minutes. You get to see the non-canon secret ending.

Halo 2
In one of the Bungie Updates, Frankie describes Halo 2's Legendary as:

''A whole new sick twist on game difficulty. Legendary includes bizarre stuff like perma-death for co-op players, meaning that you can't hopscotch like you can on other difficulty levels. Once a player dies on Legendary, both players are hurled back to the last checkpoint. It's brutal. Also, that place where you encountered two Grunts and a flowerpot on Normal? Well now they're Hunters, high-ranking, sword-carrying Elites and they're all PMS-ing. Seriously, sticking your head around a corner on level two can get it shot clean off.''

General Differences

 * Enemies fire at a much faster rate and fire far more accurately.
 * Enemy numbers are drastically increased.
 * Shields are 50% their "Normal" power and a few hits will drain them completely.
 * The Arbiter's active camouflage lasts only five seconds and takes ten seconds to recharge.
 * Enemy Shields and health are almost double their "Normal" power.
 * Virtually every Elite encountered is a Major Elite. Major Grunts are also far more common.
 * Ultra Elites are now a very common sight, you will encounter up to four in some parts. They have the most powerful shields in the game, and can take four headshots from a Sniper Rifle or Beam Rifle.
 * Elite Zealots now appear as enemies when playing as Master Chief. They always wield swords and will annihilate all your Marines with ease.
 * Enemies are extremely adaptive and intelligent in tactical action. They are very difficult to kill.
 * Grunts retreat less often when a leader is killed.
 * Marine allies are much stronger; they have more health and their AI is increased significantly, to little effect.
 * Melee attacks on you from Elites and Flood are almost always one-hit kills.
 * Enemies normally have upgraded weapons. For example, Brutes that usually had Brute Plasma Rifles now usually have Carbines and also have the deadly Brute Shot equipped.
 * Enemies will often notice you sooner.
 * Sniper Jackals will appear more often than on any other difficulty. One shot from them will kill you regardless of where it hits, so you should think twice before sticking yourself out into the open.
 * Stealth Elites appear more often, and travel in groups of 2-4, usually with one or two wielding dual-wielded Plasma Rifles, and the others using Energy Swords.
 * Almost all Flood Elites have shields.
 * Both players have "linked lives". That is, when one of the players dies, both are sent back to the last checkpoint regardless of whether or not only one of them died (possibly to prevent players from easily reaching the status of beating legendary on their profile, or to enhance it with the general knowledge of the above statement).
 * One shot from a Brute Shot will have the same power as a shot of the Rocket Launcher on Easy difficulty.

Halo 3

 * Shields are 50% their "Normal" power and a few hits will drain them completely.
 * Enemies are several times more resistant to damage (Example: You need three body shots or two headshots for a Brute Captain to take it down instead of one headshot or two body shots with a sniper or beam rifle).
 * Head shots are the only means to get a quick kill on enemies like Jackals and Grunts.
 * Nearly all enemy forces are promoted by one rank with high ranking Grunts and Brutes seen more often. This, by the way, can be changed with the effects of the Thunderstorm skull, which promotes enemies even higher.
 * Enemy numbers double or sometimes triple in the case of Flood encounters.
 * Enemy AI increases dramatically, enemy vehicles will be significantly harder to hijack and enemies will be nearly impossible to stick with grenades.
 * Sniper Jackals, one of the rarest enemies in Halo 3, will appear in greater frequency, though not nearly as much as in Halo 2.
 * Enemies fire a lot faster and toss grenades more often and more accurately.
 * Enemies fire weapons very accurately and at an extremely fast rate.
 * Turrets will appear in places where there were none, including Shades, and gunners will be affected by the above skills.
 * Brutes will wield Brute Shots more often and they fire them faster, more accurately and deadlier. They will frequently go in berserker mode on any random occurrence.
 * Grunts and Jackals now shoot their weapons faster.
 * You can't kill Jackals with one melee hit, unless you're using a melee-based weapon or assassinating them.
 * The 'linked lives' is removed and can only be achieved with the Iron Skull.

Tactics
If one plays Halo 3 on the Legendary difficulty, they should follow these tips.
 * When facing Drones, always have cover that you can hide behind, as half a dozen plasma pistols and Needlers can be deadly.
 * Take your time; you may think that rushing through a level on legendary is the way to get through, but your enemies will kill you as soon as you move out of cover. Instead, wait in cover with a medium ranged weapon, like the Battle Rifle or Carbine, and take out as many enemies (specifically Brutes) as you can.
 * Use a semiautomatic weapon against Brutes and Jackals. These weapons are usually more precise, especially ones with a scope. Save automatic weapons, like the Assault Rifle or SMG for Grunts.
 * Use sniper weapons as much as possible at long range. Take out most of the higher ranked enemies before engaging the rest.
 * Head shots are important. A head shot can kill any unarmored enemy in one shot.
 * Remember to use grenades.
 * Use vehicles with boosts when moving across an open area if possible.
 * Use silver skulls (except Blind, obviously). The Grunt Birthday Party skull and the Cowbell skull are very helpful.
 * Don't charge at enemies unless you are sure they can't fire back at you. Doing so can result in instant death.
 * Support weapons are very helpful.
 * The Grunts often go kamikaze and will kill you if you're not fast enough to kill them.
 * Kill Sniper Jackals first. If you aren't behind cover they will instantly kill you.
 * Use the Plasma Pistol, preferably charged, to take down enemy shields.
 * Use the Noob combo as much as possible. It can save you when facing large numbers of Flood forms, at least. You need to create as much distance as possible from deadly enemies such as Chieftains, so noob combo would be ideal.
 * Plasma pistols are not actually that bad. They can destroy a Brute's armor in a charged shot.
 * It is good to play with four people on Legendary. You should keep one person out of the way so that you can respawn if you die. This is especially useful on the level Cortana (Level).
 * Finding the battle rifles or carbines can and will give you the edge in sniper duels. This works best on the first and second levels as the respective ammo is plentiful.

Halo Wars

 * Enemies' health varies from being 25% to 50% stronger than on Normal, depending on the mission.
 * Enemy units deal much more damage, up to 50% more than on Normal.
 * Enemies are always upgraded with at least one or two upgrades and attack the player's base earlier and with more units.
 * When facing Flood units, player's infantry units get infected at a faster rate.
 * Extra enemy units, which normally don't appear, to deal with: Shades, stationary Jackals and sometimes even Mega Turrets. In Flood missions, more Flood Launchers, Spores and Growth Pods.

Tactics
When playing Halo Wars on Legendary, players may follow these tips:
 * Frontal assaults against large enemy groups usually are a bad choice: unless your army is varied and powerful, try to set up ambushes by using terrain and covers where troops can garrison in, like the Deployable Lookout Tower.
 * In Campaign missions, it's usually impossible to achieve the Combat Bonus, due to the enemy's lethality. The best way to make a good score is by completing the mission in a short time, achieving the Time Bonus.
 * To make the game easier, players can activate some of the Skulls.

Trivia

 * If The Maw is completed on Legendary, a special ending is shown known as the "Hugging Elite", an added, non-canon cut scene where Sergeant Johnson and a Minor Elite exchange embraces.
 * Every difficulty shield icon has the Marathon symbol on it as in the pre-Xbox Halo.
 * Legendary is the top edition of Halo 3.
 * If The Silent Cartographer is played on a level higher then Easy, the guitar version of "Rock Anthem for Saving the World" will play after the transmission with Echo-419 after accessing the Cartographer.
 * Halo 3 keeps track of whether you finished Legendary on Solo or Co-op, thus signifying finishing it on Solo, which is considered suicide compared to Co-op, which can be completable by ordinary players.
 * The second Halo 3 map pack is named the Legendary Map Pack (aptly named, for the previous map pack was the Heroic Map Pack).
 * Many players will use Xbox Live to beat this difficulty; swapping in and out so there isn't a restart from a checkpoint, increasing level run-through speed.
 * On Halo 3, you unlock EOD armor for beating Legendary difficulty.
 * If you complete the last level of Halo 3 On Legendary (titled "Halo") you will unlock a special Legendary ending that displays a bonus cutscene after the credits for the game. It shows another Galaxy near ours. This is, in fact, the Andromeda Galaxy, which is to collide with our galaxy in millions of years. The perspective makes it look closer.
 * In Halo 2, Legendary is the only difficulty where you can find the hidden skulls, except for the Blind Skull and the Assassins Skull. The Assassins Skull doesn't give you the effect.
 * The Elite Skull on the symbol for the Legendary difficulty is not the same size of a normal Elite skull. This is simply a carry-over from Halo: Combat Evolved in which the head is implied by the Elite's armor. The actual skull is much smaller.
 * It is possible to play on an unofficial difficulty, known as Mythic; this is playing on Legendary with the Mythic skull enabled. Some will take this further and play with all of the skulls. Mythic on Legendary will make even head shots from snipers have little effect, sometimes even grunts survive them.
 * Mythic mode is known to be a true 'hell' in Halo 2; as the Mythic skull doubles enemy health, the effect is similar to that of facing invincible enemies. Particularly notable is the fight with the Prophet of Regret, who has massive amounts of health and is extremely hard to defeat.
 * In Halo Wars, the only difference in gameplay is that the AI is much smarter and there are many more Shades in Campaign.
 * Halo 2 is the only game in the Halo trilogy without a special ending when completed on Legendary.
 * In Halo 3: ODST the Elite skull and the Combat Knives on the Legendary logo are gone. They are replaced by two silenced SMGs and a human skull.
 * The Legendary symbol resembles a skull and crossbones.

Internal

 * Campaign Complete: Legendary