Halo 3 in MCC: Sierra 117's achievements, including the three things watching you from the jungle

Halo 3 in MCC: Sierra 117's achievements, including the three things watching you from the jungle *Mission spoilers. This checklist is for The Master Chief Collection.* Sierra 117 has more tucked into it than its opening-mission status suggests. Two skulls, three separate caveman sightings, a score target and a time target can all send you in different directions. Then there's a Grunt who may or may not decide to tell you a story. I'd do the exploring first. Get the locations straight, rescue Johnson, and leave the stopwatch for another run. There's no reason to make every missed jump feel like it has ruined the entire mission. **The eight fixed targets** - **Landfall:** complete Sierra 117. Easy counts in MCC. - **Speedy One One Seven:** finish faster than the **15-minute** par time. Any difficulty qualifies. - **Guerilla:** beat the **13,000-point** MCC par score. - **Skulltaker Halo 3: Blind:** claim the early river-area skull. - **Skulltaker Halo 3: Iron:** claim the skull on the high ledge at the dam. - **Missing Link:** spot the caveman in the tree across the river. - **Primate:** find the caveman family along the jungle's concealed ledge. - **Haplorrhini:** spot the lone caveman above the final dam area. There is no terminal here. Also, the three caveman achievements are three different sightings, not a sequence of awards for looking at the same family repeatedly. For a combined sightseeing run, choose **Normal**, start at **Mission Start**, and keep a scoped weapon available. That setup covers the skull collection requirements without forcing you onto Legendary. Leave optional modifiers off unless you're deliberately adding the Flipyap attempt discussed below. **Missing Link: look across the water, not along the path** When you reach the riverside structures where the Pelicans come under attack, clear the enemies before trying to inspect the opposite bank. Look for the small concrete enclosures beside the river. One has a ladder outside and a valve inside. Climbing the ladder gives you a useful viewpoint. Across the water, find the tree with a V-shaped split; the caveman is sitting up among its branches, below the foliage. Use your battle rifle or another scoped weapon to look directly at him. If the first aim doesn't register, reposition slightly and zoom out and back in while keeping the correct branch centered. You do **not** need to cross the river or find a way into the tree. This is a viewing achievement. Don't mistake an unreachable figure for an unfinished platforming route. **Primate: the family is off the left side of the sniper jungle** After the riverside fighting, continue into the narrower jungle section with Jackals watching from elevated positions. Deal with them before climbing away from the main path. Keep to the left-hand wall as you move through. Near the end of that stretch, before the path turns, use the rocks to climb onto the higher ledge. Work past the large rock and crouch through the tight opening along the cliff. The family is tucked into the recess beyond it. Look directly at the group to register **Primate**. The wording about finding your “first” missing links doesn't mean this must be the first caveman achievement you earn. Following the mission normally puts the tree sighting before the family. Take your time getting back onto the normal route. There is no need to turn a harmless detour into repeated falls while the achievement notification catches up. **Haplorrhini: check the cliff above the dam** At the final complex, the cutscene shows Johnson being held by the Covenant and a Phantom leaving the area. The third sighting is high on the cliff above that departing Phantom's position, in a small leafy recess where the rock faces meet. Once it's safe to stand on the bridge, look up toward that recess with a scoped weapon. From the bridge, you're searching the rocky hillside off to the right rather than the prison building itself. Center the figure and give the sighting a moment to register. You can earn this from below. No co-op launch trick, flight modifier or climb up the cliff is required. Do it before extraction. Boarding the Pelican finishes the mission; it isn't the point to realize you still wanted another look around. **Blind and Iron: collect them, don't activate them** **Blind** is on the projecting rock overlooking the water near the first major river encounter. **Iron** is on the building ledge at Johnson's prison complex: cross the bridge, climb the machinery on the right, then follow the upper ledge around to its concealed corner. The separate Sierra 117 skull guide covers those jumps in detail. For achievement planning, the important rules are **Normal or harder, Mission Start, and an actual pickup**. Turning on Blind or Iron in MCC's menu doesn't award their collection achievements. You don't need either modifier enabled to collect its skull. **The two record runs** For **Speedy One One Seven**, Easy with optional skulls off is the straightforward starting point. Turn on the timer, skip the sightseeing and keep moving between the required fights. At the dam, finish the rescue and extraction instead of stopping to search the ledges. Aim comfortably under 15 minutes rather than relying on the boundary. For **Guerilla**, use the current **13,000** target. Original Xbox 360 guides use **15,000**, and some MCC launch-era guides still show **25,000**. Those aren't the current MCC target. Normal with manageable scoring modifiers or a clean Heroic run are reasonable approaches. The better choice is the one you can finish without repeatedly dying. Keep a precision weapon for exposed enemies, break Brute protection before going for the finishing headshot, and clear dangerous Jackal positions before pushing into their sightlines. Don't spend the scoring attempt staring into trees. Lost time and repeated deaths can undo the advantage of stacking extra modifiers. Check the completed mission's result rather than assuming a promising number halfway through guarantees the award. **Two extra opportunities—not guaranteed rewards for finishing** **Can't Keep Him Down** concerns fighting alongside and hearing Chips Dubbo. Sierra 117 is an early opportunity. Stay with the Marines through the fighting and allow their dialogue to happen; there isn't a collectible to pick up or a requirement to hurt an ally. **Flipyap** is random Grunt dialogue, and it is not exclusive to this mission. Enable **IWHBYD** for a dedicated attempt. A practical setup is Normal, with IWHBYD alone, using the later Charlie section and the fighting around the dam. Kill one Grunt where another can witness it, then leave the survivor alive long enough to react. Avoid clearing the whole group with a grenade. If the relevant line doesn't occur, another attempt may be needed; there is no guaranteed number of kills or retries. This is a separate dialogue run, not a condition for Landfall, the cavemen or either skull. Keep the fixed eight targets separate from those extra opportunities. That way you can finish a productive run without deciding it failed just because one Grunt refused to cooperate.