Type-52 Pistol

The Type-52 Pistol (commonly known as the "Mauler") is a Jiralhanae "sidearm" used by the Infantry and Security forces of the Covenant Loyalists during the Human-Covenant War. The Mauler is a cross between a shotgun and a revolver, but is not as powerful as the UNSC M90A shotgun, however its compact design allowed for dual wielding, doubling the firepower. The Mauler has a blade like other Jiralhanae weapons, however it is used to stab rather than cut. It is the Brutes' weapon of choice for close-quarters combat.

Tactics
The Mauler is generally unable to inflict the one-hit kill damage that the shotgun did, unless dual wielded. It was possible to replicate the Shotgun's lethality with fast reflexes at close range. To do this, you must first be within melee distance of your target. Fire your first shot and immediately strike with a melee attack. This will often dispatch the opponent instantly. Although that is not entirely true, it was possible to score an instant kill, however, you just had to be very close to the enemy. If you mastered this skill, you would be able to shoot the target before they had time to react. Take care when using this tactic against a shotgun-wielding opponent; he will usually not need to melee you after his first blast. This does not work against overshielded opponents. While dual-wielding a pair of Maulers, one double-blast at close range will kill most enemies. Staggering your shots could be effective as well, but this seemed to work best when you were outside of melee range. Dual-wielding this weapon in tandem with a Plasma Rifle or Plasma Pistol was a highly effective combination. Draining your opponent's shield (preferably with one of the Plasma weapons), then moving in and shooting also worked well. If you were reloading your Mauler when you had one of these combos, you would drain there shield with the other weapon and melee. It didn’t matter that you dropped your weapon, you’d just pick it up after the enemy was dead.

The Mauler also had one of the fastest reloads in Halo 3. Even when dual-wielding, it would reload quickly.

Unless duel-wielded, the Mauler was the weakest of other close-range weapons, such as the Shotgun, Gravity Hammer, or Energy Sword. Thus, you should never have attempted to have had a close-quarters fight against someone who had any of these other weapons. Switching to another, longer-range weapon is often a better option.

Tactics When Facing A Mauler
When facing a player armed with a Mauler, the best tactic was to stay back and take them out from a distance. As with the shotgun, energy sword, or gravity hammer, the weapon was virtually useless at longer distances. The official Halo 3 strategy guide states that, "Firing the Mauler at an enemy from anything other than extreme close range is akin to insulting his mother: it's all just hot air and noise and is only going to make him mad". It was inadvisable to get too close unless you had a devastating close-range weapon of your own. Recommended counters were:


 * Long Range: Beam Rifle, Sniper Rifle, and the Spartan Laser. Be careful, the mauler was small, so it was hard to know what the player was wielding. You should have used long range only if you knew the player was carrying a Mauler.


 * Medium Range: Battle Rifle, Covenant Carbine, or Support Weapons such as the AIE-486H Heavy Machine Gun or Missile Pod.


 * Short Range: Shotgun, Energy Sword, Gravity Hammer, Flamethrower, and SMG.


 * All ranges: Grenades, and vehicles.

From Long Range, if you couldn’t tell if the weapon being carried was a Mauler or not, you should have taken cover at an angle off to the side out of the enemy’s line of sight. If you didn’t have a weapon with a scope, you should look at the way the weapon is carried. If it was resting towards the hip its due to the awkward shape, it was probably a Mauler.

Reduction In Matchmaking
Several maps have been altered to remove or reduce the number of Maulers in matchmaking. It is believed that this change was caused by near-constant complaints regarding the large number of Maulers in many levels combined with the Mauler's ability to nearly-instantly kill an opponent at very close range. Many people felt that the weapon was unbalanced because of the close-quarters prowess of the Mauler, especially in CQB-style levels; this is a misconception. The problem was a combination of the somewhat large number of Mauler spawn locations, the fast respawn time on a lethal close-combat weapon (usually only 45 seconds), and players not changing their play style to compensate for a number of camping and / or charging Mauler wielders.

Trivia

 * The Mauler was originally the name of the Brute Chopper in the early stages of Halo 3's development.
 * There are sixteen pellets in one Mauler cartridge, which could be a 7 reference (1+6=7).
 * The original Covenant Mauler appeared in the Pre-Xbox version of Halo as a Covenant weapon, it can be seen here beginning at the 2:49 mark.
 * The Mauler, like the Brute Shot and Spiker, is based on primitive Brute technology, not Forerunner technology, like the other Covenant weapons, as it doesn't fire plasma. Similar to the human technology, it fires projectiles.
 * The Mauler bears a strong resemblance to the Mauler pistol in Perfect Dark (for Nintendo 64).
 * Players often refer to this weapon as the Brute Shotgun or the Mini-Shotgun. They also (less commonly) refer it as the Eagle due to its resemblance to an eagle-like icon when shown.
 * The reticule of the Mauler seems to be about the same as the reticule of the Plasma Rifle and SMG when dual-wielded.
 * In Halo 3 multiplayer, you do less damage per shot when dual-wielding the weapon than when single wielding. This is not noticeable when an opponent has either no shield or normal shields (taking 1 and 2 shots to kill, respectively), but with no damage modifiers and an overshield, it takes one more shot to kill while dual-wielding than while single-wielding.  A 4x overshield resists 4 single-wield or 5 dual-wield shots.
 * It's name, Type-52 Pistol, could be a reference to 7 (5+2=7).
 * When viewed front-on and at a distance, an orange glow is emitted from the 'barrel' of the Mauler.
 * Dual-wielding the Maulers as well as a usage of the Shotgun can single-handedly stop an Energy Sword lunge within close-combat, which makes it extremely useful against Sword users on small maps.
 * When firing a Mauler and throwing a Fragmentation grenade straight after, you can see the Mauler shots in slow motion.
 * Maulers were originally going to be longer, and the blade would be at the front like a Spiker's.
 * The Maulers hand grip is similar to that of the Energy Sword.
 * The Mauler is like an old western revolver, because its magazine revolves.
 * It is actually wondered why Bungie set the Mauler's respawn time at 45 seconds on majority of the levels, including Close-quarters style maps, as its Shotgun, Gravity Hammer and Energy Sword counterparts' respawn times on these maps were either 90, 120, 150 or 180 seconds respawn times.
 * Mauler spawn points were modified on Epitaph, Construct, Narrows, Guardian and High Ground.
 * When holding three Maulers (Not triple-wielding, simply dual-wielding and then one as a backpack weapon due to a glitch), the maximum amount of Mauler rounds can go up to 75 (including cartridges).
 * The Mauler is slightly less powerful than the Shotgun at point-blank range. It takes a single shot plus a melee from a mauler to kill an enemy, while it only takes one shotgun round to kill an enemy.
 * On Halo 3 the first time you see Brutes using Maulers is on The Ark.
 * The reloading of the Mauler is similar to that of the Russian PPSH-41 used in World War 2.
 * Dual-wielding Maulers make effective weapons against The Flood.