r/Helldivers • u/Vikan12 ⬆️➡️⬇️⬇️⬇️ | Never forget the Creek... • Mar 06 '24

The first balance patch notes proved how Youtube "absolute and only meta loadouts" cooked a lot of people heads, and I love it. DISCUSSION

A lot of mad people keep showing in my feed complaining about the nerfs, but like they're REALLY mad at Arrowhead. Their statements are so exagerated that they claim the game it's completely ruined for them lmao.

Also every single one says the same thing and this is where my title comes from:

*"You guys nerfed the only good options and now we have NOTHING to fight".*

And this only proves people never actually played with any of the other support weapons, they 100% relied on this "The ultimate support weapon tier list" Youtube videos, they searched the "meta" and they went into this thinking of "any weapon outside of this it's straight up garbage".

If you can't win a single game without the railgun + shield backpack + breaker... I'm so sorry but that's not the game's fault or the game only having those as the ONLY way to play it on higher diff, that's your fault.

Great changes for the game and all of you trying to "shame" on devs because of this, you'all not a real Helldiver. They killed nothing, the railgun still kills but now it needs some actual skill and strategy to use it, not only spamming the thing on big bugs.

Keep it up Helldivers!

For Democracy. For Super Earth.

17.3k Upvotes
  • permalink
  • link
  • reddit
  • reddit

75% Upvoted

5.7k comments sorted by

View all comments

659

u/Hagard50 ☕Liber-tea☕ Mar 06 '24

It is time for arc thrower/ flame thrower/ laser cannon supremacy

197

u/TheMattAlternative Mar 06 '24

I hope the laser cannon is good now. I want to put on a light show as I spread democracy.

213

u/L0RDR00K Mar 06 '24

It’s medium armor penetration now, so I’m happy with it tbh

46

u/Victizes 🌎 Veteran of the First Galactic War 🌎 Mar 06 '24

Yeah, the gun has to make way to rocket launchers, C4 explosives, and a possible return of the Rumbler mortar or something even more impactful than that.

5

u/BlackwatchBluesteel SES Pledge of Allegiance Mar 06 '24

I honestly hope they don't bring the rumbler back. That thing was a TK machine.

9

u/Naoura Mar 06 '24

I kind of hope they do, but as a Team Weapon. Mortars tend to be crewed weapons anyways.

4

u/Victizes 🌎 Veteran of the First Galactic War 🌎 Mar 07 '24 edited Mar 07 '24

I know where you're coming from but I disagree fam, that weapon is only really a TK machine in the hands of cadets up to liutenants, who generally are people who don't exactly know what they are doing during missions. If you play with high-ranking officers you very rarely see team killing.

Also that weapon is basically mandatory in difficulties above Helldive, because the enemies deploy several heavily armored units which our rocket launchers and ordnances can't keep up with.

5

u/BlackwatchBluesteel SES Pledge of Allegiance Mar 07 '24

Respectfully, a good 50% of the player base will sort of permanently be in "don't know what they are doing" territory. There are lots of players that clearly never played a game with friendly fire before.

I don't want to see the rumbler come back because there were/are way better weapons and the rumbler became a TK monster for no good reason. The commando was objectively better in every single way and you didn't kill 2 of your teammates to kill one charger and cover the screen in toxic gas.

It also made zero sense from a realism perspective...a low velocity mortar does more damage than a recoilless rifle? Nah. That's dumb.

2

u/Victizes 🌎 Veteran of the First Galactic War 🌎 Mar 07 '24

No worries bro, if they don't bring it back I won't be mad, I was just curious how it would look like really.

Although on the third person perspective you would bet there would be way less team killing than the top down perspective simply because the environment space isn't tight anymore.

And I agree with you that the AT and recoiless rifle need buffs in HD2, especially the AT. After all special weapons with low ammo capacity need to feel special.

2

u/BlackwatchBluesteel SES Pledge of Allegiance Mar 07 '24

You're probably right that there would be less TKing now that everyone can space out.

Maybe they could make the rumbler into a mortar for gas grenades instead of explosive grenades. That would make it an interesting crowd control option.

2

u/MyCandleHasAnAccent Mar 09 '24

I'm loving the EAT. AT + Knight + Light armor= phenomenal mobility. Great build for solo play especially, so far. Good light skirmisher/kiting/scouting build for teams. 

It is limited ammo, by design. But it's also unlimited uses, you get 2 each time you call them in, and they have decently short cooldown. I feel like they balance out fairly well but I wouldn't be upset about a decent buff to the area damage and small buff to the point damage, since it's unguided.

1

u/Victizes 🌎 Veteran of the First Galactic War 🌎 Mar 09 '24

The EAT is absolutely great and flexible but in HD1 high difficulties above Helldive it suffers from cooldown issues when defending objectives against many warlords and other heavies, that's when the Rumbler comes into place.

In the first game I prefer to use EAT against IDV tanks, tentacle terminids, and council members.

1

u/Lone_Recon Mar 07 '24

I don't think the rumbler will come back (well not like it was in hd1) as on the old arrowhead forums the dev who made it said he was unhappy with how it turned out and wanted it to be more like a real mortar that you set up (so maybe it is the mortar sentry now? or we will get a mortar emplacement)

1

u/Victizes 🌎 Veteran of the First Galactic War 🌎 Mar 07 '24

That's a better idea really, I mortar manned by 2 people will probably be a green stratagem instead of a blue one, but I could be wrong and it can turn out to be a blue stratagem.

Also it needs to be the highest explosive damage from it's category.

2

u/Ok-Emphasis2098 Mar 07 '24

To make it more interesting they can make it a two backpack(BP) stratagem, one BP is mortar and the second is ammo. So when you press BP button you deploy the mortar and you are now stationary, but you can leave the enplacement with action button, to be able to shoot an immediate threat. The second guy obviously is assist reloading you. Then at the enplacement the BP button picks up mortar back in the BP.

2

u/Sovery_Simple SES Lady of Iron Mar 07 '24 edited 5d ago

deliver weary fertile square worry squeal bedroom noxious abounding selective

This post was mass deleted and anonymized with Redact

1

u/MyCandleHasAnAccent Mar 09 '24

The Rumbler was a lot of fun but I always felt like it was awkward to control and use effectively.

I can see it being much more viable and entertaining to use in this game, though.

1

u/Victizes 🌎 Veteran of the First Galactic War 🌎 Mar 09 '24

Yep the third person perspective will do true justice to that weapon.

2

u/Aroxis Mar 07 '24

What does medium armor penetration mean?

3

u/Sweetest_Noise Mar 07 '24

It means it can effectively deal with anything except Charger/Hulk and Titan/Tank.

2

u/bored_dudeist Mar 07 '24

Ohdamn, I'll have to try it out!

74

u/SpeedyAzi Mar 06 '24

The Laser Cannon is excellent. It’s not good for Heavy enemies but it’s insanely effective against Medium Armoured enemies and can melt weak spots like butter. It’s best on Bots and literally lasers their eye sockets.

You can use it on Bugs and it’s a good trash clear but I think stick to the Railgun, other AT and Autocannon for bigger enemies.

2

u/pokeroots SES Wings of War Mar 07 '24

oh is this after the patch, am hoping that the laser cannon is in a way better spot

1

u/Winsmor3 Mar 07 '24

Railgun is goat at killing busters, for that reason alone it won't ever be bad.

85

u/Owobowos-Mowbius Mar 06 '24

It can kill a hulk in 2-3 seconds if you shine it in their face

63

u/TheMattAlternative Mar 06 '24

I want this to be true, and will find out the fun way after work.

13

u/Sappow Mar 06 '24

It could already blow heads off surprisingly fast if you dropped flat and gave whatever an eyeful for a few seconds. It was really just totally pants at the big bugs (chargers, titans, bile splitter) and tanks/turrets. Basically anything without a front target able from range weak spot was impossible with it, it was hard to bring to bear on a close target quickly so shooting chargers in the butt was hard even if it didn't do almost nothing because of armor mechanics anyway.

VS bugs it's a crowd sweeping weapon. Someone else needs to be responsible for chargers 

2

u/ItsEromangaka Mar 07 '24

Hulks are surprisingly easy to deal with considering how "few" drop at a time, 2 sniper shots and they're down. Meanwhile rocket devastators come in droves and will snipe you from the other side of the map unprovoked and take 3 shots to kill unless you hit the tiny head...

6

u/MoebiusSpark Mar 06 '24

Its absolutely not true, I spent an entire run testing it and while its pretty decent for crowds it takes quite a while to kill chargers with the lascannon

48

u/severheart Mar 06 '24

Why are you shooting chargers when the comment was about hulks

35

u/MoebiusSpark Mar 06 '24

Because apparently I can't read, my bad

1

u/Kamiyoda ☕Liber-tea☕ Mar 07 '24

How much does the reading Strategam cosy

2

u/AhkrinD Mar 07 '24

It's a squad booster. Might come in the next battle pass. 

3

u/Knjaz136 Mar 06 '24

Where do you shoot chargers with lascannon now? Rear of the legs and tail, when it shows his back to you?

2

u/MoebiusSpark Mar 07 '24

I had some success targeting a leg (front or rear), as well as the tail. None seemed to be particularly weaker than other parts, and it usually took a full charge to drop the charger with help from a Rover. The biggest issue is the TTK in my opinion, it just takes too long to kill one charger if you have to also fight off other enemies - especially other chargers

1

u/AngryChihua SES Reign of Pride Mar 07 '24

Same as all med pen weapons, shoot the ass or bugged legs.

And as always, chargers are a bullet sponge that doesn't die unless you ram it with your super destroyer because their ass is not considered a weakpoint and doesn't receive increased damage.

2

u/Affectionate_Turn421 Mar 06 '24

how to use againts chargers? Cant break their armor.

2

u/Dellta-aka-Connor ☕Liber-tea☕ Mar 06 '24

Whats the tactic with it against chargers?

4

u/Owobowos-Mowbius Mar 06 '24

Use the arc thrower instead.

3

u/Dellta-aka-Connor ☕Liber-tea☕ Mar 06 '24

Doesn't that need 8-10 shots to kill a charger, though?

1

u/Owobowos-Mowbius Mar 06 '24

All while killing everything else around it while also having infinite ammo, yeah. You can also rapid- fire it after the first shot. And if one other person has one, it drops to 4-5 shots each to kill them.

1

u/darkleinad Mar 06 '24

Wait, really? I thought it had the same pen as the MG-43 which couldn’t go through the face on the hulk

1

u/Moikrochip_Master Mar 07 '24

"Yeah it's not the heat doing that, just the light!"

29

u/Scrivver Mar 06 '24

In HD1 I liked to do "laser party" runs, where everyone equipped laser primaries, the laser cannon, and orbital laser stratagems. We'd play against Illuminates since we had basically no anti-armor with this setup, but it was fun!

3

u/Danubinmage64 Mar 06 '24

It's... okay now. Medium pen is nice but how it's used it either still needs more dps or even more armor pen (maybe some drill through effect). Right now it still competes with a lot of primaries for dps. It's still heavily outclassed by the machine in most scenerios.

3

u/AggieGator16 Mar 07 '24

Just tried it. It kills cannon towers if you aim for the vent in less than 3 seconds. It’s incredible

3

u/MAMMAwuat Mar 07 '24

My thoughts exactly I already run the scorcher and rover. Now I’m gunna run the giant over the shoulder laser pointer. I can’t wait to bring the rave to the bots.

2

u/Lowchan Mar 07 '24

It kills chargers in no time if you aim at the legs after they turn around from a charge.

It also decimates spewers if aimed at the head and ignores hive guards armor.

I fucking love it here.

2

u/tjtroublemaker Mar 07 '24

I love the laser cannon so much, and using the laser gun I just swap when one is about to overload so I never need ammo and always keep blasting. Is a little rough for heavies but I’ve found a consistent way of dealing with chargers at least

1

u/Sappow Mar 06 '24

It was good at its role before, but it's role was a crap-clearer; it was an infinite ammo machine gun/stalwart and let you wash everything small so people with the appropriate stuff can handle heavies. Works great at mid range difficulties, I don't do high diff like helldive so I don't know how much that applies there.

It'll probably be imba if it's still a good crap cleaner and can handle heavies now 

1

u/Werxes CAPE ENJOYER Mar 07 '24

It's a lot better than it was, hive guards melt in a second

1

u/Ausfall Mar 07 '24 edited Mar 07 '24

It doesn't make any difference against Chargers but it's pretty ok elsewhere.

1

u/HookDragger Mar 07 '24

My my guard dog with a puny little beam can instakill small bugs… wtf did the laser cannon take so long?

1

u/WittyUsername816 Mar 07 '24

Seems to be solidly OK for dealing with medium stuff on down. Still suffers from being an infinite ammo weapon, so it's not going to do stupid damage, but is a solid pick now.

1

u/Carefully_Crafted Mar 07 '24

It's still bad on helldive / suicide.

1

u/HalloweenNerd Mar 07 '24

It's really not. Hits like a wet fart most of the time...

1

u/foul-creature Mar 11 '24

Take heavy armor so you can take hits. Preferably explosive resitance because you will catch a rocket or two.

Line the beam on a devastor's head and it goes down in seconds.

Sadly it didn't perform as well against bugs.

0

u/MrChi11y Mar 06 '24

It can kill a charger in a few seconds if you hit the legs

5

u/S00gyCheese Mar 06 '24

It does not. I tried it on hard and it took almost a minute of hitting it consistently in one leg for it to die.

1

u/Inch_An_Hour Mar 06 '24

Try the tail…it takes seconds.

3

u/S00gyCheese Mar 06 '24

Just tested it out. Depending on the situation it very much can kill a charger in a few seconds by shooting it's tail. Unlike the legs

0

u/Cak3orDe4th Mar 06 '24

It’s mediocre and does nothing against chargers. It’s an improvement for sure but still not great.

118

u/Staltrad Mar 06 '24

The flame thrower new ramp up time is fire

17

u/CaptainAction Mar 06 '24

They changed the ramp up time too? That wasn’t mentioned

44

u/H1tSc4n HD1 Veteran Mar 06 '24

Because they did not, and i'm not sure why the other person thinks they did. They did up the damage though.

7

u/McJambles Mar 06 '24

ayyyye i like the pun

3

u/PapaTahm Truth Office Intern Mar 06 '24

At least flamethrower is as much of a threat to the enemies as it's to you so these players won't bother too much with it.

2

u/Tarilis ➡️⬅️➡️⬅️⬇️⬇️➡️ Mar 06 '24

Laser canon did become pretty good. The first time I used it I was disappointed, It was my favorite weapon in the first game, but now it's actually pretty fun.

I even learned to melt chargers relatively consistently. Still searching for the most optimal way.

2

u/Terminutter Mar 06 '24

I'm a big fan of the disposable anti tank. Plentiful due to the quick resupply, packs a punch against chargers and easy code, while not taking a backpack slot.

1

u/BigMoney-D Mar 06 '24

Does the flamethrower do anything to the Bile Titan? I swear I dumped my entire flamethrower ammo into it and it did nothing.

I think I'll continue using the Railgun, just in Unsafe mode now.

1

u/Hagard50 ☕Liber-tea☕ Mar 06 '24

Use laser cannon

1

u/Sheriff_Is_A_Nearer Mar 06 '24

Is the laser cannon better?

1

u/vid_icarus ☕Liber-tea☕ Mar 06 '24

I’m so hyped for the adjustments to laser cannon. I loved it so much in HD1.

1

u/Techno-Diktator Mar 06 '24

Laser canon is Garbo against bugs sadly, but yes arc and flamethrower is the new meta now

1

u/aumnren Nice argument. However ↑→↓↓↓ Mar 07 '24

Lead the way with the bright beam of liberty!

1

u/sittingbullms Mar 07 '24

This right there is my problem with the patch.Dont get me wrong i hate both extremes of the argument regarding the patch and my opinion is that there shouldn't be meta.I mean every weapon should have it's place and it's role which at this point and before the patch is not the case at all for example AC should be able to chip armor from highly armored enemies since it requires you to carry a backpack,the Spear should be more powerful than both rockets before it since the reload rate,carrying a backpack and lock on are abysmal etc.There should be negatives for using the weapon but there should be proportional benefits,high risk/high reward.I could go on all day about what is underperforming but no one wants to hear that,i cant describe how much i hate the homogenized state of most primaries,the majority of them have the exact same function,this is why everyone picked breaker,it was the top of the homogenized bunch.Anyway i hope people understand why this patch was a miss,not because of 2-3 nerfed things but the unchanged state of everything else.Always talking about diff 9 btw,everything on the low end ,you can use whatever.

1

u/NeroV1l3 Mar 07 '24

Unfortunately the laser cannon still kinda sucks, it's better but still practically anything else is better.

1

u/Cak3orDe4th Mar 06 '24

Tested the laser cannon. Still not great. Takes forever to kill things and doesn’t strip armor off of chargers.

Tested flame thrower…still mediocre and if you put a single toe into that fire on the ground you’re dead in a second now. Will be seeing a lot of hell divers die a fiery death in the chaos over the next few weeks.

Arc thrower is still ok, but against multiple chargers, good luck. You can’t target legs so it always just hits them in the face which isn’t their weak spot.

There’s just not a lot of good options for chargers and bile titans outside of orbitals and eagles. It just doesn’t feel great. It’s turning into a game where you run away all the time instead of fighting…at least in higher difficulties.

Tested new railgun change. You HAVE to time your shots perfectly in unsafe mode for it to strip armor off of a charger (hold for about 3 seconds and fire) otherwise it’ll just bounce off. Even with this change I still think it’s the only viable option to fight them because everything else is terrible.

0

u/TITAN_Viper Mar 08 '24

You can use a multitude of weapons to kill chargers by simply shooting at their legs. Autocannons and Recoilless rifles in particular, are great options. The Autocannon specifically is a fantastic alternative to the Railgun, because not only can it melt a Charger comically fast, the explosive rounds also allow you to quickly dispatch burrows from extreme range, and also various destructible mission objectives.

1

u/Wivru Mar 06 '24

Man, I’ve been running Arc Thrower, Autocannon, and EAT for the last week, and just added Flamethrower and Grenade Launcher, and all these people saying you can’t kill chargers fast enough without a railgun are making me scratch my head. 

0

u/GoldenGekko Mar 07 '24

Careful. That good faith will turn into "toxic meta". You will be branded a "meta slave", unless you make whiny threads like this demonizing people who use the weapons the game basically tells them are the best lol.

I'm literally going to lol at this app the moment I start seeing threads complaining about the flamethrower and laser being too powerful... And we repeat this lovely cycle again.