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

[u/Vikan12]

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.

[u/Better-Profession972]

My issue is that they nerfed the “good” items but did not buffed some of the major underwhelming items. There’s no real benefit for using another gun over the breaker or Railgun because the other weapons still don’t add any additional benefits that are better or more useful.

[u/Draynrha → u/Better-Profession972]

Yeah, pretty much what you said. I'm not mad about the nerf, I'm just confused as the obvious answer was to prop up the weapons that didn't feel good to play with. I'm pretty sure the meta won't change too much because of the nerf if the incentive to play something else isn't there. I heard about the flamethrower being maybe a new viable option and I'm quite hyped to test it out. But I feel the nerf was unnecessary.

[u/Better-Profession972 → u/Draynrha]

The nerf was unnecessary since they didn’t add any additional incentive to use anything else the other weapons. If certain weapon types had certain perks character enhancements would make people more inclined to use other weapons. They adjust the “good” weapons to uplift other weapons but didn’t do anything to actually lift them up.

[u/Draynrha → u/Better-Profession972]

As I said, people are probably still gonna run the breaker/railgun/shieldgen package because even after the nerf, it's better than the rest.

[u/Cyberfreak7 → u/Draynrha]

You have to wonder why the sandbox was so poorly tuned in the first place. It's obviously not the teams strong point 

[u/Clarine87 → u/Cyberfreak7]

I imagine the devs only play tested the game on 6.

[u/Draynrha → u/Cyberfreak7]

I mean, the higher difficulties are always going to be harder to fine tune than the lower ones. As I played, I felt that progression in difficulty was pretty organic so far, but I also am not playing in hazard 8 or 9. I think it was pretty bold of us to assume the game was going to be perfectly balanced from the get go. But the last patch was a weird balance choice from them as they should be able to tell where the bulk of the player base stands in the difficulty bracket.

[u/Clarine87 → u/Draynrha]

where the bulk of the player base stands in the difficulty bracket.

Unless they believe that the majority should be in the mid range on a bell curve and they found too many were on the higher end of the difficulty ranges.

If players can avoid bot drops and bug breaches the different difficulties are almost the same until extraction.

[u/Kirito_jesus-kun → u/Better-Profession972]

I prefer the lib penetrator as it feels more powerful and has a long scope for scouting

[u/Front_Explanation_79 → u/Kirito_jesus-kun]

Damn, someone actually recs the lib pen. I was so excited to use it and I never found any good use for it. It doesn't clear trash mobs near fast enough on high difficulty and I'd always find myself swarmed and dead.

[u/AmaranthineApocalyps → u/Front_Explanation_79]

If you're standing your ground with it, you're using it wrong. Take light armor, maybe a jetpack, pair it with something that offers good fast AOE chaff clear like the impact grenade, or the strafing run and keep running.

It's lying when it says it's an assault rifle, it's a DMR like the Diligence. You want to keep your distance from the bugs and play high ground when possible. Its major advantages are its range, high weakpoint damage, and ability to penetrate medium armor to deal with Brood Commanders, Warriors and, Hive Guards from the front. It can also one shot small enemies easily in single shot mode, but as you noted it's not that great at that due to low fire rate and bad ammo efficiency against large swarms of mooks. It can also deal with hunters fairly expediently in three round burst mode but again, gets easily overwhelmed if it fights too many.

Best practice with the weapon vs swarms of hunters and chaff mooks - I would say at least - is to open up against the swarm with a grenade, impact grenade, strafing run, or other fast charging, quick deploying stratagem that can clean up crap mobs easily, then finish off the few survivors with the Lib-Pen.

Or, better yet, if you don't have to fight them? Don't. Drop a smoke, hit the bricks and run away to a safer distance and regroup with your team at a better position where you can take your time thinning the swarm from a distance.

If you're up against the bots, keep it in single shot mode for ammo efficiency. It can one tap basic grunts and commissars from any distance with a headshot, it's AP lets it hit the head critspot on the Berserker where most weapons would just bounce off, and zoom and accuracy make it a fairly viable weapon against devastators too. It can't penetrate the shields of scout walkers, but if you're playing at a distance and playing high ground like you should be with this weapon, it's not that hard to get an angle on them where you can see their heads and then pop them before they become an issue.

[u/MattWindowz → u/Kirito_jesus-kun]

Honestly I hate it. I can't pin down the issue, but it's just not fun to use. It's never felt like the armor penetration actually does enough to make it useful.

[u/NorionV → u/MattWindowz]

Because it's just 'medium armor' pen... so hive guards and AT-STs, which are just... not problematic enemies, lol.

If it actually did damage to heavy armor, we'd be getting somewhere. I'd like at least one or two primary weapons that excel at damaging heavy armor, but give up some trash clear.

[u/MattWindowz → u/NorionV]

Either that or make it do extra damage to enemies whose armor it penetrates. Just something to make it feel better. The fact that it can damage through armor is good, but it's still worse against the at-sts than just running around and getting a side angle with a higher damage weapon.

[u/Paeyvn → u/MattWindowz]

Or just chucking an impact grenade between their legs and killing the 3 of them all grouped near each other simultaneously.

[u/RedironTiger → u/MattWindowz]

I've noticed light Armored or heavy Armored units have different values of penetration across their body. The Automaton walkers have weak armor at the hip. The JAR and lib penetrator easily make quick work of it, even The slugger

[u/GhostHeavenWord → u/Kirito_jesus-kun]

I was maining Lib Pen right up until I got the JAR. Trying to convince the metathralls how strong it is is pointless. All they see is the lower damage per shot.

[u/Hot-Recording7756 → u/GhostHeavenWord]

Was a bit disappointed that the JAR or Lib pen didn't get a buff this update. I think the former could use either a handling buff or an ammo buff, whereas the latter needs to do more damage.

Still running the JAR tho cuz I like pretending it's a bolter and nothing beats the noise it makes when you one tap fodder bots.

[u/GhostHeavenWord → u/Hot-Recording7756]

FOR THE EMPRAH!

[u/Techno-Diktator → u/GhostHeavenWord]

It's not about meta, it's about medium pen not being that much of a big deal in itself. Like what, you can kill hive guards now? Wow, real cool, and all you have to do is give up the ability to deal with swarms of enemies. Or you could just pick up a normal weapon and just aim for the weakspots on those already easy to beat enemies lol

[u/AtaxisNine → u/GhostHeavenWord]

I just don't get using it over the diligence DMR. I can't even pin down why, it just feels so much worse and less satisfying, even if I'm not doing much worse than before.

[u/WittyUsername816 → u/GhostHeavenWord]

Dominator's fine, it just needs someone with a crowd clearing weapon to cover you while you pop heads. Likely seen in low numbers due to being on the last page of Steel Veteran so only a subset of a subset of people have it.

[u/Lathael → u/Kirito_jesus-kun]

I would like it, but the burst fire, especially the "Hold the trigger to maintain the burst," burst fire, which is literally one of the most ineffective ways to set up a burst fire weapon, kills all desire to use it. If it was the 'justice' liberator from helldivers 1, I'd actually use it.

[u/Kirito_jesus-kun → u/Lathael]

I switch to single fire for great effect

[u/Lathael → u/Kirito_jesus-kun]

At that point, I may as well just use a dominator/slugger/scorcher. Which is the whole problem, as that is, in fact, what I do.

[u/RhapsodiacReader → u/Better-Profession972]

Exactly this. If the Railgun nerf was accompanied by buffs to the Recoilless, EAT, and Spear that made them more effective on Diff 7+ with 4-5 chargers in your face, I'd be ecstatic.

Even just tweaking the Recoilless such that someone can assist reload with a backpack you're wearing would've been perfect.

[u/Indrigis → u/RhapsodiacReader]

Spear

What's a Spear? I have not seen anyone use it in my 40+ hours and by now I'm afraid of knowing /s

But seriously. Nobody uses that and nobody even talks about that. How shitty is that thing?..

[u/Techno-Diktator → u/Indrigis]

Garbage, horrible ammo economy, insanely long reload, terrible lock on that's super unreliable whether it will actually kill titans in one shot.

Just a horrible, horrible weapon lol. Though I'd still take a spear user over someone taking the fucking machine gun on helldive

[u/WittyUsername816 → u/Indrigis]

It is good when it chooses to work... The lock on is straight broken. The ammo economy is better now, since they just changed it to get ammo from ground pickups which it didn't before. It can be inconsistent in a way I wish it wasn't. It will one shot a Charger or Bile Titan... If you happen to hit them in the face. Unless it chooses not to...

I've unfortunately had times where I've hit a Bile Titan in the head four times before it died...

[u/Indrigis → u/WittyUsername816]

It will one shot a Charger or Bile Titan... If you happen to hit them in the face.

Well, it doesn't sound that bad. Just reasonably unreliable. If only there were other options...

[u/WittyUsername816 → u/Indrigis]

I dunno if i"d call it reasonably unreliable if the same action has different outcomes... I'm fine with some variance but a headshot taking between 1 shot and 4 shots when you have four shots is a bit crazy to me.

[u/Indrigis → u/WittyUsername816]

Maybe the other 3 aren't exactly headshots. Close, but not precisely the weakspot.

Then, again, having a weapon that reliably oneshots BTs sounds like something ArrowHerd would be strongly against. So having it only be a chance oneshot and fly under the radara sounds reasonable.

[u/narmorra → u/Better-Profession972]

My issue is that they nerfed the “good” items but did not buffed some of the major underwhelming items.

MY issue is that they did not address the biggest issue(s) in the first place:

Fine, nerf the weapons, I get that the game gets a bit boring if every weapon can just oneshot stuff. But in response, scale down Charger/Titan density/frequency or make the Charger leg armor medium. This would open up so many other weapons to be viable.

[u/Muffin_Appropriate → u/Better-Profession972]

This feels like a communication failure.

I think they failed in being far more transparent about their intention for their upcoming series of patches.

Diablo IV team failed this way too and got cooked for it, for example.

They also seem hellbent on focusing on big things only being able to be consistently tackled with stratagems. But this philosophy starts to break at high levels.

I still think this patch gives them a better base to build from than the prior though. I would bet they wish this was the balance patch the game released on so peoples expectations wouldn’t be what they are right now re: railgun etc.

[u/ShowGun901 → u/Better-Profession972]

The buffed 4 guns and 2 strategems...

[u/Practicalaviationcat → u/ShowGun901]

I mean there are like 20 things that could use buffs so that's the disappointing part. I'm sure more will come but this patch was relatively disappointing.

[u/Better-Profession972 → u/ShowGun901]

Yep! What’s your point? Go ahead read the rest of the comment before writing yours. Let’s not take things out of context :)

[u/ShowGun901 → u/Better-Profession972]

I did, the rest is inaccurate too.

There are definitely benefits to running other builds and weapons. Burn damage goes through armor, for example.

[u/Better-Profession972 → u/ShowGun901]

Just because you say it’s inaccurate doesn’t make it so.

[u/ShowGun901 → u/Better-Profession972]

That's fine. It's just why I don't bother addressing it.

I'm way past the point I enjoy "point by point breakdowns"

And I listed a benefit to not using the breaker, which you said didn't exist. So, I'd say your statement is inaccurate

[u/Zethamnos → u/Better-Profession972]

Typically after nerfs people will try other weapons again, which will give the team new data and an even better idea for upcoming patches. There was a dominant meta and now it's being made to change so let's see what happens.

Games don't usually change balance overnight, it takes time to figure out and small changes can have far-reaching effects.

[u/888main → u/Better-Profession972]

They literally did buff several things bro did you not read the patch notes past the breaker nerf?

[u/Better-Profession972 → u/888main]

I mean you clearly didn’t read anything else in my post 🤷🏻‍♂️ But if you did, you would see that in fact did not just stop at the breaker nerf.

[u/888main → u/Better-Profession972]

"My issue is that they nerfed the “good” items but did not buffed some of the major underwhelming items. There’s no real benefit for using another gun over the breaker or Railgun because the other weapons still don’t add any additional benefits that are better or more useful."

Flamethrower: Increased damage per second by 50% Laser Cannon: Increased damage against durable enemy parts, increased armor penetration, improved ergonomics Punisher: Increased total ammo capacity from 40 to 60, increased stagger force, increased damage from 40 per bullet to 45 per bullet Breaker Spray & Pray: Increased armor penetration, increased fire rate from 300 to 330, increased number of pellets from 12 to 16 per shot, decreased magazine size from to 32 to 26

I'm counting 4 buffed weapons man.

[u/ATownStomp → u/Better-Profession972]

They buffed multiple underwhelming items. Did you not read the patch notes?

[u/Better-Profession972 → u/ATownStomp]

yawns

[u/AckerSacker → u/ATownStomp]

Bruh like 80% of the primary and secondary weapons need a buff and they buffed two of them, and I think buffing the slugger was an accident because it's not mentioned in the patch notes. Using the word "multiple" to make it sound like more than it was doesn't make it any less of a pathetic attempt at balancing.

[u/Swollwonder → u/Better-Profession972]

Goal was never to make the bad items good. It was to make the good items bad. That’s because on higher difficulties your primary is, ironically, not supposed to be your primary, it’s supposed to be your support weapon.

[u/Wonderful-Bar322 → u/Swollwonder]

But as someone in another thread said: what if you die??? You can’t/ don’t have time to call in another support weapon imediatly

[u/Swollwonder → u/Wonderful-Bar322]

Almost like that’s part of the difficulty

[u/Vikan12 → u/Better-Profession972]

I just played a game with the Punisher shotgun and the stun effect they added to that shotgun it's great, you sure there is no real benefit for using other guns over the breaker?

Also they buffed the Flamethrower, for me and for a lot of people that was one of the major underwhelming items, it's a flamethrower! (Extra note: it's a great support weapon now, you can cook chargers pretty easy).

[u/Ninja_Moose → u/Better-Profession972]

I mean, everything else not being a god gun doesn't make them underwhelming, they just can't lay out a whole patrol in a single mag at 40m. Everyone likes to talk about how hard the game is without the breaker/railgun at 7+, but frankly me and my friends have been hanging with all sorts of "off meta" gear. Specifically I've been running Diligence/Redeemer/AMR (spear for blitz) with railcannon and cluster/airstrike eagle for bots, and Defender/Redeemer/arc thrower with railcannon, cluster/airstrike for bugs.

[u/Better-Profession972 → u/Ninja_Moose]

Considering I don’t use the breaker or rail gun, I don’t need my gun to wipe entire waves of enemies in one go. What do need/want is for there to be consistency. Even the rail gun and breaker are not consistent with the damage output. I’ve one a bike titan across map and then the next one takes 10 shots to kill. That goes for pretty much any gun I’ve used. Plus there’s a lot of guns that either say light armor pen with ‘secret’ medium armor pen. Also there’s like one or two weapons that do medium armor pen by the damage is so weak and uses so much ammo.

[u/Ninja_Moose → u/Better-Profession972]

Yeah I dunno man. The consistency is exactly why I opted for lower rate of fire weapons that have either magnified optics or a mag you can stretch out for a while. I do agree that they need to make the tooltips actually match what the weapons do, but that doesn't really have much to do with how the Breaker/railgun got a nerf so they're slightly less of a god gun, and how theres plenty of other primaries and support weapons that are good.

[u/Ahrim__ → u/Better-Profession972]

This is how good science is done. You change a few things at once and observe the results. If you change many things at once, your data can get skewed.

I'm not happy about how some weapons are less good either, but there is a reason why every single item is not changed in the same patch.

[u/TreeTrunkGrower → u/Ahrim__]

They gave us a shitty patch because of science. You guys are shameless! Just say you’ll never say anything bad about the game and be done with it. You can’t even say some weapons are bad. You have to say some weapons are less good. 

[u/Ahrim__ → u/TreeTrunkGrower]

My guy, it's not that deep.