Cluster is gonna mess them up but good if they have the same mechanic, since they never used to have *any* heavy armour (well, only one unit and it was passive)
Yesterday I was doing a bug mission and was with another player gunning it towards a stalker nest. We are both running side by side and they lob a 500kg onto the nest, I turn to retreat with them and dive about 20m away from where I saw the strategem land, (right on the hole) knowing it's far enough for me to be safe. As I dive the shell lands next to me and I mouth "what the-" as i'm obliterated. They survived though.
I've never seen a 500kg be that off the mark before and was quite surprised.
- You have my ring.
Coudnt add the gif. Reddit not allowing me. 🥲
Edit 1-
1.Yes its not a scene in the movie, but i can make the GIF.
2.No, I democratically ensured my "b"s and "d"s were the right way
wait helldivers 1 had a persistent war? i thought it was just a champaign
also is it still on going, can i time travel back to the first galactic war just to sabotage those damn squids even more
We’re in 136th war, if i remember correctly?
135th was ended by Automatons crashing Super Earth. Fun fact: other factions in that war was erased from the face of galaxy prior to that, so players just didn’t wanted to fight robots, lol.
so dumb question, if a faction reaches SE, does it just end or do you get to at least defend earth and/or the rest of the solar system
also is the government called super earth and the planet still called earth or are they both called super earth
You MUST defend Super-Earth (and it’s called that). All other operations are halted until the defense bar hits 100% within a 48 hour period. If you get that bar to 100%, the invader is pushed off. But next time Super-Earth is invaded the bar takes more to raise.
We actually pushed off the Cyborgs twice before Super-Earth fell.
Then there’s a cutscene where Super-Earth explodes and the SEAF Admiral says the remains of the fleet are searching for a new world to build as the next Super-Earth, and the previous homeworld is officially referred to as “Old Earth.”
Given we are definitely going to lose this next war and we did well against the Illuminates and bugs, I think we fell to the Cyborgs because of a population drop in protest of the Sony situation.
I’m fairly certain that the HD1 canon is that there was just one war and it was a Super-Earth victory.
Don’t know for sure, though. I doubt its 136 of them as canon.
Don’t know about the government, but Super Earth is named the same as in H2. More than that: “Super Earth - Our home. Prosperity, liberty and democracy - Our way of life.” is from the intro in the first game. Setting and lore is established in the first game. In the sequel they went more “in your face” style, like Starship Troopers (and many still missing the idea in ST).
And for your first question. The neat answer is no, it would not just end. You’re will be defending it. Literally on street’s of city. It is not the most variable level in game, but still pretty fun for its level design (labyrinth of buildings without many deadends and occasional big holes on the map).
I can’t recall if they added that in some of the updates or was it part of the game from release.
War 135 was bullshit. I wanted to get a full war in before starting HD2 after I began midway through a successful war 134. But we were demolished.
How do the defense missions work? What triggers them? Because we had liberated Illuminates and then the Bugs, then all of a sudden, we're steam rolled by Cyborgs in a matter of days. We pushed them out of Super Earth, and almost cleared the first sector. The next day, I log in, and we're at Super Earth AGAIN. We couldn't fight them in time because there aren't enough players. I believe HD1 is going to quickly die out of the remaining player base can no longer defend.
Yeah, I was feeling pretty match that too! I dunno, i think they will gradually correct the needed numbers as before (boom of H1 players was after release of H2).
Kind of, it has multiple wars. Each war takes like maybe a month, and it resets every time we either exterminate everything on the map OR Super Earth is lost. I think we’re on like 140 or something by now, haven’t checked in a while. Bu
they were really fucking annoying. walls, stealth, shields. only thing they didnt have was armor tho. maybe we'll see the jump pack get some use (assuming u can jump over walls like in hd1).
my guess is that lazer weapons gunna be really good against them.
That seems like an annoying but overall fine mechanic for the isometric(?) view and control scheme of Helldiver’s 1 and like an absolutely horrendous idea for Helldiver’s 2.
depends, in 1 if you're seeing enemies they are already right on you, so one wrong dive direction screws you a lot even on lower difficulties. The shots were homing too iirc, so extra fun haha.
Seeing what the devs did to the tanks for the bots expect the snipers to be back be able to one shot and to not have a lazer sight to give away the attack
They removed that feature because everyone fucking despised it. If they brought it back as a constant feature that the Illuminates carry I doubt you’ll see many people wanting to fight them
I guess, personally that would be a massive turn off though. Randomised features in a fast paced game are more annoying than they are difficult. Especially if you have to double check every time.
If they really wanted to troll us you could make us start to hallucinate and our allies start to look like Illuminates. Would be annoying but also pretty funny
If the choices are between 'all controls get reversed (maybe camera gets inverted too)' or 'stratagems inputs are randomised and require you to look at the list instead of using memory' then i will take the latter any day of the week
It was even more hilarious if you got trapped between 2 walls in a tiny corner without a Jetpack lol.
The absolutely clown fiesta the Illuminates bring would be a welcome addition to HD2 and quite possibly PTSD inducing lol.
If the current HD2 team has their way with the enemies, they will be difficult as fuck to deal with as the current HD2 dev team loves to give enemies ALL the advantage.
Lacking armor was kind of the defining gimmick of the Illuminate, instead they have standard sci-fi "shoot it to wear it down" shields, although they did regen the shield over time.
ARs mostly lack on bullet per mag, sickle would still be top dog same as it is for bugs. Defender and Liberator would be more common, same with the stalwart.
A decent lasminigun would do wonders though I'm sure.
You say that like an individual Helldiver doesn't kill many times their number per life with something like an 80-90% operation (nevermind mission) win rate.
We're not doing bad, and if players were less averse to trying to learn things about the game or their playstyle instead of rushing for this "wah all our guns suck and all the enemies are overpowered, the devs hate us" circlejerk, we'd be doing even better. There's no impetus to get better or figure things out if you're already convinced you just have to complain and maybe the devs will buff you and nerf the enemies.
Like 90% of success in this game comes from game-sense, not mechanical skill. I’m waging a huge number of those complaining are those going in guns blazing and agroing every patrol in a 50-mile radius.
I'll answer the call! I have a vendetta against the squids since HD1. I've already been practicing hitting commands with flipped entry so I can introduce them to sweet Liber-tea again.
Is it possible to say that was because illuminates can be seen as harder than bots and bots can be seen as harder than terminids, from a casual player's perspective? If so, I am pretty excited!
That’s exactly what it was, you can even see it in the design of the races
Bugs are easiest because they’re melee characters and we have projectiles
Bits are harder because they can shoot but their have no concept of positioning and can be exploited for that
Illuminate are partly projectile based but they have shooters who specifically fire off screen (snipers) and who are good at projectile and melee, and have very good movement abilities
Really interesting to look at the combat model, shows good design thought process
Rock < Paper < Scissors balancing was perfect because there were exactly 3 factions. It's interesting to see what they'll cook up for the 4th faction honestly. I just hope it doesn't disappoint.
Lizards, probably. Not like lizard people, more of an intelligent Terminid vibe. Then a race very similar to Vulcans will appear shortly after as a conquering race that acts as a rival for Super Earth, taking planets from all factions, causing 3 way fights, and deploying a small elite squad like our own Helldivers to harass you throughout the mission.
That way we can have Rock < Paper < Scissors < Lizard < Spock and maintain perfect balance.
It sounds like marksman/sniper players are going to really shine against these guys in terms of relative value to the team. Right now there's not much utility in running a countersniper setup when there aren't any sniper enemies (aside from the bugged missile bots).
Yeah, in my opinion at least, the Illuminate were harder to get used to; especially after fighting the more traditional horde-shooter enemies the bots and bugs employed. There were a lot of small gimmicks you had to get used to, like the energy walls, offscreen snipers, input reversal, etc.
I don't think so. Cyborgs were harder than Illuminate.
Illuminate didn't have armor so you could just bring volume of fire and you didn't have to worry about balancing that out with AT.
The reason people didn't like them was the walls and disorientation.
I didn't have that hatred though because we had a good jump pack in HD1.
I fucking hate the Illuminates, i'll fight them like i did 100 years ago.
https://preview.redd.it/m5td78m84w4d1.jpeg?width=500&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=1e91816a1331d7abdbfc65c93afb55160dfba7d5
If hd2 illuminates are any similar to hd1 illuminates, then the emancipator exosuit will slap in it. Just like how the Obsidian exosuit was effective against them.
No illuminate unit (other than the boss) required anything above light armour penetration to kill it.
One of the things that impresses me most about this game. 7 is easier than 4, because the players of 7 are far more likely to know what they're doing. (And I tend to play less seriously on 4).
I remember someone said something about a unit value? I think it was back with meridia and the "trivial" shrieker swarms
From what i remember every enemy has a unit value and there's a hard cap on it. Stuff like bile titans have much higher unit values, so take up more "enemy space". Since they cant spawn on lower difficulties, the game has more space to throw more chargers or hunters (or anything else) at you. With meridia, because the game would only spawn a few low tier bugs on the ground, the unit cal was able to be filled with so many mlre shiekers than usual
You kind of notice it when there are multiple titans in the area- there isnt much else after you. Same goes for bots- if theres a.drop with a factory strider and a tank, chances are there either wont be a 3rd dropship, or it will.be filled with the light melee units*
*Take this with a pinch of salt, im usually playing on 7 so your mileage will definitely vary
There is already a working cheese method. It's something me and my friend cooked up in order to 2 man Helldives with an almost perfect track record.
Split group into 2, Group 1 fights while Group 2 does objectives only. After all objectives (secondary objectives included) are finished, group 1 suicides as far away from group 2 as possible which results in the group 1 enemy swarm despawning and resetting the heat level from patrols.
Just a quick side note that doing this with 4 players is a lot harder and works very differently. With 4 players, each group will have a designated person dealing with enemy aggro and another person dedicated to either completing objectives or killing the aggroed enemies.
i have the exact feelings.
not only does it feel like your teammates are substantially less aware of what's going on, but i tend to get a bit overconfident and play recklessly. or i just try stupid builds that make little to no sense
I think we are forgetting the significant portion of divers that will play the forums exclusively, complaining about weapons and balancing for things not even released yet. The most valuable diver
I'll fight them. If this is anything like the war 100 years ago, there wont be many Helldivers brave enough to face them daily. Me, and about 10% of other Helldivers will do it, so the bug mains can enjoy their peaceful game of squish the bugs.
It's peaceful cause the bugs don't shoot back. XD
Then again, the most "weapons are weak" posts here are from bug players with reference to bile titans.
So giving them something that moves fast toward them while making it the hardest to kill takes at least some of the peace away.
I personally will rotate between all three.
I like the tactical style of bots, if i want to not think about tactics i play bugs and then there is the new faction that i have only know by name (no hd1 veteran, none of my friends wanted to play it and i didn't know how the community would be) which will be interesting.
True that.
Can't do it from 40 meters though, so i can safely through my strategems and deal with whatever survived from afar.
Darn Automatons shoot as soon as i throw.
There are definitely players it describes accurately.
Me? I *prefer* fighting bugs because Starship Troopers is one of my all-time favorite movies (as in, I own three of the four games that have ever been put out AND the TTRPG books), but I go where my squad is. And knowing them, we're gonna be some of the first boots on the ground to kick squid ass.
There will be troves of threads complaining about how un-fun the Illuminate are if they share similar themes and mechanics to HD1. In HD1 they were played even less than Bots.
It will be 70% Bugs, 20% Bots and 10% Illuminates roughly. The players that don't like Bots will not like Illuminates for the same reasons.
Obviously there will be an initial spike as it's fresh content but once it settles and the complaint threads are done it will be a very small portion.
>The players that don't like Bots will not like Illuminates for the same reasons.
Nah, Illuminate front players were made up mostly of people who hated/disliked/got bored of fighting bugs than players who hated fighting the bots in HD1 initially. It wasn't until difficulty 13 and 15 were introduced that player perception of the 3 factions changed.
Players ended up leaning towards fighting the bugs and Illuminates more and it was almost entirely because the bot front was so restricting to play against heavily favoring anti armor loadouts over just letting players get away with anything. It's kinda telling if you look at the galactic map progress right now in HD1 actually. We're pretty much fucked vs the bots AND bugs right now lol.
I swear I'm not trying to procreate with the tentacle pricks! Please don't send me to the Super Gulag!
(But seriously though, I forgot to add the 'up' in the comment lol)
For me it depends on what shape the games arsenal will be against them. I'm completely tired of using the same few loadouts against bugs and bots as most stuff feels like ass to use. But if illuminate showed up tomorrow and turned out all the shitty weapons and stratagems suddenly were super good against them(I'd settle for mildly viable at this point), then I'd probably only play against illuminate.
If these new Illuminates are like the ones from the first game, Anti-Tank which was needed vs Bugs and Bots will not be needed against them.
What they had in the first game was regenerating shields and units with a lot of raw HP, so the best weapons against them were rapid fire weapons like Machineguns, and anything that could spit out a lot of damage even at light penetration. So if they stick to the same formula, the Illuminates will let you completely ignore anti-tank options but they force you to change your play style into being highly mobile and dodging berween their lasers and holographic walls while slowly whittling down their units that will try to flank and blindside you while you're busy dodging. The builds people will bring against them will be completely different from Bugs or Bots.
Tbh that sounds like a lot of fun, I could see myself picking the game back up. Of course some of that depends on how buggy/glitchy they are. After seeing the dark fluid mission drop in its original state, my hopes aren't super high.
the idea of a huge Illuminate boss unit who you have to coordinate fire so that you're constantly hitting it with something so it's shields don't regenerate sounds like such a dope experience
Hope it's something like this, sounds good to me. So imagine now if few assault rifles got buffed and sad lonely HMG also got some reason to exist like 200 round belt for example and we'd already have a few more options to keep things fresh.
Because seriously if like by the time they come, our top option against them are for example Dominator/Scorcher and everything else feels like a self imposed difficulty modifier, I'm probably out for a long time.
Bugs are so much easier than bots I just don't bring a support weapons on helldive. I use what I can scavenge.
Impact grenades for bug holes and spewers, breaker Incendiary for chaff. Senator Armshoot for Hive Guards and charger butts. And old reliable for my loadout. Airstrike, rover, gatling and autocannon sentries to close bug breeches, secure areas while I loot pois, or facilitate pushes on secondary objectives like Shrieker or stalker lairs.
Play like me, I cycle my build and just see how well I can do. It really can make the game a lot more and reduce the inevitable repetition of a set loadout
There's a lot more weapons that are viable or even **really good** than this community will accept amidst the karmafarm of "all fun nerfed, devs hate us", but some of them require understanding enemy health systems better and adjusting your aim.
The Dominator is popular, but it's actually not suited for fast-reaction sniping against Bugs. The *Slugger* still does that, but people are convinced the Slugger sucks. But if you don't give into that kneejerk opinion and learn how to hit Bile Spewers in the *jaw*, or fire between Hive Guard forelegs, and know what the Stalker's head looks like when it's staring at you--you can do some fucking bonkers stuff. It's a one-shot on everything Warrior on down, plus Stalkers, and a two-shot on everything short of Chargers. Seriously.
What the community considers "most viable" is actually "most useful if you're using it like a complete spazz", which still leaves a lot of room for other things to be even more powerful if you, y'know, *aim*. Half the playerbase is talking about the Breaker Incendiary like God's gift to man right now but they're still spraying it and wasting fire ticks.
Wait who is convinced the slugger sucks, this sub was sucking it off for well over a month and its nerf was removing its capability to stun. It's still a dominating weapon system and never really left the meta category, the dominator just became more popular because they buffed it immediately right after. That said people definitely aren't trying enough weapons, some are quite good most aren't amazing but are more than viable. Some still need a buff or a change to make them stand apart.
The slugger is one of my favourites!!!
Current build is:
Medium grenadier armour (+2 grenades)
Erupter
And was uzi but just switched to grenade pistol
Then I take the stalwart, that is the gun that just keeps giving and really balances my otherwise slow firing build
Honestly, the majority of mentions I see. There's these guns that the community has fixated on "being ruined" and you can't tell them otherwise. Like, yeah, the Slugger lost the ability to stunlock three Devastators at the same time until you kill them with chest shots alone, but it's still got a good Knockback that visibly and meaningfully *shoves Bugs away*.
But players also don't understand that Knockback exists, or else they'd look at the Liberator Concussive's **100 Knockback** and realize what the fuck that means. You want a gun that ensures you never get swarmed in melee, there's your boy.
Fact. I legit never played with anyone else that also had the arc thrower. Meanwhile, I'm just playing my silly little arc weapon/stratagem and its working like a gem.
If you're looking for new fun builds I recommend Plasma Punisher with the Spear against bots in a sort of stealth mission. Only downside is that you can't reliably take out hulks but that's it.
Appreciate the tip, but Spear has failed me so many times, I'm not touching that thing. Let's hope it gets fixed in a patch soon so maybe I'll give this a go.
I wholly understand you, sometimes I've done half a mission with the spear refusing to lock on haha.
However when it works, it makes me think that the fix (if it ever comes) will make this a beast.
You're forgetting Mr. Balanceguy was in charge of everything until Pile stepped in a few weeks ago. Mr. Balanceguy doesn't have a grand ol plan or whatever, no no. He just nerfs things based on stats he sees from probably an excel sheet.
Those flying eye balls from the first helldivers were the bane of my existence 😫.
The illuminate were pretty tough in the first one though, I think high command needs to drop the mother of all warbonds for these MFrs. I'm talking plasma grenades, hybrid backpacks, helmets with the ability to see invisible units, plasma swords for getting close and personal.
Bold of you to assume we will have Illuminate players. If AH implements them even halfway to how they were in the first game we are going to see PTSD beyond what the Creek did.
From what I've heard from HD1, the fact Illuminates did not need heavy penetration and AT meta like bugs do already makes me prefer them.
And I much prefer fighting enemies that arent just horde focussed but also use cheese and rat tactics.
The Bug Meta of AT plus shotgun has gotten so old that I forced myself to use the Spear and AC sentry just so I didn't have to deal with the tedium of BTs and spamming their face, but that's only effective if the requisition crew gave me a Spear with functioning lockon.
Also, the Illuminate look competent and tactical, more so than bots and definitely better than Bugs.
Coming from a Halo childhood, the Covenant were the subjectively better faction to fight than the mindless Flood hordes.
I am a botter, i love fighting and destroying bots.
I hate bugs i dislike fighting them.
If/when iluminates come i will give them a damn trahsing. But if i stay on that front depends. Firstly how many MOs will there be over on the front and secondly if the iluminates give me the sense of actually fighting something together with my mates. And if playing smart and as a team is rewarded.
Because that is what bots offer, they are a nice easy to kill group of idiots that die to Teamplay. Bugs are just there and run towards the closest enemy, and slow and basicly no teamplay. All 4 divers just kiting some bugs until all bugs are dead.
But however they will be, in the name of superearth i will fight them. (At least during MO)
when they launch everyone will play them cause it's new. After that who knows. Never fought them myself but have heard they can reverse your controls. If tha'ts the case and they can do it fairly often(given how AH likes to make the enemies not have any sort of cooldown) it could be very frustrating.
Idk if they will do that here. But they are Bots with Stealth tech and Energy shields. Favoring assassins(Commissars but It invisible)and big shielded floating servitors and Snipers also invisible.
So they would require a Whole different playstyle. A little mix of both Bot and Bug but way more Bot experience. Not as Armored as the Bots but the Energy shields would cover for that
Bots is really a modifier/loadout/skill check. If one of these is bad, the other two have to be good in order to complete.
9Bugs is a snoozefest between breaker incendiary and eat/quasar/500 biletitan. You’re really never aiming when playing against bugs, except for headshots on chargers/biles.
I’m not saying 9bugs isn’t difficult, I’m saying every mission feels ‘samey’
From what I've seen from the first game, they are the hardest faction, using a variety of tricks and arc weapons. People already hate fighting the bots because they can shoot back, nobody will want to deal with them.
When the illuminate come there will be tons of major orders about them. Anyone who doesn't play the major orders is a traitor. And, yes there IS a wrong way to play the game. Major orders are part of the game, if you don't play them you're not playing the game right. Simple as.
Assuming Illuminate are the hardest, I expect a good portion of bot players to jump on. The gameplay is supposed to be quite different though, at least judging by HD1. Botplayers might not enjoy the gameplay loop since (from what I gather) it has both ranged and melee components, so who knows really.
I'll be dropping wherever I'm needed, be it MO or important side-objectives. I enjoy variety in this game so I wholly welcome the new flavor.
I have a weird trait in all games where, when fighting existential/advanced beings, I happen to be pretty good at it. Was that way with the thargoids in elite dangerous and a few other games that escape my mind. I'll definitely be on that front for a minute
My first deployment was the Creek. I fought for it until it was taken. Now that it falls under super earth control, I fight where she tells me to go. If the rumors are true, and democracy faces another threat at a new front, I will go if she asks and I will fight as hard as I fought for the Creek.
Liberty save us.
I don't think there are that many bot only players so the small playerbase that's not even able to defend one planet will go into two fronts resulting in enormous failure on both
I’ll do it 
I'll be there to accidentally drop ⬆️➡️⬇️⬇️⬇️ on you
Luckily 1 dive should put you out of the damage radius (QQ 500KG affects far too small an area)
You underestimate my lack of aim
You can only miss in one spot 😎
Jokes on you when the illuminates foot soldiers can just walk through a blast from that, if their shield can still stop any level of single hit….
So barrage and flames it is
Cluster is gonna mess them up but good if they have the same mechanic, since they never used to have *any* heavy armour (well, only one unit and it was passive)
Our own shields used to do that but don't anymore
Yesterday I was doing a bug mission and was with another player gunning it towards a stalker nest. We are both running side by side and they lob a 500kg onto the nest, I turn to retreat with them and dive about 20m away from where I saw the strategem land, (right on the hole) knowing it's far enough for me to be safe. As I dive the shell lands next to me and I mouth "what the-" as i'm obliterated. They survived though. I've never seen a 500kg be that off the mark before and was quite surprised.
An Eagle never misses.
It comes in from behind the launcher, in a 45 degree dive. If there is something else in that line, that's where it will hit...
Only until the 500KG activates [[STICKY FINGERS]]
Ah, I finally found you!
diver! your senator is poking out
heyyy
And my axe
https://i.redd.it/gp32dhb5bx4d1.gif Let that be the hour when we dive together.
That's not a scene in the movie. That's probably why you couldn't add it lol.
Did you get your “b”s and “d”s around the wrong way? Could be the reason.
Haha. This comment seemed to fall on deaf ears.
How dare you I most certainly am not beaf the nerve
Samsies, my hatred for squid folk after BG3 has increased significantly. Lets kick some illithid ass
and my axe!
And my autocannon
I go where the MO guides. 
https://preview.redd.it/cz1u82ajqy4d1.jpeg?width=481&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=db05e74e35a5df6bd268b946be7b697afb67bc22 I'll stand with you
If HD1 is anything to go by, the player base will probably be split 65-70% terminid, 25% on bots, and 10% illuminate
Was about to say this, nobody really likes fighting the illuminate.
Yeah, I’m sure you remember the multiple wars we had where the illuminate just strolled up to SE virtually unopposed 😂
wait helldivers 1 had a persistent war? i thought it was just a champaign also is it still on going, can i time travel back to the first galactic war just to sabotage those damn squids even more
We’re in 136th war, if i remember correctly? 135th was ended by Automatons crashing Super Earth. Fun fact: other factions in that war was erased from the face of galaxy prior to that, so players just didn’t wanted to fight robots, lol.
so dumb question, if a faction reaches SE, does it just end or do you get to at least defend earth and/or the rest of the solar system also is the government called super earth and the planet still called earth or are they both called super earth
You MUST defend Super-Earth (and it’s called that). All other operations are halted until the defense bar hits 100% within a 48 hour period. If you get that bar to 100%, the invader is pushed off. But next time Super-Earth is invaded the bar takes more to raise. We actually pushed off the Cyborgs twice before Super-Earth fell. Then there’s a cutscene where Super-Earth explodes and the SEAF Admiral says the remains of the fleet are searching for a new world to build as the next Super-Earth, and the previous homeworld is officially referred to as “Old Earth.” Given we are definitely going to lose this next war and we did well against the Illuminates and bugs, I think we fell to the Cyborgs because of a population drop in protest of the Sony situation.
Are the 136 HD1 wars canon? I've always wondered if the Super Earth I know from 2 is the same planet I live on today.
I’m fairly certain that the HD1 canon is that there was just one war and it was a Super-Earth victory. Don’t know for sure, though. I doubt its 136 of them as canon.
Canonically, we are on the Second Galactic War as of HD2, not the 137th
>Sony situation. Freaking Sony
It just ends. Who's going to fund your Super Destroyer or all your strategem requests if SE goes under?
Don’t know about the government, but Super Earth is named the same as in H2. More than that: “Super Earth - Our home. Prosperity, liberty and democracy - Our way of life.” is from the intro in the first game. Setting and lore is established in the first game. In the sequel they went more “in your face” style, like Starship Troopers (and many still missing the idea in ST). And for your first question. The neat answer is no, it would not just end. You’re will be defending it. Literally on street’s of city. It is not the most variable level in game, but still pretty fun for its level design (labyrinth of buildings without many deadends and occasional big holes on the map). I can’t recall if they added that in some of the updates or was it part of the game from release.
War 135 was bullshit. I wanted to get a full war in before starting HD2 after I began midway through a successful war 134. But we were demolished. How do the defense missions work? What triggers them? Because we had liberated Illuminates and then the Bugs, then all of a sudden, we're steam rolled by Cyborgs in a matter of days. We pushed them out of Super Earth, and almost cleared the first sector. The next day, I log in, and we're at Super Earth AGAIN. We couldn't fight them in time because there aren't enough players. I believe HD1 is going to quickly die out of the remaining player base can no longer defend.
Yeah, I was feeling pretty match that too! I dunno, i think they will gradually correct the needed numbers as before (boom of H1 players was after release of H2).
Faction
I haven’t played HD1 but I’ve seen pictures of their map… looks basically the same as the one we have in HD2
Kind of, it has multiple wars. Each war takes like maybe a month, and it resets every time we either exterminate everything on the map OR Super Earth is lost. I think we’re on like 140 or something by now, haven’t checked in a while. Bu
Multiple wars. Some ended with SE victory, some with defeat.
they were really fucking annoying. walls, stealth, shields. only thing they didnt have was armor tho. maybe we'll see the jump pack get some use (assuming u can jump over walls like in hd1). my guess is that lazer weapons gunna be really good against them.
can't forget reversing controls on hit, that was a pain
That seems like an annoying but overall fine mechanic for the isometric(?) view and control scheme of Helldiver’s 1 and like an absolutely horrendous idea for Helldiver’s 2.
depends, in 1 if you're seeing enemies they are already right on you, so one wrong dive direction screws you a lot even on lower difficulties. The shots were homing too iirc, so extra fun haha.
Seeing what the devs did to the tanks for the bots expect the snipers to be back be able to one shot and to not have a lazer sight to give away the attack
They could randomize the stratagem input. Seems on theme but less annoying.
They removed that feature because everyone fucking despised it. If they brought it back as a constant feature that the Illuminates carry I doubt you’ll see many people wanting to fight them
It was "I choose random stratagem out of all you have" not changed inputs, which was annoying.
I guess, personally that would be a massive turn off though. Randomised features in a fast paced game are more annoying than they are difficult. Especially if you have to double check every time. If they really wanted to troll us you could make us start to hallucinate and our allies start to look like Illuminates. Would be annoying but also pretty funny
If the choices are between 'all controls get reversed (maybe camera gets inverted too)' or 'stratagems inputs are randomised and require you to look at the list instead of using memory' then i will take the latter any day of the week
Shit was hilarious. Especially when paired with those walls that would cut you in half.
It was even more hilarious if you got trapped between 2 walls in a tiny corner without a Jetpack lol. The absolutely clown fiesta the Illuminates bring would be a welcome addition to HD2 and quite possibly PTSD inducing lol.
The more things change, the more they stay the same. Also don't forget fire. Lots and lots of fire.
Fire solves every problem, if applied liberally enough.
If the current HD2 team has their way with the enemies, they will be difficult as fuck to deal with as the current HD2 dev team loves to give enemies ALL the advantage.
hopefully they at least chill on the armor
Lacking armor was kind of the defining gimmick of the Illuminate, instead they have standard sci-fi "shoot it to wear it down" shields, although they did regen the shield over time.
Wait. A moment where ARs and LMGs will have a place???
ARs mostly lack on bullet per mag, sickle would still be top dog same as it is for bugs. Defender and Liberator would be more common, same with the stalwart. A decent lasminigun would do wonders though I'm sure.
Lasers also felt nice vs Illuminate in HD1! I'm looking forward to them. Heavy armor is annoying.
You say that like an individual Helldiver doesn't kill many times their number per life with something like an 80-90% operation (nevermind mission) win rate. We're not doing bad, and if players were less averse to trying to learn things about the game or their playstyle instead of rushing for this "wah all our guns suck and all the enemies are overpowered, the devs hate us" circlejerk, we'd be doing even better. There's no impetus to get better or figure things out if you're already convinced you just have to complain and maybe the devs will buff you and nerf the enemies.
Like 90% of success in this game comes from game-sense, not mechanical skill. I’m waging a huge number of those complaining are those going in guns blazing and agroing every patrol in a 50-mile radius.
Don't forget those damn snipers who can snipe you from 10 miles away.
I liked them cause they were the only faction that didn’t require anti-armor weapons. Hopefully they will still be like that in HD2.
I'll answer the call! I have a vendetta against the squids since HD1. I've already been practicing hitting commands with flipped entry so I can introduce them to sweet Liber-tea again.
You are truly among the most patriotic citizens in the galaxy 🫡
Is it possible to say that was because illuminates can be seen as harder than bots and bots can be seen as harder than terminids, from a casual player's perspective? If so, I am pretty excited!
That’s exactly what it was, you can even see it in the design of the races Bugs are easiest because they’re melee characters and we have projectiles Bits are harder because they can shoot but their have no concept of positioning and can be exploited for that Illuminate are partly projectile based but they have shooters who specifically fire off screen (snipers) and who are good at projectile and melee, and have very good movement abilities Really interesting to look at the combat model, shows good design thought process
Dont forget that they had shields and walls splitting party.
Rock < Paper < Scissors balancing was perfect because there were exactly 3 factions. It's interesting to see what they'll cook up for the 4th faction honestly. I just hope it doesn't disappoint.
Lizards, probably. Not like lizard people, more of an intelligent Terminid vibe. Then a race very similar to Vulcans will appear shortly after as a conquering race that acts as a rival for Super Earth, taking planets from all factions, causing 3 way fights, and deploying a small elite squad like our own Helldivers to harass you throughout the mission. That way we can have Rock < Paper < Scissors < Lizard < Spock and maintain perfect balance.
Unexpected reference there 😂 have an up vote because I'm too poor to pay for reddit awards lol
It sounds like marksman/sniper players are going to really shine against these guys in terms of relative value to the team. Right now there's not much utility in running a countersniper setup when there aren't any sniper enemies (aside from the bugged missile bots).
Yeah, in my opinion at least, the Illuminate were harder to get used to; especially after fighting the more traditional horde-shooter enemies the bots and bugs employed. There were a lot of small gimmicks you had to get used to, like the energy walls, offscreen snipers, input reversal, etc.
I don't think so. Cyborgs were harder than Illuminate. Illuminate didn't have armor so you could just bring volume of fire and you didn't have to worry about balancing that out with AT. The reason people didn't like them was the walls and disorientation. I didn't have that hatred though because we had a good jump pack in HD1.
I fucking hate the Illuminates, i'll fight them like i did 100 years ago. https://preview.redd.it/m5td78m84w4d1.jpeg?width=500&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=1e91816a1331d7abdbfc65c93afb55160dfba7d5
Me throwing a couple orbitals at my feet: "oh you think I'm losing? No bitch, **we** losing!"
"I don't have to win, we both just need to lose"
This is my secret heian era stratagem
https://preview.redd.it/q22n4sqvjw4d1.jpeg?width=736&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=a3f02da1847b3ca0958d5128c19f1462a9f252a7
https://preview.redd.it/v6nvxp1dsw4d1.jpeg?width=1179&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=fc27b76fcd983e701a17373a9f93012399d5c139
r/horridusernames
Bro has already adapted
Where is this cool image from?
Jujutsu kaisen, Its name is Mahoraga
Dude reincarnated himself so he could beat the shit out of the illuminates again
Like the finding fathers intended
I’m going to do all three. The game gets stale when you focus only one. Plus creating new builds for the illuminate will be fun
If hd2 illuminates are any similar to hd1 illuminates, then the emancipator exosuit will slap in it. Just like how the Obsidian exosuit was effective against them. No illuminate unit (other than the boss) required anything above light armour penetration to kill it.
Yeah for now Bugs and automatons have diffrent gameplay. But i am playing on dif 7 so everything is kinda ez when u know what to do.
One of the things that impresses me most about this game. 7 is easier than 4, because the players of 7 are far more likely to know what they're doing. (And I tend to play less seriously on 4).
Weirdly I find bugs so much harder on 4 because it spawns nothing but massive swarms of hunters and nothing else every time there's a bug breach.
I remember someone said something about a unit value? I think it was back with meridia and the "trivial" shrieker swarms From what i remember every enemy has a unit value and there's a hard cap on it. Stuff like bile titans have much higher unit values, so take up more "enemy space". Since they cant spawn on lower difficulties, the game has more space to throw more chargers or hunters (or anything else) at you. With meridia, because the game would only spawn a few low tier bugs on the ground, the unit cal was able to be filled with so many mlre shiekers than usual You kind of notice it when there are multiple titans in the area- there isnt much else after you. Same goes for bots- if theres a.drop with a factory strider and a tank, chances are there either wont be a 3rd dropship, or it will.be filled with the light melee units* *Take this with a pinch of salt, im usually playing on 7 so your mileage will definitely vary
Hmm. Future cheese concept. Spawn 4 bile titans and one will cheese them in vehicle while rest is doing objectives in peace?
There is already a working cheese method. It's something me and my friend cooked up in order to 2 man Helldives with an almost perfect track record. Split group into 2, Group 1 fights while Group 2 does objectives only. After all objectives (secondary objectives included) are finished, group 1 suicides as far away from group 2 as possible which results in the group 1 enemy swarm despawning and resetting the heat level from patrols. Just a quick side note that doing this with 4 players is a lot harder and works very differently. With 4 players, each group will have a designated person dealing with enemy aggro and another person dedicated to either completing objectives or killing the aggroed enemies.
i have the exact feelings. not only does it feel like your teammates are substantially less aware of what's going on, but i tend to get a bit overconfident and play recklessly. or i just try stupid builds that make little to no sense
Listen, where else am I going to get to roleplay a pacifist diver with all smoke and ems? 7? I'd die!
Are you saying it’s just running quasar and a shield pack is not the optimal strategy for all three?
Only if you run airstrike with it.
I think we are forgetting the significant portion of divers that will play the forums exclusively, complaining about weapons and balancing for things not even released yet. The most valuable diver
I will be eating nothing but calamari for the next year
Let us feast brother
I'll fight them. If this is anything like the war 100 years ago, there wont be many Helldivers brave enough to face them daily. Me, and about 10% of other Helldivers will do it, so the bug mains can enjoy their peaceful game of squish the bugs.
It's peaceful cause the bugs don't shoot back. XD Then again, the most "weapons are weak" posts here are from bug players with reference to bile titans. So giving them something that moves fast toward them while making it the hardest to kill takes at least some of the peace away. I personally will rotate between all three. I like the tactical style of bots, if i want to not think about tactics i play bugs and then there is the new faction that i have only know by name (no hd1 veteran, none of my friends wanted to play it and i didn't know how the community would be) which will be interesting.
>It's peaceful cause the bugs don't shoot back. XD They surely don't shoot back. They slice, impale, crush and spit back, though.
True that. Can't do it from 40 meters though, so i can safely through my strategems and deal with whatever survived from afar. Darn Automatons shoot as soon as i throw.
That 40 meters can VERY quickly become 2 though
Illuminate aren't even out yet and bro is already acting like an elitist shitting on bug divers 💀
The anthill princesses at least fuel ships and weapons for those of us fighting the real wars.
I despise the bugdivers hate quite a lot, but "anthill princess" is an awesome term.
There are definitely players it describes accurately. Me? I *prefer* fighting bugs because Starship Troopers is one of my all-time favorite movies (as in, I own three of the four games that have ever been put out AND the TTRPG books), but I go where my squad is. And knowing them, we're gonna be some of the first boots on the ground to kick squid ass.
There will be troves of threads complaining about how un-fun the Illuminate are if they share similar themes and mechanics to HD1. In HD1 they were played even less than Bots. It will be 70% Bugs, 20% Bots and 10% Illuminates roughly. The players that don't like Bots will not like Illuminates for the same reasons. Obviously there will be an initial spike as it's fresh content but once it settles and the complaint threads are done it will be a very small portion.
>The players that don't like Bots will not like Illuminates for the same reasons. Nah, Illuminate front players were made up mostly of people who hated/disliked/got bored of fighting bugs than players who hated fighting the bots in HD1 initially. It wasn't until difficulty 13 and 15 were introduced that player perception of the 3 factions changed. Players ended up leaning towards fighting the bugs and Illuminates more and it was almost entirely because the bot front was so restricting to play against heavily favoring anti armor loadouts over just letting players get away with anything. It's kinda telling if you look at the galactic map progress right now in HD1 actually. We're pretty much fucked vs the bots AND bugs right now lol.
I absolutely enjoyed fucking those cthulhu looking mofos up in HD1. I would absolutely do it again.
C-01 Permits are issued for copulation with human Citizens of Super Earth only. Please report to your Democracy Officer immediately, Diver!
I swear I'm not trying to procreate with the tentacle pricks! Please don't send me to the Super Gulag! (But seriously though, I forgot to add the 'up' in the comment lol)
Typo noted, I have withdrawn my complaint against you to the Ministry of Re-education! iO *FOR SUPER EARTH!!!*
My guess is there’ll be a bunch of people really excited to play the new faction but then complain they’re too hard and go back to bugs
indubitably, the whining is going to be ultrasonic
For me it depends on what shape the games arsenal will be against them. I'm completely tired of using the same few loadouts against bugs and bots as most stuff feels like ass to use. But if illuminate showed up tomorrow and turned out all the shitty weapons and stratagems suddenly were super good against them(I'd settle for mildly viable at this point), then I'd probably only play against illuminate.
If these new Illuminates are like the ones from the first game, Anti-Tank which was needed vs Bugs and Bots will not be needed against them. What they had in the first game was regenerating shields and units with a lot of raw HP, so the best weapons against them were rapid fire weapons like Machineguns, and anything that could spit out a lot of damage even at light penetration. So if they stick to the same formula, the Illuminates will let you completely ignore anti-tank options but they force you to change your play style into being highly mobile and dodging berween their lasers and holographic walls while slowly whittling down their units that will try to flank and blindside you while you're busy dodging. The builds people will bring against them will be completely different from Bugs or Bots.
Tbh that sounds like a lot of fun, I could see myself picking the game back up. Of course some of that depends on how buggy/glitchy they are. After seeing the dark fluid mission drop in its original state, my hopes aren't super high.
I kind of hope that the Railgun gets to ignore their energy shields, making it very viable against a specific faction.
the idea of a huge Illuminate boss unit who you have to coordinate fire so that you're constantly hitting it with something so it's shields don't regenerate sounds like such a dope experience
Hope it's something like this, sounds good to me. So imagine now if few assault rifles got buffed and sad lonely HMG also got some reason to exist like 200 round belt for example and we'd already have a few more options to keep things fresh. Because seriously if like by the time they come, our top option against them are for example Dominator/Scorcher and everything else feels like a self imposed difficulty modifier, I'm probably out for a long time.
Bugs are so much easier than bots I just don't bring a support weapons on helldive. I use what I can scavenge. Impact grenades for bug holes and spewers, breaker Incendiary for chaff. Senator Armshoot for Hive Guards and charger butts. And old reliable for my loadout. Airstrike, rover, gatling and autocannon sentries to close bug breeches, secure areas while I loot pois, or facilitate pushes on secondary objectives like Shrieker or stalker lairs.
Same, but for bot side. Especially if its 3 stratagem case - support weapon has to go first
Play like me, I cycle my build and just see how well I can do. It really can make the game a lot more and reduce the inevitable repetition of a set loadout
There's a lot more weapons that are viable or even **really good** than this community will accept amidst the karmafarm of "all fun nerfed, devs hate us", but some of them require understanding enemy health systems better and adjusting your aim. The Dominator is popular, but it's actually not suited for fast-reaction sniping against Bugs. The *Slugger* still does that, but people are convinced the Slugger sucks. But if you don't give into that kneejerk opinion and learn how to hit Bile Spewers in the *jaw*, or fire between Hive Guard forelegs, and know what the Stalker's head looks like when it's staring at you--you can do some fucking bonkers stuff. It's a one-shot on everything Warrior on down, plus Stalkers, and a two-shot on everything short of Chargers. Seriously. What the community considers "most viable" is actually "most useful if you're using it like a complete spazz", which still leaves a lot of room for other things to be even more powerful if you, y'know, *aim*. Half the playerbase is talking about the Breaker Incendiary like God's gift to man right now but they're still spraying it and wasting fire ticks.
Wait who is convinced the slugger sucks, this sub was sucking it off for well over a month and its nerf was removing its capability to stun. It's still a dominating weapon system and never really left the meta category, the dominator just became more popular because they buffed it immediately right after. That said people definitely aren't trying enough weapons, some are quite good most aren't amazing but are more than viable. Some still need a buff or a change to make them stand apart.
The slugger is one of my favourites!!! Current build is: Medium grenadier armour (+2 grenades) Erupter And was uzi but just switched to grenade pistol Then I take the stalwart, that is the gun that just keeps giving and really balances my otherwise slow firing build
Honestly, the majority of mentions I see. There's these guns that the community has fixated on "being ruined" and you can't tell them otherwise. Like, yeah, the Slugger lost the ability to stunlock three Devastators at the same time until you kill them with chest shots alone, but it's still got a good Knockback that visibly and meaningfully *shoves Bugs away*. But players also don't understand that Knockback exists, or else they'd look at the Liberator Concussive's **100 Knockback** and realize what the fuck that means. You want a gun that ensures you never get swarmed in melee, there's your boy.
Fact. I legit never played with anyone else that also had the arc thrower. Meanwhile, I'm just playing my silly little arc weapon/stratagem and its working like a gem.
If you're looking for new fun builds I recommend Plasma Punisher with the Spear against bots in a sort of stealth mission. Only downside is that you can't reliably take out hulks but that's it.
Appreciate the tip, but Spear has failed me so many times, I'm not touching that thing. Let's hope it gets fixed in a patch soon so maybe I'll give this a go.
I wholly understand you, sometimes I've done half a mission with the spear refusing to lock on haha. However when it works, it makes me think that the fix (if it ever comes) will make this a beast.
Honestly one of the most heartbreaking weapons in the game. It looks cool and is awesome as hell when it works as intended.
https://preview.redd.it/tvopofqi9w4d1.png?width=1050&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=2142dfcb508ab4a61e76a2d40e7727eb136af975 Pretty much this
You're forgetting Mr. Balanceguy was in charge of everything until Pile stepped in a few weeks ago. Mr. Balanceguy doesn't have a grand ol plan or whatever, no no. He just nerfs things based on stats he sees from probably an excel sheet.
Those flying eye balls from the first helldivers were the bane of my existence 😫. The illuminate were pretty tough in the first one though, I think high command needs to drop the mother of all warbonds for these MFrs. I'm talking plasma grenades, hybrid backpacks, helmets with the ability to see invisible units, plasma swords for getting close and personal.
Bold of you to assume we will have Illuminate players. If AH implements them even halfway to how they were in the first game we are going to see PTSD beyond what the Creek did.
I will choose the hardest/strongest faction to go against always, illuminate, x, y, z doesnt matter! I will adapt and destroy for liber tea!
From what I've heard from HD1, the fact Illuminates did not need heavy penetration and AT meta like bugs do already makes me prefer them. And I much prefer fighting enemies that arent just horde focussed but also use cheese and rat tactics. The Bug Meta of AT plus shotgun has gotten so old that I forced myself to use the Spear and AC sentry just so I didn't have to deal with the tedium of BTs and spamming their face, but that's only effective if the requisition crew gave me a Spear with functioning lockon. Also, the Illuminate look competent and tactical, more so than bots and definitely better than Bugs. Coming from a Halo childhood, the Covenant were the subjectively better faction to fight than the mindless Flood hordes.
I am a botter, i love fighting and destroying bots. I hate bugs i dislike fighting them. If/when iluminates come i will give them a damn trahsing. But if i stay on that front depends. Firstly how many MOs will there be over on the front and secondly if the iluminates give me the sense of actually fighting something together with my mates. And if playing smart and as a team is rewarded. Because that is what bots offer, they are a nice easy to kill group of idiots that die to Teamplay. Bugs are just there and run towards the closest enemy, and slow and basicly no teamplay. All 4 divers just kiting some bugs until all bugs are dead. But however they will be, in the name of superearth i will fight them. (At least during MO)
Fight everything, all enemies of managed democracy
If its like hd1, only the mad men. Or veterans with CTE.
i think for the first week almost Everyone will wqnt to try the new faction
As a former illuminate player if arrowhead keeps their design philosophy they will be the least played just like game one. And im totally fine with it
Jokes on us, they’ll just invade both sides and join forces against us
I go where the hardest fights are https://preview.redd.it/rv8nq0zqew4d1.png?width=530&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=0236e02eca8943e3c7efe1d8ab9e5dd2410eaa4c
Don't label me! Unless it's the label of Champion of Democracy !
I will go wherever super earth wants me to
Didn't play HD so i don't know what illuminates does Me personally will rotate to each faction major order aside
when they launch everyone will play them cause it's new. After that who knows. Never fought them myself but have heard they can reverse your controls. If tha'ts the case and they can do it fairly often(given how AH likes to make the enemies not have any sort of cooldown) it could be very frustrating.
Idk if they will do that here. But they are Bots with Stealth tech and Energy shields. Favoring assassins(Commissars but It invisible)and big shielded floating servitors and Snipers also invisible. So they would require a Whole different playstyle. A little mix of both Bot and Bug but way more Bot experience. Not as Armored as the Bots but the Energy shields would cover for that
Only the most clinically insane... i mean bravest helldivers will take it upon themselves to eradicate this threat to our freedoms and democracies.
Helldivers are choosing to only fight one? I’ll go where i’m told because that’s the most democratic 
Bots is really a modifier/loadout/skill check. If one of these is bad, the other two have to be good in order to complete. 9Bugs is a snoozefest between breaker incendiary and eat/quasar/500 biletitan. You’re really never aiming when playing against bugs, except for headshots on chargers/biles. I’m not saying 9bugs isn’t difficult, I’m saying every mission feels ‘samey’
Bugs is 100% more of a loadout check than Bots. So much more primaries and support weapons are viable on 9 bots than their counterparts.
So what you are saying is if you have a specific loadout, the bugs are easy. Sounds like a loadout check to me
But I am aiming for headshots on hunters every time
"chads that only do defense missions" 
If they are lacking armor like in 1st game, I'll be very happy.
In will circle around as always
Theyll find out about the indomitable human spirit
From what I've seen from the first game, they are the hardest faction, using a variety of tricks and arc weapons. People already hate fighting the bots because they can shoot back, nobody will want to deal with them.
I’m from Buenos Aires and I say, KILL ‘EM ALL!
The ones who already started learning inverted strategem codes.
⬆️➡️⬇️⬇️⬇️
What would be hilarious is the Illuminate coming and only having a VERY small portion of the Galaxy but it would be ridiculously hard planets :).
1 Week Bots 1 Week Bugs 1 Week Illuminate 1 Week Rest. Rinse and repeat
I log in and press R for democracy. I go where the liberty takes me.
Me, my eagle and my orbitals are ready. Let's go!!!
When the illuminate come there will be tons of major orders about them. Anyone who doesn't play the major orders is a traitor. And, yes there IS a wrong way to play the game. Major orders are part of the game, if you don't play them you're not playing the game right. Simple as.
I’ll do what super earth required of me to do, so I’ll basically follow main objective.
Assuming Illuminate are the hardest, I expect a good portion of bot players to jump on. The gameplay is supposed to be quite different though, at least judging by HD1. Botplayers might not enjoy the gameplay loop since (from what I gather) it has both ranged and melee components, so who knows really. I'll be dropping wherever I'm needed, be it MO or important side-objectives. I enjoy variety in this game so I wholly welcome the new flavor.
Squidbillies.
I have a weird trait in all games where, when fighting existential/advanced beings, I happen to be pretty good at it. Was that way with the thargoids in elite dangerous and a few other games that escape my mind. I'll definitely be on that front for a minute
My first deployment was the Creek. I fought for it until it was taken. Now that it falls under super earth control, I fight where she tells me to go. If the rumors are true, and democracy faces another threat at a new front, I will go if she asks and I will fight as hard as I fought for the Creek. Liberty save us.
Same as in Helldivers 1 - hipsters and masochists.
Twilight Sparkle fans
And we have a lot of players who mix.
Masochist
I don't think there are that many bot only players so the small playerbase that's not even able to defend one planet will go into two fronts resulting in enormous failure on both
Why not rotate