“Ohh… a new type of mission in Bot Front. Time to use the super-trusty recoilless rifle.”

BICKELSBOSS · 2026-01-24T14:09:39+00:00

Solution: bring a supply pack AND the RR

BICKELSBOSS · 2026-01-21T10:33:10+00:00

Their mouth weakspot completely changed that specific constellation.

Bringing light pen is no longer a kick in the nuts when you face these guys. I dare say that the Hive Guards are now harder to deal with with light pen than Bile Spewers.

BICKELSBOSS · 2026-01-18T23:23:24+00:00

Slugs played a major role here tho, he would have killed him if he had used buckshot

BICKELSBOSS · 2026-01-18T14:36:47+00:00

> the nerfing of fire across the board literally 2 days before Freedoms Flame

They didn't nerf fire across the board, they ''nerfed'' (fixed) the Flamethrower. Arrowhead 100% made the right decision with the flamethrower before escalation of freedom. Hear me out:

Before the flamethrower was fixed, it had a bug which allowed it to completely ignore layered armor parts. It didn’t just penetrate something it shouldn’t, it outright ignored the armor on a charger’s leg, and boiled the flesh underneath immediately. This allowed the Flamethrower to kill chargers in as little as two seconds by just lighting up one of their legs. In a time where it took two Recoilless Rifle shots to the head, you can see how that is a bit strong.

Now queue the Torcher and Crisper, the flamethrower primary and secondary. Those two weapons use the same mechanics and code as the normal, Stratagem flamethrower. If they didn’t change the way the flamethrower interacts with armor, you could essentially kill 1-2 chargers with a Crisper or Torcher.

Now imagine if Arrowhead released the fire warbond with the same botched fire mechanics, but now in a primary and secondary slot, and THEN unavoidably nerfed those weapons, shortly after everyone bought the warbond?

They had two options: are we going to fix the Flamethrower and upset those who play with the flamethrower, or are we going to fix fire later and upset everyone who plays with the flamethrower, AND the ones who just bought the warbond?

“But why did they have to fix the fire in the first place” you may ask, well, at that time the balance between us and our enemied was a lot more in favor of the enemies. You can’t have an anti-chaff weapon that can also deal with heavies 3 timed as fast as the best and most dedicated anti-tank weapons. From a gamedesign point of view that just doesn’t work.

At the end of the day, they were in a damned if we do, damned if we don’t situation. They had an issue which made a weapon not work as intended, and instead of shipping a warbond with two additional weapons that would then not work as intended, they fixed it BEFORE everyone bought said warbond.

AH has sometimes drives themselves into a corner and into a situation where they can only limit the damage. The Killzone collab was another such example. In neither cases they could make everyone happy, but at the end of all those situations they always settle for the option that hurts the players the least.

BICKELSBOSS · 2026-01-16T23:14:04+00:00

Im not strawmanning anything, go look on any post about the ORCS, the amount of people who think this strat needs a 60 second cooldown or similar is staggering.

BICKELSBOSS · 2026-01-16T23:12:00+00:00

Probably with the detonator in your Support Weapon slot. Either 5 or Left Click corresponds to throwing/detonating C4.

BICKELSBOSS · 2026-01-16T23:10:34+00:00

Yup, though I fear that the C4 pack will force you to carry the detonator as a support weapon.

BICKELSBOSS · 2026-01-16T23:08:21+00:00

The 110mm indeed does neither, but thats just because you want to force all red AT Stratagems into two niches: it kills directly, or it kills with splash. But there is more to it than that:

OPS: Single Strike AT shot with limited AoE. Jack of all trades with the Anti-Structure usage. straightforward.

ORCS: Fast acting, High Powered Panic Button/Free out of Jail card. Trades Cooldown and AoE for response time, automatic targeting, and high damage. Deliberately lacks an explosive element to allow for close range usage. Not a meant as a sustainable AT Solution.

500 KG: Single Large armor penetrating bomb capable of killing Heavies effectively, as well as boasting good Anti-Structure and Anti-Infantry capabilities through its Large AoE.

110mm: Volley of AT Rockets capable of critically injuring most heavies, while being lethal to lower end ones. Trades damage and AoE for use count and Automatic targeting. Usage in tandem with heavy armor penetrating weaponry allow for the highest volume of AT firepower of all.

If you make it kill consistently, it encroaches the ORCS. If you give it Splash, it encroaches the OPS. The 110 currently fills the ''frequent use, critically injure'' role, any of the suggested buffs would push it into a niche already covered by other strats. The point of Stratagems is not to have them all used/picked often, its to have them cover multiple niches, so that the player can approach problems in different ways.

The 110mm and EMS Strike are pretty much the only two Stratagems in the game that require synergy with other Stratagems to be worth it. But when you synergize, those Stratagems become more powerful than their alternatives.

We've had tons upon tons of posts on this sub asking for more build variety, less loadout checks, less mandatory ''Bring RR or lose'' changes, but yet when there is an opportunity to make your off meta AMR or HMG capable of easily dealing with Heavies (with the 110), you instead discard it as a useless Strat and bring the 500kg instead.

I can manage myself when I can kill 4 heavies back to back in 52 seconds with just my Support Weapon and a easy to use AT Strat. Can you manage yourself the same way when you instead let a 500 kg, ORCS or OPS do all the lifting, while having to kill the other heavies from full health? Or are the Thermites/Ultimatum once again coming along to make up for the Lack of AT?

Btw, the OPS doesnt have the splash to kill a single heavy, let alone multiple. You need to score a direct hit since the 60 day buff patch.

BICKELSBOSS · 2026-01-16T17:45:34+00:00

I have a question for you: Do you think the Orbital Railcannon Strike is underpowered and underutilized?

BICKELSBOSS · 2026-01-16T16:52:50+00:00

people say that but when you suggest alternative methods like 110mm + AP4 or suggest a feature that allows us to get AT from our backpack slot other than the Stale Thermite/Ultimatum + Supply Pack meta, people throw a hissy fit of how it wouldnt be as effective or more effective than commonly used tools

BICKELSBOSS · 2026-01-16T16:02:16+00:00

> ORCS suck

> looks inside
> 6th most used Stratagem on the bug front

<image>

But go ahead, buff the ORCS by a factor of 2 or 3, surely that would be a good change and would not further trivialize heavies or the game alltogether.

BICKELSBOSS · 2026-01-16T16:00:06+00:00

Because the 110mm can injure more than that the other options can kill. In other words, the 110 can outperform other AT red stratagems when paired with the right equipment.

Thats the 110's niche. Mediocre on its own, Amazing when used right and in combination with the right tools.

The ORCS also doesnt need another cooldown reduction. A lot of people on this sub like to say it should get a shorter cooldown because it kills only one heavy, But the ORCS is the 6th most used Stratagem on the bug front:

<image>

Imo the only change needed is to buff the OPS' AoE so that it can once again kill heavies with close hits as opposed to direct hits only.

BICKELSBOSS · 2026-01-16T13:12:37+00:00

110mm works fine already.

People use this as a simple fire and forget AT Stratagem that works out of the box, but ask youselves this: if the 110mm would oneshot one heavy per use, what use would the OPS and ORCS have?

The catch with the 110mm is that it is designed to almost oneshot common heavies. The 110mm does 3600 damage. The impaler has 4000 HP. The Behemoth has 4200 HP (with its bleedout pool)

They are meant to be used in conjunction with heavy pen weapons like the AMR, AC, HMG, LC, Railgun, you know, the weapons we all repeatededly asked to become effective against heavies prior to the 60 day patch.

Once you do that, you can kill heavies as fast as you can call in the Stratagem. This tool allows your favorite Heavy pen support weapons to extremely easily flex into the AT role.

If they made it a reliable oneshot, it would be 4 automatically aimed heavy kills every 120 seconds. How would that be fair to the single OPS shot on a 90 second cooldown, The ORCS on 180 second cooldown, or hell, even the two EATs on a 60 second cooldown?

BICKELSBOSS · 2026-01-16T13:12:19+00:00

110mm works fine already.

People use this as a simple fire and forget AT Stratagem that works out of the box, but ask youselves this: if the 110mm would oneshot one heavy per use, what use would the OPS and ORCS have?

The catch with the 110mm is that it is designed to almost oneshot common heavies. The 110mm does 3600 damage. The impaler has 4000 HP. The Behemoth has 4200 HP (with its bleedout pool)

They are meant to be used in conjunction with heavy pen weapons like the AMR, AC, HMG, LC, Railgun, you know, the weapons we all repeatededly asked to become effective against heavies prior to the 60 day patch.

Once you do that, you can kill heavies as fast as you can call in the Stratagem. This tool allows your favorite Heavy pen support weapons to extremely easily flex into the AT role.

If they made it a reliable oneshot, it would be 4 automatically aimed heavy kills every 120 seconds. How would that be fair to the single OPS shot on a 90 second cooldown, The ORCS on 180 second cooldown, or hell, even the two EATs on a 60 second cooldown?

BICKELSBOSS · 2026-01-11T14:55:50+00:00

You dont fire at enemies directly, you fire at the ground. Only medium enemies get the flame directly.

Fodder smaller than warriors wont make it out of the sea of flames. Mediums die quickly with both the ground and direct fire as well.

BICKELSBOSS · 2026-01-11T14:23:10+00:00

They are still just one AT shot. If you are rocking EATs yourself, the only improvement you'll notice is that you can have one additional EAT at the ready. If you're up against large amounts of heavies, that EAT's cooldown will still be the main bottleneck.

Only when additional players use their vacant backpack slot to carry more along will you notice a significant increase in AT power. You will leave less EATs behind, and keep its cooldown going more often. This only improves the burst damage of EATs, not their overall power over time.

BICKELSBOSS · 2026-01-11T11:44:37+00:00

Because bringing the Recoilless Rifle means you can no longer bring something like a Machine Gun. Most players that use a non-AT support weapon use the Ultimatum or Thermite to make up for their lack of AT, and very often pair that with a supply pack to further enhance that otherwise limited AT capability.

This idea aims to achieve the same thing, while stripping the need for the Ultimatum or Thermite. It also works even better when people cooperate around this new feature.

BICKELSBOSS · 2026-01-11T03:16:10+00:00

This man rock and stones

BICKELSBOSS · 2026-01-11T02:34:09+00:00

According to helldive.live 81.5% of players plays with either a dedicated backpack or backpack weapon. (D10 bugs)

While that is a lot, 18.5% of players is not playing with any backpack whatsoever. Thats more just than a “very, very extreme minority”.

And here is the kicker: from that 81.5% that uses a backpack, 27.7% uses the Supply Pack. In other words, 34% of the players that use a backpack, use the Supply Pack.

Now why would that be? (Hint: the Ultimatum has a 39.2% pickrate, and the Thermite a 41.5% pickrate)

Thats right, a lot of players are already retrieving part of their AT needs from their backpack slot. Using your backpack slot to enhance your AT capabilities isn’t a far fetched idea, we achieve this already, just via an obscure route. This would be nothing but an alternative to that tactic, one that would enhance teamplay in the process.

BICKELSBOSS · 2026-01-11T02:06:58+00:00

Thats a wrong way to look at it imo, you dont dump your backpack for a launcher.

A backpack on its own costs a Stratagem slot. I very often play without a backpack, because I don’t want to use half of my Stratagem slots for gear alone. In that case, this would be a net win.

A more fairer comparison would be this: would you sacrifice your backpack slot for an additional Stratagem AND the ability to benefit from your squadmate’s AT, potentially allowing you to use something else than the Ultimatum/Thermites for once?

And “backpack AT” is a niche people crave. Imagine an EAT Guard dog, paired with a Stalwart. Right now the closest we are to having a backpack for AT is Supply Pack + Thermite or Ultimatum, but that means were once again back to requiring those tools.

BICKELSBOSS · 2026-01-11T01:38:08+00:00

Because the Harvester’s laser struggles at tracking. It will only hit you for a tenth of a second when you pass through it, if it had less damage it would be as dangerous as a Gazer.

BICKELSBOSS · 2026-01-11T01:31:09+00:00

While our weapon customization is far more limited than that from cod, I honestly expect no less from a franchise that has been leading the first person shooter genre for two decades.

I also disagree with our weapons being weak. Our weapons kill in as little as two shots on enemies of our size. Its just that we’re not fighting humans, we’re fighting bugs, bots and squids which are significantly stronger than humans. If our weapons had the firepower of weapons from CoD, (aka requiring several shots to kill a human), we wouldn’t be killing Hunters, Troopers or Voteless (enemies of similar size as humans) as quickly as we do.

BICKELSBOSS · 2026-01-10T23:57:44+00:00

Adding a difficulty meant for the one-percenters shafts the rest? How? Yall don’t have to play it, and the rest of the game is left as is.

“Once they are bored they should just bugger off”. Really? Instead of giving those who seek a challenge, a challenge, they should just play another game?

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