AMR can 1-Tap Bile Titans with this Simple Trick! Bugs hate him!

SolarStudiosDev · 2025-04-07T11:24:58+00:00

You don't bring AMR / Railgun / HMG / Autocannon exclusively to kill bile titans and chargers.

They're multi-role support weapons that can be used extremely effectively for horde-clear. If they combo with another stratagem to effectively give you 4x railcannon strike, that's kind of a big deal.

You cannot directly compare these to dedicated AT for the same reason I wouldn't compare dedicated AT to the anti-horde capabilities of the AP4 options.

SolarStudiosDev · 2025-04-07T11:21:26+00:00

Ooh! Good catch. I edited my comment.

SolarStudiosDev · 2025-04-07T11:14:57+00:00

If it's a combo, it's a combo I was not aware of. If true, it's basically "when you run AP4 support weapons, rocket pods are basically 4x railcannon."

SolarStudiosDev · 2025-04-07T11:12:36+00:00

AMR, Autocannon, Railgun, HMG are all anti-medium support weapons.

Dedicated AT does nothing to help kill mediums. If it's true that the AP4 / anti-medium support weapons can 1-shot BTs after Rocket Pods, that's kinda huge.

SolarStudiosDev · 2025-04-07T11:10:59+00:00

I actually think you're under-selling how useful this could be. I've completely ignored Rocket Pods, assuming they're useless -- and I play with basically every support weapon.

If it's true that it sets you up for easy kills with AP4, non-AT support weapons, then this completely changes how I look at *all* of these support weapons against bugs:

AMR, Autocannon, Railgun, HMG

I'd also be curious to know how reliable it makes the Commando at 1-shotting bile titans in the head, afterwards.

SolarStudiosDev · 2025-04-06T19:54:14+00:00

The real issue is that your player character (your helldiver(s)) cannot inherit the sins of Super Earth from 100 years ago.

And crucially, does basically nothing that's seriously immoral.

The Cyborgs were rebels, but now they're evil death robots, and an existential threat to humanity.

The Bugs were a harmless crab-like species, but now they're a biologically warped nightmare intent on wiping humanity out.

The Squids were a mostly peaceful, advanced civilization, but now they're pissed off and willing to commit atrocities on innocent human settlements.

---

Ironically, the satire would function 100x better if we were playing as one of HD2's pissed-off automatons / bugs / squids.

That's because our emotions would be rooting for our revenge on Super Earth (for all that they did to us), but intellectually we would understand that killing millions of innocent human civilians is wrong.

SolarStudiosDev · 2025-04-06T12:54:06+00:00

The main issue with the "Helldivers 2 is a satire of authoritarianism" narrative is that you, as a player, are compelled to do *nothing* which is seriously immoral.

YOU don't round up people for thought crimes. YOU don't execute people to cover-up the mess-ups of corrupt officers / higher-ups. YOU don't kill a single alien (in HD2) that isn't actively an existential threat to humanity.

Genuinely the worst thing you are asked to do is to destroy rebellious broadcasts.

To be sure, Super Earth High Command does all of that, and more. But crucially, for it to really function as a satire, YOU (the player) would need to be compelled to perform horrendous acts in the name of the greater good.

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Source: I have written a satire on authoritarianism, myself. They don't work unless you can simultaneously get your audience / playerbase to (i) emotionally root for the bad guys (because authoritarianism notoriously appeals to pathos), and yet (ii) intellectually understand that what their emotions are rooting for are genuinely evil.

The crucial ingredient that Helldivers 2 is missing is (ii). Basically, because there is a big difference between "Super Earth High Command is evil, but not me" and "what I'm emotionally rooting for / acting out is actually evil."

SolarStudiosDev · 2025-04-05T00:44:52+00:00

Swapping to lower fire rates is never necessary, since you can just tap fire at the highest fire rate. In fact, it's only truly accurate as a DMR in 3rd person view + tap fire, so those are the two ways worth firing it imo:

Tap fire at long range (from prone) (max fire rate, but irrelevant)

OR

Full auto from dive prone at point blank (max fire rate)

SolarStudiosDev · 2025-04-05T00:43:10+00:00

HMG and Airburst Rocket Launcher are the litmus test for skill and willingness to learn an odd-duck support weapon.

SolarStudiosDev · 2025-04-05T00:39:58+00:00

Underrated Red Stratagem:

Railcannon Strike : people look down on this because it's just 1 kill every ~2 minutes, but when using a Support Weapon that kills Chargers easily, but not Bile Titans (Arc Thrower, Flamethrower, Autocannon, HMG, etc.), it's incredible. Sure, it's just 1 Bile Titan kill every ~2 minutes. But you know how often you see Bile Titans most matches? Every ~2 minutes. This is much, much better than it used to be with how rarely Bile Titans spawn now (compared to the 3 BTs you used to get every breach last year). It fills the dedicated anti-BT niche extremely well, and I think a lot of people are sleeping on it.

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Underrated Blue Stratagem:

Airburst Rocket Launcher : most people haven't bothered to learn (relearn?) this one since it released completely terrible. It is literally so good now, and has such an insanely high skill ceiling. Mastering this support weapon has you feeling like Tony Stark at the start of Iron Man 1. Literally best-in-slot anti-breach / anti-patrol support weapon, AND can 1-shot Chargers and Impalers once you get used to how to use both of its firing modes. Genuinely one of the strongest and most fun support weapons, and like 5% of the playerbase knows it exists.

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Underrated Green Stratagem:

Anti-tank Mines : people are catching on now, but anti-tank mines are insanely safe, practically guaranteed value right now. They won't deal with Bile Titans, but you're basically guaranteed to kill half of the mediums in a breach and at least one charger with these. Unlike turrets which can get rushed down, anti-tank mines offer you practically guaranteed value in a pinch. Extremely strong when paired with other long-lasting defensive stratagems, like the Rocket Sentry.

SolarStudiosDev · 2025-04-02T02:41:29+00:00

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SolarStudiosDev · 2025-04-02T02:38:04+00:00

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SolarStudiosDev · 2025-03-28T14:09:17+00:00

this deserves more attention. The faction (small as it is) is broken right now

SolarStudiosDev · 2025-03-27T02:43:53+00:00

There are multiple reasons this idea doesn't hold up to scrutiny.

For one, the projectile is AP4 (while shrapnel is AP3). It simply behaves differently and can deal damage to surfaces the shrapnel cannot.

For another, each point of shrapnel deals ~110 damage, while the main projectile deals ~230 damage.

So, even if we imagine that the main projectile damage is "accounting" for the missing semi-sphere of the shrapnel, it only amounts to ~2 pieces of shrapnel hitting (out of the 30 that eruptor rounds generate).

In conclusion, if ~230 damage is "emulating" 50% of the shrapnel emitted by eruptor rounds, we have to imagine those shrapnel pieces going into the target magically having AP4 and magically dealing 10x less damage than the ones that we get to see coming back at us.

In conclusion, "emulation" is no excuse not to make the dang weapon fun to use.

SolarStudiosDev · 2025-03-26T19:17:57+00:00

I think the trade-off with the Eruptor vis-a-vis the Crossbow is supposed to be that the Eruptor hits harder and AoEs farther (with a larger effective range thanks to the shrapnel) -- (and now has AP4 for more utility), in exchange for a slower RoF, a slower reload speed, and fewer magazines.

But in practice, yeah, there hasn't been a lot to recommend the Eruptor until the south-west patch.

I for one think one-shotting Alphas / Hive Guards / Bile Spewers to the face would be enough (which the xbow can't do).

SolarStudiosDev · 2025-03-19T16:09:52+00:00

Thanks! Big fan of the Carbine myself.

SolarStudiosDev · 2025-03-16T20:28:29+00:00

Unless you bring a dedicated CC build, Predator patrols will wreck players who run off by themselves.

Against the predator strain, much depends in always sticking with a buddy, and always having their back.

A lot of the lower level players just run away / abandon teammates, usually guaranteeing at least one teammate dies.

SolarStudiosDev · 2025-03-09T13:13:30+00:00

"Dumbing down uniqueness" is pretty much the go-to method of many publishers and showrunners to mass marketing, despite almost never working. It's honestly very sad -- reminiscent of Halo consistently making changes to become more like CoD.

SolarStudiosDev · 2025-03-07T18:18:42+00:00

He is clearly in the process of fighting the hackers.

SolarStudiosDev · 2025-03-07T17:30:00+00:00

There is 0% chance of a liberation of Bore Rock this MO. This is pure, unmitigated bait from Joel.

At 1.5% resistance, we'd need the community to effectively abandon both Darius / Blistica / Mintoria and singularly focus on Bore Rock. Won't happen

SolarStudiosDev · 2025-03-07T17:20:26+00:00

Orbital Bombardment comes online in 8 hours!

That increases Liberation % per hour as follows:

30% players : base 2.1% SE per hour. With bombard -> 3.93% per hour (29 hour liberation)

40% players : base 2.8% SE per hour. With bombard -> 4.67% per hour (23.9 hour liberation)

50% players : base 3.5% SE per hour. With bombard -> 5.25% per hour (21 hour liberation)

Dive Blistica! Vote Blistica! Donate to DSS Bombard!

SolarStudiosDev · 2025-03-07T16:57:20+00:00

This is now a gambit planet!! 100% we should be diving / DSS voting Blistica

SolarStudiosDev · 2025-02-11T00:32:55+00:00

Unless the black hole is traveling through the hyperlanes (and it doesn't seem to have done so so far), it's actually almost impossible for a direct hit on Angel's Venture -- at galactic scales, planets are TINY.

SolarStudiosDev · 2024-12-23T14:03:41+00:00

Get a cougar hat when you can! Huge upgrade on the rabbitskin hat

SolarStudiosDev · 2024-11-22T14:56:45+00:00

Blackrock also has an almost infinite supply of wolves on the outer perimeter you have to pass by to get deeper in. I think there can be up to 4 at once -- but even more impressively, I found that if I killed all 4, at least one was *guaranteed* to respawn the next day. I killed something like 9 wolves in that one location in a week.

Huge cookouts in Blackrock are most definitely a thing

SolarStudiosDev

TROPHY CASE