Why Nerfs Keep Happening Every New Update and Patch Helldivers 2

Every new update or patch nerfs primary weapons and support weapons. At this point the democratic detonation warbond is pretty bad and only worth getting if you want a grenade pistol. The eruptor, crossbow, quasar cannon, railgun, slugger, etc. Have all been nerfed tremendously and really need to just be reverted in my opinion. The game is meant to be fun, nothing has truly ever been broken in this game except for the ps5 glitches. But those had nothing to do with balance. #helldivers2
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[@thiccfila]

Arrowhead has already responded and is listening to our concerns on balance, update here kzbin.info/www/bejne/d6CapWqMZsuAd7s Become a member to watch my uploads before they go public kzbin.info/door/pyLLLxBL7zL-f3P_D-bKGgjoin Socials discord.gg/yN4AkD4TSx twitter.com/thiccfila_

[@debacofzomb9889]

Nerfs are the one reason I quit playing Destiny 2. Quit changing my shit. I spend two months collecting currency to get the anarchy and then you nerf it? No thank you. Imma wait and see with Helldivers 2, but it's been a rollercoaster, and TBH I cannot take much more of this. Also, the Erupotor was randomly killing people from across the map, (very rare) so I feel like this was more them removing their mistake.... By making a worse one.

[@thirdbeast7777]

bit disingenuous to complain about nerfs when you know full well its yours and similar youtubers fault for making "MuH mEtA" videos. channels like yours nerfed borderlands into the ground. meta discussions suck the fun out of the game and result in nerfs that just piss everyone off. and to the people that cant play a game without following these vids, youre the second part of the problem. you can always bet when watching one of these tier list vids that nerfs are to follow so dont even bother getting used to it. most weapons are within 10-20% effectiveness with each other with the occasional outlier that really depends on personal play style to give them the advantage. the eruptor change is what you asked for because you (lumping all the youtubers together here) didnt understand what was happening and made vids about it without testing causing people to make inaccurate reports. now the weapon ppl paid for has been neutered. congratulations. try ONLY posting vids about weapons that are glaringly bad instead or posting the exploits/skill tech that makes decent weapons great in minute situations. or better yet, get creative and make vids about ideas that could give certain loadouts interesting synergies like arc weapons increasing dmg or linking when fired through EMP chaff or flames igniting gas clouds

[@carlnielsen1458]

@@thirdbeast7777 nah meta, meta builds, and youtubers discussing meta are 100% inevitable. meta is simply the recognition of the things in a game that work the best for a given scenario. if they make every anti armor worthless (4 rockets to the head to kill a charger) it doesn't mean there is no meta, there will be a new meta. the question is if that meta is more or less fun than the prior meta. balancing your game based on hype without doing the testing yourself is idiotic. its not the job of youtubers to do the weapons testing, but honestly between the likes of thiccfila, ohdough, takibo, etc they seem to be doing much more testing than the AH team. you can't blame people for recognizing what is and isn't good and if youtubers like thiccfila are disingenuous then you are far worse for supporting them by watching their videos. don't know much about borderlands but it sounds like it was the balance team that ran it into the ground, not youtubers analyzing the results of their work

[@thiccfila]

@@thirdbeast7777 bit disingenuous to lump all the youtubers together considering i didnt make an eruptor video. and I mostly post about underrated stuff.

[@thiccfila]

​@@carlnielsen1458 the borderlands devs were great. it was the ceo who ruined the series. he can be seen on twitter saying things like "you guys would have loved wonderlands dlc, if we didnt give you such great value in borderlands 3, honestly in hindsight we spent too much money in borderlands 3"

[@Kazrel]

THE BALANCE LEAD IS THE SAME FUCKING DEV THAT KILLED THE HELLO NEIGHBOR GAMES, HOLY SHIT THAT EXPLAINS EVERYTHING

[@ferdithetank7535]

Talk about recidive incompetence, lol

[@thesyndrome43]

This needs to be spread if that's true, Hello Neighbour was basically a fucking DISASTER of a game that only got worse as development went on, if this person was heavily involved in that, then it explains a lot about why Helldivers 2 is ACTIVELY GETTING WORSE INSTEAD OF BETTER

[@Propersciguy]

Where did you find this info?

[@Neockoen]

@@Propersciguythe ‘balance’ dev who also replies in the discord server is the same guy that worked on Hello Neighbor 2 Edit: didn’t actually reply with useful information, his name is Alex ‘Alexus’ Kravchenko and he was the lead game designer for Hello Neighbor 2

[@Kazrel]

@@Neockoen thanks amigo, was gonna reply but you beat me to it, like you said tho, the information is publicly available with a Google search

[@GoBirds802]

I’ve never seen a PVE game get so many nerfs in my entire life.

[@BigChungus-gz9vw]

Bro never played BL3

[@BOBINDUN]

Or bl2

[@riskyflash6812]

Destiny has entered the chat

[@FcoEnriquePerez]

​@@riskyflash6812 balance in Destiny mostly happens because PVP, that causes the PVE players cry about it. PVE balance happens rarely and is not that bad as this game.

[@Moostar95]

After playing warframe for a decade before retirement. I suspect most pve games to have this type of changes.

[@unnero1]

"Eruptor benefits from dealing less damage more consistently" You mean, like the exact polar opposite of how a single shot grenade launcher is supposed to be working.... fuckin genius designer.

[@jglennify]

They nerf by pick rate. Like we are an esports game lol.

[@celtiberian]

That is just dumb. They should rebalance based on over or underperformance when comparing that gun to the same players using all other guns.

[@ilannewaz3177]

The Alexus guy "Bringer of Balance" destroyed the game Hello Neighbor 2 by removing key features and then bailed before the release. Had I known he was in charge of balance I would have waited to purchase HD2. He is a real problem to Arrowhead's credibility and reputation. Edit: Spelling

[@ferdithetank7535]

Are you sure this isn't just another witch hunt? Usually there are always multiple people responsible for balance changes, and often they work completely separate from eachother, that's why some additions feel misaligned or even nonsensical. Basically some people trying their best and others slacking, basic working group dynamic.

[@Neockoen]

@@ferdithetank7535he was the lead game designer before he left though, if he didn’t directly work on it then at least he was responsible for the end product. Either way it isn’t positive, as that means we will just continue to see these ‘balance patches’ from a guy that has a history of not listening to his playerbase.

[@elijahaitaok8624]

@@clay180 because its controversy after controversy, negativity catches the headlines more than the positivity does. all they need to do is stop fugging up and stay positive, the CMs weren't exactly capable of doing their jobs so now all we do is witch hunt

[@ilannewaz3177]

@@clay180 I have no idea what would drive someone to defend the intentional sabotage of a product that they paid for by someone who has demonstrated nothing but incompetence and malice in the past in a similar position to the point where they have a reputation for it but you do you. The scandal with Hello Neighbor 2 and Alexus's willful sabotage of the game is widely available online if you're even the slightest bit curious. How can I trust Arrowhead when they hire people with that type of notoriety and have demonstrated that incompetence in several patches?

[@dirge7459]

This explains so much, and it hurts that they are still doing the same as what they did with Hello Neighbour. It's like they didn't learn anything at all from past experience. Nerfing and only doing small buffs is not the "designer" way of doing things. That's what he thinks, but he's wrong by so many margins. There are tons of games that basically prove his philosophy as faulty and incorrect.

[@rox1180]

I thought the gun was fun pre nerf. I accepted the chance of killing yourself bc it was so powerful. Seemed like a good trade off lol

[@Necro_fury]

Yeah thought that was the whole reason of the weapon, that u needed to shoot like 20m out from yourself or a teamate. Was supposed to be a support weapon in that u kinda hanged back and helped ur teamates?

[@FcoEnriquePerez]

I bet this people are always spreadsheet balancing and then just checking after we complain. Is like if it's very difficult to them to play the damn game and realize what feels good or not... Hell, most thing have been just fine in release besides some bugs, but every balance patch feels like it goes sideways. Is a Godamn PVE game no one cares how powerful a weapon is, stop making it feel underwhelming.

[@thescumofhumanity]

Tbh the erupter did need a nerf, but my god they decimated my boy. I don't use it anymore because it's just totally useless now. After the first round of nerfs I think it was kinda where it should have been? A slight aoe damage decrease and a mag size decrease. But now? There's no situation where it outplays any other gun. It'll still one shot it's user if used in close quarters yet almost all enemy's that used to be a one shot kill are now two to three shots. And the rate of fire on it being as slow as it is, it's just not worth taking any more. Almost every other primary can now out damage it

[@SuperCatacata]

@@FcoEnriquePerez It's painfully clear that the balancing team for Helldivers 2 doesn't play the game. They just look at a spreadsheet of most used weapons and nerf random shit.

[@NickWebb-lc6ry]

It also made it possible to run the explosive resistance gear with the personal shield to hit youreself twice in a row to clear all enemies away from you without dying, it was OP AF.

[@manletpride7319]

The eruptor nerf shows that the developers don't believe that players should have powerful primary weapons, even if those weapons have extreme tradeoffs like a terrible rate of fire, small magazine size, poor handling, and will damage or kill the player if fired at too close of a target.

[@dirge7459]

Their "we'd rather you rely more on stratagems" shows more and more each time we see more nerfs to primaries and buffs to bugs, but it also doesn't help that rhey change stratas, increase their cooldowns or make them not as effective on higher tier bugs/bots. It feels a lot like the devs like gaslighting their own userbase, because "I like trolling" (which makes me think of that South Park episode with the Swedish trolls).

[@Kanha..2000]

Na its just a marketing strategy they tell you to buy warbonds den nerf everyone of them as the next warbond closes upon us forcing you to use the new guns until they r nerfed again

[@bobbymoore8030]

Picked up the game struggled for a few days, got the railgun and learned hiw to use it. A day later Nerfed. Had to relearn strategies to compensate saved up enough for the warbond and got erupter. Spent a few days learning it and loved it as a add clearer and bunker buster and then boom. Down came the nerf hammer twice! Now im stuck relearning strategies or quitting because it feels like im just spinning my wheels and not getting anywhere. Thanks for listening to a doddering old man.

[@dirge7459]

I constantly feel like the devs are gaslighting us, while also passive aggressively telling us how to play the game, in a way that feels forceful, and not co-operative. For a PVE based game, it just feels wrong to see an entire dev team going off against it's community in numerous ways. It's actually making me want to go back to other games and checking out new ones, because I feel like my time/money isn't being respected and that I'm being taken for some wild ride that makes no sense. This is the one game where the devs both gaslight and make me feel like I'm going schizo.Like not even a PVP game has done that to me before.

[@DeBluChild]

I never got to use the rail gun before the nerf 😢

[@nathanrood865]

I started playing not too long ago. Thought the democratic detonation looked sick and fully unlocked it. My eruptor was my baby it went everywhere with me. And then they nerfed it. So why bother spending money or medals on the new war bond when its just going to get nerfed soon? So sad that they feel they have to resort to this kind of tactic

[@sgnt117]

I think it would be OKAY if some of our weapons were a little crazy. Not everyone uses the Eruptor because despite how powerful it used to be, not everyone enjoys how slow the weapon is. But the people who did use it, probably found technique for it. I love HD2! Just can’t help but feel it’s being balanced like a PVP game lol

[@EsperTV]

I get that too, it feels like they are trying to balance like a PVP game!

[@thewitchidolsachika6682]

Eruptor had a bunch of very cool gimicks. The shrapnel manipulation to oneshot brood commanders and devastators, the animation cancelling by quick swapping to your other weapons which rewards you with quicker shots. It was a very skill rewarding gun and yet it was still niche; • Needs a support weapon to compliment for being slow. • Always a danger to die to your own shrapnel.

[@an0nym00se4]

Yup, played on helldive on bugs with eruptor, stalwart and a laser backpack and the combo was preety solid and fun, you could go into a large heavy nest and go ratattatatatatata pew ratatatatatatatatata pew and close the whole thing in a minute, but now...

[@TurbulenceOfficial_]

I really feels like that

[@orangesouls7112]

I got really good at catching shots on the Eruptor sway, aiming to the side of something and popping shots off as it swung past what I wanted to hit, learning exactly what distances I and my team were safe at, and what situations were worth rolling the dice on. It was my reliable comfort weapon, and one I hardly ever saw anyone else use. I also loved that it opened calling in a Stalwart or MG as well for crowds. Now that it and a few other things I liked using got slapped, I'm afraid to get attached to anything again. Even if nobody uses it whatever I get attached to next I know it's not safe from suddenly becoming an entirely different weapon.

[@BalgaBear]

I can see Auto Cannon, Flamethrower, Incendiary Shotgun and Quasar Cannon getting nerfed in the next update. They're so usable!

[@__Razer]

Quasar's CD nerf wasn't big enough, was it?

[@BalgaBear]

@@__Razer Alot of people say "I didn't even notice it was nerfed!" so clearly it wasn't nerfed enough.

[@DanteV42]

​@@BalgaBearthats because if you shoot and immediately swap off it goes down to 10 seconds again. and you dont run around with it out anyway so the nerf never happened, very nice

[@big_petebear8535]

Flame Thrower is 100% getting nerfed. It's fun right now.

[@ozylocz4078]

I doubt they’ll touch the auto cannon. The balance devs are pretty dumb and only nerf around popular weapons. The auto cannon is not popular at all, people like their backpack slot.

[@kylepassey7813]

The worst part of nerfs to weapons like the Eruptor isn't just that they aren't viable (though that is a big part). It's also that they begin to lose their identity. Removing the shrapnel from the Eruptor completely removes it's main selling point and what made it unique. At this rate all the weapons will become one big grey blur where none of them shine out for being specifically good in any one way.

[@__Razer]

And yet they want to release 3 new weapons per month with each Warbond.

[@deliqene3191]

​@@__Razer I feel like the people developing the weapons are fine, it seems that the second it ends up in the balancing teams arms, 50/50 chance it will get hit with a gutter nerf

[@rickhunter6513]

Good call, all the weapons are the same 👍🏼

[@cosseybomb]

I paid for the warvond specifically for the damn gun and they remove the shrapnel 😢

[@felixh2786]

Honestly the change that still baffles me the most is the Slugger nerf. At it's peak it still was a very slow firing weapon with middling damage output. The main reason it was used a lot is because it's an early unlock and now new players don't really have anything against Automatons.

[@ProvidenceXIV]

It had consistent stagger with medium pen. Now it doesn't have the stagger. Now I use the Dominator... because it has stagger and medium pen. Will they take that away from the Dom too?

[@varietywiarrior]

​@@ProvidenceXIVProbably. Every gun will feel like shit if this bullshit is allowed to continue. I'm almost to a point where I feel like rallying the troops against tyranny again until somebody takes a fucking hint.

[@theresnothinghere1745]

A yes a middling damage of one shotting devastators and rapidly killing bile spewers. With stagger, and long range, and armor penetration that made it work just as well against both bots and bugs. It was nerfed because it did the job of the punisher (holding back a line of enemies with stagger) while doing more targeted damage thanks to its armor pen (and 1 bullet so no damage is lost on a hit) meaning you trivialized bile spewers on top of the punisher's performance and it would compete even with current precision weapons because long range stagger means you can interrupt rocket devestators and shield devestators if you miss the headshot. It needed to be nerfed in some manner, AH however nerfed it in a bad manner.

[@sakaraist]

the stagger made every other gun irrelevant.

[@ProvidenceXIV]

@@sakaraist and removing the stagger made the Slugger irrelevant. Literally why use it if the 12 gauge, pump action, single target shotgun can't stagger?

[@AthamAldecua]

They said they are afraid of "power creep", but we got the opposite... We got "sucky creep". They nerfed solid (not op) weapons, and in exchange implemented tiny buffs to crappy weapons and they are still not very good weapons. Where is the power creep? We got the opposite, and that's bad too, if not worse, since having weak weapons is not fun. This is one of the very few games where I DREAD every upcoming patch.

[@TotPocket]

I also dread patches, because I know dang well that it's mostly going to introduce even more game breaking bugs and crashes

[@DawgAC]

Ya kinda sad. WAs Annoyed with they nerfed the slugger and said despite this nerf its still taken really often. Man i haven't seen a single slugger since they nerfed it.

[@I.AM.ON.MY.WAY.]

@@DawgACthe slugger has gone extinct in the battlefield, at this point I just run around with a stalwart, supply pack, and a punisher in level 7 and have fun killing bugs, level 8 and 9 are fun too but I don’t always want to sweat my ass off.

[@diogorocha9837]

Me too. Every patch I begin reading thinking if this will be the patch that will make me uninstall the game.

[@thewitchidolsachika6682]

Incendiary Breaker is super funny. Even before DOT fix it was a better spray and pray. Now it's a better spray and pray that also ABSOLUTELY obliterates any fodder up to hunters and maybe even warriors. The bullet spread and the fire damage literally melts everything right now, the hunter patrols stand no chance with it. Can't wait for it to get nerfed into complete oblivion instead of spray and pray getting buffed.

[@nguyencaotri3879]

I played Warframe for 8-9 years prior to HD2. The used-to-be-indie studio also made many controversial and outright infuriating balance patches. Nerfs after nerfs after nerfs. But at least in recent years, they revert or buff the weapons/characters after a short period of backlash. The last big one happened about a month ago, people voiced their frustration on forums and other platforms, one week later things were back to almost where they began. That being said, this game has one of the most d*gshit balance teams I've ever seen.

[@ravekiller.]

Ah, fellow Tenno

[@bobbymoore8030]

To be a little fair WF has a huge issue with devs. They inherited a great game and sadly are all children. Pablo is holding it together with duct tape and is the only adult on that whole team..

[@JustAWideWeeb]

nerfs in this game is justifyable

[@ferdithetank7535]

​@@bobbymoore8030that's kinda ironic, considering Warframe is a power fantasy about space ninja magic suits being operated by literal kids in grimdark posthuman universe. The operators represent developers as children that don't know what they want, but react wildly to everything unfamiliar and fear their own feelings getting exposed. Basically "the art is a mirror of it's creator" in a game form

[@Soundwave1900]

Man, you haven't seen Overwatch balance team.

[@bruhwatermark5439]

The biggest thing to me is still the slugger. I see no one talk about it the fact that the balance dev said that it’s still a top 3 primary for both factions is completely insane as the gun is bottom 3 in the game at this point even it got gutted to the point of oblivion. Seriously if they undid every nerf the game has had to this point it wouldn’t feel like we are op at all just that hey I can do something now. I’m getting real sick of it and I’m about to change my review back to negative as that seems to be the only way to communicate with this dev team.

[@Spectacular_Insanity]

The Slugger is unfortunately just one drop in an entire bucket of piss. It honestly should do even more damage because it's slow-firing and slow-reloading while also needing good aim to use effectively. The DMRs are still underpowered. No one uses them against bugs, a few copium huffers use them against bots even though the Dominator is just straight-up better. I don't know how anyone can look at the Diligence CS and think it's good when it has awful handling and still requires 2 headshots to kill Devastators when the Dominator has better handling and can one-tap them if you aim well.

[@steelphoenix8978]

@@Spectacular_Insanity ye this, ive said it a couple of times before the slugger got nerfed, that its a shotgun that out dmr's the dmr's if you put skill into it. im all for more skill=better output, but a shotgun shouldnt be out performing dmr's in their field. the balancing dev looked at that (not me specifically its not my fault i swear) and thought "oh the slugger is too strong" and not the more clear answer, the dmr's are GARBAGE.

[@elimgarak1127]

He's lying through his teeth. I have yet to see anyone running it. I always have 2-3 randoms with me and I'm level 80. Zero fucking change it's a top 3. I see the Liberator Penetrator more often.

[@ilannewaz3177]

Agreed. Nerfing that gun was one of the most boneheaded balance changes in a video game I've seen. Until the crossbow nerf that almost no one was using anyways.

[@dirge7459]

I'm never changing my negative review. I have never once changed my review on a game, because changing them means flip flopping, and I'm not for that, since I find first impressions are so damn important, and ppl these days seem to forget that.

[@Voxine00]

Eruptor used to one shot stalkers and brood commanders, now it takes at least 3 shots, it's basically unusable

[@marcuscato9312]

This is bigger than anything else imo, I'm basically just using it to close bug holes now, the revolver takes out brood commanders faster

[@sorcyclone]

"This weapon didn't really help you win missions and the players think it's fun. So instead of making the other weapons a little better, we nerfed the fun gun." That's been Arrowhead's balance philosophy. If the community likes a weapon, it's going to be nerfed.

[@Srafe100]

Time to pretend everyone loves the basic liberator and watch devs nerf it to ground.

[@steelphoenix8978]

its the flaw of using use rate metrics as a guide to balancing. its logically flawed. as much as i luv my fellow divers, most of yall are normies and will congregate to the same few things.

[@dirge7459]

Also "we'd rather you rely on stratas more often and also run away a lot from nearly any fight" The complete opposite of what the game is presented to us as... Can we just call the game "Gaslighters 2", because that's what it feels like when the devs nerf, then make excuses for why it is what it is, but also at the same time is not what they say it is (which also deludes me into thinking I'm going schizo)

[@robbytherob]

I’ve been using the liberator since launch on helldive difficulty. It didn’t even need a damage buff. I hardly notice the difference. The only buff I would like to see on the liberator is a reduction on the muzzle flash since I only play first person and the flash is overwhelming

[@Dugrath]

It's no wonder the reviews haven't completely flipped either. Just bad decisions after bad decisions. When will they learn what made their game great in the FIRST place? Who cares if weapons are OP!? Instead of changing guns, increase spawn rates or HP of enemies vs nerfing the hell out of everything making the game fun.

[@TheReykjavik]

They need to stop nerfing fun.

[@john-paul3271]

Join the team chaos. Fire is famileee. Get a flamethrower. ❤️‍🔥

[@TheReykjavik]

@@john-paul3271 Flamethrower is strong, and I like it from time to time, it isn't really my style though. I ran a flamethrower + gas strike against bugs and just racked up kills when a bug breach came up out of a heavy nest, anything that dodged the gas walked into the flames.

[@wavy.m3]

that seems to be their main focus rn

[@j2d4oi]

Makes no sense that shooting a Bile Titan in the unarmored mouth doesn't do more than shooting it on its armored head

[@dyroth]

Dude the weak spots on enemies make no sense. How is the chargers back side not the weak spot too, it’s so intuitive, and now with bile titans I gotta aim at its small ass forehead instead of the gaping mouth while spewing

[@BARDI77]

dam I wish riot games was this fast to nerf things in league of legends where it actually matters

[@sirgaz8699]

Oddly enough LoL and Planetside 2 came to mind when I was thinking I'd much rather have fast balancing over leaving horrendous outliers to distort the game for so long that people leave because it's a mess and the people who stay think that's how it should be and shouldn't be changed.

[@BARDI77]

@@sirgaz8699 I think the same but since this is a coop game I would like them to make the non popular weapons stronger instead of nerfing the ones that are op

[@RinnzuRosendale]

I feel like Alexus lied on his resume.

[@shortlingking]

XD this one got me

[@doctorhealsgood5456]

I heard Alexus was working on hello neighbor 2 of all things before and he was already notorious there so...

[@D4rkM4773r]

DEI hire

[@FcoEnriquePerez]

I've never read anything that makes sense from that man ffs.... And he's clearly ass at the game.

[@Klayperson]

more like alex-sus

[@torinsmith9867]

If the breaker wasn't over-performing, nerfing it wasn't a balance issue: it's an anti-fun issue.

[@JustAWideWeeb]

the breaker nerf was legit like 1 mag and a recoil nerf 😭

[@Outer0Heaven]

The breaker wasn't "overperforming". It just works compared to every other primary weapon.

[@Caplian]

@@JustAWideWeeb The nerf was to the magazine capacity from 16 to 13 and the recoil was doubled

[@Luck3yv]

@@Caplian the mag is fair unless you love unloading, and the recoil is... recoil. Just pull down however I do understand why people get upset, but alot of people are blowing nerfs way out of proportions par the railgun which should have stayed powerful

[@JustAWideWeeb]

@@Caplian the recoil isnt that bad tbh and the -3 mag is not that big either

[@FlawlessKam]

The enemies keep upgrading, and yet somehow we keep downgrading lmfao

[@DatsRandom]

I’m most frustrated by the random design choices that make the game harder for no reason. Space optimization booster is the epitome of that. Why wouldn’t we have our arsenal fully loaded when we drop in? Why is that we have to use a booster slot for something so common sense? It is ridiculous from both a gameplay perspective and a in-universe perspective. Not being able to take the magazines/stims/grenades off of our fallen allies is another nonsense curving in difficultly. And with these repeated nerfs to us and buff to enemies make the game more frustrating than it needs to be to be.

[@Snogglebit]

It really is like "mean-spirited" is the way they wanna go with the game's balance.

[@Necro_fury]

Yeah i keep getting thoughts of "i hope they add a ship upgrade that maxs out my grenades when i come in or fully reloads them from a supply pack" then i think, wait why does that booster even exist? (Was rough early game on like level 1-10 without it)

[@DatsRandom]

@@Necro_fury yeah if anything that booster should just be changed to “a single supply pack grants a full resupply” Would make more sense.

[@dirge7459]

They're also adding silly perks that make little sense, like why would I pick a few seconds faster reinforcement or 1 whole 1 person budget, over improved stamina/hit points/easier terrain movement. Also the new upcoming warbond is gonna include a perk that makes it so spewers goo doesn't slow you down as much... Literally selling us an upgrade pack solution, to an issue they could have just tweaked slightly. I'm already feeling that feature creep in this game, the kind where they invent a problem and sell you the solution, be it via a warbond or a grind for an upgrade, and none of that is fun, nor makes any sense, or even any logical sense to pick over what already works/has more pros and benefits. At this point I've gotten the idea that the devs secretly just wanted to hop onto the Souls bandwagon and turn Helldivers into a Souls-like 3rd person shooter, because it makes perfect sense when you step back and look at the sheer number of imposed difficulty modifiers this game has: Armour types Pen types Ragdoll animation (cnanot move/do anything while being tossed around) Stamina drain (used for melee/running/dodging, and the dodge distance is so small) Strata cooldowns being increased on some planets Ion storms preventing any stratas for an amount of time the focus on weapon nerfing and little to buffing Enemy buffs more than nerfs weapons that make little sense in a game with stupidly vast amounts of enemies in your face (sniper/DMR's/Side arms). If they truly wanted it to be a souls-like, they should have just said that outright from before the game's launch, because man do I loathe souls-like games (I like a challenge, but I'm not the type of person that loves to get irked at the game beating me into the ground every single second, because that just isn't fun, only mentally tapped ppl find that fun).

[@Sweetroll_Wolfie]

I've been consistently asking myself this question as well. I almost always take that Booster 'cause dropping my team in without a full stock feels terrible and nonsensical.

[@sblim9245]

the main problem is that the devs are not playng the actual game

[@ylyxa]

Oh they do. Just not at the difficulty where balance actually matters. You can solo 5-6 pretty reliably if you're, like, level 5 and have a couple pages of the default warbond unlocked.

[@nopenope8418]

@@ylyxa I used to solo 7, it was hard but okay... now it's damn near impossible: first near-double patrol spawns (stealth now near impossible), now Eruptor goes from good to wet noodle (aaaand there goes my main weapon!).

[@PorkBone8016]

Maybe someone should ask how many hours they personally have playing the game 😮

[@intothekey]

​@@nopenope8418I still run 7-9 solo. But the list of builds I can consistently pull those off with is short and dwindling.

[@manray005]

@@nopenope8418 yeah the patrol spawn increase (apparently a bug fix... doubt it) is ridiculous. Hard is now harder than impossible was.

[@samturner6061]

The Eruptor being able to kill a charger with a buttsplosion, but having the drawbacks of not being usable at close range, meant that it promoted people to experiment with different builds. Most people were falling into using the Stalwart, as the Eruptor was able to deal with medium enemies swiftly, leaving only the light ones to deal with. Then personally I was using 500kg and railcannon so I could still take on bile titans. It was just another build that worked, alongside the current meta, but now it doesn't work, so people are just gonna go back to the meta. Boring. A decent developer might have noticed that people were making new cool builds around it, and tried to balance EVERYTHING to be like the eruptor, so we can try to make cool builds around EVERYTHING, but no. They suck.

[@okchad]

It felt SO FUN getting to use the stalwart for once and I found out it’s actually a pretty decent weapon, but now the build is worthless and i’m back to just using any AR with some kind of rocket launcher 😕

[@thatokperson]

Yeah it's like the switched roles as the eruptor felt like the ok support weapon and the stalwart felt like an amazing primary

[@elimgarak1127]

It was supposedly a bug and I'd be fine with it if chargers alone were the only enemy that took different damage values from the Eruptor. Everything else about the gun was perfectly fine.

[@john-paul3271]

Flamethrower, man. 🔥 🔥 😍

[@EravinVT]

Someone who can see all the numbers on their side telling a bold faced lie about it being “100 randomly” is very underhanded. Every impact dealt 200 and if I know that, they knew that. In the least rude way possible our limited contact with the devs should not consist of them telling us lies because they think we’re stupid enough to believe them. Tell us straight up you took a thousand damage off a primary because that’s not something a primary should be doing.

[@thiccfila]

Yeah I agree. Otherwise a skill issue since he called making all the shrapnel hit one enemy an exploit....

[@orangesouls7112]

I'm a dad gamer. Me and my fellow dad gamer buddies play on our nights off, run around in 7s mostly, though occasionally jumping to 9s if all of us are on and we're feeling spicy. We all swap weapons around and try new things, but we also all have our "ol' reliable" loadouts and favorites that we managed to get good or comfortable with during our limited gaming time. The fact some of the balance feels based more on "We saw a video of a 1 in 1,000 happenstance decided to gut it" rather than "Is this actually being over-used and oppressive" just makes me feel afraid to get attached to anything anymore. I'm barely even hyped for the next warbond because I'm terrified I'll like something just for it to get wildly changed a week later. Do smaller and less changes at once, let things settle, stop knee jerk adjusting things based on knee jerk reactions from the community and give it a week or two to see if the hype dies down on "OP" things or if people learn how to actually use the "trash tier" things.

[@northlandphoenix]

The constant changes are exhausting. For people that are playing 4 hours a week, how many missions can you really get in to experiment with new loadouts once they kill your ol' reliable loadouts. Especially if you just want to shoot some bugs rather than do a research project.

[@sillonbono3196]

It feels to me devs pay too much attention to the plethora of loud youtubers making headlines like "The eruptor is absolutely insane!", "The breaker is completely OP!", "The HD community is raving about the grenade pistol" type of headlines.

[@orangesouls7112]

@@sillonbono3196 They see a clip of a 1 in a million shot and assume it's just how the weapon functions on the daily for the average player, and worse attribute it to the weapon rather than some crazy bug. PS5 glitch making Railgun 2 tap Titans says hello.

[@BugVall]

it feels like they hand out nerfs to weapons just because they are popular. The weapons are not op, they just feel good to use and consistetly do its job. I really hope the devs change their vision for the balancing. Now every patch a fan favourite weapon is nerfed, and a mediocre weapon is buffed. Then next patch the cycle continues. Happened with breaker, Slugger and now Eruptor

[@blueviper7501]

I agree with this entire idea.

[@nathanwade3934]

There’s not a good gun in the last warnond except the little grenade pistol guarenteed that’s gonna get nerfed next

[@hitandruncommentor]

It's gotten to the point where I don't share my loadouts with others so my favorites don't get nerfed. So none of you use the blitz/senator on bugs or sickle/grenade pistol on bots. You hear? I don't want to have to rework my whole damn play style again.

[@dirge7459]

What gets me, is how we've been suffering the weapon DoT bug for months now, then they fix it, only to assure us that fire DoT is getting nerfed, even though they gave us the ship upgrade... Like what's even the point in buying ship upgrades/warbonds/using certain weapons, if all 3 are going to get nerfed into the ground, and not do what they were designed to be used for?.

[@nirktheman-thingstab-cutter]

Totally. I use the AMR constantly and will go to bat for it being an S Tier weapon but because its not popular it hasn't been nerfed yet despite being a better pick than the railgun and argueably better than the AC.

[@DerLichert]

And it feels like they dont fucking play their own fucking game. Again. like allways.

[@smoldoggy1005]

No one there plays the game. I doubt they even play games or use computers

[@ravekiller.]

They can’t even finish 7’s on stream, and this was near release, before all their massive nerfs.💀 They’re pathetic and don’t understand balancing in their own game

[@thewitchidolsachika6682]

If I reckon correctly, the devs said they don't play higher than difficulty 5.

[@CheapGodiva]

They do play the game. I actually watched a video recently where the co and two of the devs were playing the game and they play it regularly.

[@sm753]

Lol, they don't. There was a video of AHS devs playing the game and they weren't able to beat a level 5 or 6 mission.

[@OverlordIX]

How the nerf cycle works: 1) Players use their favourite weapon load outs. 2) Devs sees weapons get a spike in usage. 3) Devs assume they're being used because of some meta. 4) Devs nerf said weapons. 5) Players switch to different weapons that dont suck. 6) repeat step 2 onwards. Instead of nerfing weapons, why not buff up the other existing weapons so that they are on the same level as those that are prominently used?

[@r0ketzz-marz411]

Justice for the Slugger!!! Never understood the double nerf to damage and the stagger. If they wanted to make it no longer the best dmr, they could have nerfed the damage falloff.

[@steelphoenix8978]

they couldve made the dmr's good dmr's

[@DerLichert]

Thats what i hate, the weapons that they are nerfing are not "meta" they are just fun to use, not like the other shit. So when they nerf it only feels like they fucking hate fun.

[@Sharsis8]

Except everyone and their mother was saying eruptor was "OP" amd meta. The gaming community as a whole just never learns to shut the fuck up about saying this or that is OP immediately. Also claiming something is OP in dev speak literally means it's overpowered / overperforming and needs adjustment.

[@Dert26]

So, the quasar cannon wasn't meta? Despite the fact that every single lobby had at least one person rocking it? God forbid the devs encourage people to not hover around just one weapon/stratagem because that would make the game more boring and less diverse.

[@nathanwade3934]

@@Dert26I agree with quasar but the eruptor got nerfed like hell along with the railgun nobody is going to want to use these weapons just like the breaker shotgun all these weapons have been nerfed to hell

[@carlnielsen1458]

@@Dert26 that's not how to fix that problem though. it's the opposite of rising tide lifts all ships. this gun is fun and fills a role well? not anymore, now you better use less fun guns! quasar was not invalidating the challenge before the nerf in any capacity and the popularity was a combination of it being cool and useful. honestly a full team of EATs was always better bc you get 2 instant shots no charge up or cooldown required. even on helldive 8 shots every 70seconds is more than you would almost ever need and so over time you would litter the map with unused EATs. yet people still took the quasar bc they liked it more. "encouraging people to not hover around 1 weapon/strategem" by nerfing the popular ones is an abysmal idea

[@steelphoenix8978]

@@Dert26 whats wrong with that? players can choose to have fun with whatever they want, if something is the most popular so what? vast majority of ppl listen to pop songs, but pop sucks; should we nerf pop songs?

[@coreyvaughn-patterson2668]

The team is gonna systematically annihilate every weapon we like. Idk what metrics they are looking at but they will throw 2 or three different nerfs on a single weapon at a time completely ruining any enthusiasm over it then when everyone inevitably swaps to another weapon because they want to actually enjoy the experience they target that one next. Like come on man.

[@KD-_-]

They just watch solo Helldive videos on KZbin and nerf whatever is on the loadout

[@dirge7459]

It's reached a point where I now don't know which weapon to pick, not due to "ooh so much choice", but more of "what choice is going to get me killed often and get me kicked from the game after the mission is over". Like that's what the devs have instilled in me, and I've never really felt much like that before if ever in a PVE based game. Usually PVE based games allow the player to be more expressive in their playstyles and loadouts of choice, but this game seems like the complete opposite of that, where the devs are passive aggressively telling us how to play the game we bought, and punishing us for stepping out of line, which just feels so dirty, abusive and wrong.

[@AKIRA-oz5cg]

@@dirge7459i saw a comment that said a dev who previously killed another game is now part of arrowhead and basically doing the same to Helldivers

[@dirge7459]

@@AKIRA-oz5cg Same. I looked into it and man did I find a rabbit hole.

[@AKIRA-oz5cg]

@@dirge7459 still don’t understand why a pve game is getting nerfs on weapons almost every other patch/update….if understand if there was a pvp element to helldivers but there isnt

[@burn1none]

I just don't understand the devs obsession with balance in a fuckin PvE co-op game. what would be so dangerous about giving people powerful options and letting them decide what they want to use, theres no leaderboards or any way to compete so the mentality of balance is a bit asinine.

[@Gabu_Dono]

The biggest problem are updates that reduce the amount of unique weapons or a weapon’s uniqueness. Less diversity makes the game more boring. Having one weapon with lower than average damage but massive stagger, and another with massive damage but can also kill you and teammates is much more entertaining than a bunch that are functionally similar.

[@mr.vinceable130]

Here's the thing for me, as an Eruptor user who mostly plays Terminid missions: The fantasy for me was being a support sniper who used the eruptor for mid-large targets like spewers, brood commanders, and stalkers and preventing bile titans from puking by 2 tapping the green sacks. The explosion/shrapnel also allowed me to take out small clusters of enemies like hunters that could devastate my team doing work on the ground. Meanwhile I'd use the jump pack to stay on mountains that terminids may or may not be able to climb. I understand some nerfs like the ammount of clips. That makes sense (although it's still annoying to get down, dodge terminids and try to resupply just to find a new safe spot to support my team from). But preventing me from doing large ammounts of damage and forcing me to spend 3-4 bullets when I used to 1 shot spewers and brood commanders on a low ammo gun is completely backwards. My whole playstyle is disrupted and I can't support my team the way I used to.

[@MrUniq]

U said the keyword fantasy….

[@hitandruncommentor]

Yep, I used to love the eruptor, then the patch happened. Then it started doing a better job of killing my than the enemy, I had a couple games where no matter what I shot or how far away the shot would richete back at me.

[@hitandruncommentor]

​@MrUniq and you spelled you wrong. Congratulations genius.

[@somanydynamos1001]

I loved laying down supporting fire on a swarm of bugs while "Enemy at the Gates" music played in my head.

[@john-paul3271]

Nothing suppresses bugs like a flamethrower, arch blaster, rover backpack combo.

[@skylerspurlock4755]

Honestly I feel like a child getting disciplined after every update

[@cold_ultra]

It's like you can feel the nerfs incoming. You see everyone rocking the quasar, the good pistol (idk the name) and the eruptor. And you can pretty much tell we will be getting disciplined in the next patch for not varying our loadouts more.

[@Spectacular_Insanity]

You were running around in the backyard having fun? YOU'RE GROUNDED FOR THREE WEEKS YOUNG MAN!

[@dirge7459]

"Timmy I told you not to use that kind of gun, here use this much safer water pistol instead" -Arrowhead

[@dirge7459]

@@cold_ultra Every single time I see 2-3 squaddies rocking the same loadouts, I always end up picking the opposite, because I know damn well by now that the devs will nerf those often used loadouts within a week or two. Gaslit into oblivion with this game.

[@skylerspurlock4755]

Are you ok? You’ve been running around in these lobbies causing all out mayhem! Here, let me help you!

[@thewitchidolsachika6682]

I really want some attention to the HMG. It was added with the quasar cannon, but always felt so left out. Only recently we got a 3rd person crosshair, but I still want 120-140 bullets in a mag, because it's so lame just constantly reloading the gun for a billion years. The gun in its current state *can* perform well, but it's not fun to play with this recoil and _CONSTANTLY_ reloading.

[@Brandon-yq1tm]

The thing about the eruptor that made it fun was having a powerful (but slow) primary made some strategems like the stalwart or machine gun viable for chaff and small fries. With the nerf what's even the point anymore, might as well not even use it and let those strategems never get used ever again.

[@Tuvok_Shakur]

they also nerfed the intro, instead of the ministry of truth notice being the first thing you see after booting up the game, now it gives you the sony and arrowhead logo

[@TotPocket]

That happens every time there is a patch, I believe Also, I felt violently sick seeing the PS studios logo 😂😂😂

[@smoldoggy1005]

Gaystation studios making sure they completely break the game for PC just to optimize it for ps5 users

[@Tuvok_Shakur]

@@TotPocket its treason, really

[@tenminuteteach9560]

The Eruptor is now a significantly slower firing Jar-5 that can close holes with 1/3 the clip size.

[@warrensmith7690]

It wasn't even supposed to be nerfed (officially), the change is a total fail.

[@__Razer]

​@@warrensmith7690 I feel like the gun worked fine before. They only needed to give Helldivers enough resistance to the shrapnel to not get one-shot by it at the edge of its range. Maybe the shrapnel needs damage falloff at range.

[@perseo10000]

other solution could have been reducing the range of the shrapnel, to 5 meters maybe? So the shrapnel still works in most cases and doesn't kill you in ridiculous situations, just like the fragmentation grenade.

[@nopenope8418]

@@perseo10000 THIS!

[@GD-lw9yv]

@@__Razer Or how about don't change anything and leave it as it was, a very high-risk but high-reward primary

[@dekeaustin]

It was fun to me when the bugs weren't so strong and the weapons were stronger. Sadly the newer people will never get to experience how fun it was at launch.🎉🎉🎉

[@roninwaveman]

Funny how the game gets saved from Sony just so Arrowhead can "balance" the game into oblivion.

[@thiccfila]

im glad we can all come together after defeating sony to defeat the balance devs now

[@roninwaveman]

@@thiccfila Lol yeah the top of one mountain is the bottom of another.

[@taleril5815]

The eruptor was fine before they took away the shrapnel, i could dive backwards and shoot stalkers in the face and take almost 0 damage. Killing bile spewers was consistent, the ammo nerf was a fair trade for the performance, but now it hits like a wet noodle.

[@narki86]

Agreed being limited to 6 mags was fine, it still performed relatively well after the first nerf but the removal of the shrapnel has completely castrated the poor thing, I really liked my eruptor/stalwart build but now I have to dump half a mag to kill a single brood commander or spewer, it's become completely irrelevant :(

[@bravingbrivatebrian]

​@@narki86for real. Make it a support weapon and bring shrapnel back if it's too op as a primary. Shit is so boring to use now.

[@clockwork9011]

Stop nerfing shit just let us have fun! It’s hell divers in not CS:Go or an esport it’s a shoot em blow em up. We want cool and interesting weapons. Not having eruptor hasn’t stopped me from completing hell dive missions it was just fun!

[@wutever8167]

The biggest complaint I have is that Hunters are not fun, and there's 20 of them on the screen after a breach on high difficulty. If you solo you basically have to run a Shield Pack or Supply Pack (with medical armor) and an extremely strong horde clear gun, like the Breaker Incendiary to not have a miserable time. I had a game just now where I had 41 stims used. Does anybody like getting homed in on by a common enemy that is near-impossible to dodge and get slowed for ages? Is getting one-shot by multiple Hunters jumping on you fun?

[@Inanedata]

Pro tip, you can time a melee attack to parry a hunters jump and prevent them from hitting you. Even after they have hit you, melee-ing them can stagger them long enough to get a barrel down their throat. You can sometimes dodge a hunters leap attack if you run parallel to them then IMMEDIATELY run the opposite direction after they jump. If you throw a stun grenade at your feet when being overwhelmed by a hunter pack it's often possible to get enough time to heal and reload before blasting the pack off of you. Good luck Helldiver o7

[@wutever8167]

@@Inanedata The problem isn't A hunter. The problem is 20 of the damn things, and I'm not joking about the numbers. I've had situations where I look behind me and see an army of them rolling down a hill. You can't just AoE them down because they tend to spread out, and if multiple get on you you're screwed if not by them then because of them. A medical armor and / or stuns are going to let you live longer, but there's a solid chance you'll die a slow death anyway due to being stuck or having other enemies kill you. That's how I got to 41 stims used. Still beat the mission, but man was it miserable.

[@ltrpwd]

@@Inanedatatoo bad you have to unbind melee on pc if you want to use voice

[@sheik_link]

"All these weapons can kill faster than the railgun..." Arrowhead: got it, we will nerf all of them

[@IkariXIV]

You hit the nail on the head. A lot of the nerfs are things that can be walked back due to other factors changing in the game. The railgun was absolutely miserable before the last buff, even though it felt fun to use, the payoff was terrible. I don't think most weapons have had it as bad as the railgun did, but I think it's something that I'm scared of happening to the flamethrowers now that DoT damage is fixed.

[@King.-Arthur]

They better not nerf my flamethrower, it has plenty of downside being close range and intermittently setting me on fire.

[@TehFishey]

@@King.-Arthur the flamethrower was buffed like, 3 times (if you count the ship upgrade for +fire damage) while its core mechanics were still borked. Frankly, if anyone thinks that it - or the incendiary breaker for that matter - won't get nerfed now that burning works, they're high on copium. I'd compare it to the Quasar - the thing was able to get a 50% cooldown nerf is still arguably BIS as an anti-heavy support weapon.

[@thewitchidolsachika6682]

​@@TehFishey Incendiary breaker will 101% get nerfed because it's literally breaker spray and pray but better and also with the added bonus of DoT which is crazy good. Not that sure about the flamethrower, it has its fair share of drawbacks and advantages, but so did the eruptor and many other weapons that still got nerfed so we'll see.

[@YipeekayHarasho]

ikr, bring the Breaker back to it's former Glory and some ppl will still use the Incendinary Breaker over it's vanilla, becuz simple, we like setting things up on fire.

[@varietywiarrior]

​@@YipeekayHarashoIf they restored the Slugger, that would add even more variety, as you'd have plenty of people, myself included, picking it over the Breaker.

[@samturner6061]

Slugger nerf is still a top 3, yeah sure, that's why I only ever see anyone using the breaker incendiary and the dominator. It's top 5. And it's 5th. And there's only 3 guns really viable for both bugs and bots. So it sucks. The dominator does everything it used to do and more. Taking the stagger function away from a gun called the Slugger was nearly as dumb of a move as taking the Eruption out of the Eruptor. These guys blow at balancing. I did better in my underpants editing ini files on Command and Conquer games as a child.

[@ilannewaz3177]

The dev who nerfed slugger needs an entire OJ trial for their buffoonery

[@armandklink4843]

I'm playing since about a week after launch and honestly it's getting REALLY tiring how they introduce new fun tools and 2 weeks later completely nerf them into the ground. Majority of the weapons that got nerfed weren't even overpowered, they're just popular. On the other hand, the bad weapons always get nonexistent buffs, and the strong and fun stuff not only get heavy handed nerfs that basically remove them from general usability but the nerfs specifically target their identity and completely ruin it. Arrowhead wants you to not use the Slugger as a sniper rifle, what are the changes? Obviously kill the stagger and damage so you never want to get close to an enemy with a supposed shotgun rifle. The Erruptor is a very strong AOE shrapnel weapon (one of a kind)? Let's remove the shrapnel and make it a slower and more inconsistent Autocannon instead. Changes like these only ensure people will eventually stop buying new Warbonds. I won't buy the new one because I know for a fact whatever is good in that roster of weapons will get erased out of existence in 2-3 weeks and the other shitty weapons will get minor lovetaps that'll make me deplete 1.5 mags instead of 2 to kill medium sized enemies. This is unsustainable in the long term and as if the PSN fiasco wasn't enough, Arrowhead's boneheaded tonedeaf antifun balancing will do the damage instead. I'm only a few specific nerfs away from quitting the game for good myself.

[@gringadoor5385]

I play so i can run around for 70% of time, achieving nothing, after the 13th charger shows up, while waiting 15 seconds for a quasar to reload.

[@mordbain4671]

Sometimes I wonder do devs even test any changes they make. This "bug" would have been very obvious to any test group playing with the gun for 5 minutes. But I guess it's easier/quicker/cheaper to have paid customers do the testing nowadays. Don't get me wrong, I still love the game, but this kinda stuff just feels weird.

[@cold_ultra]

Testing on live would be fine, if they were quick to revert buggy changes. They are willing to make quick fixes not knowing if it breaks something, and when it does, well... unlucky, we didn't know it would 😅 I guess yall will have to wait for the next patch now

[@diogorocha9837]

Dev team, PLAY THE GAME on lvl 9. But play a lot of hours. Play with a full squad using mics, play matchmaking random, play matchmaking without mic and play solo. And give all these types of play the same importance. Experience what real players experience and just then you have enough understanding of community complaints about nerfs, because at the moment you are killing the fun every patch.

[@Dert26]

Crying about the devs not playing and balancing around solo in a 4 player co-op game is peak malding.

[@diogorocha9837]

@@Dert26 I don't play solo. But It is a possibility within the game. Like I said, to acquire experience and knowledge enough to understand how the weapons and "metas" are performing in real life.

[@__Razer]

@@diogorocha9837 How to play Solo Helldivers 2 if you're a dev. Step 1: Dive into mission area by yourself. Step 2: Call down SOS beacon. They don't want you to play solo.

[@diogorocha9837]

@@__Razer At this point we all know they don't, but playing Solo is a thing for a considerable amount of people by the comments I read on various KZbin channels. And let me give you an example of partial solo play then. A thing that I like to do with a squad is split the team to complete all the objectives in time to extract with more ease. And because of that I kinda solo a lot of objectives. Of course I try to aggro the minimum of enemies as possible and use bug breaches that are happening in other places to engage enemies that I must fight to not cause a bug breach that I would have to face alone.

[@jamesg7508]

The devs can barely even clear level 6 difficulty

[@jkmayfourteenth]

I feel like they overshoot nerfs in the game. They see something strong (not necessarily op) and nerf it to the ground while also subsequently buffing the enemies which creates a dynamic that shits on the player. They then buff weapons a little bit to equal things out and then nerf the enemies a little at the same time which creates a dynamic where it's trivial. They need to try isolating nerfs and buffs so they can get a better idea of a baseline. At this point, it's artificial difficulty increasing by constantly changing the abilities of the weapons and equipment. People are good at adapting and eventually the hardest difficulty will be trivial if things remain the same and the devs are taking this as we need to nerf things to make it more difficult.

[@dirge7459]

Honestly feels like that South Park episode where the Swedish trolls just do it for the lulz, and the way Arrowhead works with nerfing us/buffing enemies compounds this image to me with each patch. It feels like they hate us having fun, but they have fun when we get shit on.

[@Rlowe247]

Are they calling complexity an exploit like shooting the ground under a charger?

[@thiccfila]

Yes

[@Rlowe247]

@@thiccfila The fact you can do so much with the game's systems is a strength and makes everything much more fun. Not just aim and clicking on heads, you are using the terrain and tools provided in creative ways.

[@ericvalentine1497]

Last night had 6 bile titans and 4 chargers on an extraction - cant kill them fast enough now due to nerfs. Managed to extract but wtf

[@alexanderbohm607]

How the he'll u manage that? Were u extracting with 20 minutes to go or something?

[@frotercannon2740]

I was right at the door on 8 but got kicked across the map by a charger of which there were three right in front of the door, into a horde and failed to extract. I had not died before this, but it is what it is. It would’ve been my first extract on 8!

[@noobagainst6189]

I dont now why nerf good weapons and the bad ones dont get any significant buff its not a PVP game

[@violet_paladin]

I don't know why they Nerf ANYTHING, the enemies don't get nerfed, they only get buffed. I wouldn't mind having stronger and stronger enemies as we get stronger. Instead we get weaker and they get stronger because the devs are incompetent and don't understand how to make difficulty scale

[@dirge7459]

@@violet_paladin Also doesn't help that the devs and fanboys use the ultimate cop-out to that power creep with "play on lower diff", which isn't even an answer to the growing issues the devs are presenting, not the players for simply choosing weapons they like.

[@violet_paladin]

@@dirge7459 exactly. I can't acquire higher level materials on lower level maps. I can't contribute to my team as effectively without those samples, but I can't get the samples because the difficulty of the level plus the weakness of my weapons makes this a very precarious proposition. "Hurr durr skill issue" -people who have never touched a 7+ mission

[@dirge7459]

@@violet_paladin Like I personally can do suicidal without much issue, but lately, due to dev fuckery, I've been forced to rely on acting as secondary weapon chaff clearing guy, while others roll with anti armour, and well... our primaries used to be decent at that, but I've either not got the stopping power, or I'm low on ammo/mags, and no amount of resupply is going to fix that. If devs wanna still have those higher tier diff's, they are simply going to have to re-evaluate all 3 of them, and maybe slim them down to just 2 or maybe keep "suicidal (which sounds worse than Helldive if you ask me, due to the naming) As the top tier diff, because the way the devs are currently going about it is making the last tier diff's more or less the same, only more on screen lag and ragdolling, and less rooty McShooty.

[@violet_paladin]

@@dirge7459 ya I really only play 7-9 in a pre made but when we try to get new players into the rotation it's very difficult for them because they quickly realize how completely underpowered everyone is Even at high levels.

[@BlackThanator]

My biggest complaint about the Eruptor after the first nerf together with the Scout Strider explosion resistance buff, is that it cant oneshot Striders anymore. That was what i used it most for.

[@CeresOutpost]

It's not ok. The game doesn't feel remotely as fun as it did at launch because they've made every single weapon feel like shit. Today was the first time I left the game because it was boring and frustrating. Call me when they figure out how to bring the fun back. No one wants actual NERF weapons in a horde shooter

[@mcwolves71]

Yes it does and no they haven't.

[@zarfilg]

Bro, the only people playing the final dev "vision of this game" will be the devs as the players will move on. This game is a shadow of its former self on release which was a fun game I fell in love with. The beauty of this game is watching bugs and robots get shredded by guns and bullets without being over run by 30 bile spewers. The idea that we are to use strategems is nonsense as shiny lights from the sky on 2 min cooldowns just don't cut it.

[@carloscollazoii]

I've come to dread updates, too! They nerf the hell out of weapons and exploits that Helldivers use, but don't balance the exploits that the enemies have like shooting around corners, or gunships that have been destroyed that missile you after they're dead.

[@johnmcshane4463]

Bruh, enemies clipping into cliffs and shooting out from them with no counterplay is infuriating.

[@__Razer]

Severed Devastator gun arms still shooting at you from the ground

[@carloscollazoii]

@johnmcshane4463 Let's not forget invisible enemy mines-- NOT missed visually--actually NOT there at all that appear a split second after you walk through the area and blow you up after the fact.

[@CookieManCookies]

I love the one where bots get stuck inside of mountains, and shoot the crap out of you where you can't fire back.. dumb.

[@gajxo]

I've been a game developer for live ops games. When working on PvE games we only nerfed stuff if it was absurdly OP. There is no reason to apply the PvP logic that every weapon needs to have the same win rate.

[@HidyoX]

Giving the Quasar cannon an additional 5 second nerf doesn’t make sense at all. It’s not like you can spam fire with the old cooldown. That cannon was in a sweet spot before they nerfed it.

[@KD-_-]

Quasar was S+ before the nerf lol You just switch weapons and clear hunters after killing one charger ... Which you have to do anyway before picking up your next EAT so the hunters don't kill you. Similar with bots.

[@nopenope8418]

I'd say it's the only balance nerf with which i'm neutral so far. Yes the Quasar was OP, it was over-used and every other anti-tank weapon were worse except the recoil-less ONLY WHEN TEAM-LOADING was better AND the quasar has infinite ammo. SO yeah that nerf was nothing to light bonfires about, it was, maybe, the only one truly deserved. Now every other nerf... screw that they are not playtesting anything before letting it loose.

[@CheeseDanish85]

Quasar needs a shorter charge up time post-cooldown-nerf. 3 seconds is a LONG time, where so many things can flinch your shot, and missing with it now is SO costly in terms of time.

[@will4996]

This weapon when it came out was my favorite. I feel like the recent patch striped its identity away. It rarely 1 shot any thing medium armor. That with the slow fire/small ammo. This gun went from fun to pain to use.

[@Loovis3XIV]

I was a slugger player and enjoy it a lot and they nerf it to the ground for nothing and enjoy recently the eruptor who is nerfed again thats annoying. I don’t have fun with other weapons even if its more meta like inc breaker so i am almost lvl 100 and i dont have a cool primary who match my playstyle.

[@rarneth]

Just wondering if this last minute nerf is to promote the new warbond. Then there will be a new fun gun everyone likes to play with, then they'll nerf that one. Rinse and repeat.

[@patrickhamos2987]

it's kind of amazing that they completely misunderstand the strengths of their weapons, or what's worse - they do understand, and then they make the absolute worst choice with that knowledge. Either way, it does not bode well.

[@VavrinnD7]

Balance, to me, is first making sure an array of weapons are viable. The balance patches up to now had it's highs and lows, but it's gotten to the point that anytime I've welcomed a new weapon to my load out it gets gutted within a week; leading to less viable options and more restricted game play. I don't want to keep using the same guns, support weapons, and stratagems over and over, I truly want to use the rest of the weapons but as a difficulty 9 player I'm not going to bring in a liberator concussive for example, I'm here to clear hordes, not tickle them. Make more weapons become viable, balance on how strong a weapon is over how often it's being used. Bring us more variety rather then destroying the few viable options we have left.

[@julius7539]

I already stopped playing because of the way they “balance” the game

[@janfortuna3002]

same here, 200 hours in and uninstalled, why bother getting a warbond for weapons when any slightly good one will be double nerfed soon? This was just too much, the devs are dropping the ball more and more.

[@NthnLikeCodeine]

Sucks to have ur fav weapon nerf and they’ve been shitting the bed on their weapon “balancing” but tryning new guns has been one of the most fun things about the game. Blitzer for bugs is insane and sickle is still solid for the bots

[@janfortuna3002]

@@NthnLikeCodeine thanks, but it all made me stop having fun. I literally can't bring myself to install it again and play. It would feel like a chore after so many dissappointments.

[@UmbraWeiss]

​@@NthnLikeCodeinethis is the point.. you get a weapon, starts to get fun, netf.... Get a new weapon, starts to get fun,booom nerf... Get a new weapon , starts to get fun. Nerf.... Yeah, f that.

[@CoruptedJester]

Same. Why play when whatever I find fun could be gutted and I have to use something I don't like?

[@RkEr-hd3xg]

- Fix for common issue where players were enjoying the game We found that some players have been enjoying our game but not the way we want them too so we have implemented numerous weapon and equipment nerfs in order to remedy this problem.

[@fyngolnoldor4891]

They nerfed the Breaker because people enjoyed using it. It wasn't OP, we just weren't having fun "the right way" so they nerfed it to force people to use other, shittier guns. They nerfed the railgun and shield for similar reasons. Neither of them was OP, the railgun suffered from the PS5 bug and that gave it the capability of 1-shotting bile titans but tbh as a PC player I've shot bile titans in the mouth (just before they try to spew acid on me) DOZENS of times and nothing much happened to them other than they staggered for a second. People played with railgun because it punched through armor reliably and shield so that they didn't get blown up constantly by some random Rocket Devastator shooting from so far away at you that you can barely see it. I'm glad I played the Eruptor when it was fun, I enjoyed so much blowing up bugs with it. But, very predictably, I was having too much fun so of course the thing was nerfed. Because of all these nerfs I've stopped playing, first just dropping in for a casual mission once a day or so and now I don't think I've played in weeks. I had 6 friends that I also played with whenever they were online, none of them is now playing the game because of alll the nerfs. I mean what even is the point of engaging with the Warbonds when you know everything that COULD be fun from there is going to get nerfed to shit in a month?

[@ltrpwd]

The point is to buy the most current warbond every month after the nerf to the old one. It’s the same money making philosophy that killed DDO and countless other f2p games from the 2010’s

[@fyngolnoldor4891]

@@ltrpwd I REALLY hope they're not doing that. There's absolutely no reason to. If they keep doing this people will catch on and eventually stop paying money for the warbonds.

[@TheCosmicAstro-]

The primary weapon fuckery is annoying but i have a larger issue with the support weapons. Bugs has so few viable support weapons that you can use. Compared to bots its deplorable. They really need to fix the weakpoint design with bugs so you can reasonably bring something like the laser cannon or the AMR, etc and consistently, reliably, and in a reasonable timeframe kill chargers and bile titans with them. Like you can with every single enemy in bots. Also 100% agree with changing the railgun to kill bile titans in 5-6 shots

[@etr1us]

They balance things based on data and not the actual gameplay. Thats a shame

[@Tetragramix]

"The Eruptor sounds like a skill shot weapon. We can't have that anymore." - Balance Team

[@mauroghen9157]

I dont understand wether they want weapons to be objectively better than others or not. Because there is no explanation for why some weapon types are just blatantly better than others

[@zarfilg]

I suspect that they want to baseline all guns into 2 or 3 shot vanilla milk toasts where they are all interchangeable, do nothing special and your choice of weapon will be based solely on look/sound not function.

[@CookieManCookies]

So in brief, another pointless black ops 2 / modern warfare game. Nice!

[@bluephi210]

They need to increase ammo capacity on the scorcher

[@Bionimetic]

It definitely needs more ammo. I started a month late and just unlocked it a few days ago. For so much time it took it was very underwhelming. A whole mag sometimes can't clear a patrol.

[@lordgrey5223]

Dont worry it will be nerfed next patch to better match their vision.

[@SKITTLESJ023]

They’ll increase the ammo capacity but remove the aoe explosion and the scope.

[@icata12345]

scorcher is a mid weapon yet the best of the bunch primary for bots .. 😂

[@vampyr_hale]

I play Helldivers II b/c it's an arcade-y, light hearted shooter that doesn't take itself too seriously and is beyond easy to understand. The dialogue is some of the most funny and quotable of any game I've ever played and I can't help but smirk every time my helldiver screams about democracy. Only a small portion of the game is monetized and is completely optional. The community is one of the best I've ever been apart of and the memes/content are SS tier. Please take care of our game, Arrowhead. You have something truly special. 🖤

[@farsighted6407]

Make the quasar cannon cooldown affected by hot and cold planets. Then it can be great on cold planets, mid normally, and terrible on hot planets. Changes build variety based on where you’re playing and then everyone wins.

[@philliphart6327]

My perspective about the proverbial, “only buff, never nerf” is that each patch, I literally feel happy to try new buffs, but the nerfs always feel like I have lost something. I understand that there might be certain circumstances that require a nerf, but I think that should be done with considerable hesitation.

[@Dert26]

If one weapon in one class is out performing every single other weapon in that category, buffing every other weapon in that category isn't always the best option. Quasar canon is a perfect example of this as it became one of the only types of launchers I'd see in the game since it dropped, and with it being nerfed, it allows for it as well as the other launchers to operate at a viability they already could on a more even playing field. Imagine if instead of nerfing the R8 in CS:GO, they nerfed every other pistol to be almost as powerful as it, or if in TF2 they made every flare gun have knockback/aoe damage because of how unfair it is to fight someone with the Scorchshot. TL:DR; Womp womp

[@philliphart6327]

@@Dert26 i agree. I just want them to think hard on how much that nerf should be.

[@happyaccidents156]

As a community we just have to keep the pressure on. Keep making videos, reddit posts and discord comments. Also this video has one of the best railgun rebalances I've heard. Right now its fun to use but mostly useless.

[@Popsickle666]

I still can't believe they said the Slugger was OP. I miss that gun, I thought it was super balanced at launch. Also, RIP Eruptor, I really enjoyed finding good weak points to shoot with it. Now it takes double the shots.

[@60DollarCodger]

Thank you for bringing it back to 'what is fun?' My consistent issue with the game has been the dev's attitude that seems to be governing their decisions about weapon changes, new weapons, and enemies. As shown by the post after the first balance change and by the more recent discord posts, it appears they aren't asking WHY players are having fun with a weapon and what lessons can be learned about player's expectations overall. It seems they aren't accepting that "a game for everyone is a game for no one" needs to be adapted for the 'lightning in a bottle' situation they have found themselves in with a huge and diverse player base that dwarfs the very niche audience that HD1 drew. The devs are fortunate to have a study going that is powered by hundreds of thousands of players, yet they come off sometimes as "you guys are doing fun wrong, and we're here to make sure you have fun the right way: our way, that we have discussed among tens of people internally." Going back to the railgun as an example. Sure, the safe mode needed an adjustment, but one thing that didn't come through in the online post was a recognition that part of the reason everyone was taking it was because it was one of the only weapons that was 'fun' because it made the players actually feel effective against heavy enemies like the Charger. All we received was a snarky comment about 'meta' and 'KZbin'. Then a few weeks later after heavy community discussion/requests, they adjusted the heavy armor on enemies and added the Charger weak spot. The point is that the heavy armor adjustment could have happened at the same time as the railgun adjustment if they had asked "what is fun to our players right now?" Similarly, your discussion about the skill shot with the eruptor is a great example. If the players find a fun way to use your weapon -- that isn't an outright exploit and requires specific player action -- just take that as a bonus and embrace it! (like you do with the fun memes in the community). Taking the attitude that "ackchyually, it isn't supposed to work that way" is such a head-scratcher. You have so many active players right now. Change your paradigm about how you observe them. Stop looking at how they aren't playing by your intended rules and start looking at what they are creating organically. It would be like a kid starting a game on a playground and then the game adjusting naturally by the players to where it is way more fun/popular than the original rules, and the kid saying, "no, you aren't playing it correctly" and making a teacher enforce it the "right" way. The fact that many of the primary weapons feel like you are choosing the best of the worst is also a problem. Again, the attitude of "well, your fantasy of being effective is the wrong way to have fun" is the wrong approach here. Stop dismissing the passionate community as people only concerned about buffs/nerfs/meta. Most of us just want to feel like effective Helldivers and have fun. However, sometimes it seems the devs don't understand that effective and hard don't need to be mutually exclusive. Speaking of buffs/nerfs/meta, the community (including YTers) are partially to blame for making it easy for the devs to point and go "yeah, but all we ever hear about are 'buffs' 'nerfs' 'meta'!" Let's all be better about communicating what makes the game fun. Thanks!

[@steelphoenix8978]

isnt that the wonder right there. the main selling points of rg was taking out chargers, one of the most brutally invincible high spawn drifting drag racers, and they ended up nerfing them. umm? did anyone look at that? so the rg was unjustly nerfed, and yet ppl were spouting "meta-slaves" like they always do. ah ha, yeah.

[@Jefftarnish]

I was really chill with most of the balancing changes, but the eruptor is the first one I feel they completely gutted

[@rochlum]

“A tool for every problem, a gun for every kind of engagement” give us gun attachments and let us go ham already

[@diswazzi1683]

I've BEEN fucking saying this, the fact that we have 3 different variations of the liberator and a rumored 4th coming soon is so fucking STUPID

[@__Razer]

@@diswazzi1683 Nah, this is Helldivers. We get a new Warbond every month. Each Warbond comes with 3 new weapons. Think 1 year from now, we'll be swimming in weapons, we won't know which to use.

[@dirge7459]

@@diswazzi1683 Aye, they could have slimmed down overall weapon spamming and balancing if they'd just let us run them with attachments, because tbh that sounds way better than "shotgun that staggers, shotgun that sets things on fire slightly, shotgun that is plasma and slightly staggers", etc.

[@Broxerlol]

I actively try out different weapons every time I play and a lot of them just feel bad to use. I feel like the compromises vastly outweigh the benefits for a lot of weapons. Especially the variants of the liberator and breaker. Definitely feels like the balance devs are focused on the wrong things and end up making things feel bad/un-fun to use.

[@DacianGradaMusic]

The original Railgun nerf was the first sign of this weird philosophy. "Are people having fun with it? Well not anymore!" they really need to rethink this method because the worst feeling is finding a weapon you like, get used to it, then the fun gets taken away through unnecessary nerfs. I would've had way more than 90 hours on the game since close to launch, but the recent warbonds and patches removed a lot of the fun I once had...

[@femmedracula6857]

the breaker's reduced ammo really does make it much less fun. I feel like I'm always running out of ammo on single shots faster than other weapons. I agree with everything you said about the railgun. I felt the same way when I tried it post-buff, but without numbers to back it up.

[@wutever8167]

Patch notes said that only the explosion AoE for the Crossbow was changed, however something doesn't seem right. The Crossbow takes many more shots to kill a Spewer when shooting at the sack than before the AoE change. Does explosion AoE translate to explosion damage in some way? Why does this happen even on direct impact?

[@Tehstampede]

The fact that they handle balance from the viewpoint of "use vs effectiveness" is absolutely wild. This is a PVE game the balance should be handled with the parameter of increasing the fun people have playing the game.

[@nopenope8418]

Why i play the game: To have fun with a wonderful community while sweating a little over the challenge. I like picking a weapon that fits my style of gameplay: heavy hard-hitting splash damage guns with a side of full-auto bullet-hose to cover the sides. I liked the Eruptor as it was before because it was balanced and very effective at it's job. It's job was melting medium ennemies (hive guards, brood commanders, devastators of all kind and chicken walkers) and being decent at crowd control from afar. It's ability to damage heavy units was completely correct aside from a bug or two as you needed to hit the weakpoints like the back of chargers or heat-vents on hulks to kill them for sure after many hits. Now it may sound like i described an OP weapon that can do everything, no it was not pre-nerfs. it was a good weapon that could deal with any situation, if they arose one at a time and very slowly because of it's absolutely terrible RoF (which was fine IMO). I believe it was the golden standard on which every other weapon should have been balanced. Excellent at one thing (killing mediums), decent at another (closing bug-holes destroying mech-builders), ok at another (crowd control but only from afar) and mediocre at the last one (dealing with heavies). On top of it all, despite what people said about the shrapnel killing them and everyone, i have never had a single instance of this ever happening (over 100 games maining the thing) unless i stood too close to my target and was hit by the blast anyways. (I was wondering if everyone around me was going insane until someone sent me a video of it happening)

[@2299amos]

We're supposed to be powerful, not overpowered. We shouldn't have to empty a whole clip to kill a single bug.

[@KudoRedfox]

One cannot be powerful without being overpowered in some ways

[@Tetragramix]

My fantasy is that the weapon I like this won't be a different weapon week after week.

[@cpncorndogg]

I play HD2 for the coop, the team gaming and multi prong attack and deffense. I would like for weapons to have more of a team mechanic, and not just assisted reload. A backpack that would overcharge support energy weapons but would be team assist only. IE Quasar cannon, 2 shot bile titans, with assisted backpack it 1 shots. A extended range shield backpack so you would be teaming with your buddies more. I have tons of ideas. I would also like a buff to the snipers, I think the sniper class scopes should see through smoke and hazards, letting sniper builds tag stuff through smoke, so you could tag enemies and your team could blind fire through smoke.

[@sirgaz8699]

A UAV spotter stratagem?

[@cpncorndogg]

@@sirgaz8699 DUDE !!! There you go that is a kick ass stratagem, for duration tags all enemies around and lets you see through smoke. Could extend lock on distance for spear!

[@philliphart6327]

Nice work on the railgun analysis

[@ogyonmastaflux]

It's funny the patches barely make the game more fun or even hard, just more tedious and makes me wanna cut my sessions a bit shorter than before.

[@andrew_radio]

This thumbnail was seen being shown at an actual arrowhead board meeting about community feedback. That's pretty cool.

[@ErgonomicChair]

As a game dev the bit that resonated with me here was "If players find a way to use something you didn't intend and its not broken, lean into it." That's a really good point.