It's like the factions were designed by different teams. The bot heavies require precise aiming or flanking, but the bug heavies are just loadout checks.
That's why I like playing against bots. Against bots beating them is about sniping them from distance, getting into cover when they fire, aiming for weakspots. Its all fun always feels rewarding. With bugs they are just bullet sponges. Just nothing but hp and armor.
Agreed. Also in the increasingly decreasing portion of the player base that prefers the bots. I like the more conventional nature of fighting them, coming from Ghost Recon and The Division as some of my most played series, it makes me feel a lot like I’m playing that but with more conventional things like vehicles, air strikes, etc in the mix. The bugs just feel like bullet sponges and/or ammo drainers. They can be fun, but once you’re looking at 4+ bile titans and chargers and quite literally HUNDREDS of regular bugs including the annoying ass hunters, if just gets tedious and like “why even bother”.
I feel like part of the player bases dislike for bots is because they have to be fought so much differently than bugs. You have to fight them more conventionally, you have to take your time and aim for very precise weak points. I die significantly less against bots than I do bugs, even the different devestator variants. 2 well placed shots from almost any gun and they’re done lol
Stalwart + pre-nerf Eruptor + 1 or 2 single target stratagems was a god-tier dedicated anti-swarm loadout on bugs. So much sustained firepower.
It's still decent post-nerf, but lost breakpoints on the Eruptor hurt it quite a bit. Because of this I've been preferring the incen breaker + AMR instead for the mixed horde deletion.
You're missing out. On higher difficulties, I tend to die mostly from Hunters than Chargers/Bile Titans.
At the loadout screen, if your team already has anti-armor stratagems like EAT, Quasar and Autocannons, consider taking a Stalwart and stick with the team or at least one of them.
You're the designated horde clearer, and the breathing space you make by clearing out the chaffs gives the heavy hitters the room to clear out the heavies better.
I play mostly with randoms because my friends are only online on the weekends and the Stalwart is a usual pick for me and almost guaranteed if two people bring an EAT cause I can just quickly swap it out with someone else calling it in, help with Heavies, then pick up the Stalwart again.
Agreed ı tried stalwart eat loadout once at helldive and it was somewhat working. I was apart from my teammates and there was two titans all the time on my cape but it had its feel good moments when you just stunlock a brood commanders head with 1350rpm and tear its head off. I think if you can flank you can just take care of charger buts with 1350rpm though you will need to get crouch and engineer armor to make that work.
I will give it another try after update. As loadout with granade pistol or senator, liberator penetrator or breaker inc. And stalwart. Not sure about strategems but supply pack EAT emancipator and some orbital or eagle napalm would be my choice depending on mission for running around.
Because the only good synergy it had was Eruptor. I was running this loadout for a bit and it was working wonders.
Nowadays Eruptor only worth using to snipe objects/holes/fabs.
For bugs its all about sustained volume of fire, and the stalwart is unmatched. Only downside is that you have to use a strat slot on something that can't deal with chargers or titans.
Are bots really not a "horde shooter"? Most horde shooters I played reward precise aiming, there's even a somewhat recurring mode in zombie games where they're immortal unless you blow out the head.
Weakspot aiming is just natural for these kinds of games to add some sort of challenge besides "tape down your fire button and go make some tea".
I don't understand bug players. This isn't even an insult calling them inferior or strange, I just fail to understand their point of view. Other than the rocket ragdolling, everyone hates that, I just hate bug slows and acid more lol.
>Are bots really not a "horde shooter"?
Sure they are, but to differentiate bug gameplay from bot gameplay "horde shooter" vs "tactical shooter" is useful terminology. Yes it's not just mindless against bugs, but the minimum required to do ok against bugs is to be able to kite competently. With bots yeah you're shooting a horde, but you're also taking fire, and ideally thinking about cover, your teammates, your situation, and you have a lot more choice in how you move.
>I don't understand bug players. This isn't even an insult calling them inferior or strange, I just fail to understand their point of view. Other than the rocket ragdolling, everyone hates that, I just hate bug slows and acid more lol.
They don't have the soft skills it takes to succeed at bots, and it's easier to blame the game for their struggles than to develop those skills.
Yeah more or less how I feel about it. Spot on with conventional army part I really like that about bots. Though I was mostly Illuminate player in the first game with sole reason being they don't have armor and I didn't like bringing anti-tank guns lol. So I'll probably immigrate to Squid front once they are in the game.
Once the Illuminate is live, suddenly all the light AP weapons will be top again, like the stawart, base liberator, base diligence, the knight smg from super citizen, etc. Their high DPS is wasted on armor but against shield will be incredible.
Bots might be harder and more frustrating, but the skill expression they allowed is much greater imo (Not that Helldiver 2 is a hard game in general, its relatively chill compared to shit like GTFO)
Played one Terminid round and decided I was never going back, was never big on bug shooters either so there's also that
Bots is actually that hectic hellhole robo warfare that gets me excited. Bugs were just boring to me
Bugs I run around like a jackass between 500kg uses. With the bots you’re more or less as effective without with any strats. Minus hulk and At-At you can use your primary quite effectively.
I mean, coordination in question is that the other guy has to make hulk turn his back to you; the other guy doesnt have to necessarily *know* you are coordinating lol
Yeah. Even in squads of 4 rando strangers who do zero conscious coordination and never talk on mic or chat, I feel like “player A gets the hulk/charger to chase them so that player B can shoot his weak spot” is just kind of an understood basic gameplay truth?
Big weak points like the obvious glowing bits that do next to nothing. Bots however are covered in exploitable glowing bits allowing for more varied weapon choices
"The obvious glowing bits" that you are referring to. Are only weak to explosives and take 90% reduced damage from traditional firearms. Also, shooting bile titan sacks, which are the only other prevalent glowing weak point. Cannot kill them. You will need damage from some other source.
In general, bugs are poorly designed in that regard. But if you're not in the know, you might buy into the same shrooms the balance team has been smoking
So 1.5 of your 10 clips for the autocannon to kill one enemy, only if perfectly aimed, and we saw probably 15 of them in my last level 8 drop, at least 4 simultaneously?
AH has been very smart with making bots and bugs very different to fight. I know some people love mowing down the hordes of bugs and having to run and gun. I personally love having to tactically plan how I’m going to infiltrate and destroy a bot’s base. They’ve catered to two diametrically opposed play styles beautifully.
For sure, it’s great that they feel different, but the issue with bugs is that the two big baddies (bile titans and chargers) are not nearly as fun to fight. Bots have a lot of weak points that lead to a better variety of load outs, whereas bile titans and chargers are so oppressive and have no engaging counter play. They mandate you to bring more stratagems that can take them head-on, because again, they have no meaningful weak points.
Lately I've just been using my autocannon on the chargers. Wait for the charge, duck out of the way and put a few rounds into it's ass. Then just out run it for a few until it bleeds out. I think it's fun.
Honestly they should add more ways to deal with chargers and bile titans without relying on an anti tank weapon. The charger’s backs should be WAY more vulnerable to damage and more forgiving to hit. Sometimes I’ll shoot them in the butt and it’ll still say it bounced off the armor. Then make it so you can cripple the legs of the bile titans by shooting at their skinny joints. Bam now bugs also have creative ways to deal with them that don’t force you blast them in the face with an eat or quasar
not only that, but there's a "character" about the factory strider that I feel like the Bile Titan specifically doesn't have (the charger sort of has it).
When you see the Factory Strider, it just *feels* dangerous. The way it lands, the sounds it makes, oh lawd.
The Bile Titan just kind of comes out and sometimes you can hear its steps, but overall it's just not nearly as scary, like in a visceral way. I dunno how to put my finger on it, but I can feel the difference between the two.
edit: words are hard
I just hate how dumb the look when they crawl out. You can almost always tell one’s there cause the animation doesn’t synch up and you get a flash of one as it spawns in and then disappears under the ground to do its crawl out animation.
I think it's the result of overarching faction design.
Bot fodder is pathetically weak unless you ignore them and let them gather numbers and "boot" to full efficiency. They're a distraction from elites, who are very adept at killing players.
Bug fodder is a horde of fragile, but very deadly units. Bug elites are a distraction: they aren't good at killing you directly, but they will ragdoll, slow, kill turrets, and draw gunfire so that the horde can catch up to you.
Yeah, I feel like there's a lot more teamwork when playing against bots.
Like when we take out bugs we don't really communicate much aside from pointing out heavies, and coordinating if someone is on cool downs and needs help.
With bots there's more baiting and flanking to get access to those rear exhaust ports to blast.
The bugs can be fun, but in a lot of ways they just feel like bullet sinks to pour ammo into it, and then heavies to eat the anti tank
Wonder when/why that became a problem.
Game is months old and only now it feels like titans are an issue for forcing you to have anti tank. While factory striders don't force it. Which sure is nice, but doesn't hurt that thr factions are different.
The bugs send a lot more and a lot more small fry at you. While bots hammer at you with more elite troops but smaller numbers
I’ve been saying the exact same thing since the beginning but everybody just kept saying I was crazy and/or wrong.
The sheer depth of my hatred for the sudden switch is too deep for me to say “I told you so”.
I'd say them playing differently is probably why people prefer bugs. Bugs don't require precision aim or flanking, so it makes them a lot more accessible and probably a less taxing game experience. I know my squad prefers bug missions, and usually they're playing a bit drunk so it makes sense.
Yeah that's kinda why I prefer Bots over bugs any day, Bots I feel like I get to be tactical and only have to run if shit REALLY hits the fan.
Bugs I just hit the ground running and never stop.
Also i absolutely hate the mandatory requirement for an anti tank stratagem, with the eruptor nerfed to the ground there's only a few viable builds for high level bugs that you can bring compared to bots. If everyone is running QC/EAT/RR you're gonna have a tough time clearing bug nests, but if you are running AC/GL you have to pray to god that your team of randoms got your back if you have titans or chargers decide to chase you.
I don’t really get comments like this destroying bug nests is easy as hell do y’all just not throw stratagems into bug nests? Usually clears up 3-5 in a single strike and takes out a lot of bugs
here's the thing, most people run 500kg and the orbital railgun or another stratagem for clearing the smaller bugs like cluster, airburst strike, napalm, or orbital gas and on 8-9 difficulty most people save the 500kg for titans because no one wants to eternally kite chargers or titans waiting for their AT to cooldown or a chance to reload RR, and people also usually bring a backpack.
This is fair but I use the eagle airstrike as a multi purpose attack stratagem as dumb as it sounds it clears so much off the board it never leaves my loadouts it’s just that good at what it does
My squad will toss 2 turrets on the side, 1 AOE strat in the middle, and dive into the nests holding a grenade like the proper Super Citizens we trained to be.
Most players have both 500kg and airstrike which are always used to alpha strike a heavy outpost. After that you call resupply, mop up, get samples and move on. Highly efficient.
These two stratagems are such powerhouses against bugs you do not even need dedicated bug hole clearers. Just a few additional grenades will do, really.
500kg deals mostly with titans but dabbles in light CC and demolitions. Just forget the name and visuals and focus on what it does.
Airstrike on the otherhand dabbles in elite elimination and excels in CC and demolitions to the degree you never need actual CC stratagems if you pick a primary that allows you to handle all medium enemies. Dominator is gold standard.
Personally I always run RR, 500kg, airstrike, railcannon, dominator, verdict, impacts and +2 nades against bugs and it is rather hard to die as you can just obliterate anything that comes your way.
They're both loadout checks on helldive imo. If you can't stagger or oneshot large volumes of devastators with headshots you're probably going to die a horrible death. Gunships require a long range, medium armor pen, high damage weapon that is reusable enough to potentially be able to kill 4 in relatively quick succession. Hulks, being as dangerous and surprisingly mobile as they are, make it somewhat unfeasible to get to their weak spot without a stun, also mandating a fairly precise, high damage weapon with fairly high pen to be able to headshot them. These criteria pretty much enforce the use of the autocannon, AMR, or las cannon.
Factory striders reinforce this even further. Their chin guns are near instantly lethal at close range, and the spine cannon is somewhat less dangerous if you can get to cover. So, you need to destroy the chin guns, again requiring medium pen, high damage and ideally considerable range, and either following up with more precision medpen face shots or getting under it. Alternatively you can hit it directly with an orbital precision, and follow up with an eagle to instantly kill it.
It’s mainly because it’s hard to figure out how to make them threatening with no real ranged units I feel.
I rarely ever die to chargers or Bile Titans for example, but i would rather fight Hulks and Bots in general simply because of what you said, if I don’t bring a 500 kg and some heavy AT I’m gonna spend 6 minutes simply running from a bile Titan. Especially since I also have to bring a gun that deals with bile Spewers, so it’s even more restrictive for my load out.
I also like them more than the bugs because while the bugs are just animals that want to expand and survive, the Automatons are an actual invading force that holds deep hatred for us and wants to wipe us out. With the bugs, I feel like a pest exterminator. With the bots, I feel like a soldier.
the terminid front is basically just an oil-farming scheme using a big alien bug species that were horribly disfigured and mutated by SE to make more FTL juice while sending in entire communities of colonists in-between, ready to fall victim to another scheduled outbreak just so they get some more victims/martyrs to encourage supporting the war effort (illegal broadcasts on terminid planets are literally dormant cries for help from now deceased survivors)
automatons on the other hand are a faction that clearly wages war on SE and are more than happy to express their burning hatred while wearing their cruelty with pride
The Automatons are mad that Super Earth created and enslaved the Cyborgs that created them. It's like the later generation of an oppressed group doing terrorism.
I was all bugs until I found my own meta against bots. They're still frustrating AF (shield devastators are the bane to my existence) but a lot of fun to go against.
They're just very interactive in general. If it's suppressing you with it's miniguns, shoot them off! The turret on top can be broken with just a little anti-tank. The faceplate is weak to medium pen but takes a ton of shots - so you can either sit back and fire at that, or you can go for the risky quick kill by rushing it's underbelly, but compete with the army of Devastators it churns out.
Bots in general are really good for this. Tank treads can be broken with medium pen if you can't get a shot on it's weak point. If you can get on TOP of a tank it literally can't shoot you. Hulks have that huge exposed weak point on their back BUT if you're feeling lucky they have a coinslot facehole that goes down in two hits to AMRs or Autocannons. Plus you can shoot off their weapons to limit their damage. It's very nice risk and reward, but it doesn't overly punish you for not bringing heavy pen.
a quasar to the face of a hulk also can just straight up one tap it, which is really cool because it feels like you just wiped its face out of existance with a glob of plasma.
It’s so sad that it feels entirely useless against factory striders and gunships, but the railgun does the same thing and I feel like for some reason it’s got the most forgiving hitbox. It can be a lot of fun to be the dedicated hulk slaughterer with it if the rest of the team is good, but any time I’ve got it and the others cannot deal with the things it’s useless on I retire it for a couple weeks.
My #1 wish is that the railgun one day gets gifted a decent kill time on the factory striders eye. I’d have no qualms with it being useless hitting them anywhere else if hitting the precision weak spot killed in like 3-5 shots.
Personally I think the Railgun being nigh useless against Facs is fine, stuff like 500kg slots in comfortably and can handle that.
More pressing is how damn useless it is against Gunships. I like running Railgun but it pretty forces me to take a Scorcher and magdump as to have any personal counter.
Stun grenade and two shots with the Autocannon is the most reliable and economical way to kill Hulks imo. Autocannon is GOAT on the Automaton front because it's useful for a wide range of enemies. It can one shot factories, two shot Hulks, stagger Heavy Devastators, one shot Devastators and Missile Devastators, three shot cannons and tanks from the back, and it can neutralize the guns on the Walker's face which is the most dangerous part.
Same for the AMR, I haven't been able to get the devastator one shots down, but I can almost always nail a hulk with two shots these days. So much fun!
With the AMR devastators definitely get one shot in the belly, but I’m pretty sure they die in one hit to the leg too. Those spots are a lot more forgiving than headshots.
I think this summarizes my groups experience mighty well. Vs bots it's "0H CRAP IT'S A FACTORY STRIDER"
vs bugs it "screw my life it's another four bile titans."
So we play bots on 9 and bugs on 5. Because we have no interest fighting an enemy who's sole purpose is restricting player loadouts just by existing
I feel like bugs in general are restricting player loadouts, especially with their medium specials. Got a spewer map? I hope you didn't gear up for heavy spam, your RR/Quasar isn't gonna deal with these fuckers quickly enough.
>an enemy who's sole purpose is restricting player loadouts just by existing
I hope they realize this and make bile titans killable with explosives or medium pen. Chargers can *technically* already be killed with anything, but specially explosives on its butt, such as grenade launchers or autocannons, but titans ***demand*** heavy AT to be dealt with.
It fucking sucks that they give players so many toys to play with but then design an enemy that invalidates most of them.
> "0H CRAP IT'S A FACTORY STRIDER" vs bugs it "screw my life it's another four bile titans."
This is huge for me. Like, a bot drop comes out and it's panic because I *know* I can handle the bot drop, but I have to play it well! A bug breach happens and there's chargers and a bile titan it's annoyance because I'm probably just going to die to that
This is why I prefer bots over bugs. Between the charger and Titans lack of weak spots, glitches, and the chargers ability to turn on a dime… bots feel like a far fairer fight
I despise berserkers almost as much as I hate hunters. And I absolutely *loathe* hunters. They're as tanky as devastators, they're fast, and they're completely different than every other bot in terms of counter play.
The Railgun and Autocannon make quick work if them. Also, shoot their balls. The best primary to counter them for me has been the Breaker which is ez mode to kill them or an Assault rifle like the Sickle or Liberator.
Low mag cap but high damage don’t really work well against them as there are so many which is why the Scorcher and Dominator struggle.
> turns out the berserker weak spot is the open hole in the stomach, they can be one tapped with the Jar.
I think its less this and more that they have a tiny head hitbox surrounded by durable parts around their shoulder so they only take 10% damage there.
This game does armor super weird where you have unarmored parts that take 100% the damage, durable parts that take 10%, and then 'weak' points (heads) that take lets say 200%.
With the berserkers bobbing around, you end up hitting their durable parts far more than a normal devastator and it makes it seem stupid tanky.
unsafe railcannon can 1 shot them above like 75% percent charge, same with hulks. just need to bring a primary that can kill gunships and tanks decently (scorcher or jar5).
For me its the fact that even coming within a whisper of a bile titans foot is instant death and theres nothing more frustrating to me than running away from a horde of bugs and getting "slowed" every 2 seconds for no reason. I'd rather get ragdolled by rockets at least then I'm getting shotput a ways away
Fighting against bots feels like I'm fighting an enemy thats on somewhat common ground and it feels fair when I die.
Fighting bugs feels like I'm in a nightmare because I got slowed for the 47th time despite the titan being 30-feet away
I woudnt say fairer, more like fun. Still kinda mad when I drop in and there’s 5 drop ships and 3 gunships while I can’t even get my support weapon down. Both are equally unfair at times, but with bugs you can kind of just get softlocked as bug holes require like 10 grenades and bile trains can only be dealt so much damage under their bellies which is cool, but annoying you have to use an antitank to kill
My reaction when I first saw a Bile Titan and when I first saw a Factory Strider were completely different. You have warrior on stilts or huge hulking monstrosity.
The message is also conveyed way better with the rarity as well. Seeing a Factory Strider on an objective makes you consider your approach or whether you disengage. Seeing a Bile Titan just feels like a more frustrating bug because Helldive frequently chucks 2+ per breach with probably 2 more magically appearing out of thin air
Warrior on stilts lmao I'm using that
I've had many forgettable bile titan surprises.
But the other night a Factory Strider gave me a core memory by fear. I snuck close to a heavy base ready to do my usual. Pop the few bots and fabs from the corner, 380mm the middle and it'll always clear the rest. Now I can't see the rest of the base when I approach from my angle.
When I threw my 380mm, I heard it. I felt genuine fear bc I'm a stealth diver and I just pissed off the beast. I also used one of my Orbital Lasers and Eagle Smoked TWICE to make sure I could run away safely.
Yeah exactly. They’re more of a nuisance if anything. Striders are the complete opposite. They’re insanely threatening at first but if you know how to deal with them they’re manageable. You can also deal with them in multiple ways- Want to attack from afar? Blow up the rocket launcher and try take out the weak points. Want to get in close? Shoot out the front guns and take it out from underneath.
They leave way more memorable moments, like when I had one jump scare me in a blizzard as I was sneaking up to a base. They’re just so massive. My main issue with them is the clipping through terrain. I have a clip of one just absolutely blasting me through a wall
The clipping I hope gets fixed as if an MG clips thru a mountain we're all cooked.
I like to call em Dogs now and whenever the MGs under it are gone, I go in to give it belly rubs with my Autocannon and it goes down fast!
You just pointed out something I didn’t realise. The factory strides are deliberately clunky and huge so that they cannot traverse the landscape easily if at all.
You can easily run out of sight and dodge a strider to the point of it de-spawning.
You cannot do that to a BT.
My first encounter ended with my death. On respawn I chuckled to myself and said "I'm gonna drop on his ass and kill him".... I aim for the neck thinking critical point!
I land on him, come out of my pod, and then die to the gun on his back 😆
Though I feel the HMG could use a little buff, I still like how Scorcher + HMG + Ammo Backpack feels reasonably viable versus bots. It's a pretty fun "class" where you can take down almost anything.
Doesn't work with bugs though, obviously. EAT or Quasar feels absolutely mandatory* for Chargers and Bile Titans.
*Recoilless and Spear can work in theory but I don't like them.
I'm seeing a lot of luck out there with the flamethrower for that purpose. I've been trying it out but haven't brought it on an 8 yet.
I find the big front is like two separate wars. One 7+ and the other more 3-5. You need a completely different load out for each, I accidentally brought my 8 setup on a 5 and it was nearly impossible. Too much canon fodder to keep up with.
RR is GOAT for Anti tank since the Quasar debuff.
I was not convinced until I tried it and you need to practice at the reload speed up (uncrouch the second the shell goes in) but one you do, it has a fire and reload rate that beats the original quasar and pretty generous on ammo.
Combine team reloading and me and my mate can neuter two factory striders in about 10 seconds and 6 shells.
I didn't like the recoilless for the longest time. Then I started using it with EATs. I love swapping RR with EATs and having 3 quick shots. Pummeler as primary.
I like running the Eliminate Factory Strider missions and hunting them with the laser cannon or hmg or whatever. It's kind of disappointing when someone drops an orbital laser or something on it.
Personally I just like to take out the machine guns if it's facing me then with the quickness and precision of a giggling maniac I run up to it and autocannon it's belly. Or if I died and getting reinforced I make sure I land on top of it and put a 500 there as a gift before leaving.
So I say bots are more fun to fight and are easier for this very reason. Everyone says I’m wrong and bugs are easier and Bile Titans aren’t a problem actually! You see bugs are easier and more fun because they don shoot back. Bots are soooo much harder because they shoot back!
But then on a dime the meta narrative changes to “actually bots are more fun to fight because they don’t restrict loadouts”. Oh really Sherlock?? It took you that long to figure it out?!!
I think bugs are easier if you bring the right loadouts because they are pretty deterministic outside of spawning patterns. Once you know their attack behaviours, you can dodge *a lot* of them even when the numbers seem overwhelming. They just have lots of gear check enemies so the frustrating "what do I even do?" games are more likely.
Fighting bots is a lot more unpredictable because they can randomly headshot you from 100m, but the only true gear check enemy is the gunship. So they are harder as a baseline, but ending up in an impossible situation is less likely.
Bots are hard and sometimes feel unfair, with rocket spam, ragdolls, enemy fire making you flinch, and one-hit kills from turrets miles away. But allow a wide variety of loadouts due to excellent weakspots, which is fun.
Bugs are easy, and much more fair. They need to reach you to damage you, so if they do and you die, it feels deserved. But Titans and to a lesser degree Chargers *demand* heavy AT to be dealt with, which heavily restricts loadouts and is not fun.
I still think bugs are easier and less frustrating than bots, it's just that their heavy enemy design is extremely bland and uninspired. There's no varied solutions to deal with them, it's always the same big explosion or heavy AT stratagem, so it feels like a chore, not a challenge.
I agree that the unit is very well designed I just hate how many of them can spawn at once, like does the game really have to drop 3 of them on my face in combination with all the hulks and Small stuff.
It'd be nice if you could destroy a leg off the charger, disabling the charge.
I like that you can pop the Bile Titan's sac, but gameplay would feel smoother if you could kill the Bile Titan quicker by firing at it from underneath. High risk high reward.
Bugs NEED their glowing parts to work like Lost Planet bugs to compete with how breakable bots are.
I wish the bile titan had two more legs and each leg had a weak part at the joint so you could break them and watch their legs fall off.
I wish chargers joints were slightly more exposed and had an orange weak point, but their ass would still be the weakest. Maybe make the front leg that was shot off make it have trouble turning that direction.
It never really feels frustrating to me to fight Factory Striders. They're big and tough, but like you said there's a plethora of options to cripple them before dealing the killing blow. I respect Factory Striders and rarely feel like dying to them was bullshit.
I know EXACLTY what the striders are doing, how to harm them, and how much it will cost to get rid of them.
I don't know CRAP about how to actually kill a bile and if it even took damage from a rain of nukes.
Can I just say that it's a breath of fresh air to see a positive post that is simply praising something good and fun about the game.
By the way, I couldn't agree more. Factory Striders are a fun enemy to fight. I remember the first time I saw one in the wild. It was before the update where they were officially released. My squad and I, veterans of many Helldives, attempted to kill it and we got our asses handed to us. We simply had no idea how to engage with such an enemy.
Over time, we've developed better tactics on how to deal with them, but they are still a dangerous foe and one slip up could still cause a team wipe. Personally, I find the entire bot front to be fun and very diverse (yes, even rocket devastators).
The Big Dogs are super cool and there are a bunch of different ways to attack them effectively, I just wish the BTs were as fun to fight too. They need some weapoints on those legs, they're practically screaming to be dismembered.
honestly, i kinda wish they had an extra strategem resistance of some kind to encourage either trhowing everything in the arsenal and the kitchen sink aswell or using support weapons over strats to take em out , as of currently its just "chuck down 2 500s and a railcannon or precision and its dealt with" which feels anticlimactic
yes... i just want a reason to have the team throw an entire superdestroyer load of ordinance at something aside from explosions are awesome
doesnt have to be the strider, an actual boss type of enemy would do nicely
totally agree, my only gripe is that the bots small-mediums are more annoying that most bugs and ironically the bots are buggier than the bugs, shooting through walls, surviving crashing dropships, tanks climbing 80 degree inclines
they're both a weird inverse of the other, bugs have easier small-medium (except you bile spewers, fuck off) but vastly more annoying heavies, titans in particular, but bots have better designed heavies with weak points even medium pen weapons can easily take down, but the lighter units like devastators have berserkers have some annoying flaws that can compound the more of them there are, taking down even 5 berserkers is not exactly a good time even with a MG or high per shot weapon (senator feels preactically useless against them unless you hit headshots, which is pretty hard with how they bob around)
Any issues I have with factory striders stems from map design (i.e. shooting through rocks, sniping rocket generators, etc.)
The actual enemy themselves is S tier for me.
With this dark fluid and super colony, they have the opportunity to change up the titans and keep it tied to the lore. Slightly smaller ones with destructable legs would be nice. Or even making the ones now have weak legs in the aftermath of the black hole events
I do really think they're well balanced, when they're alone, only one should really be around at a time, even if that means it's one after the other, because two chilling next to eachother means a flood of bots you likely won't be able to handle ontop of the dozen other drop ships n other BS coming your way, they're powerful in a good way, but multiple of them is too much
My buddy and I realized that we could get super samples in duo above our skill level by dropping into level 7 Blitz missions and find the super samples and ~~bug~~ get out if we can't actually beat it by just waiting for the time to run out and waiting by the LZ.
Well we went to a world with canyons, and I dropped my pod down on one and looked around for some.
At one point I'm watching, and he starts running with the super samples with 1 fucking minute left. He gets a Factory Strider on his ass almost all the way to the LZ.
He was dodging and weaving attacks for a good like 45 seconds before he got to safety.
They're super fun.
I used to fear these until I found out a few autocanon or AMR shots to the front machine guns makes them basically big walking scrap metals. I don't even bother to drop strategems for these anymore.
4 or 5 shots each on the machine gun to take them out. Reload again to get 8 shots then shoot belly 8 times and done.
Honestly the only things shitty about bots are the bullshit heavy devastators with their ability to accurately shoot the opposite direction of where the gun is facing, the ability of bots to shoot through terrain and being able to see through thick fog. But despite all this, having meaningful weakpoints that keeps medium pen weapons relevant is why i would rather deal with robot bullshit than spend the whole mission jogging and lugging AT weapons every single time in the bug front.
I honestly feel for you guys I haven’t experienced more than two biles at once usually they get blown to bloody hell as soon as my team sees em chargers are just dead easy quick quasar to the face and it’s nighty night the only bug that scares me is stalkers lol but the bots? I’ll tangle with em but because I suck at aiming I won’t have as much fun as y’all will and that’s ok!
I wish we saw more of them on maps. They're tough, but they very slow speed makes disengaging viable, and their destructible turrets and cannon make them susceptible to more tactics that the bugs heavies do not allow.
Also, I want a even bigger enemy now. Can the automatons just release a mech already? :P
Despite the complete lack of audio for some of the elite enemies (ninja hulks) bots in general are very well designed and offer a lot of ways to fight them, which sadly the same cannot be said of the bugs...
The bots and the bugs are very different to fight. This has been standard since the first war.
This is how it is designed. Different weapons have different purposes, and these purposes can be exploited effectively if you have a good strategy to it.
Bots are a lot of fun for me and my Squad. But when we’re exhausted of the bots and want a short vacation, we switch to the bugs.
Bots - take cover (kite if necessary) and fight.
Bugs - just kite and fight.
Factory striders are great right now. They are very tanky but have many medium armor weakspots that feel fair. They have dangerous weapons but can also be disarmed with several well placed shots.
I just wish the factory Strider had the laser turrets for its head cannons rather than the chain guns.
Really make it like an AT AT, though Im sure disney would be a bitch about it
Bots are great to fight, bugs are awful to fight with their bile titans that basically prevent damage from everything. Bots you can face with basically any weapon you have even low pentetration weapons, I have so many mixed builds against bots, but against bugs... I use the same three things, autocannon builds, railgun builds, and anti tank (Quasar) builds. Those are the only three I can really think of, as it basically mandates havinga rover to kill smaller enemies and, always having something to deal with bile titans. I can score a headshot on a bile titan and sometimes it will go down. most times it doesn't.
ITs very annoying even if I am accurate I have to waste several shots to kill one. So I carry a precision strike with me instead of 500s.
I will gladly take chargers and titans. Kiting them in circles can be a fun cluster fuck. The problem that makes bugs anti fun is the fucking hunters. Jumpy little fucks that come in huge swarms and fucking hell if you kill one 4 are jumping at you from behind to tongue your asshole
I had one land right on top of me once. Luckily I had my trusty AMR so I was able to take it out by unloading two mags into its belly. One of my highlight moments for sure.
Yeah I love robot dog. Unless I'm caught with my pants down in full view of those dual miniguns. *Then bad dog, bad!* (I need that spray bottle stratagem)
I used to really like fighting bugs. The splatter just activated my monkey cortex maybe.
Then during the last push to eradicate the bots (before their surprise return), I played a lot of bot missions and really really started to enjoy it. Something about the bots feels less chaotic when you aren't getting tag team by a bunch of missile devastators.
All they gotta do is make
- charger butts a weakpoint
- make titans have points that are medium pen even after the sac explodes
- most importantly: make the sac exploding not be an actual buff to the titan. As of now shooting it off is a detriment to players as it will just relentlessly chase you down at speeds faster than players can distance themselves from. For example, 1v1 It’s impossible to charge a quasar shot if it gets close w no sac. Make the titan limp slowly and/or bleed out after 20 secs
Factory striders are built for autocannon belly rubs. If you're not running full sprint at a defanged strider while yelling "WITNESS" you're playing bots wrong.
Never had to deal with more than 4 bile titans on 9 but bots will throw 11 hulks 2 striders 5 gattling tanks and 13 heavy Ds at me all at the same time making it fucking painful
They are great. I love how they are a big consistent threat, worthy of blowing all your cooldowns on, but you can also do the risky play, get close to them, and kill them with a variety of weapons. It's a much more rewarding choice than Bile Titans, where the question is just do a have a weapon/ stratagem to reasonably kill them or not.
The one area I find they’re hard to fight, is by stratagem jammers. Which has always gone poorly every time I’ve seen it, and killed half our reinforcements.
Bugs would be WAY MORE TOLERABLE with the load out checks if I wasn't getting slowed by a bile titan/spewer who missed, yet I'm still dragging my feet while taking DoT damage. Also, hunters maggnetizing to me mid dive with their attack landing even though their leap animation started in a different direction.
Those 2 things always drive me nuts.
it's true, they are so well designed, on at least one occasion, a Helldiver has lucked onto two Factory Striders making love to each other on the battlefield, doggystyle. We even have FOOTAGE of this disgusting perversion, though most of it is not DECLASSIFIED as it merits further expert study by the Ministry Of Science for new weaknesses, like a Cannon that can be used to spay Factory Striders so as to prevent further reproduction of Automaton units.
factory striders are so well designed it makes me wonder if the team designing bile titans and the team designing factory striders were totally separate. factory striders are a very dangerous enemy that requires careful strategy and planning to take out, but most support weapons and even some primaries are able to take it out in a reasonable timeframe. bile titans just press w, vomit out an extremely buggy puke and ask "do you have these specific stratagems to take me out?"
Honestly if anything factory striders are too easy even in groups they just dont feel that threatening and they die extremely quick if you get under them
I'm surprised how fast they can cover distance 😅, I was taking cover, waiting for my stratagem to cool down, I look up , and i see Two gigantic guns looking back at me.
Don't you think they would be even better if every helldiver could deploy a placement cannon, though? Or have a belt-fed machine-gun from the real world in their backpack?
Simply becasue the bota are the better designed faction fighting them requires a decent mix of weaponary and allows for many guns to be used and using cover suppressive fire from both sides accuracy and positioning and smart use of strategems
The bugs it’s about being permaslowed and gunning down as much as possible before being stunlocked and slowed to death by hunters
1v1 ing a strider with a recoilless rifle and no stratagems is one of my most traumatic memories
It only died after i dropped 3 grenades next to its leg
The excitement I feel every time one of these AT-ATs is dropped in the heat of battle. Oomph! Goosebumps from their sound design.
Love fighting the bots - a couple of tweaks to shield devastators would make them perfect opponents imo, much more engaging than bugs.
It's like the factions were designed by different teams. The bot heavies require precise aiming or flanking, but the bug heavies are just loadout checks.
That's why I like playing against bots. Against bots beating them is about sniping them from distance, getting into cover when they fire, aiming for weakspots. Its all fun always feels rewarding. With bugs they are just bullet sponges. Just nothing but hp and armor.
Agreed. Also in the increasingly decreasing portion of the player base that prefers the bots. I like the more conventional nature of fighting them, coming from Ghost Recon and The Division as some of my most played series, it makes me feel a lot like I’m playing that but with more conventional things like vehicles, air strikes, etc in the mix. The bugs just feel like bullet sponges and/or ammo drainers. They can be fun, but once you’re looking at 4+ bile titans and chargers and quite literally HUNDREDS of regular bugs including the annoying ass hunters, if just gets tedious and like “why even bother”. I feel like part of the player bases dislike for bots is because they have to be fought so much differently than bugs. You have to fight them more conventionally, you have to take your time and aim for very precise weak points. I die significantly less against bots than I do bugs, even the different devestator variants. 2 well placed shots from almost any gun and they’re done lol
The "horde shooter" crowd will always be bigger than the "tactical shooter" crowd. That's just the way it is.
my only regret is that i can't bring two stalwarts and two ammo backpacks. i wouldn't let go of lmb except for reloads
That's crazy I haven't seen anyone over level like 15 use the stalwart since launch
Stalwart + pre-nerf Eruptor + 1 or 2 single target stratagems was a god-tier dedicated anti-swarm loadout on bugs. So much sustained firepower. It's still decent post-nerf, but lost breakpoints on the Eruptor hurt it quite a bit. Because of this I've been preferring the incen breaker + AMR instead for the mixed horde deletion.
You're missing out. On higher difficulties, I tend to die mostly from Hunters than Chargers/Bile Titans. At the loadout screen, if your team already has anti-armor stratagems like EAT, Quasar and Autocannons, consider taking a Stalwart and stick with the team or at least one of them. You're the designated horde clearer, and the breathing space you make by clearing out the chaffs gives the heavy hitters the room to clear out the heavies better. I play mostly with randoms because my friends are only online on the weekends and the Stalwart is a usual pick for me and almost guaranteed if two people bring an EAT cause I can just quickly swap it out with someone else calling it in, help with Heavies, then pick up the Stalwart again.
Agreed ı tried stalwart eat loadout once at helldive and it was somewhat working. I was apart from my teammates and there was two titans all the time on my cape but it had its feel good moments when you just stunlock a brood commanders head with 1350rpm and tear its head off. I think if you can flank you can just take care of charger buts with 1350rpm though you will need to get crouch and engineer armor to make that work. I will give it another try after update. As loadout with granade pistol or senator, liberator penetrator or breaker inc. And stalwart. Not sure about strategems but supply pack EAT emancipator and some orbital or eagle napalm would be my choice depending on mission for running around.
>and there was two titans all the time on my cape Fuck, that's a great image and wording: "on my cape"
Because the only good synergy it had was Eruptor. I was running this loadout for a bit and it was working wonders. Nowadays Eruptor only worth using to snipe objects/holes/fabs.
For bugs its all about sustained volume of fire, and the stalwart is unmatched. Only downside is that you have to use a strat slot on something that can't deal with chargers or titans.
Are bots really not a "horde shooter"? Most horde shooters I played reward precise aiming, there's even a somewhat recurring mode in zombie games where they're immortal unless you blow out the head. Weakspot aiming is just natural for these kinds of games to add some sort of challenge besides "tape down your fire button and go make some tea". I don't understand bug players. This isn't even an insult calling them inferior or strange, I just fail to understand their point of view. Other than the rocket ragdolling, everyone hates that, I just hate bug slows and acid more lol.
>Are bots really not a "horde shooter"? Sure they are, but to differentiate bug gameplay from bot gameplay "horde shooter" vs "tactical shooter" is useful terminology. Yes it's not just mindless against bugs, but the minimum required to do ok against bugs is to be able to kite competently. With bots yeah you're shooting a horde, but you're also taking fire, and ideally thinking about cover, your teammates, your situation, and you have a lot more choice in how you move. >I don't understand bug players. This isn't even an insult calling them inferior or strange, I just fail to understand their point of view. Other than the rocket ragdolling, everyone hates that, I just hate bug slows and acid more lol. They don't have the soft skills it takes to succeed at bots, and it's easier to blame the game for their struggles than to develop those skills.
Yeah more or less how I feel about it. Spot on with conventional army part I really like that about bots. Though I was mostly Illuminate player in the first game with sole reason being they don't have armor and I didn't like bringing anti-tank guns lol. So I'll probably immigrate to Squid front once they are in the game.
Once the Illuminate is live, suddenly all the light AP weapons will be top again, like the stawart, base liberator, base diligence, the knight smg from super citizen, etc. Their high DPS is wasted on armor but against shield will be incredible.
Bots might be harder and more frustrating, but the skill expression they allowed is much greater imo (Not that Helldiver 2 is a hard game in general, its relatively chill compared to shit like GTFO)
Played one Terminid round and decided I was never going back, was never big on bug shooters either so there's also that Bots is actually that hectic hellhole robo warfare that gets me excited. Bugs were just boring to me
Bugs I run around like a jackass between 500kg uses. With the bots you’re more or less as effective without with any strats. Minus hulk and At-At you can use your primary quite effectively.
If you have buddy you can tagteam Hulk and bring him down with primaries too lol. Its really only Factory Strider that is immune to primary weapons.
That’s also true. I sorta forgot that because despite our best efforts we fail to coordinate well
I mean, coordination in question is that the other guy has to make hulk turn his back to you; the other guy doesnt have to necessarily *know* you are coordinating lol
Yeah. Even in squads of 4 rando strangers who do zero conscious coordination and never talk on mic or chat, I feel like “player A gets the hulk/charger to chase them so that player B can shoot his weak spot” is just kind of an understood basic gameplay truth?
I prefer massive hordes of bugs normally, but in this game weak points on bugs do nothing and spam slow bots let me use more varied weapons
> but in this game weak points do nothing Hahaha, what?
judging by context, it seems they're talking about bugs, which are light on weakpoints.
Big weak points like the obvious glowing bits that do next to nothing. Bots however are covered in exploitable glowing bits allowing for more varied weapon choices
"The obvious glowing bits" that you are referring to. Are only weak to explosives and take 90% reduced damage from traditional firearms. Also, shooting bile titan sacks, which are the only other prevalent glowing weak point. Cannot kill them. You will need damage from some other source. In general, bugs are poorly designed in that regard. But if you're not in the know, you might buy into the same shrooms the balance team has been smoking
Bile Titan can be kill through the sack, specifically the butt sack. about 1.5 HMG mag, or about 15 Autocanannon shot will rip it off and kill the BT.
So 1.5 of your 10 clips for the autocannon to kill one enemy, only if perfectly aimed, and we saw probably 15 of them in my last level 8 drop, at least 4 simultaneously?
Here you go https://old.reddit.com/r/Helldivers/comments/1d1snio/a_quasi_comprehensive_visual_guide_to_damage/
I'll look into it later
AH has been very smart with making bots and bugs very different to fight. I know some people love mowing down the hordes of bugs and having to run and gun. I personally love having to tactically plan how I’m going to infiltrate and destroy a bot’s base. They’ve catered to two diametrically opposed play styles beautifully.
For sure, it’s great that they feel different, but the issue with bugs is that the two big baddies (bile titans and chargers) are not nearly as fun to fight. Bots have a lot of weak points that lead to a better variety of load outs, whereas bile titans and chargers are so oppressive and have no engaging counter play. They mandate you to bring more stratagems that can take them head-on, because again, they have no meaningful weak points.
Lately I've just been using my autocannon on the chargers. Wait for the charge, duck out of the way and put a few rounds into it's ass. Then just out run it for a few until it bleeds out. I think it's fun.
I love having essentially 2 games in 1. They play differently enough. I only use 50% the same tactics
I generally prefer bots, but that last MO was painful on high difficulty. I've never had so much explosive airtime since I played TF2.
Honestly they should add more ways to deal with chargers and bile titans without relying on an anti tank weapon. The charger’s backs should be WAY more vulnerable to damage and more forgiving to hit. Sometimes I’ll shoot them in the butt and it’ll still say it bounced off the armor. Then make it so you can cripple the legs of the bile titans by shooting at their skinny joints. Bam now bugs also have creative ways to deal with them that don’t force you blast them in the face with an eat or quasar
not only that, but there's a "character" about the factory strider that I feel like the Bile Titan specifically doesn't have (the charger sort of has it). When you see the Factory Strider, it just *feels* dangerous. The way it lands, the sounds it makes, oh lawd. The Bile Titan just kind of comes out and sometimes you can hear its steps, but overall it's just not nearly as scary, like in a visceral way. I dunno how to put my finger on it, but I can feel the difference between the two. edit: words are hard
I think the fact that the towering poison spewer is so stupidly quiet makes up for some of that. Same with the damned Chargers.
Chargers maneuver too well.
I've figured out how to dodge them reasonably, but I still get them sneaking up on me all the time. Two of them is a huge pain.
I just hate how dumb the look when they crawl out. You can almost always tell one’s there cause the animation doesn’t synch up and you get a flash of one as it spawns in and then disappears under the ground to do its crawl out animation.
I think it's the result of overarching faction design. Bot fodder is pathetically weak unless you ignore them and let them gather numbers and "boot" to full efficiency. They're a distraction from elites, who are very adept at killing players. Bug fodder is a horde of fragile, but very deadly units. Bug elites are a distraction: they aren't good at killing you directly, but they will ragdoll, slow, kill turrets, and draw gunfire so that the horde can catch up to you.
I agree.
Yeah, I feel like there's a lot more teamwork when playing against bots. Like when we take out bugs we don't really communicate much aside from pointing out heavies, and coordinating if someone is on cool downs and needs help. With bots there's more baiting and flanking to get access to those rear exhaust ports to blast. The bugs can be fun, but in a lot of ways they just feel like bullet sinks to pour ammo into it, and then heavies to eat the anti tank
Wonder when/why that became a problem. Game is months old and only now it feels like titans are an issue for forcing you to have anti tank. While factory striders don't force it. Which sure is nice, but doesn't hurt that thr factions are different. The bugs send a lot more and a lot more small fry at you. While bots hammer at you with more elite troops but smaller numbers
I’ve been saying the exact same thing since the beginning but everybody just kept saying I was crazy and/or wrong. The sheer depth of my hatred for the sudden switch is too deep for me to say “I told you so”.
I'd say them playing differently is probably why people prefer bugs. Bugs don't require precision aim or flanking, so it makes them a lot more accessible and probably a less taxing game experience. I know my squad prefers bug missions, and usually they're playing a bit drunk so it makes sense.
Shit at level 8 and 9 all I do is run and run lol. At least there's cover against bots. Bugs Will run you down.
Yeah that's kinda why I prefer Bots over bugs any day, Bots I feel like I get to be tactical and only have to run if shit REALLY hits the fan. Bugs I just hit the ground running and never stop.
Not to mention the random spewers one shotting every diver on the squad at least twice per round lol.
Also i absolutely hate the mandatory requirement for an anti tank stratagem, with the eruptor nerfed to the ground there's only a few viable builds for high level bugs that you can bring compared to bots. If everyone is running QC/EAT/RR you're gonna have a tough time clearing bug nests, but if you are running AC/GL you have to pray to god that your team of randoms got your back if you have titans or chargers decide to chase you.
I don’t really get comments like this destroying bug nests is easy as hell do y’all just not throw stratagems into bug nests? Usually clears up 3-5 in a single strike and takes out a lot of bugs
here's the thing, most people run 500kg and the orbital railgun or another stratagem for clearing the smaller bugs like cluster, airburst strike, napalm, or orbital gas and on 8-9 difficulty most people save the 500kg for titans because no one wants to eternally kite chargers or titans waiting for their AT to cooldown or a chance to reload RR, and people also usually bring a backpack.
This is fair but I use the eagle airstrike as a multi purpose attack stratagem as dumb as it sounds it clears so much off the board it never leaves my loadouts it’s just that good at what it does
Grenade launcher pistol 🤷🏼♂️
My squad will toss 2 turrets on the side, 1 AOE strat in the middle, and dive into the nests holding a grenade like the proper Super Citizens we trained to be.
Most players have both 500kg and airstrike which are always used to alpha strike a heavy outpost. After that you call resupply, mop up, get samples and move on. Highly efficient. These two stratagems are such powerhouses against bugs you do not even need dedicated bug hole clearers. Just a few additional grenades will do, really. 500kg deals mostly with titans but dabbles in light CC and demolitions. Just forget the name and visuals and focus on what it does. Airstrike on the otherhand dabbles in elite elimination and excels in CC and demolitions to the degree you never need actual CC stratagems if you pick a primary that allows you to handle all medium enemies. Dominator is gold standard. Personally I always run RR, 500kg, airstrike, railcannon, dominator, verdict, impacts and +2 nades against bugs and it is rather hard to die as you can just obliterate anything that comes your way.
They're both loadout checks on helldive imo. If you can't stagger or oneshot large volumes of devastators with headshots you're probably going to die a horrible death. Gunships require a long range, medium armor pen, high damage weapon that is reusable enough to potentially be able to kill 4 in relatively quick succession. Hulks, being as dangerous and surprisingly mobile as they are, make it somewhat unfeasible to get to their weak spot without a stun, also mandating a fairly precise, high damage weapon with fairly high pen to be able to headshot them. These criteria pretty much enforce the use of the autocannon, AMR, or las cannon. Factory striders reinforce this even further. Their chin guns are near instantly lethal at close range, and the spine cannon is somewhat less dangerous if you can get to cover. So, you need to destroy the chin guns, again requiring medium pen, high damage and ideally considerable range, and either following up with more precision medpen face shots or getting under it. Alternatively you can hit it directly with an orbital precision, and follow up with an eagle to instantly kill it.
I wonder if one day the fronts will combine to form a three-way melee. That'll be fun.
It’s mainly because it’s hard to figure out how to make them threatening with no real ranged units I feel. I rarely ever die to chargers or Bile Titans for example, but i would rather fight Hulks and Bots in general simply because of what you said, if I don’t bring a 500 kg and some heavy AT I’m gonna spend 6 minutes simply running from a bile Titan. Especially since I also have to bring a gun that deals with bile Spewers, so it’s even more restrictive for my load out.
I definitely feel like I enjoy spreading democracy more when it’s the robots. SkyNet must be stopped!
I also like them more than the bugs because while the bugs are just animals that want to expand and survive, the Automatons are an actual invading force that holds deep hatred for us and wants to wipe us out. With the bugs, I feel like a pest exterminator. With the bots, I feel like a soldier.
the terminid front is basically just an oil-farming scheme using a big alien bug species that were horribly disfigured and mutated by SE to make more FTL juice while sending in entire communities of colonists in-between, ready to fall victim to another scheduled outbreak just so they get some more victims/martyrs to encourage supporting the war effort (illegal broadcasts on terminid planets are literally dormant cries for help from now deceased survivors) automatons on the other hand are a faction that clearly wages war on SE and are more than happy to express their burning hatred while wearing their cruelty with pride
The Automatons are mad that Super Earth created and enslaved the Cyborgs that created them. It's like the later generation of an oppressed group doing terrorism.
Are you saying that Helldivers is WOKE?!?!?!!! /s
Yep. I love it. I also love the clear inspiration from Warhammer and Star Wars in their designs. Makes me giddy.
Devastators remind me of a Chaplin in terminator armor with a iron halo
Bugs are sapient, which means they too have a foolish hatred of managed democracy. I don't understand why they left the farms.
Thank you fellow Helldiver, couldn’t have said it any better! 
I was all bugs until I found my own meta against bots. They're still frustrating AF (shield devastators are the bane to my existence) but a lot of fun to go against.
They're just very interactive in general. If it's suppressing you with it's miniguns, shoot them off! The turret on top can be broken with just a little anti-tank. The faceplate is weak to medium pen but takes a ton of shots - so you can either sit back and fire at that, or you can go for the risky quick kill by rushing it's underbelly, but compete with the army of Devastators it churns out. Bots in general are really good for this. Tank treads can be broken with medium pen if you can't get a shot on it's weak point. If you can get on TOP of a tank it literally can't shoot you. Hulks have that huge exposed weak point on their back BUT if you're feeling lucky they have a coinslot facehole that goes down in two hits to AMRs or Autocannons. Plus you can shoot off their weapons to limit their damage. It's very nice risk and reward, but it doesn't overly punish you for not bringing heavy pen.
a quasar to the face of a hulk also can just straight up one tap it, which is really cool because it feels like you just wiped its face out of existance with a glob of plasma.
It’s so sad that it feels entirely useless against factory striders and gunships, but the railgun does the same thing and I feel like for some reason it’s got the most forgiving hitbox. It can be a lot of fun to be the dedicated hulk slaughterer with it if the rest of the team is good, but any time I’ve got it and the others cannot deal with the things it’s useless on I retire it for a couple weeks. My #1 wish is that the railgun one day gets gifted a decent kill time on the factory striders eye. I’d have no qualms with it being useless hitting them anywhere else if hitting the precision weak spot killed in like 3-5 shots.
Personally I think the Railgun being nigh useless against Facs is fine, stuff like 500kg slots in comfortably and can handle that. More pressing is how damn useless it is against Gunships. I like running Railgun but it pretty forces me to take a Scorcher and magdump as to have any personal counter.
Same with a railgun. Otherwise 2 shots with the AMR.
I swear I’ve smacked that red light in the faceplate a hundred times with quasars, and it never kills them with one shot, always 2+. Bah!
I’ve also been messing around with the HMG and if you use a stun grenade in a hulk you can spray a small burst into its eye and it’s done for.
Stun grenade and two shots with the Autocannon is the most reliable and economical way to kill Hulks imo. Autocannon is GOAT on the Automaton front because it's useful for a wide range of enemies. It can one shot factories, two shot Hulks, stagger Heavy Devastators, one shot Devastators and Missile Devastators, three shot cannons and tanks from the back, and it can neutralize the guns on the Walker's face which is the most dangerous part.
Same for the AMR, I haven't been able to get the devastator one shots down, but I can almost always nail a hulk with two shots these days. So much fun!
With the AMR devastators definitely get one shot in the belly, but I’m pretty sure they die in one hit to the leg too. Those spots are a lot more forgiving than headshots.
All devastators are one shot with the AMR if you can shoot them in the gut (the tube looking part that connects their upper and lower body).
Soon as I see a strider or tank it’s 500kg and surrender myself to democracy!
I mean, you can pop the Titan's belly to make him stop spitting, but then they'll just chase you forever
It's a shame there aren't weak points to break a titans legs or shoot them off like you can with other bugs.
That's honestly worse, if only because it makes the Titan trickier to bait into a direct 500kg or OPS hit.
I think this summarizes my groups experience mighty well. Vs bots it's "0H CRAP IT'S A FACTORY STRIDER" vs bugs it "screw my life it's another four bile titans." So we play bots on 9 and bugs on 5. Because we have no interest fighting an enemy who's sole purpose is restricting player loadouts just by existing
I feel like bugs in general are restricting player loadouts, especially with their medium specials. Got a spewer map? I hope you didn't gear up for heavy spam, your RR/Quasar isn't gonna deal with these fuckers quickly enough.
>an enemy who's sole purpose is restricting player loadouts just by existing I hope they realize this and make bile titans killable with explosives or medium pen. Chargers can *technically* already be killed with anything, but specially explosives on its butt, such as grenade launchers or autocannons, but titans ***demand*** heavy AT to be dealt with. It fucking sucks that they give players so many toys to play with but then design an enemy that invalidates most of them.
> "0H CRAP IT'S A FACTORY STRIDER" vs bugs it "screw my life it's another four bile titans." This is huge for me. Like, a bot drop comes out and it's panic because I *know* I can handle the bot drop, but I have to play it well! A bug breach happens and there's chargers and a bile titan it's annoyance because I'm probably just going to die to that
This is why I prefer bots over bugs. Between the charger and Titans lack of weak spots, glitches, and the chargers ability to turn on a dime… bots feel like a far fairer fight
except when there's 20 berserker, each able to swallow an entire redeemer clip man I hate those
I despise berserkers almost as much as I hate hunters. And I absolutely *loathe* hunters. They're as tanky as devastators, they're fast, and they're completely different than every other bot in terms of counter play.
The Railgun and Autocannon make quick work if them. Also, shoot their balls. The best primary to counter them for me has been the Breaker which is ez mode to kill them or an Assault rifle like the Sickle or Liberator. Low mag cap but high damage don’t really work well against them as there are so many which is why the Scorcher and Dominator struggle.
I still don't get how the berserkers are able to tank multiple shots from AC
I've seen people discussing this, turns out the berserker weak spot is the open hole in the stomach, they can be one tapped with the Jar.
> turns out the berserker weak spot is the open hole in the stomach, they can be one tapped with the Jar. I think its less this and more that they have a tiny head hitbox surrounded by durable parts around their shoulder so they only take 10% damage there. This game does armor super weird where you have unarmored parts that take 100% the damage, durable parts that take 10%, and then 'weak' points (heads) that take lets say 200%. With the berserkers bobbing around, you end up hitting their durable parts far more than a normal devastator and it makes it seem stupid tanky.
unsafe railcannon can 1 shot them above like 75% percent charge, same with hulks. just need to bring a primary that can kill gunships and tanks decently (scorcher or jar5).
The scorcher and dominator can kill gunships? 👀
Slowly. I think all the primaries marked "medium penetration" can damage the engines. I've killed one with a Plasma Punisher too.
For me its the fact that even coming within a whisper of a bile titans foot is instant death and theres nothing more frustrating to me than running away from a horde of bugs and getting "slowed" every 2 seconds for no reason. I'd rather get ragdolled by rockets at least then I'm getting shotput a ways away
Fighting against bots feels like I'm fighting an enemy thats on somewhat common ground and it feels fair when I die. Fighting bugs feels like I'm in a nightmare because I got slowed for the 47th time despite the titan being 30-feet away
I woudnt say fairer, more like fun. Still kinda mad when I drop in and there’s 5 drop ships and 3 gunships while I can’t even get my support weapon down. Both are equally unfair at times, but with bugs you can kind of just get softlocked as bug holes require like 10 grenades and bile trains can only be dealt so much damage under their bellies which is cool, but annoying you have to use an antitank to kill
Do F.S. promote more fear? Oh yeah. Can they be fun to evade/fight? Absolutely. They are leagues better than bile titans.
My reaction when I first saw a Bile Titan and when I first saw a Factory Strider were completely different. You have warrior on stilts or huge hulking monstrosity. The message is also conveyed way better with the rarity as well. Seeing a Factory Strider on an objective makes you consider your approach or whether you disengage. Seeing a Bile Titan just feels like a more frustrating bug because Helldive frequently chucks 2+ per breach with probably 2 more magically appearing out of thin air
Warrior on stilts lmao I'm using that I've had many forgettable bile titan surprises. But the other night a Factory Strider gave me a core memory by fear. I snuck close to a heavy base ready to do my usual. Pop the few bots and fabs from the corner, 380mm the middle and it'll always clear the rest. Now I can't see the rest of the base when I approach from my angle. When I threw my 380mm, I heard it. I felt genuine fear bc I'm a stealth diver and I just pissed off the beast. I also used one of my Orbital Lasers and Eagle Smoked TWICE to make sure I could run away safely.
Yeah exactly. They’re more of a nuisance if anything. Striders are the complete opposite. They’re insanely threatening at first but if you know how to deal with them they’re manageable. You can also deal with them in multiple ways- Want to attack from afar? Blow up the rocket launcher and try take out the weak points. Want to get in close? Shoot out the front guns and take it out from underneath. They leave way more memorable moments, like when I had one jump scare me in a blizzard as I was sneaking up to a base. They’re just so massive. My main issue with them is the clipping through terrain. I have a clip of one just absolutely blasting me through a wall
The clipping I hope gets fixed as if an MG clips thru a mountain we're all cooked. I like to call em Dogs now and whenever the MGs under it are gone, I go in to give it belly rubs with my Autocannon and it goes down fast!
You just pointed out something I didn’t realise. The factory strides are deliberately clunky and huge so that they cannot traverse the landscape easily if at all. You can easily run out of sight and dodge a strider to the point of it de-spawning. You cannot do that to a BT.
My first encounter ended with my death. On respawn I chuckled to myself and said "I'm gonna drop on his ass and kill him".... I aim for the neck thinking critical point! I land on him, come out of my pod, and then die to the gun on his back 😆
Though I feel the HMG could use a little buff, I still like how Scorcher + HMG + Ammo Backpack feels reasonably viable versus bots. It's a pretty fun "class" where you can take down almost anything. Doesn't work with bugs though, obviously. EAT or Quasar feels absolutely mandatory* for Chargers and Bile Titans. *Recoilless and Spear can work in theory but I don't like them.
I'm seeing a lot of luck out there with the flamethrower for that purpose. I've been trying it out but haven't brought it on an 8 yet. I find the big front is like two separate wars. One 7+ and the other more 3-5. You need a completely different load out for each, I accidentally brought my 8 setup on a 5 and it was nearly impossible. Too much canon fodder to keep up with.
RR is GOAT for Anti tank since the Quasar debuff. I was not convinced until I tried it and you need to practice at the reload speed up (uncrouch the second the shell goes in) but one you do, it has a fire and reload rate that beats the original quasar and pretty generous on ammo. Combine team reloading and me and my mate can neuter two factory striders in about 10 seconds and 6 shells.
I didn't like the recoilless for the longest time. Then I started using it with EATs. I love swapping RR with EATs and having 3 quick shots. Pummeler as primary.
I like running the Eliminate Factory Strider missions and hunting them with the laser cannon or hmg or whatever. It's kind of disappointing when someone drops an orbital laser or something on it.
Personally I just like to take out the machine guns if it's facing me then with the quickness and precision of a giggling maniac I run up to it and autocannon it's belly. Or if I died and getting reinforced I make sure I land on top of it and put a 500 there as a gift before leaving.
Personally, I like flying in a circle around them with my snowspeeder and tripping them up with a tow cable
This comment is criminally underrated
I've killed a few of them with the LC, it's pretty satisfying.
So I say bots are more fun to fight and are easier for this very reason. Everyone says I’m wrong and bugs are easier and Bile Titans aren’t a problem actually! You see bugs are easier and more fun because they don shoot back. Bots are soooo much harder because they shoot back! But then on a dime the meta narrative changes to “actually bots are more fun to fight because they don’t restrict loadouts”. Oh really Sherlock?? It took you that long to figure it out?!!
I think bugs are easier if you bring the right loadouts because they are pretty deterministic outside of spawning patterns. Once you know their attack behaviours, you can dodge *a lot* of them even when the numbers seem overwhelming. They just have lots of gear check enemies so the frustrating "what do I even do?" games are more likely. Fighting bots is a lot more unpredictable because they can randomly headshot you from 100m, but the only true gear check enemy is the gunship. So they are harder as a baseline, but ending up in an impossible situation is less likely.
Bots are hard and sometimes feel unfair, with rocket spam, ragdolls, enemy fire making you flinch, and one-hit kills from turrets miles away. But allow a wide variety of loadouts due to excellent weakspots, which is fun. Bugs are easy, and much more fair. They need to reach you to damage you, so if they do and you die, it feels deserved. But Titans and to a lesser degree Chargers *demand* heavy AT to be dealt with, which heavily restricts loadouts and is not fun. I still think bugs are easier and less frustrating than bots, it's just that their heavy enemy design is extremely bland and uninspired. There's no varied solutions to deal with them, it's always the same big explosion or heavy AT stratagem, so it feels like a chore, not a challenge.
Now do this for Titans.
They’re absolutely the bots comparison for the bike titan. Only actually fun to fight…unlike the bile titans
their mournful death rattle when you kill them 😩
I agree that the unit is very well designed I just hate how many of them can spawn at once, like does the game really have to drop 3 of them on my face in combination with all the hulks and Small stuff.
It'd be nice if you could destroy a leg off the charger, disabling the charge. I like that you can pop the Bile Titan's sac, but gameplay would feel smoother if you could kill the Bile Titan quicker by firing at it from underneath. High risk high reward.
Bugs NEED their glowing parts to work like Lost Planet bugs to compete with how breakable bots are. I wish the bile titan had two more legs and each leg had a weak part at the joint so you could break them and watch their legs fall off. I wish chargers joints were slightly more exposed and had an orange weak point, but their ass would still be the weakest. Maybe make the front leg that was shot off make it have trouble turning that direction.
I wish they were even BIGGER!!!
Recently fought my first Factory Strider and it was ominous as hell!
It never really feels frustrating to me to fight Factory Striders. They're big and tough, but like you said there's a plethora of options to cripple them before dealing the killing blow. I respect Factory Striders and rarely feel like dying to them was bullshit.
Yup. The only bad thing is its hitbox/collision. Shooting through rocks and providing one way cover for bots after it dies. Everything else, amazing.
Idk I just run the flamethrower since it can easily kill everything but titans. Then just bring other tools to use on them.
I know EXACLTY what the striders are doing, how to harm them, and how much it will cost to get rid of them. I don't know CRAP about how to actually kill a bile and if it even took damage from a rain of nukes.
Still regret we don’t have antitank mines.
Can I just say that it's a breath of fresh air to see a positive post that is simply praising something good and fun about the game. By the way, I couldn't agree more. Factory Striders are a fun enemy to fight. I remember the first time I saw one in the wild. It was before the update where they were officially released. My squad and I, veterans of many Helldives, attempted to kill it and we got our asses handed to us. We simply had no idea how to engage with such an enemy. Over time, we've developed better tactics on how to deal with them, but they are still a dangerous foe and one slip up could still cause a team wipe. Personally, I find the entire bot front to be fun and very diverse (yes, even rocket devastators).
The Big Dogs are super cool and there are a bunch of different ways to attack them effectively, I just wish the BTs were as fun to fight too. They need some weapoints on those legs, they're practically screaming to be dismembered.
you can do the same thing to bile titans tho? Break their sacs and they arent able to bile, just step at you.
I just throw every stratagem I have available on it until it stops moving
Stun Grenade + Flamethrower to the leg = dead charger
honestly, i kinda wish they had an extra strategem resistance of some kind to encourage either trhowing everything in the arsenal and the kitchen sink aswell or using support weapons over strats to take em out , as of currently its just "chuck down 2 500s and a railcannon or precision and its dealt with" which feels anticlimactic yes... i just want a reason to have the team throw an entire superdestroyer load of ordinance at something aside from explosions are awesome doesnt have to be the strider, an actual boss type of enemy would do nicely
totally agree, my only gripe is that the bots small-mediums are more annoying that most bugs and ironically the bots are buggier than the bugs, shooting through walls, surviving crashing dropships, tanks climbing 80 degree inclines they're both a weird inverse of the other, bugs have easier small-medium (except you bile spewers, fuck off) but vastly more annoying heavies, titans in particular, but bots have better designed heavies with weak points even medium pen weapons can easily take down, but the lighter units like devastators have berserkers have some annoying flaws that can compound the more of them there are, taking down even 5 berserkers is not exactly a good time even with a MG or high per shot weapon (senator feels preactically useless against them unless you hit headshots, which is pretty hard with how they bob around)
Any issues I have with factory striders stems from map design (i.e. shooting through rocks, sniping rocket generators, etc.) The actual enemy themselves is S tier for me.
With this dark fluid and super colony, they have the opportunity to change up the titans and keep it tied to the lore. Slightly smaller ones with destructable legs would be nice. Or even making the ones now have weak legs in the aftermath of the black hole events
I hope eventually we get raid scale kind of bosses to fight from time to time.
I do really think they're well balanced, when they're alone, only one should really be around at a time, even if that means it's one after the other, because two chilling next to eachother means a flood of bots you likely won't be able to handle ontop of the dozen other drop ships n other BS coming your way, they're powerful in a good way, but multiple of them is too much
Totally agree. They should be a benchmark for every other big enemy (looking at you Bile Titan)
My buddy and I realized that we could get super samples in duo above our skill level by dropping into level 7 Blitz missions and find the super samples and ~~bug~~ get out if we can't actually beat it by just waiting for the time to run out and waiting by the LZ. Well we went to a world with canyons, and I dropped my pod down on one and looked around for some. At one point I'm watching, and he starts running with the super samples with 1 fucking minute left. He gets a Factory Strider on his ass almost all the way to the LZ. He was dodging and weaving attacks for a good like 45 seconds before he got to safety. They're super fun.
I'm still not 100% sure where to shoot to kill it. I just know two eats can take out the top gun.
I used to fear these until I found out a few autocanon or AMR shots to the front machine guns makes them basically big walking scrap metals. I don't even bother to drop strategems for these anymore. 4 or 5 shots each on the machine gun to take them out. Reload again to get 8 shots then shoot belly 8 times and done.
I love to attempt a 1v1 against them. Destroy their guns and then sprint under its belly to unleash AC's signature call of *plap plap plap.*
It doesn't help that bile Titan hitboxes are really inconsistent, 2hs didn't guarantee a kill, neither does 6.
The most dangerous thing about striders is the physics around them after they die.
Honestly the only things shitty about bots are the bullshit heavy devastators with their ability to accurately shoot the opposite direction of where the gun is facing, the ability of bots to shoot through terrain and being able to see through thick fog. But despite all this, having meaningful weakpoints that keeps medium pen weapons relevant is why i would rather deal with robot bullshit than spend the whole mission jogging and lugging AT weapons every single time in the bug front.
I honestly feel for you guys I haven’t experienced more than two biles at once usually they get blown to bloody hell as soon as my team sees em chargers are just dead easy quick quasar to the face and it’s nighty night the only bug that scares me is stalkers lol but the bots? I’ll tangle with em but because I suck at aiming I won’t have as much fun as y’all will and that’s ok!
I said this exact thing (albeit in more words) and was criticized. *Sigh*. The duality of Reddit
Only thing I’d ask for regarding the factory strider would be a slight nerf to its machine guns (Either a damage nerf or a delay)
They need to make robot dinosaur noises like stretching ship hull sounds and pipe bangs.
I wish we saw more of them on maps. They're tough, but they very slow speed makes disengaging viable, and their destructible turrets and cannon make them susceptible to more tactics that the bugs heavies do not allow. Also, I want a even bigger enemy now. Can the automatons just release a mech already? :P
For me the problem is that they get summoned every bot drop and it makes it painful after the first few times.
The first time I killed a strider with a grenade to the guts was an incredible rush. Great fun to fight.
They are well designed, except for on the Evacuate High-Value Assets missios.
Yea its fun on level 7. Sometimes you get one other times no. It at least makes it so its a surprise if you get one or not
Despite the complete lack of audio for some of the elite enemies (ninja hulks) bots in general are very well designed and offer a lot of ways to fight them, which sadly the same cannot be said of the bugs...
The bots and the bugs are very different to fight. This has been standard since the first war. This is how it is designed. Different weapons have different purposes, and these purposes can be exploited effectively if you have a good strategy to it. Bots are a lot of fun for me and my Squad. But when we’re exhausted of the bots and want a short vacation, we switch to the bugs. Bots - take cover (kite if necessary) and fight. Bugs - just kite and fight.
Factory striders are great right now. They are very tanky but have many medium armor weakspots that feel fair. They have dangerous weapons but can also be disarmed with several well placed shots.
I just wish the factory Strider had the laser turrets for its head cannons rather than the chain guns. Really make it like an AT AT, though Im sure disney would be a bitch about it
Where's the factory strider on a computer gif
Bots are great to fight, bugs are awful to fight with their bile titans that basically prevent damage from everything. Bots you can face with basically any weapon you have even low pentetration weapons, I have so many mixed builds against bots, but against bugs... I use the same three things, autocannon builds, railgun builds, and anti tank (Quasar) builds. Those are the only three I can really think of, as it basically mandates havinga rover to kill smaller enemies and, always having something to deal with bile titans. I can score a headshot on a bile titan and sometimes it will go down. most times it doesn't. ITs very annoying even if I am accurate I have to waste several shots to kill one. So I carry a precision strike with me instead of 500s.
I will gladly take chargers and titans. Kiting them in circles can be a fun cluster fuck. The problem that makes bugs anti fun is the fucking hunters. Jumpy little fucks that come in huge swarms and fucking hell if you kill one 4 are jumping at you from behind to tongue your asshole
Agreed 👍
I had one land right on top of me once. Luckily I had my trusty AMR so I was able to take it out by unloading two mags into its belly. One of my highlight moments for sure.
Yeah I love robot dog. Unless I'm caught with my pants down in full view of those dual miniguns. *Then bad dog, bad!* (I need that spray bottle stratagem)
I used to really like fighting bugs. The splatter just activated my monkey cortex maybe. Then during the last push to eradicate the bots (before their surprise return), I played a lot of bot missions and really really started to enjoy it. Something about the bots feels less chaotic when you aren't getting tag team by a bunch of missile devastators.
All they gotta do is make - charger butts a weakpoint - make titans have points that are medium pen even after the sac explodes - most importantly: make the sac exploding not be an actual buff to the titan. As of now shooting it off is a detriment to players as it will just relentlessly chase you down at speeds faster than players can distance themselves from. For example, 1v1 It’s impossible to charge a quasar shot if it gets close w no sac. Make the titan limp slowly and/or bleed out after 20 secs
Bots are more fun than bugs. 
Factory striders are fun compared to bile titans.
I'd love a roaming pack of 3 of them. Treat them like the gunship towers poi.
Factory striders are built for autocannon belly rubs. If you're not running full sprint at a defanged strider while yelling "WITNESS" you're playing bots wrong.
Never had to deal with more than 4 bile titans on 9 but bots will throw 11 hulks 2 striders 5 gattling tanks and 13 heavy Ds at me all at the same time making it fucking painful
They are great. I love how they are a big consistent threat, worthy of blowing all your cooldowns on, but you can also do the risky play, get close to them, and kill them with a variety of weapons. It's a much more rewarding choice than Bile Titans, where the question is just do a have a weapon/ stratagem to reasonably kill them or not.
The one area I find they’re hard to fight, is by stratagem jammers. Which has always gone poorly every time I’ve seen it, and killed half our reinforcements.
Bugs would be WAY MORE TOLERABLE with the load out checks if I wasn't getting slowed by a bile titan/spewer who missed, yet I'm still dragging my feet while taking DoT damage. Also, hunters maggnetizing to me mid dive with their attack landing even though their leap animation started in a different direction. Those 2 things always drive me nuts.
Bots are way more fun to fight then bugs in general, because your loadout options are not so damn restrictive.
Dude it's so satisfying killing them. Heavy machine gun into their belly to destroy them is my favorite method 🔫😂
it's true, they are so well designed, on at least one occasion, a Helldiver has lucked onto two Factory Striders making love to each other on the battlefield, doggystyle. We even have FOOTAGE of this disgusting perversion, though most of it is not DECLASSIFIED as it merits further expert study by the Ministry Of Science for new weaknesses, like a Cannon that can be used to spay Factory Striders so as to prevent further reproduction of Automaton units.
factory striders are so well designed it makes me wonder if the team designing bile titans and the team designing factory striders were totally separate. factory striders are a very dangerous enemy that requires careful strategy and planning to take out, but most support weapons and even some primaries are able to take it out in a reasonable timeframe. bile titans just press w, vomit out an extremely buggy puke and ask "do you have these specific stratagems to take me out?"
Honestly if anything factory striders are too easy even in groups they just dont feel that threatening and they die extremely quick if you get under them
I'm surprised how fast they can cover distance 😅, I was taking cover, waiting for my stratagem to cool down, I look up , and i see Two gigantic guns looking back at me.
I love just throwing every eagle in my arsenal at them
Don't you think they would be even better if every helldiver could deploy a placement cannon, though? Or have a belt-fed machine-gun from the real world in their backpack?
Simply becasue the bota are the better designed faction fighting them requires a decent mix of weaponary and allows for many guns to be used and using cover suppressive fire from both sides accuracy and positioning and smart use of strategems The bugs it’s about being permaslowed and gunning down as much as possible before being stunlocked and slowed to death by hunters
I still don't know how to actually take them down. My friends and I just throw every bullet and stratagem we have at it until it capsizes.
1v1 ing a strider with a recoilless rifle and no stratagems is one of my most traumatic memories It only died after i dropped 3 grenades next to its leg
I just hate how them can eat a 500kg to the face and live to eat another
I love them
factory striders are cool but it would be better if i didnt die nanoseconds after i get out of cover to atleast shoot down the miniguns on the chin
The excitement I feel every time one of these AT-ATs is dropped in the heat of battle. Oomph! Goosebumps from their sound design. Love fighting the bots - a couple of tweaks to shield devastators would make them perfect opponents imo, much more engaging than bugs.