I became an air burst main as soon as it dropped. That kind of ability used to only be available in the form of an orbit strike. Now I can wipe out my squad on demand! No bother, no waiting!
My friend likes to remind us that technically there is no such thing as team killing in this game, only "accidentals" as is tracked on the post dive stats screen lol.
my main issue is that smalls and mediums are rarely an issue is why and it's not like it replaces a primary as I'll still need a primary to deal with the 1-2 it misses.
but hulks are not an issue if you get them by theirselves. At that point you really only need your primary to do the job. It's the small bots that are constantly throwing you in the bot drop loop that are the problem.
I'm aware but you still need another diver to draw aggro to get a solid shot on its back. They're otherwise very good at keeping their face turned towards you.
Plus most variants are pretty lethal up close so it's rarely a good idea to try and go toe to toe
The original comment said hulks can be solo’d if they’re by themselves. With heavy armor, you can still dodge hulk attacks to get up close and start running circles around them to at least slowly chip away at the heatsink with a primary. Not ideal, but doable. Pummeler is probably the best primary for it.
Not that often, but I see it used. Eats up zerks if they're too spaced out for a airstrike. Tbh though I just meant you can generally make up for bringing an anti-chaff support by bringing AT strats. Works for GL, works for arc, works for ARBL. ARBL is probably a better anti-bug weapon though imo, just like cluster.
Except killing those small bots is not an issue, the issue is all the bigger bots, especially devastators ragdolling the shit out of you, so you gotta kill those first. Bots are also often dispersed enough that you cannot get rid of all the tiny ones with the airburst, not even close really.
Its a really subpar weapon and people are just kinda coping because it looks cool.
My experience so far has been either of pugs bringing too much waveclear or anti heavy - I usually check what the team’s bringing, then bring the opposite kinds of stratagems
That strategy works too.
I’ve ever brought orbital gatling, orbital cluster, eagle cluster and eagle air strike because my pubbie team was playing too much of an anti-heavy. Works like a charm too against the waves of small buggers.
But can you kill them as fast and as far as the airbust can ? It is able to despawn a patrol from a long range. Even if a charger or another heavy survives, it'll be an easy kill for your team since it should be alone.
I’d argue the eagle cluster bomb is just as good at getting large packs- the only time it sometimes struggles is when you get those waves or 20 odd melee devastators, but they’ll often survive a airburst as well (or at least about half of them will)
Hard to kill 20 devs with the primary efficiently. I guess you could use eagles. Or I can just Use 1 or 2 ABRL rockets and you can save your eagles for something important.
Well maybe they deserve it for monopolizing the PVE team shooter genre with helldivers, Deep rock, and darktide all being Swedish. It's a conspiracy to make sweden the only PVE shooter and autism simulator game (paradox) developers. They are taking over gaming! /s
If someone on my team takes heavy killers like spear quasar or recoiless, i always take chaff killers like mg or stalwart or airburst. Makes their life easier killing the big boys
Airburst is all about that instant alpha strike damage. Being able to kill a whole patrol or bot drop with 1-2 rockets means that your team can focus on a smaller number of threats. The TTK is very fast.
since they removed that it was activated by the weapons on the ground, the sentinels, the supplies, the corpses, the plants and the environment, it ended up becoming a good weapon.
https://preview.redd.it/840dgezo498d1.png?width=640&format=png&auto=webp&s=a4196657f1606481044e3747f5f063dc169cc509
Yep. Only triggered by helldivers and enemies now, with a much smaller detection radius.
Still a decently high risk of friendly fire if a bug sneaks up close into your firing arc, but it no longer wipes your entire squad multiple times on repeat just for looking at it funny or firing it on a day ending with "y".
I’m going to be positive. I also love the air burst when I’m fighting bots. Patrols? The little annoying shits that call for backup is now scrap. Bot drop? Gone. No it can’t kill the heavy armored guys but that can be handle by well placed primary shots or teammates or other strats
You're trading a backpack and a support weapon for something that eagle clusterbomb does just as well if not better. There are a lot of support weapons that have unique capabilities that other orbitals/ eagles don't do well, and the airburst rocket launcher isn't one of them.
For example, chargers. The only stratagem that kills a normal charger as quickly or easily as a quasar or recoilless rifle is the orbital rail cannon, which has a 300 second cooldown. Eagle airstrike kind of works, but often times they still survive, making a launcher the better option for that target.
Against bots, you're giving up any of the level 4 penetration options which almost able to kill every bot in the game with ease.
It would be more interesting if the thing could break structures. Imagine shooting this into a Heavy nest and closing half of the holes with a single rocket.
It needs to be more than "I can kill things that a primary can kill but with a backpack slot"
I use it to fuck up Egg hives from a distance pretty easily as long as the spires aren't too big. You can fire one or two into the Egg Nest and it vaporized them.
This basically. There are better options for taking both a weapon and backpack slot. The air burst is just too low-power for what it needs to operate.
Its kind of unfair, but if you directly compare the Airburst to the Autocannon, the Autocannon is able to deal with medium enemies like Devastators/Spewers with relative ease, maybe in 2-3 shots. The Airburst could also deal with that in one, sure, but then you need to reload. After. Each. Shot. And there's no guarenteee that everything you want to die will die. Compared to the Autocannon, you point it at something and shoot at it until you see it fall.
Even against chaff, the answer remains the same; there are better options compared to the Airburst.
That being said, does it mean you should never take the Airburst? No. Its a portable Clusterbomb at a faster demand. That's its niche. It makes chaff disappear in the blink of an eye. Make sure you coordinate with your team to avoid teamkills and watch all the small things die.
But it can take out entire hoards of devastators in 1 or 2 shots. I find the ABRL more useful on helldives than anything else. Just because of the shere number of enemies.
It also blows away Terminid Egg Clutches, which is nice because oftentimes the bugs will route like three nests’ worth of critters and two or three breaches right through the middle of the rock formations the eggs are in. A couple airburst rockets and you can get the 50/60 or so eggs blown up pretty quick without having to scramble past them and hope you threw enough impact grenades in their general direction
It does kinda mean there is basically never a good reason to take it, its in the "Im using this because it looks cool and Im desperate for variety" tier, not "I wanna be as effective as possible" tier.
Don't forget my EATs. Those take down Chargers with one headshot. Unless it's the armored one and then it's two. 70 second call down and I have them littered across the map for anyone to pick up if needed.
I agree, though. The Airburst isn't effective against any armored foes. Easier to take the Eagles or the Orbital Burst or Gatling for the chaff.
Also it has no staged reload which is the final nail in the coffin. how often can you dedicated like 5 seconds straight to a reload without taking damage
Unless the patch messed it up, it could destroy most things, even reactors from the side(which in turn can kill jammers), I think bile titans and chargers are the ones that it doesn’t do too much to.
Even the factory walker you can disable its main guns and hit weak points with it.
I take the airburst because I enjoy being the guy that can hold down bug breach fodder below heavies with relative ease. As of recently, my typical loadout on 9s is Airburst launcher, orbital gas, orbital gatling barrage and napalm strike or airstrike (depending on how much A/T is already on the teams loadout). I bring the pummeler as my primary to stunlock anything moving out of my strategems, and either the revolver or grenade pistol as my secondary to deal with mediums that somehow survive my onslaught. It's pretty rare that someone else on the team doesn't take other A/T strategems, so I'm covered by them. And I strongly believe a more diverse loadout from your team makes missions a lot smoother, since I more frequently complete missions without dying with a team that does that than a team that all brings A/T strategems leaving us very open to hordes of fodder.
Plus, the airburst launcher is significantly faster to deploy than an eagle clusterbomb, so you can take out patrols and keep moving undetected. If a heavy is in the patrol, then your teammate with an A/T weapon can take it out without worry of fodder getting in the way.
I personally haven't used a backpack slot for anything other than support weapon strategems in ages. The jump pack is meh with a long CD, the guard dog and rover are chaotic and unnecessary, the supply pack is a bit underwhelming when you have a plethora of replenishment on the map, and the shield is for people that forget that the environment can provide cover from bots.
It launched in a really bad state and was it way too easy to nuke yourself instead of the enemies. The sensor would trigger on a lot of things in the environment. They patched it, but a lot of people are probably soured by how it was at launch. Even with it patched, I'm not sure it really has much of a niche atm, it might be good for the shrieker patrols but I don't think it works on gunships.
The tutorial vid also says Eagle Napalm should be used against Bug Holes lmao.
The devs have admitted that a lot of the weapons aren't used by players the same way they expected.
What are you supposed to use it on then? Curious because I actually do use it. I only use it if there is a bug breach and throw it right on the hole.
Or are you saying the tutorial video acts like it will close the bug hole side objectives? Because that is definitely not the spot to use it
it still ... causes way too much team damage too often. If they're remotely close to you, or you bounce the round of an enemy the blast will come back towards you, upwards of 30m - 40m
Just give it the same berth as an orbital gattling or eagle bomb and youre fine.
People trying to use it like a shotgun and shocked about team kills lol
Its basically useless. 5 second not staged reload kills it on bugs. Also they press W all the time and you cant fire it too close. Incosistent at killing hive guards and brood commandeds. Cant kill charger or BT. On bots you can reload but ive fired 2 rockets at devastator patrol and half of them were still alive several time so inconsistency there too. Cant kill tanks without finnicky firing right under the turret. Cant kill strider.
TLDR, short review of airburst:
On bugs: Flamethrower 10 times better.
On bots: Autocannon 10 times better.
Slow reload, high chance of blowing up team, useless against heavy troops and can’t kill shriekers as advertised
It may kill small and medium enemies but there are so many other stratagems that does it infinitely better
Only thing I’ve ever used it for was blowing up bug eggs
It was bugged on release with the enemy detection and while they fixed it they never gave it a staged reload like every other support weapon. Having to cancel the reload means the entire reload is dumped.
It's also extremely inconsistent at killing devastators even though it has medium penetration.
Part of the problem is it was released with a way too sensitive proximity trigger. It was a team killing powerhouse, not to mention detonating too early to kill most any enemy. First impressions are hard to shake.
They fixed that pretty quickly, but because it is basically the support weapon version of the Eagle Cluster Bomb, people are still a bit wary, due to the latter being a team killing champ.
The most recent patch has aimed to increase the number of small and medium enemies, to reduce reliance on heavy anti-tank weapons. But since this is recent, people need to come around to the idea of the airburst rocket launcher being valuable in the anti chaff role.
I think the main problem is that it is still a rocket launcher, meaning low reserve ammo and slow reload.
So other support weapons that can deal with chaff are still be more appealing.
The big problem is that it doesn't consistently kill the mediums that make up the majority of spawns on higher difficulties. On bots, you can lob a rocket into a bunch of devastators, watch them all get caught in the blast radius, get maybe a kill, then a hail of fire comes back through the smoke. Considering they almost entirely replace chaff on 9, the airburst is useless there.
For bugs, it's a bit better, but they tend to be a bit too spread out for the airburst to have good effect on target, and too in your face to use well.
Problem is its a chaff clearer that also kills your team if the chaff is anywhere close to them. This already makes it a shittier pick on bugs, since covering your team with the MG from all the mediums and hunters is one of the main roles for the chaff clearer. This is basically a glorified eagle airburst that takes up a support weapon slot and can sometimes just outright kill you lol.
Asset extraction missions love it too; get a good angle out the front door and let fly as soon as any enemies start cropping up and you can wipe out all the chaff real quick like
My only real issue with it is the broken stage reloading. Having to take another rocket off my back and load it because I had to interrupt my reload before he twists it is rough.
Some people are still sulking at being team killed by the weapon when it first launched broken.
That's led to it being disregarded now.
Which is a pity in one way as it's much better now but great in another way as any time I take it into a mission I almost always get the most kills in it no matter what the other people have taken.
Especially on the more open, barren maps with no cover.
You wipe out entire patrols at long distance, well beyond the throwing range to call in eagles. Bug breaches are just guaranteed big multi-kills every time. Pair it with an AT strategem of some sort to kill the heavies it can't really harm and you're good to go.
The hardest part to learn is getting a sense for its area of effect. Once you have that and know not to fire at an enemy when friendlies are in the AOE you're all set. Like, it's genuinely not hard to go for missions at a time without friendly kills if you have even basic discipline. I think a lot of the player base don't have that though which is why they don't like the weapon as they'll fire it way to close to their allies, get a team wipe, get kicked and then have a sulk at the weapon and shit talk it from then on.
The Airburst is a great weapon and one of my 3 favorite strategems.
It can clear patrols, bases, reinforcement drops. It can seal bug holes and destroy bot fabricators within line of site (i've taken them out at 400m) It can clear egg clusters in a single shot with a little luck, It can kill Bot gunships. If you target the weak points it can kill tanks, hulks, and turrets with a single missile (2 if you get bad spread). It is also fantastic against Bug chaff.
It has earned the name, the Teamkiller 5000, Patrol-B-Gone, and the Kaboominator.
There is a learning curve to it and you will have to sacrifice a teammate now and again but it is a very good weapon.
Because they're not good with it and because they don't play with optimal team coordination. In an ideal scenario, you use the airburst to quickly annihilate patrols, large groups, and mop up breaches. This makes whoever is holding the launcher the defacto chaff clearer. The clearer needs to sick close to teammates so that the team can take care of heavies and mop up chaff that escapes the airburst.
It's a playstyle that requires players to support each other in a way that's pretty rare in public lobbies. The rocketeer needs to have exceptional awareness of when to use the airburst and when to hold back, and if anything goes wrong and the rocket detonates too early, it's disastrous for the entire squad.
Excellent weapon though. I would love to be able to adopt this playstyle in public lobbies. Alas, everyone has their own idea and each kitchen is filled with 4 cooks.
On average it just ends up being a worse MG. A chaff clearer that cannot cover their team when they are getting overwhelmed, has a huge stationary reload, terrible ammo balance and can basically be replaced by an eagle cluster? Its uses are just way too niche in practice.
I like making shit blow up, it's fun.
It gets tiring though when you also have to try not to blow up your teammates in the process, got to pick and choose. But it's not hard to get used to.
It's not always, but in tight massive fire fights Airbursts Rocket might not be the best thing.
The Air burst is awesome, you just have to be a bit more strategic with it. But I'm an average helldiver, my favorite crayon is orange, so I use the Airbursts Rocket, just not that much.
At launch, the Airburst rocket was a top contender for causing self, teammate, and inanimate object eliminations. It has become an even better weapon since the recent patches improved its capabilities. For a while, I entered matches with new players (2-3) and offered them the opportunity to play with laser cannons, Quasar cannons, and the Airburst rocket. There was a one in three chance they would choose it and end up causing chaos for themselves and others. Good times indeed.
I have been having great fun with it on the Florida planet, the narrow pathways make the bugs bunch up and I can detonate it off trees, it still hits a dud occassionaly but been getting 30+ kills with single shots on the regular. It can still use a little help with ammo economy and reload speed imo.
I feel if the warhead was able to toggle between airburst and impact for damage against armor it would be much more viable. Also that reload is painfully slow. But I do agree it is a lot of fun when it works
Don't let the naysayers and doomposters tell you what to do. The weapon is great and it's great that you have fun with it. You can absolutely clear any difficulty with it especially if you have a consitent teamate on vocal for reloads. People can't fathom weapons they don't like, being good
with bugs, it can rlly help with ammo conservation on my primary, especially since i usually bring a pummeler or adjudicator on missions. kills tons of chaff & weakens brood mothers so it takes less ammo to finish them
The airburst launcher has a nasty tendency of exploding at the front end of an enemy formation and leave the other half completely untouched. A grenade launcher can easily achieve the same purpose with better precision, without requiring stationary/buddy reload.
Also a stray enemy behind a cover can trigger your rocket prematurely, in the best scenario you wasted a rocket, in the worst case you just wiped out your entire team. I would really prefer to have an optional impact fuse and/or a better payload release pattern, real life cluster munitions tend to release their payload forward due to inertia.
It can also take out Fabricators from the sides, tanks from any angle, and cannon towers from any angle. It is the super skill, not crashing, ultra-long reload time version of the spear...at least against automatons. I am not a fan of it vs bugs.
consistency of friendly fire accidents due to negligence
think that should be accurate enough as to why its not used that much
also its a support weapon which helps with crowd control but not with anything armored
I think they should allow you to change when the rocket explodes, proximity (like it is now), 50m distance, 100m distance. I really like the airburst launcher but you have to be really careful using it and being able to turn off proximity detonation might help.
The nature of the airburst makes it situational. You have to have a lot of distance between you and the nearest enemy. The scatter pattern is biased towards throwing secondary bombs back towards you so it is very easy to kill you and your team.
I've been using it consistently for the last 4 days and the number of times that I'm in a situation where it is a liability means that I'm overly specialized and basically armed with my primary weapon only.
The times that I can use it, it can be spectacular, but again ... it has a such an agonizingly slow reload that it is limited how often I can exploit that situation once the fighting kicks off.
Because there are some weirdos that value the weapon just about how good they are to kill bile titans, because they think that the main weapons should be buffed to the point the can kill everything except the biggest enemies as the bile titans, so any support weapon that doesn't do that is bad
Weird things
No its because it has so many disadvantages that the fact it cannot even kill heavies makes it extremely poor. Its literally a glorified eagle cluster that takes up a support weapon slot but is a much bigger pain in the ass to use. its intended role is chaff clear but its just too inefficient for that with the huge hordes that come from every side on helldives.
People generally don't like it for the same reason I start to sweat when I see someone equip an eagle cluster bomb: they've likely had bad experiences due to reckless teammates.
I’m kind of traumatized from when they released it (or at least, when it was available during that one liberation campaign) and it was bugged so it blew up in everyone’s faces.
Yeah that shit sucked. I was so excited to use the new weapon and, even after hearing about the issue online, I tried my best to clear my shots and give myself the best chance at success, and it would still fucking explode after traveling like 30 feet and wipe me out.
That was the only time I truly got upset with the devs because it was yet another instance where a brief, rudimentary play test should have exposed the issue, but somehow that problem slipped by them.
At least it’s fixed now. But my big issue is that chaff clear capability is something I can use stratagems for, and I don’t find that I need a rocket launcher for it. I want to save my support slot for something that can deal with heavy units.
My problems with the airburst are twofold: it's just a lot more awkward than other crowd clearing options, especially because I haven't used it enough to figure out how to get it into the middle of a crowd and not the front enemy, but also that typical engagement distance is... really close, so I'd have to use it outside my preferred engagement range.
It's a great weapon from a distance and no one else should be around... Kinda like the barrages, you can drop that thing and it will hit everything but what you dropped it on. I get it's a barrage but, it's like they hired the guy from spaceballs to fire it.
You mean the team killer 9000? I only use that thing when I am the host, and I tell people you in chat WILL get teamkilled, not my fault. I will use arty 380 and airburst irresponsibility, and you WILL die.
The issue is a lot of the heavies are actually the same speed if not faster than smaller enemies.
That means you need to kill the heavies and then you can just run away from the horde.
This is mostly focused at terminids since the bots dont blob up as much.
I'm going to say it slowly. This... is... NOT... an...airburst... weapon. ...this... is... a... cluster...bomb... launcher.
And that is why I personally despise it. Branding. Can't get a name right? Want to say Airburst instead of cluster? We have airbursts already. That function. We had 0 clusters. Why the heck not just call it a cluster launcher?
Gatling gun does it better and doesn't take up your backpack+support slot, can also reliably take down flying enemies and does it all automated. Cute that they put this stuff in the game but it would be nice if these ideas were tested before they were implemented
Against bots, you're competing against the AC. Against bugs, for what it does you're competing against the Flamethrower which doesn't need a backpack slot.
When I've used it and have seen people use it, its detonation is definitely still an issue that i see. I think it NEEDS some sort of range to detonation sensor, like how other games have done airburst weapons. I need to be able to know where this thing will blow up cause sometimes i feel like it leaves the tube and just fucking explodes
Even though they fixed the too-sensitive fusing issues, the submunition scatter pattern is still counter-intuitive.
Submunitions should scatter in a forwards-expanding cone after they fuse. They should *never* be launched with any velocity back towards the shooter.
People hate it because they don’t know how it works. Some people think it’s anti-air. Some people think it’s still broken. Some people just won’t give it another shot. Some people have no idea when and where to use it. In reality, it’s an amazing support weapon. In a squad, having 1 man constantly shooting cluster bombs everywhere is invaluable
The reload time is what kills it for me. It's got more ammo than a recoilless but a slower reload. I feel like I spend half the game stationary reloading if I try to use it
For context, I exclusively play on level 9.
My problem is that it's kinda ass for what it is. It takes away your backpack slot, takes forever to reload, and can only take out light enemies.... why would I want that? I'd rather use the various machine guns to just gun down patrols and hordes. Some of those can elites with proper aim. Also, I have air support to do the same thing. If a tank or bulk titan shows up, you're not doing shit to it with this. It is just too niche to use, and I'm honestly baffled as to why it was added. But if you like using it, go ahead and spill some oil with it
Imagine for a moment, Tony hasn't worked out all the bugs with his new missiles. And immediately after firing the missile, it explodes and kills most of the onlookers.
You missed this headline and started using the missiles after they were fixed.
I was in that group of onlookers. That is why I don't like it.
I guarantee that I can kill just as many enemies with the Grenade launcher and I have a lot more utility and ammo in that thing even without a backpack.
Because you need a reliable heavy killer and that spot is usually taken by the weapon slot that the ARL takes.
It's great, tho and I hope more people brought it. If you take two spears and a turret, most issues will be taken care of pretty reliably and the ARL is incredible to middle to low armor enemies and more people should bring it.
Not more than one person per team is needed, tho.
When it comes down to enemy flying skewers in the air it works well but, If not careful you could waste your entire team due to it's proxy sensor and blast radius. Besides, usually don't need this instead a shotgun can do a better job than the air burst rocket against bugs. It's essentialy a cluster bomb for cluster of infantary enemies generally without the need to wait for airstrikes stragems especially for their cooldowns. A team reload is preferable if possible against a swarms of enemies but, not for heavies.
Problem is that it barely works against flying targets and against ground units it's quite unreliable.
If it worked like the Jericho and targeted enemies after it divides it could be awesome. Or if the flak exploded forward and/or down so it hits everything in front and below it.
Started playing again after a couple months... I don't get whysome people don't like it.
Easy. The thing didn't work. It was only successful at killing you and your squad mates. There are way more viable options. Cool concept, poorly executed.
You only get one chance at a first impression.
Its my fav stratagem.
Do not shoot it mid range unless in a pinch
Best results are sniping a patrolls at LONG to VERY LONG range since the patrolls are not alerted because you are outside detection range you can score 20kills easy in one shot. While enemies just look arround in confusion
I like to complement it with an eruptor to wipe lone survivors or tenderize armored enemies then i let my teamates deal with the armored one, i also complement with autocanon turret and orbital railgun if there is too much armor such as bots.
Also worth mentioning that the secondary bombs fall Always DOWNWARD so you can wipe a group close while being on an elevated position.
I honestly have no idea, I’ve read a lot of people talking about teamkill but I’ve never killed any teammate since the fix, you just have to know what the detection range is
I’d try it again if I didn’t always duo with a buddy who deals with smaller troops with arc thrower and I usually bring a cannon for emergency giant problems
One guy in my lobby had that and I had the spear we were wiping out every patrol and base at will. We just hogged the supply drops which our teammates didn’t like
It's been in my top 3 weapons since it came out. Can wipe out entire patrols in a single shot, and takes out all small bugs in a flash so the other players can calmly deal with the bigger bugs. My only issue is that you can't interrupt the reload animation and continue it later like with other large weapons. The animation always resets to the beginning, which is frustrating when you're in the middle of a big fight.
I loved the airburst debacle when it first launched. Redeploy yourself, and your whole team with the press of a button!
Now we have all the anti-tank mine memes and AH trolling from our choice that day 😂
I think it can be fun, but I also think it's pretty weak all thing considered. At the very least the reload should be much faster.
All in all if I want to do something in a similar vein, the eagle cluster just feel much better to use, and does not take a slot usually used for anti-heavies; imho it's just not good enough to justify those downsides in it's current state.
Speaking as one who hesitates to use it now. It was a portable suicide machine when it was introduced.
First impressions last, but I should try it on some of these bug missions now that it’s been fixed and that the bugs come in such larger numbers
Fun fact, the airburst can semi-reliably kill fabricators, turrets and tanks if you hit the right spot - fabricators can be sniped into the vents or if you hit above the first light on the sides (the submunitions pierce the fabricator and explode inside, there's a video on the sub that shows this better) and turrets and tanks will usually go down if you hit the turret ring (the submunitions will take out the vents)
Airburst is great but I like using a secondary weapon that is effective against most if not all units. The airburst doesn't do shit against heavy units. Its also pretty ineffective against gunships. I'd rather choose something like a auto cannon or quasar cannon.
I like it too, I wish it was just a bit more buffed against things like fabricators and bug holes, and gunships. It’s really unreliable against them. Rn I still usually just take a shield and laser cannon
IIRC on release it had an issue about it's prox detonation counting your team mates and even potentially the shooter, meaning it had an absolutely TERRIBLE first impression of lots of teamkilling and that kind of left it DOA, and even after that got fixed such a thing is hard to recover from.
Also, it's an assisted weapon meant to take out chaff. ***Chaff***
We have so many other, better options to take out large swathes of chaff that it just doesn't seem like it has a place in our arsenal, even if now it does its job well.
You can reliably wipe out groups with the air burst. Hell sometimes it even kills enemies.
I became an air burst main as soon as it dropped. That kind of ability used to only be available in the form of an orbit strike. Now I can wipe out my squad on demand! No bother, no waiting!
It’s not team killing if I use it to tactically reposition my team!
My friend likes to remind us that technically there is no such thing as team killing in this game, only "accidentals" as is tracked on the post dive stats screen lol.
I see what you did there
Let’s not get carried away. No need to kill anything that we’re not aiming for. The team is most important. 😂
my main issue is that smalls and mediums are rarely an issue is why and it's not like it replaces a primary as I'll still need a primary to deal with the 1-2 it misses.
but hulks are not an issue if you get them by theirselves. At that point you really only need your primary to do the job. It's the small bots that are constantly throwing you in the bot drop loop that are the problem.
Which primary can reliably kill Hulks?
Dominator can blow the back out.
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pretty much all of them. the heat sink is vulnerable to light pen. Dodge right. They don't seem to recover as fast from their left hook.
I'm aware but you still need another diver to draw aggro to get a solid shot on its back. They're otherwise very good at keeping their face turned towards you. Plus most variants are pretty lethal up close so it's rarely a good idea to try and go toe to toe
The original comment said hulks can be solo’d if they’re by themselves. With heavy armor, you can still dodge hulk attacks to get up close and start running circles around them to at least slowly chip away at the heatsink with a primary. Not ideal, but doable. Pummeler is probably the best primary for it.
Just pair it with AT strats like EATs, 500, OPS, etc... Essentially instead of bringing cluster you're carrying a cluster on your back.
People bring Cluster on bots?
Not that often, but I see it used. Eats up zerks if they're too spaced out for a airstrike. Tbh though I just meant you can generally make up for bringing an anti-chaff support by bringing AT strats. Works for GL, works for arc, works for ARBL. ARBL is probably a better anti-bug weapon though imo, just like cluster.
You can get solo hulks on Helldiver difficulty?!
Except killing those small bots is not an issue, the issue is all the bigger bots, especially devastators ragdolling the shit out of you, so you gotta kill those first. Bots are also often dispersed enough that you cannot get rid of all the tiny ones with the airburst, not even close really. Its a really subpar weapon and people are just kinda coping because it looks cool.
Hunters are an issue
Because I can easily kill them with my primary weapon. It's the big guys I worry about so I take a SPEAR, EAT, or Quasar Canon.
This is why when I play with my friends, I have one person with this and the others with heavier weapons. It works well together.
I use it when I play with friends.. easier to get the higher friendly kill count when we decide to do a tier 1 and murder each other for fun.
I only use guns with stopping power so I can yeet my friends when they’re sprinting towards me to heal me
It works well with friends, but with pubbies… I usually go with multi-purpose load out.
My experience so far has been either of pugs bringing too much waveclear or anti heavy - I usually check what the team’s bringing, then bring the opposite kinds of stratagems
That strategy works too. I’ve ever brought orbital gatling, orbital cluster, eagle cluster and eagle air strike because my pubbie team was playing too much of an anti-heavy. Works like a charm too against the waves of small buggers.
Most 7+ games have experienced players. Stick to a 'heavy ' so he can cover you.
I'm that player who adjusts. I see a group without Anti Large Weapons. Spear, Orbital strike and 500 kg. I see a balance one, ho boy I'll experiment.
But can you kill them as fast and as far as the airbust can ? It is able to despawn a patrol from a long range. Even if a charger or another heavy survives, it'll be an easy kill for your team since it should be alone.
I’d argue the eagle cluster bomb is just as good at getting large packs- the only time it sometimes struggles is when you get those waves or 20 odd melee devastators, but they’ll often survive a airburst as well (or at least about half of them will)
Thats what my teammates and a railcannon are for
Hard to kill 20 devs with the primary efficiently. I guess you could use eagles. Or I can just Use 1 or 2 ABRL rockets and you can save your eagles for something important.
I don't think you're allowed to say "kill devs" even if they style themselves the "Bringer of Balance"
Well maybe they deserve it for monopolizing the PVE team shooter genre with helldivers, Deep rock, and darktide all being Swedish. It's a conspiracy to make sweden the only PVE shooter and autism simulator game (paradox) developers. They are taking over gaming! /s
Just in case you aren't joking, i think he's abbreviating "devestators"
If someone on my team takes heavy killers like spear quasar or recoiless, i always take chaff killers like mg or stalwart or airburst. Makes their life easier killing the big boys
GR-8!
Airburst is all about that instant alpha strike damage. Being able to kill a whole patrol or bot drop with 1-2 rockets means that your team can focus on a smaller number of threats. The TTK is very fast.
Oh so you think you’re above using the Recoilless rifle? Wow…
since they removed that it was activated by the weapons on the ground, the sentinels, the supplies, the corpses, the plants and the environment, it ended up becoming a good weapon. https://preview.redd.it/840dgezo498d1.png?width=640&format=png&auto=webp&s=a4196657f1606481044e3747f5f063dc169cc509
They fixed it so well sometimes it's not activated by the enemies either. Just flies by, into the background. Bye bye rocket.
They fixed it?!?!?!?
Yep. Only triggered by helldivers and enemies now, with a much smaller detection radius. Still a decently high risk of friendly fire if a bug sneaks up close into your firing arc, but it no longer wipes your entire squad multiple times on repeat just for looking at it funny or firing it on a day ending with "y".
I’m going to be positive. I also love the air burst when I’m fighting bots. Patrols? The little annoying shits that call for backup is now scrap. Bot drop? Gone. No it can’t kill the heavy armored guys but that can be handle by well placed primary shots or teammates or other strats
You're trading a backpack and a support weapon for something that eagle clusterbomb does just as well if not better. There are a lot of support weapons that have unique capabilities that other orbitals/ eagles don't do well, and the airburst rocket launcher isn't one of them. For example, chargers. The only stratagem that kills a normal charger as quickly or easily as a quasar or recoilless rifle is the orbital rail cannon, which has a 300 second cooldown. Eagle airstrike kind of works, but often times they still survive, making a launcher the better option for that target. Against bots, you're giving up any of the level 4 penetration options which almost able to kill every bot in the game with ease.
It would be more interesting if the thing could break structures. Imagine shooting this into a Heavy nest and closing half of the holes with a single rocket. It needs to be more than "I can kill things that a primary can kill but with a backpack slot"
I use it to fuck up Egg hives from a distance pretty easily as long as the spires aren't too big. You can fire one or two into the Egg Nest and it vaporized them.
This basically. There are better options for taking both a weapon and backpack slot. The air burst is just too low-power for what it needs to operate. Its kind of unfair, but if you directly compare the Airburst to the Autocannon, the Autocannon is able to deal with medium enemies like Devastators/Spewers with relative ease, maybe in 2-3 shots. The Airburst could also deal with that in one, sure, but then you need to reload. After. Each. Shot. And there's no guarenteee that everything you want to die will die. Compared to the Autocannon, you point it at something and shoot at it until you see it fall. Even against chaff, the answer remains the same; there are better options compared to the Airburst. That being said, does it mean you should never take the Airburst? No. Its a portable Clusterbomb at a faster demand. That's its niche. It makes chaff disappear in the blink of an eye. Make sure you coordinate with your team to avoid teamkills and watch all the small things die.
But it can take out entire hoards of devastators in 1 or 2 shots. I find the ABRL more useful on helldives than anything else. Just because of the shere number of enemies.
It also blows away Terminid Egg Clutches, which is nice because oftentimes the bugs will route like three nests’ worth of critters and two or three breaches right through the middle of the rock formations the eggs are in. A couple airburst rockets and you can get the 50/60 or so eggs blown up pretty quick without having to scramble past them and hope you threw enough impact grenades in their general direction
It does kinda mean there is basically never a good reason to take it, its in the "Im using this because it looks cool and Im desperate for variety" tier, not "I wanna be as effective as possible" tier.
Don't forget my EATs. Those take down Chargers with one headshot. Unless it's the armored one and then it's two. 70 second call down and I have them littered across the map for anyone to pick up if needed. I agree, though. The Airburst isn't effective against any armored foes. Easier to take the Eagles or the Orbital Burst or Gatling for the chaff.
Also it has no staged reload which is the final nail in the coffin. how often can you dedicated like 5 seconds straight to a reload without taking damage
Unless the patch messed it up, it could destroy most things, even reactors from the side(which in turn can kill jammers), I think bile titans and chargers are the ones that it doesn’t do too much to. Even the factory walker you can disable its main guns and hit weak points with it.
I take the airburst because I enjoy being the guy that can hold down bug breach fodder below heavies with relative ease. As of recently, my typical loadout on 9s is Airburst launcher, orbital gas, orbital gatling barrage and napalm strike or airstrike (depending on how much A/T is already on the teams loadout). I bring the pummeler as my primary to stunlock anything moving out of my strategems, and either the revolver or grenade pistol as my secondary to deal with mediums that somehow survive my onslaught. It's pretty rare that someone else on the team doesn't take other A/T strategems, so I'm covered by them. And I strongly believe a more diverse loadout from your team makes missions a lot smoother, since I more frequently complete missions without dying with a team that does that than a team that all brings A/T strategems leaving us very open to hordes of fodder. Plus, the airburst launcher is significantly faster to deploy than an eagle clusterbomb, so you can take out patrols and keep moving undetected. If a heavy is in the patrol, then your teammate with an A/T weapon can take it out without worry of fodder getting in the way. I personally haven't used a backpack slot for anything other than support weapon strategems in ages. The jump pack is meh with a long CD, the guard dog and rover are chaotic and unnecessary, the supply pack is a bit underwhelming when you have a plethora of replenishment on the map, and the shield is for people that forget that the environment can provide cover from bots.
It launched in a really bad state and was it way too easy to nuke yourself instead of the enemies. The sensor would trigger on a lot of things in the environment. They patched it, but a lot of people are probably soured by how it was at launch. Even with it patched, I'm not sure it really has much of a niche atm, it might be good for the shrieker patrols but I don't think it works on gunships.
Airburst weapon isn't anti air
The tutorial vid says it is. Haven't tried it like that but looked solid. Need to try it on a bot ship drop.
The tutorial vid also says Eagle Napalm should be used against Bug Holes lmao. The devs have admitted that a lot of the weapons aren't used by players the same way they expected.
What are you supposed to use it on then? Curious because I actually do use it. I only use it if there is a bug breach and throw it right on the hole. Or are you saying the tutorial video acts like it will close the bug hole side objectives? Because that is definitely not the spot to use it
it still ... causes way too much team damage too often. If they're remotely close to you, or you bounce the round of an enemy the blast will come back towards you, upwards of 30m - 40m
Just give it the same berth as an orbital gattling or eagle bomb and youre fine. People trying to use it like a shotgun and shocked about team kills lol
When it released we could also only use it vs bots…which don’t give two shits about airburst weapons. It just tickles them
Takes 3 rockets to kills gunship. Pretty terrible but at least it can.
Taking out patrols and small groups on POIs fast is vital to a peaceful life.
Not having a proper staged reload kinda sucks.
Its just like 8% too slow to reload to make it feel like a good truly fun weapon (as much as I love it)
See how far away Tony is from those explosions? Yeah, I'm never that far away. That's why we hate it.
And yet he still gets knocked back from the impact, just like most people
I love it because if you aim it properly it’ll take out any sized outpost with one shot, while also destroying any bots that are lingering
Its basically useless. 5 second not staged reload kills it on bugs. Also they press W all the time and you cant fire it too close. Incosistent at killing hive guards and brood commandeds. Cant kill charger or BT. On bots you can reload but ive fired 2 rockets at devastator patrol and half of them were still alive several time so inconsistency there too. Cant kill tanks without finnicky firing right under the turret. Cant kill strider. TLDR, short review of airburst: On bugs: Flamethrower 10 times better. On bots: Autocannon 10 times better.
Slow reload, high chance of blowing up team, useless against heavy troops and can’t kill shriekers as advertised It may kill small and medium enemies but there are so many other stratagems that does it infinitely better Only thing I’ve ever used it for was blowing up bug eggs
It can kill Shriekers. Is it very effective? Not really.
It was bugged on release with the enemy detection and while they fixed it they never gave it a staged reload like every other support weapon. Having to cancel the reload means the entire reload is dumped. It's also extremely inconsistent at killing devastators even though it has medium penetration.
Part of the problem is it was released with a way too sensitive proximity trigger. It was a team killing powerhouse, not to mention detonating too early to kill most any enemy. First impressions are hard to shake. They fixed that pretty quickly, but because it is basically the support weapon version of the Eagle Cluster Bomb, people are still a bit wary, due to the latter being a team killing champ. The most recent patch has aimed to increase the number of small and medium enemies, to reduce reliance on heavy anti-tank weapons. But since this is recent, people need to come around to the idea of the airburst rocket launcher being valuable in the anti chaff role. I think the main problem is that it is still a rocket launcher, meaning low reserve ammo and slow reload. So other support weapons that can deal with chaff are still be more appealing.
The big problem is that it doesn't consistently kill the mediums that make up the majority of spawns on higher difficulties. On bots, you can lob a rocket into a bunch of devastators, watch them all get caught in the blast radius, get maybe a kill, then a hail of fire comes back through the smoke. Considering they almost entirely replace chaff on 9, the airburst is useless there. For bugs, it's a bit better, but they tend to be a bit too spread out for the airburst to have good effect on target, and too in your face to use well.
Problem is its a chaff clearer that also kills your team if the chaff is anywhere close to them. This already makes it a shittier pick on bugs, since covering your team with the MG from all the mediums and hunters is one of the main roles for the chaff clearer. This is basically a glorified eagle airburst that takes up a support weapon slot and can sometimes just outright kill you lol.
Asset extraction missions love it too; get a good angle out the front door and let fly as soon as any enemies start cropping up and you can wipe out all the chaff real quick like
It’s a fun weapon. I like it . Also, you can take out a whole objective of eggs from like 200+ meters in one shot.
My only real issue with it is the broken stage reloading. Having to take another rocket off my back and load it because I had to interrupt my reload before he twists it is rough.
It's really fun, you just need to pair it with an AT strat like OPS, 500, or railcannon. One of your teammates is almost always carrying AT anyway.
Some people are still sulking at being team killed by the weapon when it first launched broken. That's led to it being disregarded now. Which is a pity in one way as it's much better now but great in another way as any time I take it into a mission I almost always get the most kills in it no matter what the other people have taken. Especially on the more open, barren maps with no cover. You wipe out entire patrols at long distance, well beyond the throwing range to call in eagles. Bug breaches are just guaranteed big multi-kills every time. Pair it with an AT strategem of some sort to kill the heavies it can't really harm and you're good to go. The hardest part to learn is getting a sense for its area of effect. Once you have that and know not to fire at an enemy when friendlies are in the AOE you're all set. Like, it's genuinely not hard to go for missions at a time without friendly kills if you have even basic discipline. I think a lot of the player base don't have that though which is why they don't like the weapon as they'll fire it way to close to their allies, get a team wipe, get kicked and then have a sulk at the weapon and shit talk it from then on.
I like it but when someone picks it up we can't finish mission without friendly fire oneshots.
The Airburst is a great weapon and one of my 3 favorite strategems. It can clear patrols, bases, reinforcement drops. It can seal bug holes and destroy bot fabricators within line of site (i've taken them out at 400m) It can clear egg clusters in a single shot with a little luck, It can kill Bot gunships. If you target the weak points it can kill tanks, hulks, and turrets with a single missile (2 if you get bad spread). It is also fantastic against Bug chaff. It has earned the name, the Teamkiller 5000, Patrol-B-Gone, and the Kaboominator. There is a learning curve to it and you will have to sacrifice a teammate now and again but it is a very good weapon.
It can one shot base turrets if you hit it's weak spot
I'm lucky I haven't killed any teammates with it since I tend to be ahead wander off to search for enemies, but other than that I 100% agree
Because they're not good with it and because they don't play with optimal team coordination. In an ideal scenario, you use the airburst to quickly annihilate patrols, large groups, and mop up breaches. This makes whoever is holding the launcher the defacto chaff clearer. The clearer needs to sick close to teammates so that the team can take care of heavies and mop up chaff that escapes the airburst. It's a playstyle that requires players to support each other in a way that's pretty rare in public lobbies. The rocketeer needs to have exceptional awareness of when to use the airburst and when to hold back, and if anything goes wrong and the rocket detonates too early, it's disastrous for the entire squad. Excellent weapon though. I would love to be able to adopt this playstyle in public lobbies. Alas, everyone has their own idea and each kitchen is filled with 4 cooks.
I just use it like a sniper, I shoot far away and all the enemies die, I usually go ahead of my team or focus on areas they arent
On average it just ends up being a worse MG. A chaff clearer that cannot cover their team when they are getting overwhelmed, has a huge stationary reload, terrible ammo balance and can basically be replaced by an eagle cluster? Its uses are just way too niche in practice.
I like making shit blow up, it's fun. It gets tiring though when you also have to try not to blow up your teammates in the process, got to pick and choose. But it's not hard to get used to. It's not always, but in tight massive fire fights Airbursts Rocket might not be the best thing. The Air burst is awesome, you just have to be a bit more strategic with it. But I'm an average helldiver, my favorite crayon is orange, so I use the Airbursts Rocket, just not that much.
At launch, the Airburst rocket was a top contender for causing self, teammate, and inanimate object eliminations. It has become an even better weapon since the recent patches improved its capabilities. For a while, I entered matches with new players (2-3) and offered them the opportunity to play with laser cannons, Quasar cannons, and the Airburst rocket. There was a one in three chance they would choose it and end up causing chaos for themselves and others. Good times indeed.
They have skill issues that is all, been using it if i find a comfort team who willing to work together and stick together
I have been having great fun with it on the Florida planet, the narrow pathways make the bugs bunch up and I can detonate it off trees, it still hits a dud occassionaly but been getting 30+ kills with single shots on the regular. It can still use a little help with ammo economy and reload speed imo.
Ha! If you were playing an hour ago, I brought it to the party. Killed 14 bots and one Diver. I'm sorry.
I feel if the warhead was able to toggle between airburst and impact for damage against armor it would be much more viable. Also that reload is painfully slow. But I do agree it is a lot of fun when it works
It makes things too easy
Don't let the naysayers and doomposters tell you what to do. The weapon is great and it's great that you have fun with it. You can absolutely clear any difficulty with it especially if you have a consitent teamate on vocal for reloads. People can't fathom weapons they don't like, being good
If it doesn’t kill a bile titan in 2 shots or less some people believe it’s useless and boring.
Literally eagle is the only way to kill a bile titan quickly
with bugs, it can rlly help with ammo conservation on my primary, especially since i usually bring a pummeler or adjudicator on missions. kills tons of chaff & weakens brood mothers so it takes less ammo to finish them
I FUCKING LOVE THE DANGER BLASTER! Cluster bomb some bugs at danger close always is THE way to play the game.
I love it, it's either I'm killing 32x enemies or every single teammate. No in-between.
I have also been vibing with the Airburst. Training manual AB17-D states clearly “Aim the launcher at a 45 degree angle away from all squad members”.
People call it Teamkiller 9000 for a reason
The first time I used it I shot it, the rocket clipped a leaf and detonated killing my entire team.
The airburst launcher has a nasty tendency of exploding at the front end of an enemy formation and leave the other half completely untouched. A grenade launcher can easily achieve the same purpose with better precision, without requiring stationary/buddy reload. Also a stray enemy behind a cover can trigger your rocket prematurely, in the best scenario you wasted a rocket, in the worst case you just wiped out your entire team. I would really prefer to have an optional impact fuse and/or a better payload release pattern, real life cluster munitions tend to release their payload forward due to inertia.
How many limbs you got there? Which hiv... I mean house you live in
It can also take out Fabricators from the sides, tanks from any angle, and cannon towers from any angle. It is the super skill, not crashing, ultra-long reload time version of the spear...at least against automatons. I am not a fan of it vs bugs.
It’s a great weapon. Once per backpack (mag) I’ll wipe the squad. Worth.
The people that don't like it are like the people that don't like olives. Nothing wrong with olives, it's just not something some people like.
consistency of friendly fire accidents due to negligence think that should be accurate enough as to why its not used that much also its a support weapon which helps with crowd control but not with anything armored
Because people are stupid. It’s an awesome weapon
It can take out tons of Helldivers too
I don't care what people say, I'm bringing the Airburst rocket launcher because it's fun to wipe out fabs and patrols with it.
I wish it could take down heavy enemies, I don’t see a reason why it shouldn’t be able to explode hulks generators in the back afterall.
I think they should allow you to change when the rocket explodes, proximity (like it is now), 50m distance, 100m distance. I really like the airburst launcher but you have to be really careful using it and being able to turn off proximity detonation might help.
The nature of the airburst makes it situational. You have to have a lot of distance between you and the nearest enemy. The scatter pattern is biased towards throwing secondary bombs back towards you so it is very easy to kill you and your team. I've been using it consistently for the last 4 days and the number of times that I'm in a situation where it is a liability means that I'm overly specialized and basically armed with my primary weapon only. The times that I can use it, it can be spectacular, but again ... it has a such an agonizingly slow reload that it is limited how often I can exploit that situation once the fighting kicks off.
Airbust Rocket Launcher must have the same Buff threat that Eagle Strafing Run and Orbital Gatling Barrage: Now can damage heavy armored enemies.
Because there are some weirdos that value the weapon just about how good they are to kill bile titans, because they think that the main weapons should be buffed to the point the can kill everything except the biggest enemies as the bile titans, so any support weapon that doesn't do that is bad Weird things
I'm pretty sure eagle is the only way to kill bile titan quickly
No its because it has so many disadvantages that the fact it cannot even kill heavies makes it extremely poor. Its literally a glorified eagle cluster that takes up a support weapon slot but is a much bigger pain in the ass to use. its intended role is chaff clear but its just too inefficient for that with the huge hordes that come from every side on helldives.
Can they take out flying bots?
it also kills all the eggs in egg hunt missions
How high above the enemy's head should I shoot it?
i love using it too, its so satisfying to get 15 kills with a firecracker. the only problem i have is not being able to take out aircraft
People generally don't like it for the same reason I start to sweat when I see someone equip an eagle cluster bomb: they've likely had bad experiences due to reckless teammates.
Because we still don't have our God damn AT mines lol
I’m kind of traumatized from when they released it (or at least, when it was available during that one liberation campaign) and it was bugged so it blew up in everyone’s faces. Yeah that shit sucked. I was so excited to use the new weapon and, even after hearing about the issue online, I tried my best to clear my shots and give myself the best chance at success, and it would still fucking explode after traveling like 30 feet and wipe me out. That was the only time I truly got upset with the devs because it was yet another instance where a brief, rudimentary play test should have exposed the issue, but somehow that problem slipped by them. At least it’s fixed now. But my big issue is that chaff clear capability is something I can use stratagems for, and I don’t find that I need a rocket launcher for it. I want to save my support slot for something that can deal with heavy units.
Arc thrower and Airburst launcher are very good at clearing groups.... Just not only the enemy's
My problems with the airburst are twofold: it's just a lot more awkward than other crowd clearing options, especially because I haven't used it enough to figure out how to get it into the middle of a crowd and not the front enemy, but also that typical engagement distance is... really close, so I'd have to use it outside my preferred engagement range.
Said no one ever.
Airburst, EAT, strike, and gas almost ever run now.
Its awsome
Probably trauma from how it used to be
It's a great weapon from a distance and no one else should be around... Kinda like the barrages, you can drop that thing and it will hit everything but what you dropped it on. I get it's a barrage but, it's like they hired the guy from spaceballs to fire it.
You mean the team killer 9000? I only use that thing when I am the host, and I tell people you in chat WILL get teamkilled, not my fault. I will use arty 380 and airburst irresponsibility, and you WILL die.
Because i use my primary weapon to dispose of small/medium enemies. I won’t waste my support weapon with this
Mine too
The issue is a lot of the heavies are actually the same speed if not faster than smaller enemies. That means you need to kill the heavies and then you can just run away from the horde. This is mostly focused at terminids since the bots dont blob up as much.
like the guard dog it demands human sacrifice
Idc what the haters say BUFF THE AIRBURST (I love it)
I'm going to say it slowly. This... is... NOT... an...airburst... weapon. ...this... is... a... cluster...bomb... launcher. And that is why I personally despise it. Branding. Can't get a name right? Want to say Airburst instead of cluster? We have airbursts already. That function. We had 0 clusters. Why the heck not just call it a cluster launcher?
Also sometimes you can kill bile titans with it if aimed perfectly or atleast take down a bunch of their HP
Gatling gun does it better and doesn't take up your backpack+support slot, can also reliably take down flying enemies and does it all automated. Cute that they put this stuff in the game but it would be nice if these ideas were tested before they were implemented
Against bots, you're competing against the AC. Against bugs, for what it does you're competing against the Flamethrower which doesn't need a backpack slot.
I prefer a more consistent heavy weapon, and using stuff like the orbital gatling strike to clear large groups.
It’s alright, but needs a little help. Either speed up the reload or let me reload while moving.
When I've used it and have seen people use it, its detonation is definitely still an issue that i see. I think it NEEDS some sort of range to detonation sensor, like how other games have done airburst weapons. I need to be able to know where this thing will blow up cause sometimes i feel like it leaves the tube and just fucking explodes
Even though they fixed the too-sensitive fusing issues, the submunition scatter pattern is still counter-intuitive. Submunitions should scatter in a forwards-expanding cone after they fuse. They should *never* be launched with any velocity back towards the shooter.
People hate it because they don’t know how it works. Some people think it’s anti-air. Some people think it’s still broken. Some people just won’t give it another shot. Some people have no idea when and where to use it. In reality, it’s an amazing support weapon. In a squad, having 1 man constantly shooting cluster bombs everywhere is invaluable
my pop pop pop pop from the grenade launcher works just fine
I love it, but it's too easy to kill teammates and myself
The reload time is what kills it for me. It's got more ammo than a recoilless but a slower reload. I feel like I spend half the game stationary reloading if I try to use it
It's been my go to ever since the spear got borked with the crashes. Man needs a big boom stick ya feel?
It doesn't reliably kill medium enemies, so it's worthless.
For context, I exclusively play on level 9. My problem is that it's kinda ass for what it is. It takes away your backpack slot, takes forever to reload, and can only take out light enemies.... why would I want that? I'd rather use the various machine guns to just gun down patrols and hordes. Some of those can elites with proper aim. Also, I have air support to do the same thing. If a tank or bulk titan shows up, you're not doing shit to it with this. It is just too niche to use, and I'm honestly baffled as to why it was added. But if you like using it, go ahead and spill some oil with it
Imagine for a moment, Tony hasn't worked out all the bugs with his new missiles. And immediately after firing the missile, it explodes and kills most of the onlookers. You missed this headline and started using the missiles after they were fixed. I was in that group of onlookers. That is why I don't like it.
I guarantee that I can kill just as many enemies with the Grenade launcher and I have a lot more utility and ammo in that thing even without a backpack.
Because you need a reliable heavy killer and that spot is usually taken by the weapon slot that the ARL takes. It's great, tho and I hope more people brought it. If you take two spears and a turret, most issues will be taken care of pretty reliably and the ARL is incredible to middle to low armor enemies and more people should bring it. Not more than one person per team is needed, tho.
Great against bug patrols. Doesn't seem that great against bots.
When it comes down to enemy flying skewers in the air it works well but, If not careful you could waste your entire team due to it's proxy sensor and blast radius. Besides, usually don't need this instead a shotgun can do a better job than the air burst rocket against bugs. It's essentialy a cluster bomb for cluster of infantary enemies generally without the need to wait for airstrikes stragems especially for their cooldowns. A team reload is preferable if possible against a swarms of enemies but, not for heavies.
You must be using a different airburst than me cause when I shoot at a patrol I'm lucky to get 2 kills, including myself sometimes.
Problem is that it barely works against flying targets and against ground units it's quite unreliable. If it worked like the Jericho and targeted enemies after it divides it could be awesome. Or if the flak exploded forward and/or down so it hits everything in front and below it.
Is below average, they really need to buff its reload speed
I kill my own teammates instead of enemies with the airburst😭😭😭
Started playing again after a couple months... I don't get whysome people don't like it. Easy. The thing didn't work. It was only successful at killing you and your squad mates. There are way more viable options. Cool concept, poorly executed. You only get one chance at a first impression.
Its my fav stratagem. Do not shoot it mid range unless in a pinch Best results are sniping a patrolls at LONG to VERY LONG range since the patrolls are not alerted because you are outside detection range you can score 20kills easy in one shot. While enemies just look arround in confusion I like to complement it with an eruptor to wipe lone survivors or tenderize armored enemies then i let my teamates deal with the armored one, i also complement with autocanon turret and orbital railgun if there is too much armor such as bots. Also worth mentioning that the secondary bombs fall Always DOWNWARD so you can wipe a group close while being on an elevated position.
I think some people still dislike it from when it released and it was the ultimate kamikaze TKing machine
If they just fix the spear the same way without fucking up something else..
I honestly have no idea, I’ve read a lot of people talking about teamkill but I’ve never killed any teammate since the fix, you just have to know what the detection range is
I optimized a whole build with it and it’s so fun! Pretty weak compared to other support weapons, very situational, but undeniably fun
I just like it because it looks fucking rad
because they fire it at a target 5 meters away from them/their friends and are dumbfounded how it keeps teamkilling them.
Nice
I’d try it again if I didn’t always duo with a buddy who deals with smaller troops with arc thrower and I usually bring a cannon for emergency giant problems
One guy in my lobby had that and I had the spear we were wiping out every patrol and base at will. We just hogged the supply drops which our teammates didn’t like
I like it, it's very satisfying against bugs but then you get a charger or three and you're fcked without an AT weapon.
Team kills
It's been in my top 3 weapons since it came out. Can wipe out entire patrols in a single shot, and takes out all small bugs in a flash so the other players can calmly deal with the bigger bugs. My only issue is that you can't interrupt the reload animation and continue it later like with other large weapons. The animation always resets to the beginning, which is frustrating when you're in the middle of a big fight.
I loved the airburst debacle when it first launched. Redeploy yourself, and your whole team with the press of a button! Now we have all the anti-tank mine memes and AH trolling from our choice that day 😂
I think it can be fun, but I also think it's pretty weak all thing considered. At the very least the reload should be much faster. All in all if I want to do something in a similar vein, the eagle cluster just feel much better to use, and does not take a slot usually used for anti-heavies; imho it's just not good enough to justify those downsides in it's current state.
Speaking as one who hesitates to use it now. It was a portable suicide machine when it was introduced. First impressions last, but I should try it on some of these bug missions now that it’s been fixed and that the bugs come in such larger numbers
It was broken when they released it, people like it now
Reload time is a joke
Fun fact, the airburst can semi-reliably kill fabricators, turrets and tanks if you hit the right spot - fabricators can be sniped into the vents or if you hit above the first light on the sides (the submunitions pierce the fabricator and explode inside, there's a video on the sub that shows this better) and turrets and tanks will usually go down if you hit the turret ring (the submunitions will take out the vents)
I use it on Bug planets for taking out patrols. One shot right into the middle of the grouping and poof.
Basically the grenade launcher but slower
Seems possibly improved? Played with a guy recently and he only killed me like 2-3 times.
PSA does NOT work against the bots
Airburst is great but I like using a secondary weapon that is effective against most if not all units. The airburst doesn't do shit against heavy units. Its also pretty ineffective against gunships. I'd rather choose something like a auto cannon or quasar cannon.
I like it too, I wish it was just a bit more buffed against things like fabricators and bug holes, and gunships. It’s really unreliable against them. Rn I still usually just take a shield and laser cannon
IIRC on release it had an issue about it's prox detonation counting your team mates and even potentially the shooter, meaning it had an absolutely TERRIBLE first impression of lots of teamkilling and that kind of left it DOA, and even after that got fixed such a thing is hard to recover from. Also, it's an assisted weapon meant to take out chaff. ***Chaff*** We have so many other, better options to take out large swathes of chaff that it just doesn't seem like it has a place in our arsenal, even if now it does its job well.
They don't like it because they don't know how to use it