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--- helldivers_2_guide [2026/10/19 08:19] – ultracomfy
+++ helldivers_2_guide [2026/10/19 09:18] (current) – ultracomfy
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 Dive + Stim\\
-Dive + Stim is the only reason Helldivers are feared. This seemingly inoccuous move is what makes a Helldiver scary. Use it. Dive. Dive for your life. When it says "Dive, dive again. And again. And again.", this is what that means. "Helldivers" means using your <key>Alt</key> key, diving like hell. It's **not** being sent onto hellish planets. Stimming alone is already useful, but on the field you will quickly realize that enemies often tend to interrupt you before the stim becomes active, and you will die. You can not die by pressing <key>Alt</key> and //then// stimming.
+Dive + Stim is the only reason Helldivers are feared. This seemingly inoccuous move is what makes a Helldiver scary. Use it. Dive. Dive for your life. When it says "Dive, dive again. And again. And again.", this is what that means. "Helldivers" means using your <key>Alt</key> key, diving like hell. It's **not** about being sent onto hellish planets. Stimming alone is already useful, but on the field you will quickly realize that enemies often tend to interrupt you before the stim becomes active, and you will die. You can not die by pressing <key>Alt</key> and //then// stimming.
 ==== 1.3 Survivability ====
-So, what's the problem? You use stims all the time and you understand how powerful stims are. You understand how this works. But you still keep dying. Obviously, it's not that easy, right? Yes, you're right. It's not that easy. Stims are one half of the formula, but we spend most of our time in the game //not// actively getting the effects of stims. If we had permanent stim-like effects, this game would be very, very boring. With the limitation being as it is, we need to think about what to do //before// stimming. We don't need stims all the time, but the situation can change from "I'm fine, I don't need to use a stim" to "I need a stim //right now//" extremely rapidly, sometimes in the blink of an eye. Sometimes, with the wrong strategies and loadout, it can change faster than the game allows you to stim at all. The goal is to extend the amount of time we get to stim, and to stretch out the amount of time we need //between// stimmings. We need to have a conversation about survivability.
+So, what's the problem? You use stims all the time and you understand how powerful stims are, but you still keep dying. Obviously, it's not that easy, right? Yes, you're right. It's not that easy. Stims are one half of the formula, but we spend most of our time in the game //not// actively getting the effects of stims. If we had permanent stim-like effects, this game would be very, very boring. With the limitation being as it is, we need to think about what to do //before// stimming. We don't need stims all the time, but the situation can change from "I'm fine, I don't need to use a stim" to "I need a stim //right now//" extremely rapidly, sometimes in the blink of an eye. Sometimes, with the wrong strategies and loadout, it can change faster than the game allows you to stim at all. The goal is to extend the amount of time we get to stim, and to stretch out the amount of time we need //between// stimmings. Or in other words: Survivability.
-Survivability, simply put, is the ability of our diver to resist dying. This is more than just the amount of hitpoints our player character gets, and the amount of damage resistance they have. It's about the ability to avoid damage in the first place, it's about damage mitigation of all kinds. The easiest way to do that would be to run heavy armor and, honestly, as a beginner you probably should. Armor rating is the one easiest way to give yourself more time to stim and to avoid bullshit deaths((I'm talking to you, contact mines.)). However, there is more to it. Mobility is directly linked to survivability, as mobility allows you to just, well, run away from your damage. An easy example here is the jump pack, which serves as an easy "peace out" for 90% of scary situations (if used correctly, mistakes happen).
+Survivability, simply put, is the ability of our diver to resist dying. This is more than just the amount of hitpoints our player character gets, and the amount of damage resistance they have. It's about the ability to avoid damage in the first place, it's about damage mitigation of all kinds. The easiest way to do that would be to run heavy armor and, honestly, as a beginner you probably should. Armor rating is the one easiest way to give yourself more time to stim and to avoid bullshit deaths (I'm talking to you, contact mines). However, there is more to it. Mobility is directly linked to survivability, as mobility allows you to just, well, run away from your damage. An easy example here is the jump pack, which serves as an easy "peace out" for 90% of scary situations (if used correctly, mistakes happen).
-Survivability also means your ability to take a hit in the first place - stay at max health. Being at reduced health is an idea for stim conservation - which is great if you know how the game works and have things under control, but it essentially means that you can take one or two less hits before death; a lot of time in Helldivers terms: If a hit takes an enemy 0.2 seconds, that's 0.2 seconds less you get to react to a hit you didn't see coming. And it also means that some hits that don't ordinarily oneshot you //WILL// now oneshot you. Stay. At. Max. Health. You can learn damage [[damage breakpoint|breakpoints]] later.
+Survivability also means your ability to take a hit in the first place. If you aren't at full health, it will take less hits to kill you, which means you have less time to stim. The only reason you'd ever try to not be at full health is stim conservation, which is great if you know how the game works and have things under control. But, for a beginner, stim conservation often ends up costing lives, which tend to be more expensive than just taking a supply pack. Helldivers is largely designed around Helldivers at full health, and most enemy combos leave you with just a sliver of health if you dive out of them correctly. This does not work when you begin the encounter at already reduced health.
-Helldivers 2 gives you all kinds of options to increase your survivability. Take a jump pack. Bring a shield generator. A walker. Bring a gun that stuns/staggers enemies. Bring heavy armor. Bring medic armor (+2 stims & +2 stim effect duration) Bring crowd control weapons. Bring a sentry. Keep your stims stocked, loot stims from POIs, learn what POIs look like and where to find stims. Heck, bring a fucking Supply Backpack for a virtually infinite supply of stims.
-Additionally, use your Eagle and Super Destroyer support mid-fight. The cool thing about Dive + Stim is that it makes you invincible for multiple seconds, so you can Dive + Stim and then just stay on the ground to take your sweet ass time to punch in a stratagem code. //Nothing will kill you while you're stimmed.// Dive + Stim + Reinforce. Dive + Stim + Eagle 500. Dive + Stim + Laser. Nothing can bring you down, especially if your stim duration is longer with the medic armor. There can be 20 bugs behind you that will dogpile onto you during a Dive + Stim + Eagle 500 - but what are they gonna do about you? The entire horde of bugs can keep hammering into you until they're old and grey - as long as you're stimmed, you are invincible. And if you call in the Eagle 500, they will be dead before your stims run out((Throw the 500kg at your feet, not towards the enemies. When you run away, the enemies will follow you, so you need to throw the 500kg to where the enemies will be, not to where they are. If you throw the 500kg at your feet, you should run about 30 meters until the 500kg lands, which is the perfect distance to have.)). The alternative here is Jump Pack + (maybe) Stim + Stratagem. Hover Pack + (maybe) Stim + Stratagem. While midair you're unlikely to get hit, so that's a perfect opportunity to punch in a stratagem.
+Outside of maneuvering (diving) better and using stims, Helldivers 2 gives you all kinds of additional tools to increase your survivability. You can take a jump pack. Bring a shield generator. A walker. Bring a gun that stuns/staggers enemies (Slugger). Bring heavy armor. Bring medic armor (+2 stims & +2s stim effect duration). Bring crowd control weapons. Bring a sentry. Keep your stims stocked, loot stims from POIs, learn what POIs look like and where to find stims. Heck, bring a Supply Backpack for a virtually infinite supply of stims.
+Additionally, use your Eagle and Super Destroyer support mid-fight. The cool thing about Dive + Stim is that it makes you invincible for multiple seconds (you already know this), so you can Dive + Stim and then just stay on the ground to take your sweet ass time to punch in a stratagem code. //Nothing will kill you while you're stimmed//. You can Dive + Stim + Reinforce. Dive + Stim + Eagle 500. Dive + Stim + Laser. Nothing can bring you down, especially if your stim duration is longer with the medic armor. There can be 20 bugs behind you that will dogpile onto you during a Dive + Stim + Eagle 500 - but what are they gonna do about you? The entire horde of bugs can keep hammering into you until they're old and grey - as long as you're stimmed, you are invincible. And if you call in the Eagle 500, they will be dead before your stims run out((Throw the 500kg at your feet, not towards the enemies. When you run away, the enemies will follow you, so you need to throw the 500kg to where the enemies will be, not to where they are. If you throw the 500kg at your feet, you should run about 30 meters until the 500kg lands, which is the perfect distance to have.)).
+The alternative here is Jump Pack + (maybe) Stim + Stratagem, or alternatively (if you prefer) Hover Pack + (maybe) Stim + Stratagem. While midair you're unlikely to get hit, so that's a perfect opportunity to punch in a stratagem.
 <wrap em>**If you're gonna learn anything at all from what I'm writing here, it's this:**</wrap>\\
@@ Line 54: / Line 57: @@
 ===== 2. Objectives =====
 ==== 2.1 Helldivers is actually about objectives ====
+Well. Maybe I've been lying a little bit. Maybe Helldivers isn't //just// about staying alive. It is true, your absolute priority in Helldivers should always be to stay alive, but if that's the only thing you do then you'll never actually get anything done. The truth is that Helldivers 2 is a walking and terminal simulator, with the occasional enemy encounter thrown in. Yes, the first and most important realization of a Helldivers player should be the absolute brokenness of stims, //but// up there on the list is //also// the realization that nobody is standing to gain from a dead enemy (except on certain mission types). There is no inherent value to killing an enemy. When you kill an enemy, you should do it to increase your survivability. Maybe you want to go somewhere and you would die doing so if the enemy was left alive. Maybe you want to work on a terminal and you'd die if you left that enemy alive. Either way, it's about giving yourself room, not about the dead enemy.
-Well. Maybe I've been lying a little bit. Maybe Helldivers isn't //just// about staying alive. It is true, your absolute priority in Helldivers should always be to stay alive, but if that's the only thing you do then you'll never actually get anything done. The truth is that Helldivers 2 is a walking and terminal simulator, with the occasional enemy encounter thrown in. The first and most important realization of a Helldiver player should be the absolute brokenness of stims, but up there on the list is //also// the realization that nobody is standing to gain from a dead enemy (except on certain mission types). There is no inherent value to killing an enemy. There is, or at least there should be, an ulterior motive behind the killing of an enemy. Maybe you want to go somewhere and you would die doing so if the enemy was left alive. Maybe you want to work on a terminal and you'd die if you left that enemy alive. Either way, it's about giving yourself room, not about the dead enemy.
 <WRAP right box>
 {{ ::haywood_jablomey_quote.png?nolink |}}\\
 If you don't believe me, take it from this guy.\\
-He's only the best Helldivers player on Earth.
+He's only the best Helldivers player on Super Earth.
 </WRAP>
@@ Line 66: / Line 68: @@
 When a helldiver is walking towards and objective, there is almost never a need to address enemies on their path. Enemy breaches or drops generally do not need to be addressed, they are a waste of lives and resources. New players waste most of the team's reinforcement budget on fighting enemies they never needed to address.
+<WRAP center round tip 60%>
+This is particularly true of breaches //at// objectives when the objective is cleared during the breach. Players have this weird fixation on killing enemies until a breach is ended, even though the moment the objective is cleared it is possible to just disengage and move on. While teammates like this are useful on the objective (because they are quite good at giving me room to work on the objective), they stop being useful as soon as the objective is complete. Too many times I've transferred across the whole map wanting to work on the next objective, while seeing my teammates still on the other end of the map dying to and wasting lives on the bug breach that has been going on for the last five minutes - at a **completed** objective.
+</WRAP>
 ==== 2.2 When you are NOT on an objective ====
-**Anytime you are not on an objective**, your first priority is to pick a direction towards an objective. You should //always// know where to go next. Once that is established, go there. Ignore bug breaches or drop ships. If there is an enemy on your way towards an objective, push it out. If there's multiple, it might be worth to just take a small detour. You have places to be, you can reach your objective without engaging with these enemies. Funnily, most enemies will literally just let you walk past them. If you're scared, you can dive past them as well. As long as you walk past them with a bit of confidence, enemies will probably not hit you (with some Illuminate exceptions).
+Literally **any time you are not on an objective**, your first priority is to pick a direction towards an objective. You should //always// know where to go next. Once that is established, go there. Ignore bug breaches or drop ships. If there is an enemy on your way towards an objective, push it out. If there are multiple, it might be worth to just take a small detour. You have places to be, you can reach your objective without engaging with these enemies.
+Funnily, most enemies will literally just let you sprint past them. If you're scared, you can dive past them as well. As long as you walk past them with a bit of confidence, enemies will probably not hit you (with some Illuminate exceptions).
-Generally, if you're at A but you need to be at B, why fight enemies at A? Just go to B. And B can be whatever. It can be the next mission objective, it can be a shiny, a side objective, whatever. It is important to have a B. As a Helldiver, there is no dawdling around, you always have somewhere to be next. Once you reach B, you will work on the objective and the second the objective is completed, you should already have a new B to go to. Don't fall asleep.
+Generally, if you're at A but you need to be at B, why fight enemies at A? Just go to B. And, for your info, B can be whatever. It can be the next mission objective, it can be a shiny, a side objective, whatever. It is important to have a B. As a Helldiver, there is no dawdling around, you always have somewhere to be next. Once you reach B, you will work on the objective and by the time the objective is completed, you should already have decided on where to go next (B). Don't fall asleep, and don't think that there's any reason to stop for an enemy if you just want to go to B. I will be using the term B a lot here.
 ==== 2.3 When you ARE on an objective ====
-So, **anytime you are on an objective**, it is actually just the same stuff. Where you are is A, the next step of the objective is B. Say, the objective requires you to work on the terminal first, then that terminal is B. Push your way towards that terminal, push enemies out of your way to the terminal, then push enemies away from the terminal, but only for as long as you need to work on it. If it then asks you to turn valves, push enemies out of your path towards the valves. Ignore enemies not on your path to a valve. If the objective then asks you to come back to the terminal, push enemies out of your way towards the terminal. At any time in Helldivers, you are just creating small holes that allow you to slip through between enemies and towards the places you want to go. You don't need to kill all the enemies around a shiny, you only need to kill all enemies that can get to the shiny in less than 3 seconds, as that's the amount of time you need to loot it. Any enemy further than 3 seconds away from the shiny is irrelevant to you. Any enemy further than 5 seconds away from a valve is irrelevant to you, unless the enemy is between you and the valve. As soon as you have completed all the steps for an objective, decide where to go next. Set a new B, carve your way towards it - everything else is distraction. This is to 90% the reason why teams leave players behind, as more knowledgeable players don't want to spend 5 minutes or more of their time fighting a bug breach they already know is pointless to fight, draining resources, reinforcements, time and their nerves. They would rather actually be productive, so they're just gonna carve paths on their own((Interestingly, it is //this// being left alone with enemies that first forced me to find directions on my own and start carving paths instead of just fighting every enemy I saw. I was good //enough// to not die, but I eventually realized that I wasn't getting anything done, so I started looking at my map and pushed into certain directions, paying only as much attention to enemies as I had to.)).
+So, **anytime you are on an objective**, it is actually just the same stuff. Where you are is A, the next step of the objective is B. Say, the objective requires you to work on the terminal first, then that terminal is B. Push your way towards that terminal, push enemies out of your way to the terminal, then push enemies away from the terminal. Note that working on a terminal does not require radio silence in the general vicinity. All you need is to push enemies far enough away from the terminal to allow you to work on it without getting killed. Really you're just trying to punch a small hole around the terminal to give yourself a second or two to do whatever needs to be done on the terminal. If the terminal then asks you to turn valves, you rinse and repeat:
-It helps to learn what objectives look like, where enemy spawners are (bug holes, automaton fabricators, etc.), what the sequence of certain terminals is, where the valves are, where the connection towers are, etc. etc., because it will make it a lot easier to know where to go. If you have to search for where the valves are, it means essentially clearing the entire search area of enemies, which is costly on time and resources. This is why it's good to start on lower difficulties - they let you get familiar with objectives and let you learn navigation without too much drama. It helps teaching that there **are** things to do in a game of Helldivers and that you //can// fight enemies, but after killing them all you only have a lot of dead enemies, no completed objectives.
+Push enemies out of your path towards the valves. Ignore enemies not on your path to a valve. Create enough room to turn the valve without dying. Any enemy further than 5 seconds away from a valve is irrelevant to you, unless the enemy is between you and the valve. Similarly, you don't need to kill all the enemies around a shiny, you only need to kill all enemies that can get to the shiny in less than 3 seconds, as that's the amount of time you need to loot it. Any enemy further than 3 seconds away from the shiny is irrelevant to you. By the time you have completed all the steps for an objective, you should have already decided where to go next. Set a new B, carve your way towards it - everything else is distraction.
-However: Staying alive supersedes objectives. If enemies are pushing //you// out of an objective, that's OK! You can always retreat and come back later. Try to hold the objective as long as you can, but if it's hopeless then a retreat is rational, not cowardice. You're trying to win wars, not battles, and by the time you're forced to retreat you've already lost the battle anyway. So? Instead of dying, win the war.
+% of the time, failure to do this is the reason why teams leave players behind: More knowledgeable players don't want to spend 5 minutes or more of their time fighting a bug breach they already know is pointless to fight, draining resources, reinforcements, time and their nerves. They would rather actually be productive, so they're just gonna carve paths on their own((Interestingly, it is //this// being left alone with enemies that first forced me to find directions on my own and start carving paths instead of just fighting every enemy I saw. I was good //enough// to not die, but I eventually realized that I wasn't getting anything done, so I started looking at my map and pushed into certain directions, paying only as much attention to enemies as I had to.)).
+It helps to learn what objectives look like, where enemy spawners are (bug holes, automaton fabricators, etc.), what the sequence of certain terminals is, where the valves are, where the connection towers are, etc. etc., because it will make it a lot easier to know where to go (determine B). If you have to search for where the valves are, it means essentially clearing the entire search area of enemies, which is costly on time and resources. This is why it's good to start on lower difficulties - they let you get familiar with objectives and let you learn navigation without too much drama. It helps teaching that there **are** things to do in a game of Helldivers and that you //can// fight enemies, but after killing them all you only have a lot of dead enemies, no completed objectives.
+However: Staying alive supersedes objectives. If enemies are pushing //you// out of an objective, that's OK! You can always retreat and come back later. Try to hold the objective as long as you can, but if it's hopeless then a retreat is rational, not cowardice. You're trying to win wars, not battles, and by the time you're forced to retreat you've already lost the battle anyway. So? Instead of dying, win the war. Solo players specialize in circling around to objectives, as there is physically no way for a solo player to fend off an entire enemy reinforce on their own (except in some special cases like the Napalm Barrage). They will disengage and do something else.
@@ Line 86: / Line 98: @@
 The team can be considered to be a modifier to all the things previously discussed. It is beneficial for some things, it is detrimental to others. For example, two obvious examples are Resupply usage and stratagem placement. Resupply is one of the major sources of stims - everyone relies on them, so it is imperative that everyone gets them. If you call in supplies only for yourself, this might lead to someone else running out of stims and dying because of it. Therefore, resupplies should only be called in when a substantial part of the team is present, or only in an emergency when strictly necessary to prevent yourself from dying.
-Sticking with your team is cool, because having someone close by means fire support and stim support. In the same way that you can't die when you have stims, someone else can help you not to do die when you run out of them. That means taking a serious amount of damage before you can be stimmed - ie. it's very risky - but it's still very much useful. The real problem with the team comes from stratagem placement. There isn't very much to say about this - learn SOS diving and not communicating. Always expect an Eagle 500 on top of your goddamn head //at all times//. You might be behind a wall and a player thinks you're further away than you really are. A player might have just genuinely not noticed. A player might have thought that you would for sure see it. A player might have gotten ragdolled. A player might just be fricken stupid. Doesn't matter. The threat is real, and you need to look out for it. Check red beacons. For sentries behind yourself. Oh, talking about sentries: Defend them. A sentry is essentially a fifth player that packs unfathomable amounts of damage. Your primary weapon can only dream of the DPS a gatling sentry can put out. Team playing means defending other people's sentries. Team playing, however, also means removing sentries behind friendly positions that are likely to cause friendly casualties. Keep an eye on the map, watch friendlies and the situations they are in. If they run low on stims, think about helping them. And don't get hit by allied player's stratagems. That really is a thing you can just get experience with. You'll get killed by friendly Eagle 500s very frequently, but you'll begin noticing them more and more over time.
+Sticking with your team is cool, because having someone close by means fire support and stim support. In the same way that you can't die when you have stims, someone else can help you not to do die when you run out of them. That means taking a serious amount of damage before you can be stimmed - ie. it's very risky - but it's still very much useful. The real problem with the team comes from stratagem placement, ie. don't throw 500kg on the head of another Helldiver.
+There isn't very much to say about this - learn SOS diving and not communicating. You should expect an Eagle 500 on top of your goddamn head //at all times//. You might be behind a wall and a player thinks you're further away than you really are. A player might have just genuinely not noticed. A player might have thought that you would for sure see it. A player might have gotten ragdolled. A player might just be fricken stupid. Doesn't matter. The threat is real, and you need to look out for it. Check red beacons. Check for sentries behind yourself. Oh, talking about sentries: Defend them. A sentry is essentially a fifth player that packs unfathomable amounts of damage. Your primary weapon can only dream of the DPS a gatling sentry can put out. Team playing means defending other people's sentries. Team playing, however, also means removing sentries behind friendly positions that are likely to cause friendly casualties. Keep an eye on the map, watch friendlies and the situations they are in. If they run low on stims, think about helping them. And don't get hit by allied player's stratagems. That really is a thing you can just get experience with. You'll get killed by friendly Eagle 500s very frequently, but you'll begin noticing them more and more over time.
 Finally, the team is why the "carving paths" concept is almost never followed to the letter. You're meant to only strictly kill the enemies that are directly a threat to progress, but considering a team you have to consider //human factor//. Especially with that amount of enemies around, a single player cannot cover all 360  angles around him. To enable safe play, it is necessary to kill or push away more enemies than only the strictly necessary ones. I still teach "only kill strictly necessary" first because that's the basis upon which we should start learning, but the truth is that when together with other people, we need to be a bit more generous with which enemies to kill, to make sure our friend doesn't get surprised. Passing a tight alley might have worked for you, but by the time your friend gets there the enemies might have doubled in number or taken up better spots. Therefore, you should carve a path for your friend as well.