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We'll see how it goes, I dislike judging things without spending some hours or days into it first hand, and hearing more thoughts from others. It does sound strong if you're just fighting Chargers, but in a real game they're supported by Hunters, Spitters, Spewers, Commanders, Titans, etc, and they might get tweaked too, and that's just talking about the Terminids, not the whole picture. I'm guessing since their armor are getting nerfed the dedicated ATs can one shot them in the head? Which is what's more important, and the cause of the rage when they removed the flamer's ability to kill Chargers in the leg. If you're gonna take something away, atleast give something else that works.

@@rnfmello8207 not sure about AT, but the flamethrower was never meant to hurt chargers much. It bounced off the armor in the first game and at launch; when it got buffed it also got bugged which made it hurt chargers and kill them way too quickly. Current flamethrower is insane at anything medium and below, so killing chargers was too much imo. I stopped using it because it was so easy and everyone was running it every match. The current one is very fair and forgiving in what it can do Strafing Run and 110 will probably one shot them going forward now. It may be alright, but it is going to make the classic bug elite pretty trivial to most decent players.

@@T4nkcommander Flamethrower should strip/melt heavy armor after prolonged hosing, its short range effectiveness also meant you're taking more risk and are prone to taking hits, so that balances it out. Current flamethrower bounces off Hiveguard armor from what I've noticed, so I'm not sure what you meant by "Insane vs medium armor" there. "Everyone" was using it because Quasar, EATS, RR, Spear struggle vs Behemoth Chargers and AH made more common. They reduced the HP of the original Charger's head to one shot them, but they're rarely seen now. Again, we'll see how something will go when the new balance patch comes out.

@@rnfmello8207 I haven't had any problem with hive guards especially if you spray the ground. They die really quick. Back in HD1 flamethrower took a full canister to down a brood and did basically nothing to Behemoths. Current flamethrower can melt multiple alphas and crew in a tank. Behemoths are already a lot easier what with the rear weak spot, and flamethrower can still take advantage of that. But a chaff clear shouldn't be able to wreck elites just like RR or EATs suck at chaff kill... different jobs. In the first game we actually had to work together to take down threats...now the gear is so strong everyone just runs off solo for the most part. We'll see how it goes I guess

@@T4nkcommander The bulk of the flamehtrower's damage is from direct damage, not the flame puddles. That's how you can kill Commanders and Spewers more quickly, and they're dangerous since they don't get slowed or staggered with the flamehtrower's flames. Yes, the Charger butts can be destroyed, but getting there involves doing several steps; and is usually done after they've run past you after a charge, during that time as they turn or if you're lucky they've hit a wall so their butts get exposed longer, allowing you to close in for the flamer's short range, though usually you won't have time unless you have Stun Grenades to assist in the task. But you also need to think about the other bugs that came with it. Flamethrower should be strong and able to strip armor, isn't that was AH was going for? Realism in their flamethrower? In the first game you could also build in a way that you could face multiple threats solo, so i'm not sure i follow here.

Barrages being barrages I guess, didn't get lucky enough to clear it all, but it did soften the place. Using the AC vs Squids was fun, could destroy everything they threw at you, reminds me of it vs the Bots now. Interesting how you don't find it fun, it is powerful, sounds powerful, very satisfying to shoot and destroy things with, of course it's a subjective matter. By pump shotgun cancelling you mean constantly reloading it after firing? It does look funny but my eyes are usually on the enemies not on the gun lol, it's great you can do it again here in the sequel and you don't have to spam the reload key to fully reload the gun.

To be fair, there weren't titans in the first game, and time between engagements was much lower. I never used RC in the first game because it never was up when I wanted it, but I really like it in HD2 as a Behemoth deleter. I find even without Stratagem Priority it is functionally available to me much more often. RC paired with 110MM Rocket Pods makes for a quick solo titan delete. Then you have two more runs for a charger or titan if need be. I certainly wouldn't be opposed to RC one-shotting Titans tho.

@@T4nkcommander In one engagement the game spawns multiple heavies though, not sure what you meant. Railcannon is only used for heavies too and for just single target, vs a Precision Strike which can deal mostly with everything. Also I'd just pick a Barrage which shares almost the same cooldown and can hit multiple heavies and a swarm.

@@T4nkcommander What does "cover all my bases" mean? And how does it apply in this context? Sorry, English can be hard for me sometimes.

@@rnfmello8207 it is a reference to American Baseball....it means to have a solution for every problem, a tool for every issue. In the context of Helldivers, I mean that I have something to deal with every enemy or situation.

@@T4nkcommander Cool ty, idk the differences between American and Japanese Baseballs, but I have seen animes featuring the latter, so I had a feeling that was what you were referring to as. As for your build I probably won't use it 100%, but to tweak a little to deal with fast bugs like Hunters and Red Warriors, Xbow and Arc Thrower are both slow weapons to me, the former due to its small mag, thus constant reloads and latter because of its charge up mechanic. I ran both Dominator and Grenade Launcher together once, both are slow weapons, you can things done from a disfance for sure, but it was challenging when the fast movers were in my face.

There will always be 'most effective tactics available' no matter how much people want to nerf or buff things in video games, but the highly skilled players like Mikasa, YOPG, and others could solo on the highest difficulties with meme loadouts like stacking 4 Resupply call-ins with the Constitution in the first game. Too bad that I'm not that skilled nor enjoy those loadouts, so I tend to lean on the strong weapons that seem to trigger the anti-meta people, and use things like animation-cancelling, forward momentum tech for anti-tank launchers to strip a Behemoth's leg armor, because that's how I enjoy a game, knowledge got made known to me and I refuse to deliberately not use it. Arrowhead will nerf one thing, then buff another in a balance patch anyway, and the cycle continues. People will never be pleased, while I'm here just enjoying the video game, and having a laugh at the people taking it too seriously like on Reddit. 😂

i gave the grenade launcher a try in place of the hmg a day after, it's stronger for very dense pack of bugs at medium range and has the good bug hole closing utility , but it's dangerous to use up close due to splash and the grenades bouncing off, and is harder to hit long range targets due to projectile travel time. least to say i like the hmg better haha, it's safer to use, has range , fun to kill weakened bile titans with and has more flexibility being able to kill shrieker spires and spore shrooms

I honestly enjoy fighting Hunters, they teach you target priority and to watch your flanks, and it's fun to track your aim vs them. Stun grenades are good, yeah. I don't see much use of the incendiary grenades other than lighting up a chokepoint at a distance and their bug hole closing utility when running it with the flamethrower, because you can just light the floor with it anyway, applies to Napalm Strike too. I'd die for sure if I got hit by those Titan spits in EoF update, I believe they've a change for that, but here is before the update.

When the Cookout is compared to the Incendiary Breaker it's balanced to it, and the IB is too good too. Which one you pick is personal preference. Cookout has slower fire rate, rounds reload, less shots, but more damage and stagger than the IB. IB has faster fire rate, faster reload, more shots, but less damage and less to no stagger, but if you're good with movement you don't really need the stagger eventhough it is nice to have. Honestly, I don't know how they should balance these two vs the rest of the gun pool.

@@rnfmello8207 BI got a huge ammo nerf so you have to be careful about how much you shoot now. It is probably ok now, similar to the Knight in that regard. Cookout staggers and has a large ammo pool, as you said making it outperform everything else in ease of use and damage. Think an ammo reduction and stagger removal would go a long way in bringing it in line. That, or stagger removal and cut down initial damage a lot.

@@T4nkcommander 60 shots in reserve isn't a lot to be honest and you do run them dry very quickly on level 10s, the punishers being able to stagger is their signature ability i'd say and since they shoot slowly it feels required to have and shotguns should be treated as more as personal defense weapons too, i can only agree is a damage nerf in some form.

@@rnfmello8207 sure but dragons breath has no weight to it, your basically just throwing sparks on enemies. Hence no stagger. If enemies could keep rushing while burning that would change things significantly

@@T4nkcommander removing stagger on the cookout would give me no reason to run it, i'd just go for the incendiary breaker instead on second thought, i think cookout is balanced lol, because it struggles on the bot front, i'd go with the regular punisher because it has more direct damage and stagger would help

th-cam.com/video/sxEQHyxWisQ/w-d-xo.htmlsi=aSaXx8oKKgkZBR31&t=888 is my POV of this

if you're talking about the hmg i almost always use the highest rpm (750) out of preference and to take out devastators and berserkers more quickly so i struggle going full-auto to hit a hulk's visor in one trigger pull, i exclusively use stun grenades vs bots anyway and are mainly reserved for hulks, so i have ample time to tap their visors in, and i'm not always on my A-game so I will try to always use loadouts i find strong to pick up the slack... i find hulks not as threatening vs heavy and rocket devastators though, because i have stuns. Yes I almost always crouch when firing the hmg for the recoil control, and prone for longer ranges... 2:40 yes i know about their eye and belly weakpoints (didn't have a good angle to go for them here), but i always go for their gatling guns first, once they're down a factory strider drops down on my priority list of targets significantly as they're pretty much a non-threat at close range.

h5

the exploders got many of the bugs too haha, pretty sure the plasma nade was primarily used as cover for him as he builds the 2nd turret

Bro what

@@lukethewalrus7555he’s not wrong. Anytime I try to take on a shrieker nest up close I have titans, chargers and hunters galore.

tbf, seeing that it's near the beginning of the mission where the enemy spawn numbers are less and a bug breach happened elsewhere, it probably would've worked anyway

I’d say take the arcing bullshit and give a little more ammo.

hawkeye system?

I have never had it drop me anywhere near where I was