Automatons are a soulless, robotic threat to Super Earth and her people. As members of the elite inHelldivers 2, it’s important to know how to dispatch these mechanical foes and levy every tool in your arsenal to get the mission done.
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If you’re new to Helldivers 2, or if you’re struggling to contain the robotic menace, here are some tips to help you handle the many dangers these mechanical monsters can throw at you.
Helldivers 2
10Aim For The Midsection And Limbs
It’s Usually Not Armored (Heavy Devastators Are The Exception)
Most of the automaton enemies have a weak spot in their head. However, for the larger, more armored enemies, their heads can be a tiny target surrounded by heavy armor.
To make your life easier, aim for the midsection of most of the bots you fight. There’s a glowing section in their abdomen where there’s no armor plating. A few well-placed bullets there will easily bisect almost every bot. This tip is at its most useful when you’re staring down a horde of Berserkers, since their midsections are unarmored and that weak spot is larger targets than their heads.
This tip mostly applies to every enemy except Heavy Devastators because their midsections are armored midsections.
9The Orbital Precision Strike Is A Swiss Army Knife Against Bots
It Handles Hordes Of Larger Bots, Factories, Turrets, And Tanks
The basic Orbital Precision Strike is a flexible solution to almost every problem the automatons can throw at you. This stratagem can one-shot tanks as long as it lands close to them, destroy factories and turrets, take out hordes of bots, and it’s on a fairly low cooldown of 100 seconds (90 seconds with Zero-G Breech Loading). Its call-in time of ~5 - 6 seconds can be problematic, but targets like tanks, turrets, and factories don’t move very fast, so it’s fairly easy to catch them in the strike. While Hulks can be a problem because they can move at a decent speed, the Exploding Shrapnel ship upgrade makes it easier to catch them in the AoE, and any form of anti-tank can stagger them just long enough to keep them in the explosive radius.
It’s important to know what the basic Precision Strike can do since everyone starts with this stratagem. This means everyone is capable of taking down all the targets in the Automaton sector without the need to heavily invest into new stratagems (unlike the bugs and theirBile Titans). When you reach later levels, you’ll want to bringmore specialized stratagemslike the Railgun that are better specialized to cover weaknesses in your loadout. In the meantime, if you’re ever lost at what to bring against the Automatons, the Orbital Precision Strike is not a bad option to use.
A comparable stratagem with a specialty in taking out tanks and turrets is the Eagle Missile Pod. It has a much faster call down speed, and it targets the biggest enemies, but It’s limited to two charges before the Eagle needs to rearm.
8Railguns, Autocannons, and Grenade Launchers Are Good Against Automatons
Railgun And Autocannon Are The Most Flexible Though
Each call down weaponbesides the machine gun has a purpose against bots. Much like against the Terminids, Railguns are the universal answer to almost everything since it can take out armored threats in a single shot likeStriders, Hulks, and Devastators. Autocannons are capable destroying objectives and shredding through Striders and Devastators. It’ll struggle against Hulks, but it can rip off the Hulk’s arms in 2-4 shots.
The Anti-Material rifle is great at taking out all of the automaton enemies except the tank. Brutes go down in 2 - 3 shots to their glowing red eyes, and the rifle makes short work of Berserkers, Striders, and Devastators. However, it doesn’t offer too much more utility besides taking out enemies and should be replaced with a Railgun when you get to level 20. In comparison, the Grenade Launcher is great for destroying factories from a safe distance, thinning out robot hordes, and taking out Striders in a single shot.
7Always Kill The Commissar First
Otherwise You’ll Be Drowning In Bot Drops
Whenever you encounter a patrol, keep an eye out for the Commissar. They’ll have one sword and a pistol and usually stay far behind the rest of the enemies. This bot has to die as soon as possible because it’s usually the fastest to send out a flare and call for a bot drop. Taking out the commissar gives you time to find all of the other small bots and take them out so they also can’t call for help.
Helldivers 2 Needs More Overpowered Weapons (Skip The Nerfs)
I’m tired of seeing the same meta loadouts, but nerfs aren’t the answer.
Luckily, all of these bots can be taken down by a stiff breeze from a Helldiver. One headshot, or a few bullets from an assault rifle, is more than enough to reduce them to scrap. Just verify you find them before they get the chance to launch a flare.
If a Bot drop does happen, it’s not a bad idea to call down an Expendable Anti-tank to shoot down the oncoming drop ships. Just make sure to aim for their engines.
6After the Commissar, Rocket Bots Go Next
Doing This Will Defang Every Patrol
Rockets will one-shot almost every Helldiver regardless of armor (Armor rating is currently broken as of writing). This means any robot with a rocket launcher becomes the next priority target after taking out the Commissar. Rocket Raiders are also capable of calling bot drops and take little time to get rid of, so they’ll usually be the next optimal target to take down. If a bot drop is already happening, Rocket Devastators become more important to take out, since they fire more rockets from longer ranges and their armor means it’ll take a little more time to destroy them.
Against Rocket Devastators, shoot their abdomen if you’re not confident about shooting their heads. Alternatively, their shoulder-mounted rocket launchers are also a weak spot, and removing their weapons will make these Devastators far less threatening.
5Bring The Shield Generator Pack
It’ll Give You A Larger Margin For Error
There are only a handful of ways to avoid getting one-shot by rockets from automatons. For example, armor with the fortified trait takes less damage from explosives and will keep you alive against rockets. But if you don’t have that armor, equipping the Shield Generator Pack is an assured way to survive at least 1 rocket hit. This will give you enough time to fire back at the bots and pick out the Commissar or any missile-wielding machines.
Since the pack also protects you from melee damage, the Shield Generator Pack is a great pick if you need more time to escape from jetpack Raiders or Berserkers. If your shield does go down from either melee attacks, or if it just saved your life from a large explosive, make sure you wait until your shield comes back up before you take a peek at any rocket-launching enemies.
4Use Smoke And EMS To Cover Your Escapes
Better For Team Compositions Than Solo
As you get into harder and harder difficulties, you’ll want to safely run away from patrols or bot drops and just focus on fighting to destroy a factory or to complete a mission objective. Being able to conjure a sheet of smoke to disappear behind or to stun the enemy becomes aninvaluable defensive toolwhen you’re being pursued by several hundred robots. The Orbital smoke stratagem and the Orbital EMS strike are both great ways to accomplish this, since smokescreens will force bots to shoot randomly in your direction, while EMS stuns and slows bots.
If you’re ever worried about dealing with a horde of melee enemies, EMS is the perfect tool. Just make sure you don’t get caught in the electric smoke field. Remember, while enemies will shoot randomly at you, the moment you shoot through smoke, all enemies will know where you are and start shooting at you.
3Throw Grenades Back
It’ll Thin Out Enemy Hordes And Keep Your Team Safe
Here and there, automaton enemies will throw grenades at you while you’re in cover. Don’t panic! You can walk up to these grenades and push your interact key to pick them up and throw them back at your soulless foes. Just make sure you’re careful with which direction you throw the grenade back in.
I’m Worried Helldivers 2 Isn’t Going To Last
Comedic deaths are fun and all, but that only lasts until you git gud.
It’s important to do this in defense missions, since fleeing citizens might run into the grenade and blow up. If you want to maximize harm to the robots and reduce the number of exploded citizens, make sure you always throw grenades back.
2The Digilence Rifle And Breaker Shotgun Are The Best Weapons
Both Guns Have Their Uses, But You Can’t Go Wrong With The Breaker
The Breaker is currently the best main gunyou can use because of its ridiculous long range, high damage output, and tight cone of projectiles. It shreds through enemies and even has a full automatic mode to handle times when you’re getting swarmed. Against bots, it’s more than capable of bisecting 3 - 4 Berserkers and will still have ammo left over to blast a handful of smaller robots.
Its closest competition in the main weapon slot is the Diligence rifle, which is a semi-automatic DMR. While it’s not as ammo efficient at stopping Berserkers, it’s fairly good against every other form of infantry in the Automaton army. Most small robots die in 1 headshot, which makes this gun extremely ammo efficient at removing Commissars and Rocket Raiders at long ranges. Up close, you’re able to fire off your entire magazine to take down ~2.5 Berserkers at a decent rate. Against Devastators or other automatons where you need to shoot them in a specific place, the Diligence’s semi-automatic nature makes it much easier to control each shot and place it right where it needs to go. This is especially convenient against Heavy Devastators when they hide behind their larger shields, since you can carefully place shots into their arms and head.
1Stratagem Jammers Can Overlap
Jammers Block Stratagem Usage
Automatons can deploy two kinds of jamming towers to a planet: small jammers and large jammers. Small jammers only require a grenade to its vents to destroy it, but large jammers require a hellbomb to be called down and detonated to destroy the tower. This is an important tip to know just in case you’re next to a large jammer and, for some reason, you’re still unable to call down a hellbomb. If you’re in that scenario, look around the map for a smaller jammer and take that out first, then come back for the larger jammer.
