Helldivers 2 developer Arrowhead has deployed its first post-release patch that is all about weapon and stratagem balancing, now that the game has reached stability after being an unexpected hit.
Posted on Arrowhead’s site, Patrik Lasota, Head of Product Testing for the game has divulged the first pass of balance changes for Helldivers 2, and the philosophy behind them. Fans have been providing various feedback on how to make the multiplayer shooter better, but looks like the devs have a different idea on how to balance the game compared other conventional multiplayer games.
One of the most fascinating details from the blog post is how primary weapons are meant to be not powerful enough to deal with all the hordes of enemies. “This is very much intentional,” Lasota says. “You need to rely on your Stratagems, and the Stratagems of your team to deal with all the enemies effectively”.
Another fascinating detail is how Helldivers 2 won’t be following the typical “don’t nerf, only buffs” mentality, but rather each balance change is to reinforce a specific “core fantasy”.
The lack of interest in nerfs in multiplayer games these days can be attributed to how nerfs tends to make things less fun- dialing down a weapon’s power because it produced bonkers damage would just make the weapon feel weak and less fun as the fun was derived from how it can deal bonkers damage, for example.
And Lasota believes “players are scared of nerfs, because it will ruin the fantasy of a weapon, ruin their fun.” There will be nerfs in Helldivers 2, though Lasota hopes that players will let them know should they go too far with nerfing that it spoils the fantasy of a weapon or stratagem.
Helldivers 2 First Balance Changes (Patch 01.000.100)
For those looking for the patch notes, here are the changes:
- Weapons
- SG-225 Breaker – Decreased magazine capacity from 16 to 13, increased recoil from 30 to 55
- SG-8 Punisher – Increased total ammo capacity from 40 to 60, increased stagger force, increased damage from 40 per bullet to 45 per bullet
- SG-225SP Breaker Spray & Pray – Increased armor penetration, increased fire rate from 300 to 330, increased number of pellets from 12 to 16 per shot, decreased magazine size from to 32 to 26
- RS-422 Railgun – Decreased armor penetration in Safe Mode, decreased damage against durable enemy parts
- FLAM-40 Flamethrower – Increased damage per second by 50%
- LAS-98 Laser Cannon – Increased damage against durable enemy parts, increased armor penetration, improved ergonomics
- Stratagem
- Shield Generator Pack – Increased delay before recharging
- Orbital 120MM HE Barrage – Increased duration of the bombardment, decreased spread
- Orbital 380MM HE Barrage – Increased duration of the bombardment, decreased spread
Full patch notes can be found here.
The first balance changes here took note of what people deemed “meta” weapons and stratagems, and have adjusted accordingly. Helldivers using railguns are now required to make more use of the unsafe mode to really deal damage on the heavies (and risk their life should they messed up the timing).
The personal shield will go offline longer to allow players to experience other fun Helldivers 2 mechanics like “knockback, shockwaves, and giant explosions obliterating you and your friends” and the Breaker shotgun will be more unwieldy and ammo-hungry. Meanwhile the Punisher shotgun should be more useful despite its slow per-round reload.
Though apparently the Laser Cannon is being buffed to have better armour penetration. Lasota explains that they are siding with the players’ expected fantasy on balance changing this one, as players expected big lasers should deal big damage just like the precision orbital bombardments have established.
The full blog is worth a read, just to get in the headspace of how these devs approach the game design. And one thing we all discovered about Helldivers 2 is how brilliant the game design is.
Helldivers 2 is out now on PS5 and PC (Steam). Check out our review here.