You're now much stronger against tanks and armour in Helldivers 2, as Arrowhead patch for "more versatile" tactics

Last month, Helldivers 2 studio Arrowhead thrust a white flag out from their shelled position in an attempt to placate mutinous fans of the co-op shooter. In response to a community sentiment best summed up by a popular Reddit post titled “Let the super earth burn”, Arrowhead released a statement. “In short, we didn’t hit our target with the latest update…what matters most now is action. Not talk.” Said action (which, it must be pointed out, felt a bit troublingly reactive to the loudest and most histrionic voices in the roo..uh, subreddit) was foreshadowed in a list of issues to be tackled over the coming months.

That list's gist, if you missed the list, was a promise to fix “our approach to balance. Our intention is that balance should be fun, not “balanced” for the sake of balance." Yesterday, Patch 1.001.100 dropped, accompanied by a video that I can only describe, in a professional capacity, as long as fuck.

In case you have better things to do with the next 35 minutes, here’s a summary of the patch notes, the full list of which you can find here.

• Major Overhaul of Anti-Tank, Armor Penetration, Health and Armor Values

• Weapon & Stratagem Balancing

• Enemy Reworks

• Helldiver Health and Damage Mechanics Tweaks

• Gas Gameplay Mechanic Rework

• New Galactic War feature

• Emote Wheel feature

• Crash & Bug Fixes

“Thank you for your valuable feedback. Many players have expressed feeling constrained in how they approach challenges, often relying on a limited set of tools while other options seem less effective,” reads the blog. “To address this, we've reworked armor penetration, anti-tank weapons, enemy armor and health values."

"Our goal is to improve the effectiveness of weapons such as the Autocannon, Heavy Machine Gun, Flamethrower, and Anti-Materiel Rifle against heavily armored enemies," it continues. "Although they may not be as effective as specialized anti-tank weapons, they are now more viable choices making your loadouts more versatile, fostering better team collaboration and planning.”

It’s a hefty list in all, and Arrowhead say they aren’t done yet - they “plan to conduct another balance pass by Day 60 of our commitment”. The general gist of these changes seems to be that players are now more powerful, and the bugs, especially, are less oppressive. As noticed by cheery RPS fanzine PC Gamer, the game’s director agrees that a harder difficulty is now needed. Truly, the real sisyphean eterna-war was the constant rush to try and please the entire fanbase, all the time, along the way.

Arrowhead have also been not-teasing the game's third faction recently.