Helldivers

Hey there, Helldiver! Just dropped into Super Earth and not sure where to start? Don't sweat it, this guide's got your back for those first few drops. You'll probably go through a quick tutorial first, but once you're on the bridge of your ship, here's the lowdown.

Use Stratagems to Complete Objectives

Your radio is your best friend in Helldivers. Seriously, get comfortable holding down L1 and punching in those codes. While blasting bugs and bots is a blast, the game is all about using your stratagems to tackle problems. Need ammo, gear, vehicles, or defenses? Want to call in airstrikes or bring back fallen teammates? That's all done with stratagems. Don't just charge in with your primary weapon!

Complete Objectives and Extract for Mission Success

Winning missions isn't just about racking up kills. When you hit Select, check the objective checklist in the upper right corner. The extraction point will be grayed out until you've completed all other objectives (or made them impossible to complete). Once that's done, your ship will drop a Hellpod with the extraction beacon. Head to it and call your shuttle. Survive for 90 seconds and get on board, and you've succeeded – no matter how many optional objectives you missed. This nets you planet rewards, often unlocking new weapons. You don't need to fight endless waves of enemies; if you see more bad guys showing up, usually it's best to break contact. Remember to hit L3 to run. You might need to take out a few fast enemies that keep up, but don't feel obligated to fight a huge group that's calling in constant reinforcements. Leaving enemies alive doesn't cost you experience points.

Succeed in Missions to Unlock Things

Perks, primary weapons, and even new outfits come as you level up. But to get new stratagems, you need to conquer planets. Most planets have two or three missions, marked with checkboxes. Clear all the boxes on a planet, and you'll get its reward. Head to the galactic map (that glowing yellow table on your ship's bridge) and look for low-difficulty planets that show stratagem icons as their reward. Unlocking more stratagems means you can start finding your own playstyle and get ready for tougher challenges and better rewards.

After Unlocking Things You Like, Upgrade Them

The first few levels in Helldivers come super fast, and you'll earn research points along the way. Some of the early items you unlock are actually some of the best to upgrade, so don't feel like you have to save your points for later, harder-to-get gear. If you get the UAV early on, upgrading it first is a great move – when fully upgraded, it makes samples visible on your radar. Next up, prioritize upgrading your Reinforce and Resupply stratagems. You'll use these constantly, they help your whole team, and missions just run smoother and faster with them improved. After that, consider a primary weapon, your pistol, and the Hellbomb. An upgraded Hellbomb drops faster and can take more damage before breaking, making it a solid investment. Since you use your primary weapon all the time and can't lose it, it makes sense to upgrade one of the early ones and start reaping the benefits. The Liberator, Breaker, Defender, Sickle, and Scythe all get a big boost from every upgrade point spent. And hey, your pistol is always with you, so why not make it as good as it can be?

Controls and moving are not complicated. You move slowly on snow, more slowly still in water. On dry ground, your normal pace will equal or outdistance many enemies if running away. If you try to run around enemies that are focused on you, some of them will respond by playing cornerback and moving to contain you. If you want to get to the other side of weak enemies without shooting, it's better to go straight through with melee attacks. Small bugs die in 1 hit; the weakest Cyborgs die fast, too, especially to a bayonet. If you're faced with big enemies you don't want to fight, take an angle away from them; don't try to loop around.

If you push the right stick while moving, you will walk slowly in the direction of the left stick while aiming or firing in the direction of the right stick. This nudges the screen slightly in the direction you aim. Certain heavy weapons will fix you in place while firing until upgraded; submachine guns allow faster movement. When you first start out, you may find yourself using the left stick to aim at enemies; because you are only walking toward them slowly, using the left stick and R2 can feel right. It is wrong. You almost never want to be walking toward enemies as you attack them. Break this bad habit and aim with the right stick.

To run, press L3 while moving. No need to hold it, just click it. Stopping or shooting breaks your run. You will also eventually get tired and return to normal speed.

To take cover, hit square. You dive forward and enter a prone state where you can crawl slowly. You will not be able to attack or call stratagems. You are much less visible to enemy patrols. Direct fire will pass over your head, allowing your teammates to hose nearby enemies with bullets without fear of harming you. Explosions do reduced damage, including nuclear blasts. Melee attacks still hurt. The DLC backpack drones continue to attack or heal while you are prone. You can also acquire a jump pack to replace your "dive" move with a rocket jump.

If critically wounded, you will be knocked down on your back and begin to bleed out. You can crawl around slowly and mash X to get back up; the MD-99 autoinjector perk greatly speeds up this process. Direct fire will pass over you. A teammate can help you up much faster than you can recover by yourself.

IMPORTANT: While voluntarily prone, you give up all ability to attack. If wounded and downed (blood spurting, groaning, X prompt over your Helldiver), you can still fire and reload your pistol or another 1-handed weapon. You can throw grenades. Most important of all: you can call in stratagems while downed. If you die, you drop the stratagem marker, and it activates. If you are your team's last survivor, and you are bleeding out and doomed, you can still call in the reinforce stratagem and bring back your team as your last act of heroism. There's even a trophy for it!

You will always drop and respawn with your pistol, your chosen primary weapon, half your maximum ammo supply for both, and your maximum of 2 grenades. You can radio your ship and have heavy weapons sent down; most of these also drop with a half-load of ammo.

When your weapon gets low, the game will warn you. Your firing sound will often change. Some weapons have red tracers loaded as the last few rounds in each magazine. Your ammo gauge will empty and flash red. Lasers have their own warnings to signal imminent overheat. Hit R1 to reload. If you reload before your current magazine is completely empty, you do it faster, but you sacrifice the remainder of your old mag. Do not press reload after every brief encounter, as you should do in many FPS games! As you burn through the last of your reserve, your Helldiver will give off emotes saying "Low on ammo!" or "Weapon dry!"

The dive (square) and melee attack (circle) interrupt your reload animation. If you start to reload, but squash a bug before finishing, hit R1 again. If you just can't get time to finish reloading, you may need to switch to your pistol instead to clear out the immediate area. When upgraded, your pistol fires armor-piercing shots in 3-round bursts; it's then more of a PDW and does higher damage than you might expect.

To replenish your ammunition, pick up ammo boxes. These will be outlined in yellow. You find them from time to time, but you will also need to bring your own with the resupply stratagem (the blue icon with the 3 cartridges). This will drop 2 boxes anyone can pick up; upgrade it to shorten the wait. Most weapons drop with a half-load and pick up another half-load per ammo box. For instance, your starting primary weapon, the Liberator assault rifle, drops with 6 spare magazines, adds 6 per pickup, and maxes at 12. Other weapons use different numbers, but the pattern is almost always the same.

An ammo box replenishes pistol, primary, and heavy weapon ammo. It adds a grenade. It refills any backpack that involves a consumable (by far the most important with the missile rack!) You cannot pick up a box unless it would help you in some way. It does nothing for vehicle-mounted weapons. Heavy weapon ammo stays with the weapon. If you die and drop a flamethrower with half a tank in the gun and 2 spares, that is how much your teammate will have if he picks it up.

Try to avoid switching away from an empty weapon. In the chaos, it does happen to everyone sometimes, but it's never good when you need your other weapon _now_ and it's out.

IMPORTANT: You can make your life easier by topping off your ammo at the start of a mission. As soon as you get out of your Hellpod, call your resupply and any heavy weapon you plan to use. Get your weapon first, then pick up an ammo box; if the game offers an X prompt for the second box, get that as well. Upgrade your resupply all the way to make this go faster. Topping off is a good thing to do in any case, but it is especially important if armed with the Breaker shotgun. Too many new Helldivers equip the Breaker, assume they began the mission with all the shells they can carry, and run dry in a pitched battle. Don't become a statistic.