Helldivers 2, the highly anticipated sequel to the cult classic Helldivers, has recently received a substantial update, marked as Patch 01.000.200. This update, available on both PlayStation 5 and PC via Steam, brings about significant alterations to the game’s equilibrium and introduces additional planetary threats for participants to confront. In this article, we delve into the intricacies of this update, exploring the changes in gameplay dynamics, mission dynamics, armaments, adversaries, and more.
Introducing New Planetary Perils
Developer Arrowhead Studios has enriched the gameplay experience by introducing two new planetary perils: blizzards and sandstorms. These environmental hazards add depth to the gameplay, presenting new challenges for players to overcome as they navigate hostile planets in their quest for victory.
Mission Dynamics: Fine-Tuning for Enhanced Balance
One of the highlights of Patch 01.000.200 is the fine-tuning of mission dynamics. Arrowhead Studios has reworked the Retrieve Essential Personnel mission archetype, strategically relocating adversary spawn points to provide participants with a fairer opportunity to safeguard the objective. Additionally, adjustments have been made to the Destroy Command Bunkers mission archetype, ensuring that it offers a more balanced and engaging experience for players.
Armaments: Comprehensive Equilibrium Adjustments
A significant aspect of the update is the comprehensive equilibrium adjustment made to armaments. Arrowhead Studios has bestowed enhancements upon several weapons, including the Anti-Materiel Rifle, Breaker Incendiary, and Dominator, while also implementing reductions where necessary. Notably, the Slugger has undergone a reduction, and the firing mode of the recently introduced Heavy Machine Gun has been moderated for better balance.
Balancing the Threats
In addition to adjustments in armaments, the update addresses the balance of adversaries in the game. Arrowhead Studios has subjected various adversaries, such as the Charger, Bile Spewer, Nursing Spewer, and Shriekers, to reductions in their capabilities. However, the Bile Titan now boasts increased resilience against stunning, adding a new layer of challenge for players to overcome.
Stability Refinements and Bug Fixes
Beyond the gameplay adjustments, Patch 01.000.200 also includes stability refinements and bug fixes to enhance the overall gaming experience. Arrowhead Studios has addressed various crashes and glitches, ensuring a smoother and more enjoyable gameplay experience for all participants.
The Future of Helldivers 2
With the release of Patch 01.000.200, Helldivers 2 continues to evolve and expand, promising an exciting future for fans of the franchise. As players embark on new missions, confront new adversaries, and overcome new challenges, the world of Helldivers 2 remains as vibrant and engaging as ever.
Helldivers 2 update 01.000.200 patch notes:
Gameplay
Planetary Hazard additions
- Blizzards
- Sandstorms
Balancing Missions
Retrieve Essential Personnel
- Moved the enemy spawn points further away from the objective to give players a fairer chance of defending the location.
- There are fewer civilians required to complete the mission on higher difficulties.
Destroy Command Bunkers
- Now has more objective locations, the mission was too easy before compared to other missions.
- It can now appear in operations from difficulty 5.
- Halved the negative effect of operation modifiers that increase stratagem cooldowns or call in times.
Primary, Secondary, & Support Weapons
- Arc Thrower: fixed charging inconsistencies; it will now always take 1s to charge a shot.
- Arc Thrower: reduced distance from 50m to 35m.
- Arc Thrower: increased stagger force.
- Guard Dog: now restores full ammo from supply boxes.
- Anti-Materiel Rifle: damage increased by 30%.
- Breaker Incendiary: damage per bullet increased from 15 per bullet to 20 per bullet.
- Fire damage per tick increased by 50% (from all sources).
- Liberator Penetrator: now has a full auto mode.
- Dominator: increased damage from 200 to 300.
- Dominator: increased stagger.
- Diligence Counter Sniper: increased armor penetration from light to medium.
- Slugger: reduced stagger.
- Slugger: reduced damage from 280 to 250.
- Slugger: reduced demolition force.
- Slugger: fixed armor penetration tag in the menu.
- Slugger, Liberator Concussive, Senator: fixed incorrect armor penetration tags in the menu.
- Recoilless Rifle: increased the number of rockets you restore from supply boxes from 2 to 3.
- Spear: increased the number of missiles you restore from supply boxes from 1 to 2.
- Heavy Machine Gun: the highest fire rate mode reduced from 1200 rpm to a more moderate 950.
Stratagems
- Patriot Exosuit: rockets will now penetrate armor only on direct hit.
Enemies
Balancing adjustments have been made to:
- Chargers normal melee attack now does less damage against Exosuits.
- Bile Spewer and Nursing Spewer do less damage with their puke.
- The Bile Titan can no longer be stunned.
- Shriekers no longer create bug breaches.
- Shriekers hitting you while they are dead now does significantly less damage.
Helldiver Balancing adjustments have been made to:
- Heavy and medium armor protects better and you now take about 10% less damage than before while wearing heavy and about 5% less when wearing medium armor. Fortified commando and light armor is unchanged.
Fixes
- Fixed issue where save settings for PS5 would be reset when the game is rebooted, causing things such as loadout and hint settings to reset.
- Enemies now properly target Exosuits. Previously, many enemies effectively ignored Exosuits if a helldiver on foot was available for them to target.
- Fixed Exosuits being able to fire their weapons while opening the minimap.
- The Helldiver and the Exosuit both had a bug that made them sometimes take explosion damage multiple times making things like automaton rockets be too deadly, this is now fixed.
- Automaton enemy constellations that preferred to spawn more of certain Devastators types did not work and are now functioning as they should. This means that sometimes when playing against the Automatons you will face more Devastators instead of other enemy types.
We have improved the system that prevents hellpod steering close to large or important objects.
- We have solved issues where the effective area around objects was a lot larger than intended.
- We have reduced the number of objects that prevent hellpod steering.
- Note: This system is intended to prevent softlocks where players can drop on important interaction points, or drop into unintended places. We will continue to monitor the state of the system after the update to see if additional tweaks are necessary.
- Fixed cases where the ground under some assets could be bombed causing them to float.
Ballistic Shield changes
- Collision mesh has been slightly increased in size for more forgiveness
- Changed shield poses so that less of the helldiver is exposed
- Addressed bug where parts of the helldiver would become vulnerable while using the shield in first person
Known Issues
These are issues that were either introduced by this patch and are being worked on, or are from a previous version and have not yet been fixed.
- Game might crash when picking up a snowball or throwing back a grenade
Various issues involving friend invites and cross-play
- Cross-platform friend invites might not show up in the Friend Requests tab.
- Players cannot unfriend other players befriended via friend code.
- Players cannot unblock players that were not in their Friends list beforehand.
- Players cannot befriend players with Steam names shorter than 3 characters
- Explosive weapon stats include only direct hit damage but not explosive damage.
- Explosions do not break your limbs (except for when you fly into a rock).
- Planet liberation reaches 100% at the end of every Defend mission.
- Drowning in deep water with a Vitality Booster equipped puts Helldiver in a broken state.
- Stratagem beam might attach itself to an enemy but it will deploy to its original location.
- Some player customizations (like title or body type) may reset after restarting the game.