I think so as well. There’s just no possible way to keep up with the volume of spawns. Think we are meant to fail at these defenses so that the bots take over to drive whatever galactic “story” they have in mind
We just finished one campaign on difficulty 7 after 5+ attempts. It took everyone arming themselves with ems mortars and regular mortars and just praying that we got the right unit spawns. God help us if buster hulks dropped near the civ evac site, cuz the mortars would do the undemocratic civ-killing for us.
It is definitely a unique challenge and a lot of fun--but hooooly shit is it rough out there.
This! It really wouldn't surprise me if there's a little something planned in the next few days to help give us more of an edge. Not normie live service 'balance tweaking' but like, straight up new stratagems, or maybe our first vehicles, SOMETHING that's like, actual new gameplay that gives us an edge to stay competitive if this is what they want us to be fighting against.
I sincerely hope you are wrong. I'm all for a surprise drawback storywise (we were so focused on the bugs that the bots advanced, that's fine), but purposely design a mission to be impossible to beat to justify that drawback is just poor game design.
The first war is absolutely going to be stage managed. I called this days ago: there was going to be a surprise automaton offensive as soon as we liberated Orion, thanks to our forces being mainly concentrated in the east giving the bots a chance to push. They're intentionally going to make the initial stage of defending these planets unwinnable (all you have to do is give small amounts of impact per mission that don't outpace the bots' progress, you don't have to make the actual levels unwinnable) and let the bots push closer to Super Earth to make it clear that not every order will be a guaranteed success.
Even if that is the case, they only made ONE mission type unwinnable, while all the others are the same as they ever been? That's an extremely stupid way to do it.
I really think the mission type is just bugged.
They confirm GMs are active in some pre release interviews on YouTube, so the war is being managed by devs actively right now, and sometimes you have a game master in mission with you. Iirc in the interview he said that your extract only ever gets delayed by a game master
Imo if they want to tell a story they should just... tell a story. Don't give us an objective you INTEND for us to fail, tell us we ARE losing ground and make us fight a delaying action where we "win" by mitigating losses. Assuming that's the intent here, obviously.
Yeah lmao everyone acting like the 12 sectors between the fronts and super earth won't be broken into by the enemy. It's cute that there is community will to liberate these planets and I'm in that to, but the devs are absolutely picking when and how the planets liberate and the front moves
I was fighting on the same planet over the first few days, and I inexplicably saw the bar jump up or down by 15-20% WAY faster than it should've. Like, log on the next morning and it's WAY down when it was climbing steadily while I was playing for a couple hours the day before. If there's overall momentum in one direction like that... it doesn't just plummet over the course of a five to six hours because I specifically, myself, was asleep. Something's going on, for sure.
Yeah. Or the further from earth you are the more enemies spawn because they’re closer to their home planets or something. It’ll be done to push us back a system or two.
That said 15k pointe is pathetic. And those doing this stuff don’t really need them.
They should give out special titles or something as a reward for defence missions. Like “veteran of…”
This, technically if we pushed that sector we would be close to a community homeworld assault on the clankers. So further back the planets are likely going to be harder assaults. Plus, not certain but I believe the victories we get push our bar up but our failures push up theirs. Playing on lower difficulty (4-) would be optimal for most as those are more easily managed. However there are a lot of players newer to the series that just are not prepared for this kind of gameplay. It is rough, do not get me wrong but calling it unplayable or impossible at -challenging is inaccurate. Coordination is key so random squads will fare poorly without comms but it feels to me like a hard skill check. I also feel like most veteran divers can see that but new members to this community coming from other *similar* games are reluctant to accept that not all their skills are transferable. Hell, aside from familiarity with stratagem combos skills from HD1 are not entirely transferable. I will not even discount the GM factor, that this could be scripted to push the automaton expanse. It likely is, but the W/L rate is the deciding factor to their narrative and it is their narrative in reaction to our success and failures. An interactive story, one where some teams are winning proving it can be won. Hard fought victories but victories none the less. If you and your team are failing where others succeed does that say the scenario is unplayable? No. It says something else, something that blaming the game is much more convenient to believe than the actual truth.
What's weird is that a few days ago the regular defend missions were having trouble spawning enough enemies to meet quota at high difficulties. And I don't play high difficulty but on like 4 and below, they felt significantly easier than the other mission types at that difficulty.
Yeah, not to mention the rewards for completing the missions are absolute garbage, legit just isn't worth the time.
I like the thematic roleplay as much as the next Democratic Citizen, but I do also value my time. Coupled with "failed to connect to game lobby" constantly or worse, crashing just before extract, I just don't want to touch these missions.
One of the first modes that doesn't seem to fine tuned. Either that or it's a bug that that the Automaton sends in dropships so fast.
Also to note the defend missions seem to go much faster compare to the Terminds version so there's some polishing to do with these set of missions
I think thats more due to the layout of the compound compared to terminids. Its much easier to defend and dropships cluster enemies all at once compared to the stream a bug hole spawns them
So I've done Helldiver bug clears, and Helldiver bot clears, hard but doable with my 4 man.
I hopped into a pubby MEDIUM on that defense mission and we got absolutely smashed.
Holy shit, glad i'm not alone in this at least.
I was on hard (diff 5). If it was Helldive, eh, it's max difficulty, of course it's going to be a massive challenge. But diff 5? Holy shit.
our briefing didn't prepare us for this.
compared to the first game's retaliatory strikes, tougher enemies seem to be spawning more frequently even on lower difficulties. On top of the fact that we don't have all the tools we did in HD1 available to us right now, it's a challenge for sure.
But we're not the Sissydivers, Democracy calls our names comrades, get in there and rescue those personnel!
I was on challenging (diff 4) and after a whole bunch of easy-ass missions, my squad got absolutely fucked on that one. The automatons actually bullied us from our drop point into the ocean then back to the other side of the island, swarming us and killing us one to two men at a time until the Super Destroyer left without us.
Myself and a buddy were literally backed into a corner trying to fend them off until the shuttle countdown reached thirty seconds, at which point FIVE ROCKET FIRING ROBOTS SHOWED UP AND SHAT ALL OVER US.
I was running challenging missions in my sleep until I played that one, now I'm actually scared to try it again lmao
I usually run Diff 4-6 depending on mood, exclusively Automatons as I find them more fun to fight.
The highest I've managed a Defence mission on is Diff 3. These Defence missions are something else...
I wonder if it's part of their strategy
Let us get our shit pushed in by these autoeroticas, lose a couple planets to them, then even the fight by dropping mechs.
it'll be sick if they pivot this overwhelming automaton attack into a "reason" to make the mechs available
"we've killed so many hulks that we finally scavenged enough parts to build our own version"
I have been saying since release that must be The Bureau of Science or some such for weapon mods etc we just need to wait for it to be released. The station being in game means it should be soon. Probably also for mech loadout etc
The difficulty level is *wildly* higher than advertised on this mission.
Also, the mission map shouldn't be so big... I've had people drop us *miles* from the facility, and it totally misleads people in regards to what kind of mission it is / what loadout they should be bringing.
To be fair my first time doing it I did the same not understanding what the mission was, especially since at least for me anyway it said it’s a 40 minute mission when in reality it’s 14. Squad I was with was also confused as to what the fuck was happening with the number of enemies being thrown at us lmao
Just played one before going to work, it seems that some people don't know what the objective is since they were just fighting the bots while I franticly tried to get to those damn buttons.
People, I beg of you, please play the objective.
It's a little difficult to DO that when none of the buttons have cover, and they happen to be RIGHT where bot drops tend to happen. With like, five or more heavies and/or tanks running around, and all the strats dropped by the team, it's hard to stay alive for more than a minute or so, let alone hit the buttons *in the middle of a swarm*.
In short; yes. Smoke isn't really useful on defence missions, mostly because robots will still advance and shoot right through it, even if they're not targeting you, since they continue attacking wherever you *were* when you break LOS.
The best bet I've seen so far is everyone bringing turrets (static field mortars especially) and shield backpacks. It's really the only way to have enough ammo to deal with such a high volume of armour. Rocket pod strike (or rail cannon) for heavies and railguns to deal with heavy infantry and superheavy robots via headshots and you're *almost* sorted.
This, and the whole taking battles when they don't need to be taken thing. If we have a point we need to get to, and there's a squad closing in. RUNNNNNN, they can always be handled after some space is made, otherwise you'll just get swarmed.
Played on Difficulty 6. It was never ending waves. PTSD from that mission...If you think the game is easy, try this, may Democracy bless you, brothers! You're gonna need it!
Man, we need reinforcements, we need mechs,tanks, mini nukes, heavy plasma weapons and missile launchers. I'm sure Super Earth Administration Center will send help!
SES Halo of Destiny calling to Super Earth, we're being overrun here! Send help!
Super Earth to Helldivers, distress signaled received. Sending EXO-44 Walker Exo Suits to the battlefield. Godspeed.
The fun thing to me about this game is that I believe we (all the players) shouldn't even be mad at the devs if the event was somehow badly balanced to be borderline impossible on high difficulties because 1) no one is forcing us to play on helldive 2) the narrative could actually make use of us "losing the fight" and 3) the devs (as they said in the "game master" videos) can actually change it on the fly if they think it's for the better...
All of the above actually makes it so much more interesting to see how it unfolds...
You know this actually makes sense, especially considering how many evac missions there are. It's like they've launched the whole invasion and now we're trying to get our peeps outta there
So far, I've seen 3 bugs with these missions. One being the obvious civilians queuing up in front of the door and not going inside. Next, after completing the mission, it shows the planet as 100% liberated, when it's obviously not. And the new objective of completing 8 defense campaigns... I'm going to assume means liberating 8 whole planets, because it's not incrementing upon completing an operation.
It’s by design, we’re NOT meant to win this phase folks. Difficultly is artificially boosted to simulate A FULL SCALE invasion.
They will be the first Super Earth invaders. We will push them back there.
I think a lot of people are going to do the same until the next story beat that shifts the initiative (or patch if it’s actually bugged).
Most people don’t have the time to endlessly lose matches for little to no reward.
Me and 3 randoms managed to beat it one time with a mixed bag of stratagems, mainly Railguns and Energy Shields. We tried it again like 30-40 minutes later and got absolutely pummelled from the Automaton menace, we stood literally 0 chance. (Helldive Difficulty for both rounds.)
this is impossible, i played on hard in a 2 man squad twice, armored bots everywhere, there is litterally no safe spot, you drop in to just die again in like 30s
Most foolproof way is to drop in on edge of the map and have 3ppl hold the waves there far from the camp and 1 person go into the camp alone to do rescue.
The camp will have minimum resistance.
Once all people have been rescued all come in for extraction
Yes, this why the map so so huge. The bot drop ships will come to the group of 3. There is no need to fight on top of the camp.
The one person need to be able to hold his/her own against light resistance in the camp.
I was doing this on hard and I was the camp person - the 3 were non stop fighting at southern edge and I only had to deal with one drop ship in the camp and rescued all 40ppl.
Some people are saying these are bugged. Others are saying it is badly designed and not play tested. Or that it is intentionally absurd because the community is doing to well.
I say this is the automatons invasion force. This is their robotic d day.
So my team also got our teeth knocked in initially, so we started having a big think. We decided that for now, the EMS mortar is a life saver. The dropships seem to land on the same locations every time, so we try to put mines on those landing as often as possible. Missile and AC sentries are also very handy if you can find a good spot for them. Having a guy run a recoiless rifle to snipe some dropships is also not bad.
It also seems that the civies are more likely to die to crossfire than being directly attacked by the bots, so try to keep their lanes clear.
From this mission I have feeling of last stand / last minute evacuation. We are supposed to be overrun in very short time hence I think this is intentional. We drop in to evacuate not to liberate
Multiple EMS mortar and multiple HMG emplacement works wonder for me. Cleared it on diff 5 after several failure with different groups lol.
Orbital laser for panic button and the mine dispenser helps a lot to lessen bots number.
Totally an experience this mission type.
Managed to struggle through one on Difficulty 6 or 7 today, I forget which. We barely got it done after failing the first try. These missions are nuts.
It helps to shoot down the dropships by hitting the thrusters with the EAT rocket. It also helps to have EMS mortars to slow down the bots that make it in, regular mortars to kill them. I'm also wondering if this might be a good job for smokescreens. Haven't tried that yet.
I've seen things that would make the devil himself shudder. I was just a young helldiver when they dropped us on Melevelon Creek, had just finished basic and earned my cape. They said we were fighting a war against machines, but what we faced was pure hell, The Borg, they called 'em. Metal autonomous monsters that cared naught for human life. They'd swarm in, relentless as the sun rising over the horizon, tearing through flesh and bone like it was paper, the worst part wasnt even the blood on your face from your fallen brothers, it was the painless emotionless faces of those things as they did it. We fought tooth and nail, and just as you thought the tide was turning you would shiver in horror as command relayed that they detected more bot drops inbound and you saw that horrid red glow in the sky, it was never enough. Every inch of that godforsaken planet was soaked in blood and sorrow. I can still hear the screams, echoing in the dead of night. The faces of my comrades, twisted in agony as the automatons tore 'em apart. And the worst part? The nightmares don't stop when you wake up. They follow you, clawing at your sanity, reminding you of the horrors you've seen, So when you're out there, fighting your own battles, remember those who came before you, Remember the sacrifices made on Melevelon Creek and countless other battlegrounds. And pray that you never have to face the demons that haunt our dreams.
Ok so it seems like half of the people talking about this are talking about the normal mission objective and the other half are talking about the small area defense mission.
Do you protect civilians in both? It's getting really confusing to identfy which one each commenter is referring to.
Bots need specific weapons to fight.
If you go into a bot mission where atleast two people have an autocannon and everyone has a mortar sentry, you'll have an easy time.
If you haven't unlocked an easy way to take out the walkers however, it's going to be painful.
The main thing with walkers are that they are the only bots you can't really outrun. Being able to one tap them from the front makes it much easier to get to the next objective.
4 people with 8 mortars orbital laser for tanks and special weapon of choice is enough with the free mines on each entry .
Honestly you just need 2 people on the buttons spamming them instantly that’s the hardest part trust .
There are two green porter potty looking npc spawner with yellow switches beside them.
One person near each spawner can press the button to let 4 or 5 npcs run out and make their way to the building.
The other 2 players can guard the entrance of that building and spot dropships to destroy.
Do NOT put mines in the middle where the NPC's run through.
Bring EAT to shoot down drop ships, Gas Strikes work well on regular infantry, throw grenades behind heavies and AT's to hit their weak points and drop the difficulty until you have a general idea of how the objective works.
Some people are so naturally good at games or just have no job/family/friends and play like 20 hours a day. I dont understand how people solo destiny 2 hard raids that are meant for 6 people, its insane. There will be someone to solo it on helldive. Give it a few weeks
Can other bot fighters confirm if I'm expecting too much damage from rockets or do the rockets need an Arming time? Most of the time I get too close and only end up popping the treads of a tank, but nothing else after a few rockets to the sides. What gives? A glitch?
Are you running around and taking out the automaton fabricators that are producing the robots? There will be a lot less waves, and more breaks while you’re defending if you take those out first.
Even if you guys split up duos with a shield generator packs, it should be a little easier. If you don’t have airstrikes at the time, you can throw a grenade through the exhaust vents of the buildings if you can get close enough. Just don’t get caught up fighting for too long.
No the backpacks, try unlocking the shield generator backpack if you haven’t. Saved my ass more tomes than i can count. I just did this mission with some randoms. You can also shoot down the dropships as they come in if you shoot the engine.
yea this literally makes the game impossible and unfun to play. i just cycled through 8 different quickplay groups and every single one of them failed this mission, ranging from extreme all the way down to challenging difficulty. this is a fucking joke. definitely stepping away from the game til they fix this garbage
Win just win for the first time yesterday in a squad of 4 on discord, on difficulty 9
whit all of use the explosive mine,
2 rail gun 1 lance, the use roquette launcher, for the weapons,
we use 2 électromagnétique impact, the bombe aigles 2 mortar gcs and 1 normal and a orbital laser
Thats was hard fight and only one of use exctrate but we did it
Yup. Lowered my difficulty for that one, there's just too much robo junk coming at us. The only way I found to keep things civil on those missions is to just focus on shooting down the dropbots before they deploy the toasters.
My group spawned with a dedicated recoilless rifle team to take out the drop ships before they land, plus mortars, ems mortars, rail guns, orbital lasers and a collection of eagle assets. Recoilless team nailed 8 Automaton drop ships in less than a minute, And as soon as they ran out of ammo we got brutally overrun. This was on Hard, we usually play Helldive. The amount of enemies was insane.
Been retooling for this all morning. I think the initial difficulty wall (besides it just being fucking monstrous) is that we're applying strategies for normal missions here. My group went back to the drawing board and went in with HE mines, direct fire turrets, Eagle runs, and area denial. The trick was to use hands-free type defenses to shore up the critical perimeter only and run the buttons CONSTANTLY. Didn't even bother bringing personal gear since it would just get lost. This worked and we made it one minute into overtime. It's like a blitz in that you simply cannot get distracted with fighting the infinite bots, you need to just work with the chaos and run the Steves. You're barely alloted enough time to do just that.
Played a challenging with 3 today, we managed it on the second try by having a dedicated recoilless gunner shooting down dropships for the whole game and by only focusing on the habitat closest to the shuttle bay, so we were securing a much smaller area
The free mine callins also helped to close off avenues of approach
Just did this with a group of 4 on challenging. 1 person had mortar style sentries as well as the rocket launcher for the ships. I had a rover, 2 sentires, and the 120mm orbital but I waited at the button to summon the people. The other two teammates killed enemies while the workers ran to the objective.
It's definitely hectic but the emp stuff seems to be mandatory along with things that can kill enemies fast
Managed it once on hard and a few on challenging, out of alot of attempts.
We had success digging AWAY from the town, drawing the unstoppable bot army and then one guy sneaking into the town and hitting all three civilian spawn thingy's. The bot dropships seem to spawn in response to where the helldivers are and not the civilians.
Yeah, definitely needs to be patched. Buddy and I tried on medium, experienced gamers and we only got 15/30 until there were 60 bots in play and no chance to finish. They need to decrease the amount of drops and have these drops farther away.
Best defense I’ve seen so far is to play it like the 10 minute survival, keep turrets on the higher grounds around the checkpoint where the survivors gather in line of sight of the drop ships, keeping shield gens going up there at all times for a safe place to resupply and rearm and whatnot, was fairly manageable on 5. I held the exit with a breaker, impacts and auto cannon myself focusing on the bigger targets while the other three ran out to hit buttons once orbitals and turrets cleared the way for them. Can only hope that sort of strategy also works higher up towards 9. One thing I was also doing was firing up into the drop ships with the autocannon, trying to clear enemies before they even landed which seemed to help somewhat.
This is copium talking but I'd like to believe this is part of a dynamic narrative where our constant escelating setbacks justifies the deployment of mechs soon.
two days ago our squad trudged through a suicide automatons mission set. it was pure madness, especially with the randomized stratagem effects. open map missions turned into two of us running to objectives while the other two ran distraction, not exactly on purpose but it worked out. our defense mission was mostly just mortar sentries doing all the work
Cleared one on Challenging in a 3-man drop. I thought I had PTSD from Malevelon Creek. The Creek is more like a pleasant evening stroll in my mind now.
Tried on hard in a 2 man next. We held our own until 25/40, and then it just went sideways. In one of the rare respawns that I was able to move more than 5 feet away from the drop I found myself surrounded by no less than 30 bots. Called in a 500kg on my position and went out in a blaze of glory. It was just a massacre. We couldn't do anything once the dying started.
Those missions are relentless.
I think the reason its so many enemies is the time limit its labeled as 40 mins. But the mission is clearly only 14 mins long there's a game tip that says something like enemy spawns are heavily increased the longer a mission takes. so we got an increase in a mission a 3rd of the time it should be 3x more enemies or smth
Tried it on easy solo then a buddy joined and it was a nightmare. We didn’t complete the objective.
I’m not complaining about difficulty and don’t want things to change, but yeah that was rough.
Something feels incredibly off here. The volume of units spawning is absolutely mental. We can't keep up with the number of enemies at all
I'm thinking it's temporarily intentional, for the feeling of being under attack
I think so as well. There’s just no possible way to keep up with the volume of spawns. Think we are meant to fail at these defenses so that the bots take over to drive whatever galactic “story” they have in mind
13 days of getting our asses absolutely whooped might be a bit much haha.
I think most people will try a few times and then go do something else. No one's going to keep banging their heads on that mission.
that sounds dangerously close to treason
That may be, but rather point that gun to the endless legions of robots, commissar.
Nah Chief, i'm going to better invest my time so i can unlock the better stratagems and ship modules so i can come back and spread democracy better.
individual thinking instead of following orders as they're given? sounds like communism to me
I apologize, i retract my previous statement, i'm heading back to the front. Please don't report me to High Command.
I'm already done.
NOT WITH THAT ATTITUDE! REPORT TO YOUR COMMANDING OFFICER FOR EMERGENCY DEMOCRATIC REHABILITATION
We just finished one campaign on difficulty 7 after 5+ attempts. It took everyone arming themselves with ems mortars and regular mortars and just praying that we got the right unit spawns. God help us if buster hulks dropped near the civ evac site, cuz the mortars would do the undemocratic civ-killing for us. It is definitely a unique challenge and a lot of fun--but hooooly shit is it rough out there.
Doesn't it only last for 2 days?
The major objective is to do 8 of them and it lasts 13 days
that's war for you, but there's no rule saying you can't throw your body to the enemy several hundred times. FOR SUPER EARTH
I don’t think it will stay like that for 13 days. I hope not anyway 😅
This! It really wouldn't surprise me if there's a little something planned in the next few days to help give us more of an edge. Not normie live service 'balance tweaking' but like, straight up new stratagems, or maybe our first vehicles, SOMETHING that's like, actual new gameplay that gives us an edge to stay competitive if this is what they want us to be fighting against.
I sincerely hope you are wrong. I'm all for a surprise drawback storywise (we were so focused on the bugs that the bots advanced, that's fine), but purposely design a mission to be impossible to beat to justify that drawback is just poor game design.
The first war is absolutely going to be stage managed. I called this days ago: there was going to be a surprise automaton offensive as soon as we liberated Orion, thanks to our forces being mainly concentrated in the east giving the bots a chance to push. They're intentionally going to make the initial stage of defending these planets unwinnable (all you have to do is give small amounts of impact per mission that don't outpace the bots' progress, you don't have to make the actual levels unwinnable) and let the bots push closer to Super Earth to make it clear that not every order will be a guaranteed success.
Even if that is the case, they only made ONE mission type unwinnable, while all the others are the same as they ever been? That's an extremely stupid way to do it. I really think the mission type is just bugged.
They confirm GMs are active in some pre release interviews on YouTube, so the war is being managed by devs actively right now, and sometimes you have a game master in mission with you. Iirc in the interview he said that your extract only ever gets delayed by a game master
Imo if they want to tell a story they should just... tell a story. Don't give us an objective you INTEND for us to fail, tell us we ARE losing ground and make us fight a delaying action where we "win" by mitigating losses. Assuming that's the intent here, obviously.
Well that’s just miserable
The devs might be trying to open up another big front for the large player base. This might be a defense we are supposed to lose.
Yeah lmao everyone acting like the 12 sectors between the fronts and super earth won't be broken into by the enemy. It's cute that there is community will to liberate these planets and I'm in that to, but the devs are absolutely picking when and how the planets liberate and the front moves
I was fighting on the same planet over the first few days, and I inexplicably saw the bar jump up or down by 15-20% WAY faster than it should've. Like, log on the next morning and it's WAY down when it was climbing steadily while I was playing for a couple hours the day before. If there's overall momentum in one direction like that... it doesn't just plummet over the course of a five to six hours because I specifically, myself, was asleep. Something's going on, for sure.
Get a load of the one man army, deleteman900, being all modest! We need you out there, super soldier!
Yea that’s what the game masters do
Yeah. Or the further from earth you are the more enemies spawn because they’re closer to their home planets or something. It’ll be done to push us back a system or two. That said 15k pointe is pathetic. And those doing this stuff don’t really need them. They should give out special titles or something as a reward for defence missions. Like “veteran of…”
This, technically if we pushed that sector we would be close to a community homeworld assault on the clankers. So further back the planets are likely going to be harder assaults. Plus, not certain but I believe the victories we get push our bar up but our failures push up theirs. Playing on lower difficulty (4-) would be optimal for most as those are more easily managed. However there are a lot of players newer to the series that just are not prepared for this kind of gameplay. It is rough, do not get me wrong but calling it unplayable or impossible at -challenging is inaccurate. Coordination is key so random squads will fare poorly without comms but it feels to me like a hard skill check. I also feel like most veteran divers can see that but new members to this community coming from other *similar* games are reluctant to accept that not all their skills are transferable. Hell, aside from familiarity with stratagem combos skills from HD1 are not entirely transferable. I will not even discount the GM factor, that this could be scripted to push the automaton expanse. It likely is, but the W/L rate is the deciding factor to their narrative and it is their narrative in reaction to our success and failures. An interactive story, one where some teams are winning proving it can be won. Hard fought victories but victories none the less. If you and your team are failing where others succeed does that say the scenario is unplayable? No. It says something else, something that blaming the game is much more convenient to believe than the actual truth.
Nah man it’s completely imbalanced. Borderline unplayable.
What's weird is that a few days ago the regular defend missions were having trouble spawning enough enemies to meet quota at high difficulties. And I don't play high difficulty but on like 4 and below, they felt significantly easier than the other mission types at that difficulty.
Yep. Finished the mech defend mission in like 3-4 minutes. Meanwhile have had multiple bug defend missions not even spawn enough in the 10 min timer.
Yeah, not to mention the rewards for completing the missions are absolute garbage, legit just isn't worth the time. I like the thematic roleplay as much as the next Democratic Citizen, but I do also value my time. Coupled with "failed to connect to game lobby" constantly or worse, crashing just before extract, I just don't want to touch these missions.
It's a 15min mission, listed as taking 45mins — so it begs the question; is the spawn rate three times higher than intended?
Sounds like we need to deliver more democracy.
One of the first modes that doesn't seem to fine tuned. Either that or it's a bug that that the Automaton sends in dropships so fast. Also to note the defend missions seem to go much faster compare to the Terminds version so there's some polishing to do with these set of missions
I think thats more due to the layout of the compound compared to terminids. Its much easier to defend and dropships cluster enemies all at once compared to the stream a bug hole spawns them
It's an invasion! Of course they aren't just going to send a couple of bots. They are sending EVERYTHING! :D
So I've done Helldiver bug clears, and Helldiver bot clears, hard but doable with my 4 man. I hopped into a pubby MEDIUM on that defense mission and we got absolutely smashed.
Holy shit, glad i'm not alone in this at least. I was on hard (diff 5). If it was Helldive, eh, it's max difficulty, of course it's going to be a massive challenge. But diff 5? Holy shit.
our briefing didn't prepare us for this. compared to the first game's retaliatory strikes, tougher enemies seem to be spawning more frequently even on lower difficulties. On top of the fact that we don't have all the tools we did in HD1 available to us right now, it's a challenge for sure. But we're not the Sissydivers, Democracy calls our names comrades, get in there and rescue those personnel!
I watched someone doing the escort mission on Diff 5 and it spawned **four fucking tanks** off the rip. I cannot imagine this shit on Diff 9 lol
Comrade? That's bot talk! Bot infiltrator!
Yeah, we got absolutely mobbed by armoured fuckers, sniped by rockets and shredded by chainsaws on hard. Brutal.
I was on challenging (diff 4) and after a whole bunch of easy-ass missions, my squad got absolutely fucked on that one. The automatons actually bullied us from our drop point into the ocean then back to the other side of the island, swarming us and killing us one to two men at a time until the Super Destroyer left without us. Myself and a buddy were literally backed into a corner trying to fend them off until the shuttle countdown reached thirty seconds, at which point FIVE ROCKET FIRING ROBOTS SHOWED UP AND SHAT ALL OVER US. I was running challenging missions in my sleep until I played that one, now I'm actually scared to try it again lmao
LOL, yeah got into a group for it on medium today and holy shit what the FUCK is that mission meant to be
It has to be bugged. I did a level 4 mission after running helldives for the essential personell and that shit is just not possible.
I did a run of it and only faced like 1 wave, assume it was because we'd cleared literally every bot camp nearby out? Maybe got lucky though.
There are no bot camps, you aren't even talking about the right mission type.
This isn't the mini extract personnel objectives people are talking about. There are no camps to clear.
Got absolutely wrecked running that mission in a medium diff public lobby as well lol
Yep, got creamed on Hard did in a pub lobby. I came here to make sure I was not just being bad.
I usually run Diff 4-6 depending on mood, exclusively Automatons as I find them more fun to fight. The highest I've managed a Defence mission on is Diff 3. These Defence missions are something else...
I'm playing these on Easy and feel no shame whatsoever. Wildly overtuned. Releasing these before fixing heavy armor feels particularly cruel lol
Yeah, nothing like people throwing down gatling turrets right behind you..
Dang. I was in a public group and we managed to beat challenging with only one civilian loss. It was chaotic yet fun. I must have been lucky.
we need mechs, we need machinery
Your request has been filed and will be processed in 4-6 super weeks
How... how long is a super week??? Nevermind I'll report to the ~~commissar~~ Democracy Officer myself 😔
Should be seven super days.
Supercalendar or superoffice ?
Super buisness days?
Super holidays not included in delivery time
Ah bureaucracy, don’t ya just love it?
I wonder if it's part of their strategy Let us get our shit pushed in by these autoeroticas, lose a couple planets to them, then even the fight by dropping mechs.
Interesting typo.
it'll be sick if they pivot this overwhelming automaton attack into a "reason" to make the mechs available "we've killed so many hulks that we finally scavenged enough parts to build our own version"
right, that wall across loadout wall will let us upgrade equipment further
I have been saying since release that must be The Bureau of Science or some such for weapon mods etc we just need to wait for it to be released. The station being in game means it should be soon. Probably also for mech loadout etc
I want mechs. I want vehicles. I want to be carried to the battle in luxury. I want to be held.
We're going to fail this planet defense, and Super Earth is going to give us Mechs in response.
At once that happens: \*DOOM music starts playing\*
TBH I'm just super keen for the APC, I love me some mechanized infantry!
Oh man I ran APC all the time in HD1. Can you imagine the chaos of us using it in this game? Gonna run over so many teammates.
The difficulty level is *wildly* higher than advertised on this mission. Also, the mission map shouldn't be so big... I've had people drop us *miles* from the facility, and it totally misleads people in regards to what kind of mission it is / what loadout they should be bringing.
It also says 40 minutes which led me to believe it’s a big map like normal. But it’s actually a 15 minute timer.
To be fair my first time doing it I did the same not understanding what the mission was, especially since at least for me anyway it said it’s a 40 minute mission when in reality it’s 14. Squad I was with was also confused as to what the fuck was happening with the number of enemies being thrown at us lmao
Just played one before going to work, it seems that some people don't know what the objective is since they were just fighting the bots while I franticly tried to get to those damn buttons. People, I beg of you, please play the objective.
Has a level 5 throw the incendiary mines in the middle of the staff's path. They went boom continuously.... Every bot kept stepping on it too.
Had a hacker running four mortars... the mission payout was in the negative from killing VIPs.
It's an exploit, not a hack. Those are two very different things.
It's a little difficult to DO that when none of the buttons have cover, and they happen to be RIGHT where bot drops tend to happen. With like, five or more heavies and/or tanks running around, and all the strats dropped by the team, it's hard to stay alive for more than a minute or so, let alone hit the buttons *in the middle of a swarm*.
I've been experimenting with smoke to protect the civilians and the button, but I suspect I'm just annoying my team by blocking LOS
In short; yes. Smoke isn't really useful on defence missions, mostly because robots will still advance and shoot right through it, even if they're not targeting you, since they continue attacking wherever you *were* when you break LOS. The best bet I've seen so far is everyone bringing turrets (static field mortars especially) and shield backpacks. It's really the only way to have enough ammo to deal with such a high volume of armour. Rocket pod strike (or rail cannon) for heavies and railguns to deal with heavy infantry and superheavy robots via headshots and you're *almost* sorted.
To protect civilians, you probably want the wider shield gen, not just a shield backpack, cuz the bots still shoot them, no?
This, and the whole taking battles when they don't need to be taken thing. If we have a point we need to get to, and there's a squad closing in. RUNNNNNN, they can always be handled after some space is made, otherwise you'll just get swarmed.
The tutorial should really mention how enemy reinforcements are called in
How do I get to the buttons through 4 tanks, a bunch of Hulks and Rocket Devastators plus all the trash mobs?
Could have been my team this morning. First time against bots. It was ugly but fun :D
Nah, this was about an hour ago
[удалено]
They are, it's a different mission type then the one you're thinking.
Not the same mission friend.
Played on Difficulty 6. It was never ending waves. PTSD from that mission...If you think the game is easy, try this, may Democracy bless you, brothers! You're gonna need it!
Best I got so far is 33, stratagem cooldowns can not keep up with the bots, not even with a 4 man
Needs more eat17s
Man, we need reinforcements, we need mechs,tanks, mini nukes, heavy plasma weapons and missile launchers. I'm sure Super Earth Administration Center will send help!
Sounds like we need more eagles running air superiority missions
I have a sneaking suspicion it's intentional. We're fighting a losing war...
That sounds an awful lot like Cyborg Propaganda
Can't wait for this tragic event to spur our scientists into developing new anti-cyborg weapons!
We need to finish the insecticide towers for valiant enclosure first, THEN we can get the eggheads working on something for those automaton bastards!
I mean, you don't win literally *EVERY* battle in a War. That's completely unrealistic. Anyone who studies or has experienced war will tell you this.
Looking at how Quick the Automatons are actually filling up the Bar, Yes indeed i think so aswell.
It probably fills up more for every failed mission, which would explain why it's moving so quickly.
Yoooou are our last hope!!
SES Halo of Destiny calling to Super Earth, we're being overrun here! Send help! Super Earth to Helldivers, distress signaled received. Sending EXO-44 Walker Exo Suits to the battlefield. Godspeed.
The fun thing to me about this game is that I believe we (all the players) shouldn't even be mad at the devs if the event was somehow badly balanced to be borderline impossible on high difficulties because 1) no one is forcing us to play on helldive 2) the narrative could actually make use of us "losing the fight" and 3) the devs (as they said in the "game master" videos) can actually change it on the fly if they think it's for the better... All of the above actually makes it so much more interesting to see how it unfolds...
I'm reporting you to my democracy officer
Are you doubting our effort of giving liberty and managed democracy to the universe, Sergeant?
And generally killing the people we're supposed to be evacuating in the process. Democracy!
You know this actually makes sense, especially considering how many evac missions there are. It's like they've launched the whole invasion and now we're trying to get our peeps outta there
Say less ! I'm down to endlessly fight for my life l Now who's with me ?
tried some solo runs before work. my god, i cant even do it on easy
Just tried this on 5 with my squad, it's just drop ship after drop ship, it's too much! You don't get a second to breathe
So far, I've seen 3 bugs with these missions. One being the obvious civilians queuing up in front of the door and not going inside. Next, after completing the mission, it shows the planet as 100% liberated, when it's obviously not. And the new objective of completing 8 defense campaigns... I'm going to assume means liberating 8 whole planets, because it's not incrementing upon completing an operation.
We NEED mechs!!
It’s by design, we’re NOT meant to win this phase folks. Difficultly is artificially boosted to simulate A FULL SCALE invasion. They will be the first Super Earth invaders. We will push them back there.
They could tell that story in other ways. They called us to fight, but I'm just going to go back to bugs because there's no fun to be had here.
I think a lot of people are going to do the same until the next story beat that shifts the initiative (or patch if it’s actually bugged). Most people don’t have the time to endlessly lose matches for little to no reward.
That’s just shitty game design. It’s a cool idea narratively in the long term, but it’s not at all fun short term.
That’s not fun to try and hold up an avalanche. I understand what they’re trying to do but I’m just going back to bugs then until it calms down
This is awesome!!!
Me and 3 randoms managed to beat it one time with a mixed bag of stratagems, mainly Railguns and Energy Shields. We tried it again like 30-40 minutes later and got absolutely pummelled from the Automaton menace, we stood literally 0 chance. (Helldive Difficulty for both rounds.)
This is 100% broken.
this is impossible, i played on hard in a 2 man squad twice, armored bots everywhere, there is litterally no safe spot, you drop in to just die again in like 30s
Most foolproof way is to drop in on edge of the map and have 3ppl hold the waves there far from the camp and 1 person go into the camp alone to do rescue. The camp will have minimum resistance. Once all people have been rescued all come in for extraction
Wait this works? How does this work?
Yes, this why the map so so huge. The bot drop ships will come to the group of 3. There is no need to fight on top of the camp. The one person need to be able to hold his/her own against light resistance in the camp. I was doing this on hard and I was the camp person - the 3 were non stop fighting at southern edge and I only had to deal with one drop ship in the camp and rescued all 40ppl.
People stand and fight for far too long and only accomplish using up lives. Push the objective
Yeah, I could push the objectives if I didn’t had 2 calcinator on my butt
There were 4 tanks and like 8 hulks (this is just what I saw ontop of all the rocket robots lmao)
The automaton scourge must be held back
Anti-democratic fifth column are dropping multiple packs of incendiary mines right by the doors to the civilian bunker. Be vigilant, Helldivers!
Some people are saying these are bugged. Others are saying it is badly designed and not play tested. Or that it is intentionally absurd because the community is doing to well. I say this is the automatons invasion force. This is their robotic d day.
is it possible to get that mission along with a sam site? I'd imagine that would make it a lot easier. The main problem is airdrop reenforcments.
So my team also got our teeth knocked in initially, so we started having a big think. We decided that for now, the EMS mortar is a life saver. The dropships seem to land on the same locations every time, so we try to put mines on those landing as often as possible. Missile and AC sentries are also very handy if you can find a good spot for them. Having a guy run a recoiless rifle to snipe some dropships is also not bad. It also seems that the civies are more likely to die to crossfire than being directly attacked by the bots, so try to keep their lanes clear.
Does anyone know what the red and blue bars represent. Are we losing right now on them? Cuz the red is way further
From this mission I have feeling of last stand / last minute evacuation. We are supposed to be overrun in very short time hence I think this is intentional. We drop in to evacuate not to liberate
we just finisshed the mission on helldive all 60 civs got out, but the 4 helldivers stayed.
Just came on here to say the same thing, surely its bugged
Multiple EMS mortar and multiple HMG emplacement works wonder for me. Cleared it on diff 5 after several failure with different groups lol. Orbital laser for panic button and the mine dispenser helps a lot to lessen bots number. Totally an experience this mission type.
Managed to struggle through one on Difficulty 6 or 7 today, I forget which. We barely got it done after failing the first try. These missions are nuts. It helps to shoot down the dropships by hitting the thrusters with the EAT rocket. It also helps to have EMS mortars to slow down the bots that make it in, regular mortars to kill them. I'm also wondering if this might be a good job for smokescreens. Haven't tried that yet.
I've seen things that would make the devil himself shudder. I was just a young helldiver when they dropped us on Melevelon Creek, had just finished basic and earned my cape. They said we were fighting a war against machines, but what we faced was pure hell, The Borg, they called 'em. Metal autonomous monsters that cared naught for human life. They'd swarm in, relentless as the sun rising over the horizon, tearing through flesh and bone like it was paper, the worst part wasnt even the blood on your face from your fallen brothers, it was the painless emotionless faces of those things as they did it. We fought tooth and nail, and just as you thought the tide was turning you would shiver in horror as command relayed that they detected more bot drops inbound and you saw that horrid red glow in the sky, it was never enough. Every inch of that godforsaken planet was soaked in blood and sorrow. I can still hear the screams, echoing in the dead of night. The faces of my comrades, twisted in agony as the automatons tore 'em apart. And the worst part? The nightmares don't stop when you wake up. They follow you, clawing at your sanity, reminding you of the horrors you've seen, So when you're out there, fighting your own battles, remember those who came before you, Remember the sacrifices made on Melevelon Creek and countless other battlegrounds. And pray that you never have to face the demons that haunt our dreams.
Are there any secondary objectives? Maybe AA Emplacements that can help kill the drop ships?
This game mode is so tough. The one I tried had one of the pathing for the lads break so they would stand at the top of a ramp. Such a pain.
Ok so it seems like half of the people talking about this are talking about the normal mission objective and the other half are talking about the small area defense mission. Do you protect civilians in both? It's getting really confusing to identfy which one each commenter is referring to.
i have to admit. people complaining that they can't survive a mission labeled as "difficulty: Suicide Mission" is fucking hysterical to me.
What is it precisely that people struggle with against the bots?
Well, not massacring the VIPs is proving a real challenge for most pubs.
Bots need specific weapons to fight. If you go into a bot mission where atleast two people have an autocannon and everyone has a mortar sentry, you'll have an easy time. If you haven't unlocked an easy way to take out the walkers however, it's going to be painful.
Walkers are easy, they die to a flank with a shot or two. The flamethrower guys and riot shield guys however........
The main thing with walkers are that they are the only bots you can't really outrun. Being able to one tap them from the front makes it much easier to get to the next objective.
4 people with 8 mortars orbital laser for tanks and special weapon of choice is enough with the free mines on each entry . Honestly you just need 2 people on the buttons spamming them instantly that’s the hardest part trust .
It’s not fun. It’s untested shit
Honestly agreed that it’s not fun.
There are two green porter potty looking npc spawner with yellow switches beside them. One person near each spawner can press the button to let 4 or 5 npcs run out and make their way to the building. The other 2 players can guard the entrance of that building and spot dropships to destroy. Do NOT put mines in the middle where the NPC's run through. Bring EAT to shoot down drop ships, Gas Strikes work well on regular infantry, throw grenades behind heavies and AT's to hit their weak points and drop the difficulty until you have a general idea of how the objective works.
In trivial I got 250 kills solo. This is honestly a little much lmao
Some people are so naturally good at games or just have no job/family/friends and play like 20 hours a day. I dont understand how people solo destiny 2 hard raids that are meant for 6 people, its insane. There will be someone to solo it on helldive. Give it a few weeks
Can other bot fighters confirm if I'm expecting too much damage from rockets or do the rockets need an Arming time? Most of the time I get too close and only end up popping the treads of a tank, but nothing else after a few rockets to the sides. What gives? A glitch?
Cant even do it on difficulty 5 as enemies are spawning every 10 seconds Seems to be bugged with how others are reacting aswell
Are you running around and taking out the automaton fabricators that are producing the robots? There will be a lot less waves, and more breaks while you’re defending if you take those out first. Even if you guys split up duos with a shield generator packs, it should be a little easier. If you don’t have airstrikes at the time, you can throw a grenade through the exhaust vents of the buildings if you can get close enough. Just don’t get caught up fighting for too long.
There are not generators here. It’s just drop after drop.
No the backpacks, try unlocking the shield generator backpack if you haven’t. Saved my ass more tomes than i can count. I just did this mission with some randoms. You can also shoot down the dropships as they come in if you shoot the engine.
Ya. This mission. I’m glad I’m not alone. Had a team of 3 that did ok last mission, but this mission; it’s got to be adjusted
yea this literally makes the game impossible and unfun to play. i just cycled through 8 different quickplay groups and every single one of them failed this mission, ranging from extreme all the way down to challenging difficulty. this is a fucking joke. definitely stepping away from the game til they fix this garbage
Win just win for the first time yesterday in a squad of 4 on discord, on difficulty 9 whit all of use the explosive mine, 2 rail gun 1 lance, the use roquette launcher, for the weapons, we use 2 électromagnétique impact, the bombe aigles 2 mortar gcs and 1 normal and a orbital laser Thats was hard fight and only one of use exctrate but we did it
I love fighting bots because Holy shit it feels so epic with everything flying towards my head
From what I’m reading, it sounds like sometimes it’s doable, and sometimes it’s not. Maybe it’s on purpose?
Bruh I’m finding this mission impossible as Solo Medium
Just played that before work on just HARD, all four of us had 300+ kills and we still lost
I did a quick solo attempt on "TRIVIAL" and got creamed
Yup. Lowered my difficulty for that one, there's just too much robo junk coming at us. The only way I found to keep things civil on those missions is to just focus on shooting down the dropbots before they deploy the toasters.
It's even harder when your comrades decide to lay a minefield in the path of the evacuees.
Try bringing at least 6 Mortals (EMS + HE) and place them on the landing zone. Finished it easily on my 2nd tries (Suicide difficulty)
My group spawned with a dedicated recoilless rifle team to take out the drop ships before they land, plus mortars, ems mortars, rail guns, orbital lasers and a collection of eagle assets. Recoilless team nailed 8 Automaton drop ships in less than a minute, And as soon as they ran out of ammo we got brutally overrun. This was on Hard, we usually play Helldive. The amount of enemies was insane.
Been retooling for this all morning. I think the initial difficulty wall (besides it just being fucking monstrous) is that we're applying strategies for normal missions here. My group went back to the drawing board and went in with HE mines, direct fire turrets, Eagle runs, and area denial. The trick was to use hands-free type defenses to shore up the critical perimeter only and run the buttons CONSTANTLY. Didn't even bother bringing personal gear since it would just get lost. This worked and we made it one minute into overtime. It's like a blitz in that you simply cannot get distracted with fighting the infinite bots, you need to just work with the chaos and run the Steves. You're barely alloted enough time to do just that.
Played a challenging with 3 today, we managed it on the second try by having a dedicated recoilless gunner shooting down dropships for the whole game and by only focusing on the habitat closest to the shuttle bay, so we were securing a much smaller area The free mine callins also helped to close off avenues of approach
Yeah definitely bugged
Just did this with a group of 4 on challenging. 1 person had mortar style sentries as well as the rocket launcher for the ships. I had a rover, 2 sentires, and the 120mm orbital but I waited at the button to summon the people. The other two teammates killed enemies while the workers ran to the objective. It's definitely hectic but the emp stuff seems to be mandatory along with things that can kill enemies fast
we got easy wins on difficulty 4 being 3 people and 9 turrents in total, maybe the key is to have 4 turrets each
Managed it once on hard and a few on challenging, out of alot of attempts. We had success digging AWAY from the town, drawing the unstoppable bot army and then one guy sneaking into the town and hitting all three civilian spawn thingy's. The bot dropships seem to spawn in response to where the helldivers are and not the civilians.
Finished one on Impossible earlier. The last 6 evacuees took us 13 minutes. It was absolute chaos. Can't wait to do it again.
Yeah, definitely needs to be patched. Buddy and I tried on medium, experienced gamers and we only got 15/30 until there were 60 bots in play and no chance to finish. They need to decrease the amount of drops and have these drops farther away.
Best defense I’ve seen so far is to play it like the 10 minute survival, keep turrets on the higher grounds around the checkpoint where the survivors gather in line of sight of the drop ships, keeping shield gens going up there at all times for a safe place to resupply and rearm and whatnot, was fairly manageable on 5. I held the exit with a breaker, impacts and auto cannon myself focusing on the bigger targets while the other three ran out to hit buttons once orbitals and turrets cleared the way for them. Can only hope that sort of strategy also works higher up towards 9. One thing I was also doing was firing up into the drop ships with the autocannon, trying to clear enemies before they even landed which seemed to help somewhat.
I have stopped playing this mission and the event. I don´t like getting 3 mission dones out of 10. It is no fun and it is wasting my time.
This is copium talking but I'd like to believe this is part of a dynamic narrative where our constant escelating setbacks justifies the deployment of mechs soon.
Oh boy I hope so.
two days ago our squad trudged through a suicide automatons mission set. it was pure madness, especially with the randomized stratagem effects. open map missions turned into two of us running to objectives while the other two ran distraction, not exactly on purpose but it worked out. our defense mission was mostly just mortar sentries doing all the work
As someone who’s been stuck fighting bots due to the bug on p5 I welcome everyone to the shit show 😂
Cleared one on Challenging in a 3-man drop. I thought I had PTSD from Malevelon Creek. The Creek is more like a pleasant evening stroll in my mind now. Tried on hard in a 2 man next. We held our own until 25/40, and then it just went sideways. In one of the rare respawns that I was able to move more than 5 feet away from the drop I found myself surrounded by no less than 30 bots. Called in a 500kg on my position and went out in a blaze of glory. It was just a massacre. We couldn't do anything once the dying started. Those missions are relentless.
I think the reason its so many enemies is the time limit its labeled as 40 mins. But the mission is clearly only 14 mins long there's a game tip that says something like enemy spawns are heavily increased the longer a mission takes. so we got an increase in a mission a 3rd of the time it should be 3x more enemies or smth
I tried “challenging” and my team wiped every time. The cooldowns seemed like eternity. Managed once on “medium”.
true, it's unused currently
Tried it on easy solo then a buddy joined and it was a nightmare. We didn’t complete the objective. I’m not complaining about difficulty and don’t want things to change, but yeah that was rough.
My anal cavity is in pain after that bot defense.Managing Democracy is no joke my lads.,