⚠Due to the recent update, some strategies advised in this video are outdated, therefore please see my new videos on the current best tactics to use against all enemies: Bugs: kzfaq.info/get/bejne/sK6idZuexLXclKs.html Bots: kzfaq.info/get/bejne/eZiWpJR118CumZ8.html What we want to see in Helldivers II: kzfaq.info/get/bejne/gZ53na57tJ3Doqc.html Things you need to STOP doing: kzfaq.info/get/bejne/ldOEerx5yMWVfJ8.html Advanced Tips: kzfaq.info/get/bejne/had4dMxntqergWg.html

You can shoot down the Automaton's Dropships really easily with a well placed shot to one of the engines with the recoilless rifle, on extermination and scientist rescue missions I'll just sit with one and a resupply and swat the things out the sky when they try to drop bots.

One thing you didn't mention about the Stalker, is they occasionally disengage. When they do this, they tend to leap away, go invisible, and then stab you in the back 30 seconds later. It's one of their more endearing features.

As a note for the Bile Titans, if you blow up their sacs, not only will you weaken them, but you will also disable their spewing ability. It makes them a lot easier to deal with in general :)

One thing I noticed... The autocannon is actually a surprisingly good melee club, because it actually takes advantage of the long barrel to hit enemies farther away. You can bonk your way through small groups of the smaller, weaker bugs with ease and not have to switch weapons or worry about blowing yourself up.

The Dreadnough-I mean...Hulks, are absolutely terrifying. Knowing about the arms being removable is fantastic knowledge, thank you!

For people that are new to the rail gun , if you hold square (on the play station) or R you can switch the function from safe to unsafe , unsafe will let's you charge over the cap limit dealing way more damage but if you hold it for to long it will explode and blow you up

I pretty much always carry a E-AT with me on difficulties with chargers. The recent update made the E-AT a 1-shot-stop if you shoot them directly in the head - as it should. I've basically become my squad's anti-tank guy, always having a E-AT at the ready. Also great for putting down stalkers, bile spewers, and hitting spore trees from across the map. E-ATs are also amazing for taking out bot dropships. Hit a thruster nacelle, and down they go.

For the tanks, the easiest strategy is to actually run towards them. The closer you are, the relatively slower the turret is in tracking you. If you're at point blank range, you can casually jog around the tank, and it will never be able to aim at you. Or better yet, climb on top of it, or even use it as cover. To actually close the distance, run towards it and to the right at roughly a 45 degree angle. Running to the left is more risky, as it puts you in sight of the machine gun on the side of the turret. You'll approach it in a soft arc as you keep strafing and closing the distance. Depending on how far away it is when you start, you may need to dodge cannon-fire. The barrel will flash just before it fires, and you can dodge it fairly easily by diving to the right if you time it correctly. Alternatively, you can take cover behind a rock and wait for it to approach you to close the distance. Once you're behind it (or on top of it), you can attack the weak spot on the back of the turret by throwing grenades or shooting it with an Autocannon/Railgun/etc. Impact grenades work best for this, though the stock grenades work too if you time them correctly so they don't bounce. This whole process is mostly for the cannon type tank. The quad-barrel AA type tank is harder to close distance on reliably, though still doable. A lot of this advice also works for the cannon tower installations, though they also track quickly and are hard to dodge.

This is a great video and helped me with Chargers and Bile Titans. I did want to add - just in case anyone reads this - Hunters are even more impressive than you think. More than one occasion I've seen multiple hunters break off from groups and circle our *entire* team to try and attack from the sides or rear, not actively engaging until they're at least completely in our flanks or worse - directly behind us. Even if nobody is actively tracking or shooting them, they will do this somewhat infrequently. It's how you get surprise hunters on your ass even though there's no horde; they're not spawning, that little bastard probably circled you during the main battle.

The other really neat thing about stalkers is that they will chase you across the map. You can't outrun them, but you will occasionally tread too close to a base of theirs. If your team is moving to another objective, having either missed or attempted to avoid a stalker lair, if they noticed you at all they might not catch up immediately but they certainly won't stop until they do. Edit: Ugh, the way you deal with Hulks is aggravating. If you have a railgun just shoot right through the center of them. It only takes one shot if you can hit the eye, two shots otherwise. You will do so much more for your team if you just don't bother with the arms. I'm not sure about other guns but I believe the recoilless rifle also works this way? When you get to the very challenging difficulties you will absolutely need to do this as they spawn almost as commonly as berserkers. Tanks also get pretty common. You HAVE to use stratagems for them. They are basically the automaton equivalent of bile titans. The weak spot is susceptible to grenade damage, however, so a single well-placed grenade can take the entire thing out. Great video. Personally, I prefer automaton missions. I love them both, but Terminids feel like a numbers game, where Automatons are a bit more of a skill-shooter game. A lot of people love the Breaker shotgun because it works for both, but I find the Liberator can really shine in Automaton missions if you can be precise. From what I've experienced in Automaton missions on higher difficulties is it seems like Suicide Mission (7) is a reasonably hard difficulty, where they incorporate all of the elements, 8 is where they start doubling the count of the most challenging enemies (spawning a ton of hulks and at least two tanks at a time), and 9 is doubled again.

Thank you for this videos! Great info for a new player. Makes me feel a little more useful on the higher difficulties.

Eight extra tips 1. The scout strider can be knocked over with a hand grenade 2. Stalkers go after players who are not with the group 1st. If you see a stalker, call it out and group up so you don't get picked off. 3. Bile titans with destroyed sacks can no longer spew acid 4. At higher levels bile spewers will gain a mortar strike pose 5. Pouncer's and hunters can be killed quickly with head shots. In my opinion, what makes them a greater threat is that they slow you when they hit you. A personal shield will cancel the slow 6. The hive guard can also be taken out quickly using the revolver. It penetrates the front armor and often takes them out in 5 rapid revolver shots. 7. Don't call in turrets near a charger. They tend to focus turrets before players. 8. Fighting bots, you can sometimes activate anti air turrets. This will take out the drop ships when called in.

Pro tip from an experienced diver: The charger's soft underside, along with Bile's sack, the titan's belly, and the like, only take 10% damage unless you're using explosive damage. (In which case you'll do full and bonus). Damage types matter!

Thank you for making this video this was actually really helpful

This is a very good video, knowledge is power and my power in this game has greatly increased thanks to your video. I already knew a fair bit but this post with the video evidence for the tactics used has clarified much for me. I'm impressed that you have condensed down important detail even for the weaker enemies into a 24 minute video and I appreciate the identifying you have done of enemies in regards to names and enemies position within the hierarchy, as well as adding chapters in the video. Helps understand the game much more. I personally find the Bile and Nursing Spewers quite cute. 😆 I've already got far to many subscriptions to keep track of on KZfaq but I'll give you a sub, due to the quality and care that was put into this video. Keep on posting my fellow brit, great video. 🙂👍

Awesome guide. Thank you so much for your work! It helped me a lot.

There's a quick and easy way we've been dealing with Bile Titans. You need one person with a recoilless rifle, and another with a railgun. Shoot a recoilless rocket right at it's head and you will strip its armor off, follow up with one or two railgun shots to the head and it will die.

Small correction on the Hulks. You can shoot off their arms but arms are not the weak spot, it will still be alive if mostly disarmed and at that point all they can really do is try to trample you. It has two weak points: The heat vents on the back (as you correctly noted), and the red eye in the front. With practice with an overcharged railgun shot you can drop them in one hit from the front if you hit the eye. You can also also focus it with any other heavy piercing or explosive weapon and they will die. Also regarding the tanks, their turret tops are weak to explosions at the heat vent and from above, so all else fails, run up to it, chuck nades at it, and hope for the best. Works best with impact grenades but the normal frags will work as long as they stay on top of it or you cook them. Finally, they will fall to armor piercing shots eventually, so railgun or anti-materiel rifle hits from the front and side might not be optimal but they will work. Finally what works against all enemies in a pinch (outside of solo play) is to throw the reinforcement at the heavy enemy and have your teammate crash land into them. This also works with everything that drops a pod (reinforcement, resupply, hell bomb, SSSD delivery, any weapon, any backpack, turrets, etc).

15:50 "You can easily just shot the trooper on the back" >Proceeds to completely miss the trooper on the back

something ive learned about the annihilator tank is that if you are within range of it and you can run to it before it fires its cannon, its usually possible to stim and run right behind it while it takes ages to spin around to fire at you

The glowing eye in the middle of the Hulk's body is an insta-kill shot if you have a railgun. Get a good shot on that and it goes down in one hit. You can flank the tank and jump on top of it for a better chance at not immediately dying and getting time to call in stratagems. It can also serve as emergency cover if you prone on top of the turret. Always aim for the middle of the Strider with penetrating weapons. The armor around the edges can deflect your rounds or it may just not hit anything vital. The backpack of the Devastator units can also be shot and seem to do a little bit of extra damage. The middle of the Devastator is also a weak spot. Hitting it with a penetrating weapon can split it in half. The same is true for the Berserker. You can stagger the Heavy Devastator for a good shot at the eye or arms using a grenade or any heavy support weapon. The HMG emplacement is armor penetrating, making it suitable for fighting Devastators and similar armored enemies. It will not do much against Hulks or tanks unless you hit them in a weak spot. Disposable Anti-Tank can one shot a dropship if you hit it in the engines. The same is likely true for the recoilless rifle. PSA: Enemies can use your shield generator relay as cover too. Don't be afraid to withdraw and come back later to flank or reattempt an objective! Holding a line and getting everyone killed will only hamper your ability to fight for Democracy. Tactics are indeed very useful in this game. Enemies don't automatically know where you are unless they see you or hear you, and usually they have to get a good eye on you before they can hunt you down, meaning that having a couple people distract a base while the others flank it is a great way to complete objectives. - Sincerely, a Malevelon Creek veteran.

My first encounter with annihaltor was so thrilling, it was night time on one of those planets with a lot of vegetation. We were deep in a jungle weaving around foliage when suddenly a barrage of lasers and cannon fire came shredding through trees. 2 of my team mates died instantly, i had no clue what was going on so i dove down into a little ditch, chucked all 4 of my nades in the general direction if the fire, an eagle and an orbital strike. Didnt see a kill streak counter but all the gun fire stopped instanting, poked my head out of the tree line there it was! God that was awesome, this game is just a living action movie

Really good job! 👍

Love this video, thanks so much! Would love to see you talk about the offensive buildings that bots have; i.e. giant turrets, eye of sauron thing, mortars. I noticed bugs have mortars too.

ok, here's something incredibly useful to know against bots: take impact nades and save them for tanks/tank towers. why? because 2 relatively well placed throws are enough to blow them up instantly. just try to aim at the rear vent, and if you're up front, top of the turret to hopefully hit its back. and contrary to the video, DO try to get up close to the tanks if there's enough cover around. once you're at point blank you can literally run circles around them and there's nothing they can do. hell, you can even use a live tank as cover if you want to. tank tower shots can just barely be avoided while running in 550 speed armor at exactly 90° to the left or right, it's risky, but it can help you get close. once you're underneath the tower, it can't shoot you anymore, just find its rear vent and lob 2 impacts at it. I've also noticed that these towers don't seem to spot you if you come at them from the side or rear, at all. but once they see you, they won't stop tracking until you're out of sight.

As a trick I've found, the Devastators, no matter the variant, have a 'weak spot' or 'area you can target for more damage' that's way larger than their heads. If you shoot at the pelvis area where the legs connect to the torso and the abdomen area, that area doesn't have as much armour as the upper torso. So for a larger target area to do reliable damage that is a good alternative.

_Apologies for this wall of text, I kept adding more as the video played, lol._ When a bug is charging you after their head comes off, they can easily be bonked with melee (assuming you actually melee toward the enemy) though Brood Commanders tend to take two bonks at least it seems. The interrupt on the melee is a great "Oh shit!" button if you get in the habit of slapping things when they get too close. Also, Expendable Anti-Tank (EAT-17) support weapon is super powerful as a general counter to any of the more dangerous enemies, and the 70 second base cooldown is insanely good (with the Ship Module upgrade "Donation Access License" you get 2 every calldown). If you have an EMS of some kind (Orbital EMS Strike or the EMS Mortar Sentry) for Chargers, Annihilator Tanks, and Hulks, you can even one-shot them with the EAT-17 calldowns directly on their head. You can also use the calldown to destroy Bug Holes and Automaton Factories/Turrets (though you'll likely die to them exploding) or just shoot an EAT-17 rocket in the hole/vents. For Spewers (Nursing and Bile) you can one-shot them with a direct hit from the Impact Grenade, too, as well as the other grenades if cooked properly so it explodes right at them. As for the Dropships, you can one-shot them every single time they call one in if you bring the EAT-17s, just shoot the thrusters on the side and you can take down every dropship wave. Sometimes they just drop onto the troops and don't kill them, but the enemies sometimes get stuck under it regardless which is usually a net gain... lol. I literally cannot stress enough how fantastic the Expendable Anti-Tank is. Aside from faction specific stuff, on top of the Expendable Anti-Tank, I highly recommend Orbital EMS Strike and EMS Mortar Sentry (And likely the EMS Grenade in the new Warbond on March 14th). At least up to T7-Suicide Mission difficulty I've soloed with Arc Thrower, Jump Pack, Orbital EMS, and Expendable Anti-Tank for stratagems. Scythe (Primary), Senator (Secondary), Impact Grenade, and a super-light (50 Armor Rating) Scout Armor (Specifically the SC-30 Trailblazer Scout Armor, personally, but there are other armors with the "Scout" Armor Passive and different armor ratings for your preference). The stealth gameplay in HD2 has a solid base to build on (at least with that Scout armor passive), though we don't have any ranged weapons that are silent yet you can still crawl up to a pack of enemies and as long as they don't look directly at you they won't react to an ally getting donked with melee right next to them. Even if the one you melee sees you it won't alert the others unless it gets to attack. Heck, somehow the Jump Pack is entirely silent according to the enemies, lol.

You can use the Spear against the Bile Titan, a well placed lock-on head shot with the spear can bring it down in just one hit.

For the Scout Striders, the weak point of the actual mech itself (not just taking out the driver, I mean) is actually the "waist" area of the mech, and it's legs. A properly placed AMR shot, 1 autocannon shot, or one railgun shot, to these areas will kill it immediately. The railgun will also pierce through and hit multiple Striders. Oh, and the one railgun shot to the abdomen area of any Devastator will cut it in half, and that shot will pen through Heavy Devastator shields. Basically, Railgun kills everything. (Oh, and I've also noticed that it's not just the Commissars that will use the flare gun, it's ANY small troop-type.)

Hive guard armor is ignorable with medium AP value, so the starting MG, Senator revolver, etc. Note on Bile Spewers: At higher difficulties they gain a new artillery attack mode, making them mobile mortar batteries. Bile Titans: The rocket strike might be useful here, since you could throw it into a mass and it'll autotarget the biggest enemy (which is always gonna be the Titan.) Scout Striders: Interesting fact, the hip joint of their legs can be blown apart (killing them) with medium AP weapons, like the starting machine gun. Rarely needed, but has saved my life a few times. Tanks: There's an AA variant of the Annihilator, which trades in the turret for the quad AA gun, which it can and will hose you down with. Also: The cannon turrets have a grill on their back which is a weak point, but are extremely hard to kill otherwise because stratagem markers will just bounce off the tower they're emplaced in. Rocket strike from the Eagle's auto targeting helps here, or having someone distract it so you can kill it with man portable weapons. Do not expect a bombing run or artillery shelling to kill these, as only a direct hit will do so.

Thanks for the tips. Save me alot of headaches

Thanks for the upload

Specifically for the bots, the autocannon is good medicine against most of their roster. For stiders in particular, it doesn't matter if they are facing you. Just aim where the diver should be and it typically one shots them.

DEVS have also confirmed that any enemy that has a huge squishy area (like the big butt-sacs of bile spewers and any exposed fleshy bit of enemies after you destroy armor) CAN TAKE 100% EXTRA DAMAGE from explosives. Which means nade launcher against hordes of the big fat spewers is really really good, you can aim in-between multiples of them, try to land the nade to hit the big fat sac for extra damage and easy kills at very low ammo cost. NOTE: the extra fat squishy bits take 90% less damage from all other damage types other than explosive.

thnx for the bug tips ! didn't realize the charger weak spot was its legs! its like its baiting you to shoot in the rear of its body! GGS

Awesome vid! Couple notes from a relative noob haha: The charger can be oneshot if you hit the head with something like HEAT or Recoilless. Same for the hulks if you hit the glowy eye. Also as others have said, the dropships can actually be downed by something like HEAT or Recoilless to one of the four vertical engines at the corner, and if you do it before they deploy their troops, the entire wave can be killed! Of special note for automatons are the laser turrets, big hardened emplacements you'll see at bot locations sometimes. Big chungus rounds that just about obliterate you when they fire (and fairly accurate too) they like all the other big hitters have a heat vent on the back to target, its just finicky to get to it, especially if you're solo

One thing to note with the automaton brawlers is that they will sometimes use their blades to block shots aimed at their head. Body shots will still take them down quickly, but their blades will reflect any shots they make contact with. It's a neat little detail added to these guys.

Some things I felt worth mentioning, the JAR-5 Dominator has medium armor pen, which means it can shoot THROUGH the armor of Bile Spewers and Hive Guards. Stalkers also seem to also be able to track you from across the map, they seem to have perfect sight on you at all times, something shared by the Bile Spewers when they're firing their Bile Artillery at you. Stalker's going invisible isn't really too scary on most maps, but in certain environments with certain lighting, and they truly go invisible right in front of your eyes. A tip with Bile Titans, if you shoot them in the mouth and break that initial bile sac, you completely disable their Bile Attack, and therefor make them completely reliant on stomp attacks. Bile Attacks do crazy slowing to you, so it can be beneficial to remove that ability ASAP For Striders, you can pen them with medium armor pen weapons as well. Dropships will crash if you shoot one of the engines with a recoiless or EAT, and it only takes one shot to bring them down. If you see one coming, fire the shot and it'll nullify the wave. Hulks have their head as a weakpoint if you have a powerful weapon. You showed footage of targeting that, so I'm surprised you didn't mention it. Railgun to the head should kill them quickly and save you ammo. And for tanks... it has a massive heat vent on the back of the turret, a few shots there with a recoilless and its dead. Simple as that

I was thinking about how nuts the grenade launcher is versus bile spewers during the whole termenid section, and I'm glad you brought it up

No way you didn't mention you can headshot Devastators.. even better if you use the Revolver, because the Revolver one-shot headshots all the Devastators. It's great for the Heavy ones, since they move so slowly it's pretty easy to get a headshot on it

One thing I want to add about Hulks - Leg them! Especially the Scorcher. Taking out one leg will slow the thing to a crawl, and destroying both will end the Hulk entirely. I found this easy to do with the Autocannon, as that's my personal go-to heavy weapon, but I'd imagine it can be done with any support weapon that can tear through heavier armor. Mechwarrior logic served me well here.

REALLY worth mentioning you can 1 shot a lot of the higher end boss like creatures you’ll be fighting. You just have to drop a pod on top of them, whether that’s a teammate redeploying, or that spare weapon slot you called in once and can’t find another use for, getting hit with a hot drop will annihilate most enemies. You just have to be precise. Up until my group understood the weak spots, we used to hit hulks and chargers with hot drops since we died so frequently

good video, definitely has most things i know about, and some things i didn't. The one thing you forgot to mention though, which I also didn't see in the comments, is the scavengers and brood commanders can summon bug outbreaks, or whatever they're called. definitely want to focus fire on them if they're pulling their head back to start spewing out that yellow cloud stuff to stop it if possible.

Thx for the great tips

Terminids: - BILE TITAN: Railgun can one-shot it if you shoot at its head, if you get good at the rithm of shooting the railgun, you can set it up to unsafe and charge it a bit more. You can drop multiple titans consecutizely pretty fast with it. - CHARGER: Less efficient but you can blow up its butt with a few autocannon shots and it'll bleed out pretty fast. With a loot of ammo fast reload every 5 shots, the Autocannon is a solid choice to deal with things fast up until ranking up difficulty and Bile titans start popping up more regularly. - HUNTER: use small weapons if you can and start shooting at range, dont let them get close. It usually just takes 1 bullet to stun them sometimes. If you're having trouble hitting themyou can telegraph when they'll launch at you and shoot them down there when they cant dodge. - HIVE GUARDS: You can bait it and just have someone shoot it from behind. These things just start to give you a reason to use medium piercing primary weapons, like Dominator or machine gun. - STALKER: If multiple stalkers gang up on you remember that you dont have to kill them to get them off you, if you deal enough damage they'll try to retreat themselves and you can move to the next one, after gaining some space you can start finishing them off. Multiple of them have to no spacial awareness and will group up when following the same target, bait them and have someone else use something with splash damage from the side. - BILE SPEWERS: Kill on sight, even if you can outrun them, they can snipe you with long distance mortar like shots, the more there are the less manageble it becomes pretty fast. They do tend to cluster like the stalkers so same tactic applies. Get a feel for how long their shots are, if youre being pushed back and you're already pretty far, the tread to get away from their range may be better than getting close up again, remember that once they start sniping you they're inmobile and you can get away from their range if you're already far enough. Sniping their head from a distance before going in also helps.

You never mentioned them in the video, but one great solution for many of the medium and heavy enemies is the disposable AT launcher. They are on a very short cool down and you get two of them at a time. They are great for giving your team an easy answer to difficult to kill enemies and buildings without requiring anyone to give up their backpack or special weapon slots. They can just pick up the launchers, use them, then repick up their weapon. Quick and easy. They are the best way to ensure your team has missiles throughout the entire mission.

Two million views in two weeks! Congrats man. Great video.

Good tip for all terminids, the flamethrower does wonders. A good wide sweep will kill most common enemies and on a charger I was able to kill it with about ¾ of a tank of fuel.

You forgot the robot tower gun, which has crazy range and pretty much one shots you no matter what. Also i think the bots that man turrets are at least worth mentioning.

Hulks are vulnerable in the back, but the true weak spot is the red eye on the front. Shoot them right in the eye twice with the railgun or antimaterial rifle and they're done! Great video! Thank you!!!

Nice vid!

For the scout striders, the box that covers the rider is heavy armor, but just below that, the waist if you will, it is medium armor and can be destroyed by something like the liberator penetrator.

Another tip for locating stalker lairs. Is that they are an objective on maps, which means they are able to be tagged on your minimap. They all have an identically shape, the orientation just varies. So go ahead and look at your map for its lair and ping things that look like rock circles with a small body of water and if it's it, the obj will pop up on your map.

1. Both spewers take only 1 hand grenade to kill. Using impact grenade is advised since it doesn't require movement prediction and timing. 2. I solo-ed one bile titan with an autocannon sentry. With distance 150m or above is advised. It take about 12 shots to do the job. AC sentry fire 3 shots in a burst so its doesn't take long. Just make sure to have a clear line of sight and clear the bugs in the vicinity first. 3. Shooting berserkers in the head will kill them. 4. The automaton's cannon tower also worth mentioning. That thing is a huge pain in the arse. It blends in with other outpost structure and hence hard to spot. The tower base is indestructible and only the turret can be destroyed. It is hard to defeat especially for new player. To kill it players can 1) shoot the vent at the back with light AP weapon, 2) hit it with EAT/Recoiless Rifle, or 3) place an explosive strategem precise on the top to bombard.

3:56 “primarily focus on the legs” - shows footage shooting specifically the head 😂

Great video, very informative. I think the automaton turrets and artillary could be worth while to mention.

The bot dropships are actually very easy to take out with the dedicated anti-tank weapons: a single EAT or RR shot to an engine drops it out of the sky, then it crashes and promptly explodes, frequently killing most or all of the units it brought in. The best time to shoot is generally (in my experience) right when it pulls into a hover so it is mostly stationary. There's a brief window to hit it before it releases its troops, and then another one after they've dropped before it zooms off.

Great vid, as for my added advice, it's about the Automaton tanks. 1. There is a second worse tank variant, with a quad barrel rapid firing laser cannon turret. 2. If you have no fit weapons to kill them, they are slow, so drop supply hellpods on them, or call down dead friends onto them. ^^

Great solutions all I wanted to add was the autocannon one taps the scout strides and does well against armored enemies

Hey, cool list, thank you for that! You forgot regarding the Bile Titan, that a correctly aimed headshot between his eyes from a fully charged Railgun, just oneshot it, and drops faster than it crawled out of it lair. :)

Fwiw - running the Bulldog (either variant) is great for survivability. I was able to run through swarms, picking up dropped samples, on level 8. You might be tempted to take the jump pack for height advantage, but if you're sample running, the Bulldog is clutch. Also worth noting - if you go prone with the LMG, you can take out a Titan in nearly 1 full clip, as long as you have space and distance. Just aim for the underside of the abdomen. Super helpful when you don't have the best loadout for dealing with them. Edit: Forgot to mention something that is often overlooked; when the bots come out of their spawn bases, throw a nade in the open door. Destroys it just the same as throwing one in the vents. Annnd the Spear can 1/2 shot Annihilator tanks.

Some things you missed and some tips I've learned: There is another tank variant with a quad barrel laser instead of a main cannon for the bots A tip for fighting tanks it struggles to turn quickly and cant do anything to you if you're on top of it, once your on top take any ol' weapon and go first person to drill it in its weak spot. BE WARNED when you kill the tank it explodes so be full health before finishing it off or become a martyr. If you destroy the sacs on a Bile Titan it will stop doing its spewing attack which can make it easier to deal with. Also you CAN strip the Bile Titan armor on its side/top but good luck landing any follow up shots on the new weak point, I recommend spamming rockets into its face until dead lacking other options. Hive Guards, Bile Spewers and, Devastators all have medium armor in some locations meaning only some primaries can penetrate their armor but they're not invulnerable It requires more testing but I believe I've killed a hulk in one hit by using an EAT to shoot it in its tiny face All in all the tips about Commissars and Hulks are going to be a big help for me and mine thanks!

Not sure if anyone mentioned it yet but you can actually mark stalker nests on the map while its not visible as a icon, helps distinguish where they come from, a easy distinguish factor that is they look like a nest struture on the map but they have no threat (red) circle

Something I discovered while going solo with the Rover, The Hive Guards, when under assault from the Rover's laser, will hunker down pretty consistently, and you can go around and blast it's flanks.

Its worth noting how much of a swiss army knife the Railgun is for any high tier mission. One could argue having at least one competent railgunner is a necessity for high difficulty bot missions, in fact. The rail gun, even on safe mode, can one shot hulks with a well placed shot to the "skull" or "eye" at the center of its cockpit on the front. It's *very* precise, but this evens the playing field immensely. As well with annihilator tanks (there are two variants, you didnt cover the chaingun one), my best recommendation is either the SPEAR, which can one shot them, or expending about 5-6 well placed unsafe railgun shots in a perpindicular angle to its turret. The only automaton the railgun cant kill is a dropship. Railgun meta is wild right now.

One thing I'd like to add here is that the anti-materiel rifle works wonders on automatons with armor. You can take striders out from the front with it, you can 2-shot devastators with it, and you can 2-tap hulks if you can nail them in the head/face. Stratagems are quick and easy but if you learn to take out the different enemies with armor piercing weapons by knowing where to shoot, you can save those strats for other situations. Hope this helps any new players out there!

For every tank and Devastator, if you are using liberator armor and have a half decent throw, you can take them out by calling down a support item on them. The tank's barrel moves extremely slowly, you can run around the tank and climb up the back to stand behind the barrel and call down your support item right on the heat vents. Lastly thanks for all the info, I know you're team spent much time and effort to gather and present this and I thank you for it.

Thx man👍🏻

I've noticed there are two types of chargers. The normal common ones and the type that normally guard nests with the extra spikey bits. Although I've mostly seen them doing the kill the charger mission on lower difficulties but I have seen them on higher difficulties a few times that I've noticed. There are also those warriors with the green pus that explode when killed. Tons of weird variants of enemies that are often forgotten, also you can't ignore the bile spewers that shoot gas artillery on higher difficulties. Also while not a weak point its important to note that the tank's angled armor can deflect anti tank weapons and its crucial to hit it straight on perpendicular on the sides, the back or preferably the turret.

Seeing the annihilator cannon pointing at you is the most terrifying thing in this game

The joints on scout striders can also be shot with piercing rounds to neutralize them if you have to take them on from the front!

Devastators have explosive munitions packs on their backs that you can hit from the side of them or behind them if they aren’t staring you down, or if they are chasing a teammate

I think it's worth pointing out (even though I'm sure its a bug atm) that for the annihilator tanks that once they're dead, climbing on the remains will insta kill you. So try and avoid that until it's patched!

Had no idea about some of these; the tips here are massive. Hulks seemed unstoppable other than their backs, but you showed that arm shots can do the job.

With hunters, I've found the Arc-12 Blitzer to work really well considering you don't actually have to put the cross hair directly on the target for the arcs to hit and deal damage to them. It also stubs them if no outright kills them so it gives you a little more breathing room

if you wanna count them as enemies, there's also the turret towers, which also have vents on their back same strategy as the hulks, shoot it in the back with autocannon etc, or a well placed precision strike/orbital rail cannon will do the trick

One tip for the Bile Titan, the Railgun on Unsafe, can one shot a Bile Titan if you hit it in the mouth during the windup for its spit attack. It's a lot less reliable than the Orbital Railgun, but it works.

Something to explain about the way damage to weak spot works is that it is a bit counter-intuitive. Weak spot damage spots only exist on heavy armor bugs and bots. All weapons do 10% damage to weak spots, except for Explosive damage weapons, which do full damage. The Dominator, Liberator Explosive, EAT, Recoilless Rifle, etc. all do Explosive damage, so they all do full damage to weak spots. This can actually be seen when doing enough damage to the orange tail of a Charger, causing the tail to explode into gore, after which the Charger will take massive damage over time until it bleeds to death.

An easier way to take down the tank is to circle it, they will only target you with the MG if you are in front of it and will prioritize shooting with the cannon. Use this to your advantage to close in by moving in a spiral pattern. You can mantle on top of them and once you do they are basically incapable of retaliating against you. Additionally, hitting the back half of the turret with two impact grenades will kill it outright. So use impacts to frag them if you can, if not, climb onto the body of the tank and either call a strike on them (scatter before it hits of course) or blast it with the railgun or anti-material rifle in its weak spot, this also works for cannon turrets.

Please note, the bile spewer and nursing spewer will insta die if you hit them with an impact gernade & as mentioned in the video, gernade launcher will two hit them :)

Just a quick side note: I noticed that all small Automatons can shoot the flare. Commissars just do it more frequently. I guess its because of scripting. Also: Strider and Hive guard can be easily countered by throwing a Grenade under them. Even works with Frag Nades. Very nice guide anyway. EDIT: Forgot to mention: All automatons receive heavy damage from headshots. You need 2 hits with an Autocanon on a Hulk, one for any other bot.

One tip missed off are guns with the explosive perk. I'm not sure if any strong late game primary weapons have it but in the premium warbond route you can unlock an assault rifle with explosive perk. The explosive perk doesn't actually do AOE damage but it does affect how the weapon affects enemies. It does 100% critical bonus damage against enemy weakspots (instead of 10% that the other guns in the game do) and it also behaves differently it will stunlock a lot of the larger termanids and it will stumble the larger robots. So berserker and heavy devestator are stumbled by it. Berserkers attacks will miss you then and it will slow it down and heavy devestator will move it's shield out of the way as a result so don't sleep on the explosive perk I know everyone is currently all about the shotguns but the other weapons in the game do have some benefits people haven't discovered yet

you can hold down the "R" key while un-aiming and u can turn ur rail onto "Unsafe mode" . Now u can hold the rail gun longer before you shoot and it will 1 shot armor on chargers! love the video i needed the all the juicy knowledge

A strategy for annihilator tanks is to just get a friend with a jump pack or a mean to get on top of it, it usually will try to rotate the turret and point its gun up to try and target the player on top. If you see it’s main gun jot pointing upwards then it’s not targeting you, afterwards your friend is usually fine to get out of cover and get behind the turret to destroy it. The turret exploding also doesn’t deal enough damage to kill you, nor the tank exploding after the turret blows up however the impact damage will when you get flung.

Disagree with the Brood Commander focusing the legs. You can shoot off both front legs and a third sometimes and the commander will still come at you with zero slowdown. Head shot still faster and more effective even with them running around a little after death.

Some notes id love to add for handling some of these enemies with ease. /// TERMANIDS Most of the lower level termanids can be easily handled by carrying a Guard Dog Rover with you at all times. Its got unlimited use, it takes care of bugs with ease, and it really helps as a form of sensor (sometimes) for Stalkers. The only thing id absolutely want you to be aware of is the fact the Rover may try to cut you or your fellow helldiver's head off if its firing at a bug that your head is so conveniently in the way of. You can reduce these chances by crouching, though. Speaking of Stalkers, They like to behave like Brackens from Lethal Company in some way. If you stare at them from a distance while they are cloaked (and are hopefully firing at them), they will instantly try to flee out of your line of sight to wait for the best moment to attack you again. Best way to combat them is having a buddy (Rover or Helldiver) watching your guys' back when you are aware Stalkers spawn. Bile/Nursing Spewers are a very easy to take down enemy using an Arc Thrower it can two shot them without ever needing to spend ammo. My personal method when dealing with chargers (especially on higher difficulties) is to use an Orbital Laser, as it will track and roast it to death. It lasts for about 2.5~ Chargers in the area before exhausting. Though, Id personally reccomend just striking its legs with a railgun, scuttling them with a few rifle rounds, and going on with your day. fun little tip Ive been using for Bile Titans, When using a Railgun, wait for the Bile Titan to open its mouth to spit at you before firing a round straight into its mouth. This will INSTANTLY terminate it without the need of extra armor piercing equipment/stratagems. the Spear also works as an alternative (who would use it, though?), and surprisingly, the Arc Thrower can handle Bile Titans pretty well, Though expect yourself to dump 20+ charged shots into the titan before it actually falls. /// AUTOMATONS Rocket Raiders. I hate them so and they'll usually try their hardest to make sure you become the next reinforcement. Best way to handle them for me personally was using either the "Hero of the Federation" Armor, or a Shield Generator Pack. The HotF Armor helps with the added benefit of having a 50% chance of NOT getting one shot! Though the ragdoll impact is likely to kill you afterwards, if it chooses to send you that hard. This tip also applies for everything else that fires rockets. Assault raiders are awful in everyway because they take the oneshot potential of rockets, and then throw it right in your face when you kill them. Best way i think to handle Assault Raiders is to shoot them with either your: Primary, a Guard Dog Rover (if you chose to use that over a shield generator), or an Arc Thrower. The Rover usually pickles them midair before they can even get close to you, and the Arc Thrower turns them into fried cheese if timed correctly. Scout Striders are also easy to vanquish using an Autocannon or by being at a higher elevation than them. Autocannons quickly penetrate and terminate them in one single round, and its aesthetically pleasing to watch. The other tip, being higher up, also helps greatly because a bit of their head (which will look like a white dome) will be exposed to be easily shot at. Heavy Devastators also can have their head shot at for an easy one shot kill, as its partially exposed from the shield. Though you can alternatively catch one on the flank and fire at its backpack, which will promptly explode and likely will terminate the bot. Hulks for me are such a little threat now because of the biggest weakpoint thats nice and exposed for you, being their eye. The red spot in the center of their body can be shot at with a railgun (or almost any medium to high power support weapon) for a lightning fast kill that will end up in your confidence skyrocketing. Try it! Its probably my favorite thing to do. Tanks suffer from three things: One, they dont like it when you take cover, because then it means their barrage of lasers dont do anything (though the cannon may ragdoll you), Two, The slow moving turret allows you to engage the giant vents on rear with an explosive or highpower weapon, or even grenades if you're close enough, and Three: They dont like it when you have a Spear. Spear, despite how little its used, has alot of high power advantage to smoke a tank with quick work, as its explosive charge will do plenty of damage to sort one out into a nice scuttle of debris. /// HONERABLE WEAPON MENTION: ARC THROWER I praise this weapon too much, but its strangely the second most powerful weapon in the game second from the Railgun. The Arc thrower has unlimited ammo, full armor penetrating capabilities, and semi-auto targeting. It can take care of literally every enemy in the game, at the most major drawback that you'll need to work against two things that the game has to offer: 1. Its Damage is far from the greatest, meaning you'll have to fire multiple rounds at higher end targets to deal with them. Tanks, Chargers, Bile Titans, Turret Towers, Mortar Emplacements, (I think even fabricators? It targets them but ive never sat around to try and break one) and even Hulks take about 20~ ish fully charged shots to terminate them. Only good thing to come out of spam firing them is the charges chain onto other smaller enemies, meaning it can take care of crowds nice and easy. 20 shots sounds like alot for a support weapon, but do be reminded this weapon has ZERO ammo capacity, so it can just be used on and on and on. 2. Its very VERY poorly made hit registration. Sometimes, the bolt will refuse to fire forward, just appearing as a fizzle infront of the weapon's muzzle, and sometimes the Bolt will prefer to instantly pop your teammate like popcorn so make sure your fellow helldivers are very much out of your FOV before using it. Do Know the bolt doesnt prefer or prioritize targets, so it may fire on a weaker enemy instead of the one you're aiming at, or it may even just discharge on a corpse multiple times till it despawns or you aim away.

Light Armor Piercing Weapons vs the front side of the Scout Strider's lower section where the legs connect together - it's less armored than the crew capsule that shields the Trooper. It's less than ideal, but good to know if you have no other options due to ammo/maneuver constraints.

It's really quite easy to land the stratagem beacon for the Expendable Anti-Tank on the chargers. So you can use the pod as weapon against them and since it has a short cool down and two launchers with it, it was my go-to for my early game experience.

There is a 2nd tank variation called the shredder tank as well, encountered a few in difficulty 7+ missions. The main gun is replaced with a fast firing chaingun

I find the tank anihlator is not too diffucult, even if you’re out of strategems and don’t have any high armor pierce weapons. You can run close to it sideways faster than it’s turret turns. Once you’re close enough it can’t shoot you and you can climb on it. While you’re on top you can throw 3 verandaed on the back side of it and dive off. It’s badass and it works

Is good to be back in this channel.

Playing in groups that are rarely over level 20 for access to the railgun, the armored units have been a ROUGH time. I'm glad they've buffed the flamethrower and laser cannon to give earlier options that don't require your backpack slot to use.

One shot with an autocannon to the "T" where the legs connect will kill a scout strider From the front.

Fun fact: on 1-2 difficulty you can take a revolver to deal with hive guards, as it actually penetrates their armor in spite of the "light armor piercing" stat. Also, high-cal rifle strategem is pretty good for starter players, as it's basically a low-damage version of the railgun. It pierces medium armor; 1-shots guardians, spewers and devastators with a nice headshot; and also successfully takes out striders and hive commanders with 1-3 shots. I've been using it all time until I got the railgun, and I still prefer it while playing prior to the 4th difficulty. Another tip for starter players: Eagle bomb run is your forever friend. It kills *everything* and has 2 charges even before the upgrade. It saved my ass countless times when climbing up to the 5-6 difficulty before 20th level.

A small tip for a scout strider. When it somehow got close to you just dive on either of his sides so that operator would be in your sight and shoot it with anything. Make sure you are not under his leg otherwise he will stomp you.

for the scout staider, you can actually hit their knees and it does normal damage but you need to be accurate so use a sniper at long range or use a shot gun at close range

Very important weak spot you forgot to mention is the Hulks head. If you get good with the Railgun, you can take hulks down in 1 shot. Using ADS in first person mode allows you to really line up shots, it's surprising how reliable you can get at 1 shotting them once you get used to swapping every time you need a precision shot.

the thing about the titans is that once you get to higher difficulty, youll start fighting 2-4 titans at a time at each objective, the orbital rail gun just isnt enough atp, rail gun/orbital laser beam are the most optimal since the laser can help you with more than 1 titan, the javelin spear is also amazing against them

oh yeah, I was going into a mission with my friend, we just upgraded the difficulty from medium to challenging, thinking we were awesome. It was a humbling experience getting pommeld to the ground by the Stalkers. Like, we definitely weren't expecting that.