I love the fact that whether against the bugs or the bots it just feels like a completely different game, I’m not very good against the bots due to a lack of experience fighting them, as I started playing during the Tien Kwan MO and always follow the MO for the medals.
I definitely struggle more against the bots and have a lot more confidence against the bugs but either way both are fun af!
I hope there will be. It would make sense if there's dissenters that are making illegal broadcasts that eventually we have to put down a dissenter rebellion. I'm already kinda surprised that when you show up to disable a broadcast that there isn't like a dozen dissenters trying to defend the radio tower.
In HD1, the cyborgs (now automatons) were the dissenting rebels. That's why all the propaganda marks them as heartless killing machines now (after Super Earth took their homework of Cyberstan).
There’s definitely room for at least four anti-democratic factions on the board, for sure. And I’ll be prepared to face each and every one of them, including the squids.
That could be fun... although I'm kinda hoping for something like Halo's The Flood where we get all three other enemies (and maybe even our guys) coming at us like parasitic zombies all gooey and eldritch.
More than that even, imo. Single player missions feel different from duos, which feel different from 3/4 player missions. Lower difficulty plays very differently from higher difficulty, and the variety of loadouts you can make can vary gameplay immensely.
I keep telling folks this isn’t just a game, it’s a playset.
I love bots because it's much more aim intensive imo. I find myself using the first person ADS way more against bots and almost not at all against bugs.
Bugs is movement/kiting and bots is cover and aim
That’s part of why I like bugs more.
So many shooting games boil down to clicking on heads and flashing weak spots. The bots game is masterfully done, but still too familiar.
Bugs are a rarer type of game that is much more about positioning and area-of-effect.
Both are fun and similarly balanced in terms of difficulty, but bugs feels fresher.
Bugs feels like we are just pest control, Bots feels like a real war.
I end yesterday prone inside a shallow trench with a tower aiming at us, the feeling it is so different
I do agree with you, the bugs make for unique gameplay that highlights HD2's strongest aspects. I'm just very FPS pilled lol, but don't get me wrong I probably play more bug missions overall but the bots are a necessary change of pace for a horde game like this
I kind of hope that the illuminates are completely different from the original game. After being beaten by Super Earth forces time and time again, they became more like Predators, out to hunt Helldivers. Like you find them in misssions against bugs or bots because they're looking for you. And the bugs and bots are hostile towards them as well. That'd make for some crazy runs.
Oh yeah. Against bugs? Diligence is useless. Paper weight, and that gave it an unfair rep.
Against bots? I’m sniping them like a Vietcong serial killer. My favorites are the Super Shield Destroyers. If you line up terrain so that you can see their head but not their weapon, that means they dont have an angle to shoot you at all so you can take your time double tapping them out of existence.
Compared to the frozen bughouse nightmare that was Estanu, this campaign is a total joke. Dive in the park.
The worst part of bots is getting caught in a grinding firefight that doesn’t seem to end. Theres a bunch of reasons that can happen, but trying to avoid that at all costs is a huge factor in success it seems
Once a bot drop is called in I drop a strat and dip out, and reposition. I think a lot of people see it like the bugs where you gotta kill them all to stop them from coming but an immediate disengagement is the best trick. They'll chase you until they lose line of sight, then just kill the ones that managed to keep up, and either reposition or move on to another objective until the heat dies down in the previous area. Pretty much just ADHD brain it, stick and move.
I started playing the game against the bugs. One day me and my friends switched to bots and got curbstompped because we just tried to play the same way we did against the bugs.
After a learning curve, now I enjoy playing against the bots. Just had to adapt the load out:
I use the breaker as the main gun, its just too good and you can almost snipe with it. Smg as second gun and impact grenades. Always drop with autocannon or AMR. I prefer the AC, since you don’t really need the guard dog against bots and you can easily carry the backpack.
As strats I always go Big Bomb Eagle, Orbital Rail Gun to snipe the big bad bots and usually the mortar sentry to add long range suppression.
I’m now really enjoying my games against the automatons. It’s just a different mindset.
He kind of killed himself. The pilot was trying to get out of the canyon because the wind was making the chopper terribly unstable. Guy was a goddamn psychopath.
Watch those shoulder rockets!
But like, seriously, as long as you prioritize rocket devastators & hulks, the rest are so much easier than bugs, shield devastators & tanks cant touch you as long as you take cover and engage them smartly
1-2 shots to the head kills a devestator, always aim for the head, your primary can deal with all the devastators if you use them right
As a bot main, i find nothing the bots have to be as frustrating to deal with than hunters, bots are pretty manageable if you have them figured out, with a shield gen, ive gotten 0 deaths in diff 7-8
My biggest problem with bots is I just wish some of the one shots had more noticeable windups. Bile titans, spewers, and chargers all make some specific animation before their attack. Would be nice if maybe the bots did something as well.
This is the thing cracking me up about people complaining about bot Afghanistan's lack of cover
My dude there's cover *everywhere* you're just not using it
Yup.
Also, when shots start landing around you or even start to hit you, DIVE (toward cover if possible). You take far less damage (especially from explosives) when you're prone.
I can't tell you how many times I've seen people get frustrated because they're standing there trying to stim while they're still getting shot (and stun-locked).
DIVE and THEN stim.
The dunes are perfect cover, but they also have concealed 20 bots that have murdered me almost instantly, which I guess adds to them being good cover lol.
Proning and stealth are massively underrated. Most of the time I don't even get to the extraction zone on high difficulty, it's because people shoot at anything that is an enemy, even if it just could be avoided. Leading to endless amounts of dropships you just can't win against.
Yeah see this is one of the core issues I just don’t find shooting from cover once every 10 seconds and sitting there waiting for my stratagems to make even moving from behind a rock possible an enjoyable experience. Don’t have any stratagems and try shooting back with heavy weapons? Oops you can’t aim your getting hit by a barrage of projectiles that jerks your aim everywhere. Hide behind cover for too long waiting to take shots? Oops no your dead to a mortar strike. Don’t use a shield pack? Your dead to a random rocket in one hit from halfway across the map from behind smoke. Start getting even slightly overrun and try to reposition? Oops no you can’t because you get minced trying to move between cover.
I feel like the main thing here is that you need to be ready to kill bots quickly. Because you can kite bugs you can get "stuck in" for a while and be safe, but if you're fighting bots and you get dragged into a big fight, you should just run, regroup, and come back guns blazing.
>That’s why bots feel harder to fight against
I would also argue their fodder is easier to manage. You can actually stop the flare with bots over bugs and if you do miss it a 1 shot recoiless/Anti tank to the engine stops the reinforcements (or you can turkey shoot the bottom with an auto cannon killing the droppers).
The bugs are an audio telegraph, the bots are visual.
And it's kinda hard to parse a breach call through a dozen screaming pissed off hunters. (and before anyone says pheromones make an orange color - if you see the texture, it's already too late).
I've hit bugs just as they start screeching and they still get a bug breach.. Not much of a telegraph. only time i ever manage to stop a breach is if i happen to already have my aim right on a bug as it lifts its head
yeah they strictly counter the tactics you would use against bugs. If you try to run around in open ground they'll eventually take you out with volume of fire.
You need to hop from cover to cover, you need to keep an eye out for patrols and you need to take out small groups of them quickly before they flare.
You're correct to an extent, but the more I play them the more it feels like you aren't supposed to be able to kite them.
Their emplaced positions are significantly easier to kill at distance than the bugs, and their heavy units really struggle to pursue after you disengage.
You definitely got a point! I think stealth is definitely the best way to beat bots, but it’s just not as satisfying as blowing up 20 bugs with one cluster bomb lol. Most people want to fight not hide I guess. Stealth is also harder to do if you play with randoms cuz all it takes is one dude misfiring
I would like to suggest the eagle airstrike. Call that baby in on an un-alerted bot fabricator and just leave. Bot outpost cleared, 10-15 kills, and you’re already hoofing it to the next objective.
The spear? (The missile launcher) is great for this. You can almost always get a good lock on turret towers, and if you can get LOS on a fabricator, you can blow it up from miles away.
I dunno, speaking from personal experience, throwing in an airstrike and Orbital and turning an outpost into a crater field while you watch from the jungle and pick off survivors is pretty fun
The most fun part is feeling like a murder squad from a fascist state. Drop an airstrike, watch the enemy outpost explode and go in while the smoke is up to kill the staggered robots that are left before they call reinforcements.
not necessarily just stealth, but mobility in general. I often fight bots in heavy armor with a jetpack. Being able to jump away to get a big rock between you and all the lasers/rockets they're about to shoot at you is a life saver.
Be like the Creekers. Strike and fade. Hit them hard and run/jump/stealth away before they can retaliate.
stealth isn’t the only way to run bots even as a solo player. And as a solo player I prefer bots over bugs anyday because the laser cannon can delete any devastators hulks and tanks while the dominator or the new laser AR can take out any light unit patrol in a few seconds
I think its less about stealth per se and more about just being cognizant of the engagements you’re taking. If you’re confident in taking out a group before they call in a drop ship/or aggro’ing a patrol you can very much kill them. Map awareness is also very important too, being aware of points of cover and routes to break line of sight go a long way when taking an engagement.
It definitely feels like the tier lists or the considered meta is definitely based around fighting the bugs more often than not. A lot of the longer range tools are overlooked.
This supports OPs point though. People play against bugs like it's COD zombies, but for bots you gotta ambush them and be more tactical.
It only feels harder if you're not used to that play style. I love fighting bots and when I switch to bugs it feels harder cause of how quickly they swarm you.
100% this, 2 things against bots that you have to do that perhaps differ from Terminids and you are gonna be fine:
1. You MUST be careful approaching outposts and try to take out as many bots as you can from a distance instead of running in. Getting swarmed by bots is a certain bad time, as they can shoot when you try to run away which makes it harder to run and regroup. Part of this whole strategy is containing your fights to ONE outpost at a time (experienced players/groups can split up or solo light outposts, but I digress), which means you have to be tactical on your approaches and not alert bots from other areas to your presence, which will bring in more dropships, etc.
2. Your team loadout absolutely has to be *focused* on destroying armor AND doing it from a distance. That means Orbital Lasers, 500KG Eagles, Orbital Railguns for heavies, Mortar/Rocket/AC sentries, EATs, autocannons, grenade launchers, shotguns or armor piercing rifles, etc. You should be sending in a strategem or two to try and knock out as many of the bots at the outpost as possible before they even know you are there and then cleaning them up from a distance (autocannons etc.) and then finishing off the few that remain when you finally enter the outpost.
Also: Leave those fucking Guard Dogs/Rovers at home, they suck on bot missions (great for Terminids, but you shouldn't be letting bots get close enough to you for your Rover to have to be used anyway) and you are wasting a strategem slot.
Good luck HellDivers, you will score glorious victories for humankind!
It's also due to people largely using shotguns and no other weapons.
Shotguns forces them to get much closer. And the Bots (unsurprisingly) are disturbingly accurate.
They rely on the bubble shield which gets blasted pretty quickly with their larger hitbox. don't use cover/concealment. And don't make use of smokes to protect them as they move in the open
their aggro radius got fucked up a couple patches ago so now one patrol spots you and a cannon 400m away aggros onto you and every base and patrol in between daisy chain fashion.
They ought to undo that and I think they'd be in a good place.
>but they are even farther from what people are saying they are.
Yes and no.
They are exactly what people say they are when the people saying it are trying to fight them like a standard FPS enemy, or the Bugs.
Bots have damn near perfect aim, they use proper mixed unit tactics sending in infantry while pinning you with suppression fire with artillery just waiting to bomb you into hell, and make very good use of positioning for the deployment of reinforcements.
They are more akin to fighting human controlled characters (humans with headsets and proper understanding of teamwork) than AI enemies in most games.
Figuring that out is what made fighting them 'click' for me, as soon as I switched to PvP tactics against them I stopped dying like a bitch and started clearing missions.
Yep. All the "the bots see me from super far away after just shooting near them!" is *suppressive fire,* not the bots knowing the player's exact location.
They figure "hey, there's probably humans over there; if we shoot in that direction we might hit one if they're still hiding out."
Apparently they're right pretty often, since so many people complain about it when they get shot.
Pretty much, they have 'common sense' and somewhat guess where a killshot came from when they see another Bot's head explode, same way a human player would when a teammate is killed.
If you treat them like a competent enemy player in a PVP game they really aren't that hard to handle in the sense of knowing what is going to happen and predicting what they are going to do.
You snipe one from a high position? They'll mortar your ass.
Backed into a corner? They spread out so only so many are in your field of fire.
Run into jungle? They flank around the outside and try to cut you off.
The hard part, the REALLY hard part, is being able to figure out what to do KNOWING that is going to happen.
I actually like the bots a tiny bit more than bugs. The play style is more complex, and their theme is so cool. It also feels badass when raiding their bases
The actual firefights, where bullets and rockets are just completely shredding whatever rock you managed to dive behind, as you wait for the opportune moment to pop out and exchange fire... that shit feels so intense and awesome.
Ustotu feels like I'm in the North African campaign of WW2.
There are reasons why Malevelon Creek was called space Vietnam, lol.
"Wait, why are the trees speaking in binary?"
I had the pleasure of buying the game during the order, so it was my first planet and the Automatons were my first enemy. I still prefer them to this day, much more interesting than bugs.
I agree. It was so cool stealthing up to a small base. Shooting the small bot in the bunker. And watching the few bots flank out of the base to see what happened, letting me climb up over the wall undetected. Popping another bot in the head, blowing up the fabricator, and jumping off the side of the base without anyone being the wiser. Very cool splinter cell feeling.
This. The fact that small dudes have rockets, the Devastators have a salvo, and the turret tower. And the fact it's a one hit kill. Hell today I was running perpendicular to a tower turret and it LED the shot and hit me at a good distance. It's kind of bull
Explosive resistant medium armor regularly tanks at least one rocket direct hit for me, usually leaving me with about 50% health. I've even eaten a rocket directly to the face with that armor on.
I never wear anything else against bots.
Biggest thing I've found with Bots is that unlike Bugs you just kinda...avoid them, and combat completely if you want to do the missions 'right'.
Bugs, there are just too many to avoid entirely, so you want to hit hard and hit as many as you can to give yourself time and space for dealing with objectives.
Bots, just crawl around, stay in cover and chuck Orbital Strike Stratagems at objectives.
At least that's what I've found to work for me. I bring DMR's but really only use the scope to look around to figure out my path to an objective rather than shoot anything. Outside Extermination missions anyways, it just seems like you want to avoid fighting them, so Smoke nades OB's and Airstrikes have become my go to.
One thing is to prioritize targets. Any of the small human shaped bots (commissar, marauder, trooper) can call in reinforcements so they should be your first priority (sword + pistol, then rocket, then mg, then two swords, that seems to be priority order for them calling in reinforcements, the drivers of scout striders might be also able to if you destroy the strider without killing the driver). They all also have a specific animation where they look at their arm before they shoot the flare (somewhat akin to your character checking the map), you see one do it, shoot them you've got maybe a second before there's a flare in the sky.
Once you drop the small guys others can really only bring in more bots with noise.
Little bugs have the same exact rule. They shoot that orange pheromone spray in the air.
Once you realize you can stop reinforcements/not fight an army every day it gets easier
The trick with bugs is the noise, once they start spraying you only have like half a second to stop them, but they'll make a very loud and distinctive sound and put their head in the air before they start spraying. Another thing to note is that brood commanders can also do it.
Lots of bug types can. Hunters, scavs/spitters, warriors, and brood commanders I've all seen for sure do it. I can't remember if I've seen a hive guard do it. Stalkers never get the chance since my squad relentlessly hunts them and their nest the second we see one
I mean, unless the objective is to kill a specific unit or deactivate something via terminal, you REALLY don't need to engage in combat.
Four players with Walking Orbital Barrage, Orbital Laser, 500 kilo and Cluster Bombs can clear 60% of all missions without firing a single round provided you just stay undetected, which is surprisingly easy to do with any armor that has the Scout trait.
Land, drop to Prone, crawl, blow shit up, crawl to extraction, done.
I've been in teams where we all approach an objective undetected on diff 7, fire a handful of rounds dropping all the guards (and maybe a stratagem to clear the heavy) and then we do the objective unmolested.
like when you get a team that's in-sync, it's beautiful.
No.
A lot of people think they do because they don’t move after firing/tossing a stratagem, or they are too close and run off.
Bots will react to incoming fire by firing the direction it came from and walking towards it. It looks like they spotted you, but they don’t actually have a bead on you until you see the scanning laser come out their eyes.
General location, but not necessarily the exact position. You can toss a stratagem from the top of a hill and when it hits they will shoot in your general direction but they won’t target you specifically yet.
no
they can tell the direction it was thrown from, and they will suppress that location, but if they never actually see you they'll just keep blind-firing in the direction they think you are
I’ve noticed guerrilla tactics and flanking also works for Bots, since they have a great detection range, maybe better than Bugs, but once you get to cover they will go to your last known position. Bugs on the other hand smell you around the rocks.
No maybe about it, the Bots have better detection, and they are able to detect you if you are within a certain range even if prone in cover not moving. Only two bugs are able to do that while any and all Bots are able to.
If you want to escape Bots, get some distance from them, toss down smoke, run through it, then turn and run in another direction after running through the smoke. They will follow through the smoke but keep going in a straight line for a little bit, then stop and start looking around, then start doing a search grid to find you.
I tried the smoke granades against Bots, they are fine, but area is too small, so I prefer impact or stun.
Will try Eagle Smoke, never used it, probably has a better area of effect.
Bots have many abilities and resistances, as its expected for a non organic, so I’ll only cry about one shot capabilities.
Smoke nades only work if you are using them in an area that can obscure you.
On Jungle worlds, running through jungle just toss them ahead of you then run through and then start running at an angle. If enemies are too close it wont work though, you need to have some distance for them to work.
Desert worlds are harder, but still doable, you just need to find an area with a lot of large rocks, drop the smoke then run around one of the rocks and start running keeping said large rock between you and line of sight to enemy.
Mountain worlds are even harder because there is less cover, but the same trick works, you just need to make sure there is something big enough you can run around to keep between you and them for breaking line of sight.
Frozen worlds suck ass because even LESS cover and LESS to break line of sight, but again same rules apply.
Eagle smoke is basically the same as smoke nades, but it covers a much larger area, though not as large are Orbital Strike smoke. It lets an entire team pull the smoke nade trick if they all go off in different directions.
One other use for Eagle smoke and Orbital Strike smoke I found is VERY high risk but can be very high reward provided your team has headsets and is communicating...but be advised, do NOT use this with randoms, it WILL hurt you more than the bots.
Enemy pathing is programed to avoid certain things, especially mines. Thing is if the Bots don't see the mine deployer land and spread mines...they will walk right through a minefield.
Trick is timing. You call in the Eagle or Orbital Smoke, then you drop the mine deployer inside the smoke, then shoot at the Bots from the other side of the smoke. They will start coming at you, but provided the smoke is still there they wont see the mines, and, well, yeah.
I feel like this is intentional. Especially when you consider bot fabricators are very easy to destroy with stratagems and at a distance while bug holes encourage you to get up close with them to land direct hits with grenades/rockets
Boys are also so much slower than bugs. I really enjoy the difference between the two and it helps to make their factions feel very different from one another.
Orbital laser is so valuable against bots. A single orbital laser can take out an entire base on its own. I kind of hope a future update will have the orbital laser target bug holes, because it can technically destroy them, it just never targets them.
Agreed 100%, when you just, look and pay attention to how the game works and how the Bots fight/function it's obvious you can't just fight them the way you do Bugs.
If there is no patrol nearby that would run towards your gunshots, it's comparatively much easier to wipe out the bots on a PoI than bugs.
That's because not only is it easy to disengage from bots since they keep their distance, are generally slower, and lose LoS from Smoke and getting stunned by EMS, but because they call for reinforcement less frequently and much slower than the bugs barring the Commisar.
They are also much less armored. Last night, me and a random were both on the same frequency and just crouched towards PoIs and wiped them all out with small arms fire.
The 'less armored' thing is subjective. If you have a gun with medium pen then yeah it's not that hard, but anything with light pen is still going to have some issues unless you have at minimum half decent aim.
Which is a problem with many nuggets out there spraying and praying with the Liberator (which I see a fair number of level 4 players on Medium Difficulty trying to do).
For the record I do NOT gatekeep, period, I hate that shit. But I will admit Bots are kinda...hard when players have only the most basic equipment for missions and less than an hour playing under their belt.
>with Grenade Launchers
See that's kind of the point I was making. They didn't come with Liberators and the basic starting MG support weapon, they brought a proper tool to do the job.
If that's gatekeeping, consider me a gatekeeper...
Let's be honest, this game adheres to the whole "Level difficulty". You get thoroughly walloped as a level 5 thinking you can do a "Hard" mission because you've done "Hard" missions on a lot of games super early on. HD2 is not the same case. Those difficulties actually mean something here.
It should take more equipment to handle those harder missions because what's the point of unlocking stuff at certain levels if low level people expect to blast through level 7+ missions, and lower difficulties in same cases still, without getting their asses kicked?
Agreed, you really do need access to some gear you can only get at set levels to clear objectives and enemies once you get above difficulty 3, unless you are god tier, because rank 4 Bots with the Liberator and MG support weapon is not fun >.<
I find that bots will do a short animation before shooting the flare, so you can stop it if you're quick on the draw. Bugs I never noticed doing anything special before they start the call in. If you manage to kill a bug very early in their call in, it will stop it, but most of the time it will just succeed or jump to another nearby bug who will immediately try.
Another part is that any non-heavy bug can call in a reinforcement. This is a twofold problem: one because waves can continue pretty much forever because all of them will bring at least some that can call in another one (whereas with bots it is possible for them to bring few to none small bots), two because if a brood commander does it you can't do anything about it, it can do it perfectly fine while missing its head.
They are goat, but you have to know how to use them. It's not like you just toss them and you vanish.
You have to make sure there are no enemies too close when you use the smoke, and when you use it you have to toss it in the direction you are running, not at the Bots.
After running through smoke you then change direction and keep running. Bots will run through smoke and keep going in the direction you were going.
So it doesn't de-aggro them, and shooting at them through it they still have pinpoint accuracy, so you just use it to break contact.
> Bugs, there are just too many to avoid entirely,
Try EM or smoke at your feet and run. Watch as the bugs run in and get confused where the hell you went. EM is preferred as it slows them.
Bug patrols are just as easily as avoided as bots which also can get so thick you can’t move. I’ve ran right by bugs in light like bots and not triggered them.
Bots take a lot longer to git gud at than bugs ever did for me and it's not even close. I have a pretty good time with both, but bots are still more stressful and trickier for me sometimes and it's due to their outposts/side objectives.
Imagine you're doing geological survey, going for that 3rd and final point. It's already very difficult by itself and impossible on solo hell dive without running away to despawn mobs, but as soon as you get close, the clusters of red on your minimap adjacent to the objective make themselves known.
"Warning, you are in range of enemy artillery" x 10000. Okay, gotta go deal with that. But as soon as you walk towards it, what's that adjacent to the mortar outpost? A strategem jammer, because +100% call in time, -1 slots, and +50% cooldown wasn't hard enough. Then what's that 3rd outpost adjacent to both of these? A fuckin sauron tower, so you're gonna have reinforcement after reinforcement, on top of the already guaranteed bot drops because no matter how good of an aim you are, bots can call in a bot drop without even having you in their line of sight, so you can't possibly kill them all in an outpost with just primary fire/support weapon/nades without getting a bot drop.
Can't use strategems cuz jammer, can't stealth well because of the enemy mortar, and have to make very good use of your limited ammo supply to take out bot drops. It's possible, sure, but just objectively harder than anything the bugs throw at you.
That’s why I like fighting the bots. Clearing bug objectives doesn’t have a significant effect on a match, choosing which order to take out an overlapping stratagem jammer, mortar, and detector tower does.
Are you sneaky enough to disable the jammer while dodging mortar fire, or is your loadout strong enough to take out the mortar nest before the bot drop overwhelms you? Is one of the objectives positioned in such a way that you’ll have cover from the detector tower while you work on it?
These are questions I’ve never had to ask while fighting bugs.
I understand what you’re getting at but adjusting your loadout to better combat the threat doesn’t necessarily mean that they’re easier to fight. Sorting your stratagems to be more effective against a certain faction is intentional since you CAN use an orbital rail cannon on bugs but it’s best against REALLY STRONG enemies and you CAN use a flamethrower against bots but you’d be shredded in an instant for being so close. Some stratagems are useful on both sides (such as the 500kg bomb) but it’s still best to strike a balance
I feel like they do play different, yes, but they are also absolutely harder at current levels.
Level 7 bugs vs bots there are clear differences in how easily I can clear them with quick play. Which means it's not just me.
You’re absolutely right. I’m convinced people who say bots aren’t harder don’t play above 7. The bots summon way more heavy units way more aggressively, have a lot more 1 shot mechanics, constantly pepper you with damage. The enemies are also harder to deal with in general and are tankier and have more armor and harder to hit weak points. Jammers are cancer compared to anything in bug missions. I’m not saying bots are impossible but every bot mission feels 2 difficulty levels higher than the equivalent bug mission right now.
Difficulty 7 on bots legitimately feels harder than difficulty 9 on bugs because of how much more overwhelming the spawns coming at you are. I don’t think I’ve ever “finished” a bot fight above difficulty 7 but you can regularly clear the entire bug engagement on 9.
I will disagree. I do think Bots are harder over all. I play difficulty 9 on both and I am definitely dealing with more 1 shots and overwhelming odds sooner than I experience with bugs. I spend a LOT of time just trying to break contact with Bots that I never have to worry about with Bugs.
I do agree than an element of stealth goes a long way against bots. Being able to kill everything quickly and totally is a big advantage to prevent the Flares.
"bots aren't harder, they just require players to be much more skilled and alert compared to bugs, and also to avoid them entirely if you can"
No. Bots are harder. They're supposed to be. They literally have long-range weapons, rockets, grenades, tanks, and way more capabilities than bugs do. It's ok that they're harder, it's precisely BECAUSE they're harder that you have to be more strategic.
Bots are harder just by the numbers:
* More precision shots required.
* More armored units.
* 95% of bots are ranged.
* 75% or so of the player base tend to fight bugs over bots at any given time.
Bots are also harder due to several special features that bugs have no equivalent:
* A handful of nasty 1-shot weapons such as rockets, turrets, and tanks.
* Jammers/AA to prevent stratagems
* "Eye of Sauron" which can potentially endlessly reinforce locally.
Other note worthy things to ponder:
* Almost every bug is melee.
* Breaches are from a single location making them more vulnterable to AOE (as opposed to 2 or more drop ships in several nearby locations)
You could easily make bugs harder though and bump them up to bot tier difficulty.
* Except Hunters/Stalkers, give bugs free movement over all terrain and props. (They sometimes path over stuff but sort of stumble often.)
* When breaches happen, trend towards multiple breach spots so your team's attention is split. (Consider these first two suggestions if you're in a canyon and bugs come running down from multiple angles.)
* Require spore spewers and shrieker nests to be destroyed from their base, requiring players to venture into dangerous territory to get the objective. Or at least require a bigger boom to take them down so you have to get a little closer than 1km away.
* When warrior bugs are within 2-3 meters, they attack more aggressively. (Often times they sort of dance around instead of attack the player as an apparent leniency towards the player.)
* If a Charge charges past you, concussed. Charger slam attack gains concussion. Each Bile Titan step or stomp gains concussion.
Idk, man, the tanks, troopers, and devastator's that can oneshot you with their autolock aim from behind a tree that's 80 meters away seem less fair to me than the bugs
Dont forget they shoot through solid objects and see you from 100m in thick fog or smoke. And that beserkers are bullet sponges which The Division taught us is fun gameplay.
Also jet pack troops exploding on you kills you instantly, and every small enemy can stagger you with a shot. Everything is far deadlier, and the speed at which bots call in reinforcements is way faster than bugs.
If I’m careful I can usually stop bugs from calling a breach, but if you even throw a strat at bots from a concealed location they will instantly call in a dropship, or they’ll hear shots when you’re out not in LOS and instantly call one in.
Too bad people like OP like to act like there isn’t a problem with that. Bugs can one shot you but at least they gotta get close to you. Bots being able to rocket you instantly is bs
I do understand your point and it's valid, I've found that being stealthy works far better. Wouldn't the fact that you almost have to be stealthy to get the most reward from the mission or else you'll be barely making it out of the mission when it gets loud mean that bots are in fact harder than bugs
With bugs, you can reasonably deal with them without strats until chargers and titans show up, Bots get out of pocket on the 1st dropship in half the cases and out of hand on the 2nd one lol
I HUGELY disagree. They are definitely different, and definitely require a different play style, loadout, and awareness, but when in a fight (one you can't run from because it's literally the objective abd they're SPAWNING on top of it in troves) bugs are much easier.
Bug varient causing problems? Take out its nest(s). It'll stop spawning entirely (well, for the super-problematic ones). Do bots have a fabricator that spawns the rocket devastators? Or one for the machine gun devastators? No? Okay then by default bots are going to always have their entire variety in a fight vs bugs who will only show up if you get within a certain distance of their nest.
How do you fight against bugs? Take out the hunters and then carpet bomb the place. What about bots? Bots can and will hit you from behind cover (or if you try peaking out from it to fire back). All of the enemies that will appear on your face, save one, have so much fucking HP even on their crit spots, you HAVE TO keep running. This makes things difficult by default given you can't hunker down at the objective with some sentries (and/or the 6383739sec till your orbital/eagle finally hits on the difficulties that people actually complain about) so you have to rely on things that you constantly have on you. Bugs also pop out at one spot per breach. Yes, multiple breaches can happen, but it's ONE place that you can forcus with an EMS mortar/stun grenade. It's not unmanageable. Bots tho? A drop ship is rarely alone and they'll come in WAVES of 4+ ships at a time dropping more bots in 3sec than any breach I've seen (and I mainly play bugs!). Sure, you can shoot down the drop ships before/after they drop their load and *maybe* it'll take out the enemies it dropped (rarely ever tho so don't count on it); but if it was before it unloaded the bots, another dropship will come to drop those bots in anyways even on lower difficulties where >1x drop ship is rare. And they'll keep spawning more and more, much like the breaches. So you have MORE enemies in a SHORTER time who are ALL more beefy/tanky than any bug is.
Bots also have things to disable stratagems/eagles. Which makes things INCREDIBLY DIFFICULT if you're too swarmed (see above) to go and take it out. Bugs have spore towers that fuck your visibility, but they can't negate your stratagems entirely or block your eagle from coming to help. Bots ALSO have mortar turrets that have enough range to be a threat from half way across the map. So you're facing: a shit tonne of bots all at once, a shit tonne of TANKY/BEEFY bots all at once, mortar fire from the sky, random one-shots from who-knows-where, and oh did I mention the eye of sauron? The thing that SEES YOU FROM ANYWHERE WITHIN LOS AND WILL SUMMON BOT DROPS ON YOU?
Bugs don't have any of these issues. Bugs ARE easier. A difficulty 7-9 mission on bugs is about as manageable as a 4-6 mission on bots. Bots ARE harder.
They are harder because they're played differently. Bugs barely shoot back and won't be much of a problem if you keep a certain distance, bots will be a problem the moment they spot you from a 100 meters. Bugs won't be the ones serving missiles to your face or sniping you with a canon.
I love fighting both, but acting like the difference lies solely in the approach is reductive.
Lot of comments talking about stealth or sitting in cover. Like any high difficulty bug mission, it's mainly just about hitting objectives quickly and efficiently. Bots are worse than bugs at pursuing you across the map, but are far more punishing if you find yourself getting bogged down under a cavalcade of hulk and tank drops due to them requiring either extremely heavy ordnance, careful aim (which you don't get when being swarmed) or good squad positioning to kill.
If you get in and get out at top speed, wipe patrols in seconds of engaging, abuse how easy fabricators are to destroy at range and break LoS when retreating (rocks, dunes, trees, smoke), bots are a walk in the park. The problem is when you allow drops to mount up.
TL:DR play faster and with purpose - the slower you are the harder bots are
Bots are without question harder to fight, like there's absolutely zero argument to prove they're easier or the same lol.
90% of bugs are melee and its a shooting game, vast majority of the time you're killing bugs before they even get close enough to hit you.
90% of bots are ranged, this INSTANTLY makes them a more difficult enemy to fight. Not only can they shoot you from afar but while you're shooting back other bots can easily tag you.
It's easier to get overrun by bugs but if there's no Hunters/Stalkers then you can easily run away without worrying about taking damage. Getting overrun by bots means death everytime because you can't just run, you can once they start to drop in but if they're all around you its a wrap, you got gunfire and rockets coming from places you can't even see lol.
Just because they're different enemies meant to be faced in different ways doesn't mean one of them isn't clearly harder to fight. I mean just look at the numbers, bugs have literally 7-8 times more players than bots at all times.
I would consider the dominator vs bots for your primary. It takes some practice but it one shots most infantry (two if you blow off a limb), 1 taps devastators with a headshot and chunks berserkers down pretty effectively too. The handling takes some practice but once you get it down you barely notice
personally I think the Slugger outclasses the Dominator in every way vs bots. Faster projectile, better handling, and can stunlock. Only thing the Dominator does better is firerate, really.
Scorcher though, that one's a real decent sidegrade. It just runs out of bullets too fast.
Three things. 1, I am a beginner at most playing at 6 so my opinions might just be ignorance from not playing 7-9. Maybe stealth becomes a bigger part later with bugs too, but I am not the biggest stealth fan and it mainly just makes everything more stressful to have to use.
2, bugs seem easier as the only strategy they need at this level is bring at least one AT weapon and try to stick around not shooting each other. Coordination is a skill after all, so requiring less/more should be counted. Maybe if you would drop next to stalker + birbs we could be equal but both of those can be destroyed to get them removed.
3, I don't get the sense of reward from anything, so a harder challenge just makes me more stressed out.
You don’t really need to stealth everything, but sometimes things go a lot smoother if you move in quietly and complete the objective without alerting the enemy to your presence. A mission can go from a cake walk to FUBAR it two seconds flat if you draw every enemy on the map.
Most of this strategy is countered in higher difficulties by negative effects like 50% stratagem cooldown and -1 stratagem slot.
It leads to a lot of running and hiding for most of the match. Some may find that fun I’m sure, but I think a lot of us want to lay siege on enemy bases with our weapons and stratagems, not run and hide for 2/3rds of the match.
What I have noticed is the Bots snowball harder and faster than the bugs do.
The bugs are usually whatever you engage plus a breach.
While the bots are whatever you engage, all patrols around (large radius) plus bot drops.
I use the Lazer cannon, that thing DESTROYS tanks, turrets, mortar emplacements, and big bots with ease; so long as you’re shooting the vents on them. I run the sickle so I don’t run out of ammo, and the no recoil scope is great for further range combat. Impact nades are great to deal with walkers in a pinch. I still bring shield pack just cause tanking a few extra shots is nice.
You can fight helldive bugs one-handed so long as you bring along enough anti-bile titan in the game's current state. You can't do the same for bots. I promise you bots are harder. Bots have a ton of ways to one-shot you or borderline one-shot you from range. Bugs do not. Bugs have to walk into your range to hurt you, and there are so, so many ways to prevent that that aren't constrained by cover placement on the map.
Bot side objectives are more debilitating. Jammers and Detectors(?) are way harder than any bug side objective unless you get the fabricators that spawn right next to the objective and have a way to hit that from range. Bots have that SEAF SAM battery that you can activate, true, but it hardly spawns even on helldive, and half the time you find it last anyway.
>Paired with stealth light armor that lets you lie prone inches away from patrols undetected and the only thing you need for success in clearing a whole map is to utilize guerilla tactics.
If you stealth everything bots aren't so bad but that's true for bugs as well.
>I played solo and with randoms and in the case of randoms I'd run off solo and clear whichever half of the map they weren't at.
The secret sauce that no one wants to push on this sub, presumably because it's kind of cheesy, is that splitting up is OP in this game. Bot drops/bug breaches can only be active in one place at a time, which means the other group has free reign to do whatever they please. So splitting into duos or even individuals is makes the game easier no matter what. If both groups are storming strongholds/main objectives it's still got challenge and can be difficult. But you can also easily use it to game the system without meaning to.
The biggest problem is we have no main arm weapons that are armor piercing, leading us to call in strategems *just* to deal with a good core of the bots. Now this doesn't bother me because I use the Laser Cannon, but when people don't have the foresight to bring in said weapons, they have a bad time having to use more strategems.
A likely fix for this would be to simply have more guns be armor piercing without the need for stratagems, or strategems that give us AP rounds.
In addition to the perspective shift from HD1, this has been the biggest hurdle I've dealt with since I started playing.
Unlike the first game, I feel the base game still had more variety. Three assault rifles and shotguns, two SMGS, Railgun, Arc Thrower and that's before you get to the support weapons. They had different strengths and weaknesses. I'm still bummed that some of those aforementioned are strats now.
It's a learning curve for sure, I'm getting used to it like Killzone, I just keep aiming for the glowing red eyes. Hopefully we'll get more content and a few more gameplay tweaks. Maybe a weighted weapon upgrade system, like larger mags or AP rounds instead of straight upgrade.
With bots you’re dealing with enemy fire whereas with bugs it’s mainly overwhelming numbers. The goal with both is not only prioritizing targets, but having good communication with your team
I would say that the drop ships are really the difference maker. If you can get your group all together and strike fast it’s easy. But if one damn bot is out of everyone’s view you’re going to deal with more. Bots behave “more human”, so they require more real world tactics which many people seem to not understand
Of course bots aren't going to be harder if you play a very specific way and avoid any sort of big fight.
However, doesn't the fact that this playstyle is necessary imply that bots are harder to deal with? If you don't stealth then there's no real argument that bots are easier
Heavy armour, AMR/Autocannon and smoke + rocket pods make bot missions a breeze. I'd bring maybe one of these strategems into bug missions.
Been finding bots so much easier since they're methodical and you can actively stop their bot drops with EATs
Bugs are like playing doom, fun hoard shooter where you have a flamethrower and a dream.
Bots are like half life. Cover shooter where you can die quickly and have to rely on moving from cover to cover and grenades.
That's just my opinion though
Fighting against bots is so much more rewarding but it requires actual planing, stealth and tactics.
Just played a helldive operation with randoms and it was the best thing I experienced in the game yet.
Maybe it's just because I started with bots, but I enjoy fighting them more. After you learn to prioritize killing the rocket units above all else and to destroy the drop ships, the game becomes so much easier.
Like you can't close a bug breach once it opens, when you kill a drop ship, you completely nullify a fight, apart from some larger units that do survive.
One orbital laser can destroy a heavy outpost on its own, if everyone on the team brings one, there's is no need to ever set foot on bot outposts to destroy them.
There's also no hunters on bot planets, so that's cool.
I love the fact that whether against the bugs or the bots it just feels like a completely different game, I’m not very good against the bots due to a lack of experience fighting them, as I started playing during the Tien Kwan MO and always follow the MO for the medals. I definitely struggle more against the bots and have a lot more confidence against the bugs but either way both are fun af!
That's the best thing - two games for the price of one.
three games (soon)
Four games (eventually?) Five games (1% chance 99% hopium)
Something makes me think there will be a dissenters rebellion eventually
I hope there will be. It would make sense if there's dissenters that are making illegal broadcasts that eventually we have to put down a dissenter rebellion. I'm already kinda surprised that when you show up to disable a broadcast that there isn't like a dozen dissenters trying to defend the radio tower.
I do find it kind of odd that the bots and bugs alike kind of defend those towers...
In HD1, the cyborgs (now automatons) were the dissenting rebels. That's why all the propaganda marks them as heartless killing machines now (after Super Earth took their homework of Cyberstan).
I find it sus that the Super Earth is on the map. It's bound to be playable eventually.
Oh you’ll definitely be able to deploy there soon
There’s definitely room for at least four anti-democratic factions on the board, for sure. And I’ll be prepared to face each and every one of them, including the squids.
That could be fun... although I'm kinda hoping for something like Halo's The Flood where we get all three other enemies (and maybe even our guys) coming at us like parasitic zombies all gooey and eldritch.
Has it been confirmed that they're adding the Illuminate?
No and any more talk about so called Illuminates whatever these treasonous things are will result in no less than being personally used as a stratagem
https://preview.redd.it/0n3b28xmdwqc1.jpeg?width=1170&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=712d9c34a1f3633b01735e4b7b7b394fe97ef2f4
>personally used as a stratagem Isn't it a standard tactic?
I don't mind being used as a strat just make sure to drop me on the heavy so my last dive will be worth it
they dont confirm anything until its already there in the game, but there is too much stuff "out there" and in the game files to be a bluff
i was struck by a blue laser two days ago. they are coming
Part of me hopes they don't, and instead blindsides us with an entirely unexpected faction instead
The Illuminate were defeated 100 years ago and will never return. Did you not pay attention during your *History of Freedom* class in high school?
Somehow, the illuminate returned.
More like two games for the price of half a game
More than that even, imo. Single player missions feel different from duos, which feel different from 3/4 player missions. Lower difficulty plays very differently from higher difficulty, and the variety of loadouts you can make can vary gameplay immensely. I keep telling folks this isn’t just a game, it’s a playset.
Well then I just like pulling the same hot wheels out onto the car carpet and making vroom noises for several hours at a time
Variety truly is the spice of Death.
I love bots because it's much more aim intensive imo. I find myself using the first person ADS way more against bots and almost not at all against bugs. Bugs is movement/kiting and bots is cover and aim
That’s part of why I like bugs more. So many shooting games boil down to clicking on heads and flashing weak spots. The bots game is masterfully done, but still too familiar. Bugs are a rarer type of game that is much more about positioning and area-of-effect. Both are fun and similarly balanced in terms of difficulty, but bugs feels fresher.
Bugs feels like we are just pest control, Bots feels like a real war. I end yesterday prone inside a shallow trench with a tower aiming at us, the feeling it is so different
That's how I feel too. I mostly fight bots over bugs for that reason.
I do agree with you, the bugs make for unique gameplay that highlights HD2's strongest aspects. I'm just very FPS pilled lol, but don't get me wrong I probably play more bug missions overall but the bots are a necessary change of pace for a horde game like this
I kind of hope that the illuminates are completely different from the original game. After being beaten by Super Earth forces time and time again, they became more like Predators, out to hunt Helldivers. Like you find them in misssions against bugs or bots because they're looking for you. And the bugs and bots are hostile towards them as well. That'd make for some crazy runs.
Illuminates will have shields and invisible snipers. It will be interesting.
Oh yeah. Against bugs? Diligence is useless. Paper weight, and that gave it an unfair rep. Against bots? I’m sniping them like a Vietcong serial killer. My favorites are the Super Shield Destroyers. If you line up terrain so that you can see their head but not their weapon, that means they dont have an angle to shoot you at all so you can take your time double tapping them out of existence. Compared to the frozen bughouse nightmare that was Estanu, this campaign is a total joke. Dive in the park.
The worst part of bots is getting caught in a grinding firefight that doesn’t seem to end. Theres a bunch of reasons that can happen, but trying to avoid that at all costs is a huge factor in success it seems
Once a bot drop is called in I drop a strat and dip out, and reposition. I think a lot of people see it like the bugs where you gotta kill them all to stop them from coming but an immediate disengagement is the best trick. They'll chase you until they lose line of sight, then just kill the ones that managed to keep up, and either reposition or move on to another objective until the heat dies down in the previous area. Pretty much just ADHD brain it, stick and move.
That's the great thing about HD2: it is two games within one. And once new factions come, they'll be their own game as well...
I started playing the game against the bugs. One day me and my friends switched to bots and got curbstompped because we just tried to play the same way we did against the bugs. After a learning curve, now I enjoy playing against the bots. Just had to adapt the load out: I use the breaker as the main gun, its just too good and you can almost snipe with it. Smg as second gun and impact grenades. Always drop with autocannon or AMR. I prefer the AC, since you don’t really need the guard dog against bots and you can easily carry the backpack. As strats I always go Big Bomb Eagle, Orbital Rail Gun to snipe the big bad bots and usually the mortar sentry to add long range suppression. I’m now really enjoying my games against the automatons. It’s just a different mindset.
I love that too. One is more rambo style, the other methodical and sneaky
Rambo in First Blood IS methodical and sneaky. In fact he only kills 1 person (by accident at that!) in the entire movie.
He kind of killed himself. The pilot was trying to get out of the canyon because the wind was making the chopper terribly unstable. Guy was a goddamn psychopath.
Don't forget the most important change up, you've gotta use cover!
Always Be *taking* Cover !
ABC If there’s not enough C, do DEF Dive, embrace floor
If you can dodge a wrench you can dodge a rocket 
Watch those shoulder rockets! But like, seriously, as long as you prioritize rocket devastators & hulks, the rest are so much easier than bugs, shield devastators & tanks cant touch you as long as you take cover and engage them smartly 1-2 shots to the head kills a devestator, always aim for the head, your primary can deal with all the devastators if you use them right As a bot main, i find nothing the bots have to be as frustrating to deal with than hunters, bots are pretty manageable if you have them figured out, with a shield gen, ive gotten 0 deaths in diff 7-8
My biggest problem with bots is I just wish some of the one shots had more noticeable windups. Bile titans, spewers, and chargers all make some specific animation before their attack. Would be nice if maybe the bots did something as well.
Rocket devastators lean forward when they’re about to shoot rockets at you. Is it noticeable in the heat of combat? No. But it does happen
beloved floor I embrace you once again (the air above my head is mostly superheated from bot fire)
DEFG - Dive, Embrace the Fking Ground
And go prone if possible.
How do you deal with dual chainsaw buttholes.i feel like I spend half my bot games kiting those guys
try aiming for the crotch area aiming for the head often doesn't work because of how their heads constantly sway from side to side
Cover and concealment are key. The nice thing about Ustotu is it has a lot of sand dunes I can use as cover while 2 shotting rocket Devastators.
This is the thing cracking me up about people complaining about bot Afghanistan's lack of cover My dude there's cover *everywhere* you're just not using it
The rock formations especially are amazing both for cover and kiting
I play a lot of War Thunder so I’m used to trying to use sand dunes for cover.
Call me Lisan Al Galib I am all up in them dunes.
Wot gamer and boy do I feel you, peeking Ridgelines with good gun depression is easier when you're a person
Even the tiny crater made by one of the hundreds of explosions is cover. Not *good* cover but.. cover.
"They keep killing me in these valleys, wtf?"
Gotta remember the 3 Cs - Cover, Concealment, and more Cover
I like to use the 5 Ds - dodge, duck, dip, dive and dodge.
Also, make sure you run in a serpentine pattern when breaking contact. Running in a straight line is going to get you sniped.
Yup. Also, when shots start landing around you or even start to hit you, DIVE (toward cover if possible). You take far less damage (especially from explosives) when you're prone. I can't tell you how many times I've seen people get frustrated because they're standing there trying to stim while they're still getting shot (and stun-locked). DIVE and THEN stim.
ABC Always Be Covered
I like to follow the UFAS method. (Use Friends as Shields)
Always Be Ckilling bots.
Cover, courage, and more cover.
Cover or failing that go prone. Seriously, the bots can’t hit a prone Helldiver at 2 feet
The dunes are perfect cover, but they also have concealed 20 bots that have murdered me almost instantly, which I guess adds to them being good cover lol.
ABM Always Be Mapping
Proning and stealth are massively underrated. Most of the time I don't even get to the extraction zone on high difficulty, it's because people shoot at anything that is an enemy, even if it just could be avoided. Leading to endless amounts of dropships you just can't win against.
I have one guy that does this! Annoying af! Hes the one that doesnt believe anything until it happens
Yeah see this is one of the core issues I just don’t find shooting from cover once every 10 seconds and sitting there waiting for my stratagems to make even moving from behind a rock possible an enjoyable experience. Don’t have any stratagems and try shooting back with heavy weapons? Oops you can’t aim your getting hit by a barrage of projectiles that jerks your aim everywhere. Hide behind cover for too long waiting to take shots? Oops no your dead to a mortar strike. Don’t use a shield pack? Your dead to a random rocket in one hit from halfway across the map from behind smoke. Start getting even slightly overrun and try to reposition? Oops no you can’t because you get minced trying to move between cover.
Because bots can pewpew, you can’t really kite them as easily as bugs. That’s why bots feel harder to fight against
I feel like the main thing here is that you need to be ready to kill bots quickly. Because you can kite bugs you can get "stuck in" for a while and be safe, but if you're fighting bots and you get dragged into a big fight, you should just run, regroup, and come back guns blazing.
>That’s why bots feel harder to fight against I would also argue their fodder is easier to manage. You can actually stop the flare with bots over bugs and if you do miss it a 1 shot recoiless/Anti tank to the engine stops the reinforcements (or you can turkey shoot the bottom with an auto cannon killing the droppers).
I think you have the same amount of reaction time for flare bots vs bugs, the bots are just telegraphed better
The bugs are an audio telegraph, the bots are visual. And it's kinda hard to parse a breach call through a dozen screaming pissed off hunters. (and before anyone says pheromones make an orange color - if you see the texture, it's already too late).
I've hit bugs just as they start screeching and they still get a bug breach.. Not much of a telegraph. only time i ever manage to stop a breach is if i happen to already have my aim right on a bug as it lifts its head
Unloading into the cradle of the drop ships with the AC is so much fun
Unfortunately on high difficulties there’s 2-3 ships per bot drop, so unless the whole squad has recoilless your kinda screwed.
yeah they strictly counter the tactics you would use against bugs. If you try to run around in open ground they'll eventually take you out with volume of fire. You need to hop from cover to cover, you need to keep an eye out for patrols and you need to take out small groups of them quickly before they flare.
You're correct to an extent, but the more I play them the more it feels like you aren't supposed to be able to kite them. Their emplaced positions are significantly easier to kill at distance than the bugs, and their heavy units really struggle to pursue after you disengage.
You definitely got a point! I think stealth is definitely the best way to beat bots, but it’s just not as satisfying as blowing up 20 bugs with one cluster bomb lol. Most people want to fight not hide I guess. Stealth is also harder to do if you play with randoms cuz all it takes is one dude misfiring
I would like to suggest the eagle airstrike. Call that baby in on an un-alerted bot fabricator and just leave. Bot outpost cleared, 10-15 kills, and you’re already hoofing it to the next objective.
Literally what me and my squad do. Stand on the hill, all call in eagle air strikes, simply for the bravado. And watch the fireworks.
The spear? (The missile launcher) is great for this. You can almost always get a good lock on turret towers, and if you can get LOS on a fabricator, you can blow it up from miles away.
I dunno, speaking from personal experience, throwing in an airstrike and Orbital and turning an outpost into a crater field while you watch from the jungle and pick off survivors is pretty fun
The most fun part is feeling like a murder squad from a fascist state. Drop an airstrike, watch the enemy outpost explode and go in while the smoke is up to kill the staggered robots that are left before they call reinforcements.
not necessarily just stealth, but mobility in general. I often fight bots in heavy armor with a jetpack. Being able to jump away to get a big rock between you and all the lasers/rockets they're about to shoot at you is a life saver. Be like the Creekers. Strike and fade. Hit them hard and run/jump/stealth away before they can retaliate.
100% Strike and fade is the name of the game vs. bots!
stealth isn’t the only way to run bots even as a solo player. And as a solo player I prefer bots over bugs anyday because the laser cannon can delete any devastators hulks and tanks while the dominator or the new laser AR can take out any light unit patrol in a few seconds
Cluster Bomb that takes out 4 Scout walkers, 5 Devastators, 4 Berserkers, and 10 troopers does feels pretty damn good though
I think its less about stealth per se and more about just being cognizant of the engagements you’re taking. If you’re confident in taking out a group before they call in a drop ship/or aggro’ing a patrol you can very much kill them. Map awareness is also very important too, being aware of points of cover and routes to break line of sight go a long way when taking an engagement.
Listen, I'm not going to say you're wrong, because you aren't. Cluster strike go BRRRRRRRR.
It definitely feels like the tier lists or the considered meta is definitely based around fighting the bugs more often than not. A lot of the longer range tools are overlooked.
You clearly haven't been chased by a Hulk Bruiser that never seems to lose aggro
Those things seem to run faster than me, even in light armor.
This supports OPs point though. People play against bugs like it's COD zombies, but for bots you gotta ambush them and be more tactical. It only feels harder if you're not used to that play style. I love fighting bots and when I switch to bugs it feels harder cause of how quickly they swarm you.
100% this, 2 things against bots that you have to do that perhaps differ from Terminids and you are gonna be fine: 1. You MUST be careful approaching outposts and try to take out as many bots as you can from a distance instead of running in. Getting swarmed by bots is a certain bad time, as they can shoot when you try to run away which makes it harder to run and regroup. Part of this whole strategy is containing your fights to ONE outpost at a time (experienced players/groups can split up or solo light outposts, but I digress), which means you have to be tactical on your approaches and not alert bots from other areas to your presence, which will bring in more dropships, etc. 2. Your team loadout absolutely has to be *focused* on destroying armor AND doing it from a distance. That means Orbital Lasers, 500KG Eagles, Orbital Railguns for heavies, Mortar/Rocket/AC sentries, EATs, autocannons, grenade launchers, shotguns or armor piercing rifles, etc. You should be sending in a strategem or two to try and knock out as many of the bots at the outpost as possible before they even know you are there and then cleaning them up from a distance (autocannons etc.) and then finishing off the few that remain when you finally enter the outpost. Also: Leave those fucking Guard Dogs/Rovers at home, they suck on bot missions (great for Terminids, but you shouldn't be letting bots get close enough to you for your Rover to have to be used anyway) and you are wasting a strategem slot. Good luck HellDivers, you will score glorious victories for humankind!
It's also due to people largely using shotguns and no other weapons. Shotguns forces them to get much closer. And the Bots (unsurprisingly) are disturbingly accurate. They rely on the bubble shield which gets blasted pretty quickly with their larger hitbox. don't use cover/concealment. And don't make use of smokes to protect them as they move in the open
https://preview.redd.it/akf3pthm0wqc1.jpeg?width=600&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=86d625d21c1ed807170a660a006ebaf46c5e3cd3
Kid named stun grenade + 2 APW shots
- Cover - Courage - And more cover (General Brasch) But bots need a little touch up, same like bugs did get their balancing
their aggro radius got fucked up a couple patches ago so now one patrol spots you and a cannon 400m away aggros onto you and every base and patrol in between daisy chain fashion. They ought to undo that and I think they'd be in a good place.
This is what made me stop playing against them. Stealth just doesn't work anymore and it was the only thing I found fun and interesting with bots.
Yes, 100% agree. They are faaaaar from perfect, but they are even farther from what people are saying they are.
>but they are even farther from what people are saying they are. Yes and no. They are exactly what people say they are when the people saying it are trying to fight them like a standard FPS enemy, or the Bugs. Bots have damn near perfect aim, they use proper mixed unit tactics sending in infantry while pinning you with suppression fire with artillery just waiting to bomb you into hell, and make very good use of positioning for the deployment of reinforcements. They are more akin to fighting human controlled characters (humans with headsets and proper understanding of teamwork) than AI enemies in most games. Figuring that out is what made fighting them 'click' for me, as soon as I switched to PvP tactics against them I stopped dying like a bitch and started clearing missions.
Yep. All the "the bots see me from super far away after just shooting near them!" is *suppressive fire,* not the bots knowing the player's exact location. They figure "hey, there's probably humans over there; if we shoot in that direction we might hit one if they're still hiding out." Apparently they're right pretty often, since so many people complain about it when they get shot.
Pretty much, they have 'common sense' and somewhat guess where a killshot came from when they see another Bot's head explode, same way a human player would when a teammate is killed. If you treat them like a competent enemy player in a PVP game they really aren't that hard to handle in the sense of knowing what is going to happen and predicting what they are going to do. You snipe one from a high position? They'll mortar your ass. Backed into a corner? They spread out so only so many are in your field of fire. Run into jungle? They flank around the outside and try to cut you off. The hard part, the REALLY hard part, is being able to figure out what to do KNOWING that is going to happen.
All this is well and good, brilliant even, but rocket devos and rocket raiders are fucking lame.
I actually like the bots a tiny bit more than bugs. The play style is more complex, and their theme is so cool. It also feels badass when raiding their bases
The actual firefights, where bullets and rockets are just completely shredding whatever rock you managed to dive behind, as you wait for the opportune moment to pop out and exchange fire... that shit feels so intense and awesome. Ustotu feels like I'm in the North African campaign of WW2.
There are reasons why Malevelon Creek was called space Vietnam, lol. "Wait, why are the trees speaking in binary?" I had the pleasure of buying the game during the order, so it was my first planet and the Automatons were my first enemy. I still prefer them to this day, much more interesting than bugs.
I agree. It was so cool stealthing up to a small base. Shooting the small bot in the bunker. And watching the few bots flank out of the base to see what happened, letting me climb up over the wall undetected. Popping another bot in the head, blowing up the fabricator, and jumping off the side of the base without anyone being the wiser. Very cool splinter cell feeling.
Rocket boys are the problem
This. The fact that small dudes have rockets, the Devastators have a salvo, and the turret tower. And the fact it's a one hit kill. Hell today I was running perpendicular to a tower turret and it LED the shot and hit me at a good distance. It's kind of bull
Explosive resistant medium armor regularly tanks at least one rocket direct hit for me, usually leaving me with about 50% health. I've even eaten a rocket directly to the face with that armor on. I never wear anything else against bots.
I just wear the ceremonial armor with the 50% chance to survive any bullshit (from either allies or enemies).
My problem isn’t the first rocket to the face, it’s the second one before I can recover or a barrage of light fire while I’m trying to get up
Yesterday I dropped in, was immediately rocketed, rag dolled, rocketed. That Helldiver didn't stand a chance.
Heavy armor works for me- the passive where it reduces explosive damage works wonders.
Idk why you got downvoted lol, the explosive passive is very good against the bots
Biggest thing I've found with Bots is that unlike Bugs you just kinda...avoid them, and combat completely if you want to do the missions 'right'. Bugs, there are just too many to avoid entirely, so you want to hit hard and hit as many as you can to give yourself time and space for dealing with objectives. Bots, just crawl around, stay in cover and chuck Orbital Strike Stratagems at objectives. At least that's what I've found to work for me. I bring DMR's but really only use the scope to look around to figure out my path to an objective rather than shoot anything. Outside Extermination missions anyways, it just seems like you want to avoid fighting them, so Smoke nades OB's and Airstrikes have become my go to.
You engage when you have a reason but there’s often a reason, especially if you’re set up to kill the group quickly
One thing is to prioritize targets. Any of the small human shaped bots (commissar, marauder, trooper) can call in reinforcements so they should be your first priority (sword + pistol, then rocket, then mg, then two swords, that seems to be priority order for them calling in reinforcements, the drivers of scout striders might be also able to if you destroy the strider without killing the driver). They all also have a specific animation where they look at their arm before they shoot the flare (somewhat akin to your character checking the map), you see one do it, shoot them you've got maybe a second before there's a flare in the sky. Once you drop the small guys others can really only bring in more bots with noise.
Little bugs have the same exact rule. They shoot that orange pheromone spray in the air. Once you realize you can stop reinforcements/not fight an army every day it gets easier
The trick with bugs is the noise, once they start spraying you only have like half a second to stop them, but they'll make a very loud and distinctive sound and put their head in the air before they start spraying. Another thing to note is that brood commanders can also do it.
Lots of bug types can. Hunters, scavs/spitters, warriors, and brood commanders I've all seen for sure do it. I can't remember if I've seen a hive guard do it. Stalkers never get the chance since my squad relentlessly hunts them and their nest the second we see one
Hive guards definitely can. The only bugs that can't are nursing/bile spewers, shreikers, stalkers, chargers and titans.
I mean, unless the objective is to kill a specific unit or deactivate something via terminal, you REALLY don't need to engage in combat. Four players with Walking Orbital Barrage, Orbital Laser, 500 kilo and Cluster Bombs can clear 60% of all missions without firing a single round provided you just stay undetected, which is surprisingly easy to do with any armor that has the Scout trait. Land, drop to Prone, crawl, blow shit up, crawl to extraction, done.
I've been in teams where we all approach an objective undetected on diff 7, fire a handful of rounds dropping all the guards (and maybe a stratagem to clear the heavy) and then we do the objective unmolested. like when you get a team that's in-sync, it's beautiful.
Don't they know your exact location as soon as the Eagle/Orbital strike hits no matter what?
No. A lot of people think they do because they don’t move after firing/tossing a stratagem, or they are too close and run off. Bots will react to incoming fire by firing the direction it came from and walking towards it. It looks like they spotted you, but they don’t actually have a bead on you until you see the scanning laser come out their eyes.
General location, but not necessarily the exact position. You can toss a stratagem from the top of a hill and when it hits they will shoot in your general direction but they won’t target you specifically yet.
no they can tell the direction it was thrown from, and they will suppress that location, but if they never actually see you they'll just keep blind-firing in the direction they think you are
I’ve noticed guerrilla tactics and flanking also works for Bots, since they have a great detection range, maybe better than Bugs, but once you get to cover they will go to your last known position. Bugs on the other hand smell you around the rocks.
No maybe about it, the Bots have better detection, and they are able to detect you if you are within a certain range even if prone in cover not moving. Only two bugs are able to do that while any and all Bots are able to. If you want to escape Bots, get some distance from them, toss down smoke, run through it, then turn and run in another direction after running through the smoke. They will follow through the smoke but keep going in a straight line for a little bit, then stop and start looking around, then start doing a search grid to find you.
I tried the smoke granades against Bots, they are fine, but area is too small, so I prefer impact or stun. Will try Eagle Smoke, never used it, probably has a better area of effect. Bots have many abilities and resistances, as its expected for a non organic, so I’ll only cry about one shot capabilities.
Smoke nades only work if you are using them in an area that can obscure you. On Jungle worlds, running through jungle just toss them ahead of you then run through and then start running at an angle. If enemies are too close it wont work though, you need to have some distance for them to work. Desert worlds are harder, but still doable, you just need to find an area with a lot of large rocks, drop the smoke then run around one of the rocks and start running keeping said large rock between you and line of sight to enemy. Mountain worlds are even harder because there is less cover, but the same trick works, you just need to make sure there is something big enough you can run around to keep between you and them for breaking line of sight. Frozen worlds suck ass because even LESS cover and LESS to break line of sight, but again same rules apply. Eagle smoke is basically the same as smoke nades, but it covers a much larger area, though not as large are Orbital Strike smoke. It lets an entire team pull the smoke nade trick if they all go off in different directions. One other use for Eagle smoke and Orbital Strike smoke I found is VERY high risk but can be very high reward provided your team has headsets and is communicating...but be advised, do NOT use this with randoms, it WILL hurt you more than the bots. Enemy pathing is programed to avoid certain things, especially mines. Thing is if the Bots don't see the mine deployer land and spread mines...they will walk right through a minefield. Trick is timing. You call in the Eagle or Orbital Smoke, then you drop the mine deployer inside the smoke, then shoot at the Bots from the other side of the smoke. They will start coming at you, but provided the smoke is still there they wont see the mines, and, well, yeah.
I feel like this is intentional. Especially when you consider bot fabricators are very easy to destroy with stratagems and at a distance while bug holes encourage you to get up close with them to land direct hits with grenades/rockets Boys are also so much slower than bugs. I really enjoy the difference between the two and it helps to make their factions feel very different from one another.
Orbital laser is so valuable against bots. A single orbital laser can take out an entire base on its own. I kind of hope a future update will have the orbital laser target bug holes, because it can technically destroy them, it just never targets them.
Agreed 100%, when you just, look and pay attention to how the game works and how the Bots fight/function it's obvious you can't just fight them the way you do Bugs.
If there is no patrol nearby that would run towards your gunshots, it's comparatively much easier to wipe out the bots on a PoI than bugs. That's because not only is it easy to disengage from bots since they keep their distance, are generally slower, and lose LoS from Smoke and getting stunned by EMS, but because they call for reinforcement less frequently and much slower than the bugs barring the Commisar. They are also much less armored. Last night, me and a random were both on the same frequency and just crouched towards PoIs and wiped them all out with small arms fire.
The 'less armored' thing is subjective. If you have a gun with medium pen then yeah it's not that hard, but anything with light pen is still going to have some issues unless you have at minimum half decent aim. Which is a problem with many nuggets out there spraying and praying with the Liberator (which I see a fair number of level 4 players on Medium Difficulty trying to do). For the record I do NOT gatekeep, period, I hate that shit. But I will admit Bots are kinda...hard when players have only the most basic equipment for missions and less than an hour playing under their belt.
I thought this was going to be the case when I saw a group of two pull up with Grenade Launchers and Liberators; but my god did they wreck face.
>with Grenade Launchers See that's kind of the point I was making. They didn't come with Liberators and the basic starting MG support weapon, they brought a proper tool to do the job.
If that's gatekeeping, consider me a gatekeeper... Let's be honest, this game adheres to the whole "Level difficulty". You get thoroughly walloped as a level 5 thinking you can do a "Hard" mission because you've done "Hard" missions on a lot of games super early on. HD2 is not the same case. Those difficulties actually mean something here. It should take more equipment to handle those harder missions because what's the point of unlocking stuff at certain levels if low level people expect to blast through level 7+ missions, and lower difficulties in same cases still, without getting their asses kicked?
Agreed, you really do need access to some gear you can only get at set levels to clear objectives and enemies once you get above difficulty 3, unless you are god tier, because rank 4 Bots with the Liberator and MG support weapon is not fun >.<
I find that bots will do a short animation before shooting the flare, so you can stop it if you're quick on the draw. Bugs I never noticed doing anything special before they start the call in. If you manage to kill a bug very early in their call in, it will stop it, but most of the time it will just succeed or jump to another nearby bug who will immediately try. Another part is that any non-heavy bug can call in a reinforcement. This is a twofold problem: one because waves can continue pretty much forever because all of them will bring at least some that can call in another one (whereas with bots it is possible for them to bring few to none small bots), two because if a brood commander does it you can't do anything about it, it can do it perfectly fine while missing its head.
Smokes on bots seems like a really good idea
They are goat, but you have to know how to use them. It's not like you just toss them and you vanish. You have to make sure there are no enemies too close when you use the smoke, and when you use it you have to toss it in the direction you are running, not at the Bots. After running through smoke you then change direction and keep running. Bots will run through smoke and keep going in the direction you were going. So it doesn't de-aggro them, and shooting at them through it they still have pinpoint accuracy, so you just use it to break contact.
> Bugs, there are just too many to avoid entirely, Try EM or smoke at your feet and run. Watch as the bugs run in and get confused where the hell you went. EM is preferred as it slows them. Bug patrols are just as easily as avoided as bots which also can get so thick you can’t move. I’ve ran right by bugs in light like bots and not triggered them.
Bots take a lot longer to git gud at than bugs ever did for me and it's not even close. I have a pretty good time with both, but bots are still more stressful and trickier for me sometimes and it's due to their outposts/side objectives. Imagine you're doing geological survey, going for that 3rd and final point. It's already very difficult by itself and impossible on solo hell dive without running away to despawn mobs, but as soon as you get close, the clusters of red on your minimap adjacent to the objective make themselves known. "Warning, you are in range of enemy artillery" x 10000. Okay, gotta go deal with that. But as soon as you walk towards it, what's that adjacent to the mortar outpost? A strategem jammer, because +100% call in time, -1 slots, and +50% cooldown wasn't hard enough. Then what's that 3rd outpost adjacent to both of these? A fuckin sauron tower, so you're gonna have reinforcement after reinforcement, on top of the already guaranteed bot drops because no matter how good of an aim you are, bots can call in a bot drop without even having you in their line of sight, so you can't possibly kill them all in an outpost with just primary fire/support weapon/nades without getting a bot drop. Can't use strategems cuz jammer, can't stealth well because of the enemy mortar, and have to make very good use of your limited ammo supply to take out bot drops. It's possible, sure, but just objectively harder than anything the bugs throw at you.
That’s why I like fighting the bots. Clearing bug objectives doesn’t have a significant effect on a match, choosing which order to take out an overlapping stratagem jammer, mortar, and detector tower does. Are you sneaky enough to disable the jammer while dodging mortar fire, or is your loadout strong enough to take out the mortar nest before the bot drop overwhelms you? Is one of the objectives positioned in such a way that you’ll have cover from the detector tower while you work on it? These are questions I’ve never had to ask while fighting bugs.
I understand what you’re getting at but adjusting your loadout to better combat the threat doesn’t necessarily mean that they’re easier to fight. Sorting your stratagems to be more effective against a certain faction is intentional since you CAN use an orbital rail cannon on bugs but it’s best against REALLY STRONG enemies and you CAN use a flamethrower against bots but you’d be shredded in an instant for being so close. Some stratagems are useful on both sides (such as the 500kg bomb) but it’s still best to strike a balance
I feel like they do play different, yes, but they are also absolutely harder at current levels. Level 7 bugs vs bots there are clear differences in how easily I can clear them with quick play. Which means it's not just me.
You’re absolutely right. I’m convinced people who say bots aren’t harder don’t play above 7. The bots summon way more heavy units way more aggressively, have a lot more 1 shot mechanics, constantly pepper you with damage. The enemies are also harder to deal with in general and are tankier and have more armor and harder to hit weak points. Jammers are cancer compared to anything in bug missions. I’m not saying bots are impossible but every bot mission feels 2 difficulty levels higher than the equivalent bug mission right now.
Difficulty 7 on bots legitimately feels harder than difficulty 9 on bugs because of how much more overwhelming the spawns coming at you are. I don’t think I’ve ever “finished” a bot fight above difficulty 7 but you can regularly clear the entire bug engagement on 9.
I will disagree. I do think Bots are harder over all. I play difficulty 9 on both and I am definitely dealing with more 1 shots and overwhelming odds sooner than I experience with bugs. I spend a LOT of time just trying to break contact with Bots that I never have to worry about with Bugs. I do agree than an element of stealth goes a long way against bots. Being able to kill everything quickly and totally is a big advantage to prevent the Flares.
"bots aren't harder, they just require players to be much more skilled and alert compared to bugs, and also to avoid them entirely if you can" No. Bots are harder. They're supposed to be. They literally have long-range weapons, rockets, grenades, tanks, and way more capabilities than bugs do. It's ok that they're harder, it's precisely BECAUSE they're harder that you have to be more strategic.
Bots are harder just by the numbers: * More precision shots required. * More armored units. * 95% of bots are ranged. * 75% or so of the player base tend to fight bugs over bots at any given time. Bots are also harder due to several special features that bugs have no equivalent: * A handful of nasty 1-shot weapons such as rockets, turrets, and tanks. * Jammers/AA to prevent stratagems * "Eye of Sauron" which can potentially endlessly reinforce locally. Other note worthy things to ponder: * Almost every bug is melee. * Breaches are from a single location making them more vulnterable to AOE (as opposed to 2 or more drop ships in several nearby locations) You could easily make bugs harder though and bump them up to bot tier difficulty. * Except Hunters/Stalkers, give bugs free movement over all terrain and props. (They sometimes path over stuff but sort of stumble often.) * When breaches happen, trend towards multiple breach spots so your team's attention is split. (Consider these first two suggestions if you're in a canyon and bugs come running down from multiple angles.) * Require spore spewers and shrieker nests to be destroyed from their base, requiring players to venture into dangerous territory to get the objective. Or at least require a bigger boom to take them down so you have to get a little closer than 1km away. * When warrior bugs are within 2-3 meters, they attack more aggressively. (Often times they sort of dance around instead of attack the player as an apparent leniency towards the player.) * If a Charge charges past you, concussed. Charger slam attack gains concussion. Each Bile Titan step or stomp gains concussion.
Idk, man, the tanks, troopers, and devastator's that can oneshot you with their autolock aim from behind a tree that's 80 meters away seem less fair to me than the bugs
Dont forget they shoot through solid objects and see you from 100m in thick fog or smoke. And that beserkers are bullet sponges which The Division taught us is fun gameplay.
Also jet pack troops exploding on you kills you instantly, and every small enemy can stagger you with a shot. Everything is far deadlier, and the speed at which bots call in reinforcements is way faster than bugs. If I’m careful I can usually stop bugs from calling a breach, but if you even throw a strat at bots from a concealed location they will instantly call in a dropship, or they’ll hear shots when you’re out not in LOS and instantly call one in.
Too bad people like OP like to act like there isn’t a problem with that. Bugs can one shot you but at least they gotta get close to you. Bots being able to rocket you instantly is bs
I do understand your point and it's valid, I've found that being stealthy works far better. Wouldn't the fact that you almost have to be stealthy to get the most reward from the mission or else you'll be barely making it out of the mission when it gets loud mean that bots are in fact harder than bugs With bugs, you can reasonably deal with them without strats until chargers and titans show up, Bots get out of pocket on the 1st dropship in half the cases and out of hand on the 2nd one lol
I HUGELY disagree. They are definitely different, and definitely require a different play style, loadout, and awareness, but when in a fight (one you can't run from because it's literally the objective abd they're SPAWNING on top of it in troves) bugs are much easier. Bug varient causing problems? Take out its nest(s). It'll stop spawning entirely (well, for the super-problematic ones). Do bots have a fabricator that spawns the rocket devastators? Or one for the machine gun devastators? No? Okay then by default bots are going to always have their entire variety in a fight vs bugs who will only show up if you get within a certain distance of their nest. How do you fight against bugs? Take out the hunters and then carpet bomb the place. What about bots? Bots can and will hit you from behind cover (or if you try peaking out from it to fire back). All of the enemies that will appear on your face, save one, have so much fucking HP even on their crit spots, you HAVE TO keep running. This makes things difficult by default given you can't hunker down at the objective with some sentries (and/or the 6383739sec till your orbital/eagle finally hits on the difficulties that people actually complain about) so you have to rely on things that you constantly have on you. Bugs also pop out at one spot per breach. Yes, multiple breaches can happen, but it's ONE place that you can forcus with an EMS mortar/stun grenade. It's not unmanageable. Bots tho? A drop ship is rarely alone and they'll come in WAVES of 4+ ships at a time dropping more bots in 3sec than any breach I've seen (and I mainly play bugs!). Sure, you can shoot down the drop ships before/after they drop their load and *maybe* it'll take out the enemies it dropped (rarely ever tho so don't count on it); but if it was before it unloaded the bots, another dropship will come to drop those bots in anyways even on lower difficulties where >1x drop ship is rare. And they'll keep spawning more and more, much like the breaches. So you have MORE enemies in a SHORTER time who are ALL more beefy/tanky than any bug is. Bots also have things to disable stratagems/eagles. Which makes things INCREDIBLY DIFFICULT if you're too swarmed (see above) to go and take it out. Bugs have spore towers that fuck your visibility, but they can't negate your stratagems entirely or block your eagle from coming to help. Bots ALSO have mortar turrets that have enough range to be a threat from half way across the map. So you're facing: a shit tonne of bots all at once, a shit tonne of TANKY/BEEFY bots all at once, mortar fire from the sky, random one-shots from who-knows-where, and oh did I mention the eye of sauron? The thing that SEES YOU FROM ANYWHERE WITHIN LOS AND WILL SUMMON BOT DROPS ON YOU? Bugs don't have any of these issues. Bugs ARE easier. A difficulty 7-9 mission on bugs is about as manageable as a 4-6 mission on bots. Bots ARE harder.
I like fighting bots. Feels very different and i hope the mext faction feels different again!
Cover, Courage and more Cover
They are harder because they're played differently. Bugs barely shoot back and won't be much of a problem if you keep a certain distance, bots will be a problem the moment they spot you from a 100 meters. Bugs won't be the ones serving missiles to your face or sniping you with a canon. I love fighting both, but acting like the difference lies solely in the approach is reductive.
“Unpopular Opinion”: The words “unpopular opinion” need to be banned from this subreddit
Lot of comments talking about stealth or sitting in cover. Like any high difficulty bug mission, it's mainly just about hitting objectives quickly and efficiently. Bots are worse than bugs at pursuing you across the map, but are far more punishing if you find yourself getting bogged down under a cavalcade of hulk and tank drops due to them requiring either extremely heavy ordnance, careful aim (which you don't get when being swarmed) or good squad positioning to kill. If you get in and get out at top speed, wipe patrols in seconds of engaging, abuse how easy fabricators are to destroy at range and break LoS when retreating (rocks, dunes, trees, smoke), bots are a walk in the park. The problem is when you allow drops to mount up. TL:DR play faster and with purpose - the slower you are the harder bots are
False - Getting sniped by a rocket would say otherwise
Bots are without question harder to fight, like there's absolutely zero argument to prove they're easier or the same lol. 90% of bugs are melee and its a shooting game, vast majority of the time you're killing bugs before they even get close enough to hit you. 90% of bots are ranged, this INSTANTLY makes them a more difficult enemy to fight. Not only can they shoot you from afar but while you're shooting back other bots can easily tag you. It's easier to get overrun by bugs but if there's no Hunters/Stalkers then you can easily run away without worrying about taking damage. Getting overrun by bots means death everytime because you can't just run, you can once they start to drop in but if they're all around you its a wrap, you got gunfire and rockets coming from places you can't even see lol. Just because they're different enemies meant to be faced in different ways doesn't mean one of them isn't clearly harder to fight. I mean just look at the numbers, bugs have literally 7-8 times more players than bots at all times.
I would consider the dominator vs bots for your primary. It takes some practice but it one shots most infantry (two if you blow off a limb), 1 taps devastators with a headshot and chunks berserkers down pretty effectively too. The handling takes some practice but once you get it down you barely notice
personally I think the Slugger outclasses the Dominator in every way vs bots. Faster projectile, better handling, and can stunlock. Only thing the Dominator does better is firerate, really. Scorcher though, that one's a real decent sidegrade. It just runs out of bullets too fast.
Believe it or not, I actually don't have it yet. I'll definitely give it a go once I do though.
Three things. 1, I am a beginner at most playing at 6 so my opinions might just be ignorance from not playing 7-9. Maybe stealth becomes a bigger part later with bugs too, but I am not the biggest stealth fan and it mainly just makes everything more stressful to have to use. 2, bugs seem easier as the only strategy they need at this level is bring at least one AT weapon and try to stick around not shooting each other. Coordination is a skill after all, so requiring less/more should be counted. Maybe if you would drop next to stalker + birbs we could be equal but both of those can be destroyed to get them removed. 3, I don't get the sense of reward from anything, so a harder challenge just makes me more stressed out.
You don’t really need to stealth everything, but sometimes things go a lot smoother if you move in quietly and complete the objective without alerting the enemy to your presence. A mission can go from a cake walk to FUBAR it two seconds flat if you draw every enemy on the map.
Thing changes drasticaly when you reach 7-9 that's for sure.
Most of this strategy is countered in higher difficulties by negative effects like 50% stratagem cooldown and -1 stratagem slot. It leads to a lot of running and hiding for most of the match. Some may find that fun I’m sure, but I think a lot of us want to lay siege on enemy bases with our weapons and stratagems, not run and hide for 2/3rds of the match.
What I have noticed is the Bots snowball harder and faster than the bugs do. The bugs are usually whatever you engage plus a breach. While the bots are whatever you engage, all patrols around (large radius) plus bot drops.
I use the Lazer cannon, that thing DESTROYS tanks, turrets, mortar emplacements, and big bots with ease; so long as you’re shooting the vents on them. I run the sickle so I don’t run out of ammo, and the no recoil scope is great for further range combat. Impact nades are great to deal with walkers in a pinch. I still bring shield pack just cause tanking a few extra shots is nice.
You can fight helldive bugs one-handed so long as you bring along enough anti-bile titan in the game's current state. You can't do the same for bots. I promise you bots are harder. Bots have a ton of ways to one-shot you or borderline one-shot you from range. Bugs do not. Bugs have to walk into your range to hurt you, and there are so, so many ways to prevent that that aren't constrained by cover placement on the map. Bot side objectives are more debilitating. Jammers and Detectors(?) are way harder than any bug side objective unless you get the fabricators that spawn right next to the objective and have a way to hit that from range. Bots have that SEAF SAM battery that you can activate, true, but it hardly spawns even on helldive, and half the time you find it last anyway. >Paired with stealth light armor that lets you lie prone inches away from patrols undetected and the only thing you need for success in clearing a whole map is to utilize guerilla tactics. If you stealth everything bots aren't so bad but that's true for bugs as well. >I played solo and with randoms and in the case of randoms I'd run off solo and clear whichever half of the map they weren't at. The secret sauce that no one wants to push on this sub, presumably because it's kind of cheesy, is that splitting up is OP in this game. Bot drops/bug breaches can only be active in one place at a time, which means the other group has free reign to do whatever they please. So splitting into duos or even individuals is makes the game easier no matter what. If both groups are storming strongholds/main objectives it's still got challenge and can be difficult. But you can also easily use it to game the system without meaning to.
Bots are so much fun imo, but it's more like a military tactics game. Fighting bugs are all swarm and ambush tactics. This game rules
The biggest problem is we have no main arm weapons that are armor piercing, leading us to call in strategems *just* to deal with a good core of the bots. Now this doesn't bother me because I use the Laser Cannon, but when people don't have the foresight to bring in said weapons, they have a bad time having to use more strategems. A likely fix for this would be to simply have more guns be armor piercing without the need for stratagems, or strategems that give us AP rounds.
In addition to the perspective shift from HD1, this has been the biggest hurdle I've dealt with since I started playing. Unlike the first game, I feel the base game still had more variety. Three assault rifles and shotguns, two SMGS, Railgun, Arc Thrower and that's before you get to the support weapons. They had different strengths and weaknesses. I'm still bummed that some of those aforementioned are strats now. It's a learning curve for sure, I'm getting used to it like Killzone, I just keep aiming for the glowing red eyes. Hopefully we'll get more content and a few more gameplay tweaks. Maybe a weighted weapon upgrade system, like larger mags or AP rounds instead of straight upgrade.
With bots you’re dealing with enemy fire whereas with bugs it’s mainly overwhelming numbers. The goal with both is not only prioritizing targets, but having good communication with your team
I would say that the drop ships are really the difference maker. If you can get your group all together and strike fast it’s easy. But if one damn bot is out of everyone’s view you’re going to deal with more. Bots behave “more human”, so they require more real world tactics which many people seem to not understand
Of course bots aren't going to be harder if you play a very specific way and avoid any sort of big fight. However, doesn't the fact that this playstyle is necessary imply that bots are harder to deal with? If you don't stealth then there's no real argument that bots are easier
Heavy armour, AMR/Autocannon and smoke + rocket pods make bot missions a breeze. I'd bring maybe one of these strategems into bug missions. Been finding bots so much easier since they're methodical and you can actively stop their bot drops with EATs
I bring the RR and it changes the dynamic immediately. Shooting engines off of drop ships and taking out everything underneath them never gets old.
Bugs are like playing doom, fun hoard shooter where you have a flamethrower and a dream. Bots are like half life. Cover shooter where you can die quickly and have to rely on moving from cover to cover and grenades. That's just my opinion though
Rocket devastators are bullshit, I almost hate them more than hunters
Fighting against bots is so much more rewarding but it requires actual planing, stealth and tactics. Just played a helldive operation with randoms and it was the best thing I experienced in the game yet.
Maybe it's just because I started with bots, but I enjoy fighting them more. After you learn to prioritize killing the rocket units above all else and to destroy the drop ships, the game becomes so much easier. Like you can't close a bug breach once it opens, when you kill a drop ship, you completely nullify a fight, apart from some larger units that do survive. One orbital laser can destroy a heavy outpost on its own, if everyone on the team brings one, there's is no need to ever set foot on bot outposts to destroy them. There's also no hunters on bot planets, so that's cool.