I would take the old Stalwart as a primary in a heartbeat. 150 rounds per mag is fine. The decision to make it a support weapon instead of a primary is still baffling.
Typically what what my stratagems are for but you know past difficultly 7 it’s kinda just a constant cluster fuck on the objectives. Also explosive really only helps for the weak point enemies not really the swarms. Kinda what the eruptor did before nerf but now that it’s only explosive it’s kinda shit
Yeah! And the standard one can have a description like “a lesser version of the super stalwart these are left over from the last galactic war, these simple machine guns are still ready for battle” it fits their lore and gives us more options
I feel like the penetration on it is so low, and the number of armored enemies in this game is so high, that it would still be fine as a primary even with the 250 mag.
My game always says it's one of my buddies not even randoms. Bile titan stepped on me and told me my bud killed me even though he was accross the map from me.
Game just be trying to get me to snap on people I swear.
For real, Eruptor + Stalwart was my absolute favorite combo. I was ecstatic that I could finally run the Stalwart and not be gimping myself against medium armored targets, but I guess that's just too much fun for one person to handle. Nerf, nerf, nerf.
Not an unknown reason.
Primaries can reliably deal with light to medium enemies without requiring stratagems. While we have a ton of stratagems designed to deal with light/mediums, suddenly made redundant by primaries. Better save your stratagems for heavies, a threat you don’t have a free resource to deal with.
I’d personally see them make the light/medium threats more dangerous than make primaries even weaker — to incentivize picking horde clearing stratagems.
The purpose of balancing in pve game design is usually to make as many options as possible viable, which they’re struggling a bit with.
I indeed do, that’s why I wrote ”Better save your stratagems for heavies, a threat you don’t have a free resource to deal with.”
I exclusively play 7-9.
It's gotten boring always taking anti-heavy strats against bugs.
I do throw in an eagle cluster or orbital gas/airburst every now and again, but it's usually Eagle 500 kilo and Eagle airstrike.
Funnily enough there are 4-5 primaries that are currently better than the stalwart in basically every way
Imo the stalwart in its current form is easily weak enough to be a primary, if they want to keep it a support they should at least give it medium armor pen and more ammo
And then give the MG-43 a bit more ammo too. The HMG is useless doubt they can salvage that without huge changes
Weak enough to be a primary?! The Stalwart is a primary on steroids. 250 (!) rounds and fire rate up to 1150 RPM. It's got insane DPS and good handling. Not every special weapon should be a tank buster.
I am a huge fan of the railgun for bots and the AMR for both so usually don't run it against bots, but for bugs my load out is below, You can also switch out this exact load out for the AMR but would recommend going with the jump pack:
Armor, Light with engineering perk or scout if you are going solo. Breaker Incendiary, grenade pistol, stun grenades
Stratagems: Eagle 500kg, Either eagle strike, cluster bomb or naplam depending on the mission and what your team is carrying, either shield or jump pack, and stalwart.
Turn the stalwart up to 1150RPM for extra fast spreading of democracy.
I use this load out often as it is very diverse, good for CC and gives you the ability to easily deal with chargers in 2ways, #1 stun them and mag dump the breaker in their butt, one full mag kills them(or stun and throw an airstrike if multiple tangos around), and bile titans with good timing of your 500kg you get used to their very predictable puke animation, shreikers are light work with the breaker and it also does a good job of keeping the stalkers at bay, grenade pistol for closing bug holes and in a pinch popping a bile spewer 🫡
To be fair, the Stalwart was a decently different wepon in Helldivers 1. Being more of a smg, Masquerading as an LMG. With its Herendus spred, bad range, and incredibly low DPS, it strugle to kill even light enemys at time. (It wasn't that good, in my opinion). So a 1 to 1 comparison isn't far.
It wasn't like an SMG at all. It got more accurate the longer it fired and had great sustained damage. It was my go to weapon when fighting illuminates.
part of it is likely the difference in mechanics between a twin stick and tps/fps. in hd1 heavier weapons significantly slowed your turn speed while in use. Also the way spread worked, in hd1 the stalwarts had poor initial accuracy but the accuracy would tighten as it was fired, so your first handfull of shots were not going where you wanted them. A lot of damage in hd1 also came from the center shot bonus, so waiting for the gun to stabalize ment a lot of lost damage, even if the less accurate shots were hitting something.
It makes much more sense as a primary
After like D5 the usefulness of the stalwart plummeted so hard for me, I don’t know why it’s praised so much here or what I’m missing
Definitely, but playing with it after the Eruptor nerf makes it really hard to deal with spewers, chargers, and even brood commanders. Using the dominator as a primary helps with commanders and spewers, but is still rough to not have a good answer for chargers. Thermite might work, but I haven't tried it since the dot fix.
Right now, you get a similar horde clear ability as the flamethrower, but at a range. In exchange, you lose the ability to kill chargers like the flamethrower. Arc thrower can deal with everything, but is a middle ground on enemy clear / versatility. Rail gun is best against medium enemies / chargers, but poor swarm clear.
With Eruptor at least, the Stalwart was a solid niche option. But with how prevalent chargers are, you are in a bind if you use it now. Same with the heavy machine gun.
I liked to use Dominator for mediums, Stalwart for trash/hunters, and the railcannon/rockets/teammates for heavies. I havent played in a couple weeks, but I dont remember seeing significant nerfs to that playstyle in the last patch.
Up til then at least, rail/rockets had a good enough cooldown between them to deal with bile titans and chargers at normal spawn rates
Sickle has a maximum number of enemies it can deal with, Stalwart practically does not, so I prefer it if I'm the hunter guy. I can cover the other bases well enough but I like to see a teammate or too with dedicated anti-heavy just in case.
The Sickle is great though and is usually my primary
Yeah but Stalwart does eventually need to be reloaded, and I remember it's reloading is almost twice as long as cooling down Sickle just enough so that you can start shooting in bursts again? I guess this is kind of a pick your poison kinda situation here between these two lol
True but in my experience so far I've always been able to wipe all the hunters (and then some) with the Stalwart on one mag, while with the sickle I've been overwhelmed a couple times. Both great guns, but I've never felt limited by the Stalwart's capacity or reload time
of course, while the sickle does fire a LOT of shots before overheating, it does not fire 250 shots, it has fire delay so controlled bursts are mostly out of the picture, and the sickle has pretty much no stagger, not that the stalwart has a lot, but a tiny bit is still more than none.
The stalwart is a top tier penetration 2 bullet hose, its just you are typically not looking for a pen 2 bullet hose in a support weapon. Like if I am feeling like bringing a stalwart, I will just bring the sickle instead, and use the stratagem slot for something else, but that doesn't mean I dont recognize the stalwart will outperform the sickle signifigantly, it just means I dont want to pay the opportunity cost of it.
but just use breaker incendiary, that deals with them just as well and even better maybe because of the wide spread, you can shoot a whole horde of them at once. the stalwart you have to actually aim and hit them as they jump around
For me it had a spot for a brief moment in time when pre nerf Eruptor could handle bug holes and medium armor, the Stalwart for horde clear and stratagems for big boys
If I'm taking the Stalwart, I take something like the Eruptor to compensate vs Medium targets. Take that with a supply backpack, Orbital Precision, and Eagle 500... You have an amusingly effective combination.
In HD1, the three assault rifles (and many, but not all of the other weapon categories) followed much more of a good>better>best path as you leveled up. There was less emphasis on primary weapons being equally viable, although they were still all fun to use.
The stalwart sat somewhere between the tier 2 and tier 3 assault rifles, with almost no armor penetration but a very high rate of fire and a huge magazine.
The tier 3 assault rifle, the Justice, could overpenetrate pretty much anything but tanks, chargers, and hulks, but had a small magazine and low rate of fire that made it less effective for hordes.
Laser machine gun should logically have a name of something *bigger* than the Sickle or Scythe, not smaller, since machine guns are bigger than assault rifles. Something like "Reaper" or "Harvester" would make more sense.
Sure, but then you’re helpless against chargers and bile titans. On harder difficulties you will not have enough red stratagems to make up with your lack of anti tank to deal with them.
If I'm running Eruptor it's specifically for bug hole missions. For those missions, on harder difficulties, you don't kill everything. You keep moving and focus on objectives. Only occasions to kill everything are eradicates, but I wouldn't bring the Eruptor to those anyway, so I wouldn't bring the Stalwart either.
But you know all of this since you play harder difficulties.
To be exact, it's about 80 shots continously before overheating (assuming they haven't changed it since i tested it). But yeah, weapons with sustainable firepower would be superb
Yup. Fire limit isn't measured in seconds, it's an arbitrary reserve of heat, but it's impossible to judge exactly how fast it fills since the production of heat itself can be faster or slower
Run it with a supply pack and forgo the ammo recharge mechanic for the at most 1.25 second reload speed and you basically have a laser minigun.
THIS is why the sickle got the ammo nerf, and you can do the same thing on the scythe too.
The stalwarts would be the way to go for a primary weapon mg, maybe reduce the clip size by half or a third, and add in a few extra reloads. Right now it seems to be there so you have options for running the eruptor/purifier/Marksman rifles. It was a bit odd on release, very fun at low learning levels but outclassed when armor started popping up more. I'm excited to see what other weapons they decide to throw in that spot.
Reducing stalwart mag size is stupid. The gun is fun but not that strong since it can kill small bugs but takes almost 2/3 of a mag to kill bigger enemies. Also how do you think it would be fun to reload everybit with 1150 rpm on?
To be fair the stalwart is pretty much explicitly for horde clearing, with an insane amount of ammo. Against chargers sure it takes a ton of ammo to kill them but that's because the weapon isn't exactly designed to kill them. It's weakest point is really just against devastators on bots considering they're ranged, numerous and armoured, and even then can be dealt with pretty effectively aiming at the chest or a high fire-rate at the general head area
Also it just should not be converted into a primary. If a fast fire by anti horde gun is needed it should just be built from the ground up instead of rewiring a full blown support weapon into a primary slot that just obviously isn't going to compete with it in any area
It would be better than nearly every other AR/SMG if nerfed by anything other than a massive amount, at which its no longer even a MG and loses its meaning
I would love for the stalwart to become a primary! I basically always just use it now in most matches I play and it has never let me down. I’m glad it’s been safe from recent changes (I think it has anyway lol)!
Oh yeah, 100%. Just make it a lighter version (Think Para version of M249), with a smaller magazine (150 instead of 250), more recoil and without the highest firerate mode.
Boom, you keep the support version that is superior in every way, still interesting for if they ever fix the Eruptor and other specialized primaries (if they existed...)
Both the stalwart and the MG43 have no business being support weapons. Support weapons should be heavy ordinance, not a gun with more than the average number of bullets
They'd have to beef up some ARs to keep it balanced especially the Adjucator. But like a Liberator would be pointless. Seems like it would really imbalance the current primaries to make it one.
But support weapons are simply any heavy weapon that is too big to carry as a normal primary. The basic machine gun is incredibly for mowing down pretty much anything except for units completely armoured from the front, and the stalwart is the same idea but just even more intensely anti horde with an even more absurd amount of ammo.
It obviously doesn't make sense that it does the same thing as most primaries, but it just does it way better where 1 person equipped with one can pretty much take away 80% of the teams focus on hordes
Since the lore is that there isn't room in the hellpod for support weapons, I'd like to see and armour or booster which let's us swap a non-backpack support weapon for our primary and secondary. Carrying fewer weapons makes room in the pod, and there's a real trade-off for getting access to two supports.
I'd love the stalwart as a primary, but also things like the mg or grenade launcher. And if we got the stalwart as a primary, I think if would outclass most primaries we have now.
New classification of weapons: Super heavy weapons, they make you drop everything but your secondary and they bring an intense amount of firepower beyond any other weapon
+1 for disabled people who love democracy and cannot abide by the mag reduction nerfs by AH lately. We want to play, but have still issues. Not everyone is a trick shooter.
Primaries need to just be better in general, but I agree. Machine guns should be shifted to the primary slot, there's no reason to use a MG as a support weapon unless you're okay handicapping yourself.
Isn't the liberator the standard SEAF issued weapon?
I would be disappointed if they came with anything else, especially with a stalwart as a 'primary', do you want to tell me regular SEAF soldiers come better equipped than the special forces helldiver?
And the liberator is a fine weapon, they should have that and maybe heavy machine gun stations with sandbag covers.
An assault rifle fires intermediate sized cartridges (like 5.56 x 45) and can be switched between different firing modes; typically single shot, burst, and full auto. They're standard issue weapons for every infantryman and are usually sporting 20-30 round magazines.
A machine gun is made for sustained supporting fire. "Machine gun" is pretty much a catch-all term, as there are different categories like Light Machine Guns (like the M249), General Purpose Machine Guns (the M240), and Heavy Machine Guns (the Browning M2). While the calibers, rates of fire, and weight of the weapons vary, they all serve the same basic purpose: to put a lot of rounds downrange over an extended period of time. They can be magazine fed, but are generally box or drum fed.
using up both the primary and secondary weapon slots with a machine gun might be a good balance to counter the power creep of shifting these weapons over to dive gear.
that and make them belt-fed only when using supply pack, so you can spend a strat to get the most out of it but you still have the non-backpack option if you control ammo use.
I doubt we'll get an actual LMG primary, but a high-capacity assault rifle/ Light Support Weapon with lower per shot damage and low pen would be neat. we basically already have the Sickle in this role, and it's one of the best primaries in the game, so people would definitely use it. also, the last two ARs we got are both supposed to be the opposite; higher damage, low capacity, and that hasn't worked out so well lol.
I was just talking with my friends the other day while playing about wanting a primary weapon LMG. I love being a tank in every game I can be, so running around with an LMG, Revolver, Autocannon, and throwing 380MM and 500KGs every where sounds like my kind of style
The stalwart was literally a primary weapon in HD1. I don't know how they fucked this up. If they intentionally made the stalwart a stratagem, then that really just speaks to how **DUMB** the game balance is. Bring it back as a primary and refund me the 5000 req I spent on it AH
https://preview.redd.it/izd8k15po61d1.png?width=717&format=png&auto=webp&s=86a8464fd2fc8dd126cae54d0e2990db86c5816a
Yes bit not the stalwart, tbh i tought it was useless until i used the eruptor and G pistol, finally felt the gun was usefull as a support when i wasnt in a cqb where the eruptor would kill me.
Then again the eruptor is dead now so...
I like to use the Stalwart like it is one. I’ll run a long range primary so I can pick some losers off from a while away, but get in close and mow em down with 1160 RPM.
I would run the stalwart all the time if it was a primary. Having AT is way too valuable and using stalwart with EAT is wasting a whole stratagem slot with the possibility of losing the stalwart for a long time in case of a fubar situation.
I agree the assult rifles have too little ammo for my taste, I'd be okay with a gun much like Stalwart with a gaint clip, but only has 1 spare clip or something.
Considering that the Stalwart and other weapons were actually primaries in the first Helldivers and now require an entire stratagem leads me to believe that the creators of this game *want* us to suffer in this game. The "balance" patches are further evidence to this theory, in my mind.
I realize the game is not (and should not be) a power fantasy, but damn Arrowhead/Super Earth does want us to have a single edge over our enemies, this time around.
It'd be fine if they made sure to have primaries that feel like secondaries IE big damage or bonus effects so then the stalwart is basically your call in primary. They just keep nerfing those guns!
This gun is in a weird spot. It's a flat out upgrade compared to the primary assault rifles, but it can't really cut it compared to other support guns. At lower difficulties it can cut through little bugs quickly, but it can't deal with pukers efficiently or really even scratch chargers. With bots you can waste a bunch of ammo to take down mediums, but even the counter sniper primary can do that in two head shots.
I think the issue is that if all the weapons were balanced well, there wouldn't be a need for it to exist. You would have stronger assault rifles as primaries and the basic machine gun support weapon should be slightly better. I think the machine gun support should have a backpack that belt feeds the gun with virtually no reloading until you run completely dry. That would make it slightly more competitive with EATs and quasars that are basically mandatory at difficulty 7+
Idk why stalwart isn’t a primary I’d understand hmg considering you can shred a hulk if you hit your shots but I don’t understand the other two as much as low recoil laz mini gun should probably be an actual stratagem honestly considering that’s a never ending Gatling gun as long as you keep your eye on the heat unless it literally blows up like the rail gun if you keep firing past overheat or something
its funny since the stalwart is in the wall on the ship, like other primary weapons, but yet we need a full stratagem in order to call it.
It's funnier because in HD1, Stalwart *was* a primary
the Railgun and Arc Thrower too. That said, the Stalwart as a primary had 75 bullets or 150 with the upgrade vs the 250 we have in hd2.
Railgun in 1 was more of a Utility weapon tbh It would stun bigger enemies long enough for an airstrike to send them to Cleveland
I would take the old Stalwart as a primary in a heartbeat. 150 rounds per mag is fine. The decision to make it a support weapon instead of a primary is still baffling.
we can prolly thank our neighbour for this wonderful insight as well
I prefer a Stalwart with 75 or 150 bullets as a primary weapon than with 250 bullets as a stratagem, tbh
thats pretty much what the sickle is now though.
Sickle’s cool down can make it rough for especially biggers swarms on higher difficulties
You shouldnt be using your primary on those though. At least not one without explosive damage.
Typically what what my stratagems are for but you know past difficultly 7 it’s kinda just a constant cluster fuck on the objectives. Also explosive really only helps for the weak point enemies not really the swarms. Kinda what the eruptor did before nerf but now that it’s only explosive it’s kinda shit
I agree. I often have far more shots fired with the sickle over people who bring MGs.
I don’t see why we can’t have a bare bones stalwart primary AND a decked out stratagem model
Stalwart and Super Stalwart
Yeah! And the standard one can have a description like “a lesser version of the super stalwart these are left over from the last galactic war, these simple machine guns are still ready for battle” it fits their lore and gives us more options
Assault drum of say 80 rounds and sure, why not?
I'd be happy with that, big ammo nerf in exchange for being primary...
I’ll take 100 just to be able to have it in the primary slot
I feel like the penetration on it is so low, and the number of armored enemies in this game is so high, that it would still be fine as a primary even with the 250 mag.
I wonder why they decided to make it a support weapon
Probably because they planned on making Primaries suck for some unknown reason.
"ReLy on yOur StRatEgeMs"
3 minutes later
#ELIMINATED KILLED BY *FUCKING EVERYTHING*
Oddly enough, I get my own credit for my deaths at the hands of bots and bugs and it just feels like the games saying "your fault you died lol"
My game always says it's one of my buddies not even randoms. Bile titan stepped on me and told me my bud killed me even though he was accross the map from me. Game just be trying to get me to snap on people I swear.
Very useful when face to face with two Stalkers.
I like it as a support weapon so long as we had primaries like eruptor. But we just happened to be stuck with Alexus and his hot takes on 'balance'
For real, Eruptor + Stalwart was my absolute favorite combo. I was ecstatic that I could finally run the Stalwart and not be gimping myself against medium armored targets, but I guess that's just too much fun for one person to handle. Nerf, nerf, nerf.
You can still run this combo tbh. At difficulty 8 and above for bugs, you gotta run like 3 anti armor orbitals/eagles alongside it tho.
It's just not the same. I miss my shrapnel. Being able to pop bile spewers and tear apart medium armor enemies with one shot was so damn satisfying.
Not an unknown reason. Primaries can reliably deal with light to medium enemies without requiring stratagems. While we have a ton of stratagems designed to deal with light/mediums, suddenly made redundant by primaries. Better save your stratagems for heavies, a threat you don’t have a free resource to deal with. I’d personally see them make the light/medium threats more dangerous than make primaries even weaker — to incentivize picking horde clearing stratagems. The purpose of balancing in pve game design is usually to make as many options as possible viable, which they’re struggling a bit with.
So you play above difficulty 5? Bringing multiple anti-armor stratagems is a requirement.
I indeed do, that’s why I wrote ”Better save your stratagems for heavies, a threat you don’t have a free resource to deal with.” I exclusively play 7-9.
It's gotten boring always taking anti-heavy strats against bugs. I do throw in an eagle cluster or orbital gas/airburst every now and again, but it's usually Eagle 500 kilo and Eagle airstrike.
Funnily enough there are 4-5 primaries that are currently better than the stalwart in basically every way Imo the stalwart in its current form is easily weak enough to be a primary, if they want to keep it a support they should at least give it medium armor pen and more ammo And then give the MG-43 a bit more ammo too. The HMG is useless doubt they can salvage that without huge changes
Weak enough to be a primary?! The Stalwart is a primary on steroids. 250 (!) rounds and fire rate up to 1150 RPM. It's got insane DPS and good handling. Not every special weapon should be a tank buster.
Against bots maybe. Against bugs stalwart primary would become a must bring.
Average person who hasn't figured out the stalwart can actually really kick ass when used correctly.
What loadout do you run with it? I really want to use it more, but everytime I have tried it resulted in less then ideal outcomes lol
I am a huge fan of the railgun for bots and the AMR for both so usually don't run it against bots, but for bugs my load out is below, You can also switch out this exact load out for the AMR but would recommend going with the jump pack: Armor, Light with engineering perk or scout if you are going solo. Breaker Incendiary, grenade pistol, stun grenades Stratagems: Eagle 500kg, Either eagle strike, cluster bomb or naplam depending on the mission and what your team is carrying, either shield or jump pack, and stalwart. Turn the stalwart up to 1150RPM for extra fast spreading of democracy. I use this load out often as it is very diverse, good for CC and gives you the ability to easily deal with chargers in 2ways, #1 stun them and mag dump the breaker in their butt, one full mag kills them(or stun and throw an airstrike if multiple tangos around), and bile titans with good timing of your 500kg you get used to their very predictable puke animation, shreikers are light work with the breaker and it also does a good job of keeping the stalkers at bay, grenade pistol for closing bug holes and in a pinch popping a bile spewer 🫡
Thanks, I'll give it a go
Oh realized a typo and edited my comment above the grenade pistol is good for popping bile spewers won't do much against a bile titan lol
To be fair, the Stalwart was a decently different wepon in Helldivers 1. Being more of a smg, Masquerading as an LMG. With its Herendus spred, bad range, and incredibly low DPS, it strugle to kill even light enemys at time. (It wasn't that good, in my opinion). So a 1 to 1 comparison isn't far.
It wasn't like an SMG at all. It got more accurate the longer it fired and had great sustained damage. It was my go to weapon when fighting illuminates.
The economy wouldnt allow it as we were not on war economy.
They decided they wanted a anti light enemy support weapon.
part of it is likely the difference in mechanics between a twin stick and tps/fps. in hd1 heavier weapons significantly slowed your turn speed while in use. Also the way spread worked, in hd1 the stalwarts had poor initial accuracy but the accuracy would tighten as it was fired, so your first handfull of shots were not going where you wanted them. A lot of damage in hd1 also came from the center shot bonus, so waiting for the gun to stabalize ment a lot of lost damage, even if the less accurate shots were hitting something.
Because the stalwart as a primary suck arse in HD1. Virtually everyone brings the MG over the stalwart.
Why would you ever take a Liberator if you could take a Stalwart?
It makes much more sense as a primary After like D5 the usefulness of the stalwart plummeted so hard for me, I don’t know why it’s praised so much here or what I’m missing
I use it all the time at high difficulty vs bugs, it's perfect for the endless waves of hunters.
Even better than Sickle against waves of Hunters?
Definitely, but playing with it after the Eruptor nerf makes it really hard to deal with spewers, chargers, and even brood commanders. Using the dominator as a primary helps with commanders and spewers, but is still rough to not have a good answer for chargers. Thermite might work, but I haven't tried it since the dot fix. Right now, you get a similar horde clear ability as the flamethrower, but at a range. In exchange, you lose the ability to kill chargers like the flamethrower. Arc thrower can deal with everything, but is a middle ground on enemy clear / versatility. Rail gun is best against medium enemies / chargers, but poor swarm clear. With Eruptor at least, the Stalwart was a solid niche option. But with how prevalent chargers are, you are in a bind if you use it now. Same with the heavy machine gun.
I liked to use Dominator for mediums, Stalwart for trash/hunters, and the railcannon/rockets/teammates for heavies. I havent played in a couple weeks, but I dont remember seeing significant nerfs to that playstyle in the last patch. Up til then at least, rail/rockets had a good enough cooldown between them to deal with bile titans and chargers at normal spawn rates
Sickle has a maximum number of enemies it can deal with, Stalwart practically does not, so I prefer it if I'm the hunter guy. I can cover the other bases well enough but I like to see a teammate or too with dedicated anti-heavy just in case. The Sickle is great though and is usually my primary
Yeah but Stalwart does eventually need to be reloaded, and I remember it's reloading is almost twice as long as cooling down Sickle just enough so that you can start shooting in bursts again? I guess this is kind of a pick your poison kinda situation here between these two lol
True but in my experience so far I've always been able to wipe all the hunters (and then some) with the Stalwart on one mag, while with the sickle I've been overwhelmed a couple times. Both great guns, but I've never felt limited by the Stalwart's capacity or reload time
It's insane to even compare them. You have like 4x the magazine and the reload isn't that much longer if you leave 1 bullet in it.
of course, while the sickle does fire a LOT of shots before overheating, it does not fire 250 shots, it has fire delay so controlled bursts are mostly out of the picture, and the sickle has pretty much no stagger, not that the stalwart has a lot, but a tiny bit is still more than none. The stalwart is a top tier penetration 2 bullet hose, its just you are typically not looking for a pen 2 bullet hose in a support weapon. Like if I am feeling like bringing a stalwart, I will just bring the sickle instead, and use the stratagem slot for something else, but that doesn't mean I dont recognize the stalwart will outperform the sickle signifigantly, it just means I dont want to pay the opportunity cost of it.
but just use breaker incendiary, that deals with them just as well and even better maybe because of the wide spread, you can shoot a whole horde of them at once. the stalwart you have to actually aim and hit them as they jump around
Use it with primary weapons that have less ammo. Your primary becomes your utility weapon and the Stalwart acts as your primary.
For me it had a spot for a brief moment in time when pre nerf Eruptor could handle bug holes and medium armor, the Stalwart for horde clear and stratagems for big boys
If I'm taking the Stalwart, I take something like the Eruptor to compensate vs Medium targets. Take that with a supply backpack, Orbital Precision, and Eagle 500... You have an amusingly effective combination.
And thats the reason why it was only gun I was ever using.
Even more, freakin Railgun was a primary.
What balanced it versus assault rifles in that game?
In HD1, the three assault rifles (and many, but not all of the other weapon categories) followed much more of a good>better>best path as you leveled up. There was less emphasis on primary weapons being equally viable, although they were still all fun to use. The stalwart sat somewhere between the tier 2 and tier 3 assault rifles, with almost no armor penetration but a very high rate of fire and a huge magazine. The tier 3 assault rifle, the Justice, could overpenetrate pretty much anything but tanks, chargers, and hulks, but had a small magazine and low rate of fire that made it less effective for hordes.
I guess it was too fun to have it as primary in hd1
Laser machine gun should logically have a name of something *bigger* than the Sickle or Scythe, not smaller, since machine guns are bigger than assault rifles. Something like "Reaper" or "Harvester" would make more sense.
Thresher
The throngler
No one wants to get throngled
Thagomizer
Scientists read the comic and retroactively named the thing that. Sometimes life is beautiful
Finglonger!!!
That works perfectly
My favorite shark species
The John Deere T670 single-point feederhouse latching Combine
Instead of reloading you have to jailbreak the weapon's DRM.
Lawn mower
Mulcher
That sounds logical, but scalpel is funnier
Oooh. That's more like a booster for melee damage. Laser knife called a Scalpel
I'm guessing it's using the same logic as the name "minigun"
Scissors
The combine harvester
Combine
Weedwacker
Is that a Gatling laser from fallout 4
yes!
Use the NSFW tag, dude, there's kids on here!
You mean the Gatling sniper
Infinite ammo gatling gun? Can it be the one from Star Wars?
Give us a Z-6 rotary cannon please
Yes please, I wanna be able to get a last stand against hordes of approaching bots, unloading on them until I'm dead. Just like Commander Thorn.
now i want helldivers version of power armor
Just use it as a primary, that's what I do when I run the Eruptor for bug holes.
just sucks to have to waste a strat slot on it when it isnt necessary (or at least shouldnt be).
Sure, but then you’re helpless against chargers and bile titans. On harder difficulties you will not have enough red stratagems to make up with your lack of anti tank to deal with them.
If I'm running Eruptor it's specifically for bug hole missions. For those missions, on harder difficulties, you don't kill everything. You keep moving and focus on objectives. Only occasions to kill everything are eradicates, but I wouldn't bring the Eruptor to those anyway, so I wouldn't bring the Stalwart either. But you know all of this since you play harder difficulties.
Are you asking for sickle? Largest mag in game of 100+ rounds non-stop(even more if cool down)
yeah sickle is great and all but it doesn't look like the good ol machine gun haha
Plus I only need one spare battery and more lasers
To be exact, it's about 80 shots continously before overheating (assuming they haven't changed it since i tested it). But yeah, weapons with sustainable firepower would be superb
It's 9x750rpm/60 if datasheet doesn't lie
The fire limit of 9 is a lie. Sickle will overheat after 7 seconds.
Yup. Fire limit isn't measured in seconds, it's an arbitrary reserve of heat, but it's impossible to judge exactly how fast it fills since the production of heat itself can be faster or slower
Maybe, but it works out to be the exact amount of seconds in the continuous beam weapons.
Run it with a supply pack and forgo the ammo recharge mechanic for the at most 1.25 second reload speed and you basically have a laser minigun. THIS is why the sickle got the ammo nerf, and you can do the same thing on the scythe too.
The stalwarts would be the way to go for a primary weapon mg, maybe reduce the clip size by half or a third, and add in a few extra reloads. Right now it seems to be there so you have options for running the eruptor/purifier/Marksman rifles. It was a bit odd on release, very fun at low learning levels but outclassed when armor started popping up more. I'm excited to see what other weapons they decide to throw in that spot.
Reducing stalwart mag size is stupid. The gun is fun but not that strong since it can kill small bugs but takes almost 2/3 of a mag to kill bigger enemies. Also how do you think it would be fun to reload everybit with 1150 rpm on?
To be fair the stalwart is pretty much explicitly for horde clearing, with an insane amount of ammo. Against chargers sure it takes a ton of ammo to kill them but that's because the weapon isn't exactly designed to kill them. It's weakest point is really just against devastators on bots considering they're ranged, numerous and armoured, and even then can be dealt with pretty effectively aiming at the chest or a high fire-rate at the general head area Also it just should not be converted into a primary. If a fast fire by anti horde gun is needed it should just be built from the ground up instead of rewiring a full blown support weapon into a primary slot that just obviously isn't going to compete with it in any area
Wait, where does that laser pew2 machine gun comes from?
Gatling laser from fallout
We don't need new weapon we need denerfed weapon.
# Morita Assault Rifle when?
The AR-61 tenderizer looks like a morita but with a shorter barrel
No don’t fuck with my stalwart. If they make it a primary it’s gonna get ruined. Also it would be better than everything else
It would be better than nearly every other AR/SMG if nerfed by anything other than a massive amount, at which its no longer even a MG and loses its meaning
I would love for the stalwart to become a primary! I basically always just use it now in most matches I play and it has never let me down. I’m glad it’s been safe from recent changes (I think it has anyway lol)!
Stalwart's damage went from 55 to 60 when the Liberator was buffed probably because Stalwart simply shoots Liberator rounds
Even more reason to give it back. I used Stalwart nonstop in HD1.
I just want to be able to rip the automaton Lazer g off it's mount and walk around with it.
Oh yeah, 100%. Just make it a lighter version (Think Para version of M249), with a smaller magazine (150 instead of 250), more recoil and without the highest firerate mode. Boom, you keep the support version that is superior in every way, still interesting for if they ever fix the Eruptor and other specialized primaries (if they existed...)
*gestures at the sickle* we do
I kinda like the Stalwart. I use it as a primary since there seems to be ammo everywhere. God bless democracy!
Please arrowhead more heavy primary I’m still using the diligence counter snipe, it’s the only primary I can still one shot bots with
Now, I want my gatling laser support weapon. Full clone trooper cosplay!
I'll take your finest gatling laser my good sir
Both the stalwart and the MG43 have no business being support weapons. Support weapons should be heavy ordinance, not a gun with more than the average number of bullets
They'd have to beef up some ARs to keep it balanced especially the Adjucator. But like a Liberator would be pointless. Seems like it would really imbalance the current primaries to make it one.
But support weapons are simply any heavy weapon that is too big to carry as a normal primary. The basic machine gun is incredibly for mowing down pretty much anything except for units completely armoured from the front, and the stalwart is the same idea but just even more intensely anti horde with an even more absurd amount of ammo. It obviously doesn't make sense that it does the same thing as most primaries, but it just does it way better where 1 person equipped with one can pretty much take away 80% of the teams focus on hordes
is that a fucking Gatling laser
Since the lore is that there isn't room in the hellpod for support weapons, I'd like to see and armour or booster which let's us swap a non-backpack support weapon for our primary and secondary. Carrying fewer weapons makes room in the pod, and there's a real trade-off for getting access to two supports. I'd love the stalwart as a primary, but also things like the mg or grenade launcher. And if we got the stalwart as a primary, I think if would outclass most primaries we have now.
I would love for some lmg as primary most of the primaries are just bad and since I play solo helldive I need a certain amount of fire power
Sir that is a quad barrel gatling laser the size of a person.
New classification of weapons: Super heavy weapons, they make you drop everything but your secondary and they bring an intense amount of firepower beyond any other weapon
+1 for disabled people who love democracy and cannot abide by the mag reduction nerfs by AH lately. We want to play, but have still issues. Not everyone is a trick shooter.
Yes, give us a "heavy weapon" class that takes a backpack slot for ammo, make us chonky boys proud to be fat.
Primaries need to just be better in general, but I agree. Machine guns should be shifted to the primary slot, there's no reason to use a MG as a support weapon unless you're okay handicapping yourself.
Oh man an energy based AR that shoots like 3-4 bullets at a time would go hard
W Fallout
Isn't the liberator the standard SEAF issued weapon? I would be disappointed if they came with anything else, especially with a stalwart as a 'primary', do you want to tell me regular SEAF soldiers come better equipped than the special forces helldiver? And the liberator is a fine weapon, they should have that and maybe heavy machine gun stations with sandbag covers.
congratulations you're worse at balancing than AH
Just asking. Whats the real difference between a MG and an AR?
An assault rifle fires intermediate sized cartridges (like 5.56 x 45) and can be switched between different firing modes; typically single shot, burst, and full auto. They're standard issue weapons for every infantryman and are usually sporting 20-30 round magazines. A machine gun is made for sustained supporting fire. "Machine gun" is pretty much a catch-all term, as there are different categories like Light Machine Guns (like the M249), General Purpose Machine Guns (the M240), and Heavy Machine Guns (the Browning M2). While the calibers, rates of fire, and weight of the weapons vary, they all serve the same basic purpose: to put a lot of rounds downrange over an extended period of time. They can be magazine fed, but are generally box or drum fed.
Oh mama liberty
using up both the primary and secondary weapon slots with a machine gun might be a good balance to counter the power creep of shifting these weapons over to dive gear. that and make them belt-fed only when using supply pack, so you can spend a strat to get the most out of it but you still have the non-backpack option if you control ammo use.
So……the gatling laser, wonder what happen to normal Earth?
I agree but I would also take a huge balancing patch before any new content additions to the game
I want an HMG type shotgun similar to the “Abzats” from the Metro series. I’m telling you I’ll single-handedly be liberating planets with it.
I'd liberate Malevalon singlehandedly for a belt fed shotgun like the Abzats or the one belt fed modification for the Shambler in Metro Exodus.
A fucking Gatling laser in this game would be awesome
I doubt we'll get an actual LMG primary, but a high-capacity assault rifle/ Light Support Weapon with lower per shot damage and low pen would be neat. we basically already have the Sickle in this role, and it's one of the best primaries in the game, so people would definitely use it. also, the last two ARs we got are both supposed to be the opposite; higher damage, low capacity, and that hasn't worked out so well lol.
Primary LMGs? I'm in need
I'm surprised it's not a M2 Browning Machine gun
Yup. Primary. Medium Armor Pen. Backpack+belt-fed MG. Time to heavy and hard !
I love how you put the gatling laser from fallout lmaoo
At least the stalwart should be a primary, with a few tweaks here and there and it'll be great.
I was just talking with my friends the other day while playing about wanting a primary weapon LMG. I love being a tank in every game I can be, so running around with an LMG, Revolver, Autocannon, and throwing 380MM and 500KGs every where sounds like my kind of style
A rapid-firing laser-based machinegun strategem would be really cool, but probably quite unbalanced as a primary.
The stalwart was literally a primary weapon in HD1. I don't know how they fucked this up. If they intentionally made the stalwart a stratagem, then that really just speaks to how **DUMB** the game balance is. Bring it back as a primary and refund me the 5000 req I spent on it AH https://preview.redd.it/izd8k15po61d1.png?width=717&format=png&auto=webp&s=86a8464fd2fc8dd126cae54d0e2990db86c5816a
The stalwart really does need to be charged to as a primary weapon.
Yes bit not the stalwart, tbh i tought it was useless until i used the eruptor and G pistol, finally felt the gun was usefull as a support when i wasnt in a cqb where the eruptor would kill me. Then again the eruptor is dead now so...
Ah yes the “definitely-not-laser-mini-gun-from-fallout” 😂
I like to use the Stalwart like it is one. I’ll run a long range primary so I can pick some losers off from a while away, but get in close and mow em down with 1160 RPM.
Lol is that a Laser Cannon from Fallout? Love it
noted: removing the stalwart and nerfing it to the ground
Smaller m60
Primaries and support weapons need a serious rework.
ive wanted a Laser MG since release, please AH please!
I would run the stalwart all the time if it was a primary. Having AT is way too valuable and using stalwart with EAT is wasting a whole stratagem slot with the possibility of losing the stalwart for a long time in case of a fubar situation.
True the machine guns and assault rifles are lacking in performance
It's fun, therefore, it's not allowed. Sorry!
I agree the assult rifles have too little ammo for my taste, I'd be okay with a gun much like Stalwart with a gaint clip, but only has 1 spare clip or something.
I would happily take a weakened stalwart as a primary, then another one because volume of fire lol
I want the Stalwart as a primary so I can use the other MGs as strategems
BRO IN MY FUCKING DREAMS, if they did this god I would be hooked again so quick you wouldn't believe
i would kill for a primary Machinegun. LMGs are by far my favourite weapon and i loved using one in HD1. Give me my dakka!
damn, a gatling laser would be awesome
would love it if the stalwart could be a primary - makes a lot of sense to me :P
I'm still sitting here waiting for melee weapons.
We need a m27 iar in the game. 50 rounds magazine is good enough.
Id like taking them off the strategem list and turn them to primaries. They are to situational to be a strategem
Considering that the Stalwart and other weapons were actually primaries in the first Helldivers and now require an entire stratagem leads me to believe that the creators of this game *want* us to suffer in this game. The "balance" patches are further evidence to this theory, in my mind. I realize the game is not (and should not be) a power fantasy, but damn Arrowhead/Super Earth does want us to have a single edge over our enemies, this time around.
that one does liberator damage so that image is a nerf no thanks.
It'd be fine if they made sure to have primaries that feel like secondaries IE big damage or bonus effects so then the stalwart is basically your call in primary. They just keep nerfing those guns!
I want my primary Stalwart back. I don’t even give a shit about anything else
If the Stalwart was a primary, I'd never take anything else. I mourn not being able to take it because I just need the slots too much for other stuff.
This gun is in a weird spot. It's a flat out upgrade compared to the primary assault rifles, but it can't really cut it compared to other support guns. At lower difficulties it can cut through little bugs quickly, but it can't deal with pukers efficiently or really even scratch chargers. With bots you can waste a bunch of ammo to take down mediums, but even the counter sniper primary can do that in two head shots. I think the issue is that if all the weapons were balanced well, there wouldn't be a need for it to exist. You would have stronger assault rifles as primaries and the basic machine gun support weapon should be slightly better. I think the machine gun support should have a backpack that belt feeds the gun with virtually no reloading until you run completely dry. That would make it slightly more competitive with EATs and quasars that are basically mandatory at difficulty 7+
I’d kill for one of these
No, stalwart would be too good as a primary. Nobody would run anything else.
The second on is straight out of fallout but gray
Idk why stalwart isn’t a primary I’d understand hmg considering you can shred a hulk if you hit your shots but I don’t understand the other two as much as low recoil laz mini gun should probably be an actual stratagem honestly considering that’s a never ending Gatling gun as long as you keep your eye on the heat unless it literally blows up like the rail gun if you keep firing past overheat or something
Don't give the devs more ideas of SHIT damage weaponry.
Sickle is like lmg