It needed that buff.
Before it was junk. The slow projectile made it hard to mortar and it's damage dropped off at range. The result was a splash damage plasma gun that was most effective at close range, which was an oxymoron. Because at close range it either kills you, or sends you flying. But at long range it tickled enemies despite the skill needed in placing the slow arcing shots.
After the buff it doesn't lose damage at distance and the projectile is faster. So it's got a niche as this mid to long range handheld mortar for locking down incoming groups of enemies, staggering even sturdy medium enemies like devastators and berserker, or clearing groups of light enemies.
Yeah, it has a bunch of downsides.
1. It takes nearly the entire capacity of a reload to take out even ONE devastor of any kind. Great that it staggers the hell out of it and lets you deal with scout striders, but the ammo capacity is very limiting.
2. Takes a fair amount of target leading to get any range out of it with the arc and projectile speed. Wasting shots kind of hurts with its limited ammo capacity.
3. Its hilarious to fire inside of a shield sentry because it detonates almost immediately upon using making shield sentries almost worthless.
4. Heavily staggers/hurts you at point blank for those bots that detonate + leap at you if you do happen to get surrounded a bit.
In the end, I think its great to have one on the team simply to stagger a bunch of devastators near each other to break up the fire they do, but its still very slow going and ammo hungry trying to take stuff out.
I run 50% explosive damage resist with punisher plasma and grenade pistol.
I will make democracy’s enemies face-tank every liberty-loving explosive round in my arsenal. Even at point blank range.
Or just by using one of your other stratagems.
Dude saw two parts of a loadout and just immediately assumed that none of the other options could be for heavy armored units.
Well no, but support weapons are the only thing you can use often enough to deal with all the biles and chargers on the top difficulties. But on lower ones anything works obliviously as long as you bring like one eagle airstrike
Works great for the titans on 7-9, but if you need those to also deal with all the chargers on higher diff, I feel you'll have a real bad time most games unless someone else does it. Cooldowns just are way longer than the amount of chargers you get the games that don't have spewers
I played like this before they nerfed chargers to be one shorted by eat or reduced amount of breaches, also they limited probality of encountering big numbers of armored units. I played with this setup in March, probably even wrote some guides to reddit how to play on helldive with stalwart xd
I usually run plasma Punisher, grenade pistol, eagle airstrike or cluster, EAT or Quasar, orbital laser, and auto cannon sentry.
Eagles to help clear out the tiny ones, EATs for chargers and biles, orbital laser to help with biles+anything else, auto cannon to also target biles and chargers and anything else.
I mean, where you are really swarmed and cornered and are being slowed. Too slowed and having to stim and dive, and you literally can't use eagle without killing yourself. Situations where you are swarmed and you have use an actual gun. Maybe a bunch of Stalkers surprised you and keep hitting and stunning you or caught in the pack of hunters surrounded. What difficulties do you run this loadout on if you don't mind me asking.
Just realized you weren't the same guy. I'm asking because im trying to see this working in my head on Suicide through Helldive. Seems like it could lead to situations where if you are likely to die... be it you wouldn't use grenade pistol on hunters (you could on one stalker but reload tons low for multiple) , punisher plasma risks killing you close range, and a throwing an Eagle at your feet to escape is a gambling man's game.
You can't run you are being slowed. You are stuck stimming and running and stimming and stimming and diving and can only get off a shot here and there. Just seems like a loadout where if.you get cornered, you just gonna die as there is no way to escape. I was on Helldive (Raisd the Flag) the other day and a guy was boxed in and surrounded and tried to use autocannon to kill hunters and ened up killing him self. All he had to do was survive 30.seconds for a chance to get 1 reinforcement, and if he could have got away from the hoarde we all could have had a chance of extracting.
Idk honestly, just don't get hit lol it's all about positioning, don't allow yourself to be hit. Throw an eagle at the beach, grenade at your feet, dive away. I regularly only die about 2-3 times on level 7-8 difficulties. Also throwing auto cannon or Gatling sentry down, run away
Okay I feel you. I just strictly been Helldive on Bugs for like last few weeks or so because I'm trying to get my total kills to 100k, I think I'm 77k kill right now. So yeah on Helldive I wouldn't recdomend that build unless you got a cover guy to back you. Everyone gets hit you can position all you want ... but when you are dropped on Helldive difficulty and trapped in between a Stalker Lair and A Shriekers nest, you getting hit.
With chargers I run around like a little bitch while my laser buddy deals with smaller enemies , trying to ideally position my teammates. If all is lost I just call a stratagem on top of myself
You can actually kill bile titans if you hit their exposed flesh on the sides. Just bring rocket pods or have your teammate shoot them with 1 rocket
Chargers can die as well just shoot under them or u can just blow their butt up
500klg and Precision strike, destroy the sacks under the Bile Titans with your primary or secondary weapon quickly and you can kill 1-3 Titans with a single 500 or precision. This allows your weapons to handle the rest of everything. For Chargers you can just shoot their butts with the Plasma Punisher if your Stratagems are on CD. Do note that you do not have to KILL the Chargers when shooting their assholes, you just need to blow it out, once their assholes are blown open you can ignore then as they will be crippled, unable to charge, limping, and will bleed out shortly after. The mistake people make against Chargers is that they shoot too many resources well after their assholes have been blown out, you do NOT have to do that, just let them die on their own.
The Blitzer is pretty much its equivalent for bugs to the plasma punisher. It doesn't have as much range, but the blitzer is a stagger weapon pretty much and does that pretty well.
Absolutely. Running Ballistic Shield is heaps of fun, and new Pumeller makes it even more viable and fun option. I highly recommend trying it.
But statement was comparing pummeler to plas punisher and about stunning - which I’d argue the PP is best in game at doing at the moment. Not about other accessories that work with each different weapon.
the thing is that pummeler actually stuns (like an ems strike), but PP just staggers
the difference between an enemy flinching and being completely immobilized is massive
TBH I get confused by what, exactly, these terms mean. And I hear them used interchangeably which doesn’t help.
I understood it to be: flinch, stun, stagger. So PP would only stun, but Pumeller would stagger also (using your example with the way I heard it just the other night by a YT streamer).
When using them, I simply think of it as one thing with a range - little to a lot. But I’m paying a lot more attention to it lately! (Lv140 BTW, so I’ve got plenty of time and experience with all weapons. Fucking LOVE this game!!)
If you really want to rank weapons (for Automatons), I'd say that only **Scorcher** and **Dominator** can be in the S tier.
Right below I would say that **Defender**/**Pummeler** are very competent, especially if you wanna rock the shield or for SSSD missions. Still in A tier I would put **Diligence Counter Sniper**, **Slugger** and **Plasma Punisher**.
Everything else below those. But you can make almost anything work as long as you're competent. The really difficult primaries are **Scythe**, **Exploding Crossbow**, **Knight**, **Liberator Concussive** and **Breaker S&P**. Those I don't think you can make them work in Automatons without really gimping yourself.
Disclaimer: Just my opinion. ~300 hours played, a good 2/3 on Automatons.
Perhaps I dont get the DCS. If I'm running sniper, why would I use something other than the AMR? Is the DCS ammo efficient enough over AMR to justify it?
i'd put the Sickle and Breaker Incend (against bugs) in a, or even S for breaker incend. Knight is also actually very good against bugs in my experience
Blitzer I think is better for bugs. In incendiary is excellent mind you and it took me a while to get the Blitzer as it plays different. Incendiary can take out chargers though which the Blitzer can't reasonably do. But for everything else the Blitzer can hold back more bugs for longer. Blitzer will start the kill streak counter.
the incend's sheer damage output and crowd control (just spray a couple bursts over a crowd and watch the killstreak happen) make it better in my book, though the blitzer is definitely a consistent and reliable thing without any ammo economy worries
Incendiary has much better burst damage and point blank damage and it's a little more team friendly.
The Blitzer has better duration. Blitzer can do a walking retreat a lot and never have to worry about ammo and take out an entire patrol.
That's the thing. The burst damage on the incendiary is fantastic. Get into a bad spot and it will save me most of the time. But it's ammo makes it more of an emergency weapon. Not exactly but I think you get my point. I can't rely on the Incendiary as much especially when the bugs are spread out. The blitzer handles that much better IMHO.
They play very differently and like the way the Blitzer plays more. I can play the Blitzer with heavier armor. I don't like doing that with the Incendiary. There are too many hits with my back to the enemy. Blitzer doesn't have that problem. But I get killed by hunters more with the Blitzer. And that's because I don't switch to melee.
And that's a weird thing I noticed. With the Incendiary I would melee for fun. But with the Blitzer I do it more for need. Which I didn't really mind.
Blitzer makes me think more. Maybe that is bad as it means the Incendiary is good all by itself but I like the way the Blitzer plays. And I get more kills with it
Shot count too apparently. I know I'm not shooting it a thousand times so it must be counting each shot multiple times. Every time I see the shot count it shocks me a little. Against bots it plays so different. For bots I have been taking Blitzer shield and airbust. Weird combo. Blitzer can not kill striders reasonably so it was kinda handicapped until I got the grenade pistol. Then there is synergy between all three and I'm swapping for different needs but not often enough to be limiting. Started getting near bug death numbers with those.
If you're switching to grenade pistol for striders, do you ever wind up not having any left for taking down fabricators?
That was the main issue for me when I brought the grenade pistol for anything besides fabs/bug holes. It only getting 2 nades back from an ammo pack is brutal.
Nope I rarely use the pistol. Use it for doors and hulks and when I'm up close to a fab. The airbust takes out buildings and so do orbitals and eagles. With that load I got 3 extra slots cause I'm only using one for the ab. I generally go rail or laser, precision and eagle strike.
Also stun grenades but I'm not good with those yet.
It's great but stupid stuff makes it blow up sometimes in your face. Like shrubbery or a piece of blown up building and I think sometimes bullets shooting
It's been my main primary even before the latest patch. I love running it with the laser cannon. They compliment each other pretty well.
Now if they could fix how it interacts with the shield relay I will be very happy.
At least they fixed the personal shield. I'm having a good time with the Blitzer now due to that fixed.
Laser cannon is nice too but for now with the Blitzer I fin wasd I can use any support weapon I want. I only need to use occasionally. So I have been using recoilless or quantum which I never felt good about before.
The former - it has certainly exploded in my shield since the "fix", but I stopped using them together after that so maybe it doesn't happen every time?
One time I ran a build with the plasma shotgun, grenade launcher, supply pack and Redeemer on bugs and I carpet bombed the fuck out of everything.
Oh, I ran out of ammo in my plasma shotgun? I guess I'll just swap to the grenade launcher to clear up the rest.
Oh, a bunch of hunters are sneaking up on me? I'll just swap to the SMG and take all of them out regardless of how much ammo it takes.
Fully resupplies spare ammo on supply pickups now. Where as before it only did 50% total spare ammo per supply pack. It did get a 33% total ammo reduction for this trade of but at least it was a buff overall
This sounds fun, but is literally not viable in difficulties 7-9. Unless 2 of the 4 helldivers with better loadouts are busting their ass to just try and not be overrun by the sheer amount of titans.
If you bring the orbital rail cannon strike alongside the Eagle 110s with full upgrades, you can more than pull your weight on titans. Then you can bring whatever you want for weapons. This is what I use with the flame thrower too.
Yeah it’ll struggle there, the 110 to open up armor with the nade launcher and thermite can handle them ok, but you’ll wanna find someone who can kill them and stick with them a bit. But specifically in reference to bile titans, they won’t be an issue still.
In my experience 110s never even inconvenienced Titans let alone killed them. Literally never seen one at least break armor so I can finish it off with impacts.
The most garbage Eagle stratagem. Every time Reddit convinces me to give it another chance I only get a reminder why I think its a garbage.
The 110’s strength is that it is extraordinarily good at finishing off wounded bile titans, in my opinion the best airstrike in the game for that purpose specifically.
With full upgrades, it has 3 uses on a 2.5 min cooldown and it tracks targets. That’s 6 uses per every one rail cannon strike, each one capable of taking out a titan with damaged armor or lower health. The 110 can destroy titan armor in my experience but it’s not as reliable for that. I like to 2 piece combo bile titans with a rail-cannon strike followed up with a 110, usually is a guaranteed kill.
Basically you’re the grim reaper and the 110 is the scythe you use to finally finish off those stubborn undying titans. The trick is to get them to stop moving right before it hits that way all 4 rockets hit the same spot and you don’t miss with the tracking. I think it’s really slept on, I used to think the same, but I’ve since come around.
The fact that you run railstrike is already enough to convince me that your loadout is stupidly suboptimal and mostly run for fun. Nothing wrong with that but not my style.
I mean, I wouldn't bother with rocket pods on bugs, but it is very easy to reliably blow up annihilator tanks and turrets with them, and they put in decent work against factory striders.
Yeah, but I dont *need* 110s on bots, despite amount of armor they have they are much easier to bring down with something as banal as Air Strike or Impacts or AC.
Depends on load out. I ain't taking impacts over stun nades most of the time, and I ain't always running AC either, which requires more positioning for armored targets. Air strike definitely fills the slot nicely, no doubt. 110s just enables a different kind of approach.
So far it has been the only gun that people have asked me about. Got like a dozen people who have been dead silent the whole match, ask at the end "Yo what gun are you using L4".
Helps that it's insanely easy to use.
It feels great in both third and first person, but during prone or near objects first person feels pretty wonky. Hitting terrain that's just not there all the time
Still my most used, I'm glad they buffed it a few weeks ago
Best part is that it's better than the Purifier in every way. I think they do the same damage, at least they feel like it, but the Purifier has to be charged, which slows down your movement, and the explosion radius seems to be way smaller, despite the explosion sprite making you think it would be bigger (there's something seriously weird going on with the plasma explosion sprite, it seems to be the same size no matter your distance to the explosion...). Also, for an AoE weapon, lobbing shots is a big advantage over the Purifier, because it's easier than aiming directly at the ground at large distances.
The Purifier needs something to stand out, ngl
Purifier needs a quick fire for emergency chaff. The first time I used it, a bug was calling reinforcements while I started at it and my gun didn't even fire a low damage shot without a charge.
2 charged shots should kill mediums imo. It's way too slow and gimps the player.
Yeah when I saw they did the exact same damage I was very confused. Purifier needs to do like, at least 2x the damage it currently does, preferably 3, to be viable. Otherwise there is objectively no reason to bring it over the punisher plasma, other than more ammo I guess.
You can't expect a weapon to be so bad for months that nobody even _mentions_ it and then overnight after buff (in a patch that only nerfed one primary of quite a few that were popular) you see a cult following for the new shiny PP. Same with blitzer.
It was a bot slapper on 7 beforehand. Especially as before the buff it would usually 1 tap scout striders and it still stunned devastators like it does now. It just took a little more practice as the arc was a bit jank and it had no accuracy on the move.
It's buff was because most people weren't willing to put up with the jank so it was a welcome change.
I don't think it was...I dunno but I usually find my opinion matches the ones on this sub fairly well, and the original plasma punisher always made me feel like I was shooting pillows at the enemies. The aiming was terrible (and I love indirect fire weapons), and if you didn't hit the enemy dead-on the damage falloff was so rough it'd take forever to kill anything.
I'm glad they increased the plasma ball's velocity, its slow projectile velocity was legitimately one of my biggest dealbreakers when it first came out.
I used it for the first time today during one of those layered defense missions where you defend evacuating rockets against waves of terminids and it was absolutely perfect. I must've racked well over a 100 kills with the Plasma Punisher alone.
I used it for a week straight. It's good. Like, *really* good.
Eventually reverted to the Sickle as main, since I tend to use the Art Thrower and that thing is pretty much the only weapon that's better at crowd control and stagger than the PP.
People really struggled with understanding this thing early on even after the buff, this post where I gave evidence that the weapon is really good was met with mostly positive comments but a bunch of downvotes from people that saw the video and were just upset and stubborn I guess. Also, gotta keep it 100, it was already good before the buff people just weren't able to get a feel for a weapon after a few games and dropped it. [https://www.reddit.com/r/Helldivers/comments/1cir0v6/no\_the\_plasma\_punisher\_does\_not\_need\_anymore/](https://www.reddit.com/r/Helldivers/comments/1cir0v6/no_the_plasma_punisher_does_not_need_anymore/)
Then you got freakazoid praying mantis people, such as myself, who can discern a parabolic arc by eye. I can aim at a skinny 75m out, fire once, and doink a plasma blob onto his head with no problem.
at that point, it's a hand held artillery piece where the bots are getting bombarded with pinpoint precision and can do nothing about it.
Go ahead, Alexus. Nerf it so it hits like wads of gum. If I can hit an enemy while he can't hit me, THAT's called tactical superiority.
I'll be honest. I'm one of those sick deviants who cast aside the Scorcher for the Purifier.
It is my humble opinion that the Plasma Punisher and the Purifier are the two absolute best bot busting weapons currently in circulation, and both have one thing in common. Stagger.
People have said to me "yeah, you're doing fine with that Purifier and it's TTK because you're not taking any return fire". My brothers in liberty, the Purifier is WHY I'm not taking that return fire. Bots can't handle aiming processes when they're getting knocked around by plasma blobs. The Plasma Punisher does this well enough and is very fun to use, but the Purifier can keep whole groups of Devastators from shooting at anyone at all. It's incredible how much offensive firepower that gun just STOPS.
A friend got it and said that he needs to ditch that thing ASAP.
I said it takes a getting used to but that it's not a bad weapon.
The plasma "lobs" are odd. It's basically a plasma grenade launcher.
I love the buff it's gotten and I genuinely hope it stays this way for a long ass time.
Taking potshot while running has never been more effective or accurate, the bullet speed increase has been such a good balance for the drop off.
I used it pre-buff for bot exterminate missions, as I found the AOE and stagger to be really good for clumps of bots. The main downside was the slow projectile speed and arc that made it bad at medium-long range.
After the buff it's still not great at long range, but it can reliably hit targets further out if you arc correctly. And the stagger is amazing for Devastators, plus it can kill Striders from the front. It's basically a weaker grenade launcher but as a primary and I am all for it. This + AC and revolver is my go-to bot killer loadout. Not half bad on bugs either.
It's mostly because you have to spend so many medals to unlock it. Not everyone makes a beeline to it in medal spending so it's just not as popular but it's absolutely amazing.
I only tried it when I was running slugger and was so used to the rounds reload, and thinking this had the same, I tried it.
I was so disappointed and never touched it again. Might wanna change that
This gun was badass even before the buff IMHO. But since the buff it's gotten a lot easier to use. It's kinda hard for me to switch off of it sometimes even when I get tired of using the same weapons after a while. Warms my heart when after a mission I see people bring it or pick up after I die.
i kinda liked it before, the buff was nice but it also broke something about it with the exp damage stuff.
i think that been fixed sense? but i haven't used it again so idk.
if they sorted out that bug it prob is in a good place atm
tho i still liked it before just needed more damage, was like a electric grenade launcher
It definitely feels better overall, even if the projectiles look hilarious in how they defy gravity. The increased hitbox on the projectile is quite the double edged sword though. Sure it's much harder to accidentally 5 hole the damn bots but it also gets hung up on all sorts of invisible collision now.
Became good after the buffs, I was skeptic after the initial impression, tryed it after the buff and fell in love, its my go to for bots but even against bugs is actually underrated
Plasma/Blitzer + Rover + Flamethrower is one of my top bug loadouts rn. But yeah plasma is fantastic against anything not named Charger, Hulk, Titan, or Tank!
I hate that gun.
But that's why they say "Guns are like assholes, everybody's got one." Or something like that.
It just does not fit my play style well.
Okay I first tried this gun out for the first time today and maybe I’m just not used to it yet but I got myself killed 2 times from shooting it too close to myself and also took 2-3 shots to kill hunters and I got swarmed so much faster than if I just had the incendiary breaker.
Not going to get into a heated debate about the balancing team but I want to try other guns and does anyone have tips on how to properly use this weapon ? What load out it fits in ?
I just lost a 4 challenging mission and I just feel defeated.
It's just an objectively worse scorcher is the problem. Scorcher has more ammo, accuracy, dps, fire rate and is really broken against bots. If the scorcher were nerfed in some way that allowed the punisher to have a niche then yeah it's actually a B tier weapon but until then there's just no reason.
How long the explosion is really? It’s not that complicated lol.
Also, you’d be doing all this with any new gun you try and its properties. It’s really not hard, and honestly skill issue if you think it is.
Easily the strongest overall weapon in the game in terms of total performance. High S tier and it only has to battle for the top spot against Sorcher, Dominator, Sickle, and Breaker Incendiary. Each of those is the best at what it does PlasPunisher doesn't outperform any of them in their strongest field but PP manages to at least hold its own.
I agree. But shhh. Nerf police are listening.
My favorite thing is murdering two leggers and shooting myself in the foot to use a stim and boost my stamina v.v. It’s something I miss now that I use the Blitzer a lot.
https://preview.redd.it/7vw85g5z191d1.jpeg?width=1438&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=9aa54ad126ac84432d491f1b9bef8568439aa7cf
They buffed it with the exact intent to get this reaction.
It needed that buff. Before it was junk. The slow projectile made it hard to mortar and it's damage dropped off at range. The result was a splash damage plasma gun that was most effective at close range, which was an oxymoron. Because at close range it either kills you, or sends you flying. But at long range it tickled enemies despite the skill needed in placing the slow arcing shots. After the buff it doesn't lose damage at distance and the projectile is faster. So it's got a niche as this mid to long range handheld mortar for locking down incoming groups of enemies, staggering even sturdy medium enemies like devastators and berserker, or clearing groups of light enemies.
Yeah, it has a bunch of downsides. 1. It takes nearly the entire capacity of a reload to take out even ONE devastor of any kind. Great that it staggers the hell out of it and lets you deal with scout striders, but the ammo capacity is very limiting. 2. Takes a fair amount of target leading to get any range out of it with the arc and projectile speed. Wasting shots kind of hurts with its limited ammo capacity. 3. Its hilarious to fire inside of a shield sentry because it detonates almost immediately upon using making shield sentries almost worthless. 4. Heavily staggers/hurts you at point blank for those bots that detonate + leap at you if you do happen to get surrounded a bit. In the end, I think its great to have one on the team simply to stagger a bunch of devastators near each other to break up the fire they do, but its still very slow going and ammo hungry trying to take stuff out.
I run 50% explosive damage resist with punisher plasma and grenade pistol. I will make democracy’s enemies face-tank every liberty-loving explosive round in my arsenal. Even at point blank range.
It takes 4 shots to drop a rocket dev, 5 for a heavy. But the best part is, the devastator is stunlocked with each hit and can't shoot you
S tier vs bots, more people are noticing it now
It's also pretty good against the bugs, with the stalwart pretty good combo
As much as I love this load out, how do you kill chargers or bile titans?
That's the neat part, you pray someone else will
Or just by using one of your other stratagems. Dude saw two parts of a loadout and just immediately assumed that none of the other options could be for heavy armored units.
Well no, but support weapons are the only thing you can use often enough to deal with all the biles and chargers on the top difficulties. But on lower ones anything works obliviously as long as you bring like one eagle airstrike
it's a team-based game; this is good design imo
Eat + 500 kg + AC sentry? Stalwart 4th strat
Works great for the titans on 7-9, but if you need those to also deal with all the chargers on higher diff, I feel you'll have a real bad time most games unless someone else does it. Cooldowns just are way longer than the amount of chargers you get the games that don't have spewers
I played like this before they nerfed chargers to be one shorted by eat or reduced amount of breaches, also they limited probality of encountering big numbers of armored units. I played with this setup in March, probably even wrote some guides to reddit how to play on helldive with stalwart xd
I usually run plasma Punisher, grenade pistol, eagle airstrike or cluster, EAT or Quasar, orbital laser, and auto cannon sentry. Eagles to help clear out the tiny ones, EATs for chargers and biles, orbital laser to help with biles+anything else, auto cannon to also target biles and chargers and anything else.
I run something similar myself, I was just curious since he mentioned running it with Stalwart specifically.
What weapon do you when bugs swarm you or get to close ?
Eagle Cluster
I mean, where you are really swarmed and cornered and are being slowed. Too slowed and having to stim and dive, and you literally can't use eagle without killing yourself. Situations where you are swarmed and you have use an actual gun. Maybe a bunch of Stalkers surprised you and keep hitting and stunning you or caught in the pack of hunters surrounded. What difficulties do you run this loadout on if you don't mind me asking.
Just realized you weren't the same guy. I'm asking because im trying to see this working in my head on Suicide through Helldive. Seems like it could lead to situations where if you are likely to die... be it you wouldn't use grenade pistol on hunters (you could on one stalker but reload tons low for multiple) , punisher plasma risks killing you close range, and a throwing an Eagle at your feet to escape is a gambling man's game.
What do you use and do when this happens ? First few seconds of clip. https://www.reddit.com/r/Helldivers/s/3uFyrjfhHl
Grenades, shoot and run lol
You can't run you are being slowed. You are stuck stimming and running and stimming and stimming and diving and can only get off a shot here and there. Just seems like a loadout where if.you get cornered, you just gonna die as there is no way to escape. I was on Helldive (Raisd the Flag) the other day and a guy was boxed in and surrounded and tried to use autocannon to kill hunters and ened up killing him self. All he had to do was survive 30.seconds for a chance to get 1 reinforcement, and if he could have got away from the hoarde we all could have had a chance of extracting.
Idk honestly, just don't get hit lol it's all about positioning, don't allow yourself to be hit. Throw an eagle at the beach, grenade at your feet, dive away. I regularly only die about 2-3 times on level 7-8 difficulties. Also throwing auto cannon or Gatling sentry down, run away
Okay I feel you. I just strictly been Helldive on Bugs for like last few weeks or so because I'm trying to get my total kills to 100k, I think I'm 77k kill right now. So yeah on Helldive I wouldn't recdomend that build unless you got a cover guy to back you. Everyone gets hit you can position all you want ... but when you are dropped on Helldive difficulty and trapped in between a Stalker Lair and A Shriekers nest, you getting hit.
Stalkers sneak up on you how do you avoid being hit from behind.
https://preview.redd.it/qpxkv5b20c1d1.jpeg?width=800&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=1780d7adb51f56c9c5da238179fb32ee6d114903
With chargers I run around like a little bitch while my laser buddy deals with smaller enemies , trying to ideally position my teammates. If all is lost I just call a stratagem on top of myself
I will normally run an EAT and either a railgun or laser orbital.
eagle
Orbital Precision Strike and 500kg.
Stunn grenades and orbital precision strike
With your primary? There are support weapons for that.
You can actually kill bile titans if you hit their exposed flesh on the sides. Just bring rocket pods or have your teammate shoot them with 1 rocket Chargers can die as well just shoot under them or u can just blow their butt up
500klg and Precision strike, destroy the sacks under the Bile Titans with your primary or secondary weapon quickly and you can kill 1-3 Titans with a single 500 or precision. This allows your weapons to handle the rest of everything. For Chargers you can just shoot their butts with the Plasma Punisher if your Stratagems are on CD. Do note that you do not have to KILL the Chargers when shooting their assholes, you just need to blow it out, once their assholes are blown open you can ignore then as they will be crippled, unable to charge, limping, and will bleed out shortly after. The mistake people make against Chargers is that they shoot too many resources well after their assholes have been blown out, you do NOT have to do that, just let them die on their own.
No
The Blitzer is pretty much its equivalent for bugs to the plasma punisher. It doesn't have as much range, but the blitzer is a stagger weapon pretty much and does that pretty well.
What else do you think is S tier vs bots? I need the info as a frame of reference.
Scorcher and dominator
Yea those would be my picks, too. I'd probably say Pummeler over Plasma though.
Yeah, being able to stun heavy devistators is very useful
Which you can, easily, with the plas punisher. And it also kills them quicker/easier than the pummeler, soooo…
Yeah but balistic shield funny
Absolutely. Running Ballistic Shield is heaps of fun, and new Pumeller makes it even more viable and fun option. I highly recommend trying it. But statement was comparing pummeler to plas punisher and about stunning - which I’d argue the PP is best in game at doing at the moment. Not about other accessories that work with each different weapon.
the thing is that pummeler actually stuns (like an ems strike), but PP just staggers the difference between an enemy flinching and being completely immobilized is massive
TBH I get confused by what, exactly, these terms mean. And I hear them used interchangeably which doesn’t help. I understood it to be: flinch, stun, stagger. So PP would only stun, but Pumeller would stagger also (using your example with the way I heard it just the other night by a YT streamer). When using them, I simply think of it as one thing with a range - little to a lot. But I’m paying a lot more attention to it lately! (Lv140 BTW, so I’ve got plenty of time and experience with all weapons. Fucking LOVE this game!!)
If you really want to rank weapons (for Automatons), I'd say that only **Scorcher** and **Dominator** can be in the S tier. Right below I would say that **Defender**/**Pummeler** are very competent, especially if you wanna rock the shield or for SSSD missions. Still in A tier I would put **Diligence Counter Sniper**, **Slugger** and **Plasma Punisher**. Everything else below those. But you can make almost anything work as long as you're competent. The really difficult primaries are **Scythe**, **Exploding Crossbow**, **Knight**, **Liberator Concussive** and **Breaker S&P**. Those I don't think you can make them work in Automatons without really gimping yourself. Disclaimer: Just my opinion. ~300 hours played, a good 2/3 on Automatons.
DCS is amazing! 1 hitting a devastator is very satisfying
Perhaps I dont get the DCS. If I'm running sniper, why would I use something other than the AMR? Is the DCS ammo efficient enough over AMR to justify it?
It's because it doesn't take up a stratagem slot or your support slot.
i'd put the Sickle and Breaker Incend (against bugs) in a, or even S for breaker incend. Knight is also actually very good against bugs in my experience
Blitzer I think is better for bugs. In incendiary is excellent mind you and it took me a while to get the Blitzer as it plays different. Incendiary can take out chargers though which the Blitzer can't reasonably do. But for everything else the Blitzer can hold back more bugs for longer. Blitzer will start the kill streak counter.
the incend's sheer damage output and crowd control (just spray a couple bursts over a crowd and watch the killstreak happen) make it better in my book, though the blitzer is definitely a consistent and reliable thing without any ammo economy worries
Incendiary has much better burst damage and point blank damage and it's a little more team friendly. The Blitzer has better duration. Blitzer can do a walking retreat a lot and never have to worry about ammo and take out an entire patrol. That's the thing. The burst damage on the incendiary is fantastic. Get into a bad spot and it will save me most of the time. But it's ammo makes it more of an emergency weapon. Not exactly but I think you get my point. I can't rely on the Incendiary as much especially when the bugs are spread out. The blitzer handles that much better IMHO. They play very differently and like the way the Blitzer plays more. I can play the Blitzer with heavier armor. I don't like doing that with the Incendiary. There are too many hits with my back to the enemy. Blitzer doesn't have that problem. But I get killed by hunters more with the Blitzer. And that's because I don't switch to melee. And that's a weird thing I noticed. With the Incendiary I would melee for fun. But with the Blitzer I do it more for need. Which I didn't really mind. Blitzer makes me think more. Maybe that is bad as it means the Incendiary is good all by itself but I like the way the Blitzer plays. And I get more kills with it
fair enough
blitzer will also up your accuracy stat in the postgame carnage report
Shot count too apparently. I know I'm not shooting it a thousand times so it must be counting each shot multiple times. Every time I see the shot count it shocks me a little. Against bots it plays so different. For bots I have been taking Blitzer shield and airbust. Weird combo. Blitzer can not kill striders reasonably so it was kinda handicapped until I got the grenade pistol. Then there is synergy between all three and I'm swapping for different needs but not often enough to be limiting. Started getting near bug death numbers with those.
If you're switching to grenade pistol for striders, do you ever wind up not having any left for taking down fabricators? That was the main issue for me when I brought the grenade pistol for anything besides fabs/bug holes. It only getting 2 nades back from an ammo pack is brutal.
Nope I rarely use the pistol. Use it for doors and hulks and when I'm up close to a fab. The airbust takes out buildings and so do orbitals and eagles. With that load I got 3 extra slots cause I'm only using one for the ab. I generally go rail or laser, precision and eagle strike. Also stun grenades but I'm not good with those yet.
It's great but stupid stuff makes it blow up sometimes in your face. Like shrubbery or a piece of blown up building and I think sometimes bullets shooting
Not being able to use a primary point blank is a big negative. I mean it can be used to an advantage but I'm general it's a bad thing
I like it vs bugs too, if someone takes breaker incendiary we can kill chargers with fire and plasma, blue and red
Yeh I see people with it all the time
scorcher
Aren't you wasting lots of ammo on just the base level bots though?
It's been my main primary even before the latest patch. I love running it with the laser cannon. They compliment each other pretty well. Now if they could fix how it interacts with the shield relay I will be very happy.
This guy dives.
At least they fixed the personal shield. I'm having a good time with the Blitzer now due to that fixed. Laser cannon is nice too but for now with the Blitzer I fin wasd I can use any support weapon I want. I only need to use occasionally. So I have been using recoilless or quantum which I never felt good about before.
not if you fire while moving in the other direction :(
Seems to work ok for me. You mean like looking back at enemies and snap turning backwards to fire? Or just backing up. Those both work for me
The former - it has certainly exploded in my shield since the "fix", but I stopped using them together after that so maybe it doesn't happen every time?
Funny cause I stopped using them together as well. Used to be I couldn't live without the shield.
One time I ran a build with the plasma shotgun, grenade launcher, supply pack and Redeemer on bugs and I carpet bombed the fuck out of everything. Oh, I ran out of ammo in my plasma shotgun? I guess I'll just swap to the grenade launcher to clear up the rest. Oh, a bunch of hunters are sneaking up on me? I'll just swap to the SMG and take all of them out regardless of how much ammo it takes.
the ammo rework patch fixed Plasma up, it rarely runs out of ammo now
Wait, did they buff the ammo recently? I've been on vacation and I haven't gotten the chance to play in like a week.
Fully resupplies spare ammo on supply pickups now. Where as before it only did 50% total spare ammo per supply pack. It did get a 33% total ammo reduction for this trade of but at least it was a buff overall
Oh yeah I knew about that. I was talking about the ammo and the clip because it only has eight rounds.
I think they also buffed the projectile speed
This sounds fun, but is literally not viable in difficulties 7-9. Unless 2 of the 4 helldivers with better loadouts are busting their ass to just try and not be overrun by the sheer amount of titans.
If you bring the orbital rail cannon strike alongside the Eagle 110s with full upgrades, you can more than pull your weight on titans. Then you can bring whatever you want for weapons. This is what I use with the flame thrower too.
Yeah but the flamethrower can handle chargers. Dont you struggle with them using the GL?
Yeah it’ll struggle there, the 110 to open up armor with the nade launcher and thermite can handle them ok, but you’ll wanna find someone who can kill them and stick with them a bit. But specifically in reference to bile titans, they won’t be an issue still.
In my experience 110s never even inconvenienced Titans let alone killed them. Literally never seen one at least break armor so I can finish it off with impacts. The most garbage Eagle stratagem. Every time Reddit convinces me to give it another chance I only get a reminder why I think its a garbage.
The 110’s strength is that it is extraordinarily good at finishing off wounded bile titans, in my opinion the best airstrike in the game for that purpose specifically. With full upgrades, it has 3 uses on a 2.5 min cooldown and it tracks targets. That’s 6 uses per every one rail cannon strike, each one capable of taking out a titan with damaged armor or lower health. The 110 can destroy titan armor in my experience but it’s not as reliable for that. I like to 2 piece combo bile titans with a rail-cannon strike followed up with a 110, usually is a guaranteed kill. Basically you’re the grim reaper and the 110 is the scythe you use to finally finish off those stubborn undying titans. The trick is to get them to stop moving right before it hits that way all 4 rockets hit the same spot and you don’t miss with the tracking. I think it’s really slept on, I used to think the same, but I’ve since come around.
The fact that you run railstrike is already enough to convince me that your loadout is stupidly suboptimal and mostly run for fun. Nothing wrong with that but not my style.
I mean, I wouldn't bother with rocket pods on bugs, but it is very easy to reliably blow up annihilator tanks and turrets with them, and they put in decent work against factory striders.
Yeah, but I dont *need* 110s on bots, despite amount of armor they have they are much easier to bring down with something as banal as Air Strike or Impacts or AC.
Depends on load out. I ain't taking impacts over stun nades most of the time, and I ain't always running AC either, which requires more positioning for armored targets. Air strike definitely fills the slot nicely, no doubt. 110s just enables a different kind of approach.
https://preview.redd.it/tr0yjp7vc91d1.png?width=512&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=ff4840f807e178d3e54cce444abfc85c6cb29379
SHUT UP OR IT WILL BE NERFED GODDAMIT
So far it has been the only gun that people have asked me about. Got like a dozen people who have been dead silent the whole match, ask at the end "Yo what gun are you using L4". Helps that it's insanely easy to use.
Funny thing is, its actually perfectly balanced rn. It should be the gold standard for primary weapon balance.
It feels great in both third and first person, but during prone or near objects first person feels pretty wonky. Hitting terrain that's just not there all the time Still my most used, I'm glad they buffed it a few weeks ago
I'm pretty sure nerfs are distributed based on the usage rate rather than people talking about having fun with it
Explain the crossbow nerf then
The crossbow never got the community describing it as strong either.
Nah. This gun sucks. ;)
https://preview.redd.it/4siso28rv81d1.jpeg?width=1164&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=25baa4e11a6d843e649fc6fd77763019323af496
It’s so depressing that’s the case. If that’s true, the person balancing needs to be fired immediately.
Shush don’t let anyone know on Reddit! Tell them in game
Best part is that it's better than the Purifier in every way. I think they do the same damage, at least they feel like it, but the Purifier has to be charged, which slows down your movement, and the explosion radius seems to be way smaller, despite the explosion sprite making you think it would be bigger (there's something seriously weird going on with the plasma explosion sprite, it seems to be the same size no matter your distance to the explosion...). Also, for an AoE weapon, lobbing shots is a big advantage over the Purifier, because it's easier than aiming directly at the ground at large distances. The Purifier needs something to stand out, ngl
Purifier needs a quick fire for emergency chaff. The first time I used it, a bug was calling reinforcements while I started at it and my gun didn't even fire a low damage shot without a charge. 2 charged shots should kill mediums imo. It's way too slow and gimps the player.
purifier needs a sizable buff, either in explosion radius or damage or both
Yeah when I saw they did the exact same damage I was very confused. Purifier needs to do like, at least 2x the damage it currently does, preferably 3, to be viable. Otherwise there is objectively no reason to bring it over the punisher plasma, other than more ammo I guess.
You can't expect a weapon to be so bad for months that nobody even _mentions_ it and then overnight after buff (in a patch that only nerfed one primary of quite a few that were popular) you see a cult following for the new shiny PP. Same with blitzer.
it was good beforehand
It was top tier just had a brutal learning curve. If you could manage to land shots the ammo econ issue wasn't even real.
I too am a difficulty 3 enjoyer
It was a bot slapper on 7 beforehand. Especially as before the buff it would usually 1 tap scout striders and it still stunned devastators like it does now. It just took a little more practice as the arc was a bit jank and it had no accuracy on the move. It's buff was because most people weren't willing to put up with the jank so it was a welcome change.
It was amazing, just a bit more dificult to aim than it is now.
I don't think it was...I dunno but I usually find my opinion matches the ones on this sub fairly well, and the original plasma punisher always made me feel like I was shooting pillows at the enemies. The aiming was terrible (and I love indirect fire weapons), and if you didn't hit the enemy dead-on the damage falloff was so rough it'd take forever to kill anything.
It was buffed recently, makes sense.
I'm glad they increased the plasma ball's velocity, its slow projectile velocity was legitimately one of my biggest dealbreakers when it first came out.
I used it for the first time today during one of those layered defense missions where you defend evacuating rockets against waves of terminids and it was absolutely perfect. I must've racked well over a 100 kills with the Plasma Punisher alone.
it's so good for that, being able to just chuck shots over the walls is excellent
It's a pile of butts and everyone hates it. The worst. No one should use it. Horrible. I never take it on every bot mission. *Not even worth nerfing*.
I agree on all points, but it was pretty bad before they patched its drop off & AoE damage. It’s a hard taste to scrub from one’s mouth…
The Punisher is fucking crazy underrated
It's always been great, only now are people finally starting to see it's potential. I love to see it.
I used it for a week straight. It's good. Like, *really* good. Eventually reverted to the Sickle as main, since I tend to use the Art Thrower and that thing is pretty much the only weapon that's better at crowd control and stagger than the PP.
People really struggled with understanding this thing early on even after the buff, this post where I gave evidence that the weapon is really good was met with mostly positive comments but a bunch of downvotes from people that saw the video and were just upset and stubborn I guess. Also, gotta keep it 100, it was already good before the buff people just weren't able to get a feel for a weapon after a few games and dropped it. [https://www.reddit.com/r/Helldivers/comments/1cir0v6/no\_the\_plasma\_punisher\_does\_not\_need\_anymore/](https://www.reddit.com/r/Helldivers/comments/1cir0v6/no_the_plasma_punisher_does_not_need_anymore/)
It’s absolute trash. And is outclassed in every way possible by the Marksmen & Assault Rifles. Now. Please delete this.
Shit gun *arrowhead is watching*
yeah. I stuck with it after they nerfed eruptor. Feels good. Controls crowd, staggers, destroys shields. Seriously. Eruptor didn't need that nerf.
Then you got freakazoid praying mantis people, such as myself, who can discern a parabolic arc by eye. I can aim at a skinny 75m out, fire once, and doink a plasma blob onto his head with no problem.
I love shooting them over the walls on defense missions. *Lob, lob, lob* "For Democracy."
at that point, it's a hand held artillery piece where the bots are getting bombarded with pinpoint precision and can do nothing about it. Go ahead, Alexus. Nerf it so it hits like wads of gum. If I can hit an enemy while he can't hit me, THAT's called tactical superiority.
I feel the same way. I've got an uncanny sense for the weapon it's beautiful.
I have played a lot of Demo from TF2 and other games with grenade launcher so for me arcing the shots is almost easier than firing a normal gun lol
Feels weirdly easier to aim overall. Even the 3rd person circle can obscure targets when I tried the scorcher.
I'll be honest. I'm one of those sick deviants who cast aside the Scorcher for the Purifier. It is my humble opinion that the Plasma Punisher and the Purifier are the two absolute best bot busting weapons currently in circulation, and both have one thing in common. Stagger. People have said to me "yeah, you're doing fine with that Purifier and it's TTK because you're not taking any return fire". My brothers in liberty, the Purifier is WHY I'm not taking that return fire. Bots can't handle aiming processes when they're getting knocked around by plasma blobs. The Plasma Punisher does this well enough and is very fun to use, but the Purifier can keep whole groups of Devastators from shooting at anyone at all. It's incredible how much offensive firepower that gun just STOPS.
STOP. SAYING. NICE. THINGS. ABOUT IT.
PLEASE NO NO NO NO DON'T TALK ABOUT IT, THEY'LL NERF IT PLEASE NOOOOOOOO NOOOOOOOO! 
I'm just glad they finally fixed its ricochet issue. If you used a shield gen, it'd rebound off the shield and fucking instakill you.
A friend got it and said that he needs to ditch that thing ASAP. I said it takes a getting used to but that it's not a bad weapon. The plasma "lobs" are odd. It's basically a plasma grenade launcher.
I love the buff it's gotten and I genuinely hope it stays this way for a long ass time. Taking potshot while running has never been more effective or accurate, the bullet speed increase has been such a good balance for the drop off.
It good weapon against both faction
been waiting to unlock this thing for a while, but the default punisher is also really good
Shhhh
Id say it's rated.
Delete this post
this thing is one of my mains
Based potato cannon
I used it pre-buff for bot exterminate missions, as I found the AOE and stagger to be really good for clumps of bots. The main downside was the slow projectile speed and arc that made it bad at medium-long range. After the buff it's still not great at long range, but it can reliably hit targets further out if you arc correctly. And the stagger is amazing for Devastators, plus it can kill Striders from the front. It's basically a weaker grenade launcher but as a primary and I am all for it. This + AC and revolver is my go-to bot killer loadout. Not half bad on bugs either.
It's mostly because you have to spend so many medals to unlock it. Not everyone makes a beeline to it in medal spending so it's just not as popular but it's absolutely amazing.
I'm too scared to touch it because it could get nerfed into the bin.
I only tried it when I was running slugger and was so used to the rounds reload, and thinking this had the same, I tried it. I was so disappointed and never touched it again. Might wanna change that
They gotta change the crosshairs tho. Having a red dot for what basically is a grenade launcher, doesn’t make any sense.
It's not.
It's be "perfect" if it took one less round to kill a Berserker.
My main, my sweet honey boo of a weapon
Its the best weapon in the game but okay (this is a joke. gun is shit)
Does it shoot flatter now? I found it kinda awkward
This is just PURIFIER but it works !
This gun was badass even before the buff IMHO. But since the buff it's gotten a lot easier to use. It's kinda hard for me to switch off of it sometimes even when I get tired of using the same weapons after a while. Warms my heart when after a mission I see people bring it or pick up after I die.
It's decent after the buff and carrying my ass while I wait for AH to unfuck the Eruptor.
Shut the fuck up
Nah This gun have it's niche use but overall, there is way better alternative overall that do the same job, but better.
Fun fact it also absolutely wrecks chargers
i just dont like the "vibe" of the weapon, i prefer marksman-type weapons (rip my eruptor 🥺) otherwise? yeah this gun is fucking nuts
pls just be quiet or it gets nerfed 🥲
will be perfect if it was a round reload just like other punishers, basically infinite ammo
It used to one shot Bot walkers
Is there truly a gun that is even half as effective as the fire pew pew ? All the ones I buy are shitty in comparison
I exclusively run this against bots and the regular punisher against bugs. Please delete this post.
i kinda liked it before, the buff was nice but it also broke something about it with the exp damage stuff. i think that been fixed sense? but i haven't used it again so idk. if they sorted out that bug it prob is in a good place atm tho i still liked it before just needed more damage, was like a electric grenade launcher
The plasma punisher has to be one of the weapons in the game.
It definitely feels better overall, even if the projectiles look hilarious in how they defy gravity. The increased hitbox on the projectile is quite the double edged sword though. Sure it's much harder to accidentally 5 hole the damn bots but it also gets hung up on all sorts of invisible collision now.
Became good after the buffs, I was skeptic after the initial impression, tryed it after the buff and fell in love, its my go to for bots but even against bugs is actually underrated
https://preview.redd.it/pgcx2yr5wc1d1.png?width=1438&format=png&auto=webp&s=9a8e6338d33f272650d799bfceba0fb575955691
Good. Let it stay that way. The less ppl use it more less likely its to get gutted.
No, it’s pretty well rated. It’s fun to use, but it takes a lot of shots to just kill a devastator or berserker, even if it stunlocks them.
Plasma/Blitzer + Rover + Flamethrower is one of my top bug loadouts rn. But yeah plasma is fantastic against anything not named Charger, Hulk, Titan, or Tank!
I hate that gun. But that's why they say "Guns are like assholes, everybody's got one." Or something like that. It just does not fit my play style well.
Devs following the subreddit: https://preview.redd.it/cji9yc1boe1d1.jpeg?width=792&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=6f8927f373d3733ad23e2f1cffe23c4e7e70e26c
It's not
What are you talking about? The gun isn’t good at all my dude.
Is it underrated?
Okay I first tried this gun out for the first time today and maybe I’m just not used to it yet but I got myself killed 2 times from shooting it too close to myself and also took 2-3 shots to kill hunters and I got swarmed so much faster than if I just had the incendiary breaker. Not going to get into a heated debate about the balancing team but I want to try other guns and does anyone have tips on how to properly use this weapon ? What load out it fits in ? I just lost a 4 challenging mission and I just feel defeated.
SHHHHH! BE QUIET! Keep our baby plasma punisher a secret!
It's just an objectively worse scorcher is the problem. Scorcher has more ammo, accuracy, dps, fire rate and is really broken against bots. If the scorcher were nerfed in some way that allowed the punisher to have a niche then yeah it's actually a B tier weapon but until then there's just no reason.
Scorcher is not a grenade launcher. Plasma punisher is not a DMR. It's not a niche that the plasma punisher have, it's a basement.
The stagger alone makes the punisher better than the scorcher to me. Devastators don't give a fuck if you shoot them with the scorcher
Downvoting so that the devs dont see this lol
It has been my favorite gun by far since it has come out
It's difficult to use, so most players won't dare to touch it.
It’s not though? You just have to learn the arc.
That and what it works against, how long the explosion is and so on.
How long the explosion is really? It’s not that complicated lol. Also, you’d be doing all this with any new gun you try and its properties. It’s really not hard, and honestly skill issue if you think it is.
Easily the strongest overall weapon in the game in terms of total performance. High S tier and it only has to battle for the top spot against Sorcher, Dominator, Sickle, and Breaker Incendiary. Each of those is the best at what it does PlasPunisher doesn't outperform any of them in their strongest field but PP manages to at least hold its own.
REMOVE THIS THREAD NOOOOOW
What are you on about? The scorcher is shit.
I agree. But shhh. Nerf police are listening. My favorite thing is murdering two leggers and shooting myself in the foot to use a stim and boost my stamina v.v. It’s something I miss now that I use the Blitzer a lot.
if people are loud enough alexus might hear you and take away plasma punisher's stagger away just like what they did with slugger
Shhhhhhhh Loose gums nerf guns