Helldivers 2 Gets A Much-Welcome Update To Reloading, Vehicles, And Campaign Progression

Helldivers 2 should feel more responsive to play than ever before, as the game's latest update brings major improvements to reloading.  Patch 6.3.0, which is live now, brought a smorgasbord of balance changes, features, and bug fixes. Among them are some major tweaks to how reloading works. At long last, players can reload while diving, and starting a reload animation, only to be ragdolled or staggered, will now continue the animation once you regain control. It also adds "delayed reloads," where, if you try to reload but are unable to do so, the reload animation will be delayed for a short window until it can be started. It's a fairly substantial change that should make spreading Managed Democracy even easier, but better reloads aren't all the update added. Patch 6.3.0 also introduced the Control Center, taking the place of the previously inactive terminal across from the armory on the deck of each player's Super Destroyer. The Control Center lets you learn more about ongoing campaigns, major orders, rewards. It also lets you read up on previous campaigns, making it easier for new or returning players can get up to speed. Each campaign will now have a unique reward players can earn should the Helldivers community emerge victorious in the majority that campaign's major orders. The first campaign under this new system is called Census Thunder, and currently tasks Helldivers with taking control of two planets from hordes of Illuminate Voteless. Should the Helldivers emerge victorious, they'll have a new FRV (Fast-Recon Vehicle, basically Helldiver's version of Halo's Warthog) to play with. Those additions alone would make for a major update, but developer Arrowhead Studios has sweetened the deal with a long list of balance changes as well, with significant adjustments to vehicles, throwables, and Orbital Stratagems. On the vehicle front, Arrowhead outlined that one of its goals with the update was to make vehicles tankier, following a previous update that technically buffed vehicles like Exo Suits but also made enemies more effective against them. In patch 6.3.0, the Bastion tank "should feel tankier" and be able to "ignore small attacks, withstand more medium attacks, and its survivability against heavy attacks should be unchanged," according to Arrowhead. As for Exo Suits, they are now able to withstand small and medium attacks, and an increase in their total health should make them feel sturdier overall. Exo Suits can additionally be called in more frequently, with their cooldown reduced from 10 minutes to eight. The FRV also received a health buff that will help it better withstand medium and heavy attacks. For turret fans, all of the game's sentries have had their health increased by 100% to compensate for previous changes that allowed enemies to more easily damage vehicles. Many of the game's grenades have received a buff in the number of starting ammo and max ammo.  Orbital Stratagem enjoyers have reason to rejoice, because nearly every Orbital in the game has seen its projectile damage, durable damage, and explosion damage increased. Rocket Pods should be more reliable and deal more damage now, and the Railcannon's huge damage buff should make it so it's deadlier against enemies like Vox Engines (though it will still be unable to one-shot massive enemies like Factory Striders or Hive Lords).  This latest update is just a small part of Arrowhead's near-future plans for its co-op shooter, plans Helldivers 2 game director Mikael Eriksson outlined in a blog post earlier this month. Those future additions include new features like Planet Warfronts, additional Super Destroyer progression and customization, and an increase of the game's level cap to 300 from the current 150. In May, Arrowhead called an update mostly focused on improving Helldivers 2's technical performance just the "opening salvo," with more updates to come. You can check out the full Helldivers 2 update 6.3.0 patch notes below. Helldivers 2 Update 6.3.0 Patch Notes Introducing the CONTROL CENTER terminal Super Earth High Command has completed fleet-wide upgrades to the previously unused terminal opposite the armory. Now Helldivers will be able to get more context to the ongoing Campaigns and their subsequent Major Orders. Each Campaign will come with its own potential reward, should the Helldivers be victorious in a majority of the Major Orders within it. The terminal will also feature an archive (to be populated as the first campaign concludes) so that new and returning Helldivers can read up on the twists and turns of previous campaigns. Balancing General balance changes Vehicle armor and enemies AP rebalance Super Earth vehicles now have more accurate Armor values (Bastion gets heavy armor, exosuits a mix of heavy and medium armor, ballistic shield heavy armor).  Some enemies have received increased armor penetration values so they can deal with the vehicles, but not all. There will be a lot of smaller enemies and expl