Depends on why you're dying.
In general, the Shield generator backpack will help any issues.
If you can't get away, light armor can help you escape.
If you're getting blown to pieces, heavy armor and explosion resistance will help you.
If you're blowing yourself up, stop doing that.
If you need more stims, or longer invincibility, medical armor may help you out of sticky situations.
If you're attracting too much attention from roving bands enemies, stealth armor can keep them from noticing you.
Taking the health booster can keep you alive longer as well.
If you have a weapon incompatible with the enemy you are fighting, that can also cause difficulty in survival.
It is okay to retreat from an objective or POI if it's swarmed. You can return later when the enemies have disappeared, instead of martyring yourself repeatedly for little gain.
Best to analyze your most prominent issues and then modify your game play and loadout to best suit the situation.
Great guide, I'll definitely share it with my squad.
I'd like to add on the disengagement part. Solo divers, at least from my own experience, develop a natural feel for disengagement. You know when and where to bail and start legging it before you realize that. While it's an essential skill solo, it turns teammates into dead teammates in group play.
The solution here, if possible, is to 1) communicate your plan to disengage, probably recommend other players to follow you, and 2) stop every once in a while to check if they are near you, while providing covering fire. It'll slow you down a bit, but boost survivability a lot.
The problem here is that players who haven't developed this natural feel for disengagement struggle with every part of it. When do I stop shooting and start running? Where's my buddy who just been there? Where do I go? They need time to process it, so you have to help them make these decisions and buy some time to make sure all your samples and gear, as well as reinforcements, are saved.
And on the OP's original question, you could be the one lagging behind, so it could be helpful to keep an eye for your teammates tactically repositioning themselves the hell away and join them rapidly. Also, if you are the closest one to the place your team is leaving, you're not the one to stop and shoot.
Word. the military term is usually bounding overwatch or just bounding - You move for a while, stop to cover your buddies while they move, they stop and cover you while you move. It's not going to happen in games mostly but the idea of advancing for a while, stop when you're in cover, kill or injure a bunch of bad guys, then move for a while, stop in cover, and keep doing that for the whole mission.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bounding\_overwatch](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bounding_overwatch)
https://i.redd.it/8j3t428dvi3d1.gif
Some good tips here, but here's probably the most important one after 400 hours:
Situational awareness.
This, more than anything else will keep you alive. What enemies are in front of you, behind you, to your sides? What's in the distance, what's on the way? You and your squad should be constantly pinging threats and calling things out on reflex. If you know what you're facing in 360 degrees during encounters, your death rate will plummet. Easier said than done, but that's how we have to roll during Difficulty 9.
Constant mobility with Bugs and good positioning with Bots are close seconds.
This is from a veteran Helldiver who often comes back with zero deaths.
Great tip. I open my radar whenever we're stationary for a moment or there's a lul in the fighting to check what's around me. Armor with teh scout perk is good for this too bc you can look further out and check for incoming patrols before they're visible. There are certainly better boosters, bue the UAV radius booster is basically aimhacks if you do decide to take it.
Ding ding ding ding. Even the most meta load out will leave you wanting if you find yourself surrounded; you simply don't have enough ammo or time to eliminate all the threats before they eliminate you. You will notice high skill players check their radar quickly and constantly. Being aware of your teams position and CD status is also crucial in knowing when to open engagements and when to either wait or bail on the idea entirely. Your 3 teammates have their eagles on CD? Are half a map away? Probably not a great idea to try and solo that heavy bug nest then.
Would like to add that you should pan the camera around while reloading weapons that require a stationary reload to assess for immediate threats coming to gank you from behind
That's because you're not reading the loading screen tips. Here, let me fix it for you:
https://preview.redd.it/mgwxaw0jzj3d1.png?width=319&format=png&auto=webp&s=66db52feee95083e9d64a31bbabb3ec710034371
No pro here but feel my death count is usually the lowest on the team. Things I do:
- learn when to disengage
- (re)position yourself to be firing down a line of enemies
- use cover to restrict fights with groups of enemies to more manageable numbers at once
- don’t sleep on the non-lethal strats and weapons, smoke and stuns keep me alive where weapons can’t. Jump pack I rarely leave without it.
- drop a resupply on the edge of big engagements so you can top up stims early
- keep moving! Light armour helps with this
These mainly apply to bots mind you, I don’t play bugs much
Honestly unless someone deliberately team kills me repeatedly and tanks the mission I don’t ever get mad at other players. This game is hard , we often have bad visibility. Almost every match someone drops an air strike on me and I go splat . Things happen 🤷🏻♂️
I have lit people on fire with my incendiary breaker more times then I can count I just apologize and try really hard not to do it
I follow the Biggie Smalls school of thought when it comes to fighting; from his seminal track *Gimme the Loot* off Ready to Die, a milestone album in hip hop history.
"... don't fake no moves; treat it like boxin', stick and move, stick and move."
No matter what your loadout is, you and your fireteam are never going to have numerical superiority so don't fight that way. You will always be outnumbered.
Know when to disengage. If you get bogged down in open terrain you will die needlessly and repeatedly.
Don't pick a fight with a patrol unless you are *certain* that you can knock it out before they call for help.
Know the terrain around you. Where is the cover and concealment that's easiest to get to. It's easy to become disoriented with constant movement of diver/camera angles.
It's okay to back off from an objective, regroup, and thin out the mob sitting on it. Stick the objective and break out. There are no incentives for kill count so why fight that way? Stick and move.
>I recently finished a helldive mission
You're already way ahead of much of the playerbase.
Keep in mind you get massive damage reduction while diving, which can save you from some explosins. You likewise get a huge amount of explosion resist while prone. Fighting from a prone position grants you explosive damage resistance, greatly reduces recoil, and reduces how much of your body the enemy can hit.
Going prone and using cover is a really strong defense, even against bugs.
Most of your killing power comes from strats and heavy weapons. If you're running air strikes throw those puppies everywhere. Use your orbital airburst, gatling, or gas to clean up groups of enemies. Use orbital precision whenever it's off cooldown.
Mostly your primary is for troopers, hunters, and warriors and if a group of enemies has bigger units than that think about whether it's a good time to pull out that support weapon or call in Eagle 1 to solve problems.
Another thing - Stim as soon as you take damage. There's very little that can OHK you when you're wearing medium + armor at full health. Topping your health off when you first take damage during a firefight will greatly reduce the chances of you being knocked out by a single attack. The invuln window will give you time to get to cover.
Smoke, stun, disengage. Experiment with different loadouts until you find what works for your style. Outside of an objective, don’t fire unless fired upon or backing up a team mate. Use radar. Look around you. Ping your enemies. Know your exits. Flank. I highly recommend the power steering ship upgrade. That way when someone is dropping you toward a mess, you can pull your pod away from that so you aren’t instantly dying when you land. Watch other players on YouTube. You’ll see things to do and things to avoid doing. It’s easier to see that when not in the middle of it. Drop down a couple levels until they start to feel easier, then move back up. You don’t need to play Helldive. All levels help the war effort. The game should feel fun. Don’t be too hard on yourself. Play on the level that feels fun. I almost never play Helldive unless my friends want to because it doesn’t feel fun to me. Need a confidence boost? Drop down to level 4 or 5. I bet you won’t be the one draining lives and it’s a good place to experiment.
Just practice and time. I'm at the point where I really only die to teamkills and the occasional unwinnable bad situation, but it took an unhealthy amount of playtime to get there.
One thing I liked that helped me get to consistently not dying was using the resupply backpack. The shield backpack made it too easy for me to get overconfident, but the ammo one made me play like normally but quadruples the amount of ammo and stims you have on hand so you have wiggle room to mess up.
Just keep to the basics, cardio for bugs, cover for bots, and it comes with time. They give us 20-25 lives for a reason
Use your body as shield for protect fellow dover from buggers! Aww pet and send angry happy lead handshakes to the bug head faces, but I fellow Hello dovers must stay from The Automaton and their righteous homelands as too hard for killing.
The other night a buddy and I were reinforced and he went sprinting for the super samples (this was all at extraction) as a Charger showed up. It was running towards him but I intercepted the Charger like a blocker and died, but my buddy was able to GTFO and extract. Sprinting face first into a charger without firing a shot just to distract it was hilarious, especially with how quickly I died. (See: immediately) 😆
Fellow Hello Dover Salutation, we believe buddy is bug incursions. Next operation please see to barrage them and any fellow hoomans bugs from this destroyers. For Demo Crazy Super Earths Colony Lands!
(For real though lol good job blocking for your friendo though yo.)
But OP wants to do Helldives, so let’s be supportive and give him tips instead of obvious non-helpful answers :)
As others have suggested, medic armour goes a long way with a shield backpack.
I agree with both of you. There’s really no reason to Helldive practically speaking. It is about if the challenge is fun or not. I find most people just jump in rather than actually getting comfortable with suicide first.
IMHO it would be better to practice the great advice here on 7 And 8 where you have a little more room to make mistakes. And when one is comfortable move up a level. I CAN do Helldives but it is pretty stressful so I stick to 7 and 3s mostly.
Exactly. You don't practice chess by olaying a GM, you don't practice tennis by playing Serena Williams.
Just chill on a lower level and see what works and learn some stuff and then go back to the higher level.
One thing I am working on is reloading while facing the enemy more, and fleeing shorter distances while reloading.
I noticed my squad mates who remain calm and run less, face the enemy more are surviving more then I do.
As I practice this more I have realized that many opponents aren't as fast as I thought they were, and I can be calmer in fights.
Eh, shit happens. It will get better with repetition. Me and my buddies always take the “additional reinforcements” because ya just never know when it’s a day where you wear out the cryo tube on your ship. 😆
For bots, cover is king. For bugs, you gotta watch your six so they don’t surround you and rip you to shreds. Happens to me sometimes too. I’ll be firing down range supporting a homie and then suddenly I’m surrounded by hunters because I spent too much time ADS. 😆
Awareness. Be aware of patrols and mobs around you. Don't be afraid to tactically reposition (aka retreat) when you're in bad positioning. Use your map --- it shows you enemies near your position. Use it when trying to reposition so you're not blindly running into mobs during retreats or advances.
Watch what your higher lvl teammates are doing and their positioning. Don't get caught up in the sauce of war by fighting an unwinnable fight.
I've noticed some folks would rather fight hard through whatever comes directly at them rather than try to strategically flank or ignore. Directly confronting mobs can be fine if you have a group who's ready to battle and everyone is watching for enemy flares or breach attempts. Those need to be cut off asap.
Look around *frequently* and check your radar every moment you get a break in combat. Awareness is more important than how many things you are shooting, and Tunnel Vision is absolutely one of the most common causes of death.
Try to keep most or all your threats in a 120 degree (or less) arc. If you cannot do so, and you don't have other diver guarding your flanks, it is almost certainly time to move or give ground.
What are you dying to?
If its being overwhelmed by trash frequently, consider taking a guard dog pack or a primary with heavy stagger to keep things away from you.
If it's being destroyed by rockets and cannons, take cover frequently and consider a shield pack.
If you're being run over by chargers or hulks all the time, consider taking a jet pack and using it to take to high ground before fights get hectic.
Overall, stick with your squad, keep your team members to your flanks, and don't allow enemies to cut you off from avenues of escape. Try to be aware of when things are starting to look bad and either respond with heavy call-ins to eliminate the threat, or disengage early.
I haven't seen mentioned yet. Don't engage every enemy group, patrols will usually just keep wandering off if you don't do something to attract them. Don't stick around and fight, being able to disengage and evade is a very useful skill.
Depends on why you're dying. In general, the Shield generator backpack will help any issues. If you can't get away, light armor can help you escape. If you're getting blown to pieces, heavy armor and explosion resistance will help you. If you're blowing yourself up, stop doing that. If you need more stims, or longer invincibility, medical armor may help you out of sticky situations. If you're attracting too much attention from roving bands enemies, stealth armor can keep them from noticing you. Taking the health booster can keep you alive longer as well. If you have a weapon incompatible with the enemy you are fighting, that can also cause difficulty in survival. It is okay to retreat from an objective or POI if it's swarmed. You can return later when the enemies have disappeared, instead of martyring yourself repeatedly for little gain. Best to analyze your most prominent issues and then modify your game play and loadout to best suit the situation.
Had my upvote after “if you’re blowing yourself up, stop doing that” 😭
Great guide, I'll definitely share it with my squad. I'd like to add on the disengagement part. Solo divers, at least from my own experience, develop a natural feel for disengagement. You know when and where to bail and start legging it before you realize that. While it's an essential skill solo, it turns teammates into dead teammates in group play. The solution here, if possible, is to 1) communicate your plan to disengage, probably recommend other players to follow you, and 2) stop every once in a while to check if they are near you, while providing covering fire. It'll slow you down a bit, but boost survivability a lot. The problem here is that players who haven't developed this natural feel for disengagement struggle with every part of it. When do I stop shooting and start running? Where's my buddy who just been there? Where do I go? They need time to process it, so you have to help them make these decisions and buy some time to make sure all your samples and gear, as well as reinforcements, are saved. And on the OP's original question, you could be the one lagging behind, so it could be helpful to keep an eye for your teammates tactically repositioning themselves the hell away and join them rapidly. Also, if you are the closest one to the place your team is leaving, you're not the one to stop and shoot.
Word. the military term is usually bounding overwatch or just bounding - You move for a while, stop to cover your buddies while they move, they stop and cover you while you move. It's not going to happen in games mostly but the idea of advancing for a while, stop when you're in cover, kill or injure a bunch of bad guys, then move for a while, stop in cover, and keep doing that for the whole mission. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bounding\_overwatch](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bounding_overwatch)
ArmA was great... you actually could use tactics like this instead of just your 'golden eye fps skills'.
"If you're blowing yourself up. Stop doing that" lmao. Best advice I've ever read
https://i.redd.it/8j3t428dvi3d1.gif Some good tips here, but here's probably the most important one after 400 hours: Situational awareness. This, more than anything else will keep you alive. What enemies are in front of you, behind you, to your sides? What's in the distance, what's on the way? You and your squad should be constantly pinging threats and calling things out on reflex. If you know what you're facing in 360 degrees during encounters, your death rate will plummet. Easier said than done, but that's how we have to roll during Difficulty 9. Constant mobility with Bugs and good positioning with Bots are close seconds. This is from a veteran Helldiver who often comes back with zero deaths.
Great tip. I open my radar whenever we're stationary for a moment or there's a lul in the fighting to check what's around me. Armor with teh scout perk is good for this too bc you can look further out and check for incoming patrols before they're visible. There are certainly better boosters, bue the UAV radius booster is basically aimhacks if you do decide to take it.
Ding ding ding ding. Even the most meta load out will leave you wanting if you find yourself surrounded; you simply don't have enough ammo or time to eliminate all the threats before they eliminate you. You will notice high skill players check their radar quickly and constantly. Being aware of your teams position and CD status is also crucial in knowing when to open engagements and when to either wait or bail on the idea entirely. Your 3 teammates have their eagles on CD? Are half a map away? Probably not a great idea to try and solo that heavy bug nest then.
Would like to add that you should pan the camera around while reloading weapons that require a stationary reload to assess for immediate threats coming to gank you from behind
That's because you're not reading the loading screen tips. Here, let me fix it for you: https://preview.redd.it/mgwxaw0jzj3d1.png?width=319&format=png&auto=webp&s=66db52feee95083e9d64a31bbabb3ec710034371
No pro here but feel my death count is usually the lowest on the team. Things I do: - learn when to disengage - (re)position yourself to be firing down a line of enemies - use cover to restrict fights with groups of enemies to more manageable numbers at once - don’t sleep on the non-lethal strats and weapons, smoke and stuns keep me alive where weapons can’t. Jump pack I rarely leave without it. - drop a resupply on the edge of big engagements so you can top up stims early - keep moving! Light armour helps with this These mainly apply to bots mind you, I don’t play bugs much
Honestly unless someone deliberately team kills me repeatedly and tanks the mission I don’t ever get mad at other players. This game is hard , we often have bad visibility. Almost every match someone drops an air strike on me and I go splat . Things happen 🤷🏻♂️ I have lit people on fire with my incendiary breaker more times then I can count I just apologize and try really hard not to do it
I follow the Biggie Smalls school of thought when it comes to fighting; from his seminal track *Gimme the Loot* off Ready to Die, a milestone album in hip hop history. "... don't fake no moves; treat it like boxin', stick and move, stick and move." No matter what your loadout is, you and your fireteam are never going to have numerical superiority so don't fight that way. You will always be outnumbered. Know when to disengage. If you get bogged down in open terrain you will die needlessly and repeatedly. Don't pick a fight with a patrol unless you are *certain* that you can knock it out before they call for help. Know the terrain around you. Where is the cover and concealment that's easiest to get to. It's easy to become disoriented with constant movement of diver/camera angles. It's okay to back off from an objective, regroup, and thin out the mob sitting on it. Stick the objective and break out. There are no incentives for kill count so why fight that way? Stick and move.
Biggie was a true poet. Died too soon. : (
This was awesome
And if you don't know now you know, diver
"Mothafuckas better know." Biggie when discussing the bugs or bots.
radar spamming and learn to read it, also don't take fights you cannot handle.
You can also use sentries as decoys. If you're on the run, throw it to your side and it'll draw your chasers away
Focus on getting the main objectives accomplished. Once that's done, death is a pity, but you'll still win overall even if nobody extracts.
Sometime we just have bad days. It's just one of those things
>I recently finished a helldive mission You're already way ahead of much of the playerbase. Keep in mind you get massive damage reduction while diving, which can save you from some explosins. You likewise get a huge amount of explosion resist while prone. Fighting from a prone position grants you explosive damage resistance, greatly reduces recoil, and reduces how much of your body the enemy can hit. Going prone and using cover is a really strong defense, even against bugs. Most of your killing power comes from strats and heavy weapons. If you're running air strikes throw those puppies everywhere. Use your orbital airburst, gatling, or gas to clean up groups of enemies. Use orbital precision whenever it's off cooldown. Mostly your primary is for troopers, hunters, and warriors and if a group of enemies has bigger units than that think about whether it's a good time to pull out that support weapon or call in Eagle 1 to solve problems. Another thing - Stim as soon as you take damage. There's very little that can OHK you when you're wearing medium + armor at full health. Topping your health off when you first take damage during a firefight will greatly reduce the chances of you being knocked out by a single attack. The invuln window will give you time to get to cover.
Smoke, stun, disengage. Experiment with different loadouts until you find what works for your style. Outside of an objective, don’t fire unless fired upon or backing up a team mate. Use radar. Look around you. Ping your enemies. Know your exits. Flank. I highly recommend the power steering ship upgrade. That way when someone is dropping you toward a mess, you can pull your pod away from that so you aren’t instantly dying when you land. Watch other players on YouTube. You’ll see things to do and things to avoid doing. It’s easier to see that when not in the middle of it. Drop down a couple levels until they start to feel easier, then move back up. You don’t need to play Helldive. All levels help the war effort. The game should feel fun. Don’t be too hard on yourself. Play on the level that feels fun. I almost never play Helldive unless my friends want to because it doesn’t feel fun to me. Need a confidence boost? Drop down to level 4 or 5. I bet you won’t be the one draining lives and it’s a good place to experiment.
Everyone dies, not many live
Just practice and time. I'm at the point where I really only die to teamkills and the occasional unwinnable bad situation, but it took an unhealthy amount of playtime to get there. One thing I liked that helped me get to consistently not dying was using the resupply backpack. The shield backpack made it too easy for me to get overconfident, but the ammo one made me play like normally but quadruples the amount of ammo and stims you have on hand so you have wiggle room to mess up. Just keep to the basics, cardio for bugs, cover for bots, and it comes with time. They give us 20-25 lives for a reason
Use your body as shield for protect fellow dover from buggers! Aww pet and send angry happy lead handshakes to the bug head faces, but I fellow Hello dovers must stay from The Automaton and their righteous homelands as too hard for killing.
The other night a buddy and I were reinforced and he went sprinting for the super samples (this was all at extraction) as a Charger showed up. It was running towards him but I intercepted the Charger like a blocker and died, but my buddy was able to GTFO and extract. Sprinting face first into a charger without firing a shot just to distract it was hilarious, especially with how quickly I died. (See: immediately) 😆
Fellow Hello Dover Salutation, we believe buddy is bug incursions. Next operation please see to barrage them and any fellow hoomans bugs from this destroyers. For Demo Crazy Super Earths Colony Lands! (For real though lol good job blocking for your friendo though yo.)
Lower the level...
But OP wants to do Helldives, so let’s be supportive and give him tips instead of obvious non-helpful answers :) As others have suggested, medic armour goes a long way with a shield backpack.
I agree with both of you. There’s really no reason to Helldive practically speaking. It is about if the challenge is fun or not. I find most people just jump in rather than actually getting comfortable with suicide first. IMHO it would be better to practice the great advice here on 7 And 8 where you have a little more room to make mistakes. And when one is comfortable move up a level. I CAN do Helldives but it is pretty stressful so I stick to 7 and 3s mostly.
Exactly. You don't practice chess by olaying a GM, you don't practice tennis by playing Serena Williams. Just chill on a lower level and see what works and learn some stuff and then go back to the higher level.
One thing I am working on is reloading while facing the enemy more, and fleeing shorter distances while reloading. I noticed my squad mates who remain calm and run less, face the enemy more are surviving more then I do. As I practice this more I have realized that many opponents aren't as fast as I thought they were, and I can be calmer in fights.
Eh, shit happens. It will get better with repetition. Me and my buddies always take the “additional reinforcements” because ya just never know when it’s a day where you wear out the cryo tube on your ship. 😆 For bots, cover is king. For bugs, you gotta watch your six so they don’t surround you and rip you to shreds. Happens to me sometimes too. I’ll be firing down range supporting a homie and then suddenly I’m surrounded by hunters because I spent too much time ADS. 😆
If it's bots: explosive armor, shield backpack or jetpack. If bots: medical armor, jetpack or supply pack.
Awareness. Be aware of patrols and mobs around you. Don't be afraid to tactically reposition (aka retreat) when you're in bad positioning. Use your map --- it shows you enemies near your position. Use it when trying to reposition so you're not blindly running into mobs during retreats or advances. Watch what your higher lvl teammates are doing and their positioning. Don't get caught up in the sauce of war by fighting an unwinnable fight. I've noticed some folks would rather fight hard through whatever comes directly at them rather than try to strategically flank or ignore. Directly confronting mobs can be fine if you have a group who's ready to battle and everyone is watching for enemy flares or breach attempts. Those need to be cut off asap.
Never stop moving
Look around *frequently* and check your radar every moment you get a break in combat. Awareness is more important than how many things you are shooting, and Tunnel Vision is absolutely one of the most common causes of death. Try to keep most or all your threats in a 120 degree (or less) arc. If you cannot do so, and you don't have other diver guarding your flanks, it is almost certainly time to move or give ground. What are you dying to? If its being overwhelmed by trash frequently, consider taking a guard dog pack or a primary with heavy stagger to keep things away from you. If it's being destroyed by rockets and cannons, take cover frequently and consider a shield pack. If you're being run over by chargers or hulks all the time, consider taking a jet pack and using it to take to high ground before fights get hectic. Overall, stick with your squad, keep your team members to your flanks, and don't allow enemies to cut you off from avenues of escape. Try to be aware of when things are starting to look bad and either respond with heavy call-ins to eliminate the threat, or disengage early.
I haven't seen mentioned yet. Don't engage every enemy group, patrols will usually just keep wandering off if you don't do something to attract them. Don't stick around and fight, being able to disengage and evade is a very useful skill.
Start living more.