Helldivers 2 Guide | How to Get Strong Early Gear

This guide breaks down a go-to early build for new players. You can put this equipment combo together quickly, and it can carry you even if you try to tackle missions solo. This setup provides a powerhouse of bullet rain with near infinite ammo and has great survivability. It only takes doing a handful of the first few missions to get every item you need for it.

The build primarily uses the M105 Stalwart heavy machine gun synergized with the supply pack, along with the SG8 Punisher, the P19 Redeemer, the Orbital Gas Strike, Machine Gun Sentry, Vitality Enhancement Booster, and DP0000 Tactical Armor Set.

Getting The Stalwart & Supply Pack

The first thing you want to save up your initial funds for is to buy the Stalwart heavy machine gun at the ship management console, which costs 3500 requisition points.

After that, down in the engineering bay section of that same menu, snag the supply pack that costs 4,000 rep. Call both of those down as soon as you start a mission and put both of them on.

Then, when the Stalwart is in your hands, hold the reload input to bring up a submenu and toggle up to its higher RPM fire rate. You just instantly increase your DPS by pressing two buttons. The Stalwart is going to be your primary weapon to handle almost everything.

Even though it grinds through hundreds of rounds of ammo fairly quickly, with the supply pack on your back, you have nearly a thousand extra rounds of ammunition strapped right to you.

You can press D-pad down with the supply pack on to snack off your own supply charges, refilling some of your ammo, even for heavy weapons.

This means you never really have to worry about running out of ammo. The Stalwart is going to quickly melt through terminate bugs, be great against the illuminate, and pretty good at handling automatons.

Unlike the default heavy machine gun that you start with, you need to entirely stop to meticulously reload that. But with the Stalwart, you can reload and move at the same time. This has a fairly strong kick when shot from a standing position, but if you go crouch or prone, the recoil becomes almost non-existent.

If you die and need to call in a new heavy weapon, keep in mind that you will need to retoggle up to its higher fire RPM. In the rare cases where you need to call down a resupply, since you have that supply pack equipped, the supplies at least have a bonus of restocking charges of the supply pack.

Using your supply pack does not just give ammo; you also get some grenades and medical stems back each time you eat one. Stems have a few extra uses other than just repairing your health.

Popping a stim while pushing the offensive in the opposite direction of enemies is an easy way to refill your entire stamina gauge since stems super boost your stamina for a time after you stick one.

If you find yourself in a situation where you need to tactically flank downward onto your face, just pop a stem before hucking yourself off a high drop. The rapid health regen will counter any of the fall damage you should have taken.

Getting The DP-00 Tactical Armor

For even more safety, you should put on the DP0000 tactical medium armor set. This is mostly because of its passive effect, Democracy Protects. This prevents the effects of bleeding if hit in the chest, but also gives you a 50% chance to survive with one HP when you deserved to die.

A grenade detonating, no problem. Sometimes you can live right through that, so you can just pop a stem and go on. Maybe you or a teammate calls an air strike straight to your helmet; sometimes you can beast right through that missile to the dome.

You are rolling the dice each encounter with death. If something does manage to mangle you out of existence, make your drop pod landing worth something. It is shaped like a huge bullet for a reason and does massive impact damage, so aim for the highest threat.

Getting The SG-8 Punisher

The next weapons for this build are going to be used more like a last resort backup, like if you are caught with your Stalwart in between reloads, but you need to quickly defend yourself.

A great backup weapon can be found on the first page of the free Hell Divers Mobilize War Bond, the SG8 Punisher. This is a pump-action shotgun that is an effective tool to counter being rushed down by lesser enemies.

You point it right into stuff in close range, and it tends to convince it to stop. The Punisher is great for fanatical reloaders as well, who like to spam that reload button because you load each shell individually, so you are not wasting any ammo if you are overly reloading. Another option here is to try out some of the new Halo ODST weapons in that new war bond.

Getting The P-19 Redeemer

The next backup weapon is on the second page of the Hell Divers Mobilized War Bond, the P19 Redeemer. This fires its entire payload in an embarrassingly short amount of time, so you should actually toggle this up to its single fire mode instead.

This turns it into pretty much a basic pistol, but one that has 31 shots per magazine. You don't need to conserve ammo with this build, but this is another backup weapon just in case you need it.

Getting The Orbital Gas Strike

Another part of this build is going to cost 4,000 rep to unlock the orbital gas strike, Strategy. This can be called down to coat an area in noxious fumes that chip away at enemy health and even makes them somewhat behave erratically while they are in it.

It is a great one for locking down access routes, and its cool-down is fairly short, so it can be used repeatedly. The initial impact of the gas strike has a small area of detonation, too, so it can be used to destroy some buildings and nests.

Getting A Sentry Turret

Next is the machine gun sentry strategy that can be unlocked for 1,500 rep. The machine gun sentry has a shorter cool-down compared to the Gatling sentry, which means you can often call it down for nearly every encounter, and it is generally a bit safer with the friendly fire than the Gatling.

You should call this down to either an elevation slightly higher or lower than where you are to reduce the risk of being mowed down. Or you can go prone underneath it to avoid most of its fire. You can also mantle on top of sentries.

Getting A Booster

Next, for your equipped booster, there are two early options you should consider in the Hell Divers Mobilize War Bond. On page three is the Hellpod space optimization, which gives every Hell Diver full ammo, grenades, and stems when they drop.

The other one to consider is on page four, the vitality enhancement. This is just a flat damage reduction from all sources for the entire team. You equip it, you die less.

Grenade & Closing Thoughts

For the grenade, you could unlock the frag for its larger radius and shorter fuse time, but you could just stick with the more powerful G12 high explosive that you start with. This takes longer to detonate and has a smaller radius, but deals higher damage than the frag.

If you learn how to time it well, it will serve you well. You can acquire all this gear in just about your first hour to 3 hours of play time, but the build itself can carry you dozens of hours up into the higher difficulties. This exact same build can get the job done even at the max difficulty.

Also, check out our other Helldiver 2 guides below:

• Helldivers 2 Guide | First Stratagems To Unlock
• Helldivers 2 Guide | How To Get Free Super Credits
• Helldivers 2 Guide | How To Defeat Chargers
• Helldivers 2 Guide | How To Use Mutated Eggs & Robot Heads
• Helldivers 2 Guide | How To Use Supply Pack