“It is in a disgraceful state and in dire need of fixing” Helldivers 2 players question why this Stratagem was ruined

With every Helldivers 2 update, it usually results in something else breaking, oftentimes a completely unrelated weapon or mechanic. The game has many quirks that are slowly being ironed out, but it is still a long way off before it reaches a stable and glitch-free state.

Unfortunately, this has resulted in many weapons and Stratagems becoming not viable, including the Ballistic Shield, which is designed to deflect gunfire from the Automatons. However, after having been a popular choice for multiple months, it has now been ruined and many players are finding it to be more of a hindrance these days.

U/Calligaster took to the Helldivers 2 sub-Reddit to discuss the state of the Ballistic Shield Stratagem. The shield can be used to block incoming fire from the Automatons, or that was the intention. Due to recent nerfs, the Ballistic Shield has become less viable as it doesn’t always protect you from bullets and rockets.

“The Ballistic Shield is in the worst state I have seen any item in this game. If you have the shield in hand and you’re knocked into a ragdoll state, there’s about a 50% chance you die to “impact”. I’ve run several games both with and without the shield and I actively die far more when I have the shield,” they said.

Other Helldivers 2 players agreed that the recent changes have had a negative impact on the Ballistic Shield, with U/No_Shock_5644 saying “I don’t understand why they wasted further development time on the shield after it got fixed the first time. It lined up properly and stopped bullets, in other words it worked fine. It was very fun to use, I mained it back then. Now it’s broken again.”

U/Djcecil2 also stated that they were disappointed with the changes and no longer use it, saying “I was so thrilled when the shield got its first fix. It was in such a good state — worked exactly as advertised. I had to stop using the shield because I casually get knocked off balance and get 1 shot by “impact”. It’s frustrating,” while concluding that “Out of all the bugs, the shield has been the most annoying and I’m really disappointed playing bots now.”

One of the strangest issues I’ve encountered using the Ballistic Shield is when using it in first-person mode, the bullets will fire way to the right of the laser. In the image below, the laser from my Pummeler SMG is directly on the Devastator, but instead, the bullets are hitting the container multiple feet to the right of the enemy. This would make it incredibly difficult to aim at enemies because you can’t accurately line up a shot and moving to the left will decrease the visibility of the target. For this reason, I don’t think I will be carrying it in any missions until Arrowhead fixes it in a future update.

It does always seem like Helldivers 2 goes two steps forward and then one step back with each update. This could be due to the outdated engine not being the ideal platform for a game of this size and style, especially a major live service game with frequent changes and updates. Unfortunately, there isn’t much that can be done about this now, so this will likely be a long-term issue that the game faces.

With Arrowhead Game Studios now focusing on less frequent updates of higher quality, hopefully, the team will be able to spend more time testing any changes before making them live. What the next Helldivers 2 update has in store remains to be seen, as the developers are currently on a semi-hiatus for a summer vacation. In the meantime, players are focused on the Major Orders, with the current one calling for Helldivers to “split the Automaton forces in two” by liberating the Andromeda Sector. With the Ballistic Shield not being a viable Stratagem to use at the minute, we highly recommend checking out our Helldivers 2 best weapons guide and best armor guide so you can keep up to date with the latest metas.