Anthem Colossus Javelin guide - The best skills, abilities and combos to get the most out of Anthem’s Hulkbuster

Although on the surface the Anthem Colossus Javelin appears to be a tank option, it's actually deceptively weak and surprisingly lacking in resilience to begin with. If you want to access its full potential as a Hulk-buster, then you're going to need to invest the time in Anthem to level up and select the necessary specialisations for the job. Do it right, and you'll become a solid unit capable of soaking up damage while dishing it out, but to get to that stage you have to understand its capabilities and quirks. That's why we put together this Anthem Colossus Javelin guide, to help you on your way.

Colossus specific skills and playstyle

Before explaining exactly what the Colossus Javelin can do, we need to outline who it's for. If you love to fly around, dart in and out of battles and ultimately prefer not being shot at, then the Colossus probably isn't for you. On the other hand, if you don't mind taking a beating as long as you can deal one back with brute force and traditional firepower, you'll feel right at home with the Colossus in Anthem. As a Colossus, your main goal is to literally smash enemies to one side.

To help you do that there are two main skills in the Colossus' arsenal:

Melee: If you melee as a Colossus, you won't just attack a single enemy; instead, the Colossus performs an impressive ground pound slam which emits a shockwave. Perform one while airborne for an even bigger area of effect.

Shield: You'll want to whip out the Colossus' shield a lot in the thick of it. It's a solid, sturdy shield that deflects almost all bullets that come at you head on. You can sprint at enemies to knock them back and deal damage, or melee with the shield for an even more powerful swing that shoves enemies flat on their arse.

Best Colossus Heavy Assault Launcher

1. Siege Cannon: Fires a single explosive shell that does immense damage to a single target. Quick to aim, quick to fire, the Siege Cannon is great for an on-the-fly explosive shot and our go-to for most engagements.

2. Flamethrower: Pretty self explanatory; you equip a flamethrower weapon that sets any target in front of you alight and deals impressive damage, though the range isn't anything to write home about.

3. Flak Cannon: Very similar to the Siege Cannon but instead of a single shot, it fires a "barrage of shells" across a wider area. Better for groups of enemies, worse against single large targets like Titans or Luminaries.

4. Venom Spitter: Fires a number of acid shots that arc and don't have great range, but it fires at 200 rounds per minute so you can get quite a few off before it runs out.

5. Railgun: Takes a few moments to charge then fires a single powerful shot that knocks smaller enemies backwards, then detonates shortly after. You're better off just equipping your shield and charging forward to knock down multiple enemies than using this.

Best Colossus Ordnance Launcher

1. Firewall Mortar: Great for crowd control and blocking off enemies, the Firewall Mortar launches a single shell that erupts into a wall of flames for 20 seconds. You can see exactly where the wall will go too, although you can't spin the angle of it unfortunately.

2. High-Explosive Mortar: A similar ability to the Siege Cannon, but fired from the shoulder with more of an arc. As you'd expect, it deals a lot of damage but there's no option for combos since it's a standard artillery attack.

3. Lightning Coil: This activates an auto-firing lightning bolt on your shoulder that will target up to 10 enemies in front of you in quick succession. It doesn't deal great damage, but it's great for combos.

4. Burst Mortar: Another basic artillery ability, the Burst Mortar is almost identical to the Flak Cannon. Not great, but not awful either.

5. Shock Coil: The Shock Coil uses electric like the Lightning Coil, but rather than firing forwards it simply emits lightning bolts all around you. If there's enemies literally surrounding you from all sides this can be useful, but otherwise we wouldn't bother.

Best Colossus Support Gear

1. Shield Pulse: It's hard to say which of the two Colossus Support Gears are outright better because it's dependent on your playstyle. The Shield Pulse is our preferred ability as it reduces all of the damage you and any nearby teammates take by 33%.

2. Battle Cry: On the other hand, if all of your teammates are under fire and struggling while you're not taking much damage, the Battle Cry will direct all of the enemies to you instead, so you can brute force your way through and give your buddies a short break.

Best Colossus Combos

While the Colossus has some insane raw firepower, combos are great for clearing out huge groups of smaller enemies due to the area-of-effect explosion that happens after every successful combo. As long as you're rocking both a primer and a detonator weapon, you'll be able to create some powerful effects.

1. Primer: Flamethrower/Detonator: Lightning Coil: One of our favourite Colossus combos is rocking the Flamethrower with the Lightning Coil. Any targets you hit with the Flamethrower will then have the Lightning Coil chain between them for immense damage.

2. Primer: Firewall Mortar/Detonator: Siege Cannon: Another option is to go for the Firewall Mortar to pin loads of enemies in one place, then whack out the Siege Cannon to shoot through them and cause a fiery blaze.

Best Colossus Weapons

As a Colossus, you want to be in the mix all the time. There's no point in sitting back with a Sniper Rifle or Marksman Rifle because you won't be doing your job as the tank. Instead, you're better off equipping either an Autocannon or a Light Machine Gun. Whichever you prefer, and whichever will mow down waves of enemies the quickest. For your secondary, the most devastating Shotgun in your collection is your best bet so you can charge through people with the shield then switch to the Shotgun to bring pain right to their faces. If you want even more explosions, you can even substitute one for a Grenade Launcher.

Best Colossus Components

At our count, the Colossus has 10 unique Components, on top of all the universal ones that any Javelin can use. Rather than detail every single Component, we've got a few of our preferred ones to use as we've progressed through the Anthem story.

First up is the Colossal Stock Augment and Colossal Storage Augment. The former increases the maximum magazine size for all weapons by 35%, while the latter increases the maximum ammo capacity by 35%. As a Colossus, you'll likely be relying on guns like Light Machine Guns and Assault Rifles, so you'll burn through ammo quickly. These two Components allow you to fire almost endlessly and never run out.

We also found ourselves rocking Explosives Expert a lot, since it increases all blast damage by 15% and applies to any of the explosive abilities mentioned above, along with the Ultimate. If you prefer to roll with elemental tools though, this one may not be as useful. If that's the case, maybe consider the Overclocked Regulator which increases lightning and fire damage by 35%.

Colossus Ultimate

A Freelancer's ultimate is the main draw for any Javelin, and it's undoubtedly the strongest aspect of Colossus. It's not complicated; activate it and you've got an enormous missile launcher with three shots. It deals an incredible amount of damage per shot and you can take a serious health chunk from some of the toughest enemies in Anthem.