New Helldivers 2 Commando Missions let you dive deep into enemy territory where Stratagems and reinforcements are severely limited. They're effectively Helldivers 2's answer to a hardcore mode, requiring players to pick their fights extremely carefully. At time of writing, these missions are limited to the Automaton front but might be ordered to other parts of the galaxy in time. What with them being quite different to normal missions, and being especially difficult, I've laid out everything you need to know about Commando Missions in Helldivers 2 and some tips for overcoming them.
How to beat Helldivers 2 Commando Missions
Commando Operations and their Commando Missions are essentially hardcore versions of regular missions in Helldivers 2 that severely restrict the resources you have available to you.
The most notable aspect of this is that you can only call in Stratagems when your Super Destroyer is nearby. Unlike a normal mission, your Super Destroyer can only stay in low orbit for one minute at a time, twice per mission. When a Commando Mission starts, you have one minute to call in whatever Stratagems you can. After that time, the Super Destroyer will leave and all Stratagems (including things like resupplies!) will become unavailable. Every player also gets one opportunity per mission to call their Super Destroyer back for another minute. After this, you will be without Stratagems for the rest of the mission.
You also start Commando Missions with zero reinforcements, so if you die, you're done. The only way to get more is to find Reinforcement Pod sub-objectives, which are marked on your minimap with a light blue helldiver reinforcement icon, and link the hellpods to your Super Destroyer with a unique Stratagem. Each time you do this, you'll get three reinforcements, and whenever someone dies, they will respawn directly at one of these pods rather than dropping in from orbit.
Finally, whenever an enemy calls for reinforcements in a Commando Mission, the threat level increases. This means more enemies will be in the mission area, so expect enemy patrol groups to become more common the more you get spotted and the longer a mission goes on.
Commando Mission tips
- Stealth is key: Because of your limited resources and the way threat levels escalate the more reinforcements are called in, the best approach to Commando Missions is to sneak around as much as possible. Pick your fights wisely and focus on the objectives – the more enemies you try to kill, the more likely it is one of them will call for reinforcements, so it's often best to pass by undetected.
- Bring the right gear: Since a stealth approach is so useful, I highly recommend the gear from the Helldivers 2 Redacted Regiment Warbond, especially the suppressed weapons. The Helldivers 2 Halo Warbond also has some useful armor and suppressed guns.
- You still need anti-tank weapons though: While being quiet is important you still need to bring heavy weaponry to deal with tougher enemies, such as Helldivers 2 Hulks, and fabricators. The Anti-Materiel Rifle, Railgun, and Quasar Cannon are excellent options due to their range and no backpack requirements. Bringing explosive grenades, Dynamite from the Helldivers 2 Borderline Justice Warbond, or the Grenade Pistol from the Helldivers 2 Democratic Detonation Warbond can also be useful.
- Support Stratagems are best: Because you have only a couple of opportunities to use Stratagems during a Commando Mission, your Stratagem loadout should mostly be blue support items that you can call in then come back to later – things like Supply Packs and expendable weapons like the aptly named Commando launcher are good to fall back on. With that said, having one big, powerful Stratagem that you can use to clear an enemy outpost, such as the Orbital Laser, is very useful as a last resort.
- Check your radar often: Your icon on your minimap frequently emits a radar pulse that reveals enemies, so use this to your advantage to monitor and evade enemy patrols and guards. If you use Helldivers 2 armor with the Scout passive, your minimap markers will also emit radar pulses, helping you spot enemies even more.
- Kill the little guys ASAP to stop reinforcements: The regular Automaton troopers are some of the most dangerous enemies in Commando Missions because they're the ones who can call in reinforcements and escalate the threat level. Shoot them in the head for a clean kill and execute groups of them as quickly as possible.
- Conserve your ammo and seek out POIs: Since you can only call for resupplies when your Super Destroyer is around, you need to be frugal with your ammo and make a conscious effort to find and loot any POIs you come across for ammo, stims, and grenades. To help with this, don the ODST armor with the Feet First passive as it increases the range at which you can spot POIs.
I've mentioned several Warbonds in this guide for their useful gear, but you can also check out our full Helldivers 2 Warbond tier list to see how they rank. Since Commando Missions are limited to the Bot warfront, you should know your enemy and make sure you know about the Helldivers 2 Automatons.
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