Highlights

  • New gear in Helldivers 2's Viper Commandos Warbond buffs melee damage, but not dedicated melee weapons.
  • The 50% melee damage buff on the new armor set sounds powerful on paper but can be inconsistent in actual gameplay.
  • Despite the addition of melee damage buffs, players are still waiting for proper melee weapons to be introduced in Helldivers 2.

The latest premium Warbond for Helldivers 2 finally added some new gear that fans have been requesting for a while now. However, this new gear isn’t quite what fans expected. Among several noteworthy items in Helldivers 2’s new Viper Commandos Warbond, the perks on the new armor sets from this Warbond stick out like a sore thumb.

On the one hand, Helldivers 2 adding new gear for melee builds is what the community has been begging for, so in hindsight, the overall message that this new Warbond sends is still worth celebrating. On the other hand, though, the new armor passive effect that buffs melee damage isn’t reliable enough for players to make a pure melee build on its own, leaving fans still wanting proper melee weapons in Helldivers 2.

Helldivers 2 HMG sentry Automatons
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Helldivers 2 Players Want Dedicated Melee Weapons

Adding dedicated melee weapons to Helldivers 2 has been a popular request among fans since the game’s release, especially considering that melee weapons were a thing in the first Helldivers, and Helldivers 2 has a habit of reintroducing items from the original game. So, letting players give enemies a taste of their own medicine with melee weapons in Helldivers 2 could be a great opportunity for the franchise to come full circle and provide a massive service to fans.

At one point, a member of Arrowhead Studios previously stated that melee weapons coming to Helldivers 2 is a possibility. Consequently, fans have been patiently waiting for this dream to come true, since there hasn’t been any information to suggest melee weapons are off the table now. With the new Viper Commandos Warbond in Helldivers 2, this dream has partly come true, although the desire for Helldivers 2 to add melee weapons has inevitably grown since this new Warbond was added.

Helldivers 2’s Viper Commandos Warbond Was a Missed Opportunity

Helldivers 2’s New Peak Physique Armor Perk

  • Increases melee damage by 50%. Improves weapon handling with less drag on weapon movement.

On paper, a 50% melee damage buff sounds pretty powerful, although melee attacks in Helldivers 2 can be inconsistent. This is seemingly due to the lack of agency players have when it comes to aiming with their melee attack, so it’s not always easy to hit an enemy’s weak point, especially for larger enemies or when fighting on uneven terrain. Considering that dedicated melee weapons could potentially solve this problem while also helping the new armor from the Viper Commandos Warbond reach its full potential, Helldivers 2 should arguably bite the bullet on introducing melee weapons at this point.

Even with the new armor set bonus, it can still take countless amounts of melee attacks to kill anything other than the weakest Automaton and Terminid enemy types. Assuming that Helldivers 2 adds dedicated melee weapons in a future update, this armor will still get a chance to shine in the spotlight, but on its own, it’s arguably not very practical, especially considering the current best armor perks in Helldivers 2 that the new Viper Commandos armor sets have to compete with.

The developers of Helldivers 2 take players' feedback seriously, so we might actually see dedicated Melee weapons in the game sooner or later.

The new Viper Commandos Warbond adding gear that buffs players’ melee damage shows that the developers of Helldivers 2 are taking players’ feedback into consideration for recent updates to the game. This is especially nice to see after several waves of controversial updates for Helldivers 2 started to affect the game’s reputation. However, the new Peak Physique armor perk shouldn’t mean that future updates shouldn’t add proper melee weapons, considering that these have continued to be one of the most requested features among the community since the launch of Helldivers 2.