Helldivers 2 finally buffs mechs with double durability, and in unrelated news, Arrowhead is selling new mechs for $10

Many Helldivers 2 fans weren’t thrilled to learn last week that Arrowhead is locking two new mechs behind the $10 Exo Experts warbond. It’s the first time the vehicle has seen any evolution in two years, and the decision to sell its flamethrowing and grenade-lobbing variants furthers a trend of all (not just some) new Helldivers 2 equipment coming with a price tag.

To help ease the tension, and make the premium mechs more enticing, Arrowhead is introducing sweeping buffs to all mechs (including the ones you can unlock for free) in patch 6.2.2, which dropped at the same time as Exo Experts today:

We agree with the community that the exosuits can take too little damage and break too easily, especially against the Automaton faction. Therefore we have made a bigger balance pass to increase its durability.

• Increased main health pool from 850 to 1600
• The exosuit will only die if the main healthpool is depleted. Before it could die if specific healthzones were depleted.
• Increased vulnerability to acid attacks by 50%
• Fixed so parts of the cockpit healthzones are not blocked by the ragdoll actor. Now the cockpit zones will be damageable in the right way.
• Increased Exo suit arms health from 350 to 600
• Exo suit arms now also have a 50% explosion resistance (just like the main body)
• Removed constitution and bleedout on the Exo suit arms.
• Exosuits no longer lose all mobility when both legs are broken.
• Can now be staggered, have stagger strength 45. Stagger does not affect the ability to shoot.
• Removed most health zones that do not affect the main health and are mainly visual effects. The reason is to improve performance. For example tow cables and similar items can not be damaged or destroyed anymore.

That’s a major upgrade to exosuit viability no matter how you slice it, though Arrowhead has also increased the damage that Terminids deal to vehicles because they have “fallen behind” the other two factions. While past updates have addressed mech durability in smaller ways, I have high hopes for them now—the fantasy of calling down a mech is to go from fragile meat sack to unstoppable metal monster, and that’s never fully clicked with its meager health pool.

Exosuit updates are just one of the highlights of patch 6.2.2. The full list, which you can also watch Arrowhead talk through in video form, also touches on buffs for a few black sheep stratagems like the FAF-14 Spear, TX-41 Sterilizer, and a huge durability boost for the Ballistic Shield Backpack.

Two new spring-themed map biomes have entered the mix as well—the fields of blooming tulips should contrast nicely with the neon yellow glow of bug blood.