If you’re a Helldivers 2 player and feel your top-tier armor isn’t doing much to keep you alive, it’s not just you. Armor rating in Helldivers 2 simply doesn’t work thanks to an annoying bug—one everyone wants fixing ASAP.
For a game that’s proved extremely popular since launch, Helldivers 2 has suffered from a copious amount of bugs and errors, from missing Daily Orders to Super Credits disappearing. This Armor rating bug is perhaps one of the more egregious examples, especially since it seems to have plagued Helldivers 2 ever since its Feb. 8 launch.
Helldivers 2 Armor rating bug explained
We already have a dedicated guide explaining how Armor rating in Helldivers 2 works, but the long and short of it is the higher the rating, the more defense you have against melee attacks and bullets. But a high Armor rating also means the Armor will be heavier, meaning you’ll move slower on the battlefield. So, you have to decide whether you want high defense at the cost of low mobility or vice versa.
As noted in the Feb. 23 patch notes, where developer Arrowhead Game Studios touched upon known issues with Helldivers 2, “Armor values for light/medium/heavy armor do not currently function as intended.” So, a higher Armor rating isn’t giving you any extra defense. This is why so many players have opted to use lighter Armor since heavy Armor has no real benefit; all it does is make you slower and an easier target. That said, the bug doesn’t appear to affect Armor passives, which grant additional effects. So, it could be worth selecting a type of heavy Armor for missions if it has one of the better passives attached to it.
Is there a fix for the Armor rating bug in Helldivers 2?
At the time of writing, no, there unfortunately appears to be no way for you to fix this Armor rating bug yourself. All you can do is wait for an official fix from Arrowhead in a future patch, which will hopefully come sooner rather than later.
The studio has been preoccupied with Helldivers 2’s server issues, but those should be resolved thanks to the server cap being raised, which aimed to reduce queue times and allow more people to actually play the game.