Helldivers 2's overpowered, wildly fun tank is the culmination of two years of balancing

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I hope the Bastion tank is a sign of what's to come in Helldivers 2.

helldivers 2 bastion tank
(Image credit: Arrowhead)

There once was a time when climbing into a vehicle in Helldivers 2 was tantamount to strapping a bomb to your back. Be it jeeps that couldn't survive a fender bender or mechs that exploded when a bug glanced at them menacingly—Helldivers 2 pilots could burn bright, but not for long. I'm glad those days are over: Today's Helldivers 2 update added a long-awaited vehicle from the first game—the Bastion tank destroyer—and it's a work of art.

Weighing in at approximately four kajillion pounds, the TD-220 Bastion MK XVI is a new free stratagem available to all players as part of Super Earth's full-on offensive toward Cyberstan, the Automaton stronghold in the outer reaches of bot territory. The tank(destroyer) seats four divers: a driver, a gunner, and two passengers on its shoulders. It's armed with a "heavy coaxial machinegun" and a "120mm high-velocity cannon."

Even the Bastion's limitations are fun. It's quite slow—like maybe 10% faster than just hoofing it yourself—and it has the turning radius of a four-lane overpass. All that bite comes at a price, like how the Bastion's cannon can't rotate on the X-axis. That means the gunner can only shoot within a rough cone in front of the tank, and it's up to the driver to whip them around to other targets. It feels a little silly if you're used to how tanks usually operate in games, but it has the fun side effect of making the driver an active participant in the destruction. And if you're curious, the locked turret design is based on real early tank destroyers (thanks to readers for pointing that one out).

I have no notes, which is nice, because I don't believe earlier iterations of Helldivers 2 would've allowed a powerful new tool like this to have so few downsides. Arrowhead enjoys that Helldivers is a punishing game that forces you to constantly switch up your game plan, and so do I, but I always found that making a vehicle or mech as dispensable as a rocket launcher diminished their identity.

In the past, I would've assumed the rollout of tanks to go this way: players get tanks, immediately complain that they're too flimsy to be useful, and two months later Arrowhead makes them better. Instead, one of the top-upvoted posts on the Helldivers 2 subreddit right now is someone roleplaying an Automaton complaining about how overpowered the Bastion is.

As it should be. Vehicles are big investments! They take up one of just four slots in a loadout that you could otherwise pack with personal nukes or reliable turrets. Vehicles are slow to deliver, carry a huge cooldown, and in the case of the jeep and Bastion, require co-op to be useful. It stands to reason that they should be dominant. Seeing a drop ship fly in to deliver armor support should feel like a fresh wave of cavalry has arrived to bail your squad out of a jam.

So cash in those Reqs you've been saving for a rainy day (35,000 are needed to unlock the Bastion) and join the armored assault toward Cyberstan.

Morgan Park
Morgan Park
Staff Writer

Morgan has been writing for PC Gamer since 2018, first as a freelancer and currently as a staff writer. He has also appeared on Polygon, Kotaku, Fanbyte, and PCGamesN. Before freelancing, he spent most of high school and all of college writing at small gaming sites that didn't pay him. He's very happy to have a real job now. Morgan is a beat writer following the latest and greatest shooters and the communities that play them. He also writes general news, reviews, features, the occasional guide, and bad jokes in Slack. Twist his arm, and he'll even write about a boring strategy game. Please don't, though.

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