4 of Helldivers 2’s Worst Boosters Deserve a Second Wind

The booster meta in Helldivers 2 is second-nature. Like a primary or secondary weapon you’ve dedicated your build to, you’ll come to intimately know the booster meta by the ‘big four,’ which are, for some reason, optional gameplay modifiers that you must equip, and not simply a ship upgrade that can then apply to gameplay ubiquitously.

This has created a vast graveyard of boosters that may never be wielded in harder difficulties or when players have completed all progression routes. While I don’t think any improvements could be drastic enough to have them ever considered S-tier, the four worst boosters in Helldivers 2 merit substantial overhauls.

Helldivers 2’s best boosters are unmistakably and invariably Vitality Enhancement, Stamina Enhancement, Hellpod Space Optimization, and Experimental Infusion, due to their effects being so overwhelmingly fundamental. You’ll often see players selecting seemingly random boosters, to be sure, but it is widely agreed upon that nothing comes close to shattering the ceiling on this meta.

I can’t help myself—Stamina Enhancement and Experimental Infusion, for instance, are my bread and butter in Arrowhead’s live-service shooter. I’d feel naked without one or the other, and it’s obvious why all four of the most OP boosters are phenomenal. Do not be mistaken, though, as this is not good for the game’s balance and longevity. Helldivers 2 boasts a total of 17 boosters thus far, and the 13 that remain will never break into the meta and belong to a sea of mediocrity:

All Helldivers 2 Boosters, Effects, and Warbond Releases

Helldivers 2’s Worst Boosters, in No Particular Order

• Dead Sprint
• Increased Reinforcement Budget
• Sample Extricator
• Sample Scanner

Unlike the stalwart, unshakable meta, debating which boosters are F-tier is far more subjective and contextual. For example, you might loathe Helldivers 2’s Firebomb Hellpods because you’ve been immolated by teammates in several bouts of friendly fire after they’ve reinforced or whenever any miscellaneous Hellpod landed nearby, but I quite enjoy Firebomb Hellpods when I demand absolute annihilation, such as on Eradicate missions.

Moreover, I can understand why you may dislike Expert Extraction Pilot when it’s literally redundant on Helldivers 2’s Eradicate and Evacuate missions, and practically futile elsewhere, too, yet I don’t see it being as horribly offensive as it is superfluous. The four boosters that I claim are the worst—Dead Sprint, Increased Reinforcement Budget, Sample Extricator, and Sample Scanner—may not be your least-favorite, as I’m basing them on my experience with the game.

Though I think nearly all of Helldivers 2’s miscellaneous, non-meta boosters could be dismissed or removed completely without many players wincing, I’d hope that even the worst of them could be buffed in order to resuscitate them and introduce compelling reasons as to why anybody should equip them. Indeed, if the meta is to be crushed and the floodgates opened to new booster incentives, Helldivers 2’s gameplay may need much more than buffs for its worst boosters.

Can Helldivers 2’s Worst Boosters Be Redeemed?

Increased Reinforcement Budget is egregious as it only grants players a singular bonus reinforcement per teammate for a maximum of four, and there’s no circumstance playing on Helldivers 2’s Level 10 Super Helldive difficulty where that would turn the tide in a grueling encounter, or when I’d be grateful that someone equipped this booster in place of almost anything else. Let’s say that a hypothetical buff gave players five or more reinforcements per teammate, then. In this case, the number of reinforcements would be hyperbolic.

Maybe more players would equip it if they feared mission failure, but mission success is rarely as dependent on how many Helldivers 2 reinforcements players have left as much as it is determined by whether players are coordinating efficiently and ensuring the main mission objective is complete before they ever have to worry about dwindling reinforcements. So, while only one extra reinforcement per Helldiver is bad, whatever number it’d be increased to would need to strike a balance between impotence and excess.

As a Helldiver who exclusively runs light armor and depends wholly on the Stamina Enhancement and Experimental Infusion boosters, Dead Sprint is basically a death sentence, if not a critical impediment to my playstyle, and I condemn it to my personal list of worst Helldivers 2 boosters as a result. I can’t wrap my head around ever wanting to sacrifice health to run, and I’m honestly not certain if Dead Sprint could ever have a ‘second wind’ since it’s so niche.

There are methods of supplementing this booster, namely with the Med-Kit armor passive, but it comes nowhere near competing with the ‘big four.’ If anything, Helldivers 2’s Dead Sprint would need to grant me incredible speed and endless stamina, and even then, I’d overlook it just as easily; the fact that it’s punitive without a half-decent incentive is baffling, and I wish I could comprehend why anyone would prioritize it as is. Does it deserve a buff? I think so, but omitting it from the game would be no less of a saving grace.

My gripes with the game’s two sample boosters are twofold: firstly, it’s not lost on me that I’m nearly a max-level veteran with no need for samples any longer beyond obligations to donate toward Helldivers 2’s Democracy Space Station (DSS), whereas newer recruits will likely find these boosters fairly helpful as they pursue ship modules; and secondly, they are unfathomably lackluster in their current state.

I admire these sample boosters because I like to think that they’d make farming less of a chore for players who are still painstakingly unlocking Helldivers 2 ship modules. Unfortunately, the chore becomes praying that these boosters will proc when you want them to, and, particularly at Level 10, you and your team are most likely suffering from it.

Regardless, there’s no buff or improvement that Dead Sprint, Increased Reinforcement Budget, Sample Extricator, or Sample Scanner could receive that would make it worth substituting in for any of the ‘big four’ in Helldivers 2’s booster meta, and I’m sincerely hoping that Arrowhead conceives of a godly booster to eclipse one of them, or decides to turn the ‘big four’ into standard ship upgrades so that players can creatively experiment with dynamic booster permutations thereafter.

Released

February 8, 2024

ESRB

Mature 17+ / Blood and Gore, Intense Violence, In-Game Purchases, Users Interact

Developer(s)

Arrowhead Game Studios, Nixxes

Publisher(s)

Sony Interactive Entertainment, PlayStation Publishing