Helldivers 2 is getting a new Warbond tomorrow: Cutting Edge, a “battle pass” packed with high-tech zappers, fancy armor, and a few new fancy hats.
If you’re used to the live service and unfamiliar with the game, this news may fill you with dread and send you scrambling for medals and super credits. Well, I got orders from Super Earth high command and it says to take a deep breath and relax.
As mentioned by the devs before starting work, Warbonds aren’t meant to be FOMO machines – not only can you earn them with elbow grease (as I personally did after 30 hours of bugs and bots), they don’t disappear when a new one appears. To reiterate: When Cutting Edge is out, Steeled Veterans will remain.
However, if you want to get into Cutting Edge right away, you may want to stock up on super credits (the game’s premium currency). Helldivers 2 has a shop page with spinning gear pieces and it’s very attractive, but the game’s free and premium Warbonds give a limited amount of super credits. Grinding them in the game is less consistent, so if you spend your super credits now, it will be harder to cash out of Cutting Edge later.
Going forward, this could be a game for cash-strapped players. Earn 1000 super credits before spending any extra dosh – then let the new Warbond’s freebies contribute to the next one.
However, I wonder if Arrowhead plans to make any changes to super credit in the coming years. Don’t get me wrong, as my fellow writer Morgan Park pointed out last month, Helldivers 2 has the fairest monetization we’ve seen in a while. This system objectively rules, but may require future testing.
If we earn eight Warbonds or more in a year, new players will have a huge challenge to unlock everything. It’s not inherently a bad thing, and it’s better than these things just disappearing – but I can see things being overkill, especially with no way to test Warbond-specific weapons before buying them.