Helldivers 2 patch confirms what must be wretched Automaton sabotage, because none of my weapons are working as intended

A new Helldivers 2 patch is live now, confirming that it's not just you - a whole bunch of weapons don't really work as intended.

Earlier today, Helldivers 2 patch 1.000.203 dropped. It's a pretty small update, but the headline change is that it brings the long-awaited improvements to armor passives that have been plaguing those of us who favor the heavier builds for a while now. Beyond that, the CE-27 Ground Breaker armor has the Engineer Kit passive that it was supposed to, and Arrowhead says it's fixed a bunch of crashes and made "various improvements to stability" across the game.

What catches my eye, however, is not what the developer says it's fixed, but what it says it's got its eye on. The 'Known Issues' section of the patch notes - issues introduced in this patch or that are still being worked on - suggests that there's some low-level sabotage going on around Super Earth: an awful lot of weapons and other mechanics aren't really working as they're supposed to.

For instance, the Superior Packing Methodology module doesn't work properly, which is bad news for people who spent tons of samples on unlocking it. But it gets worse - damage over time (DOT) might only work when it's applied by the host, meaning any auxiliary Helldivers might not be doing any Bleed or Burn damage. Speaking of Bleed damage, that's not netting you any points towards your Personal Orders.

Then, there are weapons themselves that are simply not working: weapons like the Sickle can't shoot through trees, which is very bad news on some planets; scopes on weapons like the Anti-Material Rifle are misaligned, which obviously explains those headshots I've missed; Arc weapons can misfire; the Spear's targeting system is inconsistent, which means that it's less effective against the big enemies that you'd most want some extra firepower to deal with. The good news is that currently, explosions don't break your limbs (though the related impact with a nearby rock might), but that's also up for a fix.

There's no timeline as to exactly when these known issues will be addressed, so you might want to reconsider your loadout before your next drop. Personally, I'd recommend a trusty Stalwart or Machine Gun - if, as I suspect, this is all a case of Automaton sabotage, then the 'spray and pray' strategy seems like a sensible one, regardless of any technical issues.

Helldivers 2 devs are reworking "fire as a whole" after admitting the way it works now is "ridiculous".