The latest Helldivers 2 patch introduced plenty of balancing changes, including several nerfs to weapons from the Democratic Detonation Warbond—and players are frustrated.
One of the weapons that got hit by the nerf hammer is the CB-9 Exploding Crossbow. In Patch 01.000.300, the crossbow’s stagger was increased at the cost of the explosion, and players aren’t impressed. A Helldivers 2 player shared a video on Reddit that summarizes everything you need to know about this nerf.
In the clip, a Helldiver aims and shoots the crossbow close to the Automaton soldier’s feet, and the so-called “explosion” does absolutely nothing to the enemy. Players pointed out that developer Arrowhead might as well rename this crossbow the Concussive Crossbow because of its increased stagger.
“I just started liking that wep for larger enemy groups, guess I can throw it out of my arsenal now that it doesn’t do the thing I liked using it for,” one Helldiver wrote, and many agreed these nerfs would remove the whole point of the Exploding Crossbow. Another highlighted that this clip wouldn’t sell the Democratic Detonation Warbond if it were in the trailer because there’s not much detonation left in the weapon.
An Arrowhead developer, Alexus, shared on Discord that the crossbow is now more of a “single-target” tool against medium enemies like Scorcher, as the Exploding Crossbow has medium armor penetration, even though this isn’t clear in the weapon’s details. Despite that, many players are left unhappy the weapon can’t be used as a wave-clearing tool anymore since there are other weapons, like the R-36 Eruptor, to deal with tankier enemies.
