What is Heavy Stance in Warhammer 40K Space Marine 2?

There are a handful of alternative combat styles available to you in Warhammer 40K: Space Marine 2 that you can use in various situations. You’ll hear about the Heavy Stance, but it might not be too clear what it is or how it works.

Every class in Space Marine 2 has access to a heavy stance. It might be more beneficial for certain classes based on the weapons they use in battle and how they benefit from it. You don’t always want to use your Heavy Stance, but it can significantly assist you with medium-range and long-range shootouts against hordes of enemies as they run toward you. Here’s what you need to know about how Heavy Stance works in Warhammer 40K: Space Marine 2.

How Heavy Stance works in Space Marine 2

Although Space Marine 2 refers to it as Heavy Stance, it’s a way to refer to your character aiming down their weapon’s sights for more concentrated fire. You can reliably tighten the reticle of your weapon, making it easier to hit far-away targets before they reach your position. You may have to do this when battling against Tyranids who use their Devourers, shooting down on you and your squad from an angle.

While in your character’s Heavy Stance, your movement in Space Marine 2 is significantly slower. You may want to exit the Heavy Stance when attempting to dodge enemy fire, or when multiple close-range enemies are swarming you. This is when you’ll want to switch to melee combat, hitting enemies with your knives, swords, or power hammers, depending on what weapon and class you’re using.

Even though the control settings refer to Heavy Stance as zooming with your weapon, your character does not enter an entirely new stance. They’re merely looking down sights to get better target acquisition against an enemy. It’s not similar to when you’re using a Power Sword and you’re switching from the Power Stance to the Light Stance.

If you want to ensure you don’t have to press the Heavy Stance button again to switch out of this form, head over to the Weapons, Equipment, & Interaction controls menu in your settings. Here, you can find the Aim setting, and you want to set it to Hold rather than Toggle. If you have it set to Hold, your character remains in their Heavy Stance, aiming down sights the entire time you hold the button or key.

When you let go, they exit the Heavy Stance and resume walking around normally in Space Marine 2. If you have it set to Toggle, they continue holding Heavy Stance and aiming down sights until you hit it again, or run out of the animation.

Some players may prefer to only remain aiming down sights if they hold the key rather than having to hit it a second time to leave Heavy Stance. The choice is entirely up to you while playing Space Marine 2, but hopefully this helps clear it up and provides you further context on how Heavy Stance works.