This new live event holiday event for Helldivers 2, called the Festival of Reckoning, includes a slew of temporary Stratagems and celebratory Major Orders. Running two weeks, from December 18 to December 31, it marks a vast expansion beyond last year’s brief three-day window. This year, developers have created the satirical lore of the game stating that the Reckoning Fund is flush with credits so as to ensure that there can be a longer stretch of high-explosion festivities everywhere across the galaxy.
Central to the update are “experimental” variants of the Stratagems, which players can freely access during this event period. These are augmentations of existing orbital and eagle strikes with unique elemental or tactical effects. Examples include a 120mm EMS projectile meant for wide area stunning, a Gatling Barrage carrying incendiary rounds and an Orbital Walking Barrage which launches smoke screens for troop movements. Beyond these changes, Arrowhead has hinted that even certain Premium Warbond Stratagems will either be thrown into the free rotation to keep them accessible to all players, thereby allowing them to experience higher-tier arsenal.
The experimental variations have therefore sparked new discussions within the community around creating quasi-permanent Stratagem personalization. With Chief Executive Officer Shams Jorjani recently declaring he is “100% for” a more complex customization system, many older players see the event as a live balance test. By monitoring how players use incendiary Gatling rounds or artillery that causes heavy suspension, the development team can gather the necessary data around power creep and utility before instituting what will likely be a dedicated “upgrade tree” for ship modules sometime next year.
This festive rollout comes at a pertinent moment for Helldivers 2 following a very intense session of technical stabilization. Now that the studio has dealt with some severe performance issues, in addition to bloat file sizes that peaked at 150GB on PC, the stream of content is returning to a steady cadence. While players eye new holiday Major Orders, the Festival of Reckoning serves also as a reward for that hard-core playing base and as an initial look at the mechanical depth Arrowhead intends to bring to the Galactic War in 2025.
