New Helldivers 2 warbond brings explosive crossbow, grenade pistol, thermite, and more

Helldivers 2 CB-9 Exploding Crossbow
(Image credit: Sony)

Listen up, Helldivers! Terminids and Automatons are pushing against our efforts to bring democracy to the galaxy, so we've been delivered a whole new supply of armaments and gear to increase your efficiency at protecting our values! As you might have heard, this initiative's code name is Democratic Detonation! Catchy, right?

And if you thought it wouldn't be, understand that this is a Premium Warbond. Similar to the other two Premium Warbonds available in the game, it's likely that it'll cost 1,000 Super Credits. Now let's get down to business and see what you can get your hands on when Helldivers 2's April 11 update hits.

Everything in the Democratic Detonation Premium Warbond

Let us get the most important thing out of the way first: Firepower. The Democratic Detonation warbond is introducing three new primary weapons:

CB-9 Exploding Crossbow: This is seemingly the highlight of this update, bringing a new primary weapon that launches detonating bolts that can do serious damage to armored enemies. But be careful, it has an arc when firing.

BR-14 Adjudicator Rifle: The Adjudicator rifle is a new assault rifle with powerful armor-penetrating capabilities. It's apparently useful against "smaller groups," but we'll see what that means when we eventually get our hands on it.

R-36 Eruptor Rifle: This is a bolt-action rifle that fires bullets that are "jet-assisted," apparently exploding upon impact. It seems that it has some serious potential to do damage to your friends or yourself, so be careful with it, Helldiver!

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Beyond primary weapons, we're getting one new grenade, pistol, and booster.

G-123 Thermite Grenade: Self-explanatory. Throw this sticky grenade at an enemy and it'll light it right up.

GP-31 Grenade Pistol: If you've ever been on a mission and thought "Damn it, I'm out of grenades" and also don't often use your secondary, why not replace it with a Grenade Pistol? Close those holes and blow away those factories with it, Helldiver!

Expert Extraction Pilot Booster: If you're sick of waiting for how long it takes for extraction, especially on missions where the timer is bumped up to three or four minutes, this will reduce the total time it takes for the ship to get there. We don't know exactly by how much, but we're excited to find out.

The upcoming warbond will also feature three new capes: the Harbinger of True Equality, Eagle's Fury, and Freedom's Tapestry. Finally, a trio of new armor sets are being introduced, although we don't know exactly what their special attributes are beyond flavor text. 

The CE-27 Ground Breaker is a new medium armor set that may improve traversal. The CE-07 Demolition Specialist is a new light armor set that might have resistance to explosives and fall damage. And lastly, the FS-55 Devastator is a new heavy armor set that can keep you safe even when planting mines (who knows what that means).

We're looking forward to seeing you on April 11, Helldiver! For Democracy!

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Claire Tabari
Contributing Writer

Self-described art critic and unabashedly pretentious, Claire finds joy in impassioned ramblings about her closeness to video games. She has a bachelor’s degree in Journalism & Media Studies from Brooklyn College and five years of experience in entertainment journalism. Claire is a stalwart defender of the importance found in subjectivity and spends most days overwhelmed with excitement for the past, present and future of gaming. When she isn't writing or playing Dark Souls, she can be found eating chicken fettuccine alfredo and watching anime.