u/ByteManager

Made tumbnail but realised you can't add it to pre-existing post :(

Whilst SM2 is a great game and all, I don't understand why Saber fails to explain even the most basic mechanics of their game to new players. So, here is a list of vital information the game doesn’t tell you explicitly, but you should probably know.

I know many new players will want to read this so I am listing them based on relevancy and player knowledge level according to the in-game operation difficulty levels (Though almost all of these rules apply for every difficulty). Read up to the difficulty you are currently playing on so you are not overwhelmed with information. If you are playing on lethal or absolute you should know all of these.

Rules:

- Mechanics only find their way here if the game does not explain them at all or the explanation provided is vague or useless.

- Information about hidden items are not included, because you are supposed to discover them yourself.

- Any mechanics that are explained in game (e.g. what is contested health) are obviously not included here.

- Multiplayer guidelines (e.g. who gets armour boosts) are also not included.

- Tips on how to play with certain classes / perks will not be included unless a class ability / perk is not explained properly in game.

The general vibe I am going for is the quick "did you know" tips you get in some games (e.g. minecraft), they explain only the mechanic or minor suggestions, leaving the rest for the player to figure out.

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Minimal / Average

- The word "Hard" in this game describes endgame content. Hard Siege and Stratagems are not early game content, even if you can join as a new player.

 

- Contested health is regenerated based on your dps. As such it is best regenerated with fast firing / high damage ranged weapons, NOT melee weapons in most cases.

 

- Armoury Data can be used to instantly master a weapon variant that you have unlocked and give you a weapon perk point. Simply long hold the weapon variant to do so.

 

- There are three melee weapon parry windows:

1. Fencing = parry when attack hits, very generous but weapons have lower damage.
2. Balance = parry slightly before the attack hits, if you parry like fencing you only get a block with no gun strike.
3. Block = same as fencing but the window is the least generous in the game, and instead of gun strikes on perfect parry, you gain an adrenaline surge, which buffs your next melee attacks,

With the block window: If you start an attack with one stack surge, you deal +30% damage for 2.2 seconds after that attack finishes. If you start an attack with two stages, you deal +90% damage for 2.2 seconds, gain +1 armor segment (on first hit during the buff window), get heavy stagger applied to all melee hits during buff and cause an AOE explosion with heavy stagger]

If you played the campaign, any weapon there is using the balance window. Heavy's is also using the balance window by default for his weapons (except for the heroic weapon).

- A segment of the armour bar tanks more damage than a health bar, especially on higher difficulties, despite them looking to be of the same length. This is because armour bars can tank at least one melee attack (regardless of how much damage is dealt. This most armour one melee attack can break is one). However, ranged enemies can break through more than one armour per attack and can damage your health (they can one-shot you).

- If you have a mortal wound, you get sent to a respawn counter if you die again. You can get rid of it by using a medicate stim when you are close to full health (so that the stim "overheals" you). Reminder: Restorative stims heal mostly contested health (so hit enemies after using it). Medicate stims heal mainly effective health.

- All Enemies will regain control after spending some time in the execution state. They can also be killed with normal weapons even in execution state. Additionally, you can also melee an executable Majoris (or above) enemy to get an opportunity to gunstrike them and gain armour that way if you wish. Choose your method of elimination wisely.

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Substantial

- Running attacks (press shift and attack) on a Minoris enemy guarantees you the opportunity to do a gun strike and gain 1 armour. Perfect parrying Minoris melee units also gives one armour, but it is riskier if you don't know how to parry them. Both of these methods work regardless of weapon used.

- Any enemy attack with hit indicators MAY NOT actually hit when the indicator flashes. Time your parry/dodge based on when the enemy weapon makes contact with your marine, not when the indicator comes on.

- All hit indicators in this game are shown to only one player at a time (the one the enemy is locking on to), an attack may still hit and damage you even if you receive no indication to dodge (because it was meant for your teammate). As such, try not to melee the same Majoris as your teammates, shoot them with your sidearm instead.

- There are animation locks in this game. You need to finish the animation of one action before doing the next one. This is especially important for parrying/rolling, DO NOT SPAM any of these, it will not help you, learn to do these actions at the right time.

- There are only two sources of invincibility frames in this game. The first is rolling, which has around half a second of invincibility when you initiate the dodge, but you are NOT invincible when you are in the animation of "getting up" post-roll (this is an animation lock). The second is through perks/abilities (e.g. sniper + assult prestige perk, techmarine sentry perk, vanguard grapple etc.)

- Stacked green supply crates can be broken with a roll to drop certain items. The loot is dependent on your current condition. If you are on very low health, you are likely to get stims.

- Weapon damage numbers in their stats do not always equate to how much actual “points of damage" they do. The best way to use them is to compare different variants of the same type of weapon (e.g. master-crafted alpha vs. beta). Gun strike damage is also scaled with the gun’s damage values (Link).

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Ruthless

- Medicate stims in this game heals both effective and contested health. It will heal any contested health you have, plus around 35% (50 % on minimal) of effective health instantly. Do not confuse this with restoriative stims which only gives you extra contested health (Note that it does give 5 % effective and can actually heal mortal wounds when you are basically full health).

- Melta bombs and pyro bombs detonated by your or your teammate’s ranged attacks are considered neutral damage, which can damage your entire team. So, place your melta bombs away from any flamethrower and melta weapon users.

To clarify this, we will picture the following two situations:

1. Teammate A places a melta, does not press the button to detonate it, while teammate B decides to shoot it with a ranged weapon. This melta will now explode, all players and enemies will take damage from it.
2. Teammate A places melta, presses detonate button ("g" key on PC), the melta goes off. Only teammate A and enemies will be damaged by it. Teammates B and C only take stagger, but no damage.

We want to avoid situation 1 because it can kill your entire team.  

- In absolute difficulty, the Terminus enemy you get is guaranteed to spawn with Extremis and Majoris reinforcements. These happen when the terminus enemy spawns, and again when it reaches half hp. Prepare for this. A typical mission spawns 2 Terminus, minus one if there is a mission boss fight.

- No matter how many enemies surround you, only around 4 Majoris or above enemies can melee you at the same time. Ranged enemies and minoris can still attack you (minoris melee may not attack if you are engaging a lot of Majoris, but 4+ minoris melee can still swarm you).

- Duelist perk (extending parry window) does not work properly on balanced and fencing weapons. This occurs because the parry window actually gets extended beyond the time frame allocated for the parry animation. (As of patch 13.2). It is usually not advised to pick this perk under most circumstances.

- Any perks with the description "You do not stagger from heavy hits and cannot be knocked back" is not described properly. In actuality, the game reduces the "staggering" effect from attacking by one stage. I.e. attacks that make you fall to the ground will be replaced with a simple stagger, and weaker effects don't affect you at all. Also, this perk doesn't work with every attack, so it is quite situational.

- When using the bulwark perk "Invigorating Icon", it is possible to heal all of your teammates with one Terminus execution. Normally, you can heal your teammates with the banner by dropping it right before or while a teammate is executing an enemy. However, with terminus enemies, it is possible to heal your entire team like so: When all players and executable Terminus enemy are in the range of one banner, one player (not bulwark obviously) starts the execution, and at the same time bulwark drops the banner. In this case, all players will get healed by the same banner.

- You can monitor your teammates with the UI. Teammate health bars are always on the left of your screen. If their class icon is lit up with a shield icon, it means they have some armour left.

- You can see what team perks and loot items your teammates have by pressing TAB on PC (Console players comment below the key for you guys) to . Take note of this every so often.

- Some heroic weapons in this game have hidden features that are not clearly stated in their heroic perk description. Search them up online if you want to be sure. The most notable examples are:

1.      Ardent Edge parries can stop enemy combos

2.      Heroic bolt sniper cannot be buffed by any ammo-related perks

3.  The heroic power fist (fencing version) will give you a guarenteed gunstrike on a Majoris or higher enemy after you do an execution. That enemy must be in view of your camera when the execution finishes.
   

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Comment any more unexplained mechanics below, I will add them to the list. I know the ordering may not be the best, you are welcome to comment on any changes.

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The emperor shall bless the following contributors to this list:

MalteseFarrell - Bulwark perk

AntaresDestiny - clarifying block buffs, no knockback perk and duelist.

lycanreborn123 - Melta bomb mechanics

d3r3kr - game UI, armour properties, enemy attacking limit, gun strike majoris kill