I tested ALL BOOSTERS in HELLDIVERS 2 so you don't have to

Boosters are reusable items that you bring with you on a dive and they provide additional team-wide buffs. These are unlockable with Medals in Warbonds. There are currently seven in the game. Six are in the Helldivers Mobilize Warbond, and the Steeled Veterans Warbond contains one.

Boosters Tested:
Hellpod Space Optimization
Vitality Enhancement
UAV Recon
Stamina Enhancement
Muscle Enhancement
Increased Reinforcement Budget
Flexible Reinforcement Budget

Chapters:
00:00 Intro
00:33 WTF is a Booster?
00:54 Hellpod Space Optimization
03:27 Vitality Enhancement
06:34 UAV Recon
08:28 Stamina Enhancement
09:45 Muscle Enhancement
11:10 Increased Reinforcement Budget
12:17 Flexible Reinforcement Budget
13:26 What's good?

[cashcrop_]

Thank you so much for an unbelievable reception to my first Helldivers 2 video. I historically have responded to every comment I've received. I'll do my best here, heh.
I do like to create a pinned comment with corrections (timestamps), suggestions, tips, and any additional clarity provided in the comments with attribution of who provided the help. I'll do the same here, but it will take a while to go through.

I have found a use-case that I like for Improved Reinforcement Budget. I run it on Defense missions since UAV Recon and Muscle Enhancement are relatively useless with the current meta of "hang by your turrets."

[johnprice]

Honestly, just having maxed ammo and stims on every drop makes Space Op top tier for me, especially with the armors that increase your nades and stims.

[JohnXuandou]

One of the things you didn't mention with the UAV Recon booster is that if someone on the team is running Scout armor that allows them to ping the area around a placed marker on the map, the ping distance gets the same increase in range, which effectively lets a Scout survey anywhere on the map in a massive radius for massively increased knowledge of the area. It's insanely useful.

[ArchAngelLevon]

Hey cashcrop_, I am one of the only people editing the Helldivers 2 Wiki. Thanks to you I was able to create the "Boosters" page based on like 20% of my own knowledge and 80% of what's in your video.

You are credited at the bottom of the wiki page by name and video title. You truly are a Super Citizen.

[zachsniffin]

A couple more benefits from the Muscle Enhancement booster; the slow effects from hunters and the bug mines is significantly reduced, maybe 80-90% it feels like

[tronytroo]

A lot of youtubers tend to just splatter statistics all over the screen, ramble for 30 seconds at the speed of light, and then skip on to something completely different without giving you any time to actually process the information. The way you take it slow and do your best to explain whats going on- I cannot overstate how much I appreciate it. Not to mention you have a really nice voice

[inconsideratebox]

Some additional information (hope these help!)

- *Vitality Enhancement* also increases your total HP / Armor by roughly 50 points. For example, Trailblazer Scout (as of 3/22/24) has 50 total armor. With the VE booster, you can increase this total armor value to 100. Knowing this makes VE a much more appealing option imo. Makes you bulkier in all ways (including getting shot in the head), which is always awesome.

- I've heard some hearsay around *UAV Recon* also boosting the radar distance from your pings while running armor with the Scout passive. This hasn't been confirmed on my part, but if it's true, this seems amazing. Scout was already one of the best passives in the game, but this only makes it better. For those unaware, the Scout armor passive will apply a radar to your map pings that reveals enemies around it.

- *Muscle Enhancement* will also reduce slow effects on your Helldiver. I have a video on my channel proving this claim for those who are curious (I got the footage and did the testing myself). This means that Hunters will not slow you down as bad with the ME booster equipped, which I bet many people will really like.

- Although not in the video, the new *Localization Confusion* booster will increase both patrol and bug breach / bot drop cooldown times by around 15-30 seconds. Every time a patrol spawns, a cooldown will begin, which prevents any other patrols from spawning until the timer is up and the game concludes that you need more baddies on you. This is the same for breaches and drops, with their cooldowns preventing endless breaches / drops from spawning.

^ _The cooldown for both these events decreases the higher your difficulty goes up, and Localization Confusion will *always* increase the cooldown period by a flat 15-30 seconds. That means Localization increases in value the higher you go in difficulty.

[dragomusic]

(Many Helldivers were harmed in the making of this video)

[CommandantLennon]

The most important thing about radar is that it pings "invisible" objectives like stalker lairs and SEAF Artillery platforms as question marks. In open maps you tend to just stumble across them, but low-vis and jungle maps are a little bit harder to spot objectives in.

[ADirtyEwok]

I find the UAV Booster much more important than the Vitality Booster, especially in Helldive difficulty. UAV allows you to more consistently avoid patrols, and therefore breaches or drops, which usually makes or breaks those runs.

[Sotanaht]

For the Space Optimization booster, you are forgetting to factor in the loaded mag/ammo into your counts. So it would be more accurate to say that the breaker has 6/8 mags, or that the Senator has 38/46 rounds. The slugger starts with 17/16 loaded, so keep that in mind as well.

[SaniFakhouri]

7:26 As someone who sprints with the map open, I've noticed that the radar ping does keep up with you as you move, but it definitely isn't granular (it takes a bit of time for it to update and catch up to the sprint).

[SecretPurpleQ]

The only thing i can tell about arm injuries is weapon swivel/swing speed is reduced. It takes longer for the reticle/gun to actually get to where you are aiming when you change your point of aim dramatically. It is a REALLY insignificant detriment UNTIL higher difficulties and then its a LITTLE of a hamper but still not really crippling.

Also for strength enhancement, idk about regular slopes but it DEFINITELY helps a HUGE HUGE amount when running up deep snow or deep sand slopes. So handy.

[Sotanaht]

10:15 for the randomization issues, you can repeat the exact same mission if you disconnect. Simply drop into the mission, do your test, shut off your internet, reconnect, and then drop back into the same mission.

[messypeter]

great video! its surprising (but appreciated) how good the first few boosters you get are, with every further booster getting more niche as it goes on further

[xdgamefreak]

10:16 if the fireteam leader starts a mission and than closes the game, a new person will be be leader. The person who quit can now rejoin the team. If u finish the mission, the original fireteam leader hasn’t finished the mission on his wartable. He can leave to his own ship and stat the EXACT SAME mission again. This might help for testing. (And yes you can get loot from the same mission multiple times, yes you can farm samples since you know exactly where they are and yes you can farm more medals if you do this with the last mission in a sector)

[kentucky_bandit]

Dude, TY for doing so much legwork for the community. HD2 is really becoming a great supportive community, and I am here for it.

[kheionai]

My favorite Bone'ead is now tackling the enemies of Super Earth with his amazing skills of video production and data analysis. So thankful for an excellent youtuber like you.

[Tigersight]

For the muscle enhancement - try testing it with brush. You know, those bushes that make you stagger and slow to a crawl. See if it lets you power through them without the normal slowdown. That's what I'd expect it to do based on the description, anyway.
And as others have said, see if it also affects other types of slows - spitter, hunter, EMS, etc.

[Ifyoucanreadthisgooglebroke]

I'd like to throw in another number for the stamina booster. If it is increasing total stamina by 30% and causes stamina to return to full 23% faster then the increase to stamina recovery is almost 69%. It is increasing that bar of stamina that is 30% larger, in 23% less time after all. 1.3 stamina/.77 time to full recovery = 1.6883 stamina recovered/time. That is huge.
Edit: And I'd argue that is the number that really matters, as it is the number that represents how much more total running you can do. (Wrong:) Almost 69% more running with the stamina booster.
Edit 2: First edit comment didn't take into account time spent depleting stamina and so it doesn't hold. So the way to express the benefit of the stamina booster as applies to how much you get to run goes into 'lies, damn lies, and statistics' places quick, but some of the most relevant numbers to choose from are:
You have to spend about 22% of the time not running without, or 15% of the time not running with.
You can run 78% of the time without, or 85% of the time with.
You are stuck unable to run for 32% less of your time with.
You can spend 7% more total time running with.
I lean towards the 32% less time spent unable to run as the most on-point expression given the urgent nature of running whenever you are actually bottoming out your stamina bar. 32% less of that time.