So you like
BIG
Guns huh?
Let me introduce you to the HEAVY Pulse Rifle. (bipodded)
This baby shoots at a terrifying 600 rpm, with the same bullets you load into your mk2.
Field-tested, battle-hardened.
WHY is it the "obliterator"?
Simple.
The gun does 400-300 DPS to light targets (results may vary), which is just about triple that of your Mk2.
Against armored targets it slowly tapers off - however it still remains better then mk2 ap up until you face 40 armor foes.
Once it gets to 50 armor - it is almost useless. Firerate won’t save you there.
For comparison, a m2c has 400 armor-piercing dps in a perfect environment. Considering the m2c’s low accuracy, it will often be more around 300 dps. The HPR has great accuracy though, and an easily portable bipod system.
Armor Performance
|Armor Value | DPS|
Melts (2-3 second per kill)
0-5 // 400 DPS
10 // 360 DPS
15 (Spitter) // 330 DPS
20 (Warrior) // 300 DPS
Chunks (4-6 second per kill // often enemy can disengage)
25 (Unempowered Rav, Prae, Boiler, Queen) // 220 DPS
30 (Crusher) // 180 DPS
35 (Defender) // 150 DPS
40 (Crested Defender) // 110 DPS
Wet Noodle (dont waste your bullets)
45 (Fortified Steelcrest, Max Berserk Berserker) // 80 DPS
50 (Charger from the front) / 50 DPS
65 (Fortified Defender) / 0 DPS
The Guide
This guide will have 3 sections of information. Basic, Intermediate, and Adept.
While the HPR is a very effective weapon (even for newbies), there is certainly ways to make it better.
This unique gun relies a lot on positioning and timing. With its high DPS though, it will often burst an enemy to death without needing to chase it down. Especially if you surprise an enemy.
Always keep in mind - you singlehandedly wield the power of 3 mk2 gunners. Your strength is the suppression you can provide, as well as high burst dmg capability.
Basic
The basic section will go over the necessary knowledge, in order to use the HPR effectively.
Hotkeys
You’ll need to set a activate-underbarrel-attachment keybind. No other keybinds are necessary to use this weapon.
You can set it to any key on the keyboard. You will probably use the key frequently.
Attachments
Reflex sights reduce the spread and is a good choice. It can slightly help you against FFing allies, aswell as occasions where you have a clear shot on an enemy, but another enemy is right next to them - and as such the bullet might hit the second enemy instead.
Usually, it’s pretty insignificant. Choose any rail attachment you want.
The only attachment you truly need is a bipod. (if you’re going for bipod hpr)
Suppressor gives almost no debuffs too - the sound is nice, and no muzzle flash is nice.
It’s a option if you prefer the normal hpr sound or the suppressed sound
(suppressor vs no suppressor)
Full Auto // Use Controlled Bursts!
First off, set the firemode to Automatic
If you hold down LMB with full auto, it will steadily gain more and more scatter.
Accuracy is usually ideal - so use controlled bursts! This means dont hold down your LMB for an extended amount of time. Instead, hold it down for bursts of bullets.
Bipod // Where can you shoot?
You can shoot in this whole area (everything at the blue line and further), in the direction you are facing.
All diagonals count.
Your character may turn - but it will not undeploy so long as you do not fire DIRECTLY at the sides of you or behind you.
Bipod // What counts as ledges?
Generally everything that you can shoot through - but blocks movement.
Some things you wouldn’t expect:
Floodlights.
Sentries.
Disposals units.
Vendors.
And many more. Try it out for yourself!
An important thing to remember -
The sides of cades are bipoddable too - which means you can face right, from a south facing cade for example.
And you can face south,
or even into the cade to bipod it.
This gives you a ton of options for the angles you can cover quickly.
Ammo Management
HPR chews through ammo. Luckily, it has some of the largest mags in the whole game!
You won’t need more then a mag in the gun, and a spare mag in your armor. NEVER drop hpr mags, as they aren’t common, and are easily refilled.
Use Ammo Boxes, or pull Bullets out of MK2 magazines at the FOB to put in your magazines.
how to refill a hpr magazine faster, using mk2 magazines
Set the keybind “Interact With Other Hand”, then use that keybind to take ammo out of Magazines. Then you click the HPR mag with your ammo inhand, and do this until the magazine is empty.
I don’t particularly recommend using Holo Mags - while it has slightly better vs armor performance and helps teammates, it’s very rarely useful. Mainly though, and this is big, you cannot refill holomags, and it has less capacity. So it will end up being a wasted spot in your kit, that you could have used for a normal mag.
Ideal (and necessary) Range of the Gun
The bipod makes the gun amazing, yes. But it is not without its weaknesses.
- The bipod is useless once enemies close the distance - as they can bodypush you and undeploy your bipod.
- When you are stunned, you are kicked off of your bipod.
- When deployed, the bipod can only be fired in one direction.
- When undeployed, the gun is far, far less useful.
These flaws culminate in the HPR bipod being unideal in CQC range.
Learning how to minimize its flaws is very important here.
You should aim to make use of the HPR’s range when possible - or use obstructions in order to protect yourself and improve your position. Generally, being diagonal of an enemy is good too - as they have to spend longer to get to you. And ofcourse, remain out of xeno’s ability range, or in a position where using their ability would be dangerous for them.
Keep in mind, you can undeploy the bipod at any time, and simply walk away from an enemy. Just make sure to space away from their abilities.
Intermediate
The intermediate section will go over the useful, but not immediately necessary knowledge, relating to the HPR.
Positioning Tips -
Ground vs Ledge Bipodding
Ledge bipodding will give you an aggressive immediacy or surprise factor that leads to quick kills. It is one of the greatest strengths of the weapon.
However, ground bipodding is something you will need to do if you want to use the weapon effectively.
It’s important to get used to the positions and timing where you are able to do so - since ledges will not exist everywhere, and every position you miss will carry a heavy opportunity cost. Some maps or areas have a very low amount of ledges, others have a lot.
Generally, ground bipodding will not give you kills. Compared to the m2c, it takes double the time to deploy (around 2 seconds), and you must still rely on the range of the gun to do well. If you surprise an enemy though, it can and will lead to kills.
The best tip to give is get in a good position and bipod as fast as you can. The sooner you bipod, the sooner you’ll be able to shoot.
Teammates
Despite what may be assumed - your teammates are not a critical flaw in the bipod’s design, so long as you position outside of their movement lanes. Things like up against the wall - in 3 wide halls, etc.
It’s often a benefit that you let teammates surround you loosely, as its far safer.
Still, you’ll need to be aware of your teammates and try and figure out where they want to go to avoid them pushing you.
The HPR itself is often relegated to a supporting role for your teammates since it requires support to do well, and is more static then a mk2. That does not mean it unpowerful - play well and the gun will give you the power your team needs.
Reposition constantly
You should always be searching for a better position with this gun. This means picking up your bipod, and re-bipodding constantly.
This will make it far more difficult for the enemy to leverage their abilities against you:
- boiler globs
- warrior lunges
- oppre hooks
- spits
etc.
Alongside all this, it lets you correct any mistakes you make in your position, move swiftly to respond to allies/enemies movement, gain information that you couldn’t see before, and surprise enemies.
As said earlier in the ground bipodding section, you may be in position to kill an enemy you otherwise wouldn’t have. You bipod sooner when you bipod in advance.
Fire at doors
Firing at doors (especially if they are further away from you, to the point you cannot knife them) will open up angles on enemies, which gives you more range, and more opportunity to poke an enemy.
More importantly, it gives you important vision of the battlefield.
It is a strong suit of the HPR, due to its high ammo capacity and rate of fire. Enemies get used to it fast though, but it’ll still help you cover more terrain more defensively. It’s often useful to control area.
Etc -
Onehand your weapon // Always be bipodded
Activate your ground bipod when possible, and keep your weapon one-handed.
This means you can respond immediately if a xeno approaches, and catch unaware xenos off-guard. It often leads to kills.
You can use items such as binocs while onehanding a bipodded weapon. It does not undeploy the bipod.
Bipod on Bipod
Multiple HPRs in a small area is immense.
Defensive Gun
This gun is at its best when you are NOT the one making obvious mistakes - this gun will easily punish xeno mistakes. Let them punch you till they’re out of juice, or until they’re dead. You don’t have to try hard and risk a lot with an incredibly powerful defensive gun. Play slow, and make your choices intentional, with good reasoning.
Never let xenos scare you when you know you’re in a good position. Try and be the one that controls the battlefield - make them move to your tempo, and they’ll feel, or act weak and disadvantaged.
Marines have an advantage in limiting the xenos movement and dps output with range - use it well and you are one of the most powerful factors there.
As you get better, more aggressive positions will open up to you. And then, so long as you always play it safe and live a long time during a round - the skill expression comes from learning how to fully utilize it while minimizing risk.
Use Binocs
Binocs are an invaluable tool - always be sure to have them, regardless of if you use the HPR or not.
Being more aware of your surroundings is incredibly useful.
Setting a keybind for interact with uniform helps here too. (if you store your binocs in webbing) This way, you can immediately draw the binocs from storage, and will help you build up the good habit that is using your binocs constantly.
HPR as a tertiary weapon
The HPR bipod is a practical tertiary (offhand) weapon. This means you can carry it alongside 2 other large guns - such as a shotgun and mk2.
Simply drop the gun when you need to use your normal loadout.
Since you will be mostly trying to avoid stuns - it’s unlikely you’ll lose it if you offhand it unless you get ff’d horribly, or overextend. You can make use of the gun’s power, while having your normal loadout.
All you need in order to make a HPR bipod work is a mag in the gun, and a mag in your armor.
Poor Matchups, Good Matchups
Ravs and crushers will generally be your bane as a HPR user, as they can close the distance far easier then other castes, with less danger to themselves. All ravs have ways to gain armor, which makes your gun deal peashooter damage. Crushers have both decent armor, and an invulnerability shield.
Queens will be a bane to you, as they have tons of stuns, and make it impossible for you to stay bipodded.
If you have nade pouch - it’s a good idea to expend them to cut off queens or t3s from t1s and t2s, which can give you a couple seconds of safety in an emergency. Aswell as this, it can destroy cover - giving an offensive impact to your nade that you can utilize.
Keep a backup weapon! If you want to go the full mile, the reason to use it as a tertiary weapon is to help against these matchups. Other guns are easier to use against your bad matchups.
Adept
The adept section will go over the opinionated topics. I may add more at a later date.
Effective Population (highpop or lowpop?)
In my experience, the HPR performs better on highpop over lowpop.
-
When you are a single part of a large group fighting a large group - your impact is a lot greater when using a HPR.
- More support, means you dont have to worry so much about enemies pushing your bipod.
- Target rich environment - you will have more impact against more xenos. You will have more opportunities to kill enemies.
- More people who can take advantage of your support
-
On lowpop, mobility is everything, and small group fights are very common - the HPR does not excel there.
- The HPR simply cannot respond as swiftly as a mk2 can.
- People rely on their speed on lowpop - ground bipodding becomes far less effective as a result.
- Enemies have more angles to attack on lowpop - ground bipodding becomes far less effective as a result, unless a positions really good and has ledges covering the flanks.
- Without an obvious front to push - you can’t really become a part of a larger group as easily. And when large groups do form on lowpop - they are liable to die due to xeno pressure as marines aren’t strong enough. You’ll probably do better with any other gun.
-
Lowpop maps tend to have less ledges, window frames, and floodlights to bipod on.
You can offset this a bit by carrying a rack parts alongside your HPR and a wrench to pick back up the rack parts. That way you use it more as a instant burst cannon then a group defensive tool.
The timing becomes more like 0.5 seconds - more similar to a m2c, but you don’t have to pick the rack parts back up unlike needing to pick a m2c back up.
Another option is a table parts - but table parts take far longer to put down then rack parts, and are only useful for creating strong ledges in fallback positions.
–
M2C Compared to HPR
M2C
Advantages of the M2C
- The tripod is more stable, you could deploy it closer to enemies then you can with the bipod.
- Deploying closer to enemies is not always better
- The gun has better vs armor performance
- You can turn the m2c far easier then you can turn the bipod
- This is often a bait. Just because you can turn the m2c, doesn’t mean you shouldn’t turn tail and run instead if you’re in a bad position and are about to get capped or killed.
- The gun blocks movement
- Beeg gun
- Deploy time is like 0.5 seconds
- Probably better on lowpop as a result
- Has a 2 tile scope
- More obvious to allies when set up - less likely for them to run infront of m2c
- Blocks warrior lunges
- RUN UP TO RAV. KILL RAV.
Disadvantages of the M2C
- Bad FF
- Bad reputation, because lots of m2c FF happens
- You can’t set the tripod up against walls (unless you switch direction mid tripod)
- If you want to holster it, it can only be holstered on the back
- It’s easier to lose for good
- You have to place the gun down in order to use it.
- You can’t pick it up instantly, unlike a Bipod - so it’s not as portable
- Drag clicking sucks
- Reloading takes more time
- The ammo is more expensive, more difficult to carry, and lower capacity magazines
- Because of this, it’s far less practical as a tertiary weapon then the HPR
- The gun blocks movement
- The gun overheats
- You are a sitting duck
- Vulnerable to oppressor hooks and boiler globs
- You are target #1, for both teammates and enemies
- The gun has REALLY low accuracy, and your bullets may even move past the enemy and hit your allies behind the enemy. It also makes the gun unsatisfying to use.
- Pretty likely to get nerfed more, simply because people love to hate the M2C
HPR
Advantages of the HPR
- The bipod can be used faster, by using ledges
- The bipod can be picked up faster
- Easier to constantly reposition
- Far less likely to lose this gun
- The ammo is cheap and easily carried
- Reliable. Doesn’t overheat. Does exactly what you make it do.
- Big gun
- You don’t have to dragclick to pick it up
- More covert
- You can put a suppressor on it
- Xenos underestimate the power of the bipod HPR since it’s uncommon
Disadvantages of the HPR
- Bad FF
- HPR hero who ffs everyone in the back with burst mode bfa and recoil comp is the expectation for hpr. Playing with bipod makes you look like less of a ffer, because it’s not a common attachment.
- Worse vs armor performance
- Can’t easily kill ravs, crushers, and queens
- Worse in CQC range
- You can’t turn the bipod without redeploying the bipod
- Ground bipodding is slower then on M2C
–
–
So yeah, that’s the guide, completed.
Hope you enjoyed the guide - it’s hard to create guides for specific weapons as it’s always up to individual interpretation on how to use a gun, so please tell me if I put anything incorrect or unnecessary in there.
It’s a unique playstyle definitely, and I’ll be sure to add any good tips or topics from the comments of this post.
checklist
-
At some later point I’ll add a section about carrying portable barricades… it’s around 0.5-1 seconds to put it down and bipod, so it can probably be used to bipod faster then ground bipodding. But it can take a couple seconds to pick up.
-
A small bit about rack parts is in the effective population section and eventually it’ll be put in its own section.
-
needs more clips
you got me a m2c chimp wanting to use the HPR, also frankly this guide is much better than my ramblings. ( on a side note i really need to go back and touch up my m2c guide.)