Or pick a weapon — every weak point below re-scores instantly
Green = you go through it · Amber = 65% damage · Red = your rounds bounce off
Ministry of Defense · Field terminal · Cleared for Helldiver use
Freedom is not free. Neither is shooting the wrong body part.
Every enemy of Managed Democracy has a soft spot. Find it, check that your gear gets through it, and drop knowing what is waiting for you.
Pick your front
Three tools, one drop
The one rule to remember
AP > AV
Full damage. Your weapon's armor penetration has to beat the armor value of the part you hit.
AP = AV
65% damage. The white hitmarker everyone mistakes for a good hit.
AP < AV
Nothing. Ricochet, and it can come back at you.
0 → 10
Armor tiers. Unarmored, Very Light, Light, Medium, Heavy, then Anti-Tank I to VI.
Weapons state their trait in the Armory: Light Armor Penetrating is AP 2, Medium is AP 3, Heavy is AP 4, Anti-Tank is AP 5 and up.
Armor values come from the community wiki and move with balance patches — trust what you see in-game over what you read here.
Enemy and gear pictures are Arrowhead's, kept here for personal use; leave the images folder out if you share this page.
Not on every mission
Strain units, campaign units and structures. These only turn up under the conditions listed on each card — so if you have never seen one, that is why.
CONDITIONAL
The rule in one paragraph
Every weapon in the Armory carries one of four traits: Light Armor Penetrating (AP 2), Medium Armor Penetrating (AP 3), Heavy Armor Penetrating (AP 4) or Anti-Tank (AP 5 and up). Every body part on every enemy has an armor value from 0 to 10. Your AP has to beat that value, not match it — matching it is the white hitmarker everyone mistakes for a good hit.
AP ABOVE ARMOR — 100% damage
Red hitmarker. The round goes through and the full damage number lands. This is the only column that kills things at a sane rate.
AP EQUALS ARMOR — 65% damage
White hitmarker. You are still doing damage, but a third of it is gone. Survivable on a Devastator, hopeless on a Bile Titan.
AP BELOW ARMOR — nothing
Ricochet, zero damage, and the round can come back at you. Change the angle, the body part, or the weapon.
THE ARMOR TIERS
AV 0 Unarmored · 1 Very Light · 2 Light · 3 Medium · 4 Heavy · 5–10 Anti-Tank I to VI. Explosive, fire, gas and arc damage follow their own rules and often ignore this table completely.
Want more detail? The "See the real …" button on every panel opens that enemy's page on the community wiki.
On the numbers: armor values here come from the community wiki, not from Arrowhead — they do not publish them, and balance patches move them. Treat every AV as "about this much" and verify anything you are betting a 500kg on.
