Disclaimer

You are not allowed to copy this Steam guide – whole or in part – for any reason. You may link people to this guide so that they can read it in the intended format, which is on the http://steamcommunity.com website. I reserve all creative rights to this guide to the extent allowed by the Steam Terms of Service.‎‎‎‎‎

Table of Contents

This guide is of substantial size and content. Please refer to this table of contents for a concise breakdown of the guide.

United We Stand; Divided We Fall – the core concepts of Hell Let Loose. It is your #1 priority to learn and follow this as a guideline in order to be successful at the game.
Chain of Command – the command structure of Hell Let Loose. This is a game of logistics, and proper delegation and management is tantamount.
Garrisons, Outposts, and Airheads – how spawn points work in Hell Let Loose. The information in this section is critical for achieving victory.
Supplies and Logistics – the supply chain metagame of Hell Let Loose. Logistics are a huge aspect of the game, and have a big impact on your success.
Strategic Resources – the commander abilities and how they are utilized in Hell Let Loose. If you think of this game as an RTS, these are the equivalent resources.
Game Modes – the two different game modes of Hell Let Loose. Similarities and differences between them are covered here.
Infantry – the backbone of combat as infantry in Hell Let Loose. Goes over each class and their role in the game.
Recon – the all-important role of the recon teams in Hell Let Loose. This shows you the importance of a recon team and how they can turn the tide of a battle.
Tanks – a link to my other guide on Hell Let Loose. Tanking 101 does a much more in-depth analysis of tanks, and also teaches you the basics of tanking as well as how to identify vehicles of all types.
Conclusion and Afterword – my closing thoughts on this guide for Hell Let Loose. Reiterates the main takeaways of this guide. I also give my opinion on a few things.

Without further ado…

United We Stand; Divided We Fall

First and foremost, there is something EVERYONE should understand about Hell Let Loose: this isn’t Call of Duty. This is a team-oriented game, where you have to communicate, cooperate, and coordinate with other people to win. It is a baseline expectation that if you join a public game, you will be doing this with everyone on your team. Remember to keep your ego in check – if you spend more time arguing with your allies than fighting the enemy, you are a detriment to progress and morale, and the consequences of that negatively impact your entire team.

Hell Let Loose is not about getting kills. If you kill the enemy, great – it takes them at least 10 seconds (but usually around 30 on average) before they can get back into the fight and keep contributing to their side. But that’s all it does – your enemy is forced to respawn, which at most delays them. This is not the primary objective of the game. Your overall objective is to attack and/or defend control points on the map to secure victory, and you accomplish this by building defenses and resource nodes, placing garrisons and outposts (more on that later), and coordinating defense and attacking maneuvers with your team.

So how does this affect your score? Well, there are 4 categories for score:

Combat effectiveness – Arguably the least important score. This is simply how many points you racked up from getting kills. You can be the MVP even if this is zero, and you shouldn’t worry about combat effectiveness unless you are playing a role whose goal is to get kills (and even then, it’s not as important as the other scores).
Offensive effectiveness – A measure of your efforts in taking and holding enemy control points, contributing to capture power, and the time spent in enemy territory. This is important, because without a good offense, a team is doomed to fail.
Defensive effectiveness – A measure of your efforts in holding friendly control points, contributing to reinforcement power, and the time spent in friendly territory. Defense score is critical – if nobody is defending a point, the enemy can just waltz right in and take it, which often ends in defeat.
Logistic effectiveness – Arguably the most important score. This is how effective you were at the logistics element of the game. That means placing garrisons, providing supplies, generating strategic resources, reviving infantry as a medic, using abilities as a commander, and generally supporting your team.

You might hear the term “blueberry” get thrown around a few times in comms while playing the game. Blueberry is a derogatory term for someone who is acting mindlessly in a game of HLL and ignoring all of these core concepts. The name is derived from the blue ally markers on the map which resemble dozens of tiny blueberries, often wandering around with minds of their own, not paying any attention at all to the main objectives, being oblivious to their squad lead, or haphazardly trying to rush the attack point with zero cohesion whatsoever. Do not do this. The team that has the most blueberries on their side will usually lose.

Always keep in mind that teamwork is your top priority. Wars are not won by Medal of Honor recipients alone. It takes a concerted effort from many people working together to achieve victory. Hell Let Loose is no stranger to this.

Chain of Command

Hell Let Loose utilizes a “chain of command” style system. If you have played games like Squad, you will already be familiar with how this works. There are 3 tiers in the command structure and it works best when strategy comes from the top down and tactics are delegated to the individual squads. As such, voice chat is an integral and critical aspect of the game, and must be utilized accordingly. All chat is by default push-to-talk.

Here is the command structure:

The Commander – Each side can have one commander who oversees and controls the entire battlefield. The commander has near-absolute authority over everyone, and his orders take precedence. The commander also has unique abilities at his fingertips. He can call in airdropped supplies, spawn tanks and other vehicles, send in bombing and strafing runs, activate strategic abilities like reinforcing points, or dropping a temporary spawn point for the entire team (called an airhead) in friendly or enemy territory. It is also the commander’s imperative to do logistics work behind the scenes, like running supplies within friendly territory and deploying/dismantling garrisons for the team.
The Squad Leaders (Officer, Tank Commander, and Spotter) – Squad leaders are the commander’s direct reports, and are directly responsible for the units in their squad. Officers are in charge of infantry, tank commanders are in charge of their tank crew, and spotters are in charge of their sniper. All squad leaders must communicate and coordinate with each other, monitor the needs of their squad, and employ effective strategy on the tactical level. Squad leaders must contend with the command chat as well as their own squad chat, act as a link between the two, and mentally filter information and prioritize what is more important.
The Units (Infantry, Tank Crew, and Sniper) – The individual unit(s) that make up the squad. The units make up the vast majority of a team. Their role is to listen to the squad lead and follow orders. Infantry are the main workhorse of the battlefield and have the most diverse set of roles, tank crew are the people who help operate a tank along with the tank commander, and the sniper works with the spotter to suppress the enemy and pick off high value targets.

There are 3 different channels for voice chat:

Command Chat (Default PTT Key: “X”) – Accessible to the commander and squad leaders. Allows global communication between squads. Any time squad leaders are talking on command chat, their username will appear in RED and will be accompanied by their squad letter. Any time the commander is talking on command chat, his username will appear in YELLOW and will be accompanied by an asterisk.
Squad Chat (Default PTT Key: “C”) – Accessible to the squad leaders and their respective units. Allows global communication within squads. Any time squad leaders or units are talking on squad chat, their username will appear in GREEN and will be accompanied by their squad letter.
Proximity Chat (Default PTT Key: “V”) – Accessible to all players. Allows local communication with all nearby friendly players. People talking on proximity chat will be louder when close by and quieter when further away. Any time squad leaders or units are talking on proximity chat, their username will appear in BLUE (or WHITE before U10) and will be accompanied by their squad letter. Any time the commander is talking on proximity chat, his username will appear in YELLOW and will be accompanied by an asterisk.

Garrisons, Outposts, and Airheads

In all of Hell Let Loose, nothing is more critical than garrisons. You will learn exactly how critical they are the first time you lose a game from playing with a team that doesn’t build any. So what is a garrison, and why are they so important?

Simply put, a garrison (or “garry”) is a spawn point for your entire team – anyone can spawn on a garrison. Garrisons can be placed anywhere within friendly territory or unlocked enemy territory. They provide an unparalleled strategic advantage and are a means of projecting control over the battlefield. A good team will have a defensive garrison for spawning behind or within controlled points, backup garrisons on points behind the front line in case of the current defensive position being overrun, and one or more forward garrisons for staging attacks on the enemy. Without a garrison, you are useless. Without you, it is useless.

Garrisons can only be placed by the commander, officers, and spotters. They cannot be placed by tank commanders. A garrison within friendly territory costs 50 supplies to place, and a garrison within unlocked enemy territory costs 100 supplies to place. Garrisons cannot be placed in neutral territory or locked enemy territory. A garrison spawns friendly units who are deploying on it in set timed intervals of 40 seconds. Any garrison with enemies nearby will light up with a warning. If enemies get too close to a garrison, it will be overrun: the icon will turn red and it will be disabled until the enemies leave or are removed from the area. Be mindful of the team’s garrison limit; only 8 garrisons can be active at a time. Also, no two garrisons can be built within 200 meters of each other. This forces you to spread your garrisons out.

There are 3 ways a garrison can be removed:

Dismantled by a friendly – All garrisons can be manually removed by the commander, or the squad lead who placed it. This is done by walking up to a garrison and holding “F” on it until it disintegrates. The commander also has a special ability with a cooldown that can target any friendly garrison on the map and instantly remove it, for a cost of resources.
Dismantled or destroyed by an enemy – If an enemy player is close enough to a garrison, they can walk up to the garrison and hold “F” on it until it disintegrates. Any enemy unit can do this. Also, explosive weapons like bombs or tank shells will wipe out enemy garrisons that they hit.
Destroyed by point capture – If a friendly point is captured and the sector a garrison is in comes under enemy control, any garrisons or outposts within that territory will be destroyed. Similarly, if a garrison is in unlocked enemy territory, and that territory becomes locked as a result of a point being captured, it will destroy any garrisons or outposts within that territory.

So that’s what a garrison is. But what is an outpost? Well, think of an outpost (or “OP”) as a mini garrison that only your squad can spawn on. You can place an outpost the exact same way you would place a garrison, except rather than costing supplies, they can be placed for free with a cooldown of 2 minutes. An outpost spawns friendly units who are deploying on it in set timed intervals of 20 seconds. On the map, an outpost will appear with the squad letter above it to show which squad it belongs to. Any given squad can only have 1 outpost active at a time. Outposts can only be placed by officers and spotters.

There are 2 different types of outpost:

Infantry outpost – Infantry outposts are a spawn point for infantry units. They can be placed in friendly territory, neutral territory, or unlocked enemy territory.
Recon outpost – Recon outposts are a spawn point for recon units. They can be placed anywhere – friendly territory, neutral territory, unlocked enemy territory, or locked enemy territory.

There are 3 ways an outpost can be removed:

Replaced or dismantled by a friendly – If a squad lead places a new outpost, it will destroy their previous outpost, since only one per squad can be active at a time. Squad leads can also manually dismantle their own outpost.
Destroyed by an enemy – If any enemy unit gets too close to an outpost, it will automatically be disintegrated; there is no need to walk up to it and dismantle it. However, outposts cannot be destroyed by explosive weapons such as tank shells or bombs.
Destroyed by point capture – If a friendly point is captured and the sector an outpost is in comes under enemy control, any garrisons or outposts within that territory will be destroyed. Similarly, if an outpost is in unlocked enemy territory, and that territory becomes locked as a result of a point being captured, it will destroy any garrisons or outposts within that territory. Note that recon outposts in locked enemy territory are unaffected by this.

Lastly, an airhead is a special type of garrison that can only be placed by the commander. It is functionally identical to a garrison, with a few caveats:

Exclusivity – Airheads can only be called in by the commander from the map screen, and can be placed anywhere on the map except in locked enemy territory. Airheads do not count towards your team’s garrison limit, and can be deployed even if your team has reached its garrison limit. Once deployed by the commander, the ability goes on a 10-minute cooldown. Another airhead cannot be deployed again until this cooldown timer finishes. Airheads also cost a significant amount of the manpower resource, which tends to be the most scarce, so they are an expensive investment. This investment will often pay off though – a successful airhead will typically yield decisive results, and may achieve or expedite victory for the team.
Air drop – As the name suggests, airheads are dropped onto the battlefield via parachute. This makes them slow to deploy and easy for the enemy to spot, and since the airhead is of critical strategic importance, it will almost always be targeted by the enemy if spotted. However, a clever commander may attempt to disguise an airhead as a regular supply drop.
Time limit – The airhead will eventually disappear after being active for only 2 minutes, spawning a total of 4 waves spaced apart by 30 seconds each. This means if you are a squad lead spawning on an airhead, consider deploying your outpost and a permanent garrison in a nearby place, so that you can continue to spawn nearby once the airhead is spent.

Bearing this in mind, it is generally a good idea to hide your garrisons and outposts in places where they will not be easily seen or accessed by the enemy. The best places to do this tend to be in trenches, on the inside of walled courtyards, or behind buildings. You should never place a garrison out in the middle of an open field or in the middle of a road where it can be easily spotted from a long distance away.

As a squad lead, you should always have an outpost up. One could argue they’re not necessary if you have a garrison nearby already – this could not be further from the truth. Outposts have twice the respawn frequency, allowing your units to get back into the action much faster after being killed in combat. They also will survive heavy ordinance like artillery and bombing runs even if the nearby garrison does not. As a squad lead, you have a duty to establish and defend garrisons, and in practice, your garrison will often be destroyed by the enemy. At that point, your outpost is the only means of getting to that location again. If you are a squad lead with an active outpost near a garrison that was just destroyed, it is YOUR RESPONSIBILITY to rebuild the garrison as quickly as possible, and that can only be done reliably if you can respawn on your outpost.

Supplies and Logistics

Hell Let Loose utilizes a logistics element that adds several extra considerations to gameplay. Earlier in this guide, you read about garrisons costing 50 supply in friendly territory, but 100 supply in enemy territory. So what are supplies?

Supplies are a resource utilized by the commander, squad leads, and engineers (more on that later). Supplies are needed to build garrisons, fortifications, AT guns, repair stations, and resource nodes:

Fortifications – defensive structures which can only be placed by engineers. This includes (but is not limited to): barbed wire, Czech hedgehogs, Belgian gates, barricades, and bunkers. The latter two of these can be upgraded to more effective versions for a supply cost.
AT guns – blueprints for these can only be placed by anti-tank infantry, but they must be built by different units. AT guns can be manned by any unit. They consist of a gunner and loader seat. Each shell costs 5 munitions to fire. Effective at destroying light vehicles or light tanks from any side, and medium or heavy tanks from the sides or rear.
Repair stations – structures on the map which automatically repair nearby damaged friendly vehicles. These work much faster than blowtorches for repairing tanks and are best placed in cover near main roads with lots of friendly vehicle traffic.
Resource nodes – structures on the map which generate munitions, manpower, and fuel for the team that can only be placed by engineers. Up to 4 of each node type can be placed for a total of 12 nodes. Nodes will not generate any resources if placed behind your faction’s lines on the map. Before U10, nodes would generate more resources based on how far ahead of your lines they were placed, rewarding players for putting nodes in “high risk” areas.

Any unit that has a hammer in its loadout can help build or upgrade as long as supplies are available. This includes (but is not limited to): riflemen, automatic riflemen, support, and engineers.

Supplies must be delivered to a given location through the use of logistics. Care must be taken where supplies are fielded since any enemy unit can dismantle them in the same way garrisons are dismantled, by walking up to it and holding F. There are several means by which supplies can be fielded:

Supply drops – the commander can order a supply drop of exactly 100 supplies anywhere on the map at a small cost of the munitions resource. These take a few minutes to arrive, and since they are airdropped, the parachute can be spotted from some distance away by friendly and enemy forces. The ability has a cooldown of 2.5 minutes.
Support infantry – the support role can drop a supply crate of exactly 50 supplies on demand. The ability is free but has a cooldown of 5 minutes. Each support infantry can only have one supply crate on the field at a time; placing another supply crate over this limit will destroy the previously placed one. Additionally, once a support drops supplies, he can switch role so another person in the squad can take the support role and drop more supplies. The primary use of support infantry is to provide supplies to the officer so he can build a garrison, making that squad self-sufficient. However, they can also be utilized to help build fortifications, AT guns, or a single resource node.
Supply trucks – these vehicles spawn at the friendly base, either naturally or spawned in by the commander at a small cost of the fuel resource. Each supply truck carries 2 pallets of 150 supplies each for a total of 300 supplies. Coincidentally, 150 supplies is the exact amount needed for one of each resource node type, making supply trucks ideal for building nodes. An empty supply truck can return to base to reload its supplies for free. If you are running supply trucks, DO NOT drop supplies in the middle of a road. Supplies will block roads until completely consumed, blocking the movement of friendly vehicles. They are less effective at blocking enemy vehicles since they can be dismantled by the enemy but not friendlies.

Supplies and logistics are the underrated backbone of Hell Let Loose. You can be the MVP just by doing supply runs, building defenses, and generating resources for your team.

Strategic Resources

Aside from supplies which are utilized mostly by units in the field, there are 3 other resources which work independent of supplies. The primary role of resources are allowing the commander to use abilities. Resources are collected automatically at a flat rate, and more can be generated if the team builds resource nodes on the map. A team’s current resources and resource income can be seen along the top of the map when it is open. The resources are as follows:

Munitions

The munitions icon is an ammo box. Munitions are required and consumed by friendly AT guns and artillery, which cannot be used when that team runs out of munitions. Munitions allow the commander to use the following abilities:

Supply drop – as explained in the Supplies and Logistics section above, this ability allows the commander to drop supplies on the map at a low munitions cost.
Recon plane – a spy plane sweeps over a large area of the map, revealing enemy infantry (red dots), enemy trucks (hollow red diamonds), and enemy tanks (solid red diamonds) at a moderate munitions cost. This info is only visible to the commander and squad leads, who must drop tags on it for regular units to see. Very useful for determining where to send bombing and strafing runs.
Bombing run (Americans & Germans) – a bomber plane drops several bombs in a line, killing any infantry not in cover and destroying light vehicles at a high munitions cost. Can destroy enemy garrisons with a direct hit.
Katyusha strike (Soviets) – the Soviet equivalent of a bombing run. Saturates a large area of effect with explosive rockets, killing any infantry not in cover and destroying light vehicles at a high munitions cost. Can destroy enemy garrisons with a direct hit.
Strafing run – an attack plane swoops in at high speed and strafes the ground in a line, ripping exposed infantry to shreds at a moderate munitions cost. Much less effective than a bombing run or Katyusha strike.

Manpower

The manpower icon is a boot. One manpower point is lost whenever a unit dies. In the Offensive game mode, when the attacking team runs out of time to capture points, the game goes into overtime and manpower is slowly drained instead at a rate of 5 per second. The attacking team loses when it runs out of manpower. Manpower allows the commander to use the following abilities:

Establish airhead – as explained in the Garrisons, Outposts, and Airheads section above, this ability allows the commander to drop an airhead on the map at a high manpower cost.
Dismantle garrison – this ability can be used to target any garrison on the map and instantly dismantle it at a moderate manpower cost.
Encouraged – doubles global resource generation for the whole team at a moderate manpower cost.
Reinforce – doubles the team’s capture power in target friendly sector at a moderate manpower cost. Great for holding points under attack, but only if friendlies are already present. Does not work in enemy sectors.
Final stand – prevents your team from losing strategic resources of any kind for a few minutes, at a high manpower cost. While final stand is active, all commander abilities are free!

Fuel

The fuel icon is a jerrycan. Without fuel, vehicles will only be available if they spawn naturally. Fuel allows the commander to use the following abilities:

Spawn heavy tank – allows the commander to spawn a Sherman Jumbo 76 (Americans), Sherman Jumbo 75 (Americans), Tiger 1 (Germans), or IS-1 (Soviets) at a high fuel cost.
Spawn medium tank – allows the commander to spawn a Panther (Germans) or T-34 (Soviets) at a moderate fuel cost.
Spawn scout car – allows the commander to spawn a Greyhound (Americans), Puma (Germans), or BA-10 (Soviets) at a low fuel cost.
Spawn supply truck – allows the commander to spawn a supply truck at a low fuel cost for delivering supplies.
Spawn transport truck – allows the commander to spawn a transport truck at a low fuel cost for carrying troops.

Any one resource type can be converted into another at the cost of a cooldown and a net loss. If final stand is active, resources can be converted for free!

Game Modes

Hell Let Loose features 2 game modes:

Warfare

Warfare is the most ubiquitous and popular game mode in Hell Let Loose. It is characterized by a steady tug-of-war style game where players must try to take and hold the next enemy point while defending their own. The game ends in victory if your team takes the last enemy point on the map, or takes and holds the center point on the map until the timer runs out.

Features:

5 strong points – there are 5 points on the map. At the start of the game, each side holds 2 points, and the middle point is neutral territory. The middle point comes under control of the first team to capture it. If a team captures the opponent’s last point, that team is awarded victory.
Fixed game timer – the game ends after 1 hour and 30 minutes. Victory is awarded to the team that holds the center point when the timer expires. There is no overtime, and the timer cannot be extended or reset.
Equal resources – each side starts with the same amount of strategic resources banked, vehicles, HQ spawns, and artillery assets. You will have to outplay the enemy team in logistics to get a strategic edge on them.

Offensive

Offensive is the other game mode in Hell Let Loose. It is characterized by the defending team trying to hold all of the points on the map while the attacking team tries to take them. The defending team wins if they can hold a sector long enough for the timer to run out. The attacking team wins if they capture a point behind the defending team’s lines.

Features:

9 strong points – there are 9 points on the map, and all of them start under control of the defending team. There is 1 point behind the attacking team’s lines that they must capture to establish their headquarters. Every other sector has 2 points each, which must be captured in pairs by the attacking team. Of the last 2 points on the map behind the defending team’s lines, only one needs to be taken to win – this puts huge strategic importance on the penultimate sector. Points taken by the attacking team cannot be retaken by the defending team.
Dynamic game timer – the game timer is set for 30 minutes. The attacking team has to capture all the points in a sector within this time limit to keep the game going. When a sector is fully captured by the attacking team, the timer resets to 30 minutes again. The defending team wins if the timer expires at any point in the game. Overtime occurs when the attackers run out of time, but still have manpower – manpower will start depleting, and the attackers lose if they run out of manpower. All of these factors mean that a single game of Offensive can last up to 2 hours and 30 minutes plus overtime.
Asymmetrical resources – the defending team has artillery assets available, while the attacking team does not. The defending team starts with no resources in the bank and must rely on nodes to secure income, while the attacking team starts with a large amount of resources in the bank to tide them over before they need to start building nodes. The defenders start with 3 HQ spawns and 3 forward garrison spawns, while the attackers start with just 1 HQ spawn and must capture the first point before securing their remaining 2 HQ spawns. Defenders get 2 minutes of setup time before the first wave of attackers spawns. Overall this gives a large advantage to the defending team.

Note that as of U10, Offensive maps only have 5 strong points, or one per each sector. The game timers and resource allocation remains the same.

Infantry

Infantry are the true workhorse of Hell Let Loose. A single infantry squad consists of 1 officer (squad lead) and 0-5 units. The classes available in the infantry role are as follows:

Officer

The squad lead. Tasked with giving his squad orders and coordinating with other squads and the commander to secure map objectives. Can place tags on the map and build outposts and garrisons. Has access to command chat. Typical loadout consists of an SMG or rifle as well as frag and smoke grenades.

Rifleman

The basic well-rounded infantry unit. Tasked with attacking, defending, suppressing, and engaging enemy infantry, as well as dropping ammunition for friendly infantry and building structures. Typical loadout consists of a rifle, frag grenades, a hammer, a ballistic ammo box, and occasionally smoke grenades.

Assault

Offense-oriented infantry unit. Tasked with attacking and flanking enemy infantry. The assault class is highly effective at killing the enemy in close quarters combat, but struggles at long range engagements. Typical loadout consists of an SMG or rifle, frag and smoke grenades, and a hammer.

Automatic Rifleman

Offense-oriented infantry unit. Tasked with attacking, suppressing, and engaging enemy infantry. The automatic rifleman excels at close to medium range engagements and is a good upgrade to a rifle squad. Typical loadout consists of an automatic rifle or SMG, frag grenades, and a hammer.

Medic

Logistics-oriented infantry unit. Tasked primarily with reviving and bandaging friendly units. The medic is a critical addition to the battlefield, since a single medic can prevent large numbers of infantry from being forced to respawn. Medics can revive any infantry so long as they haven’t been shot in the head or reduced to giblets. Typical loadout consists of a rifle or pistol, smoke grenades, morphine, bandages, and sometimes a box of medical supplies.

Support

Logistics-oriented infantry unit. Tasked primarily with providing supplies and helping with construction efforts. The support is a very important addition to a squad. The officer needs a support in order to be self sufficient with building garrisons, the AT needs a support to build an AT gun, and the engineer can be supplemented with a support to build nodes or defenses. Typical loadout consists of a rifle or SMG, a supply crate, a hammer, and sometimes ballistic and explosive ammo boxes.

Machine Gunner

Defense-oriented infantry unit. Tasked with defending and suppression of enemy infantry. The machine gunner works best when set up in a static emplacement overlooking an open area like a field or road where enemy infantry will come from, and pinning down the enemy with machine gun fire. The MG can be hip fired, but is much more effective with the bipod deployed. Typical loadout consists of a machine gun and a pistol.

Anti-Tank

Specialist infantry unit. Tasked with hunting, trapping, and destroying enemy vehicles tanks. Best utilized with ambushes or guerrilla tactics. AT weapons will only damage a tank if hitting the sides or rear. Typical loadout consists of a rifle or SMG, either an anti-tank weapon such as the bazooka, panzerschreck, or anti-materiel rifle, or anti-tank mines and satchel charges, frag or smoke grenades, and a wrench for designating AT gun placement.

Engineer

Specialist infantry unit. Tasked with constructing resource nodes and defenses, placing mines, and repairing friendly vehicles. Engineers are the logistical backbone of a good team. The commander relies on engineers to secure an income of strategic resources, and will often provide engineers with supply trucks when requested. Defenses must be placed by engineers but can be built and upgraded by any unit with a hammer. Typical loadout consists of a rifle, a wrench and hammer for placing and building structures, a blowtorch for repairing friendly vehicles, anti-personnel mines, and anti-tank mines. An alternate loadout for the engineer replaces the rifle with an SMG, and replaces the wrench, hammer, and mines with a satchel charge. However, this loadout should almost never be used, as the strength of an engineer lies in their ability to build structures. Overall, the nuances of the engineer class are complex enough to warrant having their own guide, which I may write at a later date.

Recon

Aside from basic infantry squads, there is a special type of infantry squad which can be fielded in battle: the recon squad. Where recon differs from infantry is their use case. Each team can only field 2 recon squads at a time, and they consist only of 2 units: the spotter (squad lead) and the sniper.

The recon team has special objectives that they must fulfill in order to bring effectiveness to their team:

Reconnaissance – as the name suggests, a recon squad must perform forward observer duties. This means communicating with the commander, other squad leads, and artillery teams, tipping them off to targets of opportunity, enemy troop movements, and incoming enemy tanks.
Offensive staging – recon teams must work with the commander to set up flanks on enemy strong points, or prepare to set up a forward garrison in position against the next enemy strong point once the current one is captured. Additionally, recon teams should be the first units on a capture point, and should relay tactical and strategic information to the rest of the team.
Sabotage – perhaps the most important aspect of an effective recon team. Recon must go behind enemy lines to sweep for and destroy garrisons, dismantle supply drops, destroy resource nodes, and deny use of artillery assets by killing artillery operators. A good recon team will always keep the enemy guessing as to their whereabouts.
Counter-recon – one potential use of a recon squad is hunting down and eliminating enemy recon squads and destroying their outposts. This becomes especially important for the defending team to do in the Offensive game mode.

Spotter

The spotter is the recon squad’s counterpart to the officer. Spotters can do anything an officer can do. However, the outposts placed by a spotter can be deployed in locked enemy territory, allowing recon squads to go deep behind enemy lines. Typical loadout consists of an SMG or a rifle, frag or smoke grenades, and anti-personnel mines or a box of ballistic ammo.

Sniper

The sniper is the spotter’s #2, and is responsible for long range engagements picking off high value targets. The sniper wields the only scoped weapon in the game, their faction’s bolt-action rifle of choice with 8x zoom. Typical loadout consists of a scoped rifle, a pistol, frag or smoke grenade, and sometimes an anti-personnel mine.

Tanks

If you want a more in-depth guide on tanks, please see my other guide for this game: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2465911982. Note that Tanking 101 is outdated as of U10 and is due for a rework. However, all of the key concepts remain the same, so it is still quite useful.

Conclusion and Afterword

If you have learned nothing else from this guide, here are the main takeaways for you:

Hell Let Loose is a team-oriented game – this isn’t Call of Duty. You are expected to communicate, cooperate, and coordinate with friendly units to achieve victory. Wars are not won by a single hero as often portrayed in Hollywood movies, but rather a large effort from many people working towards a common goal. This game is no different.
Hell Let Loose is not about the kills – killing your enemies forces them to respawn at most, which simply delays them from their objective. Taking and holding points is more important, and often times, this is best achieved through running logistics for your team. You can still be MVP even if you end the match with zero kills.
Hell Let Loose is won and lost with garrisons – if your team has no garrisons placed, expect to lose in comedic fashion to the enemy. Without garrisons, nobody can spawn. Without a spawn point, your only hope of getting to the objective is hoofing it from the HQ, which takes several minutes, even if you are riding in a transport truck. Your best bet is to place garrisons and backup garrisons everywhere you can while denying enemy garrisons.

Don’t be a blueberry.

If you keep these concepts close at heart, you will find it very hard to go wrong in Hell Let Loose. Always consider the core elements and build your gameplay and skills from that baseline.

Now go let loose some Hell.

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Thank you for reading this guide. Hopefully, this will give you some insight into the game, and if you’re a new player, it will be a learning resource for you. If you found this guide useful, please rate it up and consider sharing it. If you found it confusing or otherwise disagree with any of the information, please leave a comment and I will do my best to correct it.

You may have noticed a lack of visual aide in this guide. I will most likely come back and add visual aide later, much in the same style as with Tanking 101. I just found in this case that the basic information was more valuable than having none at all, and this guide was rushed just a few days before U10 dropped. Don’t worry, there will be images here in the future – it takes time to get good screenshots and edit them for the guide.

Hell Let Loose has become one of my favorite games of all time, and is one of the few online multiplayer shooters that I have consistently enjoyed to date. U10 seems like a promising update and I am looking forward to seeing how it turns out.

So until next time, good luck and have fun!

Hope you enjoy the Guide about Hell Let Loose – Ultimate Guide and Basic Information for Beginners, if you think we should add extra information or forget something, please let us know via comment below, and we will do our best to fix or update as soon as possible!