Helldivers 2 director asked players how to fight serial kickers, and the community's got one surefire way to humble toxic hosts: throw their samples in the abyss

gamesradar.com:

Helldivers 2 fans tired of toxic hosts kicking players out of missions are taking justice into their own hands.

Helldivers 2 is a blast to play with buddies, mixing intense shooting action with satirical comedy to brilliant effect as you fight to defend Managed Democracy from seemingly endless swarms of bugs and robots. Still, there are a few bad eggs who want to spoil the fun for everyone.

Earlier this month, Helldivers 2 director Johan Pilestedt asked for help from the community in tackling the issue of players kicking other players during higher-difficulty missions. Frequently, players have found themselves booted out for not using meta weapons or simply not following orders. With the issue still ongoing, players are taking matters into their own hands and hitting these miscreants where it hurts: their Sample supplies.

One such player is Snazzlefraxas, who, on the Helldivers 2 subreddit, revealed that during a Suicide Dive, they encountered a player "berating everyone for not knowing how to play." Having had to follow orders and endure threats about being kicked, they watched a teammate go down and "disappear from the server" and, at that point, made a "desperate choice" to make off with the Super Samples they'd previously collected from the host player's body. "I ran with your super samples to the edge of the mission area, and kept on running," the player says.

Far from seeing this as a traitorous, action players have been commending Snazzlefraxas for making these non-team players pay. "Sir, you are not a traitor," says one. "What you did was sabotage a possible collaborator of our mortal enemies. He does not deserve the samples." Another writes, "You, sir, are a hero. I salute you."

Other Helldivers, like GundogPrime, have been taking the same approach, "I threw my body into a pit one time after some screaming [eight-year-old] was demanding the squad do exactly as he instructed or be kicked," they explain. "But just before I did, I shot him in the face and took