Aliens: Fireteam Elite 2 Horde Maps
Three launch maps, five-wave rounds, and a faction roll that punishes one-element loadouts.
Horde in Aliens: Fireteam Elite 2 ships with three dedicated maps: Crash Landed, Blacksite, and Crusher. They are not campaign corridors with a wave slider. Unlock the mode first — How to Unlock Horde — then treat this page as the geography briefing. Survival shop and comps live on How to Beat Horde.
How a Horde session is structured
Rounds last five waves, not the ten-wave blocks from the 2021 Horde DLC. A round is roughly twelve to fifteen minutes. After five waves you extract with what you earned or push another round for a steeper multiplier. Between rounds the faction can swap. You might start on Xenomorphs and continue into Pathogen or Weyland-Yutani combat synthetics. That is why a Volcan-only Marauder who never packed electric ammo eats dirt on the second round.
Factions at launch:
- Xenomorphs — thermal hurts, electric is weaker into chitin. Sirens, Crushers, Wardens, Exploders.
- Pathogen — gas, Harbingers, Gasbags. Relocate; do not camp the same crate.
- Weyland-Yutani synthetics — they do not flinch like bugs. Spider-bots and larger assault frames. Electric and sustained smartgun fire matter.
You cannot pick the faction at launch. Challenge Cards do not currently let you force Xenos-only. If your squad only wants bugs, you may restart from the hangar — that is a known player habit, not a hidden setting.
Crash Landed
Set near the base of a looming atmosphere processor, with layout DNA from early campaign drops. Expect vertical threats, vent flanks, and long sightlines interrupted by processor architecture. Hold one or two adjacent chokepoints; splitting to “cover the whole pad” is how Stalkers pick you off. Machinist turrets love the processor struts if you can see both stairs. Extract before you get greedy if the next faction roll is synths and you sold your pulse rifles for flamethrowers.
Blacksite
Red desert biome wrapped around a crashed Engineer vessel. Open ground plus wreckage lanes. Hunters and Duelists get value on the long desert approaches; Marauder rockets punish clumps that funnel through the ship hull. Pathogen gas on this map is ugly because there is less “indoor” to reset in. Bring a mix of thermal and electric even if the first round is Xenos — Blacksite continuations swap factions like the others.
Crusher
Underground mining facility with live heavy machinery. Tight, loud, bad for campers who stand on a conveyor. Name collision with the Crusher enemy is real — the map is the mine, the unit is the tank bug. Turrets need overlapping cones because enemies come from elevation changes, not a single hallway. This is the map where a Medic station at the wrong stair gets immediately flanked. Call extract after a clean five if Combat Rating is lying; the mine does not give polite ammo closets forever.
Loadout rule for all three
Pack at least two damage types in the four-stack. Elemental ammo now stacks with itself after Patch 1 and refills matching elemental weapons — Weapon Augments. A four-Marauder meme works until the faction roll says synthetics.
Related pages
- How to Unlock Horde — campaign gate and officer dialogue.
- How to Beat Horde — shop, extract, comps.
- Horde Builds — ranked four-player lists.
- Enemy Dossier — Siren, Crusher, Pathogen, synths.
- Challenge Cards — stacked modifiers on top of the faction roll.
Frequently Asked Questions
Quick answers to the most common questions about Aliens: Fireteam Elite 2.
How many Horde maps are in the launch game?
Three: Crash Landed, Blacksite, and Crusher. Cold Iron has talked about more maps later without publishing dates.
Can I choose Xenomorphs only?
Not at launch. Each round can roll Xenomorphs, Pathogen, or Weyland-Yutani synthetics. Restart from the hangar if your squad refuses a faction.
Why are rounds only five waves?
The sequel shortened rounds versus the original Horde DLC's ten-wave blocks. Extract after five or continue for higher rewards and a possible faction swap.
Is Crusher a map or an enemy?
Both. Crusher is the underground mining Horde map. Crusher is also a heavy Xenomorph type. The dossier covers the unit; this page covers the mine.
Do I need to unlock each map separately?
Unlock Horde once (campaign plus Endeavor officers). All three launch maps are then available in Game Modes.