All 17 Roles in Hell Let Loose: Vietnam and Which One to Pick First

Roles in Hell Let Loose: Vietnam work like classes, and they are split across Command, Infantry, Armor, Helicopter, Recon, and Mortar. Each squad holds a maximum of six players and caps how many of them can take the same job, so no unit ever fields every role at once. Picking well matters more here than in most shooters, because half these jobs decide where your team spawns and what it can build.

How Roles Work in Hell Let Loose: Vietnam

When you join a squad you see the available roles listed with the number of slots your unit still has for each one, and the caps are strict: one Specialist per squad, three Riflemen, and so on down the list. You can change to any free role every time you die, through Unit Management on the redeploy screen, and the same screen lets you edit the weapons and gear that role carries. Two roles sit behind a different kind of lock, since Commander and Squad Leader both require you to finish specific tutorials before the game lets you select them at all. Everything else is available from your first match, although the equipment inside each role unlocks gradually through that role's own progression track. If you are still working out how the match itself functions, start with the Hell Let Loose: Vietnam Beginner's Guide - Tips and Tricks for Your First Matches and come back once the map and the radio make sense.

All Hell Let Loose: Vietnam Roles

The table below covers every role in the game, grouped by the category it belongs to, with the job that role is actually expected to perform in a match.

Note: the game and its role screen both advertise 17 roles, while the full list above runs to 18 entries once both helicopter jobs are counted, so treat the number as marketing rather than a hard count.

The Roles That Decide Matches

These roles are the most valuable, I guess, after more than 50 hours played with my two mates. Of course, every role has a great mechanic, but if you're a newcomer like me ~50 hours ago, try these and it will be okay.

Squad Leader

The role that owns your team's spawn network.

Squad Leaders place Outposts with the notepad, which give their own squad a spawn point on a 20-second timer, and they build Garrisons that the entire team can use. On the NVA side they also dig the tunnel network that lets troops reappear somewhere the US team is not expecting. That construction work is why a match with weak Squad Leaders feels like a walking simulator, since everyone ends up spawning far behind the fight and arriving in ones and twos. The role also carries the direct radio line to the Commander, so the quality of the intel reaching Command depends entirely on how much its Squad Leaders talk. Full construction costs and placement rules live in How To Build Garrisons, Outposts, and Tunnels in Hell Let Loose: Vietnam.

Commander

One player per team, and the only one who spends resources.

The Commander never really fights, and it is normal to see one sit at the HQ for most of a round while monitoring the map, taking reports from Squad Leaders, and spending Munition, Manpower, and Fuel. The job is closer to a strategy game where every unit has its own opinion than to anything else in the shooter. Because a single bad airstrike call can wipe a friendly squad, the role also demands more communication discipline than any other, and a toxic Commander simply stops being read. It sits behind a tutorial requirement, which is why you cannot select it in your first match even if the slot is empty. Everything the role can spend and when to spend it is covered in How To Play Commander in Hell Let Loose: Vietnam.

Engineer

The quiet role that shapes where fights happen.

Engineers place the blueprints for resource nodes, and until someone does that, the Commander has no Munition, Manpower, or Fuel income to spend on anything. Any role carrying a hammer can finish the build, including Riflemen, so a single Engineer can start several nodes and let the squad complete them. The second half of the job is defensive construction on the roads leading into a sector, which funnels attackers into predictable approaches and blunts armoured pushes. Engineers who work the roads before a defensive round tend to change the outcome more than anyone chasing kills in the same match. The role also benefits early from its own progression, since the tools it needs are gated behind role level rather than account level.

Medic

The clearest first job in the game.

Medic runs on a loop that needs no map knowledge to start: stay near other players, keep them alive, and watch where the fight moves from a safe distance. Support Score climbs fast enough that a new player can post something like three kills, three deaths, and eleven revives in a match and still be one of the most useful people in the squad. That teaches the habit worth carrying into every other role, which is asking what the role helps the squad do rather than how many kills it produced. Medics also carry smoke, which is the single most reliable tool for pulling a body out of the open before reviving it. The role's equipment expands sharply with level, and the weight budget it unlocks is explained in How To Level Roles and Build Better Loadouts in Hell Let Loose: Vietnam.

Tank Crew

Three roles that only work as a unit.

The Tank Commander sits on the periscope, marks targets, directs the driver, and holds the Command radio channel, while the driver handles terrain and the gunner does nothing but aim and fire. None of the three can carry the vehicle alone, and a crew that does not talk loses to a crew that does regardless of who has better aim. Tank Gunner is a reasonable beginner pick because the job is narrow and someone else is doing the map reading for you. Tank Commander is the natural step up once you want to practise talking to Command without also being responsible for six infantry. Vehicles cost the Commander Fuel and take time to replace, so losing one carelessly hurts the team beyond the crew that died in it.

Best Roles for Beginners

Rifleman, Medic, Machine Gunner, Grenadier, and Tank Gunner are the five worth starting with, because none of them puts you on a radio channel where other players are waiting for your decisions. They let you learn the pace of the front, the way squad markers behave, and how quickly a route becomes obsolete, all while doing something the squad can use. You will die often in all five, and that is the fastest way to learn which approaches into a sector are covered. Once you want a communication role, Tank Commander is the gentlest introduction, since you are marking targets from behind armour rather than leading infantry through open ground. Avoid the helicopter seats early: flying adds pitch, roll, yaw, collective, landing, and helipad logistics on top of everything else, and a crashed transport costs your team five players at once.

Before you commit several matches to one role for its unlocks, check what the next level actually gives you, because progression is tracked per role rather than per account. And if your first impression of the game is stutter rather than strategy, the graphics and voice chat fixes in the Hell Let Loose: Vietnam Setup Guide - Best PC Settings, Voice Chat, and Display Name are worth twenty minutes before your next match.