Technologies

Battlefield 6 Tips: The Best LMG Builds

If you want to be a dependable machine gunner, you’ll want to eke the most performance out of your LMGs as possible.

Developer DICE’s iconic first-person shooter is back in good form with Battlefield 6, and players are hard at work capturing flags and trading gunfire in large-scale battles. As dozens of players collide in massive fights, teamwork decides the outcome of each match.

If you want to keep your teammates in tip-top shape, you’ll probably gravitate toward the Support class. Support players are able to quickly revive any downed teammate with their trusty defibrillators, as well as drop supply bags that restore health and ammunition to nearby allies.

The support class is also extremely good at laying down the lead. Its signature weapon type is the light machine gun, or LMG, which is characterized by its high-bullet capacity magazines, high rate of fire and generally cumbersome frame. These weapons are great for suppressing enemies, which slows down their health regeneration.

There’s a wide array of LMGs in Battlefield 6, which means it might take you a little while to find the right fit for your play style. Some of these bullet hoses are suitable for close-range play, while others might allow you to contest sniper nests across long distances. Here are my favorite LMG builds in Battlefield 6.

The best LMG builds in Battlefield 6

There are eight different light machine guns in Battlefield 6, so you’re not hurting for options when it comes to setting up a bipod and laying down lead.

Most of these options are locked behind high level requirements or challenge completions, though, so it can be tough to figure out an effective loadout early on. Here are some accessible LMG builds for every possible situation.

L110 ‘Factory’

The L110 is the first LMG you’ll have unlocked when you start playing Battlefield 6, and it’s a solid workhorse of a gun. Its high rate of fire and extensive bullet capacity mean you’ll be able to keep enemies suppressed at a distance. However, this thing kicks like a mule unless you have a bipod set up.

To fix this, you’ll want to add the heavy extended barrel and grip pod attachments. These add-ons will make vertical and horizontal recoil more manageable, giving you more mobility during tricky firefights.

The red laser attachment helps tighten the hip-fire spread for those emergency situations where an opponent gets the drop on you in close-quarters combat, and crucially, enemies won’t be able to see the beam emanating from your weapon.

If you’re confident that you can handle the L110’s recoil, I recommend swapping out the regular bullets for tungsten-core rounds — they’ll shred through multiple enemies at once when you’re holding a tight sightline, like a hallway or a doorway leading into an objective.

M60 ‘Huntsman’

If you participated in the Battlefield 6 open beta, congratulations: You automatically unlock my favorite LMG upon opening Battlefield 6 for the first time. The M60 usually unlocks at player level 20, but beta players can use a special M60 Huntsman build straight away.

This LMG fires slower than the L110, but its recoil is more manageable, and it does more damage. As someone who likes to set up machine gun nests and pick enemies off from afar, the M60 has been the gun I’ve used the most so far in Battlefield 6.

However, players can’t change attachments on a prebuilt gun before they hit the level required to unlock its original factory variant. That means you can’t swap out attachments before player level 20, and you’re stuck with the awful vision-obscuring iron sights on the M60 until then.

Once you’re able to swap around the gun’s attachments, though, a 2x zoom and red dot sight is an absolute necessity for firing at medium- to long-range targets. Set up an alternative zoom on the side of the gun with basic sights to trade out the usual M60 eyesore for simpler iron sights when shooting close-range enemies. A double-port brake and vertical handgrip help control what little recoil the M60 has, and the red laser remains on this build in order to tighten hipfire spread.

RPKM ‘Carnivore’

If you’re not looking to set up a machine gun nest, there are some LMGs that support a more aggressive play style. The RPKM is one of these weapons, with stats that make it feel like a hybrid between a traditional light machine gun and an assault rifle. You can’t fire as many rounds before reloading, but you get some much-needed sprint speed and mantling mobility back.

The RPKM factory variant is locked behind player level 30, but there’s a much easier way to unlock this weapon for multiplayer modes. The RPKM Carnivore build is unlocked through completion of Battlefield 6’s nine-level campaign. You can beat the levels on any difficulty in order to unlock the RPKM.

The RPKM matches the M60’s damage per shot and even offers a higher rate of fire than my favorite weapon. This is all tempered by a very low magazine capacity for an LMG — the stock magazine holds 40 bullets — and very high recoil. You can use the RPKM to run and gun alongside your Assault-class teammates, but you probably won’t win as many gunfights across long distances.

Once you unlock the RPKM at level 30, a heavy extended barrel and some sort of vertical handgrip or bipod are must-have additions to your build. Swapping out the suppressor for a compensated brake also couldn’t hurt. These attachments will bring the recoil more in line with other LMGs, providing you with a manageable run-and-gun buzzsaw.

Technologies

Today’s NYT Mini Crossword Answers for Saturday, Feb. 21

Here are the answers for The New York Times Mini Crossword for Feb. 21.

Looking for the most recent Mini Crossword answer? Click here for today’s Mini Crossword hints, as well as our daily answers and hints for The New York Times Wordle, Strands, Connections and Connections: Sports Edition puzzles.

Need some help with today’s Mini Crossword? It’s the long Saturday version, and some of the clues are stumpers. I was really thrown by 10-Across. Read on for all the answers. And if you could use some hints and guidance for daily solving, check out our Mini Crossword tips.

If you’re looking for today’s Wordle, Connections, Connections: Sports Edition and Strands answers, you can visit CNET’s NYT puzzle hints page.

Read more: Tips and Tricks for Solving The New York Times Mini Crossword

Let’s get to those Mini Crossword clues and answers.

Mini across clues and answers

1A clue: «Jersey Shore» channel
Answer: MTV

4A clue: «___ Knows» (rhyming ad slogan)
Answer: LOWES

6A clue: Second-best-selling female musician of all time, behind Taylor Swift
Answer: MADONNA

8A clue: Whiskey grain
Answer: RYE

9A clue: Dreaded workday: Abbr.
Answer: MON

10A clue: Backfiring blunder, in modern lingo
Answer: SELFOWN

12A clue: Lengthy sheet for a complicated board game, perhaps
Answer: RULES

13A clue: Subtle «Yes»
Answer: NOD

Mini down clues and answers

1D clue: In which high schoolers might role-play as ambassadors
Answer: MODELUN

2D clue: This clue number
Answer: TWO

3D clue: Paid via app, perhaps
Answer: VENMOED

4D clue: Coat of paint
Answer: LAYER

5D clue: Falls in winter, say
Answer: SNOWS

6D clue: Married title
Answer: MRS

7D clue: ___ Arbor, Mich.
Answer: ANN

11D clue: Woman in Progressive ads
Answer: FLO

Technologies

Today’s NYT Connections: Sports Edition Hints and Answers for Feb. 21, #516

Here are hints and the answers for the NYT Connections: Sports Edition puzzle for Feb. 21, No. 516.

Looking for the most recent regular Connections answers? Click here for today’s Connections hints, as well as our daily answers and hints for The New York Times Mini Crossword, Wordle and Strands puzzles.

Today’s Connections: Sports Edition is a tough one. I actually thought the purple category, usually the most difficult, was the easiest of the four. If you’re struggling with today’s puzzle but still want to solve it, read on for hints and the answers.

Connections: Sports Edition is published by The Athletic, the subscription-based sports journalism site owned by The Times. It doesn’t appear in the NYT Games app, but it does in The Athletic’s own app. Or you can play it for free online.

Read more: NYT Connections: Sports Edition Puzzle Comes Out of Beta

Hints for today’s Connections: Sports Edition groups

Here are four hints for the groupings in today’s Connections: Sports Edition puzzle, ranked from the easiest yellow group to the tough (and sometimes bizarre) purple group.

Yellow group hint: Old Line State.

Green group hint: Hoops legend.

Blue group hint: Robert Redford movie.

Purple group hint: Vroom-vroom.

Answers for today’s Connections: Sports Edition groups

Yellow group: Maryland teams.

Green group: Shaquille O’Neal nicknames.

Blue group: Associated with «The Natural.»

Purple group: Sports that have a driver.

Read more: Wordle Cheat Sheet: Here Are the Most Popular Letters Used in English Words

What are today’s Connections: Sports Edition answers?

The yellow words in today’s Connections

The theme is Maryland teams. The four answers are Midshipmen, Orioles, Ravens and Terrapins.

The green words in today’s Connections

The theme is Shaquille O’Neal nicknames. The four answers are Big Aristotle, Diesel, Shaq and Superman.

The blue words in today’s Connections

The theme is associated with «The Natural.» The four answers are baseball, Hobbs, Knights and Wonderboy.

The purple words in today’s Connections

The theme is sports that have a driver. The four answers are bobsled, F1, golf and water polo.

Technologies

Wisconsin Reverses Decision to Ban VPNs in Age-Verification Bill

The law would have required websites to block VPN users from accessing «harmful material.»

Following a wave of criticism, Wisconsin lawmakers have decided not to include a ban on VPN services in their age-verification law, making its way through the state legislature.

Wisconsin Senate Bill 130 (and its sister Assembly Bill 105), introduced in March 2025, aims to prohibit businesses from «publishing or distributing material harmful to minors» unless there is a reasonable «method to verify the age of individuals attempting to access the website.»

One provision would have required businesses to bar people from accessing their sites via «a virtual private network system or virtual private network provider.»

A VPN lets you access the internet via an encrypted connection, enabling you to bypass firewalls and unblock geographically restricted websites and streaming content. While using a VPN, your IP address and physical location are masked, and your internet service provider doesn’t know which websites you visit.

Wisconsin state Sen. Van Wanggaard moved to delete that provision in the legislation, thereby releasing VPNs from any liability. The state assembly agreed to remove the VPN ban, and the bill now awaits Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers’s signature.

Rindala Alajaji, associate director of state affairs at the digital freedom nonprofit Electronic Frontier Foundation, says Wisconsin’s U-turn is «great news.»

«This shows the power of public advocacy and pushback,» Alajaji says. «Politicians heard the VPN users who shared their worries and fears, and the experts who explained how the ban wouldn’t work.»

Earlier this week, the EFF had written an open letter arguing that the draft laws did not «meaningfully advance the goal of keeping young people safe online.» The EFF said that blocking VPNs would harm many groups that rely on that software for private and secure internet connections, including «businesses, universities, journalists and ordinary citizens,» and that «many law enforcement professionals, veterans and small business owners rely on VPNs to safely use the internet.»

VPNs can also help you get around age-verification laws — for instance, if you live in a state or country that requires age verification to access certain material, you can use a VPN to make it look like you live elsewhere, thereby gaining access to that material. As age-restriction laws increase around the US, VPN use has also increased. However, many people are using free VPNs, which are fertile ground for cybercriminals.

In its letter to Wisconsin lawmakers prior to the reversal, the EFF argued that it is «unworkable» to require websites to block VPN users from accessing adult content. The EFF said such sites cannot «reliably determine» where a VPN customer lives — it could be any US state or even other countries.

«As a result, covered websites would face an impossible choice: either block all VPN users everywhere, disrupting access for millions of people nationwide, or cease offering services in Wisconsin altogether,» the EFF wrote.

Wisconsin is not the only state to consider VPN bans to prevent access to adult material. Last year, Michigan introduced the Anticorruption of Public Morals Act, which would ban all use of VPNs. If passed, it would force ISPs to detect and block VPN usage and also ban the sale of VPNs in the state. Fines could reach $500,000.