Field manual

Voice chat, explained

Voice in the HLL series is routed by channel, not one big lobby: local proximity, your squad's radio, and a command net for leaders. That design is why the settings menu confuses everyone — and why "open mic" complaints dominated the beta.

The three channels

Channel	Beta default (PC)	Who hears you
Proximity (local)	V	Friendly players physically near you — enemies never hear you
Squad / unit radio	C	Your ~6-player squad, anywhere on the map
Command radio	X	Squad leaders + Commander only (leadership role required)

An on-screen indicator lights up per channel when someone transmits, with your own name shown while you broadcast (beta-era community documentation). This channel structure is carried over from the original HLL (HLL1 reference). The key defaults in the table above are still the beta values — we haven't yet found a source good enough to confirm them against the shipped build, so treat them as very likely but unconfirmed.

Muting people & killing the open mic

Mute one player: in the original HLL you open the scoreboard (Tab) and click the mute icon by their name — it silences voice and text. HLL1 mechanic — still unconfirmed in Vietnam
Turn a whole channel down: the series exposes separate volume sliders per chat type in Settings → Audio, so you can lower proximity without touching squad radio. HLL1 mechanic — still unconfirmed in Vietnam
Your own mic feels always-on? Two beta-confirmed causes: a stuck-transmit bug (a quick tap or overlapping keypress locks the channel open — clear it with a deliberate press-and-release), and controller Layout A, which uses voice activation instead of push-to-talk — switch to Layout C.
The transmit keybind is mislabeled. There is no setting called "push to talk" — it hides under Controls as "Radio channel On/Off". Full walkthrough: push to talk "not working".

Console & crossplay voice

On controller you hold LB and pick the channel with the right stick (beta behavior; LB was also the default transmit key in the playtest PTT thread). Cross-platform squads are supported, so squad radio works across PC, PS5 and Xbox on crossplay servers — details on the crossplay page.

When voice just dies

The series runs voice through the third-party Vivox service, and most mid-match failures (a channel going silent, transmit keys ignoring you) are VOIP-connection drops, not keybinds. The beta-era fix order: Settings → Audio → VOIP Disconnect → Reconnect; if that hangs, leave the server and rejoin for a fresh handshake.

Team17-confirmed launch bugs (official, Aug 12–16 blog posts):

Proximity chat distortion, caused by EOS. Voices over proximity chat can sound distorted/robotic. Team17 says this is already resolved in Squad and Leadership chat; for proximity chat specifically, their dev-comms thread names EOS (Epic Online Services) as the cause and says they're still working with their VOIP partner on a fix — no ship date yet.
Tunnels break the speaker indicator. While travelling through a tunnel, you may not be able to see who's speaking in any VOIP channel — including yourself.
Squad Leader leaving kills proximity for the unit. If your Squad Leader leaves the unit, the rest of the squad stops being heard in proximity chat by other players.
PS5: audio cutting out for some players — fixed. Originally listed as under investigation; Team17 confirmed the fix shipped live in Hotfix 1 on Aug 16, 2026 (10:00 UTC), described in their official notes as having "resolved an issue that could cause audio to cut out for a period of time on PlayStation 5."
Directional audio — newly flagged, under investigation. Team17's dev-comms thread names "directional audio" as a distinct issue they're actively working to address, separate from the items above — no further detail on the symptom or a fix date yet.

This matches the intermittent voice failures the community was independently reporting on Steam and Reddit (see the PTT page) — now with an official acknowledgment and a fix in progress rather than a mystery.

Voice out and you're on the mortar? Text chat still works, and our mortar & artillery calculator turns two grid references into range, azimuth and elevation — numbers short enough to type into chat when nobody can hear your fire mission.

Sources: HLLVN voice guide (beta-era) · Steam "PUSH TO TALK" thread · official "Known Issues, Launch Time & More" blog (Aug 12) · official "Important Launch Info" blog (Aug 14) · official "Dev Comms Thread & Launch Updates" (live-updated thread, checked Aug 17) · HLL1 voice reference

Last verified Aug 19, 2026 ~05:36 UTC — badged the two HLL1-inherited mute/volume mechanics as "still unconfirmed in Vietnam" (they were stated as fact before; we haven't found a launch-build source for either) and added a contextual link to the calculator for when voice is down. Channel defaults remain beta-era. PS5 audio cutout fix confirmed shipped live in Hotfix 1 (Aug 16, 10:00 UTC; official "16 August: Hotfix 1 is live now" post). Proximity distortion still attributed to EOS with no ship date yet; directional audio still under investigation, no fix date — both unchanged since last check (Aug 17 ~01:20 UTC).