Depends on which faction you're up against, but here's what works well for deleting a patrol fast:
**The universal combo: Stun Grenade → Eagle Airstrike**
Stun grenades freeze a whole group in place for several seconds, and an Eagle Airstrike (or Cluster Bomb vs. lighter enemies) lands on top of them before they scatter. Eagle Airstrike also kills Fabricators and Bug Holes, so it does double duty. Two uses per rearm makes it very efficient for patrol clearing.
**Terminids**
- Primary: Breaker Incendiary or Cookout — fire DoT and stagger shred swarms
- Support: Flamethrower, or Stalwart/MG-43 if you want sustained chaff clearing
- Stratagems: Eagle Napalm Airstrike (denies the whole breach area), Orbital Gas Strike, Gatling Sentry
- Grenade: Thermite for Chargers/Titans, Stun if you want the airstrike combo
- Armor: anything with Inflammable if you're running fire, otherwise Engineering Kit
**Automatons**
- Primary: Sickle, Dominator, or Purifier
- Support: Autocannon or AMR — both one-tap Devastator heads and handle Hulk eyes
- Stratagems: Eagle Airstrike, Orbital Precision Strike, Gatling/Rocket Sentry
- Armor: medium with **Fortified** — the explosive resistance is a massive survivability jump against Rocket Devastators and tank fire
**Illuminate**
- Primary: Breaker Incendiary or Blitzer for Voteless hordes; you need medium pen for Overseers
- Support: Quasar Cannon or Recoilless for Harvesters
- Stratagems: Orbital Gas Strike is excellent here, plus Tesla Tower for choke points
**General efficiency tips**
- Kill patrols *fast and completely* — one survivor calling a breach/dropship costs more resources than the patrol was worth
- Or just avoid them: light armor + Scout passive plus a Smoke Strike lets you skip most fights entirely on high difficulties
- Orbital Gatling Barrage is underrated — short cooldown, no Eagle rearm, and it wipes unarmored groups
What difficulty and faction are you mostly running? The answer shifts a lot between Diff 5 and Diff 10.