Warhammer 40K: Darktide

This is a /v/ related article, which we tolerate because it's relevant and/or popular on /tg/... or we just can't be bothered to delete it.

Rejects Will Rise

Darktide is a co-op first-person shooter made by Vermintide developer Fatshark. The game has an updated core gameplay loop from Vermintide, this time in space and facing Chaos cults in an Underhive and a heavier emphasis on the balance between melee and ranged combat. The game is currently enjoying mixed reviews due to crashy performance, generally bug riddled launch and microtransactions in the form of paid cosmetics.

Story

Writing Brought to you by motherfucking Dan Abnett, with help from your favorite Spiritual Liege, Matthew Ward

The game takes place on the Hive World of Atoma Prime, where a group of Nurgle worshipping assholes called The Admonition are plotting to take over the planet from the hive city of Tertium with the extensive use of pox gases, converting the infected to their side as nurgle zombies. Thankfully (or not), one Inquisitor Grendyl has come to cleanse the heretical arsehole. Instead of doing the mercy killing, or calling 911, the inquisitor believes the situation is still somewhat salvageable. Scooping out the convicts they've collected (not for the first time), giving them weapons and throwing them to the meat grinder, hopefully they could find out what the hell is going on while purging some fucking heretics.

According to the devblog, the true antagonist is a concept known as the Darktide (roll credits!), a boogeyman threat that must be kept at bay, or so the people of Atoma Prime believe. In fact, it is a collective term referring to the brutal horrors of the Warhammer 40,000 universe: mutants, xenos, and worse - who want nothing more than to extinguish the fluttering flame of human civilization. The young people recruited to regiments like the Moebian Sixth have no idea where they’re being sent, or what they will face. They are as ignorant of the "Darktide" as any other regular citizen, for they were all citizens themselves. Out on the death worlds of the Fringe, the lasmen are thrown into the meat grinder and come face to face with unimaginable danger. Their world-view changes. They learn the nature of the Darktide and fight it tooth and nail. Sometimes, they learn too much. Long tours result in trauma, both physical and psychological. Some are broken by the experience. Some are made bitter and resentful that the grueling combat they experience is generally unrecognized back home, because the Imperial Administratum tends to keep all details of the ongoing conflict quiet so as not to generate public alarm. There might be a few news broadcasts about "great victories", but the rest of the turmoil is screened by propaganda. Some troopers, of course, serve brilliantly and bravely, and remain loyal despite everything they experience. But others fall prey to the insidious touch of the Darktide. They encounter the malevolent effect of the Warp, and it changes them. They become - literally, in some cases - the very thing they are fighting against.

In summary, the Darktide is basically Nurgle's way of weaponizing PTSD, throwing Imperial troops into a meat grinder to break their spirits and then brainwashing them to become one with the grinder themselves. It is no wonder why Adeptus Astartes were not sent. One can see some rather unnerving parallels with what happened to the Iron Warriors and how the their endless campaigns of grueling siege warfare caused them to snap and turn to Chaos. Or maybe the Astartes were just busy elsewhere, some chapters have gone through worse without flipping sides and the Age of the Dark Imperium has no shortage of threats that demand their attention.

And that's where our heroes, the convicts come in. They are invaluable yet expendable. Your player character's sorry ass is caught in the middle of a heretic attack on their cell. With the chance to go free, they instead go back and choose to fight for the Imperium. Whether they're Ogryns, guard veterans, fanatics of the Imperial Creed, or Psykers, they are the hardest meat the Imperium could send en masse, ready to purge the enemies of the Imperium with their remarkable abilities.

The Rejects Will Rise!

Gameplay

The game excitingly is one of the very few 40k video games to feature the Guardsmen and other squishy humans (plus Ogryn) in the starring role and not the Space Marines, and will play just as similar to Vermintide, only leaning more towards the shooty parts of the game. Playable classes are to be a Zealot, an Ogryn, a Veteran, and a Psyker, The classes are also apparently very customizable, both visually and gameplay-wise with lots of interchangeable weapons for classes. Also, you can play as four Ogryns. Each character can choose between three different voices with their own unique responses, for it seems Fatshark has been pulling their weight and emptying coin pouch on this game with many different VA.

Enemies start with lowly Poxwalkers and graduate to traitor Guardsmen and Ogryns, Pox Hounds, Infested Elites and worst of all the monsters: Plague Ogryns (similar to Vermintide's Rat Ogres), Beasts of Nurgle and Daemonhosts (which are basically L4D2 witches: Highly suggested to leave them alone, will lock on to the poor fool that angered them then kill 2 of your party max before fucking off to somewhere else).

Darktide was featured on Edge magazine with a 15-page article stating that there will be some form of character creator, a backstory in that you start as a newly conscripted prisoner snatched off a transport ship by the Inquisition, ability leaks, and a shield system like Payday 2.

For new introduced features unlike in Vermintide or L4D, certain enemies now "corrupt" players, reducing their maximum health represented by a purple bar (just like in Vermintide where the players are cursed for carrying grimoire). Be aware the effects can stack, so players better stick together and be ready kill any specials in order to prevent further health reduction. The corruption cannot be healed by normal means (normal health pack are health sprays that can group heal btw), but it can be treated by healing stations that appear at certain points of the run, fully healing any players that use it. However, the healing station has a usage limit of 4, so spend its uses wisely. There are no more infinite ammo boxes like in Vermintide, so players have to think more strategically on their ammo usage lest they get pinned down due to an open area mostly being the only thing between them and a heretical firing line. However, there will always be at least 3 stacks of ammo waiting at healing stations.

A new mechanic called "cohesion" gives bonuses to players if they stick together, discouraging them from trying to wander off on their own to get killed. Another mechanic called "toughness" acts as a temporary damage soak, ensuring that players won't get stunlocked to death the moment they get shot at. It also works as percentile damage reduction: At 100 Toughness you'll no-sell most attacks, but 50% goes through at 50, and so on. There is also "suppression", where simply being shot at, whether you're hit or not, makes your accuracy sky dive. This works for both you and your enemies, and can make the heretics stop shooting and take cover even if you don't kill them, allowing you some breathing room or a chance to run up and greet them up close and personal.

The soundtrack was done by the venerable Jesper Kyd, and it seriously might be his masterpiece.

Classes

Unlike the Ubersreik Five (or Four, doesn't matter), your characters each have a customizable backstory that lets you choose their homeworld, what they did in their earlier lives, and how they ended up in prison (this being the Imperium it's often something incredibly petty, like complaining about the taste of the rations or not getting out of a magistrate's way fast enough for his liking). As a result, it's perfectly possible to form a team consisting entirely of one class (though in practice it'll probably be a good idea to have some variety). Each class has several different personalities representing the various criminal lunatics serving in the campaign. Not only do different personalities have different voicelines and reactions, your backstory will also add other reactions based on their pasts. Highlights include the aggressively German male Psyker, a Northern English Ogryn, the magnificently hammy Preachers (all of them, male and female, it's great), the male Psyker who argues with the subtitles, the Irish female Psyker who is probably the biggest source of skub as people either hate her voice or love her poisonous snark and the French female Psyker voiced by Repanse de Lyonesse who alternates between psychotic and kind. She's amazingly the SANEST psyker with a shockingly well-developed moral compass for the 42nd Millennium, which says a lot. Sure she's just as much of a remorseless killer as the rest of them, and might SEEM an oblivious hypocrite for professing love for the citizens and horror at the Inquisition's regular MO even while gleefully popping skulls and ripping through hordes of enemies with her sword. But look at the types of abominations she's killing; they more than deserve it!

• Veteran: A member of the Imperial Guard dishonorably discharged for one reason or another. They're still killing heretics, so not much of a change in career. Their focus is ranged damage, though they do have more toughness and health than the Psyker. By default, they wield a Lasgun, a Chainsword and Frag Grenades. For other weapons, they have a Lucius patterned combat shotgun (aka your favourite shotgun from L4D is back!!!),a Stub Revolver, a Plasma Gun, a Power Sword, an Autogun, and a Combat Blade. Confirmed that they will be making Forge-World variation for Basic weapons such as Lasguns and Autoguns for now. Their personalities can lean towards being a relatively agreeable Professional, a cynical Cutthroat who survived the loss of their unit, or a Loose Cannon who killed a guard just to get some extra drink.
  • Sharpshooter: A subclass of Veteran geared towards long-ranged combat and scoring headshots, with their passive granting them a larger ammo capacity and more damage against enemy weak points. While in cohesion, they have a chance not to use up ammo when shooting, and they regain ammo for every elite killed. Their active ability is "Volley Fire", which slows them down in exchange for boosting their accuracy, damage against enemy weak points, and weapon handling; it also makes non-Ogryn elites and special enemies easier to identify from afar so you can snipe them better. By default the weapons they can wield are a Kantrael Mk VII Lasgun, a shovel (Krieg fanon-lovers rejoice!), and frag grenades.

• Zealot: Your happy go purging Ministorum Priest. Since player characters are all convicts for a reason, the Zealots was probably excommunicated for certain reasons, but let's hope it is not something too severe. Depending on your build, they may sometimes say "Blood for the God Emperor! Skulls for the Golden Throne!". Doesn't bode too well. By default, they wield an Autogun, a combat axe, and stun grenades, and have also been seen using a Flamer and a Chain Axe. They can be either be a hot-blooded Fanatic, a self-righteous Judge or an insane Agitator who burned down an entire hab block for suspected heresy.
  • Preacher: A subclass of Zealot that functions similarly to the Zealot from Vermintide 2: they have fast melee attacks, deal bonus damage when their health is low, and can avoid dying after taking a fatal attack, gaining temporary invincibility in the process (albeit with a long cooldown). They take reduced toughness damage while in cohesion. Their active ability "Chastise the Wicked" is a charging attack that locks enemies into melee, regenerates their Toughness, increases their base melee damage and guarantees their next melee attack will be a critical hit. By default they wield an Autopistol, Combat Axe, and Stun grenades.

• Psyker: A wizard type character with the exact some play style and mechanics as Sienna from vermintide, but no fire (at least, not physical fire). So I guess we know that the Inquisitor sending the Convicts out is a Radical. As mentioned previously in Vermintide, this type of character has unlimited ammo, but will explode if they overuse their powers (here referred to by Perils). Unlike Sienna, they also have the option of wielding guns in their ranged slot instead of a staff, but that's boring. They no longer suffer damage when trying to cooldown from overheating by "reloading" as Sienna did, bless the Emperor. As for other new features, the Psyker can get new spell powers in their grenade slot (which every class now gets their own unique grenades) to smite the enemies for the Emprah! One of the many demonstrated spell is the Brain Burst spell that deal massive damage to a single enemies' head, to the point of crushing their skull, killing them instantly. When blocking, they are able to conjure a psychic shield that not only blocks ranged fire, but also stagger enemies when they try to hit it, and it works on even the hardest hitting elites like the Crushers or the Maulers. Other powers include pushing away a horde of enemies in a burst of psychic wind (melee special attacks), and imbuing the powers of the warp into their blades and to deal lethal damage in one swing. Their unique ability allows them to instantly erase any overcharge they had. By default, they wield a Force Sword, a Force Staff (aka the conflagration staff from vermintide) and the aforementioned head busting power (speculated to be able to switched for other psyker powers in future updates). Their personalities can either be a Savant simply trying to do the right thing even when everybody hates them, a batshit insane Seer who is so incredibly joined to the Warp that they hear voice from a "Beloved" who may or may not be the God-Emperor of Mankind or possibly a daemon, and a very resentful Loner twisted by all the abuse and distrust Psykers get simply by existing.
  • Psykinetic: The most combat-focused subtype of the Psyker, their blitz is a Brain Burst that deals huge single target damage and gains a warp charge on kill, increasing the Psyker's damage. This works especially well against elite foes, not only because of its high damage, but because they gain increased damage against elites while in cohesion. While building up charges can help mitigate the risks of perils, they can also live on the edge like the Unchained from last game, enhancing their attack power and gaining other benefits at high peril levels. Their active ability is pure utility though: They send out a force wave that knocks everyone around them back and even down to the ground, while expelling a huge amount of warp peril. This allows them to balance spamming their abilities to get power at high peril and then "vent" it if things get too hairy. By default, they wield a combat sword and laspistol.

• Ogryn: Taller than the other characters (said to be the height of three Bardins tall) and can send smaller enemies flying back with his attacks. Has the same charging move as Foot Knight Kruber in Vermintide 2, which pushes enemies away and gives them a boost to their movement and attack speed to finish them off faster. By default, they wield a ripper gun (which has an alt-firing move that allows it to go full auto), a combat knife, and their own unique Ogryn patterned grenades (a cluster bomb that scatters and explodes in a large area, randomly). Due to how tall and big the Ogryn is and since this is a sci-fi game where majority of the enemies and characters use guns, the Ogryn will have to do the heavy lifting, acting as a distraction/cover for his teammates. But that's fine since he's big and strong, and being tall allows him to score headshots in melee with relative accuracy and ease. You should play a strike team of four of them. Sadly, there's no female Ogryn option yet, so no Badass Fatass SSBBW Space-Ogress option (feelsbadman). They can either be a Bodyguard who held the line alongside his fellow Ogryns when all the little humies ran away and yet was still disgraced, a Bully who revels in how strong he is over everyone else and a Brawler who sounds a LOT like Bardin (but doesn't have his VA), a simple childlike soul that lost his last master and just wants to be better next time. Something else to note about player Ogryns: They're smarter than average. The Brawler and Bully have Bonehead implants, and all of them are seen counting to FIVE in loading screens. Note that the smartest and most famous Ogryn who ever lived, Nork Deddog, can only count up to FOUR. Smarts like these are probably worth throwing in the brig for on its own, for fear of what such genius specimens could do if left on their own...
  • Skullbreaker: It breaks skulls. This chonker is a big ol' brute in the classical Ogryn image who takes less damage, staggers enemies harder and protects da lil' unz by continuously reviving allies even while taking damage. Their active ability makes them charge straight ahead, scattering anything lighter than them with a ridiculous burst of speed. Their default weapons are a break-action single-shot shotgun, a huge metal club and a box of grenades. No, they don't toss a box of grenades with some sort of igniter attached to it to set them all off in quick succession (though there is a feat that can be taken with such a functionality), they just toss a whole-ass box of grenades at someone's face to instantly murder them with the blunt force trauma. This is apparently more potentially-lethal to a single person than actual shotguns, and does bonus damage to heavily armored enemies for good measure. Can also lethally pimp slap people with some melee weapons' special attack.

Weapons

being a 40k game you have a wide plethora of weapons to shoot and beat heretics to death with, when the full game comes out, this might be of help of choosing your favored toy for killing.

Ranged Weapons

• Lasgun: The humble lasgun, while often the butt of jokes, is arguably one of the best weapons in the game. With very little recoil, good damage (minus the light lasgun, we'll get to that later), an actual scope for good accuracy, and a humongous ammo pool both in clip and reserves, there is very few scenarios the lasgun will serve you badly in - the only real waste of time and ammo for it is shooting at a carapace-armored Crusher, or hipfiring it at something more than three feet away. It is available to all classes barring the Ogryn, though it works best with the Veteran because his skills and passive traits reward precision headshots, which the lasgun is very good at. The special attack for all lasgun types is a twin-link toggle an under-slung flashlight, perfect for illuminating darkened corridors, though here's hoping we also get a bayonet in the full release. Before you start complaining about the lasgun somehow having recoil, the devs did try to make fully recoilless lasguns, but it felt so off that they scrapped the idea.
  • There are three types of lasguns, light, medium and heavy; the heavy lasgun is slower firing but heavier hitting, making it ideal for dealing with elites or specials, the medium serves as the middle ground between the heavy and light lasgun, perfect for all scenarios whether it be sniping or crowd control, and then the light lasgun... sucks. There's no sugar coating it. When guardsmen themselves call lasguns "flashlights", this thing is probably why; its rate of fire is the best when compared to its cousins, that means fuck all when you can't kill something heavier than a traitor guardsmen or poxwalker (read: chaff). Use the other two when available and scrap the light lasgun for thrones.
  • Do note they are all semi automatic, so buy a second mouse as it will break and be prepared for carpal tunnel syndrome.

• Accatran Recon Lasgun: A fully-automatic lasgun for those who wanted their lasgun to feel a bit more like a typical assault rifle but don't want to just use an autogun like some kind of casual. Burns through ammo fast and not likely to stagger even basic enemies, but almost zero recoil and a blistering fire-rate propelling that ammo will kill most things it's pointed at very effectively...but a few things are kinda hard to keep pointed at. (*Dog barking*)

• Lucius Helbore Lasgun: Veteran only. The Krieger specialstandard for all of your Death Korps cosplay needs. A lower fire-rate and higher-damage lasgun with iron sights that has its use further complicated by a small charge-up time before it actually fires- the longer you charge, the harder it hits. Its special attack is, of course, a bayonet (slap yourself if you thought it could be anything else). The stabby bits comes in handy because like the bolter, the Lucius suffers from a long swap in animation. Save yourself some time by bayoneting weak isolated enemies instead of switching to your melee weapon. Hopefully the full game includes a krieger gas mask cosmetic. Then again, considering the already penitent dogmatic doormat nature of any Krieger's upbringing, they would probably have offed themselves before being branded as a "convict" on top of their already unforgiving desire to self-sacrifice.

• Laspistol: Unfortunately inferior to a lasgun in pretty much all situations, it's OK enough against chaff, but really struggles against special enemies and bosses. On the other hand, it can be used while sprinting so if you've set your character up to focus on melee it'll serve well enough as a way to weaken enemies.

• Autogun: Depending on what you're going for, this weapon is either great or it sucks. Comes in automatic, burst fire, and semiautomatic variants. Most variants have better rates of fire than the stock lasgun at the cost of worse recoil and ammo efficiency. Good if you want to mimic an Ork, but until release it is best given up for your trusty lasgun. They either have an underslung flashlight, recoil reducing bracing, or a butt stroke as the special attack. Available to all classes that aren't Ogryn and comes in many many variations, thus notorious for clogging up players' weapon shop RNG slots while people are hoping to buy a Psyker Staff or a Plasma Gun for the Veteran.

• Shotgun: With 9 shots and a very good cone of damage, this thing is one of the better weapons for crowd control and is almost realistic in its accuracy, capable of hitting even distant targets reliably (though almost definitely not killing them in one hit at a distance) - suck it CoD players. It's also one of the few ways that the Veteran and Zealot can knock down and kill maulers, easily one of the more annoying enemies in the game with the amount of armor they have. Its special attack loads a single round that makes manages to make a shotgun even more effective against a bunch of warm bodies standing side-by-side in front of it by firing out its shot in a spread-out horizontal line that can scythe through numerous heads in one shot, though this special round is pretty much strictly inferior against anything that can be tagged.

• Autopistol: Ironically better than the autogun, it's effectively a VZ61 Skorpion submachine gun with low damage but a very high rate of fire. Has surprisingly low recoil compared to equivalent weapons in other FPS games, so don't be afraid to use it at medium to longish range. Just be warned that it's not the best against armor. Like most other guns, it has a flashlight for its special attack and it shares the laspistol's ability to fire while sprinting.

• Stub revolver: Available to the human classes. Is surprisingly accurate and does good damage, use as an alternative to the lasgun if you want to fight effectively at long range and quickly burst down specials. Count your shots, the reload animation is painfully slow since it has your character manually pushing rounds into the chamber one at a time instead of using a speed loader, despite there being a visible speed loader mechanism when reloading. On the flipside, partial reloads are accurate and your character will only empty the spent chambers.

• Force staff: Psyker only. Doesn't use ammo, but does increase your perils meter, though just like when holding the Brain Burst, you can "reload" to quell the peril. Most versions come with a mediocre energy bolt primary attack and a wimpy special attack that has you physically prodding enemies with your magic stick. The secondary attacks are the ones that really set them apart from each other.
  • Trauma Staff: Everyone's First Staff. A copy paste of Sienna's conflagration staff from vermintide that allows you to cause warpfire to geyser out of the ground but this time 'round you get to nuke whatever entity is at the center of your explosion on top of the AoE and DoT effects. Bit difficult and dangerous to use, it racks up perils of the warp like crazy. Generally abandoned for the other staves in higher difficulties.
  • Surge Staff: The Stun Support Staff. Makes you into Emperor Palpatine with medium to short ranged force lightning that damages and stuns enemies. Has a hard cap of how many enemies it can target at a time, you'll need to wade into melee or rely on allies to help deal with hordes. The lightning is good for stunning special enemies and will hurl dreg tox bombers backwards so they won't blow up in your face.
  • Voidstrike Staff: The DPS Staff. Shoots explosive warp fireballs that deals great AOE damage and sends mobs reeling. Has a faster cast rate and more fire and forget capability than the trauma staff. Use quickcharged fireballs to kill faraway enemies, they have perfect accuracy as opposed to the primary attack that can have a significant RNG deviation from your reticle location.
  • Purgation Staff: The Horde Clearing Staff. Psychic flamethrower stick for BBQing hordes in warp flames. Can also use it to farm warp tokens with a lvl 30 feat. This staff replaces the primary attack with another flamethrower attack, so make sure one of your teammates is specced to kill snipers. Or just use your Brain Burst.

• Boltgun: A fucking powerful gun that obliterates anything it aimed at. Single shots will turn basic enemies into ludicrous gibs and magdumping will have a similar effect on elites and bosses. It's drawbacks are slow reload speed, slow weapon swap time, massive recoil, and only having 15 shots per magazine,. It might be the best vidya presentation of the weapon, more so than these games.

• Flamer: Zealot only. Good for causing trash mobs to panic and do the burny dance. Main drawbacks are a slow swap in speed and limited effectiveness against special enemies, especially mutants and poxbursters.

• Plasma Gun: Our lovely blaster cannon made for Veteran only. Suffers from a low ammo pool, an incredibly long reload time, and a heat gauge; On first impression it can feel a lot like a worse Boltgun, but in true Imperial Plasma Weapon fashion the Plasma Gun is a temperamental weapon that rewards skilled Heat management with ludicrous damage from Overcharged shots that makes short work of even the toughest enemies. Reloading automatically cools the weapon to 0, and the special vents heat directly in to your face, draining a bit of health to reduce the heat. Attempting to fire normally at extremely high heat will automatically vent some heat first. Firing an Overcharged shot at 100% heat will cause the weapon to explode.

• Thumper Shotgun: Exclusive to the Ogryn, it's essentially a larger M79 that fires 20kg shotgun shells. It can only hold one round before reloading, but that one round is all you need to turn an entire mob into chunky salsa. Enemies that survive the blast are usually knocked on their back where you can easily crump em before they can get up. Has a pistol-whip secondary attack that sadly doesn't do much damage but can make for a substitute for pushing if your stamina is low and you're careful to kite away from melee attacks.
  • If you played the closed beta this is actual name of the Kickback shotgun, editors found the true name on playdarktide.com

• Ripper Gun: An Ogryn auto-shotgun. If you thought the Kickback turned crowds into paste, wait till you use this thing. Its standard fire is a three-round burst and holding right click turns it into a fully-automatic pellet hose that also tightens spread. Only bosses are going to survive a volley from this thing. The Ripper has an actual bayonet mounted for its special attack.

• Thumper Grenade Launcher: Still just for Ogryns, instead fires grenades like the actual M79 break-action launcher tended to be used for. Good area-of-effect and dishes out some pain when impacting a target directly (unfortunate basic enemies will be gibbed like with the Thumper Shotgun), but has a timed fuse making it clearly better against large groups than high-value targets. Has the same pistol-whip swings for its special attack as its shotgun brother. The grenade round itself smacking off of a special's face can often kill it alone before the round explodes, making this a hilarious weapon.

• Grenadier Gauntlet: The lovechild of a breaching ram and a grenade launcher, which Ogryns can carry by simply strapping it to a forearm. Predictably, punches the crap out of enemies with its primary function button and can fire explosives after right-clicking, as well a special attack where the Ogryn punches someone and then fires a grenade into them at point blank range. Somewhat contrary to expectations and probably to differentiate it from Thumper grenades, the impact grenades it fires have a fairly poor blast radius making not terribly effective against groups of enemies (you'll only see it kill multiple enemies at once when fired into the really numerous ambush hordes) or enemies camping in cover and instead is more useful for burning down specials or elites. You can combo it with feats that give you toughness or bleed enemies on heavy attack since its punches count as heavy attacks.

• Heavy Stubber: Ogryn only, and the description for it declares that Ogryns love their Dakka as much as any elegan/tg/entleman. Has a magazine of over a hundred and still not very accurate at a distance as Ogryn weaponry tends to, but when you can fire over a hundred shots at a sniveller you'll get them eventually anyway. Fires fully-automatically (though it lets out three-round bursts with a single trigger pull like the Ripper Gun despite having two barrels, for some reason), a grip can be pulled out to brace the gun for fully-automatic fire just like the Ripper Gun, and can be swung (at a fairly slow rate, even Ogryns have limits) with the special attack button. In practice, it's basically a bigger-but-more-cumbersome Ripper Gun with a larger magazine for longer sustained fire but less DPS caused in a smaller sort of timeframe for burning down important Specials and Elites as quickly...but it'll kill many of those things in one magazine if the Ogryn has the space to do so. The model looks to be about half of the quad-heavy stubber configuration of the Sabre Weapons Battery.

Melee Weapons

• Combat Blade: Its animations are heavily focused on quick stabs, so take it if you want a fast, high DPS, low range melee weapon like Kerillians dual daggers in Vermintide. Its heavy attack can be charged while sprinting, which gives it a tad bit more mobility than other melee weapons. Its special attack is a staggering jab which causes the next attack to be basically an instant heavy (it does slightly less damage than a true heavy attack and also strangely replaces the damage caused by it to that even if you fully charge up the next attack like a true heavy, forcing you to cancel it with blocking if you don't want that). Comes with absolutely beautifully animated flourishes in first-person as your character returns the knife to the idle position, and they change depending on when you end your combo. Worth trying out for that alone.

• Combat Axe: It's an axe, what's there to say other than its heavy attack is easily one of the better ones and does a decent job of chopping though armor, though maulers are still a pain, especially when's there more than one. Not very good at cutting a crowd to pieces (seriously, it can cut through like two enemies at max...and those enemies won't be flak-armoured) but it does the job well enough, and if you're aiming for single target heavy armor it does the job well.

• Tactical Axe: Axe, but tacticool. Ok, actually, this one attacks much faster than the combat axe but accordingly does less damage though still useful against armour. A bit of an in-between of the combat blade and the combat axe.

• Catachan Devil's Claw Sword: According to Catachans, it's a knife. According to everyone else, it's a bloody sword. As mentioned above its built for precision strikes aimed towards a heretic's neck, preferably decapitating them. Its special attack is a parry that allows you to conserve stamina for pushing/blocking when being swarmed.

• Dueling Sword: Looks like a pirate cutlass with a moveset more like a rapier. Has great range + great speed, but limited armor piercing and a relatively narrow cleave arc. Its special attack is a quick thrusting jab. Take it if you want to dodge dance enemies and bosses, it has a dodge cooldown bonus that does not show up in the unit stats.

• Chainsword: Wouldn't be a 40k game without one. The light attacks aren't as good for clearing hordes as the shovel, but it's better for taking out bosses and special enemies with its revved up special attack which will do massive damage and stagger effectively as having a fucking chainsword saw through you should, but the time it takes for you standing there driving the chainsword through leaves you vulnerable (so accordingly, you can also turn the high RPM mode off). Take note that headshots and heavy attacks cause more damage even for the revved up attacks (unless you're running it into a Mauler's head, avoid headshotting him with this).

• Chainaxe: Handles fairly similarly to the chainsword, except that it's slightly slower due to its light attacks sticking to enemies for a split second on hit to grind them for a bit of extra damage.

• Shovel: Veteran exclusive and all veterans start with one as their stock melee weapon. Perfect for roleplaying as a Krieger, it has good damage and can smack multiple heretics at a time. Its light attacks use the blade for good single target kills, while the heavy attacks use massive sweeping blows from the flat that can stagger more enemies. It focuses more on cleaving though a horde than the Night Fang which rewards more precise head severing strikes.

• Power Sword: Veteran exclusive. Similar yet distinct to the chainsword, the key thing about it is that its special attack button will instead energize the blade and cause it to cut through anyone like butter as expected of a power sword for a few hits, with its duration lasting shorter from hitting armoured enemies. This'll get the fucking job done against literally anything in range whilst energized. Generally considered overpowered, as it takes slightly less time to activate the charge than most similar charged / revved weapons, yet the charge lasts for multiple hits and will probably get nerfed at some point since it is making Veteran better at melee than the actual melee careers.

• Heavy Sword: Zealot Exclusive. A middling melee weapon that specializes in (you guessed it) sweeping heavy attacks. Seriously though, if you actually want to use this thing, never just left-click with it, its light attacks will take ages just to kill basic trash enemies. Usually skipped for the catachan sword or chain weapons.

• Eviscerator Chainsword: Zealot Exclusive. Giant FUCK OFF chainsword with a revved up heavy strike, it can cut two foes in half with one swing with its crazy good cleave. The push attacks and the first attack of its heavy attack combo are both horizontal sweeps that you'll want to spam for crowd control. A must-have weapon for female Zealot to cosplay as Sisters Repentia.

• Power Hammer: Zealot Exclusive. Like the eviscerator, its heavy attacks are wide anti-horde sweeps, while it's light attacks are head crushing overhead swings. The special attack powers up the hammer for a single high damage, high recovery energized strike. And you'll need to power it up against tougher enemies, a design oversight means that uncharged attacks do an embarrassing 20 or so damage per swing against carapace armor.

• Force Sword: Psyker Exclusive. Spectacularly fast and lethal especially at high peril, and if you don't like that you can also quell peril while holding it just like with the Force Staff. Though the Power Hammer and the Ogryn's weapons hit harder with individual hits the Force Sword is probably the best overall melee weapon so far, the ludicrous speed allowing it to both butcher hordes and take down the big bastards. If the RNG smiles upon your perk rolls, it can even block ranged attacks with the Deflection perk. The special attack imbues the blade with the warp and makes it headbang the next foe it hits, ignoring any defenses in the process. It also replaces the generic weapon push with an increased AOE force push, while the push attack that follows increases peril in exchange for a single target stagger that can stun even the most heavily armored and resistant bastards.

• Ogryn Cleaver: A knife scaled up to Ogryn size, but it would be akin to an Ork choppa in anyone else's hands, which it's probably why it's exclusive to the big boys. Is the fastest Ogryn melee weapon and has similar armor penetration as the humie combat axe thanks to the Ogryn's brute strength. The special attack is a quick uppercut to stagger things (even Maulers end up on their asses!).

• Ogryn Club: Slower than the knife, but better at staggering hordes since it's heavy attacks are all horizontal sweeps. Its special attack is pimpslapping, mostly similar to pushing in effect though it doesn't cost stamina and does at least a small amount of damage.

• Ogryn Latrine Shovel: Normal shovels are for digging trenches, these are for digging TOILETS. Ew. Fit for an Ogryn because they could probably break a normal one by using them to pick their teeth or something. Like the club, it specializes in clearing mobs with horizontal sweep attacks. Special attack is the Ogryn uppercut.

• Ogryn Shock Maul: Bafflingly shown off in the Ogryn's class trailer but not present at launch. Most likely a riot control weapon built for disruption due to the Ogryn's affinity for simple brutish weapons.

• Ogryn Slab Shield: Comes with a maul that's mostly used for sideways-aimed swings aside from its push attack that strikes downward. Can block gunfire unlike other melee weapons at the cost of some stamina (which is pretty handy since groups of lasmen at Malice difficulty and up will Rape even unprotected Ogryns caught out of cover). Emperor said you shall be the cover! The shield can also be used to bludgeon enemies to death with its heavy attacks or deployed with the special attack button so the Ogryn cannot move or turn while its active but also cannot lose stamina from blocking (stamina regeneration however will still be momentarily paused after blocking). About the only weapon that can save a teammate that blundered into the open with three snipers looking at them if an ally revives that teammate behind the Ogryn's shield. It is notably more apt at creating a "Tank" playstyle than any of the shield weapons were in VT2 but there is a lot of debate on how useful that is, as you can arguably just collect aggro by walking up to things and whacking them, best defense being a good offense and whatnot. Be prepared to face a lot of ridicule from metagamers if you want to be the "Tank".

Other Characters

• Inquisitor Gryndel: The big cheese in charge of the ship. Only appears to the player via a hologram that oscillates between various male/female voices and appearances. In theory, he/she's supposed to be the one you're reporting to while cleaning up the Hive.
• Shipmistress Brahms: A former Rogue Trader currently serving the Inquisition, she runs the Mourningstar. Notably narrates and appears in the intro cinematic. Seriously looks like Mom from Futurama if she was in 40K.
• Interrogator Rannick: One of Gryndel's Interrogators. Mostly just hands out missions sometimes and acts smart. Also narrator of the reveal trailer. Seems to be cosplaying Zorg from The Fifth Element.
• Sergeant Major Morrow: Think of him as the Mission Control from Deep Rock Galactic or Lohner from vermintide. Now with the power of Vox technology (bless the Omnissiah!), he will constantly be providing mission details for the players team in a sarcastic tone. Voiced by Kruber's VA. His original regiment is the Armageddon Steel Legion from the SECOND war for Armageddon. He was apparently the sole survivor of a warp accident and the Inquisitor rescued him. One of the veteran random dialogues states he served with Yarrick in Hades Hive.
• Tech-Priestess Hadron Omega 7-7: Runs the Mourningstar's Fabrication Shrine, allowing you to upgrade and tweak your wargear using Plasteel and Diamantium found on missions. Sometimes does the briefing and is the one who warns you when the data-interrogator starts to fuck up and you have to fix it, filled to the brim with sass and been angry for nearly 392.1736 Terran cycles or so, calls the player and the squad varlets and rightfully thinks the players are a bunch of idiots who may not be completely useless.
• Flight Lieutenant Masozi: The Valkyrie pilot. The squads accuse her of cheating at cards and somehow even the Tarot, with the more reckless characters constantly complaining about losing credits to her, and others trying to be a better cheater than her (they never succeed).
• Sefoni: The narrator for the tutorial. You can find her stuffed in a tube aboard the Mourningstar if you want to replay the tutorial or visit a simulated firing range.
• Explicator Zola: The character who recruits the PC as an inquisitorial pawn after their prison ship is boarded in the prologue. She loses her squad in a firefight and nearly dies but the PC saves her, and she decides to let them serve the Emperor once again. An Atoma native, is in the short story “Loyalty’s Price” where a psyker is interrogating another psyker before executing the victim of said interrogation, though it was probably for the poor bastard's own good. Sometimes briefs missions like Omega and Morrow. Being a local, she serves as a local guide for the rejects by providing useful information on parts of the Atoma they've traveled to.
• Captain Wolfer: Traitor captain in the cell next to the PC in the prologue, before his heretical buddies break him out.
• Sire Melk: Aka "Sir Darius Melk, Thrice Decorated for Bravery by Lord Dolmar Martialis, Holder of the Endless March, and Warden of the Crux Mortem." Long title? Deal with it. A former fighter that would very much like to get back to fighting but instead has to deal with you poor souls, he handles weekly missions, and will reward you with special markers that you can exchange for high rarity weapons. Notably, voiced by Bardin's VA.
• "Commodore" Alice Hallowette: The one who handles the much maligned microtransactions shop. Note the quotations, nobody knows if she's actually a commodore or not. Constantly teases the player characters and everyone. Your PCs on the missions complain about her high prices, which is a very interesting complaint to make about a microtransaction-based cosmetics shop.
• Medicae Servitors: Responsible for healing you on a mission. Unlike the usual servitor lobotomized into a mindless husk, likely because used to be criminals and convicts just like you, these poor bastards are VERY aware that they're nothing more than mutilated bodies attached to a medical station and beg for the sweet release of death, or on a sadder note, will ask you to be their friend or to take them with you. Interestingly, their VA is Lohner's from Vermintide.

Stages

• Smelter: You can push members of the final horde off platform and into the molten metal below instead of wasting ammo fighting them.

Enemies

• Poxwalkers: Civilians of Atoma Hive who were infected by Moebian Sixth's pox gas. They are the trash mob, Skavenslave/Common Infected equivalents, in that they come in hordes with the purpose of tarpitting the players. Befitting lore, they can be heard periodically begging for help or crying over being forced to observe their body act completely outside of their control whilst out of combat, not just that laughing like their brain has been reprogrammed to not be able to scream or cry, imagine you there reading this being trapped inside a body your unable to control well in an unholy amount of pain, all the while something inside your head is making your screams come out as laughter.
  • Poxburster: Suicide bomber. Kill him from afar as soon as possible since its explosion can also corrupt players. Can be detected by the beeping sounds from their bomb. An Ogryn charge or a Zealot rush can knock them down without blowing them up, useful if you're in the detonation radius and can't get away. Alternately, if you're ballsy, pushing them will stagger them even while they toss themselves at you and give you an opportunity to kill them at a safe range or just dodge away from their explosion...unless the direction you pushed them didn't provide enough space behind them. Be careful at all times of spawn doors on the map, as these guys can be spawned right next to you and detonate themselves before you even get a chance to defend or run away.

• Moebian Sixth Regiments AKA The Scabs. Its literal definition being protective crust formed by the blood of body wounds or cuts, fitting name for a Nurgle regiments. These regiments were known for being the toughest out of all Moebian regiments. However, a good grimdark dose of war trauma and a bit of Warp shenanigans later, they turned in a bunch of Nurgle worshippers. They now seek to "save" the citizens of Atoma and its sister worlds by releasing gas blessed with papa Nurgle's "truth" in the hab blocks, freeing them from the corpse Emperor's lies... They almost all wear skull-like gasmasks, although not as much as the Death Korps'. Comparing to the Dregs, they are slightly tougher due to wearing flak armor.
  • Traitor Guardsmen: Your HERETICAL wall of guns. Smarter than Poxwalkers. Knows how to use cover like most FPS enemies. They come in lasgun and close combat weapon varieties, and are a bit more resilient than the Clanrats they probably stand in for. The former can spawn in groups of 10 or more at difficulty 3 and higher to light your ass up like a fireworks display, forcing you to cover-hump and switch from playing 40K Vermintide to playing 40K Call of Duty.
  • Scab Bomber: Think of them as the Globadier/Spitter of this game, but lobs firebombs to create puddles of area-denying fire. Raises the question as to why their quartermasters didn't issue them gas bombs if the Sixth was going for a pestilence themed army. For whatever reason, they don't cause as much friendly fire as the Vermintide globadiers, it's pretty common to see hordes sprinting through the flames without getting burnt to a crisp.
  • Scab Flamer: Uses conventional flamers to flush players out of cover instead of the green fire flamethrowers that their Dreg Tox colleagues use.
  • Scab Trapper: The Packmaster/Smoker of this game. More clever than her ratty or asthmatic counterparts since the Trapper uses an electrified net gun to disable players from a distance and abandons them to the mercy of her buddies right away to focus on another target. An important tip is to listen for them. Trappers announce their presence only when they spawn with a distinct laugh, but are silent when moving around. It's not as audible as mutant roaring and pox hound barking, but having advanced warning is extremely helpful to avoid getting netted - see if you can put terrain between you and the trapper as it tries to net you, or dodge to the side as she brings up the net gun to bear. Similar to the smoker in L4D, you will not be snared if you kill the trapper while her net is still in the air, so standing your ground with a heavy weapon like a bolter or ogryn grenadier gauntlet is a viable way to take her down. Can take down your entire team if you lose track of her in a chaotic enough moment.
  • Scab Gunner: The Ratling Gunner of this game, but armed with a Hotshot Volley Gun. They're not very accurate, but will suppress players and make it difficult, but not impossible to effectively shoot back at him.
  • Scab Shotgunner: Suicidally aggressive, they move into optimal shotgun range and start dumping rounds. They can stagger the player on hit, so either attack them while they're focused on another player or make sure you're ready to dodge to a side if you're approaching them for melee.
  • Scab Rager: Dual wielding berserkers similar to dreg ragers except significantly more dangerous since they're dressed head to toe in flak armor. Note: Due to a bug, the kill text will identified it as a Dreg Rager upon its death.
  • Scab Mauler: Wearing Carapace Armour from the neck up, flak armor from the neck down, tough as nails, and armed with a two-handed chain-axe. Similar to Maulers from Vermintide 2 in that the vast majority of weaponry is better off used for targeting anywhere aside from these guys' heads, though this isn't as visually obvious as in Vermintide 2 since Darktide's Maulers still look pretty well-armoured on the rest of their body.
  • Scab Sniper: This guy hangs out at a distance and blends in with vanilla traitor guardsmen until he turns on his targeting laser. His long-Las shots are very painful since they're strong enough to blast through toughness and deal HP damage with every shot. He is at his most dangerous when he has pals to tarpit players while he picks them off one by one. Take cover behind a wall or a structure if you see him scoping you out with his laser even if poxwalkers are presently about to crack your head open to get at your brains, because your teammates will be hard-pressed to get you back up on your feet while a sniper is looking in your direction. On the plus side, he dies almost instantly the moment the players start shooting back at him. The veteran's ability to highlight special enemies is invaluable in pinning this slippery bastard down though any player can highlight him by spamming the callout enemy button in the general direction of his laser sight.

• Admonition Cultists: AKA The Dregs. As if their name aren't already a big give away, they are bog-standard Chaos cultists that were mostly poor Atoma underhivers. They dressed in yellow ragged robes and salvaged gasmasks. They are not as wealthy or trained as their Scabs counterpart so most of their fodders are armed with lower-quality ballistic weapons and lacking proper defensive garments and thus are weaker and much easier to kill.
  • Dreg Shotgunner: The same shit as the Scab variant. Shotguns are cheap and common unlike Lasgun weapons.
  • Dreg Tox Flamer: A lanky guy in robes carrying a flamethrower that burns green. It's hard to say whether it's supposed to be a Chem-Thrower or a Plague Belcher, or if maybe the Nurglites jumped through a Warp rift to nick Warpfire Throwers from Clan Skryre. Whatever it is, it clearly has some warp fuckery involved since the tox flamer doesn't do as much friendly fire damage as scab bombers/flamers, while also dealing more Corruption damage to you. Much like other enemy specialists, this guy loves opening up on the players while they are getting swarmed.
  • Dreg Rager: The dual wielding berserker equivalents. Pumping with combat drugs on their back, they charge into melee with dual close combat weapons and start berserker swinging (albeit reuses Norscan berserker's animations from vermintide 2). They have a nasty tendency to blend in with hordes, so keep an eye out for tall shirtless cultists with lines of green glass vials stuck all over their body. Fortunately, they're not armored and die quick when focused, though staggering them gets unlikely on harder difficulties.
  • Dreg Gunner: Scab Gunner but armed with Heavy Stubber because they are poor.

• Mutant: Mutants that were enhanced with cybernetics. Inspired by the Charger from Left 4 Dead, its role is to charge at one of the players to separate them from their team, then give them a little ground pounding, followed by throwing them even further. Keep an eye on the terrain, they can incapacitate or even instantly kill players by throwing them off cliffs. It is a pretty big abomination, about the size of an Ogryn, and it is pretty fast and tanky. Funnily, it shares the Chaos Spawn's throwing animation from Vermintide 2. Liable to choose one target and then run past everyone else to get to them no matter how much dakka that tends to attract, but it's understandable since the poor thing most likely doesn't have much of a mind anymore. Its charge can be dodged with good timing (look for it raising its arm), and it charging into you with a wall behind you won't give it enough space to try and pummel you - leading it to tossing you away without much done to you (hopefully) before it tries charging again. Is heard approaching from a mile away due to it's non-stop screaming.

• Pox Hound: A straightforward Gutter Runner/Hunter, but not as agile nor stealthy since it likes to bark and it does not fly. It sometimes comes in a squad of 2 or 3 mixed in with hordes. Its bite can corrupt players, not to mentioned it is fast and tanky so like the Pox Burster, it should be another enemy to be taken out afar ASAP. Just like the Mutants they will prioritize their chosen target regardless if the rest of the team is opening fire.

• Chaos Ogryn: The Chaos Warriors of this game, but bigger with the abnormally large body proportions of Ogryns. Their job is to attract the players' attention and tank as much as possible. These tough dumb bastards come in three variants:
  • Crusher: The offensive variant that's armored and armed with two handed great weapons. Reminiscent of the Chaos Warriors from Vermintide 2 except they actually hold up your team as opposed to falling over dead in 0.8 seconds as Chaos Warriors would.
  • Bulwark: Chaos Bullgryns, the defensive variant that's armed with a chainsword and a big sturdy shield, but thankfully its body isn't completely armored. Capable of charge towards the players. Psykers can bypass their shield with brainburster and force sword special attacks while player ogryns can knock them on their ass with bull charge. Zealots and Vets can also use grenades to throw them off-balance, leaving them open to a charge or a well-placed headshot.
  • Reaper: The ranged variant that will fill the players, the air, and their allies full of lead with their big fucking Heavy Stubber. Think of it as a harder-hitting, meatier version of the Scab Gunner.

Bosses

• Plague Ogryn: The first revealed randomly encountered boss of this game. Just a big rotting mutated Ogryn that wants to eat you and stuff you inside its shitty rotten intestine. Pretty much the Rat Ogre/Tank equivalent. Just like rat ogres/tanks, be careful fighting them around bottomless pits that they can punch players into.

• THAT KARKING THING: Revealed in the World Intro Trailer. It made its return in this game with some techno gadgets on its body and probably had the same animation as the one from vermintide 2 as well. Has yet to show up in the game even after launch.

• Beast of Nurgle: This huggy guy isn't too fast but it leaves a slimy snail trail of diarrhea everywhere it goes that causes damage over time and slows movement speed. It's attacks mostly consist of vomiting said diarrhea at the player. Don't let it back you into a corner, it can eat a player and disable them until the other players beat him up enough to make him barf them up. If you're playing as an Ogryn, you can immediately make him vomit a devoured teammate by beaning him with a thrown grenade box or using the career Bull Rush ability on it. Has a big pus bubble on the back of his head which functions as his weak spot, aggressive players can run up and hit it in melee while he's locked in one of his barf animations.

• Traitor Captain: Or Scab Captain for Low Gothic speakers. They serves as the boss of assassinate missions. Armed with a shotgun (or a plasma pistol), two handed maul (or a two handed power sword), and refractor shield. They will call in poxwalkers and traitor guard for support. Do not tunnel vision on the boss, kill his summoned fodder first. Special enemies can and will spawn in the middle of the fight and you do NOT want to play wheres waldo with trappers and snipers amongst the traitor guardsmen. Ogryns can knock him down with their bull charge when his shield is down, so having one on your team for these missions is ideal. His shield decreases ranged damage, so you have to beat him down close and personal before using your guns. Try to time your stuns to hit right before he regenerates his refractor shield so your team has extra time to beat it down while he's recovering. Has an absolutely fucking baller boss soundtrack. He also has randomly generated names.

• Daemonhost: Much like the Witch in Left 4 Dead, the Daemonhost doesn't attack you unless you hit it, shine a flashlight near it, or get too close to it. But if someone does end up doing any of those things (block, dodge and pray to the Emperor if this is you), it will teleport over to them to fuck their shit up and will try to possess them when they're downed for an instant kill. You don't need to fight it, so your best strategy is simply to leave it alone- if you hear its whispers, keep your lights off and be very careful with your shots to make sure you don't aggro it by accident. It is possible to kill it with some heavy-duty damage sources (Brain Burst is an obvious suggestion), though probably the only way to reliably kill it on Damnation without losing a teammate's soul or two is to have an Ogryn with Slab Shield aggro it (after which it will laser focus him until either one dies) and then set down the shield to constantly block its attacks and only receive some constant corruption damage from its nearby presence rather than getting absolutely karked in a few seconds. Just like the witch, it will automatically fuck off once they've reached their desired kill count. Unlike the witch, it will go for two members of the team instead of one, so have fun.

Surviving Tertium Hive for rejects

A general misconception is that being overleveled for a difficulty will make you Grimaldus flattening a bunch of snotlings. While it is obvious for people who played Vermintide, players new to Fatshark's approach of co-op games might not get the hint. What will get you through the mission is not to dish out the most damage or slaughter the most heretics, it's in fact your ability to minimize the damage you take through the level and using your environment to the fullest. Here are a few tips to help you being the best heretic crusher there is on Atoma Prime. Source: "Trust me, I'm an enginseer".

• General tips:
  • Stick together or die alone: Especially true since there is a whole mechanic of health (and passives) that encourage you lot to stick together, you'll even find out that some specials cannot do shit against you as a group (looking at you pox hound). You'll need stabby mates to hold the line and the shooty ones to clear the specials or other shooties.
  • If you see them coming, they will die: Choose carefully where you receive an oncoming onslaught- stay away from holes in the ceiling or automatic doors. You might want to see what is coming at you and kill it before it sees you. Also helps if you have cover and a chokepoint.
  • Look everywhere for supplies: Some of you you may have noticed that 'nades, well supplied ranged weapons and medipacks can make the difference between getting away with the valkyrie or seeing yourself in some weird ass nurglite goo. You may break the "stick together or die alone" to this end, just remember to regroup when the poxwalkers come, a nasty special pops up or you encounter a large group of heretics. This goes double if you're hunting for scriptures or grimoires that spawn randomly around the level.
    • Know when you don't look for supplies: On higher difficulties especially, staying in an area for too long is just invitation to getting swarmed. If you aren't hurting for ammo and health, it's better to just hoof it and get to where you need to ASAP.
  • Make sure the coast is clear: As you advance through the difficulties, basic shooting enemies become a greater and greater threat with them doing more damage and being more prevalent in the game's many shadowy corners - the only way to avoid them making you embarrassingly dead from being shot in the back after you decided to advance is to make sure they are all dead. And even then, they can spawn ambiently to suddenly fuck up your shit or be obscured by shadowy corners, so constant vigilance is your only warning system.
  • Blocking is bonkers, being pushy gets your way, but dodging is important too: Blocking is a pretty reliable tool for avoiding melee damage as long as you have stamina, pushing can give you even more control over hordes by briefly staggering even more enemies than it would take your stamina to block their attacks or give you the space to slip by enemies surrounding you, but the truly best way to not have pointy or sharp objects in places you don't want them to be is to not be there. Disabling specials can be avoided with good timing by dodging right before their attacks land. Renegade guards'/cultists' guns will briefly flash before they fire, so you can even dodge gunfire if you're quick on your feet. You can also avoid bullets while sliding. Unfortunately, it'll take practice. Regardless, using all three of these defensive tools for melee in between each other is the way to go - dodging too often one after the other will causes your dodges to barely move at all without a short break from dodging, blocking many enemies at once will drain all of your stamina, and pushing alone isn't going to work very well against heavier enemies (especially if they're already attacking)...and attacking in between is important too, since stamina regeneration is paused by dodging.
  • A good defense button for your best offense: Just like in Vermintide, blocking completely resets your attacks' chain which for certain weapons with distinct swing patterns can be extremely useful for certain situations - like the Catachan Night Fang which does two diagonal swings that are good for hitting multiple horde enemies and then a downswing which most certainly is not, so you should stick with the first two attacks and block after them to cancel your chain back into them if you've got a lot of basic enemies in front of you. This is still useful even for weapons where its attack pattern is very similar (like the shovel's heavy attacks which are just swings right-to-left and then vice-versa), since it can help you land your attacks more effectively on weaker enemies in a large horde with heavily-armored elites mixed into it by turning your camera and dodging to the right of the elites.
  • Know your gear: Especially on higher difficulties, you better be acquainted with your wargear's moveset and how to get to the important attacks. Weapons like the dueling sword and combat blade do very low damage but slash and stab ridiculously fast, deal bonus damage to weakspots and, very importantly, can dodge far and often to make sure your sorry ass isn't mashed into a pulp. Some weapons need you to use your special button to make full use of them, such as power and chain weapons. Push attacks come out when you hold the attack button after pushing, and they often do the opposite of what a weapon is good it (IE, a horde-clearing sword might get a headsniping overhead) to give it some leeway. Whether they're good for clearing hordes or singling out the Elites, Specials and Bosses, you better know what you're dealing with. The released game comes with Attack Breakdowns for every single weapon, showing which attack and, in turn, each weapon, is good for singles and which are good for hordes.
    • Pick your weapons carefully: Related to this, barring some fairly specific builds and depending on class, you'll usually want to have one weapon that can deal with hordes and one weapon that can deal with elites. The Psyker and Sharpshooter will always have some fairly reliable means of killing Elites quickly so you'll usually want a chaff killer to accompany them. The same principle applies for the others.
  • Watch your back: While it'd be great if your entire team was able to constantly overwatch each other at all times and moments, you're generally just a bunch of geeks on a computer that will probablydefinitely get distracted by the many things that can go wrong during a mission. Even worse, just like in Vermintide, enemies can spawn out of the ether without warning right behind you. Therefore, the only 100% reliable method for making sure that you never get hit from behind is to check behind you with your own eyes - spare a glance behind yourself sometimes and listen closely if you prefer to have a chance of blocking the stabs that will be aimed at you.
  • Use cover: While it may sounds like "thank you, Captain Obvious"-tier advice, you may remember that someone paid a bunch of dudes to put and design those debris, concretes slabs, crates and barrels in the middle of the fucking path. Darktide is still a first person shooter and requires you to occasionally have a shooty phase while using cover. This tip is mostly for people not familiar with this genre, Vermintide players being used to just dodging around an open space whenever there's no specials and fighting opponents who typically can't hurt them if they're not up close, or simply believing that having cosmetic flak armor makes you bulletproof.
  • Safety first, reviving that guy after: Getting hit interrupts revives unless you're an Ogryn. Don't attempt a revive until the area is clear. Zealot stun grenades (or even Veteran frag grenades, if you throw enough of them), the Ogryn's bull charge, and psyker knockdown can help you get a quick + sneaky revive without killing everyone around you. This does not apply to teammate snared by trappers. Untangling them is much faster than a revive and their healthbar will be greatly depleted if a handful of poxwalkers beat on them while they're lying on the ground.
  • Chop the shooty ones, shoot the choppy ones: As is often the case in 40k proper, enemies that are good at being shooty do poorly when they're locked in melee, while choppy heretics can't shoot worth shit and may not even have guns. Use this to your advantage.
  • Use your team to help you: This is especially useful when being targeted by elites. Since most of the time they will focus on only one teammate, it's best to tag them, then block/dodge/take cover and wait for your buddies to take care of the heretic.
  • Spam that tag button: The tag button works on special enemies hiding in darkness, in fog, or inside a mob of lesser enemies. Spam that button to pick them out for you and your teammates. Make sure to rebind it to a more convenient key or button if you must.
  • Engaging patrols or groups of heretics: Basic rule: elites die first. Composition and placement of those groups can result in multiple approaches: force them into melee if they are more shooty with a zealot rush/stun grenade or an ogryn charge, especially a good call if you can flank them. You can also have your veteran or psyker taking the most problematics out with a well placed grenade, volley fire snipe or brainburst. Or go Call of Duty style to soften up the nasties and take down the choppy ones from a relatively safe distance.
    • Kill the squishies: Another good rule-of-thumb in most cases is to kill the enemies that you will certainly kill faster. Bosses may be scary, but the player being attacked by them can focus on dodging and kiting them to take practically no damage from them. Crushers and Maulers are spooky, but the same rule applies. Gunners, Flamers, Pox Hounds and the like however can all still cause damage and disable your team while being harder to keep away from entirely but will be killed far quicker than the aforementioned enemies, removing their ability to harm you further and giving the team more space to hopefully end the tougher doodz without them doing too much damage to the team. A horde of basic enemies can usually be killed far faster than a boss will...and the team will kill the boss a lot faster when they aren't constantly turning around to the poxwalkers poking their backs. While proper resource allocation can allow you to occasionally ignore this rule (there's not much reason for a psyker to start head exploding a Gunner when the entire fucking rest of the team is already shooting at them, after all), it's a generally-safe procedure to follow. Don't get distracted by the enemy's distraction carnifexes!
    • Clear the lines of fire: Players may not actually be able to cause friendly-fire damage to each other despite their avatars' verbal complaints, but getting in the way of your teammates preventing them from shooting at specials or elites still wastes their time and even their ammo. If you're one of the closer players to a priority target, consider crouching to ensure your allies will be able to shoot at them too. If you're sticking with your melee weapon when priority targets are about, try going toward terrain (and then going backwards if also necessary) so allies behind you can stick toward the middle of an area and easily shoot at priority targets on either side (this also simplifies things for you unless the terrain is also a door, since you can be sure enemies can't approach you from the terrain).
  • Those barrels ain't for show: Maps are littered with explosive barrels and hanging land mines you can shoot to clear out enemies. Obviously, you also want to make sure you're not standing too close to them yourself, since the enemy's shots can set them off too! They're color-coded too: Yellow for vanilla explosions, red for flame bombs that will coat the ground in fire.
  • Professionals have standards: Remember to protect this guy, who is willing to give up the purging for 10 seconds and use the auspex scanner or debugging the data interrogator. If you are this guy, you deserve your own Leman Russ Battle Tank.
  • It's not fleeing, it's a strategic retrograde advance: Don't hesitate to retreat to a safer position to take cover in order to regenerate your toughness or force heretics to attack you through a chokepoint. Better yet, if you can area transfer while a horde is coming, just do it and leave those screaming sickos behind.
  • Miniboss encounters: "How" and "where", those are the two questions that you must ask yourself when fighting one. For where, a big open area to facilitate your dodges, clear of enemies and without any pit, unless you want to visit Tertium's Under-Underhive. As to how, if you are targeted by the creature, focus on dodging, blocking and looking out to not be blocked by objects. In the other case, kill all others enemies first, then focus on the bastard. This will get easier when you get an idea of how their attack pattern works. Also works with the heretic captains.
    • Do not shoot the Daemonhost: Seriously, they'll probably just eat the souls of two of your teammates if you try. Like Witches from Left 4 Dead, they are better off avoided, but they are far harder to kill than Witches. Unless you're achievement hunting, in which case, try not to get everyone killed, yeah?
      • Sometimes, by dint of game induced randomness, a Daemonhost will be directly in the way of your party. In those circumstances, clear the immediate area of enemies, sic the best dodger / blocker on the host and try your best.
  • Don't killsteal a Psykers Brainburst target (usually..): Because Psykers need to actively kill targets with brainbursts to get their Warp Charge passives (with accompanying feat bonuses), most psykers will keep their charges topped off by bursting chaff. Let them do it. On a more casual front, really try not to kill a target being brain bursted in general ; it's a waste of the psykers time and just means they built up heat for nothing. THIS SAID, some targets that need multiple brainbursts are worth dealing the extra damage to (Mutants, Ogryns, other elites on harder difficulties etc) or when something needs killing really quickly.