See for yourself. Just charge into the Bursters with Gold Toughness.
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It says there will be a big announcement.
If that’s true, it might mean they’re going to reveal the next Darktide update.
However, it feels a bit too early to announce something that’s planned for December.
So maybe it’s something related to Vermintide 2 — or perhaps it’s finally about Fatshark’s next new game.
This was an interesting read. Truthfully, I’ve always felt caught in the middle of Darktide Balance Discussions. An Auric Maelstrom is the sweet spot of difficulty where I actually have to fully pay attention to the game. I can easily carry team in Havoc up to Havoc Level 25. But I find that my peers aren’t skilled enough to follow me beyond, and Party Finder Solo Queing is a mixed bag. At Havoc Level 25+ I personally find carrying teams to be a lot harder if not borderline impossible. If my entire team goes down to something stupid in an Auric, I might have to play my butt off for a few mins, but I can clutch it up. In a Havoc, my ability to clutch is entirely dependent on whether or not the Dark Havoc Lord of Change thinks spawning 15 Crushers, 10 Bulwarks, Every Bomber and Flamer on Atoma, two weakened Chaos Spawns, 2 Captains/Champions, and a Sludge Puppy is funny. And spoiler alert, he always thinks it’s funny. There’s no way for the game to be balanced around one player surviving that without inflating player power to the point that not Havoc difficulty is practically meaningless, and second spoiler alert for you.
Havoc has never read as the highest level of play to me. To be clear, this isn’t to say that skill isn’t needed to play Havoc. Havoc is the most challenging level of play, but not the highest. Emperor’s Fading Light, Busted Mod Combinations, and the awful Demotion system means that playing Havoc well is a combination of Luck and Skill, but most importantly, it’s a measure of much a team can exploit the strongest options available to them. As you said…
The Zealot’s Ability to exploit its strongest option has been dramatically reduced, hence you recent experience. Emperor’s Fading Light is such a problem for Havoc because Darktide Attrition is based less on players slowly losing health to Chip Damage and more so on the, losing massive chunks of health suddenly to burst. The game quite literally is not designed for you to have no Toughness Buffer with the amount of powerful one shot attacks and gunners it throws at you. I personally think Havoc needs to be redesigned from the ground up, preferably after changes to enemies and the classes. The demotion system reinforces the lack of build diversity, and the modifications range from negligible to game breaking in a way that pushes Havoc too far outside the games ability to balance for it in mind. The reason why I don’t want an Overhaul like this until enemies and classes are reworked is because I don’t think Havoc can realistically change for the better until enemies and classes are shifted. For what’s supposed to be a cooperative game, Classes generate more discord between each other than synergy and all Classes have an Over-reliance on DoT and Bonus Damage Stacking, probably due to it being necessary playing into Havoc. I’ve also expressed my feeling that (amongst other problems) Havoc and Mortis were ill-conceived; providing a service in the form of a separate game mode before the infrastructure of content and stable balance was there to support it. And even today, I wrote on problems I have w/ Arbites and Zealot, two classes that I find very interesting in their lack of team centric utility, support, and power. Right now, the only way the game can truly challenge players is with a comical clown car conga line of armored units. But as much as I complain, I want to be tentatively hopeful that FS can turn the game around. I mean, this is probably the first time in the game’s lifespan where all the classes felt so close to one another in power. The game is in the best position it’s every been in for the sake of major system rebalancing and overhauling. Here’s to hoping that FS makes it worth the wait.
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this.
the amount of “havoc 40s” this event alone that go down in the most basic encounter when left to their own device isn’t even funny anymore.
today I recorded a psyker with, and I kid you not, 6/2 melee/ranged elites and a whoopin 2 disablers and 3 specials killed at 200k damage.
the rest did, apart from raw damage numbers about tenfold (and didn’t go down as much 
)
you can’t make that stuff up.
so my guess is many havoc 40s are heavily relying on their buddies going all out to keep them doing “their job” when in fact “real skill” is said solo clutch or carry, away from any other helping hand.
t.e.a.m has a fun meaning in german “ toll, ein anderer machts”
“great, someone else is doing it”
so while no doubt it takes teamplay and coordination to complete havoc, going premade with voice chat and a crew that practised the attempt for the umpth time I dont regard that particularly as “higher skill”
real great gameplay was so far solo clutching when one dude did what 3 others failed to do before and saved the day.
havoc sabotaging these moments by number tweaks isn’t my cup of tea to be honest.
to each his own I guess 
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Although your damage output and technique against bosses truly impressed me, I mentioned in my previous post that high-skill Zealots like you are extremely rare, to the point of being statistically negligible in Havoc-tier data.
Most of the typical Zealot players we encounter on the Hong Kong servers fit a very familiar profile:
they wield Dueling Swords, carry a Flamer, and rely on Prayer abilities.
They can clear melee elites with the Dueling Sword, but the efficiency is far too low.
The Flamer does help relieve pressure for Psykers, but its impact is minimal at best.
The Prayer uptime is so limited that it only provides protection during the most desperate moments.
Such Zealots cannot assist Veterans in eliminating Flame Bombers and Gas Bombers—often called the “Wipe Engines” of Havoc—
nor can they handle Armored Elites and boss waves effectively when both appear together.
That said, I still appreciate you sharing your experience —
every perspective adds something valuable to understanding how Zealots survive the Emperor’s trials in the dark heart of Havoc.
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Yes, in terms of individual skill level, Havoc 40 doesn’t really require that much. It’s more about how well you can use meta gear, builds, and loadouts, and how efficiently you can perform within a fixed, predefined playstyle.
Many players seem to think that Havoc 40 equals the highest difficulty, and while that’s true in a sense, it’s also misleading — it’s difficult, but in a very different way.
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Among Chinese players, the general consensus is that Maelstrom difficulty is roughly equivalent to Havoc Level 25–30.
But what you said is absolutely true — during the Lord of Change modifier, I’ve had runs where the game spawned two Captains, one Plague Ogryn, and twenty Crushers right at the start.
When that happens, we usually joke, “The Inquisition must have sent us into a death trap — they want us to die so the next team has room to deploy.”
As I mentioned before, high-intensity combat and sudden death are the defining features of Havoc.
This kind of situation is exactly where a player’s Bonus Damage Stacking capability gets tested — without it, it’s practically impossible to clear such enormous waves of high-HP elites.
At the same time, Golden Toughness Buffers are absolutely essential.
Otherwise, no one would want to get downed instantly just because a few Poxwalkers slapped them from behind — especially since their attacks cause Corruption Damage.
And don’t even mention the Crushers — a single hammer swing from one of them can kill you outright.
I personally think the “Emperor’s Fading Light” modifier should be reworked or removed,
so that the game no longer forces players to rely entirely on stacking maximum Toughness and Bonus Damage just to survive.
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Until recently, I’ve played Havoc 40 consistently since its release on both Asia (by myself) and NA West servers (with friends back home). I’d usually grind to 40 in Asia on my own, then play NA for fun.
I feel anyone reading this post needs some context. Asia servers are an entirely different world. They enforce strict build requirements and play every game the same way. The Havoc community is also much more active (I can’t even find a decent game most nights now that I’m back in North America, but in Asia I was spoiled for choice). In general, I had a considerably higher win-rate playing in Asia, especially once we all migrated to the Hong Kong server.
That’s not to say western players are any less skilled, but our highest skilled players (especially once reaching rank 40) have a tendency to experiment and go against the meta. We lack the attention span to play the mathematically likely to win set-ups every game, instead prioritizing build variety in our quest for fun. We generally resent more team-play oriented abilities and call for them to be nerfed as they “break the game”, while placijg more value individual skill showcases and clutches usually requiring builds with the highest damage potential.
Asia.. values consistency. And that means builds that support each other. Case in point, I’d get yelled at on TRUE SURVIVOR runs for using frag grenades instead of smokes, and this is baxk when you’d get laughed out of NA servers for using smokes. When Arbites dropped, you WOULD NOT be invited into serious Havoc lobbies playing as an Arbites, where North America was losing their collective minds over how brokenly powerful he was.
As “Karl” has stated, they fundamentally value different aspects of the game. What we might see as annoying, they see as extra challenge. Mechanics we see as game breaking crutches, they see as useful tools to overcome insurmountable challenges. They are less bothered by a stale meta than we are. They hypocritically both faster to adapt to balance changes than we are, yet more reistant to change once a meta has been established. There’s no right or wrong way here, its just a different perspective on the same issues.
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Infinite cleave. You find that normal and want things to be buffed to that level. Well, ambassador of the Chinese community, I disagree.
Fatshark, can you take this idea to Tencent, because the schism between how the Chinese community and the rest of the world sees balance is insurmountable.
I’m going to repeat it again: Havoc game mode was a huge mistake and FS has put themselves in a position where balancing for both game modes is literally impossible.
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Obviously not, because we keep seeing Chinese players asking for everything to be buffed to consistently clear H40.
The whole notion that H40 should have a high win rate to anyone who enters it is absurd.
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I tend to agree.
That said, I think the Asian servers are more than capable of adapting to change even as they rally against it. Even our friend “Karl” here believes Emperor’s Fading Light should be reworked or removed to allow for more diversity. No matter the system, they’ll optimize it. Best to make the most fun system to optimize for, right?
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I definitely agree with that. I don’t know who said it, but the danger in Darktide doesn’t come from your health being slowly chipped away, but getting that one hit that instantly downs you.
It’s a big difference to what seems to be intended with toughness and it enforces gold toughness and bubble as the required meta.
Bubble isn’t just a shield against gunners, it makes people stick together. I honestly believe that (and Burgle puke) is maybe the greatest benefit. So in that regard smoke grenades provide the same function.
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this whole “my technique worked best until..” reminds me so much of
and I love it to the point of spewing my energy drink 
blue melon or whatever the guys name translates into, never not funny 
seems really to be a cultural thing but I literally abhor the idea of only getting to the finish line as part of an “aided activity”.
when not having a distinct impact on the result based on my own abilities, it aint worth something to me, neither would I see an “overall collective” as a good thing.
in a premade no doubt, playing with (or rather around) randos though it rather obstructs my vision and in the time one would cling around the zone of cover, enemies could be dealt with individually.
granted, havoc 40 number tricks and gunner spam make turtle gameplay mandatory.
hence I don’t enjoy it
“only runs need cover”
sorry, had to, it simply came over me somehow 
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Xu Xiaodong mentioned!!! 
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ze granMASTA is enraged
Have you ever won a havoc 40 game? If you ever did so you can find that only a few weapons and builds are viable in havoc 40, vet with plasma and shout, psyker with inferno staff and shield. But does it means players can easily win a havoc 40 game with those builds? I am in huge confusion why you all think players who win havoc 40 because of builds they choose instead of their skills and combat experience, like once you choose plasma and power sword, the games wins automatically, once you choose inferno staff, bosses and captains burns themselves. Even you choose the most powerful bd, skills are still required heavily, as well as combat experience. A player who spends thousands of hours in maelstrom, even with the right build he cannot stands a single boss horde in havoc 40, because he have never encountered a horde with 20 ragers, 10 crushers , 5 bulwarks, 2 bosses and one captain in maelstrom, not to mention enemies deal way more damage and continuously heal themselves.
We are asking for buff simply because of very limited choices we have in havoc. Can you imagine someone carries an infantry lasgun in havoc 40? Or using tactical axe while have to fight against 10 crushers? You guys may now say why not play maelstrom or auric, where I could use whatever weapon I want, I only would like to do so as long as FS give them a huge update.It has been how long since main game mode got any new content ? I mean I am already tired of playing auric and maelstrom with all the same old enemies and modifiers, to you guys how much longer you would like to stay in the old, dead difficulties? Havoc has been the only mode that get continuously new content, if I don’t play havoc, I would be bored cause it means no new things to me.
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Most Havoc players want all weapons and builds to be buffed; they don’t want any nerfs at all. This is entirely correct, and I agree—it’s a perfectly reasonable opinion. These players probably make up about 5% of the total player base.
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From Uprising to Auric (Maelstrom), most weapons and talents are in a fairly good state, but DS, Gold Toughness, Smite, Inferno, and Arbites are clearly overpowered, so a slight nerf would be welcome. This is also completely correct, and such players likely make up nearly 90% of the player base.
Ideally, it would be best to balance everything at once, but in reality, that’s impossible and inefficient. Considering this, it makes sense to first adjust the balance of Uprising–Auric content, which affects the majority of players.
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Any data supports your statement? Since the main game mode receives no more new content more and more players dedicate in havoc. With FS giving new updates to havoc group of havoc players may grow even stronger.
If you are finding things too easy, try higher difficulties instead of asking nerfing everything. Do we have to nerf everything until its impossible to win n3 or n4?
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They can get what they want by having havoc get balanced instead but asking for that would require admitting that they want havoc to be easier.
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If you are finding things too hard, try lower difficulties instead of asking buffing everything.
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