Every time an Update comes out, my peers and I start dreaming up what the future state of the game might look like or things that we hope we might see. All of this boils down to something akin to Blue Sky Thinking; a stage of development that’s more about producing potential workable ideas instead of necessarily basing them off of anything that’s currently in the game. In short, we’re just shooting the shiz, but this time, I actually wanted to flesh out, write out, and share some of the thoughts we had. This is mostly because I’m interested in what the rest of the community is thinking, and what other people would be interested in seeing. Additionally, before I bring up any of the ideas my Peers and I talked about, I would like to just clarify that all of this is just the subjective opinions of on specific group of players. It, by no means is supposed to come off as anything more than banter for banter’s sake. I also won’t really be talking about Balance, as I think that’s outside this post’s scope. This is a long one, so feel free to read at your own pace, if at all. So w/ all that said, here are the ideas:
I think an easy place to start is
WEAPONS:
Darktide already has a great variety of weapons, but even if it’s a little selfish, I would love to see more weapons at our Disposal. A lot of these were original brought up as expansion to the list of weapons that are class specific, but truthfully, they don’t have to be. These are some of the Weapons my Peers and I thought of and the Class(es) we thought it would make sense to get access to them.
- Plasma Pistol (Veterans and maybe Zealots)
- Melta Guns (Zealots)
- Inferno Pistols (Zealots and maybe Veterans)
- Multi Melta (Ogryn)
- Heavy Bolter (Ogryn)
- Power Fist or Lighting Claw (Ogryn)
- Telakine Blade (Psyker. Sure, Assail already exist, but in fairness so does Smite and the Surge Force staff. Making a weapon version of Assail that operates differently from the Blitz doesn’t seem too outside the realm of possibility.)
- “Anoited” Halberd (Zealot. Darktide doesn’t really have a Polearm style weapon, but just as Ogryns apparently long for the mines, my Peers, and especially I, long for the Zealous Calvary Charge.)
- A Shotgun (or really, any Gun) and Shield Combo (Veterans, due to a connection such a loadout apparently has to the Navis Imperialis. Maybe Zealots.)
These weapon choices were largely based off of weapons from the actual war game, though a few were pulled from written media.
Another topic we set our sights on were
CLASSES:
Darktide’s Class Tree is very different from Vermintide’s Career system. So much to the point that it didn’t make a whole lot of sense to my peer group and I for Fatshark to make “Alternative Class Trees” in the same way Vermintide has DLC Careers. Our thought was that if you would need to make a whole new Class Tree, you might as well make a whole new Class at that point. Additionally, that Class would need to be something that could fall under the label of “Reject”. And as one peer pointed out, the problem with something like an “Assassinorum Reject” is that, according to lore, that would be a corpse. So here are the possible options that came to our minds, and even some class specific weapons and/or abilities we thought such classes could have.
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Tech Priest Reject
This is one that I’ve seen even outside my peer group, and it’s one that is easy to make an argument for. Class specific weapons could include any selection of Galvanic or Radium Weapons. Our thoughts were that if Psykers could be considered an Enemy Control Class, than maybe Tech Priest could be a Team Support Class. I’m also personally just attached to the idea of having access to a Servo Skull Drone that could do things like pickup and distribute ammo or pickup downed allies (Albeit probably slowly and definitely on a cooldown). -
Arbites Reject
Arbites are just kind of cool, and they aren’t that far removed from Veterans. Of course, what’s the point of adding a class if it’s just going to do something similar to one that already exist. For that reason, our peer group leaned on some of the unique things that Arbites get access to. For weapons, that the Arbites’ Electro Flail (which might be a scary, more specialized varriant of the Shock Mauls) and Grenade Launchers, since they get access to several kinds. In terms of Class Abilites, we thought that maybe giving Arbites access to a Cyber Mastiff or Hawk could be cool, making the class a kind of Cyber-Beast Master. -
Death Cult Reject
This was our answer as to how you could get something close to Assassinorum Reject while avoiding the afformentioned tricky little corpse problem. For Class specific weapons, we thought Needle Pistols or Rifles could be great ranged weapons, especially since Hallowette has mentioned them before, and for melee a Death Cult Cutlass seemed an obvious choice. As for how this class might stand out from the others, we saw them as a kind of fast moving weapons specialist with access primarily to single handed weapons. We thought that some Class Abilities that might make sense for something like that was the ability to go Guns Akimbo/Dual Weild melee weapons, A state that could just empower any weapon you were using, and maybe even a defense, auto parry stance (Think Genji from Overwatch, and their Reflect ability, but more in line with the Balance of Darktide and the flavor of 40K). -
Sanctioned Xenos
This idea was admittedly a little more out there, but we are on a Rogue Trader vessel. Our thoughts was that something like an Eldar would make the most sense, and we had a good laugh about the potential Banter between a Vet and a Space Elf with a Bomb in it’s head keeping it in check. Class specific weapons could be something like a Shuriken Pistol, Hex Rifle, and/or Wraith Bone Sword, and Class Abilities might include an Eldar Equivalent of Invisibility or maybe even a short range teleport.
And last and definitely least (at least insofar as the depths of our thoughts)
- Blank/Pariah Reject
We didn’t really have any strong ideas for this one. For weapons, you could always pull from the Sisters of Silence and do something like a Neuro-Lash, but we had trouble coming up with much that was Unique to Sisters of Silence. For Class Abilities though, Dan Abnett, Darktide’s writer, has introduced the idea of Blank Limiters, and we thought that, and the Repulsive Aura of a Blank could be something to base the Class’ Abilities around.
And finally, after the specifics of Weapons and potential future DLC Classes, the last thing my Peers and I talked about was just
GENERAL FEATURES:
we felt like we would like to see. This is more just a kind of Grab Bag of potentially fun ideas with no real order, though the same could be said for the rest of this post. Still, some of the things we talked about were
- New Environments and Locals
This one was kind of big for us. Secrets of the Machine God has offered a great snowy map, and I’m personally a sucker for a good snowy map, but it’s left my peers and I wanting more. There’s concept art for Places of Interest outside of the Tertium Hive city, and we’ve all heard of the Second Hive City that may or may not be infested w/ Xenos and Cults. I can already see a lot of fun to be had on a map near the top of the Hive City spires, or on a moving vehicle. But there are also other Locals that I would love to visit that I don’t know if Atoma can really support, such as Dense Forest or Jungles, Muddy Trenches and No Man Lands, Flooded Beaches or Underwater Facilities, or even the Morningstar Itself. While Atoma can’t necessarily support all of these locals, it doesn’t mean that a mission couldn’t take us to a different section of Atoma space.
And speaking of the Second Hive City, Xenos, and Cults, another thing that my Peers and I mentioned wanting to see are
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More Enemies:
Personally, if we do end up getting Xenos enemies in Darktide, my money is on a Genestealer Cults. It’s technically Xenos, and it’s a Cult, so it fits in with some of the Rumors going around on the Morningstar. I also think that a GS Cult would just make the most sense to the kind of game Darktide is and the Story thus far. I can’t really see Tau or Eldar in a Hoard. I feel like if it was Orks they wouldn’t be nearly this quiet. Full on Tyrranids would invoke the Shadow of the Warp. And if it was Necrons, we would be so majorly screwed. Genestealers feel like something we actually have the chance of fighting and beating, they work well in a hoard, and they won’t feel out of place w/ the current pace of the story. That being said, even if we don’t get a whole new faction of enemies, I still think that few more variety of enemies could be cool. My peers and I have debated what a Non-Demonhost Enemy Psyker might look like, and Darktide still has room for certain classes of enemies (something like L4D’s Smoker or Vermintide’s Packmaster, though Trappers might be the Darktide equivilent. There are still enemies like Vermintide’s Standard Bearer or Sackrats though). -
A Larger Variety of Cosmetics
While Darktide and 40K: Rogue Trader are two very different games, I do think the latter of the two proves that you can have a great variety of colour without losing the “Grimdark” Aesthetic. Darktide is more than happy to give us no end of Red and Black cosmetics in the Commodore’s Vesture and Commissary, but the selection for cosmetics in other colours is a bit lacking. That isn’t to say that there are no options in green or blue, just fewer than I would personally like. In fact, most of the Blue Cosmetics I have aren’t even the same shade or tone of blue, making them hard to use together, at least for the more fashion minded of those in my peer group. I really enjoy Darktide, and I don’t mind giving Fatshark money; I would just like a little more variety in what’s on offer from them. -
Chaos Waste
I think this is another obvious one that the community as a whole seems to be sure we’ll eventually get, but it doesn’t hurt to point it out here. Especially since Darktide, based on it’s current map selection, has the opportunity to put a twist on the Chaos Waste Formula. Fatshark has gone out of their way to visual connect various maps to each other, making the hive feel more connected. I think it would be very interesting to maybe play to that visual design strength with a Darktide: Chaos Wastes by having player decide how they were going to Navigate through the hive on a run, moving further up or down, or to paths that might take you away from the Hive City. As much as I want Chaos Waste in Darktide, for the sake of replayability, something that I can say I’m even more interested in is -
A Full Campaign
Look, I think the Mission Structure of Darktide is a Strength of the game. Knowing that you only really have to commit to playing the game in roughly 30 Min intervals makes the gameplay loop addictive and easy to get into. That being said, even if it’s something we’re more likely to get towards the end of Darktide’s development, I want a campaign playlist. That’s right; playlist. I actually don’t think you would need to do away w/ the mission set up of the game. Just give me some kind of dedicated order of missions to play, maybe w/ some built in cutscenes to feed me story as we go through missions, and I’ll be just peachy keen. -
Visible Holstered Weapons
This is honestly a small one, and not something actually spoken about between myself and my peers, but instead is just a personal want. I recognize that it’s probably not an efficient use of resources to show the weapon that a player isn’t using, but it’s nice, and honestly it would be great for when you load into a mission that is already in Progress to convey information to you quickly and without the need to ask after it.
And finally, there are two things mentioned by my peers that I’m not exactly sold on, but that I do think are worth mentioning, if only to see what other people think. One was:
- Weapon Customization
On one hand, it makes sense. Unlike Vermintide, Darktide has proper modern (and futuristic) firearms. And where guns go, the desire to greeble them follows. While I think freely being able to customize the colour of my weapon is well and good, I actually wonder about things like attachments. In this same peer group, we’ve talked about how unlikely we think it is for Darktide to add sniper rifles or long scopes, just because most maps aren’t built for extreme ranges, and even on ones where such weapons could shine, we think that it might just be a problem of lending itself to a Playstyle that Fatshark isn’t interested in supporting considering that Darktide is a 4 Player Hoard shooter. Having a player in the far back, picking off enemies and not moving w/ the team just rubs the wrong way with a lot of other mechanics, and Weapon customization beyond cosmetics doesn’t seem like it would add much, at least to me personally.
The other thing mentioned by my Peers that I personally don’t feel like I need is a
- Darktide Versus
In fairness to this idea, I think Darktide probably is at a Better Starting Point for a “Versus” Mode than Vermintide was. Medicae Stations, Airlocks, and Elevators for consistent checkpoints, and I can even point at a few enemies that I think could be fun (and balanced) to play. Pox Hounds don’t have the same Jump Range as something like a Hunter or Gutter Runner, but they’re fast. Mutants just seem like they would be incredibly fun to play as, ala Chargers from L4D. Flamers and Trappers are good choices. I could even see an argument for the Sniper. But Bombers already have a bad habit of hanging out in the Rafters on certain maps, lobbing bombs from where you can’t shoot them, and I can already see the problem w/ a player abusing that. I’ve seen the Vermintide Versus footage of people more or less doing that w/ the Gas Rats. Like I said though, I can see the argument for a Darktide Versus, I just know that I personally am not interested myself. If this is one that you’re hoping for though, I hope the best for you in that regard.
And with that said, this is more or less
THE END
If you got this far, I appreciate you reading the ramblings and disjointed ideas of myself and my peers. As I said at the top, this post isn’t necessarily any distinct suggestion; just some of the thoughts my peers and I have had in regards to things we think could be cool to see in the future of the game. I’m interested in what other people would like to see in the game, or, assuming that you had a similar idea to one in the post, the specifics to your idea and how they differ from the ones I presented here. I apologize again for the length of this post; I’ve been sitting on a lot of these debating if there was any value in posting this. Ultimately though, I decided to go for it. The worse that can happen is that no one reads it or cares, or alternatively that someone calls me stupid on the internet (boohoo). Best case scenario is that this starts a discussion, and I get to see other peoples ideas. Either way, to those seeing this, i’ll be seeing you in Damnation; May your games always end in glory.