Thank you so much! I’ll make sure to post my builds there and link them all to youse!
It was my “critique” of your build as it were. Seemed appropriate. I wouldn’t skip keystones on most builds even on Vet.
Focus Target in particular after 15.2 hit fixed its opportunity cost issues on the tree and has become the only pseudo free boost somewhat on par with zealot keystones.
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You named it after me and I’m happy 
Edit: If I was to use a Keystone on Vet it would be Focus Target.
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…and players preferneces, even if they are not best of the best min-maxed mathematics.
My claim is the best meta is what is the most fun to you.
If it’s fun, you put in more effort, you learn faster easier and become better with what you like to use.
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Thank you. I’m rebuilding this from memory rn so this may be a bit off, but here’s the meme HIGH NOON vet.
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Now that’s rootin’ tootin’, Dutch!
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I think I actually run kraks in order to grab Agile Engagement though, but I’ll check it later. All I know is, VoC makes it actually viable by ensuring you’re almost never actually stuck in a bad situation. Every death has been a mistake on my part rather than Random Nonsense or just not having the tools to handle things.
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i use it because of shield, when using shovel it’s debatable of course.
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Of course! Shields are a much different weapon prone to much different playstyles and that’s a good thing!
OK, everyone! The builds are up!
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For Vet - I’d remove a goodly chunk of the side abilities like the bleed stacks, Kill Zone, Twinned Blast, etc, and use those points to invest in the bottom-middle tree with the goal of getting Bring Them Down. This will help you hit those vital breakpoints and save on ammo against Ogryns, and Kill Zone (and Catch Your Breath) really aren’t that good in Damnation due to enemy/horde density, while I find Twinned Blast too unreliable. If you prefer random procs to a set regen you may also want to replace the grenade regen with the 5% chance to gain in that same process.
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Thank you!!!
It’s worth noting that on a faster/less damaging weapon than the new shovel the bleed stacks are absolutely a great add, or on a melee vet in general, allowing you to focus down armored foes even if your kit isn’t usually good for it. But with plasma, frags, and the shovel for cc it’s not a great investment of points imo.
I won’t comment on the others, since zealot is my strongsuit. But your zealot build while, no doubt, viable is a failure. I can’t see your weapon blessings but if you’re using Scourge and a crit blessing on that Evi even if you aren’t using blazing piety you should be taking Invocation of Death to get more ults more faster. Sacrefice Disdain for this one talent point. If you aren’t running crit blessings on your Mk2 Heavy micro-Evi then you would be very well served by dropping that most miserbably weak of talents known as Disdain and replacing it with Inexorable Judgement. I understand the amusement of building offmeta and not using keystones but you’re hurting yourself for no reason here. Nothing in the tree comes close to the value IJ gives for the one point it would cost you to get it. If you’re not doing crits I would also drop Scourge and run Blood Redemption to improve overall survivability.
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For Ogryn: Crunch! is worthless because it requires the attack be fully charged, which takes several seconds. Remove it for the keystone instead because that extra up to +25 is gonna be much more valuable and relevant. Otherwise, this looks like a fairly solid build, if not full meta shield Ogryn. Personally I’d invest more in the left-hand tree to maximize toughness gain at the start but this looks perfect serviceable beyond Crunch! being busted.
It’s hard to recommend or critique your build based on just the build itself. You need to say what you want to achieve with each class and if you make build to fit the weapon, or pick weapon to fit the build.
On your ogryn, assuming you want shovel, dmg, grenade and mobility - this is what i would’ve used in your place.
On shovel get Brutal Momentum and Thrust blessings. Charge up attacks and aim for head to decapitate hordes.
But i honestly dont recommend to fully charge your attacks. Neither do i recommend using heavy attacks in hordes. Your light attacks actually perform better, as you constantly stagger enemies and give more dps. So “Crunch” talent can be swapped for something else
For psyker i assume you went for support build and primarely using smite to crowd control. Not sure why you not picking keystone again. Warp charges are amazing with support psyker. You can have 2-3 kinetic domes at the same time
Now your veteran is the real problem. If that’s the builds people are using in my auric damnations - no wonder they lack damage x)
Once again, i’m trying to stay as close as possible to your original build, but just improve it and “fix”. You have a lot of talents for grenades. So we will keep those. Remove 2 nodes for reload speed, as plasmagun has enough ammo to last one fight. You can reload inbetween fights even without animation-cancel abuse.
The zealot will be the one i have to change fair a bit. If you have flamer - you MUST have charge ult. So pretty much if you find yourself in situation, where a big pack of elites (like 5-6 crushers) coming at you - chuck stun grenade, pull out flamer and start burning. After you stack a bit of burn (1-2s) - use your FotF, keep burning, after ~4s use your FotF again.
You can kill 20 crushers that way. With single magazine of flamethrower.
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Yes, absolutely! I mean I have ADHD so believe me I get it. Unless something is fun and interesting it’s almost impossible for me to do something even if it’s important. That’s prolly why I’m so hyper fixated on psykers after all, there’s so much stuff to them they almost never get boring. xD
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arguably more value in keeping Disdain and dropping the move speed Punishment and suppression boost nodes…
Thy Wrath Be Swift is far and away more effective than “uninterruptible” requiring 5 stacks of Punishment.
If they’re not having problems with stagger interrupting their attacks, then just moving those nodes elsewhere has more impact.
Alternatively swap those to anything else for more toughness or toughness regain.
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Just critiquing the plasma build as I have the most playtime on Vet, and Reginald is here for anything zealot though I gotta say you really could at least spare one point for Inexorable judgement. It just goes. Might look at Psyker, but again as I’ve reiterated I only play gunpysker so my view on them is constrained.
I’m going to go row by row on the vet build because it’s a mess.
First row:
First issue I already see is an over commitment to the reload talents. They aren’t necessary, and losing out on both Close Order Drill, and Confirmed Kill is a big L.
Next Row:
Shredders are cool. Krak is mostly a trap. Good choice. Grenade tinkerer has low value on Shredders. The 25% more damage is a dump stat, and the 25% area is nice, but not worth the point. Bleed is the only thing that does damage on them, and only if you throw 2 because of the way bleed works.
That brings me to Serrated Blade. It’s not good in short. Especially on shovel. The targets that would live long enough to see a decent bleed stack up on them are going to be dead from the special attack. You will 3 shot enemies at the worst.
Bleed only starts doing any notable damage after 10 stacks or so.
Just test how shredders work in the Meat Grinder to really see what I mean.
1 Shredder (6 bleeds) on a rager does around 15% of their health while 2 does 70%. Only thing serrated blade will do is give you soft synergy with shredders to stack up bleeds faster.
I don’t think its the worth the investment. I get that you are trying to get to the connector nodes for melee damage, but those 5, and 10% are overinvestments, and aren’t multipliers.
Catch a breath is fine. I prefer Get back in the fight because stuns are killer. This is preference. No good choices before Survivalist.
Next row:
Kill Zone is …fine. If it works. It’s a win-more talent, but its one off that does provide a more multiplier when its up. I personally skip it myself, but this can be a matter of preference.
Field Improvisation is very situational. Weirdly I think the ammo crate one is better because of Ogrynheimer than the Medi-pack one. Also works with just coherency radius (you don’t have to drop the pack) so telling your team you have Field Improv is worth doing.
Twinned Blast is a gamble talent. Has value on shredders certainly. It’s a choice. Don’t care for it, but there it is.
Demostock pile obviously great point.
5% crit node into additional nade. Meh.
Next Row:
Connector nodes? 5% melee not worth. Not a multiplier.
Plasma does not get suppressed so don’t pick it up. Precision strikes is a generic weak point modifier (not a multi again, but yeah), and applies to melee as well. Should not be skipped on any build.
Tactical Awareness is an outstanding node. Should not be skipped on any build.
Honestly just try the build I linked to you earlier. Even though it’s more “selfish” it will provide much more value to the team because you will have more killing power to keep them safe + your tags will give everyone a rolling 12% more damage constantly.
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I’m the type of player that likes to go for the most optimized builds, I’m told that I reached level 500 +ogryn (i don’t use mod for now but someone that does told me) basically all done on Damnation+.
I like to experiment things myself.
In the current version of the game I would never use the Shovel XIX if you are interested I can later explain to you why.
If you anyway enjoy the weapon this is what I could come up to suit your tastes that I think it’s an improvement from your build:
https://darktide.gameslantern.com/builds/9affbdee-0f67-48ba-8e98-730460f71d48/tanky-shovel-build?utm_medium=website&utm_source=gameslantern&utm_campaign=share_button
Why I think it’s an Improvement:
Removed for lack of value:
Reload and Ready: Achlys Mk VII Twin-Linked Heavy Stubber, while still having the fastest reload in the stubber family it’s not advised to often reload, the uptime of this buff would be neglectable so better use the point for something else.
Big Boom: Basically the same reasoning as the previous, only your Frag Bomb is going to benefit from this, it’s better to use the point in something else that is more often effective.
Implacable and connected nodes: they are normally very solid picks, but if tankiness is what you are searching for, the keystone Feel no Pain that you are now able to reach, gives you much more, trading the 5% heavy damage, that is not that useful on the XIX shovel anyway.
Hard Knocks: in truth this passive brings a lot of value for the XIX shovel and synergize very well with the stubber, would be nice to keep it but, having a lv4 Thrust on this shovel (and you should have it) reduces by a lot the effectiveness of the buff in helping reaching breakpoints.
Added value:
Bruser and Get Stuck In: I find this couple of nodes basically mandatory on any Ogryn build, in high level there are many elites, you can easily shave off 20/30% of your ability cooldown every time that you use it bringing you a ton of value.
Feel no Pain and Strongest!: Like I said before this brings much reliable tankiness to the build.
Bonebreaker’s Aura: It’s mostly for point efficiency but also selecting this aura gets you a consistent help a bit with those juicy 1shot breakpoints with the folded shovel.
Little side note, normally Crunch is a trash node, but it is quite viable on the folded shovels since their charge time is quite fast.
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