I’m frustrated with the current state of Darktide (been discussed to death, so I’m not gonna elaborate here; literally just check any forum in the DT category and you’ll understand why pretty quickly) but still wanted to play a good game in this genre, so I figured since VT2 is in a solid state, I’d give it a shot.
It’s obviously a very different game from DT, so what should I know when getting into it? I’ve already played it a little bit and it feels satisfying, although I’m still learning to pick out the sound cues and optimal melee combos. I’ve heard that blocking is generally better than dodging, though my memory’s a bit foggy.
It is nice to see one enjoying getting into the party, game does have its own flaws no doubt but it definitely has its own charms as well^^
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Now then as for what might be good to know…well i believe something worth noting is that the game is a bit more melee oriented than Darktide so there´s a bit more depth to it than “dodging/blocking always better”. Instead the answer is really just that it depends quite a lot on the situation. For instance, one elite doing a big swing might be easily dodged but if it does a charging attack(has better tracking towards you) then it can often be safer to block it, or do both even, especially when dealing with multiple targets.
Neither is typically always better than the other, the trick is figuring when to use what, often in accordance to your chosen hero career and weapon. You might even be able to stagger them out of it and bash them around like a practice dummy.
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Then a few things in general?
While holding block you can click to attack to do a push at the expense of stamina (resource to block) which reliably staggers most infantry and even shields. This alone is already a big thing when fighting hordes but wait, there’s more. With a second quick click it follows up with a weapon based attack commonly called “push attack”. Depending on weapon this can even chain into combo´s with either heavy or light attacks. Like the elf spear that can directly go into its second heavy attack which is a harder hitting stab, do play around yourself for more^^
May be obvious but different weapons have different advantages and thus roles they can fulfill, Kruber´s executioner sword is a slow but high damage cleaver which does significantly better against fewer targets while his big hammer can with heavies smack around several targets of most types easily but deals less damage.
To further note, mobility&speed is largely weapon based, like Saltzpyre´s rapier keeps him a lot lighter on his feet than his greatsword when it comes to dodging.
Game gets more challenging but also more fun as you move up the difficulties, more enemies and more challenges appear to keep the spice up, and thus, do not hesitate to go up when you feel one difficulty is too easy, all of us have gotten our asses handed to us when going up at some point and anyone stating otherwise is either a pink diamond from space or posses a very selective memory.
There are plenty of good career/build guides on steam written by veterans explaining a lot if you wonder about anything. I wont go into depth here but to start noting a few points, blockcost reduction is a wonderful stat.
Your trinkets can have a stat called “curse resistance” which significantly reduces the effect of Grimoire curses.
Your necklaces can have both health and blockcost on them.
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Well these are off the top of my head, hope you´ll have more fun^^
I’d say it’s an apples to oranges scenario. They’re in the same group (fruit, for example), but they’re different items (different fruit). You should expect to engage in more melee mechanics in V2 than in Darktide, and most ranged will be used in a scenario with specials involved (maybe some elites depending on what you play). “Shields” do not regen, in the way you’re used to at least. Instead, depending on your talents, killing enemies will generate temp health that will decay unless replenished. The skill ceiling is near limitless and if you ever find yourself topping out, you can find mods in the workshop that make the game near impossible to beat, only limited by your CPU power.
Dodging will be your bread and butter as your block is limited. There’s less ranged enemies here, but once you get on solid footing, you can learn to dodge and attack at the same time to make the most of things.
Speaking of mods, only a select handful of mods are approved for use in the “live realm.” You will find a “modded realm” where anything goes, and while the playerbase is smaller, it has its own dedicated playerbase that is happy to bring people into the fold.
Also good to note is that this game has no dedicated servers, but instead is peer to peer, so your PC’s CPU can affect enemy pathing and your internet can affect connection client-side. It’s generally recommend to avoid hosting if you fall into these camps.
That said, it has many different game modes for you try your hand at, as well as different ways to make the game more exciting in ways that bring a certain level of difficulty and excitement.
From darktide to vermintide, mobility is really different so you really cannot use say sprinting or dodge sliding to escape from situation’s. This makes terrain abusal especially using drops to make enemies traverse around more important.
Also Blocking in v2 is really good because unlike in darktide you can block basically every attack there is, barring some boss/monster moves. Hence this also makes block cost reduction a good stat and in many peoples eyes even mandatory.
If you are going into legend difficulty, get some curse resist on your curio. A lot of people are farming crates in this diff since they are the best you can get. And the way you get those is by gathering books through the map, which includes grimoires that applying curse on your team that decreses everyones max health.
Don’t bother trying to roll higher stats percentages on your weapons and curios too much.
Highest tier (red) weapons and curios always have their stats percentages as high as possible.
Never heal zealots unless they ask.
Downed teammates are dying much faster than in Darktide
lvl 15 Stagger talents:
To put it short. Smiter is generally the best, then goes assasin and mainstay.
Enhanced power is generally taken to boost your ranged damage, but can also provide some stagger breakpoints.
Why bother with shield?
Some attacks can wipe your whole stam bar and and do damage even through block.
But not with shield.
Also, shield bash attack has unlimited stagger cleave.
Elven one handed sword has unlimited dodges
Rapier has a special attack (check the keybinds)
Using medbag on an ally will clear your wound (grey screen/death door) as well.
Dont brake multipple chains at the same time in the last event (Big green couldron)
of garden of morr map. Each broken chain will spawn a wave, they can stack on top of each other.
The only thing i cam add that others havent already is that from champion to legend feels like a bit bigger of a jump then from one to others before. Or at least it did to me. That is one particular jump i struggled with for a long time and i very nearly rage quit but i am glad i didnt.
At the very least the gap between difficulty 3 and 4 seems wider in vermintide then darktide. Dont get discouraged!
Having tried going from Champion to Legend myself, I can corroborate this. It’s nuts, and now I’m in this weird spot where Champion is too easy for me, but Legend is too hard.
Hoping for a big VT2 sale soon so I can get the DLC - for whatever dumb reason you need Winds of Magic in order to play Cataclysm.
If you are struggling with legend at this time then be warned, the jump up to cata is even more jarring in some senses.
More patrols, more (often constant) specials, extra monster spawns, elites mixed into horde spawns and some enemies gain anywhere from 20% to 60% more health, stagger resistance and up to 100% more damage on a rare few attacks.
People typically skip grims up here but it´s still at a level where bad positioning and horde management gets punished hard.
Just jump in solo for like 5 try and just see how hard it is.
It’s crazy though.
I spent ages with friends who have done all the mission on legend and most with grims and we went to cata and failed for 6 hours straight.
A few things you should know, If you plan on buying winds of magic.
Cata does not have any reward advantages over legend. It drops the same crates.
But on the positive side, people on cata rarely gathering books. So you can run something more useful than curse resist on your trinket.
If you interested in new weave gamemode, then you should bring some friends. Nobody is playing it right now, so QP is not an option.
And a little suggestion.
If you struggling on new difficulties, try going on them as ironbreaker first.
This is the most tankiest, unkillable career in the game.
Bring a handgun, shield and choose a gromril curse talent on level 20, this is the only thing in the game that can release you from disablers, without teamates help.
As long-term player of both, they’re not as different as some would have you believe here.
The core gameplay mechanics are almost 1-to-1 the same. The main differences come from level, enemy and encounter design.
Everything is a lot more melee centric. There is less special enemies spawning at once, but you also can’t dispatch them as fast as you can chew them out in Darktide.
And there is no sliding or running. So be more cautious about your step. That’s mostly it. If you’re a Darktide Veteran, it’s best you just jump in.
No need for long-winded tutorials. Combos and melee combat work like you are used to.
