So my thoughts on Hive Scum are that it is a very fun, if slightly punishing, class to play (which is not helped by Darktides, er, shall we say somewhat arbitary at times approach to hit recognition). It takes some getting used to, and I think it is suffering slightly by the comparrison to other classes at the moment (I’m not going to wade into the Buff/Nerf debate - my point is merely about relative comparisons here). However, I am finding it pretty rewarding (though admittedly I’m mostly in Damnation at the moment).
Some advice if you are a somewhat mid player like myself is that it might be worth building into melee. Although it may not be optimal, I’ve found success in going:
Tertium Welcome → Precision Violence (melee gives toughness) → Untouchable → Toughness boost → Chem grenade (which seems to be the best grenade) → Gang tough → Slippery Customer (sliding makes you immune to melee, so slide your way to freedom!) → Jittery → Anarchist (I like boosting crits as they boost toxin application, but other choices might make sense too) → Toughness → Rampage (take boiling blood to improve uptime, and take Forge’s bellow for the knockdown as it can basically save your skin)
Middle → Melee Damage → Tis but a scratch + Burst of Energy + Hive city brawler (these three basically make you far less squishy!) as well as Punching above ones weight + Hyper violence + Battering strikes (to help with Damage output)
Right side → Potent tox (helps improve DOT) → Coated weaponry (so your hits apply Tox) → Toxin Mania (the more you apply, the harder you hit) → Toxic renewal (melee kills on Tox infected regens toughness - again important for survivability) → Pocket Toxin (boosts chem grenade) → Sample collector (kills replenish stim - which is a key part of this class) → Chemical dependency + Chem fortified (which coolsdown Rampage and gives toughness on stim use).
Left side → Critical Chance and Swift Endurance (this is just to boost hitting / applying toxin)
Then I build the stim Strength into Fury with a 45s cooldown.
Weapons: Mk II Needle gun (blue mode for distance crowds or yellow for single targets) with Glory hunter (for a little toughness regen) and Stripped down (immunity to range when running above 50% stamina - which can be lifesaving when there’s a group of gunners).
Crowbar with Can opener and Unstoppable Force, which allows me to stagger crowds in normal mode or flip to secondary and deal with crushers. I’ve tried other weapons (like the shivs and such), but find the stagger just an absolute life-saver.
Here’s the thinking: This build is pretty good at dealing with most things in melee, or by sprinting and sliding to get things into melee range (sprint / slide is more stamina efficient than sprinting anyway, so always be sliding!).
If there are things you can’t get to in range (e.g. gunners) dodge behind cover and slide out / shoot with needle gun / slide back.
If you need to deal with a whole load of crushers, slip the stim slide up and start hitting - if they wind up the instadeath attack, shout to knock them down.
If you are getting surrounded, shout and slide to safety.
If there is a big boss monster, soften it up with yellow needles and then take whacks / dodge. If you’ve got decent support from a team it will go down pretty easy so long as you are careful not to be the one aggroing.
If there’s a mob, stim and rampage and just go to town. So long as you are always moving, dodging, and sliding between whacking you shouldn’t face any issues.
This build is serving me pretty well, though no doubt a good player can improve on it (it is still WIP, and I hope to refine further as I go on). Still, it should see you through (I’m by no means a top level player, and unless I’m in a last one standing situation I rarely go down - and even then I can single handedly take down a Captain + mob) and you might find going absolute ham with a crowbar to be a pretty good time (I know I do!).
Hope this helps!
