I feel Veterans are way too important in high intensity shock troop games

Warhammer 40,000: Darktide Gameplay Feedback
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Recently I played a lot of high intensity shock troop games in Damnation and realize the difficulty vastly increased when you don’t have a veteran teammate.

Under this amount of enemy, ammo is just not enough if the team can’t regenerate it when killing specialists. A veteran with a bolter and power sword can destroy any elites and specialists in seconds while having the ability to clear horde fast. The other 3 classes just can’t compete, they can deal with those in their own ways for sure but veterans can do a lot faster, and speed is super important in this difficulty because those specialists keep coming.

My experiences are basically like this: The more veterans you have in your team, the easier it gets. When there is none, the game becomes very unlikely to win. The lack of the other three classes has a much smaller impact. And for Ogryn, lacking a veteran teammate becomes a really big problem with some ranged weapons.

I don’t have a very good idea about how to balance those, just want to bring up the problem I encountered.

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I did my fair share of STG without Vet and it was fine. Both Zealot and Psyker can cull the specials pretty well (AB Purgatus + Illisi psyker, Caxe + Braced Zealot). On the other hand, doing STG with recon lasgun Vet is also pretty fun. Bolter, Braced autogun, K12, Helbore and Plasma are all good choices if you aren’t into meme picks.

The vet is kinda the anti-special… specialist. So it would be surprising if they wouldn’t be good in STG. Both Scavanger and demo team are extremely busted in the mode, unsurprisingly.

Ogryn’s ammo is just busted with Vet on the team, most weapons don’t even need pickups even on normal damnation. Probably should switch aura to +weakspot damage and make ammo regen Vet only.

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Agreed and firmly seconded.

Definitely.

I, personally, have the opposite experience. For every vet above 1 i find the game gets harder. Because they fold in hi-shock like wet paper when anything gets really dangerous and messy. The zealot is tanky and survivable, though i occasionally have bad luck just like anyone, i rarely manage to be in a situation where i am saved by my down protection and then actually get downed or die. Ogryns are just tough in general and have great melee safety. Psykers have great specialist and elite sniping options and horde clear options.

As a zealot i usually run a hammer or chain axe. Both benefit the most from having lots of mutants and dogs to oneshot. And both have infinite ammo. So if anything these weapons shine more in the harder difficulties because of the prevelance of their prefered targets.

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Please no - I like it that way.

Furthermore I find the game works best, when every class is around once and all four auras compliment each other ^^

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To be fair, the mode also makes you use more ammo, so it is fine.

Old dog modifier (where you got a ton of them every time they spawned) was stupid though.
I got my “restore 2000 ammo for teammates” penance within 2 missions of damnation high int + dogs, even with psykers in the party.
That definitely was a ton of free ammo.

Wait until next patch, when we get the “more elites” modifier (at least that is how i understdood it: “Elite Resistance” which will spawn fewer but tougher enemies).
Ogryn will have ult up every 5 seconds.
Everyone else will have ult every 15sec or so, if a psyker has the feat for ult cd on elite/special kill.

It is gonna be great.

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I don’t even disagree with this, just that it’s pretty hard to balance around it. Several weapons get infinite ammo just by the aura. Scavenger cements Vet as the top 1 teammate to have pretty much by itself for anyone using guns. Is it a good thing or a bad thing? IDK.

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To be fair
Psykers usually do not use any ammo at all.
Zealots usually mostly use ammo for specials (and some elites).
So these two often do not really care about the veteran aura.

Ogryn are very ammo hungry boys though and can massively benefit from a veteran (especially when using the explosive weapons that get 1 ammo per elite/special kill).

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I don’t agree with this: veterans can seem to carry the game when everything is under control, but when things go south, they are often the first to go down. at some point you are going to have messy situations where there is fire everywhere, mutants and dogs grabbing people out of the blue and throwing them all around, poxbursters rushing at the team by dozens etc… The survivability/crowd control of the other classes are as important as raw dps.

Thing is, Veterans need ammo to perform, other classes don’t. If you have to rely on veteran’s ammo replenishment as an ogryn or zealot to do your job, maybe you are shooting too much and should focus more on the melee strengths of your class. I can quickly notice the players who rely too much on shooting. Psykers, well they don’t need ammo usually which means it’ll also increase the availability of ammo for the rest of the team. This afternoon I was in a high int STG with randoms as a zealot with 2 other zealots and a bot (who was dead 90% of the time) we completely steamrolled through the mission like it was low intensity

Veteran’s scavenger ability is very valuable still, and I agree that it is quite useful to have at least one in the team. You are really gonna need it if several players in the team are using heavy ammo consuming weapons and are not careful to use them sparingly. 1 veteran is the perfect number imho, maybe 2

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Ogryns get the most out of it, but Zealot also gets a lot too. There is a huge difference in ammo supply when I run Zealot, with or without Vet. Firebreath shotgun for example gets a similar “infinate” ammo supply if you are mostly just spamming special. Psyker doesn’t get much out of it unless it goes with the Autopistol build.

It will only get more valuable with more classes I think, unless FS tosses a Scavenger aura on every ranged-focused class.

PS: Yeah I know classes are not really coming, but a man can dream.

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If Grenade-Ogryns or Bolter Preacher use their firearms rarely only when situation demands and are thus rewarded with basically unlimited ammo that’s a good thing because both classes are played as intended.
Staff psykers have unlimited ammo by default and that isn’t a problem.

I find it actually quite annoying when stubber Ogryns, flamer psykers and shredder psykers all overuse their ammo reserve and the team runs dry…

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To be fair, some melee weapons work way better as stand alone weapons with minimal weaknesses and would not need another weapon to cover said weaknesses, but some melee weapons have a incredible strengths against some enemies and would likely do no damage against others, those are the weapons, if you should choose to use them, that would need to be paired with a ranged weapon to pick up the “slack” of your melee weapon.

At this point it’ll either be shoot them yourself, which depending on difficulty and mission modifier could be quite alot of enemies, or let your teammates handle it. So I don’t know if it is easy to say that you should focus on melee strengths of what ever class you play.

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More classes with more ways to support your team would be welcome, I’d like to see it as some form of baseline what Fatshark expect each class to bring to a game. I would imagine that any class that will let you gain resources, such as ammo and grenades would have the most impact.

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me and 3 random ppl in the community discord just cleared several HI-STG with no vets or just 1.

When it comes to soloqueing however I will bring my best Vet loadout.

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Oh yes. I don’t mean to suggest i want it changed. I think its fun and not something that is game breaking. It just changes the way you play and thats fine imo.

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Yeah, currently only Zealot and Vet aura seems obviously impactful. Ogryn and Psyker buffs do something, but it’s not something you can play around easily. Hopefully future classes will have as good auras as Vet and Zealot.

That’s fine with me. It’s just that it’s kinda too valuable in this regard and it’s a huge difference for certain weapons to have Vet. I’m not sure if this is good. Specifically the weight of the impact.

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From my experience, I can agree with this sentiment, but only as far as ammo regeneration goes. Usually having more than a couple of Vets on a Hi-Shock, unless they are rocking BM Caxes, can be kind of a liability considering how limited their options get when they are pressured. Sure, a Psyker is flimsier but with infinite dodge & slides, and a special that can make space or clear a crowd, I find that in Hi-Shock they tend to be able to take care of themselves better.

That ammo-regen aura though is such a huge difference in gameplay. Sure, if the team knows how to play conservatively, set ambushes, draw mobs, help Psykers pop, it can be done. However, the difference in fun between having it and not is night and day. With, it can be such an enjoyable experience, popping stuff with your gun with near impunity and without, welp, it becomes such a slog (maybe not for a coordinated group who enjoys more tactical gameplay and/or RP, but in general thats how it feels from the perspective of someone who enjoys PUG’ing as much as running with a regular crew). What’s “Busted” about it is, every other aura can have its effect replicated to some extent by blessings and perks on weapons and Curios; Heavy damage & Damage of Psykers is just straight up more damage that can be gained by a myriad of ways, Damage Resist of Zealots can be made up for with Curios and individual talents, but Ammo replenishment is a completely unique trait that only Veterans can bring.

If the blessing situation ever does get fixed, I’d love to get Conservative Shooter/Scrounger type options for guns. Especially for the weaker ones and the ones with more mundane blessing choices. You know that shitty Blessing called Efficiency that we all pray doesn’t show up and brick our delightfully rolled XII; why not replace that nonsense with something useful.

An idea for some types could be:

• Scrounger: % returned on Crit (Would like to see this on faster weapons/or Ballistics)

• Conservative Shooter: Fixed amount returned on Headshot (For more precise, semi automatic/sniping/charged weapons)

• Field-charger: Regenerate ammo after not shooting for x seconds. (Replace Efficiency blessing, can appear on Las & Plasma weapons)

• ? : % or Fixed amount returned on Elite or Special Kill (Curio blessing, perhaps make it a fraction of what the Vet’s aura brings)

I think this would ease the necessity of having a Vet present in Hi-Shock. It would also make balance a little easier if Fatshark plans to introduce harder difficulties or more intense/spammy mission modifiers. It’s also kind of fun to have that player-choice to make like, “do I want that blessing that would improve my QOL in harder difficulties that could be potentially not necessary in easier modes, or go for more damage or crits” etc.

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I can’t say I’ve ever noticed Psyker buffs but Ogryn buffs have definitely helped me be more of a blender in melee on many occasions. Hammer really benefits from heavy swing buffs.

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Hammer and evis heavy chainsword probably gets a good bit out of it. Psyker same with ranged weapons, it helps to hit some breakpoints.

It’s just not utilized as reliably, it’s much more circumstantial than the other two which are both way more general.

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Uuuu… Vet appreciation thread? Nice! Don’t listen to all those malcontents.
Vets are carrying all of them, they just don’t know it.

Would you recruit me for your kill team?
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I’d recruit me…
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(humming catchy tune) It puts the grimm in the backpack, or else it gets the hose again…

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Cause of wrong idea that vet needs x3 toughness on curios, every time such vet dies on STG in the first encounter when special spam starts.

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