Auric is to easy and one of the reasons for it is that you can swing your melee weapon 3 times into a horde and kill it, I don’t even take cleave blessings on most of my weapons anymore because of all the cleave talents that now exist on most classes. So increase enemy hitmass in Auric yay or nay?
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It could be a change that is applied across all difficulties, not just Auric. Any change that would allow enemies to not rely on pure numbers to be a threat to the players is welcome in my book. Of course that would make Havoc much harder, but Darktide should be balanced around its main difficulties and not a gamemode exclusively made for players craving an extremely hard challenge.
FatShark needs to show love towards the main difficulties first, then and only then look at the mess that is the Havoc gamemode, period.
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Probably best to not do it for havoc since that would just make the havoc players want buffs for cleave (which they will get since Fatshark are obviously balancing the game for havoc) and that would defeat the purpose of it.
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Let’s be honest here. If FatShark wants to fix/better the balance of Darktide, they will need to make changes to almost everything at once. It’s the best course of action for them if they want to keep every group of players from getting mad and possibly resorting to things like review bombing the game.
So if they were to buff the enemies to make the main difficulties harder they would also have to nerf the Havoc difficulty, so no side is complaining that suddenly things are too hard.
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Agreed but I am just so grutting jaded at this point, like I never though I would suggest something like increasing hitmass instead of targeted nerfs (which would be more efficient and wouldn’t have any collateral damage) but Fatshark just refuses ever nerf anything. Last time they tried they somehow made the dueling sword even worse but they have shown that they are atleast prepared to buff enemies which is a bad way of doing things but it’s better than nothing. Idk I’m just tired boss.
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That’s because when they tried to meaningfully nerf the DS, the group of supposedly Chinese players got mad and review bombed the game on the day the leaks showed what FS intends to do to the DS and the PG. They then did some small nerfs to it in Bound by Duty which didn’t achieve the intended result and here we are.
That’s why I say they need to change everything at once and not one thing after another. Before they can fix everything, the side that got the short end of the stick will get mad and stop them with review bombing.
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It is what NEEDS to happen and any sane developer would know that but I don’t have much faith in Fatshark doing anything that isn’t a band aid fix at this point but I would love to be proven wrong.
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The thing is, the changes that were seen in the leaks regarding the planned nerfs to the DS and PG, sounded very good on paper. It felt like had the playerbase actually allow FS to go along with them, the game would be in a much better state. Unfortunate that one of the first changes that didn’t felt like a mere band-aid fix couldn’t even come to fruition…
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I’m not sure… wouldn’t it be better to just do targeted Cleave nerfs where needed? Fatshark are known to unintentionally dumpster Weapons with sweeping balancing changes when they could’ve just looked at the specific Weapons that needed nerfs. Like, I’m not hating on your idea, but I don’t trust Fatshark to do their due diligence with it.
We are STILL waiting for Fatshark to buff the Weapons that were dumpstered by the sweeping Flak and Carapace buffs back in September 2025 with the “Bound by Duty” Update. Heck, the last time they’re known to have even LOOKED at Infantry Lasguns was back in October 2023 with Patch 14. And yes, I will continue to autistically bug them about them needing to buff Infantry Lasguns until they actually do it. I’ve been actively begging them to buff Infantry Lasguns since November 2024, and nothing’s come of that just yet.
But to add to the conversation in another way, I think Darktide could use more Enemies and Enemy “variants” to spice up gameplay in general.
I’d love to see some Human-sized Shield Enemies, as Darktide’s missing those. Of course, give them a limited Stamina pool, so they’re nowhere near as annoying to fight as the current iteration of Bulwarks. There’ll be more on Bulwarks later…
For a Melee Human-sized Shield Enemy you could have a Dreg Subjugator, a corrupted Enforcer who runs around with a Shock Baton and Assault Shield. Maybe they have the capability to smack their Shock Baton against their Assault Shield in a similar manner to how Arbitrators do with their Shock Maul and Suppression Shield, applying a debuff to the Player if they don’t look away or stop the Dreg Subjugator before it happens. I don’t know, there’s just a real delectable form of 40K-rich irony that comes from a Chaos Cult having to enforce ORDER over their subjects as a necessary measure to keep their power.
For a Ranged Human-sized Shield Enemy you could have a Scab Breacher, who functions as a rarer form of Shotgunner with a small, improvised Shield. Either you can choose to engage him more safely in Ranged or engage him in risky Melee where you can either bypass his Shield with precision strikes or outright smash it to get to him. I’d recommend waiting for him to start reloading or something before trying that, though. Wouldn’t it be satisfying to smash someone’s crappy little improvised Shield to bits like you could in Vermintide?
Then Fatshark should divide Bulwarks into two variants. The Brute Bulwark, and the Slab Bulwark. The Slab Bulwark would be the existing variant with its Slab Shield as you know and probably don’t love too much, while the Brute Bulwark would be a new variant with a Brute Shield. An Ogryn with a Buckler, basically. Their Brute Shield is much smaller, and they’re therefore significantly less protected. But they’d also be a lot more AGGRESSIVE and active in Melee compared to the Slab Bulwarks.
And so on. There are SO many options for Fatshark to explore regarding new Enemies and Enemy variants. Like Plaguebearers who could serve as Dreg Daemon equivalents to Scab Ogryns.
Dreg Maulers, who could be less tanky than Scab Maulers but are faster and give you Corruption when they hit you.
With some changes, Fatshark could even add Psyker Enemies to Darktide by reskinning and modifying Blightstormers and Lifeleeches from Vermintide 2. The Blightstormer analogue would be a Scab Battle Psyker, whilst the Lifeleech analogue would be a Dreg Rogue Psyker.
On top of all of this, I think CQB-focused Ranged Enemies, namely Shotgunners and Stalkers since they use Combat Shotguns and Braced Autoguns/Lascarbines respectively, should have the unique capability of shooting Players while said Players are sliding towards them, to give them a niche as a foil to the whole “dodge slide to avoid all Enemy Ranged Attacks” thingamajig. This would differentiate Stalkers from Shooters and then make Shotgunners an actual threat to Players as an Elite.
You could even add a Scab Squad Leader Elite who buffs and commands “Squads” of Scab Shooters and Scab Stalkers who has the same “can shoot Players if said Players are sliding towards them” capability, since they’d be using Heavy Laspistols and probably also Lascarbines. Give them a Sword of some kind, so they can be forced into Melee like Shotgunners and Stalkers, maybe even a Chainsword or Power Falchion.
Then rebuff Shooters to the level they were at for the “Secrets of the Machine God” Update back in June 2024. These changes were NOT significant enough to warrant the reversal they got, and actually made Ranged Veterans who put in an effort to countering them feel like a genuine contributor to the Strike Team again.
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It would
It’s just whenever a nerf is suggested you get “b-b-but havoc!” response and those are the people fatshark are catering to so I figured I would suggest something that won’t effect havoc players…I would much rather do it your way but I have lost hope of fatshark ever meaningfully nerfing anything ever again.
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Fatshark have thankfully shown improvements and a greater capacity to listen to their Playtesters recently, although there’s definitely been hiccups.
I’ll be incredibly happy if Fatshark manage to continue doing these inter-Update Balance Passes that started with Hofix 80, which occurred in October 2025, between the September 2025 and December 2025 Updates. More of those would be amazing because they’d change the balancing (and therefore also the gameplay) up every 1-2 Months instead of every 3-4 Months.
This was actually such a massive W.
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Either that or make them be able to do a dodge animation that evades our projectiles (that makes them stop shooting and has a cooldown so they can’t spam it, of course).
Since these units do not take cover, can’t be suppressed, constantly advance towards players and fulfill the role of shocktroops, it would make sense that they would be trained to not just run at the gunfire like idiots but try to dodge it.
No the game is a different beast in pubs with incompetent players already, and this would just force you into smaller and smaller build and weapon varieties. You obviously want variety or you wouldn’t be wanting something new after getting to the point auric is easy. That’s literally what maelstroms and the mode where hitmass is increased are for. This would just create an even more steep difficulty increase from damnation to auric. The reason it’s only in havoc or special events is so you don’t go up a difficulty and learn several new mechanics at once. Damnation to auric you have so much thrown at you already, and this would just make it even less appealing to move up.
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I am completely opposed to any enemy with an inbuilt ability to bypass player defensive tools. Skill expression in the game is the appropriate use of the available tools and responding appropriately to visual and sound cues.
Shotgunners already have the ability to threaten melee players by the simple fact that they can keep shooting at melee range. Pistol-armed enemies with the same ability would be fine, but “your tool for closing under fire does not work anymore” is not a fun gameplay conceit.
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There’s a bigger picture to what I’m trying to achieve here, but that’s my mistake for not going deeply enough into it.
The biggest issue right now with such a change would have to be Enemy spam. Enemies aren’t threatening us enough, and most of the Ranged Enemies are kind of… samey. The AI Director sees that we’re absolutely clobbering these Enemies and thus opts to spawn an insane amount of them to provide us with any semblance of challenge. Players not being punished for being excessively aggressive in Melee is part of this problem.
Simply put, we shouldn’t be able to just dodge slide up to EVERY Ranged Enemy and bap them to death with our Melee Weapons. That’s outright brain-dead gameplay, and Enemies should be able to counter such aspects of Players. If you decide to mindlessly bum rush a dude with a Shotgun or a Carbine while he’s still actively firing at you, why SHOULDN’T you be punished for that?
With such a change, you could make Shotgunners rarer (as Elites should be rarer than they are right now) and Stalkers an actual threat to Players again. This would encourage more team cooperation while adding a new form of gameplay diversity. And it wouldn’t be anywhere near as scary as you think it is if Shotgunners spawned in fewer numbers. Players would adapt to this change by pointing out Shotgunners to prevent their Teammates from rushing in too hastily.
Melee shouldn’t be THAT safe, especially when you’re playing as an Archetype like Veteran or Psyker who are supposed to hang back and counter Ranged Enemies. Being able to just bum rush everything with hyper aggression in Melee makes Ranged Enemies feel like a cardboard cutout to fight and thus Ranged-focused Builds often feel… meaningless.
Except on Hive Scum but that’s because they have literal Infinite Ammo with how Pickpocket currently works.
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Nay, or yes but just a little
I see that differently… Nerf what need to be nerfed. And the problem is that players always want to use what is too stong. Example, the pickaxe…
But it won’t happen… they don’t want to balance this game.. see Havoc, greatest example of the lack of will from Fatshark to balance their game.
Hordes are tiny in Auric… seriously, this is pack of few enemies… we are far away of the hordes from the old good times.
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Absolutely what I would prefer but
Annoying thing is that I absolutely believe that the game could be balanced so that everyone is happy in every difficulty all weapons being good and no weapons being op but it would require a high level of dedication and a willingness to iterate with every hotfix and it doesn’t seem like Fatshark are willing to put in the work.
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Speaking from the perspective of a primarily-ogryn player, whose second biggest counter after Silent Trappers is A Lot Of Guys With Guns Spread Out Over There… Melee isn’t safe until you’re in melee range, and Ogryn do not have the mobility tools to evade gunfire and wait for them to reload. The tendency of shooters to fan out, and the fact that melee range is also danger-close for shotgunners, collectively create a healthy risk/reward calculation for closing.
If your target priority is off and there are any shotgunners left on their feet, you’ll have a bad time. If you tunnel vision and don’t clean up the guys that scatter when you move in, you’ll have a bad time. Becoming unable to safely close isn’t going to improve the gameplay experience.
Shotgunners’ role is to apply pressure, hence the suppression immunity. They’re appropriately dangerous if ignored, but I really don’t see a need to remove tools from the players in countering them. Basically, don’t make it a question of “what tools are ‘wrong’ for this problem” with the only right answer being to shoot them before they’re in range; make it a question of “how can each tool solve this problem.”
Truthfully, I see more mag-dumping into hordes and assail spamming from vets and psykers than I do aggressive melee; getting them to pull out a melee weapon while being actively punched in the head can be a bit of an ordeal.
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Indomitable “Stomping snivellers!”