I’m a Psyker/Zealot main and I really enjoy the melee-focused playstyle, but man, the Zealot Heavy Sword and Psyker Greatsword just can’t deal with all these Crushers anymore. I’m hitting them and it’s only doing single-digit damage. I even use the special attack to apply debuffs, but still only double digits. Weren’t these weapons supposed to get buffed? Why can’t I handle these chunky armored bois? I even get hitstop when swinging into hordes.As Psyker, if I mess up once I just get surrounded by a wall of Crushers and my greatsword might as well be a prop. And don’t even get me started—I got oneshotted by a hammer swing. Didn’t even get to go down, just straight up deleted.I thought Fatshark said their weapon balance would make everything viable? But these two weapons with “powerful” and “heavy” in the name can’t even scratch those armor boys. Psyker’s out here about to pop their own brain trying to blow up all those Crushers, and it’s still not enough. And for survivability? No bubble, just Smite or shriek—but there are way too many Crushers and Ragers. Like, what is this? Even after buffs, are our weapons still worse than some Nurgle cultist’s tin can armor? Oh Emperor above…
This has to be a bait. Force greatsword is very solid against horde and crushers. Heavy sword still sucks, you gotta actually read the notes, they didn’t change much of the damage modifiers and the brittleness debuff is still not that impactful.
FGS not being good? low effort bait
Fatshark “buffed” the heavy swords this update… so why do they still hit like wet noodles? They said they buffed them, but these things still aren’t even remotely viable. I just wanted to experiment with different weapons, but turns out most melee options can’t deal with the Crusher spam—they just keep multiplying. How are our weapons worse than some heretic’s scrap hammer?! Did our machine spirits turn on us? The Omnissiah has forsaken us!
They tried, they did not succeed, most of their attempts of buffing weapons end up with them still being underperforming.
walls of crushers in rotten armour are insane but ig those peak players r gonna say that u should play in lower difficulties. and whats funny is that every time i want to use smite or shriek in havoc 40, ppl would simply ask me to run bubble even though its seen as overpowered. despite times that im being the host
Every time I check the forums, they “buff” some weapons, but most still suck. And this is supposed to be good balance? Half the weapons can’t deal with the Crusher and Mauler spam, and now these buffs do nothing. So what are we supposed to use? They talk about variety but only a few weapons are actually usable. Are we just supposed to watch as every new enemy shows up with the same stupid carapace armor? Why does everything need that tanky shell? Meanwhile our “heavy swords” hit like toys and keep falling behind. Why?! Why can’t they just give these weapons a real buff or rework for once? They’ve been garbage forever. Is a meaningful buff too much to ask? Is Fatshark just a bunch of Nurgle cultists?!
The only enemy that Heavy Sword isn’t exceptional at dealing with is Crushers. If you’re running melee Zealot, Fotf gives you 100% Rending on attack, and Hive Scum has access to tons of rending. Veteran and Psyker have access to really good ranged options that can deal with crushers. It’s still an amazing weapon.
I agree on Rotten armor it doesn’t feel good, but that’s more that Rotten Armor is an awful modifer than anything being wrong with Heavy Sword. If you get a dreg rager seed it’s a top tier weapon.
The problem is, no matter the difficulty, there are just too many Crushers. I tried bringing a new player into the game once, and during that event mission, they had to face a Crusher with nothing but a shovel. That was pure despair. They seriously need to adjust Crusher spawns or health—there’s just way too many of them. In Havoc or Maelstrom, the number of armored elites is basically a full heavy army.
And now every new enemy gets that stupid carapace armor too. The heavy sword can’t even scratch ranged enemies’ armor, and to reach them I have to go through a wall of Crushers while dodging Trappers and Mutants. With these “buffs,” we’re supposed to handle even more Crushers? Last time they got buffed to 6000 HP—what’s next? More spawns? More Crusher variants? Then what was the point of buffing heavy swords? Why can’t Fatshark see that Maelstrom has way more Crushers than last year?
Are Nurgle cultists just old enemies with carapace armor glued on? We need actual unique enemies, not reskins with ugly shells pretending to be new content!
The thing is weapons that are really good against crushers also typically destroy dreg seeds too. They’re too afraid to nerf meta weapons but somehow too afraid to actually help underperforming weapons
Fully agree, heavy sword is REALLY fun until a crusher shows up. Oneshotting muties never gets old and I wish that new special follow-up attack did more than just lightly scratch(and cleave) the wall of crushers standing in front of you. I’ll just build into it’s strengths and avoid or shoot crushers with a gun that can deal with armor.
So what exactly are we supposed to use? Lasguns? The nerfed plasma gun? Okay, the Bolter can handle some, but then there’s just even more Crushers waiting. And don’t even get me started on that reload speed. But wait—isn’t this game supposed to be all about melee? We’re sitting here in a melee-focused game, discussing ranged options just to survive. Doesn’t that say something is fundamentally broken with the game design?!
No, it just says that people are using anti-Carapace Ranged Weapons to synergise with Melee Weapons that are weak against Carapace as their downside. You know, using a build that covers different bases with its Melee Weapon and Ranged Weapon. Pretty standard stuff.
Like, sure, some Melee Weapons are TOO WEAK against Carapace, as some Melee Weapons are TOO STRONG against Carapace. But using a Bolt Pistol or whatever with your Heavy Sword to dispatch Carapace Enemies more reliably is just basic build synergy.
I feel you, but man… there’s just too damn many of them. Ever since that patch two updates ago that gave Crushers more health, so many melee weapons have been struggling. And ranged? You can’t take all the ammo yourself. Those armor-piercing guns burn through ammo like crazy. And behind that wall of Crushers, you’ve got gunners, snipers, trappers, maybe even bombers stacked up. Most weapons can’t clear the Crushers fast enough, and that’s what leads to wipes.
And honestly, these “new enemies” are just old ones with carapace armor glued on. Take the armored dog from this update—it’s basically the same as a normal dog, but slap some carapace on it and Fatshark calls it a day. And before that, we got a plasma gunner with a carapace helmet… Do we seriously need these reskinned old enemies as “new content”?
I don’t mind heavy sword being weak against crushers but as of now weapons that are good against crushers are also good against everything else so yeah nobady is gonna look at hs lol.
Oh, I completely agree here. Some of our tools are killing them WAY too fast, and the AI Director acts accordingly… which turns the game into a slog for people who don’t take specialised anti-Carapace options, or options that are just overpowered in general. A LOT of Weapons were unfortunately left behind by this sweeping buff to the HP of Carapace and Flak Enemies, when Fatshark could’ve just… nerfed whatever was killing them too fast on an individual basis.
Crushers are INTENDED to spawn less than they currently do and be more of a “Miniboss”, but they continue to have the spawn rates of Elites because specific overpowered tools Players have access to are just DELETING them.
For example, I use an Executioner’s Stance build with Power Falchion, Infantry Lasgun and Frag Grenades on my Veteran, and fighting those clown cars of Crushers and Bulwarks and Crushers and Bulwarks and Crushers and Bulwarks gets really tiring. I’m so close to just giving in and using Krak Grenades until they can nerf Krak Grenades’ Charges, Demo Team, et cetera and lower Carapace Enemies’ spawns accordingly.
Honestly, I don’t think it’s that certain things need nerfs—it’s more that the update made Crushers spawn way too often. If Crushers showed up at a mini-boss rate, and instead we had hordes of poxwalkers mixed with some elites, then the Veteran’s other grenades would actually have more value. But because there are just so many damn Crushers, we’re forced to build around this ridiculous spam, which makes the Kraken grenade feel way stronger than the others.
If Fatshark actually adjusted the Crusher spawns to be more like a mini-boss type of unit like you said, the other two grenades would naturally see more use, and players would start picking different weapons again. But right now, with the sheer number of Crushers, Veterans have to spec for survival, which is why the “Commanding Shot” (or whatever the shout ability is) has such a ridiculously high pick rate. I want to run other powerful abilities too, but I just can’t deal with that many Crushers up close without it—because there are simply too many of them…
I understand your hesitance against nerfs but there are simply fundamental issues with the game’s balancing that are only logically fixable via nerfs because it’s gotten THAT bad. There are a number of things that can’t possibly be solved by buffing and buffing and buffing.
You can’t lower Crusher spawns without trivialising the game for Krak Veterans, Duelling Sword users, and so on. Nothing else really poses a threat to us as Players because we as Players have completely powercrept everything else. Plus, you wouldn’t NEED this many Krak Grenades if Crushers were spawning less anyway.
There’s push and pull to this, before we can finally reach a proper equilibrium where everything is viable and fun in Auric and the “meta” is only marginally outperforming its peers, only being the case because perfect balancing is impossible, instead of the insane disparity in power level that we’re currently seeing.
Havoc, of course, shouldn’t be considered when it comes to the game’s overall balancing. Havoc should be balanced around the rest of Darktide as a template, not vice versa. It can’t be allowed to hold the rest of Darktide’s balancing hostage and I’m hopeful that Fatshark knows this.
Honestly, I was hoping they’d buff the weaker weapons instead. With so many Braced Autoguns running around now, the underpowered ones never even get a chance to shine. But FatShark just keeps giving us these tiny little buffs that barely change anything — and even those take up valuable update time.
I really think what we, the community, actually want is more new weapons, cooler new maps, and more story content. But every update just feels like a bucket of cold water on us. “New” enemies are just reskins of old ones, and new weapons feel like they’re never coming. I think it’s been over a year — maybe even longer — since Zealot, Psyker, and Ogryn got any new weapons.
People on the forums have been asking for more weapon additions for a while now, but what do we get? More Braced Autoguns, more “new” enemies that aren’t really new, and a boring new mode. And on top of that, the new mode is full of bugs and the gameplay isn’t even that original.
Do we really need this kind of perfunctory content? Come on, man.