The Good
Psyker and Ogryn definitely received some much needed love, all of their new tools are fun, and seem to be viable.
Zealot and Veteran received some cool new tools, and got some balance reshuffles moving their power around.
The new voice lines are always appreciated, it definitely adds more soul to the game after playing it for 480 hours. I know that some people say that they feel like your character has no character but I think I disagree.
The new cut scenes are cool, I hope to see some more as we get more patches.
The cheer button shows that they have been listening to our requests, another big positive sign for future development.
There have been some changes on maps that were not enumerated in the changelog, Being able to open the cell doors on the prison map is a really cool unexpected change. I hope to see more retreading on existing maps in future updates.
The Bad
I don’t think there is anything I would consider objectively “bad” in this update (so far), maybe ugly bordering on bad depending on how you feel about the topic.
The Ugly
Just to get this out of the way, the cash shop stuff is pretty foolish, they’ll likely address that soon in some form, but whatever that doesn’t effect balance/the gameplay loop in any tangible way.
The Zealot knives are useful and cool, but from an aesthetic standpoint the knives are not satisfying to use, the impact sound is rather quiet, and the animation for throwing them is pretty easy to miss during a fight. Especially when you compared the throwing knives to the Psyker’s Assail ability.
After taking a hit from the pinning fire nerf, the bolter feels a bit underwhelming now, it doesn’t need a lot of help but it needs something.
The counter fire change is curious, they’ve changed the wording on it to include “All Ranged Enemies” however it still does not target stalkers, and reapers are also not included as “ranged” enemies, I don’t know if this is intended or not but some sort of clarification would be appreciated.
Psykers seem to be a bit over-tuned, and filled with some pretty large bugs. Smite that doesn’t cost peril indefinitely and the Void Strike staff are two things that stand out to me. The shield seems like it’s too good to pass up using.
A lot of the new Psyker tools seem to be in conflict with Veteran (historically it’s always felt like the two are competing to do the same thing, this is just the first time it’s been Psyker sided since the first beta) The smoke grenade seems to be a worse shield, and Assail does a better job at deleting shooters than sharpshooter vet. These things are fine in practice, I think that there needs to be something to allow Veteran or Psyker to claim their own more unique identity as classes. As time goes on, and people experiment more with the new trees, more Psyker and Vet builds will come out that give a more clear cut identity but I would rather see a more apparent split in abilities.
In Summary
Overall the game seems to be heading in the correct direction, all of the classes feel good to play. The story is being built out more, making the experience feel more complete. Aside from the questionable business practices Darktide seems to be on the mend. If I’ve missed anything or you disagree I think this is a fine place for that discourse.