So...what happened to Psyker...?

Warhammer 40,000: Darktide General Discussion
81

That’s…fine. I don’t see where that’s a problem. A Plasma Vet’s job is to clear those targets quickly and efficiently for the team. While the Vet is blasting the Crushers or Maulers, I can go to town on the Shotgunners or engage the other group coming in from another side. I’m going to keep the lesser enemies and hordes clear for the team (Voidstrike with Transfer Peril and Warp Flurry means I can essentially infini-spam blasts into large groups or static targets, blapping a grouped up horde can take me from critical to zero perils), and am going to have a trivial time with things like Hound packs that the PG Vet is going to generally be much less capable against.

Between Inner Tranquility, Shriek, Transfer Perils on the staff, and Mind in Motion, I’ve got way less downtime than the Vet who’s going to have long reloads and spend a few seconds venting after every couple big volleys. EDIT: I’m also never going to be competing for resource pickups or be out of ammo.

Rotating through all classes, I’ve yet to sit there and go “dude, my Pysker just cannot keep up with my Veteran”, but I have definitely felt that way about the Veteran relative to other classes with the first couple rework patches. My Psyker has a higher mission success rate all told than my Vet does, though my highest mission win-rate build is my practically zero-damage Ogryn tank-build, and my absolute worst is Zealot as a whole.

Hrm, again, as someone who plays all 4 classes, and more Psyker time/true levels than Vet time/true levels, I don’t feel this at all. The vet tree’s a mess, there’s a reason it needed a 3.0 and 4.0 reboot after Patch 13, and Fatshark straight up came out and said they scrapped their concept and released an unfinished tree for that patch to begin with.

I feel like I’ve got a lot more flexibility on most other classes, especially before the last update where even reaching a Keystone on any of the Vet trees took 3-4 more talent points than any other class did.

The whole thing feels like it was designed by someone making something for a TTRPG, not a first person shooter. The keystones are probably the best examples of this, they’re the most fiddly ones to get use out of, and probably have the least overall value. Marksman’s Focus requires both immobility and weakspot hits to both empower and to get use out of, if I’m moving or not landing headshots, it doesn’t do anything. Focus Target wants to you spam-tag everything constantly. Weapon Specialist really wants you to artificially swap weapons in weird inorganic ways to maximize its utility. A lot of these are things that are great functionality in a TTRPG, but feel really hamfisted and inorganic in fast paced survival horde shooter that actively discourages and punishes static gameplay.

Let’s compared that to the Pysker keystones. Warp Siphon just works, I can literally do nothing and have my teammates proc it, and impacts literally everything I do, it enhances every bit of damage, and reduces perils generation from any source. Empowered Psionics generates quickly just from killing stuff, and can be held for exactly the target you want, and when faced with walls of elites can practically infini-spam abilities. Disrupt Destiny I feel is the only terrible one, and suffers I think from the same TTRPG mindset the Veteran ones do.

Again, I don’t even run a Keystone on most Vet builds, but can’t imagine doing so on any other class. I’m not really sure what else needs to be said beyond that as far as the tree being wonky.

So your problem seems to be with the fundamental concept of the entire class a gear-focused ranged specialist? I’m not sure what to say if that’s the issue.

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82

That’s exactly what it is, a fundamental design issue, all classes should have had their own weapon selection

Since they don’t; all cross class weapons will be stronger on some classes than some others, meaning when they are over the line such as the Revolver, nerfing it because of the strongest (Veteran) is actually mostly harmful for Psyker and Zealot only

When it’s a Power Sword or a Plasma Gun, it’s much easier to nerf, provided you don’t listen to the scrubs flooding the forums like it’s the end of days

edit - And before some jackass barges in saying i have it out for the Vets in particular you poor wittwe fragile thing, i had exactly the same discourse about Assail on release, or the Surge staff bug, or the Smite bug, and there were a LOT of people defending them

83

Yeah it’s a crazy good talent for any crit build. That talent turns almost every Shred melee weapon into ranged-immune. On Laspistols with enough crit passives (esp. since many use it with Scrier’s anyway) it also just frees up that ghost for something else since Empathic Evasion does that job, so you can double stack on offensive blessings instead.

Yeah I agree that Disrupt Destiny is in a weird spot, but it can definitely be worth picking still. Whether with Scrier’s or not that thing can transform any weapons with great weakspot/crit nevermind both modifiers into an absolute monster. Even with Void it lets you easily meet ridiculous breakpoints 1-shotting just about everything even with ~50-70% charge blasts.

My main issue with it is ofc stacking it. You frequently have to choose between real priorities and some random trash off somewhere to keep the buff stacked. Nevermind how it seriously forces you to rush and take dumb risks to keep it running. So to use it effectively, you literally have to accept that sometimes it’s better to let it run out than make a dumb mistake like letting priority enemies get too close or rushing too hard and get wiped. Not a fan of that.

I don’t want to agree but… yeah, it’s pretty bad. Even worse on Steam I think.

Worst of all is that because there’s like 1000 times more important information that the game doesn’t tell you vs. what it does, these people who just spread flat out lies and misinformation have real impact on new players who come looking for advice.

And then ofc the toxicity is just mind-boggling. Over at Steam probably like half the people never contribute, just spew random insults every which way. I’ve even had to block people here for that same attitude. People who aren’t even interested in learning or discussing how things work, but are simply in it for the toxicity itself and let anyone who doesn’t fall in line with their skewed weird and just wrong rants have their share of it. x.x It can get exhausting.

But I digress. Psykers are extremely strong. But imo it does take a lot more effort than the other classes to play them effectively, just like it always has.

84

So, while I can understand this issue in theory, in practice it only seems to come up very rarely, as far as I’m aware only really on the Bolter and Revolver (correct me if I’m wrong), both weapons that are relatively low RoF, low-capacity, high damage weapons with some clunkiness to them, and when it comes to the Revolver, specifically with Rending stacking right after they changed how that functionality worked and didn’t quite shake it out across everything it touched. We don’t see issues with with things like Autoguns or especially Lasguns where Vets arguably are able to stretch such weapons even further (but can’t get single shots to do incredible things generally). Going off that, while these issues have the potential to arise, they are relatively limited, and seem to occur in conjunction with other changes that aren’t fully thought out (like Rending and the 2.0/3.0 Vet trees).

The Bolter and Revolver are also weapons I’ve never used much, so I’ll cop to that, I don’t have much experience with them directly, they’re really not the types of weapons I enjoy on any class, they’re far too awkward for my tastes, and my twitch shot skills aren’t what they were back when playing instagib Unreal Tournament games :sweat_smile:

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85

I actually prefer to stack it with Ghost, because the only other Laspistol blessing that makes a difference is DumDum, burning is super overrated and practically makes 0 difference to your overall dps

With Ghost and Empathic Evasion you just guarantee that no matter where you shoot you’re probably going to be ranged immune for at least a second, sometimes you don’t have the luxury to hope for a crit (even with great Crit rate), sometimes you don’t have the luxury to aim for a weak spot (e.g. Mauler swarm)

Autoguns and Lasguns are just as silly on Veterans, the entire concept of a class which takes ranged weapons to the “next level” was a mistake

They play point and click while the other two classes who share the weapons either can’t use them effectively, or pray they aren’t going to get nerfed because of the Vets

And meanwhile you see outlandish demands on these forums or on reddit practically on a daily basis for the Bolter to be even better than the Revolver or the Plasma Gun, from completely unashamed Veteran players because “it’s the lore”

Can’t tell if it’s because they’re that bad they don’t understand the implications, or if it’s just bad faith attempts at grabbing even more main character power but in any case it’s disgusting

86

bolternerds are wanting to feel like space marines. you can tell if you watch them talking about the game outside of that argument, they’re those guys that think the “Rejects” angle was a huge mistake and we need to be space marines , battle sisters, and tau powersuits for whatever reason fighting genestealers.

they want to feel like a space marine with their bolter and the guardsman bolter is too slow for 'em.

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Well, we don’t really see issues being brought up on that count as far as I’ve ever seen. As I pointed out above it only seems to be an issue in edge cases. Outside of the Revolver with the other aforementioned issues (WIP Vet talent tree that went through 3 major revisions in just a couple months, coupled with an overhaul of Rending), and the Bolter, I’m not seeing it raised as a consistent issue.

I generally don’t run guns on my Psyker (not my thing for the class, don’t want to take/rely on ammo, and if I’ve got unique weapons like Staves, I’m gonna use them, and I find the current implementation of Gunspyker to be boring), but on my Zealot I’ve never felt terrible running things like autopistols or autoguns or las weapons.

Yes, a Vet overall will put it to better use, but the Zealot is going to be putting a chainsword or eviscerator to way better use than the Vet possibly will, and at the same time between Blazing Piety being up frequently and dramtically boosting crit chance, and talents like Anoint in Blood, I don’t feel undergunned against most things I’m fighting, Zealot’s just not the class to deal with a Sniper on the other side of the map, or to gun down Crushers at range with Rending. Put Shotgunners, Scab Gunners, Reapers, Trappers, etc or a big horde in front of me, and I’ll gun them down rapidly. If there’s a mediocre Vet on my team, I don’t feel like I have a problem outperforming them on shooting terms with my Zealot if they left their A-game at the airlock.

Likewise, I don’t feel like I can’t use a Chainsword effectively on a Vet, or need to pray that it doesn’t get nerfed because Zealots use them too well. Yes, shared weapons can cause issues at some points, but they appear to be limited edge cases from Fatshark mucking with multiple things at once, often without seeming to entirely be aware of what they’re doing.

Can’t speak to Reddit, left that place behind seven or eight years ago and will never look back, particularly the main Warhammer subreddit there (some truly terrible mods there who would do things like openly berate 12 year olds on their painting and tell them to kill themselves and the like, really genuinely awful human beings running the place). I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone ask for the Bolter to be better than the Plasma gun or the like here on these forums, though I guess there’s always someone saying something silly somewhere.

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88

That’s exactly what i’m saying, you shouldn’t end up with a nerfed Chainsword on your Vet (or Psyker) because it’s too strong on your Zealot

Although with the current “itsareworknotabuff trust me bro” Veteran, they’re also better at melee so…

I mean there’s an entire thread where the OP recommends having the Bolter delete almost anything in one hit and ignore limb shots penalty

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i dont like psyker as a class. But i do play all 4 classes and i do complete all contracts on all of them. So i played fair bit of psyker.

I think it’s not that psyker changed. It’s the enemies, that changed. There are more of them, more agressive spawns, many enemies recieved health buff and etc.

But as people already said - there are no problems or nerfs with psykers. Maybe you staying too far away from your team? I heard AI director is more agressive to the people, who stays outside of coherency for too long. That may be the reason you feel enemies pressure you all the time

90

I see a lot of responses about Psyker toughness regeneration, which is fairly easy to trigger. But it sounds like the OP is talking about his overall inability to survive incoming damage for toughness regen to matter. Positioning is of utmost importance for the class, as pretty much any damage pushes right into hp damage, whittling down an inattentive Psyker very quickly. I think the issue is that other classes have a lot more toughness damage reduction baked into their trees. Though being able to cast shield walls and bubbles is probably meant to be the tradeoff for the class.

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91

I think one thing might be that a combination of class buffs and having progressively more experienced players in the game has changed the pace of combat as much or more than any director/enemy stat changes. PUGs seem less inclined than ever to be tactical when engaging challenging situations.

Groups of Bulwarks/Crushers seem to be the only thing that give groups a moment of pause these days on unmodified maps. Even then there’s usually someone on your team that has a build itching to delete those and spam the kill console.

As a result the pace of moving around the map willy-nilly has probably increased on average, but that’s just a guess. Positioning and situational awareness feel most important on my Psyker, and gone are the days of “let me hold them with my Surge staff for you”.

92

I was killing some time at work and were watching some chocoB videos.

If after watching and comparing his two latest videos, The “MK IV Chainaxe Zealot” and the “Voidstrike Psyker”, and you’re still not convinced that the Psyker is the weaker class, then my eyes must be doing something terribly wrong.

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93

You’re right but the problem there is that nothing changed for the worse, aside from more enemies to deal with at once ofc. Positioning, awareness and mobility has always been more important for psykers than the rest due to their low passive defenses.

But what the weapon & blessing changes and new talents did do, is exponentially increase our options to deal with it all. The absolutely insane toughness regen lets us facetank ranged and even the occasional melee as long as we keep topping it via warp kills. One With the Warp among a few other nodes do add toughness dmg resistance, and there’s always the shields too. And I already went over much of the rest.

I guess what I’m getting at here is that overall things really did not change for the worse for psykers, but the opposite. But all classes are designed around performance, and this is especially true for psykers. Almost all toughness regen and talent & blessing procs are based on hits, crits, kills, or peril buildup. This includes the effects stagger, suppression and kills themselves have ofc by just reducing the enemy offense in return. So the more aggressive you are and the more impact you have, the stronger your defenses become too.

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94

Meanwhile the self proclaimed expert with 1800hrs in the game and two Psyker mains have created a thread where he discovers such amazing new things such as force sword special attack ticking more than once, and the interaction that has with rending, and the interaciton rending has with DoTs. Not to mention doing such amazing groundwork that you could only do after 1800hrs, such as actually testing the specials and push attacks.

Truly an expert that already knew everything there is to know about Psyker :roll_eyes:

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And then there’s Telopot killing like 10 Maulers at once with Voidstrike.

96

You should take some time off, this toxicity can not be healthy.

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97

Which requires optimal conditions and even then rarely happens. While with other classes, you can do crazy stuff consistently.

And thats the big difference. Sure, Psykers can do some insane moves on paper and can fill certain niche roles well, if the right conditions are met and team allows it. But with certain other classes and builds, you have the ability to clutch pretty much anything. I’d say its better to be able to perform 80% for 90% of the time, than 90% for 20% of the time, if you catch my drift.

And hey, maybe thats what Fatshark wanted for the class? They want it to be a fun, but quirky and “non-meta”, which would be fine by me and I’ll still play it. But, you’ll have a hard time convincing me it is up to par with other classes when it comes down to ability in practice.

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98

For my own experience, I don’t usually “clutch” stuff on my Psyker the way VoC or an Ogryn taunt can, but rather bring a consistency that makes the need to clutch things less frequent.

Am I the party member that’s going to solo the boss? Nope. Am I particularly tanky? Nah. Am I going to save the day with a clutch ability activation? Probably not.

What the Psyker brings to the table, at least as I’ve typically played it, is a general easing of resource burdens and a consistency of force output. The Psyker doesn’t need to compete for ammo or grenade consumables. The Psyker can’t run out of ammo. The Psker can mow more muppets than anyone else. Between Shriek, Mind in Motion, Transfer Perils on the Vstrike staff, Warp Siphon+ Inner Tranquility, etc, my downtime is minimal and my requirements for buffs/keystones/etc are low, I’m never stuck reloading a Plasma gun or trying to whip out a Heavy Stubber for several seconds. With Deflector on the Force weapon + Kinetic Deflection I’ve got some extra block utility that isn’t available to anyone else without an Ogryn shield.

I’m the jack of all trades who helps the masters be better at their specialty. Everyone else’s job is made easier because I’m effectively feeding them ammo/grenades I’m not taking nor am I ever out of the use of abilities for lack of it, I can clear the hordes and dogs off the team better than anyone else, I can deal with lighter elites and most specialists fantastically, and I can still blap a sniper from across the map or fight Crushers if I have to. I’m never the party member sitting there who can’t engage a target because it’s out of range or they don’t have a weapon that can hurt it or can’t chew through a horde fast enough. I’m always able to put out constant offensive pressure that doesn’t require me to trigger and combo or skillshot things to do so, and with particularly large fights/events I can often never need to quell and just keep throwing glowing bowling balls out the whole time without needing to stop or let up. The need to clutch something is usually lower as a result.

Granted, some of this comes out of some particular blessings/talents, but it can apply to many Psyker builds.

Side note, this is part of why personally I’m not a huge fan of the current Gunpsyker iteration, because it gives up a ton of that utility just be get a critmonster with a gun, which another existing class is basically already built to do. They could have done all sorts of cool Gun-fu Equilibrium/Matrix-ey type stuff instead that would offer genuinely new utility, psychically guided bullets shooting around corners at hidden targets, using Perils to fuel weapons instead of ammo, psychically charging the teams munitions, etc that would have been more interesting and useful, at least to my mind.

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99

But with scrier’s up they’re the best gunny lad around.

I do get why Psyker is good in terms of just generally being a free source of resourceless problem solving, and gun psyker runs very contrary to it, but I don’t think that’s really an issue considering the massive upsides.

All classes should have a boss killing build at least available, and this one is it for psyker.

Plus even a gun psyker with no ammo in the worst case scenario can still at least assail spam, or smite spam while having access to some very good melee weapons no other class has.

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100

I’m feeling this.

My preferred Psyker set up is with Surge staff. I have many examples where I’ve fully charged the staff, hit a crusher, and it’s just not stopped. Okay, “breakpoint” on total shock - get it. But then I’ve fully charged again, hit it again, then fully charged again, hit it again, and in no case did it get staggered.

I’m not sure I get the surge staff any more. Is it not meant to stun - lock?

Meanwhile, some guy with a no-RNG no-Investment grenade skill (smite) can lock multiple Crushers just by hitting their grenade key, then fire? Hmmm.

I don’t like that aspect. The grenade skills should be quick situation control, not usable as a replacement primary weapon. IMHO

(edited for clarity)