So what is the selling point of Plasma Gun now?

Warhammer 40,000: Darktide General Discussion
1

Okay, I am a bit biased towards Plasma. I love its SFX, I love its VFX, for me it’s the most enjoyable weapon to use, and I love the role that it fits in, for me it’s a support VoC veteran that prioritizes removing specials. So I may be unfair now about nerfs. But here is what I think I must say after playing for hundreds of hours and beating havoc 40 in an honest way. These nerfs force a playstyle and restrictions on us that send plasma into an utter garbage tier immediately for multiple reasons:

  1. Increased swap speed and significantly nerfed cleave force you to take 2 more talents that you might not have before, so you will now be forced to sacrifice talent points to partially compensate for the nerf if you choose to take plasma.
  2. Increased swap speed makes you too vulnerable, especially on greater difficulties, where it will cost you dearly. Quickly swapping to a secondary to remove a dangerous special is no longer an option; thus, why does your group even need you?
  3. Plasma struggles to kill some specials. Without stacking all possible buffs, you won’t even kill a flamer in the head on Havoc 40, last I checked. So, with a Helbor, you can 2 tap them, with plasma you can hit them in the head, they will fall, and now you can’t finish them, because a projectile won’t come through the horde, thus you either wait, or charge.
  4. Charging takes long, and you only have 2 dodges with such a heavy weapon, you’re done if you try to make a few shots in close quarters, flamers and trappers with infinite cleave, bombers, and gunners hiding behind the horde will make certain you are having the worst time possible before you finish charging.
  5. Charging gets you dangerously close to the overheat in 3 fully charged shots, now with there being like 10+ specials and elites at a time on Havoc, what am I supposed to do about the rest?
  6. TTK of a plasma is worse than that of a Helbor for any target, but Helbor can’t penetrate, nor can Plasma now. You may say “but you could shoot through a shield of a bulwark with a plasma and still can with a charged shot”, well, I can just jump with my Helbor and shoot them in the head over their shield.
  7. Plasma has a tiny charging time even for light attacks, so you are more vulnerable once out of 2 dodges, since you might not be able to interrupt a trapper in time. Now, it’s way worse in the horde. Helbor does not. BTW, in a time that plasma charges a light attack, Hive Scum just removes the entire patrol, but that’s a whole other story.
  8. Plasma has 1/4 of an ammo pool of a Helbor.

So, to summarize, it feels to me like devs at this point see Darktide as a super hardcore e-sports game that must put players into misery, disallow all fun, make you feel exhausted and tired, and make Dark Souls feel like a walk in the park. Constantly buffing enemies, breaking what works, never improving what does not work, and introducing the most obnoxious modifiers. Plasma Veteran is now a liability that requires to be babysat by others when he pulls out his huge water gun, while everyone else does his job so much better. This season, I will definitely be switching to a Helbor for a Veteran in all my builds that used to wield Plasma.
Rant is over. If anyone reads all of this, I’m impressed and thank you.

P.S. Considering how few people ever touch Havoc, does it ever cross your mind that too many players probably think that the game is too difficult? Or do you think everyone is like: “nooo, havoc is too easy, ain’t playing that until they nerf us to the point where we have only 1 half-viable set-up and buff all enemies”?

2

So I’m not even a vet main but when I want to shoot things my absolute favourite build in the game is Weapons Specialist with PG and latrine shovel. It honestly feels like cheating.

Plasma Gun is a heavy weapon, but it maneuvers like a pistol – I’m talking about draw time. It’s always felt overly fast to me (even though I enjoyed the benefits), able to be pulled out for a quick shot even in the midst of a horde. Giving it more draw time seems in-line with its feel (give it some heft) as a heavy weapon, balance aside. And you are now incentivised to take the quickswap perk if you value it.

The cleave complaints coming in before the patch drops is interesting, because it still has exceptional cleave (3-5 times bolgun iirc?). We all like spamming the killfeed with elites, and I’m sure that won’t go away even with the new limit. Infinite cleave on light attack is simply OP. They chose a new value that’s still very high, so in practice I’m not sure what difference it will make.

Charged shot is finally getting more of an identity by being more ammo efficient than light. Huzzah.

As for Havoc balance, I can’t really speak to that. But I’m sure players will figure it out. It still has exceptional strengths to mitigate its key drawbacks.

3

I think there’s definitely a case to be made that there’s an overfocus on Havoc with a lot of discussions (particularly when the overwhelmingly vast majority of the playerbase doesn’t and will never play Havoc), that issues that arise in Havoc are not issues that impact the rest of the game in the same way, and that the game really is actually plenty difficult for average players even with hundreds of hours if invested time. Fatshark’s numbers said 30% of missions failed globally in 2025. That’s substantially higher than every other competitor 4 person coop title than I can think of, and at least with the people I play with, find basic Damnation is more difficult than most competitors hardest modes are.

I think there’s a case to be made that the Plasma Gun overperformed in Havoc in ways it couldn’t at more normal difficulties, when you’re not playing with limited ammo and don’t have targets spawning a dozen at a time on literally the same spot for Cleave weapons to chunk through, the PG doesn’t deliver the same value you see in the ultrasweat mode. Has it been overnerfed for the sake of a niche game mode? I’m not sure, haven’t had a chance to play with it yet, but it probably did need some changes, so we’ll see how they shake out.

4

A huge thing here is that yes, they nerfed the hipfire cleave, and its now down to 18 cleave instead of 100. You can still do charged attacks for that 100 cleave, which requires more in-the-moment investment which is good to match how strong it is. But a lot of people are focused on the nerf to the hipfire cleave so look at that more. 18 cleave is significantly higher than literally every other hitscan option, a comparison would be the agrip brauto, considered “the cleavy one" at 3. 18 cleave is enough to hit 12 groaners in a row, 11 poxwalkers in a row, 5 ragers in a row, 4 gunners/shotgunners in a row, i could keep going. This is even before any buffs, the cleave buff increases all of it by 1.5x if you choose, any strength buffs from the tree or blessings, or whatever hitmass reductions they have if a teammate is staggering them. All of those are multiplicitive with each other, so it gets pretty crazy pretty fast. Its still STUPIDLY STRONG in what it does, a lot of the time you wont even notice unless you are firing into super thick density with none of the mentioned buffs. The number reduction seems harsh, but its still only half the guns firing modes, and it only just shows how high 100 cleave actually was, when 18 cleave is still doing this much. (Its also worth mentioning how much stronger ranged cleave is than melee, cuz it doesnt have cleave damage falloff, so every enemy hit is taking the full amount of damage)

5

The plasma gun still isn’t a plasma gun, it’s a railgun.

6

No ofc not, the case against the PG charged shot never had anything to do with the ammo efficiency on the already supremely ammo efficient weapon.

Ask yourself, did anything happened to PG basic attack ability to stagger 3 crushers by the time its done charging the charged shot to stagger just one? Will i roll the dice and hope to oneshot that Reaper with a charged shot or will i just double tap it in less time while efficiently buffing my next shot damage for another target and making the likelihood of a oneshot better?

Or just a simple question of geometry, have you ever considered how much often and how much of the charged shot power is getting wasted by the mere act of aiming for the head in a game where enemies got different heights?

7

I didn’t say it made the charged shot good, I would like for a more interesting changes myself. But it’s something, and in the right direction imo.

But yeah, good questions!

8

It will still be the “cleave through everything” weapon.

18 cleave is still hilariously high, with the next highest cleave gun coming in at 6.5 (double barrel shotgun ADS) followed by Zarona Revolver & full charged Helbore at 4. Not to mention Plasma still has the ability to hit thru thin walls/spawn doors and is still the only weapon to damage thru Bulwark shields.

In addition, Plasma has high stagger and stagger reduces enemy hitmass, so it’ll have more than 18 cleave in practice.

I 100% guarantee you’ll be back to Plasma after trying Helbore, as Helbore requires more than just aiming in the enemy’s general direction.

9

And i disagree, if anything its a low effort LARPing at balance that is nearly totally disconnected from the weapon it pretends to balance.

I’d like to be given a reason to use the charged shot that goes past “the kush was so good i forgot how to hold a mouse for a second” and the patch fails at it!

10

And there is a new 50% more cleave talent node.

How many difficulties the game offers?

Overall it’s not about difficulty anyway, it’s a trash design when you need to spam 1 firing mode with a gun that has huge ass hitscan projectile and doesn’t need to aim. Why there is a second firing mode even. Imagine having an intricated and nuanced design for weapons.

11

I’m going to crash out.

Somehow devs are making Darktide unplayeable to you because plasma can’t go through horde as easily (EVEN THO IT STILL HAS THE HIGHEST CLEAVE WITHOUT THE TALENT) and takes slightly longer to switch

Plasma is honest?

Wait this is a huge W, well done, another Helbore gamer born to the road of greatness

My guy melee vet with (even nerfed) shout and kraks is so good into H40 that your ranged option can genuienly be anything as long as it can kill specials from range

Zarina Revolver
Bolt pistol
Bolter gun
Infantry Autogun Vraks
Combat Shotgun Agrapinaa
Heavy Laspistol
Helbore
Recon Lasgun
Plasma (even after nerf)

Literally all of these are perfectly usable if you’re using a melee build

13

Cleave is definitely nice on ranged weapon, however it certainly is not the end all be all for ranged weapons. You can use weapons with low or no cleave in Havoc 40 and preform well. Both Veteran and Arbites can both use Agrip shotgun super well.

Exe stance Agrip shotgun is actually a lot of fun and very strong, although the reload still is a bit painful sometimes.

14

first off, the majority of players never exceed mediocrity and are thus neither metric nor audience for the high end gameplay difficulties.

you don’t design olympic efforts around couch potato skills, simple as.

second, the game isn’t hard, 2 of so many difficulties are “harder”, one specifically through artificial number bloating and requiring overperforming talents (not mechanical skill of the player) to reliably and repeatedly clear it.

which put people to the wrong conclusion clearing havoc 40 to be the norm instead of the exception.

third, “fun” isn’t something anyone is entitled to in clearing said threshold on a daily basis, again based only or even just mostly, due to overperforming outliers.

like the iron man quote:”if you’re nothing without the suit, you’re nothing with it to begin with”

clearing havoc 40 with a premade and the cheapest tools on the table isn’t a flex and isn’t “endgame” either.

going above a beyond, clutching, carrying, proving them shiverpants that reject non meta stuff at the fear of losing 30lousy minutes of their day (usually a wipe happens early in the run if the 4 rejects don’t click) for the fools that they are is somewhat “fun” but havoc needs to do away both with party finder and the mental illness like fixation on the “only viable loadout”, instead focus on pure mechanical skills such as aiming, movement, map knowledge, placing etc.

is it harder to balance and design around that instead of flipping a few numbers, sure.

is it frustrating even more people, for they realize they don’t have the god like aim they thought to have? good :saluting_face:

15

Is the plasma really more fun if you have no reason to ever charge a blast? Isn’t the weapon more fun if you have reasons to use all of its functions depending on the situation?

I keep saying it but wow people are engaging in such absolute histrionics.

16

Another Cringe muh nerfs to weapon that was op

Watch Rannick busting it down emperor style instead

17

ANIMATORS I BEG YOU
DUAL LOADING ANIMATION FOR AGRIP
SO WE CAN RELOAD ITS MAG SIZE 2x FASTER

18

Considering how many people who completed Havok 40 just do this to get their achievements and clearance level? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aH2FIj-OihU
Yes, yes, I DO think so.

The way I see it you intentionally ignore whole “charged shots make you too vulnerable with low amount of dodges that also have reduced distance and overheat you before you can kill even 10% of active specials/ranged elites, so forcing it on the player makes it so you won’t even have a desire to pull it out most of the time which means the weapon is bad” part, because it’s way easier to pretend cleave is only problem as it is way easier to argue with that, but whatever.

This is a good reply, perhaps changes are not as heavy-handed as they seemed. Thank you.

Was it a poor ragebaiting attempt? I know what Helbor is. I use it in some loadouts. Will be fine, it does not have a satisfying sound and visuals, which is a huge con after plasma and a main reason I don’t really like using it as much, but currently, its performance often is equal to that of a plasma (for me at least), if not better. So after the patch, I expect it to be an obvious choice that is just better and has a lower TTK.

19

Thank you for the numbers, when put this way it seems like a change is not as bad as it appeared to be, wish Fatshark would offer such explanations themself.
Although I still hate the need to nerf entire builds by removing 2 talent points that are now required to be put into plasma supporting traits.

20

Just clarifying - I don’t recall the cleave being “100” the hipfire has used for cleave calculation, as that seemed to be the total value of cleave one could get by charging the gun.

The way hipfire for Plasma works is that it “charges” the gun to a certain level and then expels the shot, which has cleave based on the amount of charge that was generated, so it probably was along the lines of 50-60 (I don’t recall the charge amount; it might have been something like 0.540 on a scale of 0 to 1.0), rather than 100.

What I’m interested in is… was the total cleave value changed from live with this change? Because if it did, then charged shots could also be affected - and it would mean that the cleave values have been lowered from 100 total to ~36 total (?). Which isn’t a big deal and I’m just speculating, but I’m wondering what was done to the calculation and hope that the patch notes will go into detail on this.

And in any case - hipfire still has insane cleave compared to all other ranged weapons, so it’s not like it will be unusable; it will just be less insane at sniping things through thick crowds of enemies and make cleaving non-Carapace elites less an afterthought than it currently is.

No, don’t drive that narrative. In realistic situations 18 cleave is more than enough to nail a couple of elites or wipe a good chunk of the horde still; the cleave talent will allow you to be more lenient or efficient, which is a fine tradeoff. And even then you can charge a shot (oh goodness - imagine having a use for charged shots now!) and get more cleave on your shot still.

Charge a shot.

and

Manage heat. It’s supposed to be a basic resource the weapon had, which had been in neglect since basically launch. You can also use your other resources to make space for yourself to vent or reload; and dodges are still effective even if you’re out, if you time them correctly - it’s not like you don’t have options, either - Voice of Command, frags; your teammates; staying in the backline and sniping.

No. Plasma is getting changed to make it more fun and engaging - it was in a terrific state for almost 2 years and it’s about time something was changed in how it worked.

If you think about it real hard, Dark Souls does have that odd infamy among gamers all around the world as being the game for sweats and whatnot, but realistically Darktide is much like Dark Souls in it having a certain difficulty curve that one has to get across to learn, and whilst the challenge in Dark Souls is mainly environmental, it’s expected of you to know how to react to certain situations that benefits you the most.

Now, isn’t Darktide just that? Is it bad that we are getting more complexity for mechanically well-crafted weapons that were neglected for a long time in terms of their balance state? You haven’t even played the patch and jump to conclusions on how it will perform.

Tell you what - play the patch, see how it turns out; I doubt you will see a major difference in performance in most but some extreme scenarios where it might make a difference to have 18 cleave instead of 54. You can probably also omit the entire balance shift into charged attacks and still do fine, but engaging with it now will give you 1) a new complexity to master in the weapon and 2) satisfaction from using it to full extent.

Stop shackling yourself and give change a chance to do something better for the game, in the long run.

21

On live hipfire cleave is set to 60 and charge cleave is 80 to 100.