As far as the 40k universe is concerned…they are all fodder. The biggest, meanest, scariest bosses in this game, Ogryn/Spawn/Traitor Captains, are what tabletop 40k considers large infantry with, at best, medium armor.
Darktide contains no true Monsters, nothing particularly heavily armored. That stuff is largely beyond what a team of 4 normal humans equipped with relatively mundane infantry weapons are equipped to deal with. We’re not fighting Maulerfiends or Defilers or Traitor Russ tanks or Plague Marines. We’re faced with largely unarmored/lightly armored infantry even with most of the elites/specialists.
And yes, it is quantity over quality game, most survival zombie horde games are, welcome to the genre. You aren’t going to have a 5 minute boss fight in Darktide facing down a single enemy any more than you would in Left4Dead for example.
Yes, the Rejects are basic human soldiers, I point out as much in my post. It’s why Spawn and Plague Ogryn feel like bosses, but are still things that regular humans can reasonably fight with infantry carried small arms and melee weapons. Within the 40k-scale of things, the Darktide bosses are still enemies that can be engaged successfully with typical anti-infantry weapons, the same stuff used to mow muppet cultists or Guardsmen are often (though obviously not always) the same weapons you’d bring to bear on a spawn or Ogryn. The same number of Bolter shots on tabletop that will on average kill a partial squad of guardsmen in cover moving through a factory complex will also kill a Carapace armored Ogryn. It takes about as much lasgun fire to kill a full squad of Guardsmen in the open as it does a Spawn. That’s the sense I was getting at, these enemies, while powerful, are still vulnerable to the meekest of 40k weaponry, and that they go down quickly to concentrated fire from a coordinated experienced infantry squad shouldn’t be unexpected.
And quantity with some enemies is what makes game more deep and interesting.
Shotgunners acting is a clear example of bad fodder design. Shotgunners spawn in a big blob doing nothing, slowly walking towards and 1 guy can force them to go melee. Shotgunners - melee, lol. Meanwile shotgun is a close combat weapon. (ogryn taunt forcing shooters go melee is stupid aswell)
What it should be is a breacher, fast and agressive, alomst like trapper, but never running away from you. Trying to melee him - buckshot in your face. In that case 2 shotgunners will make combat more adrenaline pumping then 10 of them spanwed from a door. It should be a quality enemy.
It takes reduced ranged damage outside of the weakspot.
Weakspot is behind so you never see it.
You get in melee range, it belly flops, breaking toughness sending you flying.
There’s sh*t everywhere. Again, you can’t melee it.
It has a “NO TELL” grab animation that nukes your health.
This boss is a good idea, but a terribly infuriating execution.
In my duos this boss takes more time than most scripted events ever do.
And forget about killing it solo. Massive pain in the a**
Well all of them were. I think they increased reloading time for sniper, and his laser pointer is a lumber thick now. That feeling of “it was at this moment that he knew he focked up” when you were slow at realising it’s a sniper laser infront of you, well it’s gone.
Bomber is nerfed
Muties barely can do something even when they are running as human centipede at you. And back then it was 2 mutes enough to juggle whole your team and create a complete mayhem.
I kind of feel like ranged enemies have been poorly handled in this game in the interest of preserving melee. They started out a huge threat, too much really because only Vet and Psy could reliably regain toughness in ranged. Zealot could of course hide behind cover and charge into it, but it wasn’t really good and ogryn got cut to ribbons. Og could make do with inspiring barrage (IF HE COULD GET IT…) but…
Meta seemed to be moving to everyone with autoguns, even zealots, taking cover and clearing everyone out instead of closing. Almost like search and destroy swat teams, and shooting at quite long ranges. This is about when I got some other game and wandered off, but I made a big thing at the time about the fact every class needs to be able to do ranged or melee and stay in that role for awhile (regain toughness in that role.)
Now, all seems better and able to exchange shots, but also it feels like there’s less shots overall coming at you, and the psyker shields help a lot.
Actually, on that note, does anyone have a guide to basic toughness with the new builds? Something big was changed since they went to the new talanet trees.
What you’re saying is true when the team plays as a team. I pub a lot and tend to have games where this just isn’t the case but I do agree with your overall feeling for a different reason. By the way, in what I wrote down below let me be clear here: I’m not singling out Plasma Gun or Vet as the main culprits of the current “fodder” feeling of the game; it’s easier for me to stick to one example. Every class is able to build around or obtain a ranged weapon that allows them to overwhelm specials and elites and crumple them like paper.
Certain weapons, especially ranged types, suffer from “main character syndrome” as they are so overwhelmingly strong. When I have to play with a Plasma Gun vet and they are competent I don’t even waste my time killing elites and specials unless it’s absolutely necessary. What I do instead is simply run off and farm Plasteel until the team actually needs my help. The alternative if I stick with the team is that I will try to kill these enemies with weaker weapons or with my melee and the vet will destroy them so it feels like I’m not even playing the game. Instead it’s like I’m spectating with extra steps until something happens to the Veteran.
I’ve thought about this exact problem with the game for a long time and have a very good but controversial idea to post in its own thread in the future. I really think it’d be a difficult idea for people to swallow but I think we are in a unique and positive environment to have something like it implemented into the game given Fatshark’s newfound willingness to have playtesters try future content.
I prefer this to bullet sponges. I remember The Division 1 where you headshot a man in a police helmet for about 20 times in a row only to chip his armor.
Or at least 5 headshots into a guy in a hoodie.
How do you think people die in real life? Sometimes it takes one unlucky punch to kill someone.
As for protagonists, well, it’s what it takes to be one.
The joy of L4D was efficiently progressing, while clutching as last man. Darktide has that and hopefully continues to evolve.
I do agree with some of your statements, the absolute vomit tide that my screen begins to look like isn’t the most fun but the mechanics are there. I do prefer the quality of V2 fights more.
Buddy just started playing and he isn’t used to crushers yet. I see two crushers and a few maulers and it doesn’t bother me, but him, not so much. He hasn’t even realized how easy it is to be one shotted yet. I realized how bad it is on damnation because you regularly see groups of 6. He’s never even seen a rager swarm.
Pretty sure we can get people in this thread to argue two bosses, 8 crushers, and 6 maulers dancing around a daemonhost is boring.
It has a tell.
The tell is „you just got puked on and are currently under the effect of its debuff“.
If you avoid getting directly hit by the puke (stepping into the puddle is fine), which is an attack that definitely has a tell, the boss can not grab you at all.
