Why do people hate Darktide Personalities?

Warhammer 40,000: Darktide General Discussion
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Obviously not everyone complains about it, but I’ve seen so many people whine about how Vermintide actually had way better character interactions - how Darktide is actually completely shallow and sucks compared to the ultra-deep character bonding in Vermintide. I just don’t agree with that at all. Darktide interactions are extremely well thought out, especially when you actually play with the characters for enough time to appreciate how many voice-lines there are.

I am a Zealot main, specifically Agitator. I am still hearing new voicelines. You hear specific ones just for using certain weapons! For example, the Agitator will declare thy weakling flesh to be naught as they cleave through a horde with an Eviscerator. All of those special voicelines reinforce the absolute certainty, intensity and complete dehumanization of the enemy - a perfect representation of a 40k Zealot.

The Bonding conversations are deep and well thought out as well, which is what made me write this post. Zealots can talk to any personality, and their faith will be completely unwavering. Even though the Ogryn can definitely leave Zealots speechless at times, they are not actually convincing anyone lol.

However, when speaking to other Zealots, they occasionally reveal fleeting doubts about their faith, but these interactions always end with them reaffirming and validating each other’s beliefs - which is amazing, hilarious, and again well thought out. I always laugh at the end of one of these dialogue interactions, when the zealots always double down on their faith no matter what their initial doubt had been.

I could say more but for the people who think Darktide interactions are completely vapid and shallow, this alone is enough to disprove that. I don’t need to write a massive essay on every personality in the game to show that the voice actors and Fatshark have definitely gone above and beyond when it comes to these personalities.

I just wish bonding interactions would play more often, you can definitely go a very long time without hearing one.

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I don’t think ive seen anyone complaining about darktide personalities, quite the opposite actually.

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I published the updated Zip It mod. Some people haaaaate them. I don’t really get it either.

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Have you played Vermintide? Vermintide 2?

In comparison, Darktide interactions are shallow and spread thin among the 33 personalities further limited by the game’s attempt at character creation. You can’t make an interesting set of character interactions on the same level of Vermintide with that many possible combinations. The personalities aren’t characters, they’re random nobodies constantly changing faces and names between random players and nothing in the game happens to flesh them out or develop them. They can’t even answer the most important question of “Who are you?”. They’re blank-slates that create noise and occasionally be funny.

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Thank you!

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No problem. Lots of people were asking for it to be rezzed. I am aware that parts of it are still work in progress :cry:

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Way to start a constructive conversation.

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Some people complaining about the DT’s personalities in comparison to VT1-2, which is imo quite fair.

But we have to consider that FS did a great job with what they wanted to do.

Would people have rather had 5 classes with each having 1 character ? So no Ogryn pack, no Vet squad (which is still to this day something I see people “complaining” as being impossible to play as Imperial Guard, which I don’t really get the nuance for)…

It’s a trade-off. And most games don’t really go that far into the voice actors.

Which we have to thank both FS and Ward for, as they’re the one that are enabling and directing it.

In the end, would I rather go back to a character cast, it depend, there are good reasons to do either, but here, it wouldn’t have made as much sense.

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I do think Vermitide has better characters but I don’t hate Darktides characters, I like them alot.

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Well they are more shallow, but at least in DT there’s enough lines that player don’t need to hear about dozens of slayed by elf one million times.

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That’s another difference between DT & VT. Vermintide’s characters created an actual noticeable culture that the player base participates in. Poggers bridge is unironically a great example of this.

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I don’t hate any except the “My beloved” Psyker. Would pay a hundred dollars to never hear from them ever again.

Not keen on the Cadian veteran either, cutthroat I think it is? Mostly because they have no personality at all, but they’re at least tolerable.

All the rest are fun.

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Yep. You either get 5 unique characters with extremely fleshed out and nuanced characters and the way the interact, and even grow and bond, but lose the ability to double up.

Or you get generic action-hero style commentary that can get you to chuckle on occasion, yet don’t work toward fleshing out the character, but you can have 4 Psykers on one team.

Darktides voice lines aren’t bad, but when you spent VT1 and VT2 getting to know these characters and their banter, with repeated voicelines becoming memed, it was a massive downgrade to get what we got as far as character development. If that was a worthy trade for unlocked party comps is subjective.

Now to respond to:

Imagine the effort that went into writing and recording all of Darktide’s possible voice lines and interactions being spent on writing and recording actually interesting dialogue that fleshed out the characters as good as they did with VT1/VT2. All the depth with little-to-none of the repetition. But, Heretical_Cactus said it best

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I think i prefer v2 characters , but i certainly dont hate Darktides.

I think it comes down to in VT they are all distinct all designed to be different but also complementary, and i mean that as they bounce off each other not they like each other. but in DT the class’s have a lot of bleed over often sounding similar and It’s just so much harder to have the bigger conversations the more personalities you have to cater for.

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My issue with the Darktide characters is that, particularly for the human OG classes, there is a lack of variety in their vocal range and accent.

This was much better done with the DLC classes.

For example, Hive Scum has a bounty hunter-esque personality, a “Joker” personality, and a Scottish personality (Outlaw male). The new Ogryn heavy is also amazing. Similarly, the Arbites have three unique and well done personalities for both female and male.

Veteran (which I am returning to as a main) is comparably bland, with the Catachan being the best, but if you roleplay for your character is not a Cadian, it can seem a little weird at times.

Personally, I think that the female voice actors outperform the males with several miles in the OG human classes (subjective I know). I’m not sure if this is because the female voice actors that FS hired are more experienced than the male voice actors or the voice direction for the female actors were better than for the males, but consider Psyker and Zealot; the female voices have much more variation and far superior lines/acting.

I’d really like it if Fatshark could try to add more personalities to the OG classes. For example, a veteran could really use a personality with an accent. Either “slavic” or “arabic” (“” - because I’m generalizing), or something else that stands out a little besides the Cadian.

Just please do better line writing FS, and again, the DLC classes, and the ‘Heavy’ Ogryn, have all excellent lines that stands out and fit their respective personalities.

There are a couple of others in the top (my top), like the female Agitator Zealot and the Seer Psyker (Sienna xD), who are both incredibly good, but if you ask me why I “hate the personalities in Darktide,” my answer is because they lack variation, accents, and, for the most part, well-written lines.

Male Psyker sounds are unplayable for me, and while the Savant has a true accent (rather than awful imitation German), his voice lines are annoying to listen to (shut up with St. Messelina!!!).

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You don’t like male loner? He’s my favorite, everything he says is so damn silly I lmao constantly while playing psyker. He reminds me of this guy from Braindead/Dead Alive

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I unironically love this movie!

Regarding Loner, I feel that his terrible fake German takes away from (my) immersion.

I know that many people enjoy the original 1980s (everyone is bad, government bad, authoritian is bad, religion is bad satire) 40k and the more recent “quippy” 40k, but I’ve always been into the Grimdark :nerd_face: and serious 40k.

This tone is what I like about 40k:

Yes, there is underlying satire in this clip as well, but it is not quippy, millenial, Avengers-style writing.

It sells the universe without always becoming a parody of itself, which is essential to me for fantasy/scifi and other genres of fiction; you (the writer’s) responsibility is to convince me/sell me, that this world might actually exist, which cannot be done with constant fourth-wall breaching and humor (Loner Psyker saying heretical things about the Emperor without having his brain blown out).

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I do like the old stuff, it’s so grimdark that it becomes stupid lol

I get it but I can’t help but laugh at his line delivery it just cracks me up! I wish he was less heretical though the guy is begging to be turned into corspse starch

Not a fan of that myself though think loner is just the stereotypical “insane evil german scientist” trope that is way older than the annoying marvel style writing.

Yeah it’s amazing!

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what personalities?

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they removed some dialogues in the recent updates actually, and also the voice types of arbitrators and hive scums are kinda meh

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