illustration from Dall-E
Zealot class overview
Let’s start with a few warnings. This guide isn’t meant to provide you with the ultimate build or to discourage any particular gameplay style.
The goal here is simply to showcase the potential of the Zealot class.
Additionally, I don’t follow “meta” builds; I believe that having fun is the most important aspect of a video game.
The best way to describe Zealot as a frontliner is that they are the tip of the spear. You are first in, last out of any fight, and it is your job to throw hands and keep enemies occupied. An especially important role is to close the gap to ranged enemies (something you can easily do with all three active abilities) and kill them in melee so that your team can move up.
The Zealot has these base stats before picking any talent tree nodes:
- 200 health points
- 70 toughness
- 5% base critical hit chance
- 3 stamina
- 0.75s stamina regen delay
- 1.5 stamina per second as regen speed
1. How to protect yourself from damages
A. Toughness regeneration talents
Every class has its own toughness regeneration nodes. Here are the ones for the Zealot:
- Blood Redemption: +50% toughness replenishment on Melee kill
- Second Wind: 15% toughness on a successful dodge
- The Voice of Terra: Replenish 4% toughness on ranged kill
- Enemies Within, Enemies Without: Replenish 2.5% toughness per second while within 5 meters of at least 3 enemies
- Vicious Offering: Replenish 10% toughness on heavy attack kill
- Retributor’s Stance [KEYSTONE]: Replenish 2% toughness for each spent Momentum
You will still recover toughness from melee kills, and this will always be your primary way to replenish it.
However, you should consider taking one (or several) toughness regeneration node.
B. Coherency regeneration talents
The Zealot can also benefit from two toughness coherency regeneration talents:
- Loner Aura: you always count as being at least 2 in coherency
- Fortitude on Fellowship: +50% coherency Toughness regeneration (nota: this one can reinforce the effect of Loner aura)
These nodes will help you replenish your toughness through the coherency mechanic.
C. Toughness damage reduction (TDR) talents
The Zealot has several toughness damage reduction talents. Here is the list:
- Benediction Aura: +15% Toughness damage reduction for you and Allies in coherency
- Enduring Faith: +50% Toughness damage reduction on Critical hit for 4s
- Stalwart [KEYSTONE]: Triggering Fury Replenishes 50% Toughness. In addition, while fury is active, you have +25% Toughness damage reduction
- I Shall Not Fall [KEYSTONE]: Martyrdom grants +6.5% toughness damage reduction per missing wound
Toughness damage reduction nodes can make a huge difference. With them, and if you maintain a high level of TDR, you can avoid losing health points.
Remember, toughness can regenerate, but health does not.
D. Damage reduction talents
We can find also Damage reduction talents.
- Good balance: A successful Dodge grants +25% Damage reduction for 2.5s
- Shield of Contempt: When you or any Ally in coherency takes damage, they gain +60% Damage reduction for 4 seconds. Triggers every 10s.
These talents will attenuate any hit that would hurt you. These nodes have impact for toughness AND health. As such, they are the greatest damage reduction mechanic that you can use.
E. Health damage reduction talents
Zealot has several talents that can reduce damages on health:
- Restoring Faith: on taking damages, heal 20% of that damage. Occurs over 4s.
- Bleed for the Emperor: Damage that would take your Health to the next wound is reduced by 40%
These nodes will delay the point where you need to heal. It should be noted that Restoring Faith pairs very well with the Holy Revenant talent.
F. Avoiding going down
There are two interesting talents that help you avoid going down:
- Until death: Fatal damages instead grants you invulnerability for 5s. Occurs every 120 seconds
- Holy revenant: When Until Death ends, you regain Health based on the damage you delt during Until Death, to a maximum of 25% max health. Melee damage dealt heals for 3 times this amount
Holy Revenant has a good interaction with Restoring Faith, allowing you to regain more than 25% health.
These two nodes are complementary and can prevent you from going down or dying. Invulnerability can let you reverse a dire situation.
The cooldown is 2 minutes. This is not a long cooldown, however, in game, 120 seconds is pretty long.
G. Strategies
To last longer on the battlefield, you must adopt a strategy. The Zealot is on the front lines, in melee combat. He (or she) will get hurt; this is unavoidable.
You should adapt to your weapon and what you are trying to achieve.
A toughness build can minimize or negate damage, but if your toughness is depleted, you could be taken down quickly. However, toughness has a major advantage: it regenerates through kills, coherency, or talents.
On the other hand, a health build allows you to take hits and still remain on the battlefield.
Choosing a lot of wound curios (outside of a Martyrdom build) is NOT a good strategy. It will make you the weakest link in your team.
Finding the right path takes time. Most players advise a health-focused strategy. With Martyrdom, prioritize wounds (though mixing in a health curio is also viable). Toughness builds are harder to master, but once you see their potential, you’ll understand how some players avoid health damage altogether.
With experience, you’ll adopt different strategies based on your chosen talents and objectives.
2. Major talents
A. Blitzes
Note: Blitzes benefit from talents that can enhance them. They also work with your weapon’s blessings, such as the rending bonus from a combat blade, which can apply to throwing knives.
a. Stunstorm grenades
Throw a grenade that stuns all Enemies within its blast radius
These grenades stun all enemies within the radius, which is useful for reviving allies or controlling groups. However, they won’t stop enemies outside the radius.
This blitz is really useful to save from a situation that is getting out of hands.
You can carry up to 3 grenades.
b. Immolation grenade
Throw a grenade that leaves a layer of flaming liquid. Burning and Staggering enemies, and barring their path Most effective against unarmoured enemies
These grenades are great against hordes, even mixed ones. They can eliminate many Groaners or Poxwalkers if placed well.
The flames are also effective for stopping waves of dogs from overwhelming your team.
You can carry up to 3 grenades.
c. Blades of faith
Throw a consecrated knife to deal high damage to a single enemy. Very effective against most enemies, less effective versus carapace armour
You have 12 throwing knives, and each melee kill of a special or elite enemy replenishes 1 knife. Ammo sources also replenish knives:
Ammo boxes replenish also knives:
- 2 from little boxes
- 6 from ammo bag
- up to 12 from ammo crate
Knives are effective if you aim for the head of special or elite enemies. They can also cleave through one Groaner or Poxwalker to hit targets behind them. Knives are a sure way to kill a dreg rager.
They’re highly effective against dregs enemies but less so against armored foes.
B. Auras
a. Benediction
+15 toughness damage reduction for you and allies in coherency.
This aura is considered one of the best, providing a significant toughness damage reduction bonus to you and your teammates. The bonus is multiplicative.
b. Beacon of purity
Heal 1.5 corruption from the current wound for you and allies in coherency every 1s
This aura helps manage corruption, allowing you to skip corruption resistance on curios and still protect against corruption effects.
c. Loner
You always count as being in at least 2 in coherency
This is often criticized but can be beneficial when paired with Fortitude on Fellowship. It’s useful when exploring or when away from your team, but if you stay in coherency, it offers no additional benefit.
C. Abilities
a. Fury the faithful
Dash forward, Replenishing 50% Toughness & gaining +20% Attack Speed for 10s. Your next Melee Hit gains +25% Damage and is a guaranteed Critical Hit. Cooldown: 30s
Can be enhanced by:
- Redoubled zeal: Fury the faithful now has 2 charges
Fury the Faithful is powerful because it guarantees a critical hit and boosts your attack speed for 10 seconds… The dash provides temporary immunity to gunfire but use it carefully, as being hit while activating it may cancel the dash and leave you vulnerable.
Gameplay-wise, use this ability to engage in intense melee fights quickly.
b. Chorus of spiritual fortitude
Wield a holy relic that releases pulses of energy every 0.8s. While channeling, Allies in Coherency have Stun Immunity and Invulnerability. Cooldown: 60s
Can be enhanced by:
- Holy cause: Channeling 5 pulses grants +30% Toughness Damage Reduction to you and Allies in Coherency. Lasts 10s.
[Picking this talent will lock “Ecclesiarch’s call”] - Ecclesiarch’s call: Channeling 5 pulses grants +20% Damage to you and Allies in Coherency. Lasts 10s
[Picking this talent will lock “Holy cause”] - Banishing light: Each pulse from Chorus of Spiritual Fortitude also Staggers & Suppresses Enemies. Range increases with every pulse.
Chorus of Spiritual Fortitude is a strong support ability. While Chorus of Spiritual Fortitude has a relatively small radius when it comes to staggering enemies, the suppression has infinite range, as long as you have line of sight to the target. You can only only move while channeling.
The ability requires that you do not attack or do actions. But still, enemies will be staggered, so it could help you to revive an ally on floor.
In term of gameplay, Chorus looks like an ability that will permit you to “pause” every enemies around you.
c. Shroudfield
Enter Stealth for 3s. While in Stealth gain +20% Movement Speed, +100% Backstab Damage, +100% Finesse Damage & +100% Critical Chance. Base Cooldown: 30s.
Can be enhanced by:
- Perfectionnist: Shroudfield grants an additional +50% Finesse damage & +50% backstab Damage, but increases ability cooldown by 25%.
[Picking this talent will lock “Master-crafter shroudfield”] - Master-crafter shroudfield: Stealth duration is increased to 5s.
[Picking this talent will lock “Perfectionnist”] - Invigorating revelation: Replenish 40% toughness over 5s on leaving stealth . Also gain +20% damage reduction for 5s.
Shroudfield transforms you into an assassin. It pairs well with combat blades, however it can be used with any weapon. It will improve any weapon toward a single target.
Be careful that you can’t hide from Demon host with shroudfield. This had been done to avoid griefing behavior from players that were making agro the DH then used shroudfield to launch it on an other player.
Shroudfield is a great tool if you use it well and can succeed to place yourself in position to backstab an elite or special.
Like veteran stealth, this can also, with master-crafted shroudfield, permits you to revive a teammate.
In term of gameplay, Shroudfield is on a fast gameplay where you will stealth, assassinate, return to fight, then quickly stealth again etc.
D. Keystones
a. Blazing fury
+15% Critical hit chance for 8s when in Fury . Fury is triggered when 25 Enemies have died within 25m.
Can be improved by:
- Stalwart: Replenishes 50% toughness. In addition, while fury is active, you have +25% toughness damage reduction.
[Picking this talent will lock “Fury rising”] - Infectious zeal: Allies in coherency gain +66% of the critical hit chance granted by blazing piety
[improvement of Stalwart] - Fury rising: Critical hits also count up towards triggering fury
[Picking this talent will lock “Stalwart”] - Righteous warrior: +10% Critical hit chance from blazing piety
[improvement of Fury rising]
Blazing fury is a “critical” keystone. It will permits to increase your critical rate. This keystone has two branches. One will allow you to protect yourself and boost critical chances of your teammates. The other will permit you to greatly increase your own critical chances.
This means that the “Stalwart” branch is useful if you want to improve your toughness damage reduction percent, while the other, the “Fury rising” one, can give you a serious increase of critical chances. Fury rising can permits you to use a weapon not great for critical hits in a critical build.
However, generally speaking piety is interesting for weapons with high finesse bonus, such as Dueling Swords or Tactical Axes.
By example, coupling a combat axe with Fury rising and Righteous warrior permits you to create a critical build with a combat axe.
Never forget that Stalwart toughness damage reduction bonus is multiplicative. By the way, you also need to know that Stalwart lasts as long as you continue to kill enemies and so refresh it.
b. Martyrdom
+8% Melee damage for each missing wound, up to a maximum of 7 missing wounds.
Can be improved by:
- I shall not fall: Martyrdom grants +6.5% toughness damage reduction per missing wound.
- Maniac: Martyrdom grants +4%attack speed per missing wound.
Martyrdom is a keystone that will improve your survivability. This keystone requires that you have wounds, so the natural way to achieve this is to add ‘wounds’ curios. A useful node exists just above this keystone that will still give you +2 Wounds.
You can mix curios, and you’re not forced to put all curios as wounds. But if you do so, then you will have to play with 220 HP.
Martyrdom works well with Restoring Faith and Bleed for the Emperor, as it will make you more resistant to damage.
What you should consider mandatory with this keystone are the ‘Until Death’ and ‘Holy Revenant’ nodes. These two will prevent you from going down and will keep you at low HP, which is desirable with this keystone.
Be advised that missing wounds means you have less health than the wound .
This keystone usually allows you to choose not to use a medicae station, simply because you should always prefer to keep your health low. The more wounds are missing, the more damage you will be able to deal. And if you have taken optional nodes, you could also benefit from a large attack speed increase and a nice toughness damage reduction bonus (up to 30% on Heresy/Damnation, 36% for difficulties below).
c. Inexorable judgement
Moving grants you Momentum (Stacks 15 times). When you hit an enemy, spend all momentum, gaining +1% melee attack speed, +1% ranged attack speed and +1% damage per stack. Last 6s
Can be improved by:
- Retributor’s Stance: Replenish 2% toughness for each spent stack of momentum…
- Inebriate’s Poise: Gain 3 stacks of momentum on a successful dodge.
Inexorable Judgement promotes a fast-paced playstyle. The attack speed increase works for ranged and melee attacks. You need to consider that, using this keystone, means that you HAVE TO always move.
Inexorable Judgement is better on builds that use weapons with low finesse bonus, such as Eviscerators or Crushers. Reminder: finesse bonus increase critical and weakspot damages and increase a little the attack speed.
Moving increases stacks, that you can discharge to get a nice bonus every 6 seconds. The bonus will apply once you hit an enemy with ranged or with melee weapon.
Inexorable judgement push you to a fast gameplay. It pairs really well with fury the faithful.
3. Builds
There is no intention here to list all possible builds or suggest a meta build. You can experiment with unconventional builds, like a ranged weapon Zealot. The aim is to present a few general directions for a Zealot build.
The builds are not organized by abilities or keystones but rather by overall playstyle. You won’t see a plan based on abilities or keystones. This is more generic builds that are exposed here.
A. Critical builds
Critical builds focus on the top-right section of the talent tree, especially these talents:
- Scourge: Melee critical hits apply bleed, causing damage over time. Melee hits on bleeding enemies grant +10% critical chance for 3s. Stacks 3 times.
- Enduring faith: +50% toughness damage reduction on crticial hits for 4s
- Invocation of death: +200% ability cooldown regeneration for 4s on melee critical hits
A critical build is not just Fury Rising. You can perfectly go for Inexorable Judgement, especially if you use a weapon that has a high critical rate (combat blade, tactical axe are such weapons) or if you have chosen to improve the critical rate of your weapon with blessings like Shred, Riposte, or Slaughter Spree.
You may also wish to improve your damage, and here the most obvious keystone should be Fury Rising, except on a high critical rate weapon. Blessings like Precognition or Perfect Strike can greatly improve a weapon when using a critical build.
By the way, you might also want to test the flamer with Everlasting Flame, which relies on critical rate, or enhance the Crucian Roulette bonus or even trigger Deadly Accurate more often, which deals a nice +100% damage on critical weak spots.
Don’t forget that Fury the Faithful is a talent that can allow you to land a guaranteed critical hit. This ability is great with such a build.
Final word, you may want to go Toughness with such build cause of “Enduring Faith” talent.
B. Martyrdom
Martyrdom is a build that relies on taking damage and staying alive as long as you can.
Martyrdom keystones are great. If you add the damage bonus, the attack speed, and the toughness damage reduction bonus, you can deal insane damage while being relatively protected.
Several talents can enhance this keystone.
- Until death: Fatal Damage instead grants you invulnerability for 5s. Occurs every 120s.
- Holy revenant: When Until Death ends, you regain health based on the damage you dealt during Until Death , to a maximum of 25% Max Health.
- Restoring faith: on taking damages, heal 20% of that damage. Occurs over 4s.
- Bleed for the emperor: Damage that would take your Health to the next wound is reduced by 40%
As said above, this build can allow you to play a mission using fewer, or even no, medicae station charges.
You should not try to deplete your health to get the most out of this keystone. You just need to choose not to use medicae stations or to avoid medikits. Having a health stim, however, is not a bad idea.
What you should aim for in this build is to remain at low health as long as you can. Be advised that Martyr’s Purpose is a total waste of a talent point, especially with such a build.
Unless you plan to heal regularly and can’t avoid getting hurt… but even in this situation, this talent is a total waste of a talent point.
C. Assassin
These builds rely on Shroudfield. The usual weapon is the combat blade, which has a good backstab bonus, a good critical rate, and can deal insane damage. You can even improve it by adding Ruthless Backstab (+100% rending on backstab attacks).
However, you should not add all these nice talents and blessings that increase damage. Be aware that improving damage on a build that can one-shot 90% of enemies is often a bad choice.
In a Shroudfield build, however, you should always pick the right top part of the talent tree, similar to a critical build.
This build can benefit from 2 cooldown reduction nodes:
- Pious Cut-Throat: Backstab kills restore 20% ability cooldown
- Invocation of death: +200% ability cooldown regeneration for 4s on melee critical hits
By the way, the laspistol and infantry autogun can benefit from the Raking Fire blessing, which can add 40% damage to backstab ranged damage. Such a build often allows you to position yourself behind an enemy, so this blessing can be a good opportunity.
D. Zealot specialized in ranged weapon, possible?
This section is about a question that several may face: Is a ranged zealot something viable? Can I test such a build?
Yes, it is perfectly possible. However, while a melee veteran is totally viable and even something good, the ranged zealot is not one of the most commonly used builds. Nevertheless, it is perfectly viable (though surely not ‘meta’). There are several talents that will permit this.
- Anoint in blood: Up to +25% base ranged damage, reduced the further you are from the target.
- The Voice of Terra: Replenish 4% toughness on ranged kill
- The emperor’s bullet: Gives your melee attacks +30% impact strength & +10% attack speed for 5s after emptying your ranged weapon.
- Unremitting: -20% sprint stamina cost
- Sainted gunslinger: +6% Reload Speed on Melee Kill. Stacks 5 times.
- Dance of death: -75% spread and -50% recoil for 3s on successful dodge
- Ambuscade: +30% damage to ranged backstab attacks
- Fury the faithful: Dash forward, Replenishing 50% Toughness & gaining +20% Attack Speed for 10s. Your next Melee Hit gains +25% Damage and is a guaranteed Critical Hit. Cooldown: 30s
- Inexorable judgement: Moving grants you Momentum (Stacks 15 times). When you hit an enemy, spend all momentum, gaining +1% melee attack speed, +1% ranged attack speed and +1% damage per stack. Last 6s
Nota:
- Unremitting can permits you to go for stripping down (immune to ranged attacks while sprinting with stamina above 50%).
- Emperor’s bullet: in generic build this talent is not great, except when using a revolver. But in a ranged zealot build, this talent is good.
- Dance of death can proc with hit and run and stripping down blessings.
- Ambuscade: Combined with raking fire on a AIG Columnus MK V, this can devastate any monstrosity, and more the beast of nurgle if you hit its weakspot.
- Fury the faithful: the +20% attack speed for 10s that applies also to ranged attack can save situations.
- Inexorable judgement: best keystone for such build. The +15% attack speed bonus for 6s that applies also to ranged attacks changes everything.
E. The protector
Such a build relies on Chorus of Spiritual Fortitude and could also make use of Beacon of Purity. Chorus is a VERY strong ability that can turn around a situation. It can allow you to revive a teammate, stagger all enemies on the battlefield, enabling your teammates to take down primary threats, and it also provides a nice bonus at the end.
The cooldown is ONLY 60 seconds. This means you don’t have to wait for the worst situation to use it. Like all keystones, you should use it frequently.
Beacon of Purity initially seems like a mediocre aura. However, it can allow you to skip corruption resistance on curios and can heal teammates in coherency. This is far from a bad aura, but it requires taking talents that don’t fit well in most builds. Basically, one branch is oriented toward ranged weapons, while the other is better for high-impact melee weapons. But don’t underestimate Shield of Contempt. Your teammates won’t notice it, but you could save their lives several times with all these tools.
Good talents in this role are:
- Shield of Contempt: When you or any Ally in coherency takes damage, they gain +60% Damage reduction for 4 seconds. Triggers every 10s.
- Beacon of purity: Heal 1.5 corruption from the current wound for you and allies in coherency every 1s.
- Chorus of spiritual fortitude: Wield a holy relic that releases pulses of energy every 0.8s. While channeling, Allies in Coherency have Stun Immunity and Invulnerability. Cooldown: 60s.
E. Mixing, what are the options?
You can mix things. To be honest, as the game is written actually, you have a real interest to try to go for critical builds.
Blitz can change the way you play the game. Stun grenade can permits you to revive an ally. The immolation grenades can create a death zone for an horde. Knives are really useful to avoid to switch to your ranged weapon.
Toughness regen nodes have to not be neglected. You should always think how you will fight and what is the best way to regen your toughness. Few weapons have blessing to regenerate toughness on a zealot. Basically, ranged weapons and the eviscerator are the only choices. For the evis, this can be totally viable to opt for this, ranged weapon for a melee class… I would not go for this.
Auras can help you to achieve what you want. Benediction is good to increase the TDR rate. Going for Beacon of purity can permits you to avoid picking corruption resist on curios. Loner is the only one that has no bonus. As its name suggests, this aura is to be able to play outside of the coherency. I would not advice this aura when you begin with this class.
Abilities are what will define your gameplay. By going for Fury the Faithful, you will pick a fast gameplay. By picking Chorus, you choose to endorse a protective gameplay. Picking Shroudfield is the possibility to always have a chance to escape any bad situation.
Choosing your keystone is an important point on a zealot build. Blazing fury has two branches. One that will increase a lot your critical rate. The other that will increase a lot your TDR.By example, you can go for Martyrdom and still add one toughness curio and go for critical weapons. This can ensure, with I Shall Not Fall, a high TDR rate. Inexorable judgment works great also with fury the faithful as you can get insane melee attack speed.
Cooldown reduction talents are an important point of zealot builds. Invocation of death is the only one that can be useful an entire mission and with all weapons. Pious cut-throat, is good with high mobility weapons cause you need to be able to backstab an enemy. Marty’s purpose is, totally situational. So, the most obvious one is Invocation of Death, so this means you have a strong reason to try to get enough critical chances. Using a CDR talent change how you play the game.
Toughness or Health? I would say that, to begin you should go for health. But once you will get enough experience, you should try toughness. Toughness is always better for an obvious reason, it always regenerates, and less obvious ones, you have less HP so you won’t deplete a deployed medikit alone.
Melee Weapon is the best zealot friend. In fact, you have to choose the right weapon for the gameplay you want to adopt and choose also talents based on this weapon. By example, if you have a very slow weapon with poor dodge capacity, you cannot go for a dodge build. A high mobility weapon allows you options that are totally uninteresting with a slow weapon. Depending of this weapon, you could favor high critical chances or decide that you don’t need it (example tactical axes) or even decide that you don’t need to ensure you will land critical hits. Pay attention also to the type of weapon you will pick. Several have a good finesse damages, this means that there is a big increase of damage when landing a critical hit or when hitting the weakspot. There are also weapons that have poor finesse damages… this can change what you should pick as perk and what to choose as talents.
Sidenote about how damage bonuses are applied: when you read +10% critical damages, this mean that it will be 10% of the amount of damage done when landing a critical minored of the base damages of a weapon. It works the same for weakspot damages. So, if the gap between base damages and critical is very low, you have no interest in boosting these damages
Ranged weapon has to be complementary of your melee weapon, this is, at least, what I advice. You must have ways to deal with carapace, ranged units, melee units, ragers and also hordes with the 2 weapons. Only exception: flamer. Here you accept that you won’t be able to deal with ranged threat and will have to close the gap between you and this threat (and sometimes it won’t be possible).
In fact, you have plenty of options and, with enough experience, you can pick what you want and develop your own gameplay. You just have to define what gameplay you want to develop.
4. Curios
Curios are one of the most important things that can make your run easy or turn it into a nightmare.
First, let’s explain the differences between toughness, health, and wounds. Then, we will be able to discuss the perks.
A. Health, toughness, stamina or wounds
Reminders:
- Health or toughness bonus from curios, and also from talent tree, are additive.
- Max bonus are +21% for health, +17% for toughness, +3 stamina and +1 wounds
- You can add perks on curios to add +5% health or +5% toughness
- You can add to weapons perk that can give you +2 stamina
a. Health
As a zealot, going health is an obvious choice. Just cause you get 200 HP at start. This is less than the Ogryn, but more than veteran or psyker.
This cannot be a wrong choice and I would even say this is a smart move in most situations.
The talent tree has one node that can boost your health:
- Health boost: +10% health (simple node close to martyrdom keystone)
Health is an important factor. However, never forget that the zealot starts with a comfortable amount of health points. You can choose to strengthen this advantage, and adding health curios can allow you to go above 300 HP.
b. Toughness
A toughness build is something you should pursue when you’re confident enough in your skills. The idea behind this is to benefit from a high amount of toughness to get a nice return in toughness regen from kills.
The zealot has:
- 5 nodes that give you +15 toughness
- 4 nodes that can give you +5% toughness damage reduction. These nodes are additives, so it can give you a +20% toughness damage reduction as maximum bonus. Then the total bonus is multiplicative with other Toughness damage reduction bonuses.
We have seen toughness talents in the first part, so I won’t present them again. Let’s just say that toughness damage reduction bonuses are multiplicative. This means that the more you add, the less bonus you get from the latest addition.
Typically, critical builds rely on toughness. This means you could have a real interest in boosting your toughness for such builds.
c. Stamina
Stamina is often neglected, but you shouldn’t overlook it. Managing stamina is very important because you block with it and that you need it to do push attacks.
Thank the zealot class for its good stamina regeneration, as it starts with 3 stamina. The zealot talent tree has a +1 stamina node (under the Loner aura).
However, I would not advise players to use stamina curios, at least until they fully understand why they need them. More stamina will give you 3 advantages:
- you can block longer
- you can do more push attacks
- you can sprint more time
d. Wounds
At heresy/damnation, you have a base of 2 wounds. When you jump to these difficulties, you should, until you’re enough confident in your skill, have at least 3 wounds. For this, or you can put a wound curio, or you can use the talent close to martyrdom:
- Faith’s fortitude: +2 wounds
Anyways, wounds builds (i.e., 2-3 wound curios) should not be used, except when going for the Martyrdom keystone. Adding all as wound curios is the biggest mistake you can make, as you will play with limited health/toughness.
Except if you want to use Martyrdom (see the developments on this).
B. Curios perks
a. Additives bonuses
- +2-5% health
- -2-5% toughness
These bonuses should not be neglected. In fact, if you use them you can increase the curios effects. Having +15% toughness or health is not negligible (3 curios x 5% bonus).
Especially cause these bonus are additives.
b. Multiplicative bonuses
- +1-4% ability regeneration
- 4-10% ally revive speed
- +7.5-30% toughness regeneration speed
- +6-15% sprint efficiency
- 6-12% block efficiency
These bonuses can improve your fighting experience. The ability regeneration bonus is not very strong. The revive speed bonus can save a run, as you will be able to revive allies much faster. The toughness regeneration speed will reduce the delay to regenerate toughness and increase the regeneration rate. The sprint efficiency will make you lose less stamina while sprinting, and block efficiency will also reduce stamina consumption when blocking.
C. Others perks:
a. Resists
- +6-15% damage resistance against Corruption
- +5-20% damage resistance against Grimoires
- +5-20% damage resistance against Bombers
- +5-20% damage resistance against Gunners
- +5-20% damage resistance against Mutants
- +5-20% damage resistance against Pox hounds
- +5-20% damage resistance against Snipers
- +5-20% damage resistance against flamers
Resists are real game changers. However, you should choose what is hurting you the most.
I would say that Corruption is something you can’t avoid, except if you have picked Beacon of Purity (and if you picked it, corruption resist is totally useless). Corruption resist works against all corruption sources, so it includes: poxwalkers, tox gas, grimoires, and even poxbombers.
The resist against grimoire is, in my opinion, the least interesting resist you could pick, as it works only against corruption from grimoires.
Bombers, gunners, flamers, and snipers are good resist perks. Precision gunner resist will work only against dreg gunners, scab gunners, and reapers.
Snipers are usually avoidable. However, when surrounded by groaners and poxwalkers, you might find this resist useful. It can also save you from being hurt if you go for a toughness build. In fact, the damage from a sniper shot won’t be reduced if your toughness can’t absorb all the damage. So, if the shot deals more damage than your toughness, you will lose your toughness and take the full damage to your health.
b. Perks useless
- 2-10% experience
- 4-10% ordos dockets
- 5-20% chance to get a curio as mission reward
These perks will provide no bonus during missions. They will only have an effect on mission rewards.