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Genre: Shooter, Adventure, Indie

Warhammer 40,000: Darktide

OUT NOW: The Traitor Curse Part 2 Anniversary Update


Devoted Rejects,



New Mission: Warren 6-19 Habzone HL-70-04


The rot goes deeper than we feared, and so must we. Head into the back alleys of the Carnival in a new mission. Wyrmwood agents report increased traitor activity and a worrying rise in Stimm use. Find out what you can and destroy the Moebian Stimm production facilities.

Karnak Twins Ambushing Strike Teams


The Karnak Twins have slipped their leash and have been sighted across Tertium. During missions, players can encounter one of the Twins, either Rinda or Rodin. Be on your guard and steel yourself for the fight to come. This combat encounter will be time-limited. You’ve also received the following information:

New Weapon Marks


Foldable Shovels

  • Munitorum Mk III Sapper Shovel
  • Munitorum Mk VII Sapper Shovel
  • Brute-Brainer Mk XIX Latrine Shovel
  • Brute-Brainer Mk V Latrine Shovel

Included in this patch there are new foldable shovels for both the Ogryn and the Veteran. These come with a new Weapon Special that folds the blade, turning the shovel into a makeshift pickaxe for one powerful strikedown attack that then resets the weapon back to its unfolded state after a successful hit.

The new Veteran Sapper shovels use the pointy end that is exposed when folded to make a precise strike that gets stuck in the enemy when hit, and also gives extra damage when the weapon is yanked out. The Ogryns Latrine Shovels goes for a more simple, powerful hammer blow that crushes most opponents.

There are two variations each of both the Sapper and the Latrine shovel giving players different movesets catering to different preferences and playstyles, but focusing mostly on crowd control and horizontal sweeps to compliment the weapon special strikedown attacks that favour single targets.

Chain weapons

  • Orestes Mk XII Assault Chainaxe
  • Tigrus Mk XV Heavy Eviscerator
  • Cadia Mk XIII Assault Chainsword

For this patch we have decided to make some changes and addition to make chain weapons play nicer. We hope that this will make all chain weapons more appealing and appreciated on all difficulties.

One big problem with the chain weapons was the risk reward of the sawing attacks. The reward rarely outweighed the risk and frustration of getting stuck and unable to defend yourself. We added so that you can dodge cancel out of these attacks, at the cost of stamina and missing out on the big damage pay off at the end. This will make the iconic sawing less risky and make the weapon more flexible and adaptable in combat.

The Orestes Mk IV Assault Chainaxe has been a problematic weapon leaving much to be desired both when it comes to damage output and usability. With this patch we made some changes to it. Along with making the sawing attacks cancelable we made the light chain and the activated heavy attack more vertical to make target acquisition easier and avoid hitting enemies at edges of the screen. It also got a bit more bite in all of its attacks.

We also introduce variations of all chainweapons with the new Orestes Mk VII Assault Chainaxe, Cadia Mk XIIIg Assault Chainsword, Tigrus Mk XV Heavy Eviscerator that mix things up with horde handling lights, strong elite shredding strikedown heavies and fast stab attacks to stagger enemies.


More New Marks

Agripinaa Mk XIV Quickdraw Stub Revolver
A lighter Stub revolver with a quick loader that reloads all bullets at the same time. Compared to the Zarona Mk IIa it has shorter range, is a bit less accurate and has lower damage, but it excels in close range with a higher fire rate and a new braced stance that allows for fanning the gun for even higher fire rate.

Kantrael Mk X Heavy Laspistol
A heavier, heavy laspistol. Compared to the Accatran MG Mk II it has higher damage per shot and slightly longer range for the cost of a slower rate of fire.

Catachan Mk VI Combat Blade
A knife that brings more horde controlling capabilities with sweeping vanguard heavies and a different light chain than the Catachan Mk III; the jab weapon special has also regained some of its lost power and should be able to stagger enemies again on both this Mk VI and the old Mk III  knife.


Player Stimms



Stimms are designed to give a temporary boost that empowers the player for a short while.

Stimms are spawned in a mission at random, similar to how ammo and medical crates are spawned. Players can pick them up and they occupy a new dedicated consumable slot for small items. To select this new slot press [4] on keyboard or [D-pad up] on the controller by default. On some controller layouts you swap between the small item slot (stimms)  and the large slot (medical crates, ammo crates, scriptures and grimoires) by pressing the same button multiple times. As a consequence of this new binding, wielding the Auspex has been moved to [5] on keyboards. Check your preferred controller or keyboard layout in-game to see exact binding.


Actions:


  • Primary Action - Use it on yourself. 
  • Secondary Action (HOLD) - Aim it to use it on another player.
    • When aimed, an outline appears around a player if they are in range for being injected. Players can then choose to inject the outlined player by pressing the Primary Action button.
  • Special Action (HOLD) - Gift Item 

All Consumable Items - Gift Consumable
We added the ability for players to be able to give equipped consumable to other players. For a player to receive an item they need to have the corresponding item slot empty. All consumables, excluding the grimoires, have gained this action.
  • Special Action (HOLD) - Gift it to another player
    • When aimed, an outline appears around a player if they are in range. Players can then choose to give the consumable to the outlined player by releasing the Special Action button.

Stimm Types:


  • Med Stimm
    • Restores one health segment, or 25% of max health, whichever one is larger, of health and corruption damage.
    • Med stimms can’t be used on a target, on one self or other players, if the target has no health or corruption damage to restore. 
  • Combat Stimm
    • Lasts 15 seconds.
    • Increase in Power 25% (Damage + Stagger Strength).
    • Rending 25% (Armour Penetration).
    • Reduction of Peril Generation -33% (Generate less Peril when using Psyker’s Warp Abilities).
  • Celerity Stimm
    • Lasts 15 seconds.
    • Increase in Reload Speed 15%.
    • Reduction in Stamina Costs -25% for Pushing, Blocking, -50% for sprinting.
    • Increases Attack Speed by 20%.
    • Increase the following by 25%:
      • Charge up time of Plasma guns, Psyker’s Brain Burst and Psyker Staves.
      • The speed of which the Psyker’s Smite propagates between enemies.
      • Speed of which the Psyker can throw Shards using Assail.
      • Speed of which the Psyker Quells their Peril.
  • Concentration Stimm
    • Lasts 15 seconds.
    • Increases your Combat Ability Cooldown Regeneration speed by +300% (Four times as fast as usual).



Bug Fixes & Tweaks


Talents


  • Veteran Tree
    • Moved Talent Nodes in the lower part of the Tree to reduce the amount of points needed to reach the Keystones, which in turn should open the tree up to more opportunities in making a build. This will require talent trees for the Veteran to be reset.


The section below the Combat Abilities, modified to ease the access of Keystones

  • Psyker
    • Fixed issue where Psyker Blitz abilities "Assail" and "Smite" would not get re-wielded after using an interaction or being catapulted by an enemy, etc.
    • Fixed issue where switching from Charged 'Brain Burst' to Locked 'Brain Burst' when affected by 'Kinetic Resonance' would cause the charge time to reset.
    • Fixed Issue where 'The Quickening' and 'Prescience' were both active at the same time.
    • Fixed so that Psyker Blitz ability "Smite" always attacks the centre mass hit zone (torso) and now only the gibbing is randomised instead.
  • Veteran
    • Fixed issue where Veteran talent "Onslaught" could be triggered by damage over time effects, like burning or bleeding.
    • Fixed an issue where the Veteran "Infiltrate" combat ability was interrupting and preventing sprint on use.
    • Fixed Issue where 'Born Leader' didn't replenish toughness of allies when the player was at max Toughness.
  • Fixed an issue where talents weren't reset when running a preset with an incorrect talent version.

Weapons & Blessings


General Weapon Tweaks


  • Orestes Mk IV Assault Chainaxe
    • Heavy attacks 10% faster and decreased chain times into and from them.
    • Heavy attacks increased cleave.
    • Increased armour damage modifiers: 
      • Light: +10% vs unarmoured, +25% vs infested and +50% vs Maniacs
      • Heavy: +10% vs unarmoured, +25% vs infested and +30% Maniacs.
    • Increased damage on initial hit of weapon special activated attacks, light 50 to 70, heavy 10 to 95.
    • Updated light chain.
    • Heavy 3 (reachable from light 3) is now a sweep right attack instead, and its speed was tweaked to match other heavies.
    • When the weapon special is active, Heavy 1 will be a vertical attack.

  • Cadia Mk IV Assault Chainsword
    • Added impact on the final damage tick on light sawing so enemies will get staggered after getting sawed.
    • Increased damage on initial hit of weapon special activated attacks, light 10 to 40, stab 10 to 35.

  • Tigrus Mk II Heavy Eviscerator
    • Increased damage on initial hit of weapon special activated attacks, light from 0.01 to 85, heavy vanguard from 0.01 to 137.5, heavy strikedown from 0.01 to 160.

  • Munitorum Sapper Shovels
    • Downward strikes now prioritise enemies heads above body.
    • Chaining the weapon special attack into itself is now 0.45s faster.
    • Light attack damage increased. Power from 70-140 to 80-160 and armour damage modifier vs maniacs increased 10% on first target.
    • Heavy attack damage increased Power from 100-200 to 110-225.

  • Brute-Brainer Latrine Shovels
    • Ogryn Heavy attack Relentless damage profiles armour damage modifier vs unarmored and infested increased from 125% to 133% on first target.

  • Ironhelm Mk IV Thunder Hammer
    • Push now combos into Heavy 3, to provide a faster way into a Strikedown heavy attack. Also fixed a bug where Heavy 3 didn't use the correct damage profile and did not deal more damage than the activated sweep attacks in Heavy 1 and 2. 
    • Buffed base damage for this Heavy activated Strikedown, power 400-800 to 450-900. 12,5% more than h1 and h2, but still less than Crucis Mk II Thunder Hammer. 
    • Push follow up now combos into Heavy 2 instead. 

  • Catachan Mk III Combat Blade
    • Increased base power of weapon special jab attack from 150 to 500. Adjusted to attack damage and impact distribution accordingly. Overall this will increase both damage and impact of the attack compared to before.

  • Ogryn Cleavers
    • Aligned all Ogryn cleavers to have the chaintime into Heavy 2 at 0.5. Krourk IV was significantly faster. This makes the other 2 cleavers faster and evens them out since the attack is similar.

  • Graia Mk IV Braced Autogun 
    • Increased base damage for Graia Mk IV Braced Autogun by about 20%, from 60-120 to 72-145.

  • Accatran MG Mk II Heavy Laspistol
    • Beams now cause much less suppression when shooting near or when killing enemies.
    • Moved attack speed back to how it was before Patch #13: Class Overhaul.
Dev note: The Accatran MG Mk II Heavy Laspistol was already strong without the added rate of fire increase, but it also put it in a place where you would have to click unreasonably fast or almost required a macro to utilise the attack speed, moving it more towards an automatic weapon that should be held to shoot. And that isn't the heavy laspistol. So to keep it more in a reasonable line with the new Kantrael Mk X Heavy Laspistol, it’s now back to its previous rate of fire.

  • Zarona Mk IIa Quickdraw Stub Revolver 
    • Carapace armour damage modifier from 60% to 40%.
Dev note: We felt that the Zarona Mk IIa Quickdraw Stub Revolver was a bit over performing. It had high armour penetration, especially combined with the "Hand Cannon" weapon blessing and was outshining for example the bolter in this regard. This change brings the revolver's default armour penetration against Carapace armour to be the same as the above-mentioned bolter and brings it closer to the new Agripinaa Mk XIV.
  • Nomanus Mk VI Surge Force Staff 
    • Secondary charged chain lightning attack now always hits the centre mass hit zone (torso) and now only the gibbing is randomised instead. Critical hits will give maximum gibbing.
  • Lucius Helbore Lasguns
    • You can now hold the primary action button to continuously shoot with Helbore lasguns while in ADS.
  • M35 Magnacore Mk II Plasma Gun
    • Fixed issue with the primary attack overcharging differently with different Charge Rate stat values. 
Dev Note: The Charge Rate stat should not have an effect on the damage output. It should only affect the duration and speed of the action. We’ve decided to change the cap of the charge level from 0.5 to 0.525 to avoid decreasing the damage output, since it could previously range between 0.5 to 0.525 depending on the amount of overcharge. Primary attacks should now always charge up to, but not overshoot, 0.525 charge level.
  • Standard-issue Munitorum Sapper Shovel
    • Fixed issue with Defences stat that was affecting the dodge distance.
Dev note: Defences stat should not affect dodge distance. Only the Mobility stat should.
  • Vraks Headhunter Mk III
    • Fixed issue where the bursts would break and not shoot enough bullets if you had a too high attack speed buff.

Weapon Tweaks - Numbers


Orestes Mk IV Assault Chainaxe
  • Light Strikedown Cleave:
    • 1.0-2.0 to 0.01.
  • Light Strikedown Power:
    • 1st Target power 50-100 to 80-140.
  • Light Strikedown Armor Modifiers:
    • Vs unarmoured 67%-133% to 75%-143%
    • Vs Infested 67%-133% to 85%-165%
    • Vs maniacs 48%-102% to 85%-165%
    • 1st target vs Flak Armour 67%-133% to 103.5%-196.5%
    • 1st target vs Carapace Armoured 24%-56% to 48%-102% 
    • 1st target vs Unyielding 67%-133% to 103.5%-196.5%.
  • Heavy Vanguard Attacks Cleave:
    • 4-9 to 5.5-10.5.
  • Heavy Vanguard Attacks Power:
    • 1st target 102-170 to 150-300
    • 2nd target  55-100 to 100-200
    • 3rd target 20-75 to 10-55.
  • Heavy Vanguard Attacks Impact:
    • 1st target 7-14 to 7-22
    • 2nd target 6-12 to 6-18
    • 3rd target 5-9 to 6-8.
  • Light Sawing (last) Power:
    • 50-100 to 50-275.
  • Light Strikedown (activated, sawing first hit) Power:
    • 1s target 50 to 70.
  • Light Sawing (activated, sawing tick) Power:
    • 50-100 to 50-200.
  • Light Sawing (activated, sawing last) Power:
    • 200-400 to 300-500.
  • Heavy Vanguard Attacks (activated first hit) Power:
    • 1s target 10 to 95.
  • Heavy Sawing (activated, sawing last) Power:
    • 300-600 to 550-1100.

Cadia Mk IV Assault Chainsword
  • Light Strikedown Power (activated, sawing first hit):
    • 1s target 10 to 40.
  • Light Vanguard Power (activated, sawing first hit):
    • 1s target 10 to 40.
  • Push follow up Power (activated, sawing first hit):
    • 1s target 10 to 35.
  • Light Sawing (activated last) Impact:
    • 0 to 6-7.

Tigrus Mk II Heavy Eviscerator
  • Light Strikedown Power (activated, sawing first hit):
    • 1st target 0.01 to 85.
  • Light Vanguard Power (activated, sawing first hit):
    • 1st target 0.01 to 85.
  • Heavy Vanguard Power (activated, sawing first hit):
    • 1st target 0.01 to 137.5.
  • Heavy Strikedown Power (activated,  sawing first hit):
    • 1st target 0.01 to 160.
Standard-issue
Munitorum Sapper Shovel
  • Light Strikedown Armor mod:
    • 1st Target vs Maniac 67%-133% to 75%-143%.
  • Light Strikedown Power:
    • 1st Target 70-140 to 80-160.
  • Heavy Relentless Power:
    • 1st Target 100-200 to 110-225
    • 2nd Target 60-100 to 75-150.
  • Push follow up Power:
    • 1st Target 100-200 to 110-250.

Brute-Brainer Mk III Latrine Shovel
  • Light Relentless Power:
    • 3rd Target 30-60 to 40-80.
  • Heavy Strikedown Power:
    • 1st Target 150-300 to 190-280.
  • Heavy Strikedown Impact:
    • 1st Target 10-20 to 10-24.
  • Heavy Relentless Finesse boost Modifier:
    • 1st Target 25% to 35%.

Catachan Mk III Combat Blade
  • Special action attack Base Power:
    • 150 to 500.
  • Special action attack Power:*
    • 1st Target 20-50 to 12-30.
  • Special action attack Impact:*
    • 6-12 to 2-5.
*Dev note: The base power level has been increased 150 to 500. Hence the power distribution of the attack and impact have been lowered to reflect the higher base power. Over all this will increase both damage and impact of the attack from before.
Ironhelm Mk IV Thunder Hammer
  • Heavy Strikedown Power (activated)
    • 400-800 to 450-900.
Graia Mk IV Braced Autogun
  • Attack Power
    • 60-120 to 72-140.

Blessings 


Hand-Cannon Blessing
  • Reduced rending bonus for all ranks:
    • Tier 1 : from 50% to 30% rending on critical
    • Tier 2 : from 60% to 40% rending on critical
    • Tier 3 : from 70% to 50% rending on critical
    • Tier 4 : from 80% to 60% rending on critical.
Dev note: Due to the recent change about rending we noticed that some blessings over-performed. Hand-Cannon is one of them and we decided to tune it down a little. Moreover, the new Agripinaa Mk XIV Quickdraw Stub Revolver when combined with Hand-Cannon was getting rid of the carapace armoured enemies too efficiently while using its braced "fanning" technique.
Ruthless Backstab Blessing
  • Reduced rending bonus for all ranks:
    • Tier 1 : from 90% to 70% rending on backstab
    • Tier 2 : from 100% to 80% rending on backstab
    • Tier 3 : from 110% to 90% rending  on backstab
    • Tier 4 : from 120% to 100% rending on backstab.
Dev note: Rending bonuses is capped at 100% so tier 2, 3, and 4 were all of the same strength. We’ve lowered tier 1-3 for this to make sense again. This won't have any impact on the damage output for Tier 4.
Combat
  • Fixed issue where projectiles that are sticking to an enemy sometimes did not give full damage when exploding.
  • Fixed so that barrels and explosive spheres should not allow for sticky melee attacks from chain or force weapons. This should prevent players from getting stuck at a barrel that will explode in their face when they accidentally hit a barrel with an activated attack.
  • Fixed so that sticky attacks on destructible objectives does not cause vertical camera movement.
  • Fixed an issue where some destructible signs would stop melee attacks in the air.
  • Fixed bug that allowed for greater movement than intended when sawing someone with chain weapons.
  • Fixed broken sawing stat for chain weapons. The sawing stat did not always affect damage output of the sawing correctly.
  • Fixed a bug where Chainswords and Eviscerators second heavy attacks could be cancelled by holding the sprint button.
  • Fixed issue where players weren't immune to damage for the first few seconds after spawning in an ongoing mission.
  • Fixed issue with "Limbsplitter'' affecting melee attacks on ranged weapons if you had a melee weapon with the blessing equipped.
  • Fixed issue where the 'Executioner' blessing would reset when not intended.
  • Fixed issue where Tier 4 of weapon blessings 'Skullcrusher' and 'Thunderstrike' were showing 5% extra damage/stagger instead of the expected 10%.

Enemies

  • Fixed issue where a player could be healed by a medical crate after being eaten by a Beast of Nurgle.
  • Increased the health modifier for Monstrous Specialists in Maelstrom missions from 25% to 40%.
  • Changed the number of Daemonhost kills before disappearing from 2 to 1 on difficulty Uprising, Sedition, and Malice.
  • Daemonhosts will no longer spawn in missions on Sedition and Uprising difficulty.
Dev Note: Daemonhosts can still spawn on any difficulty when playing with Lights Out circumstance since we spawn extra daemonhosts.
  • Lowered Ragers base health from 1200 to 1000.
  • Ragers should now be more easily heard.
  • Removed instant toughness depletion on touching fire. Slightly increased base damage, increased both flamers action speed and fire size, removed toughness regen when standing in fire and changed damage to tick higher the longer you stand in the fire to compensate.
Dev Note: This was done to reduce the frustrations of losing all toughness when briefly touching fire regardless of your toughness amount or damage reductions. Curios that affect bombers/flamers will be more viable as well.
  • Set Scab Bomber lower arm/head to unarmored armour type.
  • Scab Trapper: Set cooldown when shoot net is aborted, Decreased ranged stagger threshold a lot, increased min spawn range when using dynamic spawns (mission objective spawns are controlled by the event), increased cooldown by 2 seconds.
  • Increased brightness of Snipers laser sight beam so that it is more easily visible in outdoor missions.
  • Fixed an issue where Crusher and Scab Trapper were spamming VO lines.
  • Reduced the amount the Conflict Director ramps up difficulty on low/mid difficulties.
Dev Note: This is related to a similar patch note from Part 1, where we increased the rate at which the Conflict Director ramps up difficulties.

Missions

  • Added speedrun prevention blockers in the mission Relay Station TRS-150.
  • Improved bot and enemy navigation around destructible props in some missions.
  • Fixed an issue where the fence gate at the end event of Comms-Plex 154/2f didn’t close properly.
  • Fixed a bug that allowed players to fall out of the map instead of dying in Smelter Complex HL17-36.
  • Added more chests and pickups locations in Ascension Riser 31, Chasm Station HL-16-11, Chasm Logistratum, Smelter Complex HL17-36  and Enclavum Baross.
  • Minor visual fixes and improvements to several missions.

HUD/UI

  • Updated sorting options through the various UI menus. Also, the selected option now gets saved so when a player revisits the same screen, the last selected option is the one in effect.
  • Addressed issue with End of mission progress bar where the player level experience might not be the one showing in the UI.
  • Added an error message when the player selects a preset profile with issues that need to be addressed in the loadout.
  • Improvements on the visibility of profile presets button.
  • Fixed a case where resetting Interface Settings could set different default values from the initial values.
  • Fixed an issue where upgraded versions of a base Ability wouldn't update the HUD icon for the ability.
  • Fixed issue with Veteran keystone talent "Focus Target!" buff icon not showing refresh duration correctly.
  • Fixed issue where on screen effects and UI would appear in cinematics.
  • Added duration indication for  "Limbsplitter" on the buff icon in the HUD.

Misc

  • Fixed some clipping around ears on Veteran “Steel Legion Flak Helmet (Parade Polish)”.
  • Fix for Ogryn “Bring the Hurt” penance not progressing while using the “Bombs Away” talent.
  • Added custom VFX when sawing into Captain barrier shield.

WARHAMMER 40,000: DARKTIDE - THE TRAITOR CURSE PART 2 - COMING DECEMBER 2023


We are excited to announce that we will be releasing The Traitor Curse - Part 2 before the winter holidays! Continuing the first anniversary celebrations of Warhammer 40,000: Darktide, this second part of the free anniversary update adds new features, additional content, as well as fixes and improvements to the game.

The Traitor Curse Part 2 includes:
  • New Consumables - Stimms: Loot four different Stimms from the field to aid you in the fight against the heretics; restoring health, boosting damage, increasing speed or hasten cooldown regeneration
  • New Weapon Marks: Quartermaster Brunt has new weapon variations available to diversify your playstyle introducing, amongst others, the foldable Munitorum Mk III Sapper Shovel and the Agripinaa Mk XIV Quickdraw Stub Revolver with its fanning technique
  • New Mission - Warren 6-19: explore The Carnival’s back alleys and destroy the Moebian production facilities 
  • Time-Limited Combat Encounter: The Karnak Twins have been sighted ambushing strike teams across Tertium
  • Quality of Life: among several tweaks and fixes brought to the game, we have adjusted the Veteran talent tree based on player feedback to make the keystones quicker to reach
  • Ne - - - REDACTED: Expl - - - ola - - - disp - - - at - - - orr - - - 




In case you missed it, here is a reminder of features we added  with The Traitor Curse Part 1 free update, released November 14, 2023:
  • New Cinematic: Learn about the motivations of the Moebian 6th and discover The Carnival, a new disreputable zone promising transgressive distractions and entertainment
  • New Zone & Mission: Strike at the heart of the Moebian 6th operations and fend off hordes of enemies in Mercantile located in The Carnival
  • Inspect Feature: Inspect player loadouts within the Mourningstar and in the lobby 
  • Veteran Talent Tree Update: adding Keystones and several tweaks and changes to the Veteran tree (due to these changes, Veterans have seen their talent tree reset and players have to re-assign talent points)

Hotfix 1.2.13


Devoted Rejects,



Here are the patch notes for hotfix 1.2.13, which just went live on Steam and it will shortly be live on our other platforms. 

Nominate Warhammer 40,000: DARKTIDE for Best Soundtrack


Hotfix 1.2.12


Devoted Rejects,



Here are the patch notes for hotfix 1.2.12 which just went live on Steam and it will shortly be live on our other platforms.

Bug Fixes and Tweaks


  • Fixed a server crash which could happen if the same Veteran player applied the buff on a tag from the "Focus Target!" talent multiple times to the same enemy in rapid succession.
  • Fixed a crash which could happen while inspecting the Talents tree of another player if that player left the Mourningstar.
  • Fixed a crash which could happen if a player left a mission and was replaced by a bot just as the mission ended.
  • Fixed several uncommon crashes.
  • Fixed an issue where the Veteran "Exhilarating Takedown" talent was increasing the toughness damage taken instead of decreasing it.
  • Fixed an issue where the Psyker "Nomanus Mk VI Surge Force Staff" and “Smite” blitz would target random enemy hitzones.
Dev note: This resulted in heavily reduced damage when a limb body part was targeted. The on-kill gore effects will still affect different enemy body parts at random, but the damage will be normalised.
  • Tweaked the Psyker "Nomanus Mk VI Surge Force Staff" to always trigger maximum on-kill gore effects on a critical hit kill.
  • Fixed an issue where the progress for collecting Scriptures and Grimoires for Melk's contracts was no longer tracked.
  • Fixed an issue where the progress of the "Flawless Execution" penances chain was reset after the release of The Traitor Curse Part 1 Anniversary Update.
Dev note: The game will update to the progress value obtained in either up to Hotfix 1.2.03 or in The Traitor Curse Part 1 Anniversary Update, selecting the highest one. We apologise for the issue and for the possible loss of progress.
  • When in unobtained status, the penances in the "Flawless Execution" chain will now display the current value being tracked instead of the best value ever achieved.
Dev note: Previously, the penance UI displayed the value for highest uninterrupted run performed by the player, and did not reset to 0 when the player got downed. This made it difficult to properly check the progress in unlocking the penance, as the actual progress being tracked by the game may not have been the one shown in the UI.
  • Fixed an issue where the chest would clip through the breastplate of the Zealot "Krieg Greatcoat (Marked by Faith)" cosmetic on female characters.
  • Fixed an issue where the tassel on the "Duellists Autogun" weapon skin was affected by physics incorrectly.

Hotfix 1.2.11


Devoted Rejects,



Here are the notes for Hotfix 1.2.11 which just went live on Steam.

  • Fixed a crash which could happen if a player joined a mission while a projectile was traveling in the air.
  • Fixed an issue where the Veteran "Onslaught" talent did not affect melee attacks.

Missed Patch Notes from The Traitor Curse:


  • Achlys Mk VII Twin-Linked Heavy Stubber: decreased time to fire first shot from 0.22s to 0s, improved deploy speed, reload speed, movement speed while firing, tighter spread while braced, even tighter spread while braced + crouched.
  • Fixed a bug where Hand-cannon weapon blessing effects were applied globally.
  • Fixed an issue with the physics of the Death Korps of Krieg Upperbody.
  • Reduced the Ogryn Lorenz Mk V Kickback minimum pellet count from 16 to 12
    Dev note: "Minimum pellet count" is a way to make sure that an enemy hit by a few pellets of a shotgun attack will still react by counting it as having been hit by more pellets than it actually was. The overall maximum damage and shot spread of the Kickback are not affected.
  • Surge staff on-kill gore effects are no longer always triggered when killing an enemy - now also limbs and heads may be dismembered instead of the whole torso.

Veteran Talent Changes



  • 'Twinned Blasts' changed from 10% to 20%.
  • 'Trench Fighter Drill' changed from 15% to 10%.
  • 'For the Emperor!' changed from 20% to 10%.
  • 'Bring it Down!' changed from 25% to 20%.
  • 'Marksman' changed from 50% to 20%.
  • 'Skirmisher' changed from 3 stacks to 5 stacks.
  • 'Close Quarters Killzone' changed from 30% to 15%.
  • 'Fire Team' changed from 3% to 5%.
  • 'Confirmed Kill' changed from 25% + 25% over time to 10% + 20% over time.
  • 'Out For Blood' changed from 2.5% to 3.5%.

New Talent (Not including Keystones)

  • “The Bigger they Are …” - Executioner’s Stance now outlines all Ogryn Enemies. (Cannot be picked together with ‘Counter-Fire’)

The Traitor Curse Part 1 Anniversary Update

Devoted Rejects



Here are the patch notes for Patch #15: The Traitor Curse Part 1 which just went live on Steam and will be out shortly on the Microsoft Store.



Mission: Mercantile HL 70-04



Wyrmwood reports indicate that the Moebian VI have set up a base of operations in the Carnival. What's more, they are using some of the more disreputable areas of Mercantile HL 70-04 to produce stimms and distribute them out to the rest of the Hive. Get in there and recover samples we can analyse for traces of the Blight.

Dev note: This mission will be available on the mission board 1-2 hours after the patch release.



Veteran Tree


Enjoy many changes and tweaks made to the Veteran tree, including the addition of Keystones (due to these changes, Veterans will see their talent tree reset and players will have to re-assign talent points).
  • Marksman's Focus
    • Weakspot Kills grant you stacks of 'Focus'. Moving makes you lose stacks of 'Focus'. 'Focus' in turn increases your Reload Speed, and Ranged Finesse Power.
    • For a few seconds after your Weakspot Kills your Focus stacks will stay regardless of if you're moving around or not.
    • Improvements to 'Marksman's Focus' can provide Rending, Toughness Replenishment, Increased Max Stacks, and easier 'Focus' Stacks management
  • Focus Target!
    • Your Tags on enemies now increase the Damage Taken of the target based on how long you've waited in between each Tag.
    • Improvements to 'Focus Target!'  include increasing the Maximum Strength of your Tag, along with bonuses such as, Toughness, Stamina, and Damage to allies once you kill the Tagged enemy.
  • Weapons Specialist
    • When killing enemies with Melee Weapons, you power up your next Ranged attacks, granting increases in Critical Strike Chance and Rate of Fire.
    • When killing enemies with Ranged Weapons you power up your next Melee attacks, granting increases in Attack Speed and improvements to Dodging.
    • These bonuses are granted when you swap to the other slot.
    • Improvements to 'Weapon Specialist' include improved Stamina Management to your Melee Weapons, Ammo Management to your Ranged Weapons, and a Toughness Boost.

Inspect Feature


Now you can inspect other players’ loadouts while in the hub and in mission lobbies.
When using this feature on the MourningStar you will be able to view the chosen player’s loadout, cosmetics and talent trees - while in mission lobbies you can switch between viewing a player’s weapon loadout and talents by pressing [TAB]. 





Penances


"After the release of Patch #13, several Penances could no longer be unlocked. We apologise for the issue. In this update, we reworked the systems handling the unlock of Penances and made sure that all of them could be obtained. The fixes include, but are not limited to, the following Penances:
  • "Power Up"
  • "Malleous Monstronum"
  • "Resupply Allies"
  • "Bring the Hurt"
  • "Just a Flesh Wound"
  • "I'm in charge"
  • "Marked for death"
  • "Stay strong"
  • "Master your tools"
  • "Make every shot count"
  • "Going Out With a Bang" - Fixed an issue causing the Psyker Penance being able to be completed with a Plasma Gun overload explosion
  • “Friends Will be Friends” 
  •  "There is nothing but the Abyss" - Lowered the regained health requirement. from 75% health to 25% since that is the new max from the “Holy Revenant” Talent.
We also removed ‘Stand by for Action’ and ‘Rapid Response’ from the list of penances in the game.

Dev Note: These penances required the completion of a prototype mission type that was removed before launch. 

Group Buff Icon Setting


We have added a setting that groups the buff icons in the HUD based on their source. The groups are currently:
  • Generic - Buffs gained from conditions in game or gained from other players
  • Talent - Buffs gained from your own talents
  • Blessings - Buffs gained from your current weapon blessing.
This setting is turned on by default but it can be turned off to enable the previous behaviour. We hope that this will make it easier to see if a talent or blessing is active.

Bug Fixes and Tweaks


Talents

  • Ogryn
    • Fixed Issue where 'Light 'em Up' Talent would trigger multiple times on the same shot on the same enemy.
    • Fixed issue with ‘Furious’ triggering on all melee attacks, not just heavy.
  • Psyker
    • Assail - Increased the Base Cooldown. 2s to 3s.
Dev Note: Assail has been very powerful and has acted like a third weapon in many cases. We’re increasing the time it takes for them to recharge to incentivise switching back to your Primary or Secondary Weapons after using it, instead of wholly relying on them in most Combat situations. 
  • Fixed Bug where Psykers 'Warp Rider' Talent gave more damage on low Peril than intended. Used to give 10% Damage at 0% Peril, instead of the intended 0% Damage at 0% Peril.
  • Fixed Issue where 'Brain Rupture' had an inconsistent cast time when under the effects of 'Kinetic Resonance'.
  • Fixed Issue where Peril generated through 'Kinetic Deflection' didn't synergize with 'Warp Expenditure'.
  • Fixed an issue where specific types of enemies failed to be correctly highlighted by the 'Disrupt Destiny' talent. (The issue was only visual).
  • Veteran
    • Fixed issue where 'Tactical Awareness' didn't trigger consistently when wielding a Chain Weapon.
    • Fixed issue where Veteran talent "Grenade Tinkerer" also made the player stun immune.
    • Fixed issue where 'Enhanced Target Priority' did not have an effect for all players.
    • Fixed issue where 'Onslaught' applied more stacks of Brittleness than intended.
    • Lowered the Bonus toughness of Duty and Honour from 100 to 50.
Dev note: It became too strong with the combined toughness increase and cooldown reduction of the previous patch.
  • Zealot
    • Changed so ‘Chorus of Spiritual Fortitude’ ability staggers bosses 1st and every other pulse instead of first/last.
    • Fixed issue with Zealot Talent "Disdain" where buff icon was not showing correctly.
    • Fixed issue where two ‘Toughness Boost’ Operative Modifiers didn’t stack properly.
    • Changed max stacks for the Zealot Talent "Martyrdom" to 7, down from 9, to correctly reflect the max number of Wounds.
    • Fixed issue with 'Restoring Faith' buff icon showing up at times when it wasn't active.
    • Fixed issue where Pious Cut-Throat didn't trigger properly.
    • Fixed issue where ‘Fortitude in Fellowship’ didn't work properly.
    • Fixed issue where ‘Chorus of Spiritual Fortitude’ could get stuck wielded with no effect.

Weapons and Blessings

  • Fixed issue where the Nomanus Mk VI Surge Force Staff received the 'Smite' Bonuses from 'Empowered Psionics'.
  • Fixed an issue causing the aiming trajectory for underhand grenade throws to jump upwards when throwing the grenade.
  • Fixed a bug where Shotguns weapon special "reload" wasn't affected by any of the reload speed talents and other buffs.
  • Fixed detailed stats breakdown on the Krourk Mk IV Cleaver.
  • Fixed an issue with attached projectiles, like the Krak grenade, which now is guaranteed to hit the enemy it is attached to. Previously there were some edge cases, if the body part it was attached to was clipping into geometry due to animation, that caused the explosion to not hit.
  • Fixed an issue causing weapon temperature effects to not persist after wielding another weapon.
  • Fixed Stub Revolvers showing "Melee Critical Chance" instead of "Ranged Critical Chance" in the detailed stat inspect view.
Dev Note: The stat for Critical Hits has always been applied to the ranged attacks of the weapon only, and this has been a visual issue in the inspect view.

DEV BLOG: THE CARNIVAL LEVEL DESIGN
“THE TAWDRY SURFACE IS GARISH AND ENTICING, PROMISING ENTERTAINMENTS AND ILLICIT DIVERSIONS, BUT UNDERNEATH THE LURID SURFACE, IT’S ACTUALLY AS VILE AND PITIFUL AS THE RUMOURS SUGGEST… PERHAPS EVEN WORSE.”



My name is Fredric Grapensparr, Lead Level Designer and one part of the multi-disciplinary team that crafted Darktide’s most recent zone for you to dig into. In this post I’ll be walking you through what that process looked like on a surface level and what you may expect from it. Without further ado, allow me to introduce HABZONE HL70-04, commonly referred to as ‘The Carnival’ by the citizens of Tertium.



Our work on The Carnival began with searching for a mood and backstory that differed from what you’ve previously seen in Darktide, while staying authentically Warhammer 40,000 and true to something you’d expect to find in the dark fantasy of a Hive City. What if we combine visual inspiration from Victorian London and its legends, with that of a Deep Hive? Toying with ideas such as a corrupted governor who would make The Adeptus Arbites look the other way while profiting off unsanctioned establishments, out of sight from the main streets. The overarching pieces fell quickly into place, making room for the expertise of Dan Abnett and our narrative team to flesh things out further and make corrections where necessary.



The Carnival is effectively a massive slum. Over-populated, close-packed and riven with poverty and grim conditions. As a result, it is semi-lawless. The disreputablenature of the place means it is a notorious area for entertainment: that’s its appeal. It’s the place you go for brief respiteand vice. It’s attractive in a very degenerate way, vividand dirty, promising transgressive thrills.

A skilled brawler may find their ticket out of poverty by participating (willingly or not) in fighting pits. The glory is short-lived however as blood lust corrupts. Another may strike gold with a lucky roll of the dice - though the chances of making it out alive with the winnings are slim, as The Carnival houses its own bogeymen and monsters stalking the backstreets. Bars are particularly
dangerous, pass out and you may find yourself in the hands of a devoted murdercult. Then there are the gangs looking to expand their influence. Visitors should expect to get mugged, or worse most likely.



With the worldbuilding foundation laid out in collaboration between the world team, Dan and the writers, designers and artists are primed to establish the current day state of the zone and its locations. The Traitor Guard have invaded and established defensive lines, and intelligence says that they’re cooking something up that would be a great detriment to Tertiums war efforts. What is their ultimate interest in the place and can we turn the tide in our favour? That is mostly for you to discover as we roll the missions out in sequence. But know that the stakes are high.

After the initial concept and narrative phase, Level Design is next up. We start off by deciding on key locations that fit into the theme and sketch the entire zone out with all of its missions, both in 2D and 3D, ensuring that everything fits together. This can prove challenging as things tend to change along the way in order to better fit gameplay, while still making sense from an architectural perspective as it is always important for us that gameplay mesh well with the artistic vision. During internal playtests we may receive feedback that a road is too narrow for interesting gunfights to happen, so in order to rectify that we need to move a building or three. Suddenly that same road is now a main road leading to a dead end, which is immersion breaking and something we want to avoid.


First iteration top-down sketches from two locations in the mission Mercantile HL-70-04-510. Certain things have changed since then, while others haven’t. Play the mission once it's available and see if you can recognize them.

Much like our other zones, the missions of The Carnival are interconnected, perhaps even more so than previously. Gameplay space is not only packed densely horizontally, but vertically as well. In one mission you could pass through a key location, while in another you may find yourself in the basement of the same building. A keen eye may recognize landmarks previously visited while traversing a rooftop. Every room and all the different paths in and out should have their purpose from when the place was first built, up until its current state. Think of it as city planning to a lesser extent, except more chaotic as the city has already evolved over centuries when we visit it, with newer structures replacing older ones.

This interconnectedness also translates into the narrative, where there’s a larger plot unfolding within the zone that intersects through each of the missions. This is part of our aforementioned ambition to set The Carnival apart from what you’ve experienced in Darktide thus far.



With the refined narrative and playable 3D blockout in place, artists get to work iterating on the end visual product. We typically reference the enviroments of the established Warhammer 40,000 universe , but for environments where there’s little to no precedence it’s about working with Games Workshop to figure out what materials and architecture (spoiler: it’s often with several pinches of gothic) would make sense for the point in Tertium’s millennia long timeline in which the zone was built. In the case of The Carnival, we had to ask ourselves questions such as what a refectory and a brewery may look like, as well as other locations that you normally don’t see or hear about in the setting. What we can’t find within the vast library of official Warhammer 40,000 art and lore that has been produced over the years we work closely with Games Workshop on to define.




Early concepts of storefronts and brewery props.

At this stage in development we’re still communicating between each of the disciplines to ensure that we’re all aligned on the vision, making gameplay changes where necessary, optimizing performance, tweaking color grading, lighting and adding further worldbuilding through voice lines and ambient sound design - so be sure to pay close attention to that between the rock- and flamethrowing. It’s an iterative process through and through until we’re content with the experience.




Since the release of Darktide we’ve learnt a lot about combat (which has evolved in itself) and what makes for fun and interesting engagements. Our ambition has always been that all classes, playstyles and loadouts should be able to find their opportunity to shine. With The Carnival we’ve aimed to refine that further and we’re looking forward to hearing about your experiences with this latest chapter in Darktide’s history.

THE TRAITOR CURSE - ANNIVERSARY UPDATE COMING IN NOVEMBER


To celebrate the first anniversary of Warhammer 40,000: Darktide, we have prepared a two-part update called The Traitor Curse bringing more content to the game. Part 1 will release during November, Part 2 will follow before the winter holidays.

The Traitor Curse Part 1 - Features:

  • New Cinematic: Learn about the motivations of the Moebian 6th and discover The Carnival, a new disreputable zone promising transgressive distractions and entertainment.
  • New Zone & Mission: Strike at the heart of the Moebian 6th operations and fend off hordes of enemies in Mercantile located in The Carnival.
  • Inspect Feature: Inspect player loadouts in The Mourningstar.
  • Update to Veteran Talent Tree: enjoy many changes and tweaks made to the Veteran tree, including the addition of Keystones (due to these changes, Veterans will see their talent tree reset and players will have to re-assign talent points).




Part 2 will be released during December, we will make sure to come back to you with more information on the latter by the end of the month!





Hotfix 1.2.3


Rejects



Here are the notes for Hotfix 1.2.3 which just went live on Steam!


  • Fixed a crash which could happen when rapidly switching between wargear presets
  • Fixed an issue where every part of the "Chem-safe rebreather (red)" head gear cosmetic incorrectly appeared in red color
  • Fixed an issue where candles visual effects could appear in first person view when having one of the following Zealot upper body cosmetics equipped:

    • Saintly Lazar's Vestments, Krieg Greatcoat (marked by faith), Saintly Mendicant's Vestments and Saintly Missionary's Vestments

  • Fixed an issue where specific types of male facial hair were incorrectly displayed when equipping the "Incantata MK IVN Obedience Helm" Zealot head gear cosmetic
  • Tooltips for equipped Talents can now be reviewed in the mission lobby screen also when playing on controller
  • Fixed an issue where Talents, Portraits, Frames and Insignias sometimes failed to be visually updated in the mission lobby screen
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