I don't get the argument for chain axes having more dodge distance. What about the axe screams "mobility"? If anything, the chainsword should be mobile, while the axe chews through heavier enemies.

Finally, nuclear drama

"Chain axe used to be so bad" Me polishing my Obscurus force sword, after the removal of infinite dodges, when I kept playing "melee" psyker builds without a staff for weeks NON STOP: "What was that? Must have been the wind"

Absolutely the Thunder Hammer special needs to hit hard - much harder than it does now! Keeping the stun is (I feel) a necessary balancing factor to its power, but also because physics - that much power being output into the face of a target means the power is also acting or is being absorbed by the user. This manifests itself as the stun/recoil from absorbing the impact you just dished out (for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction and all that).

I've been lobbying for an AoE stun on hammer charge since forever. Hope to see it soon.

I always like reading in Guardsmen books how Bolters are set up like machine gun nests, never knew about how often they were used in the Guard before I started reading 40k.

I appreciate you bringing numbers to the conversation with all your tests it makes you logic easier to follow

Well yeah, I mean I guess that's it, JTC and Reginald have to fight to the death.

I had many of the same thoughts when i first watched the jtc video. A lot of the suggestions from jtc were just making the items easier to use in most situations instead of balancing the weapons for their niche

EDIT: Now that i've had time to watch, my response: Chaxes: A well made and convincing argument that has convinced me to change my mind. Thammer: I agree adding additional damage for Flak and Carapace and none for unyielding on the special is also a solid change, but I'd argue the addition of an AoE stagger on the hammer would make it too similar to the crusher's special (not saying crusher is bad - its an underrated weapon). Right now we only have 3 two handed blunt weapons in the game and I'd argue its better if each of them have something unique about them for the sake of variety rather than changing the thunderhammers's special to function more like the crusher's. The main issue I (and others) take with the thunderhammer's stun is it feels clunky and odd, and altering the stun to feel less clunky would also be a good change instead of outright removing it (by either reducing the movement reduction during the stun, or allow you to block during the stun in the Mk II's case specifically). Bolter: Overall I agree with the proposed changes (1.3 to 1.5 isn't that much more of an increase, bodyshot buffs are necessary and equalizing limb damage would be sweet) but I think our differences in stances here boil down to a difference in what the perceived role of the bolter should be. I specifically argue its position for an anti armor weapon because 1) the ranged options for anti armor is woefully lacking (revolver/plasma/hellbore on vet with surgical, exe stance and weakspot damage/ripper guns with can opener if you're counting ogryn), 2), the way the weapon handles feels as if it should be an anti armor tool, and is disappointing when it is not (As i mentioned I'm of the belief that fun/enjoyment > Lore accuracy, which I plan to further explore in my next video) and 3), weapon right now best functions as a fineese-esque, headshot weapon which we have more than enough of (which is also why I'm specifically hesitant of asking for increased flak armor damage, because if the ADS jank is ever fixed and its flak breakpoints are improved, the one shot bodyshot breakpoints for flak armor can easily cause it to be another special sniping weapon, of which we have more than enough of) Flamer: I completely agree the flamer should be trash against carapace armor - I forgot to mention that in the original video and failed to catch it in editing which is on me. The flamer should realistically follow the pattern of how it functions in vermintide with it being good against hordes and worthless against super armor/carapace, but I made the argument it should be slightly better versus flak armor (which it technically is now after the slight damage buff, which I think makes it perfectly fine now) due to some of the hordes being protected by flak, and because darktide typically has more enemies on the playing field than vermintide does at high base game difficulties. Good points all around! I enjoy having a healthy discussion with other people from the community, and think that until Fatshark starts to pump out the content this is a great way to interact with each other. I will say that I am of the personal belief that darktide's balance should not be completely centered around the lore of 40k or the weapons within it. I am currently working on a video to explore this topic more in depth (since its a belief I've held for a long time), but table top games are inherently different than video games and cannot be balanced in the same way. I do think that lore should absolutely be considered for the basic functions and interactions of things that exist within a form of media to help establish a living breathing world, but there should be a healthy amount of wiggle room to allow for logical changes that ensures that our enjoyment of the game does not suffer for the sake of lore accuracy.

Even before the buff, jct's comments on the flamer confused me because when I ran with it I didn't have a problem burning away my problems except for ogryns and monsters. Those were for my hammer or evicerator. And while it makes some sense for fire to ignore the armor and go through the gaps and heat the armor to where the wearer is being cooked. It will take a comparatively unreasonable amount of time for either of those effects to pay back dividends. That and we have to remember we're fighting Nurgle cultists, they're infamous for being relentlessly tough bastards by feeling no pain. It doesn't mean the affect of being coated in fire won't happen. It just means they won't care and will keep going and won't be rolling on the ground in pain and then dying

Boltgun lore got me thinking, in Necromunda tabletop, Enforcers get super cheap bolt guns with drum mags, why not keep the stats more or less where they are and just up the ammo pool?

here before the drama gets reacted to by big twitch streamers

I don't see why the boltgun shouldn't be good at destroying bosses. Bosses should be the one thing it is GOOD at. Lore-wise it's not great vs carapace, and for most smaller enemies it's very clunky and inefficient to use ammo on them. It practically screams "boss killer weapon", with its massive recoil, high damage, etc.

The weapon customization mod that lets you put sights and scopes on weapons was a gamechanger for me. There is also a crosshair mod that can keep the crosshair up even when in ADS which helps with the godawful bolter aiming sway

First I want to say I appreciate not throwing shade add another content creator for this game because the pool of content creators for this game is small. Good to hear another point of view especially from a person that likes to focus on melee talking about the melee weapons. My main character is melee exclusive and your content has helped me out tremendously without me having to put in tons of hours of gameplay testing to make it feel right. I've been able to get straight to the fun being able to crunch heads instead of having to crunch numbers. Keep doing you and I look forward to your next videos.

It'd be cool if Boltguns on the tabletop got something like Anti-Infantry 4+ (Hell, even 5) because the bullets explode inside targets. That's uhh...definitely going to wound things a hell of a lot easier than pure lead. In Darktide, them being good against unyielding makes perfect sense. Cause excessive internal area damage. Size can't do much against internal explosions.

I remember the first eviscerator and how I became a pro at heavy light light to clear hordes. New one is lol spam light attack. I have to imagine they made it for people who cannot be bothered to learn attack combos? Doom shotgun is the most fun I’ve had this week.

I mean I can kind of understand where they're coming from on the Flamer Armor Penetration front, after all if you breath in fire no matter how well armored you are, you're going to die choking. But the big two Carapaced enemies the Crusher and Mauler also have full helmets which could easily have Rebreathers built in. Personally I would want the Flamer to be able to suppress melee enemies except for Infested, Fanatics, Carapace, and Monstrous, after all if you aren't undead, insane, or mostly immune avoiding walls of literal fire is an instinctive response.

lore wise the bolter are meant to be good against armor its designed to go through armor and explode inside the target. its not the best at it but it good

I was about to talk about the changes the thunder hammer needs, but you just said what I wanted to say. Good points! I'm just posting this for the algorithm.

Bolter needs the limb damage normalization the plasma gun got last year. Even the revolvers and all other range weapons have the limbs hit's causing lost damage and stagger, but bolter just like plasma is a power weapon and needs to by pass that. We had the no self stun on thunder hammers do to a animation cancel bug, and fatshark saw that as OP so removed it. I think it should AoE stun us AND all near by enemies, with a small window in recovery in the players favor like 0.3 sec.

Honestly I was a little anxious about seeing a counter argument to a balance video; I've seen some wild takes and off kilter suggestions (like people insisting that the Bolter should be bad against infested) and was afraid this might be that but this turned out to be a great video. I actually had watched and commented on the JTC video and it was nice to see a genuinely good counter perspective on all the points presented in that video here. I can say that I really agree with the mindset of making weapons stand out by emphasizing their strengths over just eliminating their weakness. I can say that with JTC's suggestions, I didn't have many feelings on their suggestions for the Chainaxe or Thunder Hammer. I've been using and enjoying the Chainaxe since release, despite my peers disliking it, so I kind of assumed that maybe it was widely regarded as a poor weapon but I was just acclimatized to it. Their Thunder Hammer suggestion didn't really click w/ me and I actually like your suggestion a lot more. My big comment on JTC's video mainly revolved around the Bolter and the Flamer, the short of which can best be summarized by a relationship I drew between the Bolter and Flamer versus the Plasma Gun and Revolver. Similar to what you mentioned, I don't think the Bolter should be good at Armor Pen; I'd rather the explosive potential of the weapon be emphasized. To paraphrase an idea from my comment on that video: "If Revolver and Plasma Rifles cut through a hoard to Kill a Priority Target, then the Bolter and the Flamer should be like slamming a door in the hoard's face, growing less effective, but still having the capacity to slow down enemies the higher up in level of armor you go. In my mind, they should be weapons whom's utility lies in making space. While that means they (The Bolter and the Flamer) share that utility, I think the flamer should be even more specialized in that role than the Bolter, in the same way that the Plasma Gun is even better at cutting through a hoard than the Revolver is. The utility of being able to make space on command is balanced by having a weapon that is slower, clunkier weapon with lower ammo reserves than more generalized tools." I'm also glad that someone else is finally pointing out the currently weak place the Headhunter is at. All in all, great video.

I watched that video and was like what?... this doesnt sound like something Reginald would say.. and he knows Chain Axes! Glad you put this video out GJ!

Now that you opened the door for wanting a heavy bolter for ogryns (I do too, this game was my first 40k game and holy shit the amount of lore is nuts) I want a melta gun for zealots, plasma pistol for vet, and I sadly dont know what to add for psykers except another force weapon type

I think one of my biggest gripes with the thunder hammers right now is that the special attack has zero cleave. Nothing feels worse than having a rager or mauler charging you, powering your hammer, winding up a full-strength heavy, and then some poxwalker sticks its elbow in the way, eats your strike, and the rager/mauler kills you while you're stunned. Giving it the ability to cleave through a trash mob or two before catching on an elite like the eviscerators do now would make it feel a lot better IMO.

A couple of days ago I wrote on a note "chain axe, thunder hammer, bolter, flamer" because those were the weapons I wanted to look to be using. Coicidence?

I agree with you overall, Bolt weapons should be killing unarmored enemies as well as infested.Flak should reduce the damge by 15-30% while Carapace (unpowered Ceramite) should have 50-75% damage reduction. It should stagger Crushers at 3+ body shots and only 1 at head shot, anything other than Ogryns and Monstrosities should be staggered in 1 shot. Bolt weapons should be horde clearing, high CC/stagger weapon and should be above to a simple Revolve in regards to damage, especially since it's a miniature RPG/rocket that penetrate and explode inside the target's body. I would suggest to make the Revolver like a shotgun that have damage fall off above 15-25 meters and be the same damage as Vraks Headhunter Autogun, which they need to buff the damage in the first place, but has a close range buff to differentiate vs Autogun. Kinda like a shotgun where the closer the target is the higher the damage and can penetrate Flak but reduced against Carapace by at least 30% instead of 50+% since there's a close range buff (within 10m) and should have higher damage than Bolt weapon, in close range. By having a Plasma weapon in the game, the Bolter shines with its original usage and be closer to lore accuracy. It shouldn't be at the same category as Plasma with regards to its usage (anti-armor vs unarmored) and it will bring its iconic status no shame vs other weapons (especially the Revolver). Now if they add the Hotshot Lasgun, Melta gun and other iconic weapons, they wouldn't have a nerf Revolver (if they do nerf it) to compare against with and wouldn't tranish the lore they took it from. But if they didn't touch the Revolver, many people will be dissatisfied because a simple Revolver outshines all of the iconic weapons of 40k.

Hes evolved into the reaction youtuber. Also your pumping these videos. Oh what are your thoughts on the new helldivers upgrades, I like them but my friends say its to grindy.

I agree with you on basically everything up until the bolter. Prior to that you were talking about how we should not just look to lore, but once the bolter comes up you focus entirely on lore. Also, bolters are usually said to have very good armor penetration, they're used against space marines after all. It does change between who's actually writing a story, but generally bolters have better armor pen than any other weapon which we actually see in the game. I also think that tabletop rules should really only be for a basic guide and not as an actual measure of accuracy; in table top autoguns and lasrifles have the exact same profile, while pistols are exactly the same but with shorter range and no rapid fire. Table top and darktide both take liberties to balance their respective games, it doesn't make sense to compare the two. Besides that, i did really agree with your video a lot more than jtc's and thought your balance ideas and experience with these weapons was better, but it's just weird that you seem to switch from concern about game balance to lore accuracy with the bolter, and i also think the lore isn't even as restrictive as you paint it.

Perfect strike and shred makes chainswords horde cleaner, I guess that was what he meant

11:00 IMO the thing the force swords should do is have unusual psi-buffed attacks, such as one that drains your victim’s HP to heal yourself, or one that chucks out an energy wave that pierces enemies in a line.

I wish some of the jank around adsing with the bolter was removed. Carapace dmg is okayish and actually forces you to invest in crits or shattering. After so many hours, the last thing i want is a do-it-all weapon. Finding workarounds, combos and synergies between talents is a minigame in itself. And this is why i enjoy the tac axe rn.

I prefer the Chain Axe (the old MK) over any of the other chain weapons, probably one of my favorite weapons in general.

So lore wise bolters could get a hidden mechanic modifying their damage chart, based on the targets "squishiness". Bonus damage vs. pox walkers and the like, on top of other skills/blessings/etc. But keep the low damage/stagger against carapace UNLESS we use Rending/Brittleness and similar stuff. Simulating bullets (mini rockets) hitting the soft spots through the cracked armour and activating the hidden mechanic of bonus damage vs. soft targets. This way you won't mind the recoil and overall felling of bolter's bulk. Because you are carrying a BIG, explody nut-cracker. Just a fast, unfiltered thought...

CHAD chaxe enthusiast DESTROYS youtuber with FACTS and LOGIC. Jokes aside, kudos to you for the respect and restraint while tackling these *interesting* takes. Good points all around!

Game design hard. :) My only bit is that if something is going to be unwieldy, it better goddamn do it's designated job or it will be ignored. The Thunderhammer is a great example of a weapon where this happens. While I appreciate the value of a meme pick, having seen demonstrations of their cleave making it useless against hordes I was just baffled that it is implemented that way.

Personally. As a flamer user and lover, I would like it changed in two fold. One, be able to be used on the veteran. Two, personally I dislike the the aim down sights for a stream of flame, I would like it if the special was a switch modes rather than a bash so that I don’t need to aim down sights the rip through a horde with the cleansing fire of the emperor

Oh yeah the only 2 DT creators I watch will have beef. Ok to be real I respect you two so much. I dont tink any real beef will ever emerge, but a back and forth discussion would be fun : )

Wondering if you have a video lined up for shock mauls! Been running the Agni Mk la and its been serving me pretty well, just not sure what to build it for nor which mk is better for which scenario.

although I'd agree that the boltgun doesn't really have any precedent at being good against carapace armor (in the fantasy flight rpgs it had exactly enough to pen imperial guard armor) I would actually like it to be better against those targets as there's a pretty intense lack of anti carapace ranged weapons. Feels like more of a zealot issue but after the most recent patch your ranged options for dealing with armor are so few and that's not likely to change anytime soon as I doubt they'd get access to hotshots and the melta gun may just never come. I do think game balance should be slightly bent on iconic parts of a game, in the same way a fireball in dnd 5e is designed to be stronger because of it's icon status the bolt gun should be too. doesn't have to be horrendously op but it should shine, it is THE 40k gun.

7:26 and make so if the special hit is a crit the sound is like a 50 cal reverberating into all corners of existence

Crucis was always bad outside monster deletion memes, but it's been really left in the dirt by the overall power creep of the game, both for the rejects and the enemies. Enemies got more health, so Crucis stopped being able to deliver elite 1-taps, and, perhaps even more significantly, enemy density got cranked out the wazoo. People used to talk about using camera and animation manipulation to "snipe" elites in the middle of a horde with the Crucis special, back in the days when hordes weren't composed of 15 superimposed ragers, but I really don't think that you could reliably pull off such a feat now. And even if you could, it still wouldn't kill the target! Weapons like this frustrate me - realizing that the Crucis can't 1 tap elites anymore and fixing it should take like 15 minutes of work, and instead the weapon has been left to languish for two years. On the other hand, I think it's the only truly "bad" melee weapon in the game, so that's something at least - most weapons are only bad relative to a group of overperformers (combat axe, knife, power sword, revolver, plasma, ciag5, basically any psyker weapon), but still feel good in it of themselves.

Chainswords are brutal AF, thats enough for me. BLOOD FOR THE BLOOD GOD!

From 2nd edition 40K; which is the definitive edition and the purest ideal of 40K. This is objectively true because I read the core rulebook, wargear book and background book at a bit too young an age back in 1994 and it rewrote my brain. This is the weapons and armour stats from 2E (mostly identical to 1st edition). It was before 3E simplified Armour Piercing to be all or nothing. (Yeah it is odd from modern 40K that lasgun and bolter has identical -1 armour save modifier) Boltgun: Strength 4, -1 Save Mod. Flamer: Strength 4, -2 Save Mod (yeah this is a bit odd given Flak) Autogun: Strength: 3, No Save Mod. Lasgun: Strength: 3, -1 Save Mod. Plasma Gun: Strength: 7, -2 Save Mod.(1 sustained fire dice, needs to recharge for 1 turn after firing). Ogryn Rippergun: Str: 4, No Save Mod. 2 sustained fire dice. Auto hit at short range (0-6") -2 to hit Long Range (6-12") Chain Sword: Strength 4, -1 Save Mod. Parry (can choose to force opponent to reroll their higher attack dice) Chain-Axe: As user +1, Save Mod: -2 (probably strength 4 as normal humans were STR 3 base, STR 4 for Marines) - introduced in Codex: Chaos 2E from 1996. So was more a Chaos SM weapon. Flak Armour: 6+ Save/5+ vs Blast Weapons (anything with blast markers like frag grenades/missiles, flamers etc) Mesh Armour: 5+ Save (only 90's kids and Eldar players will remember this) Carapace Armour: 4+ Save Power Armour: 3+ Save.

Fully agree. I saw JTC's vid and was confused about the chainaxe. Dude use a push attack! The thunder hammer looks even more anaemic with the pickaxes added. My mining ogryn can annihilate armoured elites but thammer can't.

Balancing weapons according to how they perform in the lore should be considered, but it shouldn’t be high on the priority list. There’s nothing lore accurate about a team of 4 Astra Militarum dudes taking on 2,000+ traitor guard every mission they deploy on.

IMO I like the jank ADS on the bolt weapons. You can get used to it, and it fits the hard to use nature of the weapons. I also like it giving some more function to Deadshot, which the bolt weapons pair well with.

Does flamethrowers just in general don’t really care about any kind of body armor? Like the fire will make the Armour burning hot which would burn your skin anyway so it really don’t need to penetrate.

I am glad to see such a civil conversation about this game, when i watched JTClive video, my first thought was "what would Regi say about Mark 4 Chainaxe?" and here we are. Ngl i will take a side of a chainaxe cultist on this topic, rather than JTClive's side, it's just makes sense to me. I don't like thunderhammers in general, cos they work more as a "delete boss button" rather than being an actually useful weapon, and stealthknife zealot can deal with bosses really well while still be good against heavier elites, so i will gladly see thunderhammers be reworked in something more useful. About bolters - i am on a side of turning it into a good marksman weapon rather than going for full auto destruction. I think Tanner has a good vet marksman build for bolter, and this is where it should lean to in my opinion. Marksman with fullauto option if situation calls for it. And yeah, limb damage and body damage on trash mobs should be better. AND OF COURSE REMOVE THAT JANK AIMING WHY IS IT EVEN A THING?! It's still leaves a question of "why headhunters and lucius lasguns are bad as marksman weapons?" and i don't have the answer for that. When the patch dropped and i didn't have time to run with flamer i too thought that it will be bad and agreed with JTClive, but then i tried it and a flamer still was very good at what it does - control elites with M1 (and Fan the Flames) and delete hordes with M2. And that before buff dropped. PSA: Flamer video is also a good showcase of a fact that even without rendering flamer still does his job totally fine. However we got the buff anyway, and now flamer is better than it was with rending in my opinion - more power means more stagger with M1, and i am always for that. It was a very good video, Regi, this is what i really wonna see in this community - real balance conversations between content creators on a respectable level.

Another bolter mk would be sweet but the one we have now could use slight revisit on damage values against different types. From highest to lowest; Unarmored>Infested>Maniac>Flak>Unyielding>Carapace. Slight improvement in stagger rate against unyielding and carapace. Makes bolter annihilate what you expect, be good against light armor and medium toughness but mediocre with heavy armor and greater toughness. Current reloading and equip speeds are rough but should stay around. Another thing i would love to have is more interesting blessings and some to promote accuracy or quality of fire. Something like: Weak spot hits gaining stacking bleed or Critical kills gain more stagger and damage radius. Oh an totally fix the damn ADS and recoil spaz.

I found this drama more entertaining than the actual story of Darktide 😂

Imagine being able to disagree with someone and not go completely schizo about it. Reginald stays winning.

Agreed on all points 🤙

I think the Recon Lasgun needs a lot of love. There's no real reason to use it over things like the Infantry Autogun V or the braced autoguns. A sight would help ALOT for them because then you could take advantage of the low recoil and accuracy at range.

Tanner Lindberg sent me here.

2:07 the chainsword has wrath and shred, while the chain axe has headtaker and bloodletter, which are the best blessings for boss killing. How do they compare when the chainsword also has bloodletter?

If you have the % each staggered enemy (forgot the name of the blessing) you can throw a granade, stagger/hit 5 enemies and unload the bolter on a monsters weakspot will '1 shot' them. :) Chain axe isn't too good vs hordes agreed but I still have missions with 1m damage while using it. It's still very viable but not easy to use for sure

From everything I’ve done in dark tide the side of the story I hear is like it would be nice if they did this, but we have this The flamer is great for hoard clear I don’t really like using it on heavy armor targets because it’s low damage and yes, you could get pen for it, but I don’t really like that When I pick the flamethrower, I bring a hammer for everything else And I focus entirely on holding back the horde And keeping peoples health better than if they had not had me Because I reduce corruption And literally the definition of too angry to die My veteran has four loadouts five if you really think about it, but I don’t use the fourth Backstabber Sharpshooter Sergeant Doom guy Before loadouts name state themselves It’s very fun

Only thing I disagree with: Vraks 7 HH (you said autogun tho) doesn't need to delete maniacs. It deletes everything else extremely well. Other than bosses, Dreg Bruisers, unarmored ragers, and Crushers, the V7 basically annihilates everything in Damnation, limited by your head-clicking ability. Underrated gun. Hundreds of hours with it, and I can barely make myself put it down.

Just a pointer, when you show excel sheets on your video please explain it a little because I had no idea what you where taking about with them.

Fight! Fight! Fight! Also discourse is good.

Yeah I don't get JTC's reasoning. I found the horde clearing of the assault CS to be spotty, the charge attacks lacking the oomph and the LMB spam a bit chaotic and inconsistent cuz of the strange swing pattern. The heavy chainaxes charge attacks are so good if you can spam them without getting hit you'll rack up the kills.

You've made a fantastic example on how to disagree with someone in a way that is respectful and ushers in further discussion. Thank you for everything you do =) I am not really a WH 40k nerd/fan, but it is very odd to me that the flamethrower in this game is bad against carapace. Hot, sticky fire has, historically, been a fantastic way to deal with armored targets! Both on an infantry level, tanks, whatever. I'm sure it's for game balance, but I would love the primary bottleneck to be something like total ammo or ammo consumption, like you brought up. I recently found your channel, and I think it's folks like you, Jtc, and others that really help keep this games community alive =)

Hey Reginald whats your thought on helbore lasguns? They're my fav las weapon but I just cant bring them to damnation difficulty, always feel like pretty much any other lasgun does their job and more.

Agree with you, Reginald. Heavy bolter and meltagun when??

I don't like the Chain Axes because the sound effects sound bad compared to the Chain Swords, also the Chain Swords feel more versatile. That said, would like to see Zealot get the two-handed Chain Axe the Maulers carry.

Absolutely agree with all your points. Keep up the great work!

An idea I've been kicking around in re: the flamer... On top of its weakness in being overspecialized for horde clear, I've noticed that people seem to rarely if ever use its primary fire--which is understandable, since the flamer's longer pullout time and the power of its secondary fire means you usually don't need a little puff of flame that staggers hordes. What if pressing the Special button had your character inject some sort of special sauce into the promethium tank, or placed a modded thingamajig on to the barrel, that made your *next Primary fire hot* place a debuff on flak and carapace enemies that made them take more damage for a short period of time? This Special fire wouldn't itself do very much damage, but I feel like it could give the flamer a use against more heavily armored targets without becoming a game-turn-off button. It also kinda fits with the lore, where certain factions might use alternate fuels or projectiles for their flamers, like the pre-Heresy Death Guard turning their flamers into chemical sprayers. So the lore justification for this Special shot is that the Reject applies like, sticky napalm or some corrosive substance to an armored enemy that melts or compromises their armor for a temperorary period of time.

"He's saying that about the Mk4 Chainaxe and probably the Mk12 Chainaxe" THERE'S MORE THAN 1 CHAINAXE!! When was that added? I've had a Chainaxe Zealot(it's a tossup between Thunderhammer or Chainaxe being my fave) and Vet since the start but I completely missed a second Chainaxe.

They always nerf weapons and forget about them.

i love the hammers i would love for some small buffs

I still enjoy the bolter, its a oh shit i need a quick crusher delete button before im turn to dust, unload, stun grenade, reload, unload.

I felt a wave of relief when you busted out the numbers. I felt like I had just sat down after a hard day. Damn. Straight credible facts. A wonderful Oasis in this desert. Please carry on.

Thank you for mentioning the vraks rifle. the only sniper weapon is helbore and revolver pretty much. It doesn't make sense to me that a revolver is more reliable than a long rifle for long range encounters. The burst fire varients are also pretty bad. heavy bolter for ogryns annnnnnnd autoguns are pretty meh too

I use your builds almost exclusively

buff hammer, remove self stun, as far as being too good at boss killing. I kind of agree about boss killing but when you are dedicating your entire build to one hit, on a tight timing, in melee, easily interrupted or the boss moving away or aoe attacking etc..... i don't think it's too strong, if you take the other three classes and fully dedicate your build to boss killing. In a single skill cd all the classes can delete a boss, psyker being the weakest and needs a buff but can be done so does it really matter if zealots version of it is a difficult combo on a trash weapon in melee range? really?

I haven't used mk 4 Chainaxe in a very long while - might have to give it another chance heh. btw, could you share the link to the weapon damage spreadsheet you've featuring in the video please?

I agree that the bolter shouldn’t be amazing against carapace armor. There’s this weird tendency to treat the bolter as a bigger deal then it is, when even space marines have several specialist weapons to deal with enemies that even heavy bolters can’t. They should be good against everything, they are the main infantry rifle of space marines for a reason, but being especially good against carapace seems a step too far.

I was hoping they make ogryn gun absolutely op with very low ammo, like a ripper gun having 120 reserve ammo and tge kickback 35 feels wierd, like where does he carry that, another thing i never liked is the way toughness is presented, there isn't explanation whybits there, i did find a mod that give you the refracto shield, only aesthetically, but it made me think it would be cool each class has a lore reason for toughness, the vet has a shoddy refracto shield, zealot has a relic powered with faith and feeds of melee kills while other classes dont, psyker couod use its abilities for a shield and has the most between classes, ogryns can have no bar but have damg resist againts smaller targets but have a ludicrous amount of HP and generate toughness for the team passively while other classes dont do that, idk just a autistic ramble on the side

Can we get a new discord link sometime? Love the content big dog, still watched even when I took a break from Darktide ❤

DRAMA WAR, REGINALD HATES JTCLIVE!!!

I rarely comment, and tend to play just the video games of 40k, and I play darktide alot and I'm no legend at it either so I have no place making a comment here anyway but Im going to, I just found your channel and watched this on a whim an I agree with ALL of you balance opinions, I'm really shocked someone feels similarly especially about the chainaxes.

The only thing I agree with is the flamer. Yes, please. God. It needs that armorbuff.

Yepp i agree with most of this, however as a hammer user with a one shot build, I dont really want any changes to the crucis maybe some extra stagger. The crucis should stay the bosskiller hammer, and the irohelm should be changed to be good against elites/groups of elites. With this build i can make bosses dissapear, but in exchange im just okay at best in everything else, and constantly low on health. Also with this one shot build my flamer is decent too against armored targets, if im in a pinch and i have to get rid of a mauler or crusher group. Also people tend to forget there is 3 other rejects playing with you, so every weapon should have some downsides.

Good one Reginald. :)

I love his vt content and all, but I can't help but feel like all the points jtc makes for Darktide is simply parroting the loudest voices from the forums instead of taking a stance on what feels best for the game's identity. I feel like as a tide veteran he would appreciate how lower ttks and weapon specializations lead to a more interesting flow of gameplay, but here we are homogenizing armor classes because the game is balanced towards throwing clown caravans of elites and specials at you (I get that for ratmen and cultists, but plowing through entire battalions of battle-hardened soldiers and specialists is still a niggling gripe I have in matters of tone). 22:33 Given his videos on smite, he'd probably argue for brainswitch weapons to exist on the highest difficulties because PvE games should prioritize accessible playstyles over skill expression. 23:35 I actually quite like the feel of the headhunter mk7.The zoom it already provides is sizeable and functional for the firefights in this game. Scopes can still be pretty cool aesthetically and I'm still holding out hope for the weapon customization update 3 years down the line. Definitely feel like I'm gimping myself when comparing to the other sniper weapons though.

Doesn't space marines also use a more rare type of ammo for boltguns?

I to love the chain weapons, even consider myself a eviscerator craftsman agree with most everything you say on this. Also OP is boring, gimme a weapon I can take time to learn and master!

Link to spreadsheet?

wait, that's a dude's voice?

Chain axe just use Defense stat, that's why it can't be very mobile.

All the chainaxe needs is just better dodges than 2 handed weapons, and it'll be fine. I'm of the opinion that the thunder hammer stun can partially stay for the feel of the weapon, but it needs to let you defend yourself during that time. Have the stun prevent you from attacking and pushing, but let you dodge and block. Let Thammer players use their defensive tools after a special attack, but keep the lull in offense after one still. It definitely needs to be able to 1 tap all non-boss enemies with a charged special + thrust. That's the point of the weapon, the big enemy delete button. You can force it with a headshot crit from FoF on ogryns and maulers, but you can't do it without that. Whatever direction that they take for the bolter, it needs to not be pigeonholed into a precision weapon role to get reasonable damage. That's how it currently is, and it sucks because of its terrible handling and recoil making it entirely unfun to use, since you need headshots to do good damage. It needs to do more base damage on body hits, and its damage needs to be normalized across body parts so that it can reliable 1 shot regular enemies. Probably have it 1 shot headshot or 2 shot body shot most human sized elites/specials outside of maybe maulers, mutants, and ragers. I've always thought that the agrippina shotgun's regular shells have felt lackluster, and I almost exclusively use it with the slug shot, since it's so good. The only time I use the regular shot is for spamming it at shooter/special heads, since it doesn't have the damage to kill them in 1 shot, even to the head. I've felt like the lawbringer shotgun is outclassed by the kantrael shotgun ever since it's release, and now it's outclassed by the hacker shotgun too. I just don't really feel like it has its own niche, and the other 2 shotguns are just better in almost every way. I really want to love the vraks VII headhunter, but yeah, its damage is so unnecessarily nerfed vs a lot of priority targets that it just isn't capable of doing its job of being a headshot king properly. Modding a scope on it helped a lot, but it would help a ton if it had a togglable magnified scope for longer range shots by default. I tried using the modded magnified scopes, but I couldn't deal with having it for closer ranges.

Now you two just need a rigged boxing match to seal the deal

Every Darktide channel has a speeadsheet. I'm glad this game requires the least interesting part of the table top.

For the boltgun, an observation: Why do people not want or accept having to shoot a target multiple times? From a gameplay standpoint, is it really because you're that miffed it doesn't kill as fast as desired, or is it because you dread the reload afterwards? I think that it would be easiest, as a starting balance attempt, to only touch its draw speed and reload time first. Let it be in the fight for more of the time and let that simmer amongst the playerbase. Then we can think about whether it really needs bigger damage numbers, which is the type of buff that carries the most risk of unintended effects on boss enemies. Lore wise, these are also smelly-green-man cultists, they might have delved deep enough to be a bit harder to kill than the average person, unfortunately just enough to beat those breakpoints.

The Bolter section was just like 20 minutes of way too much lore 🤣

Ranged weapons in general should have their damage reduced against carapace. I would like to play with crusher packs in melee and not just have them get blasted by ranged instantly.

Bolter only really needs some damage buffs against unarmoured + maniac (about 25%), Bolter pistol this damage only applies to the headshot multiplier, and arm shots do not reduce damage. Bolter full auto fire should have more recoil (unless crouched) and less ammo 15-60. Also nerf damage to carapace armour by 20%.

Using rules for miniature game instead of lore for determining weapon strength is stupid