0:00 Overview and Evidence 8:45 What are Genestealers and How do their Cults form? 10:48 The Genestealer/Tyranid roster in Darktide 14:56 Elites, Special, and Bosses

The question has never been "are they", the psyker has long talked about a shadow in the warp over atoma (which everyone knows is nids) and how were not allowed to talk about the other hive, the question has always been "will fat shark stick it out long enough to"

Genestealer ambushes that simultaneously attack us and Chaos would be so cool. There is so much banter referencing possible other locations and enemy factions. It makes me wonder what Darktide could look like in a couple of years.

The genre along with the IP has immense potential. Hope Overweight Carcharhiniform can live up to it.

I've been hoping for more diversity since vermintide, a shame the castle maps didn't have skeletons and zombies with a VC boss.

The idea of a Genestealer and Nurgle cults fighting and keeping each other in check sounds fun from both a lore and gameplay perspective. I would be all for this.

Ever since the second hive city was mentioned in dialogue it made perfect sense to me to have a genestealer faction in darktide

This would be a very small touch but I would like to occasionally see the garrison troops shooting at the bad guys

I want a tech priest class

The recent Wyrmwood transmission could also hint at a new specialist like the xeno Loxatl. They're stealthy, hunt by scent, and work with Chaos. It would take great advantage of the verticality of some levels. It would force players to look up and around for hidden reptilians clinging to walls and ceilings just waiting to dice throne agents with nasty waste mounted flechette guns.

Enemy factions fighting each other as well as the players sounds like it could be really fun. It has the potential to add situations where players have to engage more carefully; for example, situations where players have to not aggro both factions else they get overwhelmed. I think it adds some nice play diversity

This could be really cool. I'd like to see the followers of the other chaos gods make an appearance, but getting Genestealers, Orks, or Dark Eldar would be extremely appreciated.

Considering the Timing, it makes sense for it to be Genestealers. Tyranids are very popular these days, with them getting the main spotlight for 10th edition, being the big bads of Space Marine 2 and coming to Tacticus as a new playable faction. It would make sense for Darktide to reflect the 4th Tyrannic war with the rise of Genestealers.

I absolutely adore the vibe of the GSC, the idea of this group of oppressed mutants leading a glorious revolution to usher in their bright new future, only to find out at the end that they were simply pawns of an eldritch monstrosity, just beautifully grimdark. And yeah, they make an awful lot of sense as a faction to add to Darktide. That being said, I does make me wonder what a slightly less predictable faction could look like. Like I wonder what the reception would be if they announced they were adding the Tau as an enemy XD

I really do hope they add cults of this being. Would be cool and perhaps even introduce some horror elements within Darktide, even if Atoma is already fucked from Chaos.

There is a psyker line from the dreamer that might imply that Zola has been compromised, as they mention in some dialouge with a Zealot that they had a dream with two Zolas, but one had mangled the other beyond recognition.

Genestealers, Nids, other chaos god cultists, could all be realistically added without breaking the little narrative that we have. Even the dark mechanicus could be added. It is an industrial hive after all. Half the maps are factories it feels like.

I only hope that if there IS another faction, I'd like them to be opposed/in conflict with the Forces of Chaos and NOT just a reskin of previous enemies.

A lictorboss you fight distributed over the whole lvl would be very interesting

One of the psycher voicelines I heard got me "Darkness falls on Atoma" and i immediately thought of the Shadow of the Warp that the Nids have.

Honestly, I would of actually liked to see the Dark Mechanicus come out of nowhere. Made sense with the whole "Shove demons in all the machinery". Plus they have already noted in the refinery restart missions how strange it is that they're not just tearing the place apart. Hadron says it's so they can make spiky tanks but that's not really Chao's thing. Not the spiky tanks part, that's totally a thing but actually manufacturing them. That's really the ground of the Dark Mechanicus.

We absolutely need an ad mech class. A tech priest may be a stretch but skittari would be perfect. They already have 3 classes lined up with ranger, rust stalker and infiltrator, and have a plethora of cool weapons to use like arc rifles, cognis guns and the dreaded transonic razors

Damn i hope so. More multi-faction L4D style games from all universes

I’ve been really hoping for Khornite Demons. Like a gathering of demons, one big guy. If you challenge the big guy to single combat, the horde makes a fighting ring, but only ONE of you can fight and kill him. If anyone else hits the big guy, the horde is aggro’d. If you win, the horde disappears and you get a reward

I'm fine with this... finally. Honestly looking back, with the new models from tabletop since Deathwing Space Hulk came out, might be interesting to see genestealers and neophytes and aberrants. If we could get confirmation on daemons and see other chaos gods fight for Atoma as a dev blog -- I'd buy every cosmetic to fund this!

100% the best enemies for this game. Considering it's been a huge waste if Dan's skills. Tyranids will be really really bloody interesting an make ut feel far more dark an horror than chaos ever could

It's funny because I always thought the Trapper was more of a GSC model than a Chaos one. It's literally the Webber from the Neophyte Hybrid squad.

Yes! This makes complete sense and I would love to see a Genestealer Cult but I hope they also include a Plague Marine boss mission.

I know from a lore sense it'd be sacrosanct but id LOVE to see a Lictor as a random boss, one with a hit and run, cloak/decloak mechanic, instead of being a straight up fight like the others, it would slink away to stalk the players as the move through the level, ambushing them, or the observant team could get the drop on it too to clean it up. Give it a L4D smoker tounge and bing bang boom, awesome addition.

I think Aberrants/Abominants would be the Plague Ogryn/Beast of Nurgle equivalent bosses, while a Patriach could be the focus of Assassination missions.

I’d love maps where you face both nurgle and gsc forces, be super cool if you could stumble upon both sides in the middle of a firefight.

It will be interesting to see the Genestealer Cult fighting the Nurgle Plague hordes throughout parts of the missions, allowing us to slip pass stealthy or blast our way through

With the current edition of table top launching with new tyranids and space marine 2 being nid focused it would make sense that more 40k titles are working to get nids as a overall plan by GW marketing to keep things consistent with where the current lore is at

This would be really cool and would make a ton of sense especially with space marine 2 around the corner focusing on the tyranids as the main enemy type for that game

Multiple enemy factions engaging each other and you would be absolutely incredible. There's so much you can do in a Hiveworld, even above the 'true' enemies - what about the various gangers? It'd make total sense to find groups of them in game.

really well done, love all these ideas!

There's also the interesting (speculated) bit of info regarding the inclusion of the Death Korps. It's made clear that the gear we get are scavenged from the dead. The gear we get from the Maskers carry the sigil of the 13th Heavy Tank company. It's likely the 13th, specialising in heavy tanks - with several of our missions constantly stressing we need more tanks.. likely for them - is currently in the wastes between Tertium and her sister hive, either quarantining or stalling whatever is in there from reaching Tertium and reinforce the heretics - or replace them, so to say. The Death Korps is not exactly deployed lightly, and their presence on world is highly concerning. Then again this is all speculation coming from some idiot who noticed an interesting sigil on the pauldron of two of the cashshop krieg sets. I may just be completely wrong here.

As an aside, the tech needed to create conflicts between enemy factions, like Nurgle vs Genestealers, could also be used to add conflicts between Chaos factions. Perhaps Khorne, Slaanesh, or especially Tzeentch cultists and lower daemons start showing up, to contest Nurgle's attempted stranglehold of the planet. Perhaps the Rager can be reskinned as a Khorne unit, with a tendency to attack anyone and anything in range.

You filled the desire for what is next. I've been wondering what they will do with their follow-up update for a couple weeks. This makes so much sense.

I think the patriarch boss fight could be a story high point where you assist the inquisitor in killing it. Like you've stacked up enough trust and prestige that you're selected as part of the inquisitors patriarch kill team as the screen for whatever important other units they've got, like a deathwatch spacemarine or one of the assassinorum(?) or something. Being the bait yourselves and using environmental things(like slag from a foundry, or a train) to force the patriarch into a killbox

it would be cool if we have a mission where we infiltrate enemy lines during an all out conflict between nurgle cult and genestealer cults. Just imagine twice as much enemies spawn on map but 2 sides fight each other as much as they fight you. Would be chaotic and awesome

I really think this game could use raids with multiple bosses mmo style. Be a great way to tell the story and give us good content with unique bosses and fights. Hell I'd even be up for them to be 8 man team to make it feel more epic.

This sounds really interesting if it does happen. I'd love to see a new mission for the Patriarch, luring him back through a level to the Leman Russ defensive line to kill it maybe? A whole mission of running, gunning and being chased.

This has been my theory for a long time. I'm very excited to see what comes next. More classes, more enemies, more maps, more story, more game modes, more challenges

The amount of weapons they could add is almost limitless. From the normal ones like the bolt pistol to the crazy are and exotic ones like vortex grenades. They could let the player use almost anything in the Imperium of mans/inquisitorial arsenal

This was something that I was thinking about myself, that Genestealer cults would be perfect for a game like this. Honestly, I'd have preferred them to Nurgle to be honest, so I'm stoked at the idea they might ACTUALLY come to Darktide. I think my only point of contention is what units we'd see and in what roles. I don't think the Patriarch makes sense as a boss unless its like...a story mission? Cause if it died, and if you're fighting it, it can die. No way Fat Shark does a 'just survive' final mission even if it would be a cool change of pace. But yeah, if the Patriarch dies then the cult falls apart. Would it return? Sure, EVENTUALLY. It would mean the cult ceases to be an enemy faction for years. Aside from that, I doubt the rejects could kill a Patriarch. Unlike daemonhosts, there's not a ton of variety in a Patriarch's power from another one...they're just sheer power but also mind control which the rejects (aside from maybe the psyker) has any protection from. Never mind a single hit should rip through a character per hit from one of those behemoths. So my protest is lore based, but more of the 'if the patriarch dies, the cult goes dormant until another genestealer can complete that metamorphisis which takes a long time' and a 'something that shreds terminator armor while also being able to tank that level of damage in return is probably outside our pay grade in it SHOULD just kill the rejects very quickly'. But a 'survive against the Patriarch until extraction arrives? Inject that into my veins, lol. That said..I think you have some perfect boss enemies already in the faction. The Primus, Magus, and maybe the Redactus Sabotaur. A lot more variety there than with the traitor guard captains. Meanwhile you have the other hero types for various elite roles, Abominants for sub bosses. Maybe something like a Lictor (another vanguard organism could make sense) but what I'd love to see is vehicle boss like the rock grinder or something like that. Really separate Darktide from Vermintide by bringing in vehicle encounters could be awesome. I'd say a genestealer boss but..well..video already covered that for as lethal as they are, they aren't super durable. Which, ironically, makes them perfect for a pox hound like role.

It would make absolute sense for Genestealers to come to Darktide. Current TableTop Lore and minis are pushing Tyranids heavily and Genestealers are adjacent to that. They have been sneaking in more and more lore into the game and since Darktide is supposed to be a game that has a long tail, similar to Vermentide, then it would make sense they would hope to leverage it to move minis by incorporating "current event" from the tabletop. Nids are hot right now, push nids. Recent books are also related to the current Nids invasion so that is also another cool tie-in to try to get people invested in the media. I'm interested in seeing what they add. Going to be very cool.

Ha nice! I made a post on the steam discussion board about this last week. There's so much potential to do something with this. I'd love a chaos wastes style gameplay mode where we investigate/explore the second hive that culminates in a boss fight vs the patriarch.

They could also be adding Hive gangs, Dark Eldar or a new chaos faction coming up. I kind of hope they go with Dark Eldar. it would be kind of cool to have the Dark Eldar raiding the population for slaves during the confusion of everything going on. it also could bring out some cool boss fights and new Aliens to fight.

This topic is super interesting and I believe the genestealer cult is almost guaranteed at this point but what I want to know is what the 5th character spot is going to be? Never played vermintide but I guess I could go look at there available classes to give me an idea of what roles are covered.

i would absolutely Adore GSC in Darktide, especially if a squad or troop of them could just randomly door kick their way into a run you're already doing as a random curveball, would be a really neat addition in alot of ways

Genestealers would be awesome and make the most sense to add in. That said, I would love me some Orks or Slaanesh representation.

Wish we got to see Arbites, they’d be the last holdout, maybe we’ll see a Arbite fortress-precinct with friendly AI fighting valiantly to their last where you can help, or enemy ai fighting guardsmen still loyal/ gangers that are still loyal fighting the cult (gangs ONLY stop fighting each other when cults pop up), I think we’ll see gangers v cultists, cultists v cultists maybe? Also friendly AI v cultists / enemies in general

Would be cool to see more mission variety and scenarios like where the opposing factions swarm against each other.

Love all the Darktide content! been a great spice up to normal total war.

I’d love to fight Nids and Stinky bois but I’m unsure they can add an entire new faction and new locations in less than 5 years.

Would love to see an update where you have the chance to run into an ork band of raiders

I would really like to see nurglings, plaguebearers and flying enemies as well the other chaos gods represented, mostly slaanesh seems awesome.

you know what would be really cool and to help differenciate darktide from other horde shooters? going off with the last boss idea you were talking about, an 8 player map where 2 teams are fighting off the hordes, later converge together as a finale with raid boss style mechanics but simple enough that randoms don't need full communication.and if one team gets wiped, it's still doable but just harder

I could see them going with a Pactsworn theme in Darktide as GC have been known to fall/worship chaos as well at least in the early editions of Warhammer 40k. However I do like the idea of a 3 way war and cutting your way through an ongoing fight with your team to reach objectives much better then just the one faction

Took them a year to just add skilltrees. Probably take them a decade to add a new enemy.

I'm totally ignorant of all those lore, so it was cool hearing your theories and ideas of how it can be implemented

I recently got into tabletop with genestealer cults. I would love nothing more than to see my bois up close.

They added a whole faction in vt2 with the beast beastmen. Would not be a stretch for them to add GSC

I was hoping for Khorne themed enemies even, something varied from zombie dudes and nurgle muck. For both this and V2. But I’d take gsc as a boon as well! I can only hope to fight a nid prime one day 🙏 also chaos space marine bosses? Plz

God, genestealers would be so fun to fight. I really hope this happens. I also saw a video a bit ago where someone was talking about different ideas for new classes and one of them was a genestealer. I think it would be really funny to have a genestealer in the strike team while mowing down hordes of them and hearing a voiceline along the lines of "oi mates, are we sure we have to fight these guys? They seem pretty chill."

I've been expecting this for a while since I saw one of the 4 wheelers in the underhive in a mission that is identical to the one from the GSC Jackals model

Tyranids and Orks would be SCHWEET to add in.

i think all this messages are from the other Hive, the one no one is supposed to talk about

Fantastic breakdown and well researched, also love the rationalisation behind all of the hypotheses of what would fit where into gameplay and the power level based on canon. Based on the lore and your breakdown it sounds like gene-stealers could be a notably harder faction to fight gameplay-wise than any other in-game, which sounds like a very very interesting concept and would be great for the health of the game if implemented properly, especially seeing as how the player won't be bearing the full brunt of their force with new in-fighting. Already a lot of players are comfortable with the difficulty of damnation maelstrom and the like, so a hardcore campaign with a harder faction could be great, and for the lower difficulty casual play, the odd swarm or shock unit of gene-stealers among regular chaos fodder would be great to spice things up. Overall great video and I absolutely agree with everything you've covered. 👍

I don't have the game for money reasons but a mission that's a 3 way skirmish over something important (maybe plant a marker for an inquisitorial stormtrooper raid and leave as they come to secure the thing as an example) would be cool. Your group is there to soften the landing zone, mark it out and hurt both cults and traitors

Whether or not GSC will come to the game at some point, I can't say. It seems a bit odd open with that clip though, when that broadcast and the one before it are explicitly hinting to daemons

Genestealer cult is awesome! However i would like to see some sort of chaos undivided approach for the dlc after that. Keep the poxwalkers, they make a great horde-enemy. But add Tzeench specials (leech and blightstormer equivalents) and some dude that brainbursts one of your guys. Korn and Slanesh could add nice elites, too. Upgraded Ragers, Demonettes maybe as a very dangerous horde-type. And ofc some sort of lesser demons from all the chaos factions as a monstrosity.

Warhammer has been pretty good at the whole Genestealer thing recently, both in Darktide and in the fact that its becoming increasingly apperent that they will play a role in the Warhammer Crime series soon

These fellas would make low light/visibility missions into a true horror experience, getting real hopeful on this one.

I think the thing you're forgetting is that the only reason it's possible to fight one space marine is because Ogryns and psykers are powerhouses in lore, so I'd say it's somewhat accurate because the ogryns and psykers keep the power scaling at least relatively believable.

The kill team trailer with the krieg fighting orks makes me hope for a rogue ork invasion sometime

Love for the possibility of charging towards Chaos and Orks fighting each other, only to have Gene stealers also join the fray from behind our group.

There's also a vox message aboard the ship that makes mention of a Dark Eldar raid happening somewhere in the sector. I'm hoping they'll add them at some point.

I'd honestly want to see some of there vehicles used as a boss encounter, or the lead up to one with the boss crawling out after we disable it. The 'example' vehicles that got statted are all pretty much mining vehicles so having it so that we have to destroy one to stop their continued tunnelling could be interesting, and as explicitly jury rigged mining vehicles its easier to suspend SoD about a small team of operatives without heavy weapons actually managing to stop one. Not linked to the genestealers at all but I'd also like seeing either ambots or ambulls added, or some other hostile lifeforms that aren't explicitly connected to the rampaging cults. But are simply simple beasts doing what they do best and eating people, whether that person is good, bad or indifferent to the greater conflict. Make the world itself feel more unique than 'just a battleground for greater forces'. An idea linked to how you said about familiars for ad mech characters, do you think they could make it so that we can come across allies fighting during missions. Like an imperial guard squad cut off behind enemy lines or ad mech skitarii doing their best to keep a tech priest alive as he maintains/secures vital technology to the greater hive. Maybe we get a mission where we're deployed in a sector that is a more open battleground between the PDF & inquisitorial reinforcements and the cult forces. With us needing to complete a critical objective to either stem the tide and help our allies hold or cripple the cult defences so our allies can advance. Another possibility is that its not just a Nurgle cult running rampant on the world, but another cult of chaos that was trying to go under the radio while the Nurgle one stirring up all the attention. I could certainly see a Slaaneshi or Tzeentchian beastie/mutie being the one stalking the guy on the radio. And such a cult and the cult of admonition isn't likely to get along, especially if its because of the cult of admonition causing a ruckus that they got discovered simply through collateral damage.

Would love to see a mission where you have genestealer cult clashing with chaos cultists while trying to make it through from point A to point B through their fighting.

Great break down

These ideas for new enemies types are great, I hope fatshark does something similar

Genestealer Cults would definitely be a good fit and send a very positive message that Chaos, and especially Nurgle, is not the only force we'll face in Darktide. A Biophagus could also go full Hookrat if there is a chance, at least something like that would make sense as a melee attack option against a single character. They could also be closer to Globadiers, leaning into AOE debuffs, leaving a bit of room for the Reductus-Saboteur to go for AOE damage and explosive traps. The Locus could either be a slightly stealthy melee special, just waiting at a point of interest and unleashing a flurry of blades on the first character that gets close or a bodyguard for other specials. Or both, depending on the situation. The Nexos might be the most tricky to include, might actually be a case that would work best as the target of specific missions, given their role in coordinating the cult. Or maybe as a backline special that leads to more enemies spawning behind the players? They could buff Abominants a bit to use the as monstrosities, as Genestealer Cults are a bit lacking in the monstrous department. Ciaphas Cain, HERO OF THE IMPERIUM, killed a Patriarch, so why wouldn't we be able to do the same. Though he had a Jurgen as support, which we don't. And nothing stops GW from expanding the lore and giving Fatshark a bit more leeway. To me at least, it would make sense if some of the Purestrains, especially the ones of the Patriarch's original pack, would grow into something not quite on the Patriarch level as both a precaution in case the Patriarch is killed (to reduce the growth they'd have to undergo at that point) and as an elite force to either lead purestrain packs or go on solo missions. Or maybe that's just what Broodlords are and GW hasn't come around properly explaining that. While not technically part of the Genestealer Cults, I wouldn't mind having Lictors and Neurolictors show up as monstrosities, maybe even Von Ryan's Leapers as Elites or special. Tyranids in general would be a cool extension to that, adding a ton of additional elites, specials and monstrosities, but other than the vanguard organisms, I don't see that working in the narrative. One thing that might be cool, but would probably be really hard would be the addition of vehicles. They might work as monstrosity equivalents, but they'd be limited in their movement on many maps so I don't think that would work. Maybe specific maps could have scripted events with a random pick from a list of vehicle encounters in rather open sections: -Goliath Rockgrinder with heavy weapons that want to run over the players -Goliath Truck as a moving piece of cover for the cultists riding on the back -Achilles Ridgerunner as a fast weapons platform -a squad of Atalan Jackals that harass from all sides while the waves of cultists run into the players Another thing the whole NPC interaction mechanics open up is sections of missions where the players get reinforcements of the PDF or mission types like covering the retreat of a bigger unit or an evacuation with surgical strikes (while having the NPCs in question actually be present and not just be mentioned over coms) or maybe even escort missions.

Immagine a gene cultist running into a demonhost and triggering it, the rage

Another thing to point towards tyranids as the next new enemy is all the hype and attention building on them with getting new models and new lore from GW as the next big new enemy the imperium is facing in current lore now. As well as Space Marine 2 focusing on the bugs this time as well

19:23 To further support this lore refutation: Commissar Cain went "face-to-belly", as he put it, with a broodlord on Gravallax and held his own against the creature before his aid, Gunner Ferik Jurgen, was able to support him by charging in and cooking the Patriarch's insides with his Melter heavy weapon while Inquisitor Vale and a sniper kept the brood from overwhelming them. For every bit of lore lamenting the invincibility of foes in WH:40K there seems to be lore in another segmentum or even neighboring system that tells a different story.

Purestrains seem like they'd honestly be best as a special. Maybe a pinning one like the hounds, but maybe they're able to climb on ceilings and walls or something.

Man you read my mind. The only thing id want to add is a lictor boss. Devastation of Baal went into detail how a lictor could catch a ride on voidcraft similar to a genestealer so its feasible to have one.

I'm glad you mentioned the purple banners. I remember seeing those and thinking... hmmm... As for genstealers fighting the Admonition? Eh... I'd rather fatshark just focus on solid, consistent game updates than trying to be bold and almost certainly botching it with underwhelming delivery. What I'd like is something like this: Rejects get sent to the other hive because Grendyl wants to investigate reports of genestealer cults. You go in, and the first mission is very VERY "343 Guilty Spark." Lots of dead admonition around, our player characters remarking on how they've been torn to shreds, the atmosphere cooks for a short bit, building tension - then ambush by the genestealer cult. After that, several missions in the new hive gathering data and trying to disrupt their activity. At the end, cutscene showing that Grendyl has requested help dealing with the threat : intro Magos Biologis as new class.

Feel like to have two factions warging war while we carve a path threw both lines is cool and probably draw in both sides to cause more huge fights. Then have the first mission be to find her then the normal kill random generated genestealer leader types and have us try to cause new conflicts between both factions to start small wars with one another to help keep them distracted while the inquisitor trys to figure out how to salvage the world

I'd love to see you cover my boys the orks as a new potential darktide enemy, like what you did now with the genestealer cult. Can't leave out tve green boyz now can we? They are one of the og factions after all.

I hope that along with adding GSC I hope that they also add in the Loxatl. If Wyrmwood isn’t referencing GSC then that’s the only other unit I could think of that’d be hunting like that.

Genestealer Cult would be a pretty cool addition.

After reading the Infinite and the Divine, I've loved the Tyranids. Always been a fan but seeing a Tyranid cult take over a planet was wild.

me and my buddy were literally just talking about the possibility of them adding gene stealer cults for the second hive city the other day. Me personally, I would like to see khornites added to the game but I won't complain either way cuz Im just happy to see this game is on the come up after such a rough start

New maps, mission variety and types, and of course new factions is definitly the way to go to upscale the content. Like the idea of a Genestealer Cult and different factions fighting each other, and would also like to include an Orc infestation or Dark Eldar invasion to spice it up (xenos, heretics and aliens 🙂).

8:43 A slight generalized misnomer of Tyrannids. Sometimes they're pink, striped, or speckled. It either depends on the bioship brood or spawning pool according to the Ordo Xenos per a footnote in the Cain Archives. See "The Last Ditch" and "The Greater Good" for some of the most extensive analysis of Tyrannid behavior the Cain archives and Inquisitor Vale have to offer with "Duty Calls", "For the Emperor" and "The Emperor's Finest" containing valuable data touching more on the foul creatures' Genestealer infiltrator faction.

an interesting consept for the final boss fight could be something like you having to support a space marine squad while they fight the patriarch. It could be cool fight and fit the lore better.

Been predicting this for a long time. All the hints are there in the dialogue of the game if you pay attention.