'Darktide's' New Update Adds Power Mauls, Balance Changes And More

Patch 1.0.20 for "Warhammer 40,000: Darktide" is one of the biggest updates the game has seen so far. It's brought with it a host of technical improvements as well as some new weapons to smite the worshippers of Chaos with.

Many fans were disappointed when they found out that "Darktide" launched with an incomplete arsenal. Fatshark is taking its first steps to address this concern by adding two new melee weapons.

The Indignatus Mk IVe Crusher and Achlys Mk I Power Maul are essentially the same, except the former is for Zealots and the latter is for Ogryns. They both have sweeping attacks that deal decent damage and can knock down enemies, and they can be powered up to deliver lightning-infused hits.

A number of weapons were also buffed in this patch. The Veteran's Lucius line of lasguns now feels much better to use thanks to a bump to their base stability and the cleanup work done to their VFX. Additionally, charged shots now consume less ammo and deal more damage.

Meanwhile, the Zealot's Heavy Swords now deal more damage on light attacks and pierce through flak armor more reliably. The Thunder Hammer was supposed to be buffed this patch, but according to the devs, the changes for this weapon will instead come in a future update.

Other buffed weapons include Headhunter Autoguns, the Stub Revolver and the Plasma Gun.

Speaking of delays, the new Archivum Sycorax map was also set to be released in Patch 1.0.20, but due to technical issues, its launch was pushed back to an unspecified date.

Other patch changes include various crash and bug fixes, power sword nerfs and a change to the Boltgun's draw animation, as repeatedly racking the bolt every time the gun was drawn was deemed too frustrating.

Unfortunately, the update brings a few problems with it as well. People have been complaining about an unintentional VFX change for the Psyker Surge Staff that makes the weapon painful to use. A bug is also locking players from manually quelling Peril after the meter reaches 100% twice in succession.

Fixes are expected in a later patch, though dates are unknown as of this writing.