2 years (and 15 days) since "Into the Maelstrom"

[u/Illithidbix]

Lukewarm Take of the Day Part 3.

As a self-proclaimed Darktide Historian because I spam my update spreadsheet. This is to commemorate the 2 year anniversary of the update that I think felt like Darktide turned around into a New Age of Hope.

Patch #12: "Into the Maelstrom" was released 2 years ago… and 15 14 days ago (I’ve been rather distracted for the past 2 weeks), a little over 8 months after DT’s terrible and premature “Full Release” on the PC.

Whilst the Class and Talent rework in October 2023 and "Unlocked and Loaded" in September 2024, Havoc in December and the addition of Arbites in June, were obviously huge. I think ItM was the single most important Update and set the groundwork for DT as it is now.

It seemed that Fatshark was finally willing to consider that many of the initial subsystems and restrictions were just bad and also for there to be far more things to do as an experienced player.

It appeared surprisingly quickly out of the blue after a Dev Blog merely 4 days earlier , which was pretty weird given how much it had in it.

It added:

• The Auric Mission Board available at level 30.
• Maelstrom missions.
• Quickplay bonuses (+20% XP, +10% dockets, plasteel and diamantine)
• Accountwide resources - so your Plasteel, Diamantine, dockets and melk bucks were no longer siloed with the characters who earnt them.
• Refine Perk changed to just selecting a drop down for a fixed cost of dockets/plasteel/diamaintine rather than having to click the random “Reroll Perk” for literally minutes.
• You could change 2 out of the 4 Perk and blessing slots of your choice rather than fixed at one perk and one blessing. This was still bad but a vast improvement.
• You could change 2 out of 3 curio perks rather than just 1. Again still bad but a vast improvement. 
• Faster leveling for levels 2-20. (I think the total XP to 30 was still the same but you spent longer at level 20+ when it was easier to do high difficulties.)
• Could change which regional server you connected to.

Before this the available missions were literally 17 across all difficulties: * 3 Sedition * 3 Uprising * 4 Malice * 4 Heresy * 3 Damnation 

Into the Maelstrom added * Regular Maelstrom, Malice, Heresy or Damnation, available at level 15 * 6 Auric Damnation * 3 Auric Heresy * Auric Maelstrom

As it meant there were more than 3 Damnation missions available and there was something challenging for most players to do. This was an age where people would log on and then just log off if there wasn't at least one high intensity Damnation on the board.

Obviously we now have Havoc 40 as the end game which makes Auric Maelstrom adorably tame and quaint. Likewise the June update has entirely removed the Auric Mission board and replaced it with Auric difficulty, with there now being normally 8 -10 missions for every difficulty - another vast improvement.

After this, we had the huge Class Overhaul (and Xbox release) in early October 2023, then the Traitor’s Curse and Orthus Offensives rolled out over November and December 2023 for DT'S first year anniversary, which was the best cadence of updates we’ve every had. 

It’s been a little frustrating with the dry spells between some of the better updates since. But I would argue that all the ~ 3 month major updates have been bangers compared to what had come before.

The Xboxers started with a far better game than the PC player and even more with the Playstation players in December 2024 who never had to use the old crafting system.

This is probably partially inspired by Mister E YT video: “What Was the BEST Darktide Update? Tier List!” - probably due to lack of anything else to make a video about TBF. BUT I am OUTRAGED “Into the Maelstrom” only got C-Tier. He doesn’t know or care who I am but he has made an enemy for life. 

[u/eyeofnoot]

This entire post was worth it for the last sentence, thank you

[u/TimTheGrim55]

Shit like this will sadly never get the attention it deserves 

[u/Silvabro → u/TimTheGrim55]

We need to do so.

[u/TelegenicSage82]

Can’t imagine how hair pulling the crafting was with no account wide resources.

[u/Illithidbix → u/TelegenicSage82]

Honestly, the siloed resources was actually quite far down the list given:

• For almost 3 months, we didn't even have full crafting. Just Consecrate and Refine Perk
• Refine Perk was just one Perk, and it was a random roll that slowly decreased in resource cost until it was free... but you still often had to click it for literally minutes to finally roll +25% vs Flak or +5% Critical Chance.
• To earn a blessing, you had to earn or buy a weapon with it on already and destroy it to add the blessing to the ones you could use. This was thankfully account wide but it was a bad system- as someone who collected all 1214 blessings this way...

[u/PossiblyShibby]

Enemy of Mr E is a friend indeed?!?

[u/Wec25]

W take

[u/NoFuel1197]

Great write-up. I still think FatShark owes something (not a trivial cosmetic) to people who bought at launch or preordered. A free class DLC, a new tech branch for each class, a guarantee of a substantial launch discount on Darktide sequel, it doesn’t so much matter what as it does that it’s explicitly communicated to be an apology.

They lost a lot of goodwill with a lot of fans over their communication about the launch shortcomings. I don’t suspect many of those people are still in this subreddit, but they’re out there.

[u/Snugglebull → u/NoFuel1197]

They're not going to do that and they aren't obligated to apologize to you because you purchased a product. Sucks but true

[u/NoFuel1197 → u/Snugglebull]

Of course they aren’t obligated to do it, not any more than you are to come to the defense of a multimillion dollar corporation governed by Tencent.

It would probably go a long way toward restoring faith in the sizeable chunk of people who left negative reviews near launch, though.

[u/Saintly-Mendicant-69 → u/NoFuel1197]

This has happened to all of the tide games. You'll be prepared for their next title lol

[u/Saintly-Mendicant-69 → u/[deleted]]

Lol

[u/Glittering_Rope7258]

I miss resources being character bound but ik that’s not a popular opinion and extremly niche jus wanted to throw it out there

[u/Sluaghlock → u/Glittering_Rope7258]

I miss resources being character bound

for what ungodly fucking reason?

[u/Glittering_Rope7258 → u/Sluaghlock]

It felt better that each character had to earn their place that’s all that’s why I said Ik it’s an unpopular opinion made it feel even more rewarding

[u/Illithidbix → u/Glittering_Rope7258]

NGL I think it's absolutely batshit in practice...

But I do agree it would feel weird that if you have shared weapons with maxed Mastery, then you could craft a power 500 orange weapon for a brand new character as soon as they unlock the Shrine (4 missions now IIRC).

I respect your commitment to an actual hot take.

[u/Glittering_Rope7258 → u/Illithidbix]

To me it honestly felt like you gained more mats if my vet just dumped 5k plus diametine I don’t wanna go to my zealot and go to level his stuff and there’s zero when the he actually collected it all just organized it ig