Today we have a treat for you all, not one, but two new enemies are on their way to make a debut in Darktide! We have braved the mad laboratory lair of Jonathan, our Game Designer in charge of these new creations. Take it away!
“Hello! My name is Jonathan and I have been told I am not good at making enemies in real life, so I took it as my mission to make them for the game instead. Jokes aside, I work with stuff relating to enemy behavior, pacing management and general enemy combat design.”
We have two new enemies to talk about today, both of them being themed to each other. You might have already seen them in the new teaser video here. Let’s shine the spotlight on them, one at a time, starting with the…
Have you ever wondered who takes care of all those Pox Hounds running around in Tertium? Well this might be your answer, introducing the Pack Master, an Ogryn monstrosity (yeah you read that right) that packs a serious punch! The Pack Master ticks two boxes for us, one is the fact that we wanted to add another monstrosity to the enemy roster for some while now, and the other is the fact we have wanted to make a monstrosity that is a bit less daemonic or mutated. The game hasn't had a new monstrosity in ages, so it was about time.
Making him an Ogryn also lets us have a monstrosity with interesting voice lines that are not just guttural roars or chaotic screams, but instead a guy who likes to talk while he battles the players. He has some really cool reactive voice lines depending on what happens around him. He will for example react when you take one of his hounds down or when one of them manages to pounce you or someone on your team.
But you are not here to read just about his “lovely” personality, you wanna know what he brings to the fight right!
“He is very fast for an Ogryn. Very fast and very heavy, and he will keep up with you!”
The Pack Master is a fast and heavy bruiser type of an enemy. He won’t have any problem charging into the fray, his big shocking prod ready to bash some agents of the Imperium. He is a melee fighter that will do his utmost to get into your face. This weapon also applies a debuff to players, so getting hit will not just hurt, but also leave you with a speed reduction and slower dodge replenishment.
Additionally, what makes him extra scary is that he will be joined by Pox Hounds to help him in combat. Depending on the situation, he can bring along either normal Pox Hounds, the new Armoured Pox Hound (more on that in a bit) or a mix of the two. He is called the Pack Master for a reason! It will also be important to take him down as quickly as possible, since even if you get rid of all of his hounds, he can still spawn in new ones as long as he is alive.
Another interesting thing is that you will find him roaming, so you will be able to hear him as he walks around. You can use this to your advantage and prepare to take him on. Having all of those hounds around him makes him a pretty good tracker, so hiding from him might prove very hard.
“Oh and he sees through stealth! This is a big one. You can't hide from him, he will see you and just keep up his attack.”
Finally, before we move the spotlight to his canine friend, we should give a fair warning to all Arbites players out there. This guy is used to having unruly dogs around him, so you should probably think twice before you send your Cyber Mastiff his way. Don’t say we didn’t warn you.
“Yeah we do have a new cool animation for when a Cyber-Mastiff attacks the Pack Master and he just…”
With those words of warning, let’s proceed to the…
So this is a new Pox Hound with, you guessed it, armour. This enemy is what we could call a sidegrade to the normal Pox Hound. All that armour is giving it more health than the already existing hound, so it’s harder to take down, but at the same time all that metal makes it slower than its less iron clad cousin. If you manage to block this enemy in midair you can stagger it, and if you do, you might want to circle around and attack the unarmoured weak spot on their backs for some extra damage. We hope that this new variant will give even the most seasoned Pox Hounds hunters a new challenge!
“Best thing is to stagger them and then circle around and hit them in the… yeah, haha”
The armoured variety will be part of the Pack Master’s pack, so you will only encounter these hounds when he is around.
Hope this little teaser has made you ready to fight the Pack Master when he and his new armoured friends enter the fight in Darktide. They will both appear in the next update, and while we’re excited to share more, we’ll dive into the details when the time is right!
So for now we will have to leave this as just a teaser! Keep your eyes on our community space and social media channels for information when we are ready to talk more about this!
In the meantime, as always, thank you for reading this dev blog. See you on the Mourningstar!
- The Darktide Team