Complicated name, great turn-based tactics – Warhammer 40k: Daemonhunters expands in the best possible way. But Kevin still hangs in there.
Warhammer 40,000: Chaos Gate – Daemonhunters – Duty Eternal How many names, colons and hyphens does a title actually need in 2022? For the sake of simplicity, I”ll just say Duty Eternal from now on.
The first DLC to the surprisingly grandiose W40K Daemonhunters heralds the next round of tricky round-robin tactics battles between Grey Knights and Chaos Demons. Similar to Firaxis” XCOM series, the add-on integrates itself into the existing gameplay. At a price of around 15 euros, you get access to a new class (the Techmarine) and an eagerly awaited innovation: the all-flattening Dreadnought fighter.
Our original Daemonhunters tester Sascha Penzhorn has thrown himself into battle for you once again, even though he doesn”t really have any time at the end of the year. His conclusion: This expansion is a must for all fans of the main game. Whether it is also a good reason for everyone else to finally try out this brute strategy game, you can find out in the test.
It”s so much fun!
My dreadnought is not as agile and nimble as the regular Grey Knights. They jump, run and climb, the Dreadnought just tramples everything flat and also dismantles obstacles and cover quite effortlessly as it passes by, because it is as big as a house.
It has massive armour, also grants armour points to surrounding combatants with the appropriate specialisation and crushes enemies with rush attacks, a heavy flamethrower and weapons such as the Twin Lascannon, a Multi Melta, a Plasma Cannon, Doomfist, Doomglaive or even a rocket launcher, which you can specialise in for extra damage against demonic units. The Doomglaive can sabre several enemies at once in close combat, while you can use smoke grenades to protect your allies from enemy fire.
The Comrade plays exactly as powerful as it reads here, standing by your Grey Knights as a fifth unit in the special Technophage missions. And there”s the rub: Technophage missions are extremely difficult, you”ll have to deal with the biggest enemy masses yet, so you”ll really need the extra firepower.
Unfortunately, there is no dreadnought available for regular missions because it would be completely overpowered. Honestly, I wouldn”t care at all, because the critter is so outrageously fun that I”d like to take it on absolutely every mission. Luckily, there”s a second new unit that you can actually always invite onto your team: the versatile Techmarine.
Mighty late bloomer
Admit: At first glance, the new Techmarine doesn”t look terribly much. He goes into battle with an axe and a boltgun, with both of which he can destroy and penetrate enemy armour, it doesn”t get much more exciting at first. The Techmarine”s gimmick is the Sevitors, which he commands on the battlefield as expendable cannon fodder with various uses.
Depending on flavour, a Servitor can, for example, deal area damage with the Plasma Cannon and fling enemies back, can bind enemies in close combat or temporarily incapacitate Nurgle”s minions. Properly powered up, an experienced Techmarine will later control up to three Servitors at once, transforming a rather mediocre unit into a real threat on the battlefield.
Along the way, he can repair both servitors and dreadnoughts and provide them with buffs like extra armour. It”s just a shame that outside of the extra crunchy Technophage missions, you”re still only allowed to send out four marines at a time by default. With an additional default class, it”s even harder to settle on just four favourites from now on.
Restart worthwhile
If you”ve already completed the campaign, Duty Eternal offers a good reason to start over. After about the first 15 days in the game, you”ll gain access to the Techmarine as a class for the first time. You get your own dreadnought shortly after starting the second chapter of the story.
A little later, when all corners of space are in a state of chaos, you finally unlock the Gladius frigate and can send it to mission areas independently of your main ship, the Edict of Doom, and thus fight on two fronts at the same time. Missions that you start with a frigate are fought automatically and not manually. Your chances of victory are calculated from the strength of your sent marines and the strength of the respective enemies.
Just like in self-played missions, at the end of the mission you will receive goodies such as experience and seeds, but also injuries and worse losses, should you burn a cucumber troop on a particularly fierce mission. Basically, the frigate relieves you of the burden of trying to keep space clean from Nurgl”s influence and to level up less experienced marines at the same time. Good thing!
Along the way, you collect the new currency Archaeotech via the space map and in missions, which you use to buy upgrades for dreadnoughts and techmarines. In missions, the stuff is guarded by enemies and must be recovered within a time limit. Small story missions introduce the new elements of Duty Eternal, but you shouldn”t really expect a significant storyline from them.
If you enjoyed the base game, the first DLC is worthwhile and makes the game even better. Dreadnought and Techmarine as new units rock hard. If you still have an ongoing campaign, you can even activate the DLC for existing saves and don”t have to start from scratch. If the game hasn”t convinced you so far, you can safely ignore Duty Eternal. Nothing has changed in the basic gameplay. It”s an appetising second helping for existing fans – no more, no less.
Editor”s verdict
I just can”t get my head around how fun this damn game is again! WRC Generations is lying around here shamefully disregarded, I haven”t even played all the dungeons from the new expansion to Everquest 2 yet, instead I”m going to start a new campaign in Daemonhunters right after uploading this article and go off with a Techmarine from the start and use the Dreadnought as often as the game allows. Yes, a little more additional story would have been great too. Or enemies that don”t all revolve around Nurgle. Or game modes away from Technophage or certain story moments where I can send out more than just four Grey Knights.
Still, it”s great to be able to touch a game again where all my criticisms basically boil down to the same thing: I”d like to have more of it. And because the game is so handy and turn-based and also works via controller, you can play it comfortably in bed on cold winter evenings via Steam Deck (or on the Onexplayer, like me). And then you don”t even have to interrupt if you want to visit the Golden Throne in between! May the emperor protect this development studio for a long time to come, so that many more great DLCs will be brought to us!
