Hi everyone! My name is Teodor, resident game designer on Vermintide 2. While I have been at Fatshark for a while now I am still fairly new to the V2 team, joining just last year. And so, this will be my first ever dev blog for the project. Let’s get straight into it!
This latest update saw the introduction of our new Chaos Warrior variant (and his big shield). Players coming from Darktide might feel right at home when looking at our newest enemy, but he does function slightly differently than his Bulwark brother from across the studio. We’ve been looking at adding a new Elite enemy for a while, especially one that makes room for some heavy-stagger-playstyles, so here he is in all his shield-wielding glory.
The first thing you’ll notice is that this new Chaos Warrior is heavy, but he does have an exposed weak spot in the form of his big, green swollen stomach (safely tucked away behind his shield, of course). We set out with the mindset of always promoting multiple ways of dealing with this new threat, so while waiting and sneaking in weak spot attacks during openings is entirely possible, you’ll find that heavy swings work just as well. Landing repeated heavy blows on his armor or shield will slowly knock down his stature. Once breached, the Chaos Warrior will stumble and open up for damage. Getting teammates in on the action is worthwhile as well as these stagger values do stack, ‘opening him up’ much faster. But try not to lose focus of him, as he’ll start recovering his poise if left alone for too long!
The second thing you’ll notice are his shield attacks. Being a bit of a scrambler-type enemy, the new Chaos Warrior’s role (on top of damaging the players and being an all-around menace) is to push the heroes away from each other, separating them. While a shielded Chaos Warrior might be less of a threat by his lonesome, he should amplify the threat of any horde he’s in pretty drastically (especially if there is a regular Chaos Warrior somewhere in the mix). We wanted to build something that jams well with other, more frantic, enemies, and hopefully, this new Chaos Warrior will accomplish just that.
Introducing a new enemy to an already well-rounded roster in a game like Vermintide 2 is always going to be an interesting time, so please let us know how you feel about it. I’ll be monitoring the new Chaos Warrior’s performance and sentiment over the coming weeks so that we can continue to develop the experience together and turn him into a more natural fit if need be.
Cheers!