Soul Grinder Psyker | Gun + Fire + Horde | Auric
 Psyker Build - Warhammer 40k: Darktide 

Like playing gun psyker, but don't like feeling like a piece of expensive china in a room full of angry bulls? This build adjusts the usual crit-focused gun psyker build to focus on a toughness synergy between Blazing Spirit, Wildfire and Souldrinker that's become especially potent on the new Blaze Force Greatsword. Scriers Gaze and Shred boost your crit; crit sets things on fire; Souldrinker uses fire to give you toughness and even more crit; things die and you get more fire. Combined with the huge range and cleave of the greatsword, this transforms the horde-beset psyker from an overwhelmed nerd into an invincible soulblaze blender.

And then on top of that, this is still gun psyker! You still have the massive ranged DPS courtesy of the Vraks V Infantry Autogun and its finess bonus, and you still have disrupt destiny cranking up your crits and weakspot hits. But your new melee prowess means you don't have to spend so much time worrying about your ammo and toughness in the downtime between Scrier activations. This is still a psyker build, and you still aren't as tough as a veteran spamming VoC - you can't just go running into rooms full of gunners. But with careful positioning, you can stay in regenerating blender mode most of the time, while still cranking out ranged damage for gunner hordes and bossfights. 

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Melee: Covenant Mk VIII Blaze Force Greatsword

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This variant has a simple and effective moveset (especially if you're using lmb macros for carpal tunnel) and has the range and cleave that have enabled this build, in my opinion, over the old force sword soulblaze options. Blazing Spirit is obviously non-optional for the core synergy, and pairs best with Shred for maximum crit uptime in crowds. You don't need Wrath since Warp Splitting does the cleave for us. I've elected for a boost in carapace damage since the vraks still suffers with crushers even in scrier mode and in the absence of a dueling sword you'll have to rely on your greatsword overheads. Extra bit of maniac damage vs ragers and mutants is always helpful. Crit could also be slotted in, but it's a bit redundant with the 55+% crit you're already getting when all your boosts apply.

With this setup you should set whole hordes of poxwalkers on fire within a swing or two, and every subsequent swing spreads the fire and recharges your toughness. Wildfire is useless for damage, but it shines here in maximizing your crit and toughness regen through Soulblaze kills. And as a bonus, once you've chugged enough souls out of the blender you can chop a whole horde in half with your greatsword special, which is usually not strictly necessary but is a lot of fun.

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Ranged: Vraks Mk V Infantry Autogun

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This is just the conventional gun psyker pick, for the finess bonus and cracked damage at max crit. Damage focused blessings, extra flack damage perk for gunners, extra maniac for specials. Still deletes Reapers, Gunners and bosses as well as ever, and is good for picking off your Disrupt Destiny targets at anything but the most extreme ranges. But you've got some new breathing room to not hoover up all the ammo and piss off your teammates every mission just to stay alive.

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Blitz / Ability: Smite and Scriers Gaze

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Smite here is your final fallback option - you don't have to use it often, but when you do, it can get you out of a lot of trouble. Could be a batch of ragers when you're on Scrier cooldown and your gun's empty, could be a mixed horde of bulwarks and maulers chasing your team down in a chokepoint. It's handy, and it also gets your peril back up for Warp Rider and Warp Splitting, so you can get back into the fray at full strength when things have calmed down a bit.

You should be activating Scriers Gaze pretty much every time you enter combat. It's not just the damage lynchpin of your build, but is also key to your toughness regen. On auric and/or maelstrom Psykinetic's Aura is going to give it back before you know it so it's better to be reckless than conservative. Just don't get cocky with greatsword projectiles when you're too high on peril.

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Talent Notes:

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• Mettle is the most essential toughness talent of this top section. Quietude is mostly to get to Perilous Combustion, as most of the time you'll let your peril go down in combat to take maximum advantage of Warp Rider and Warp Splitting. The only real warp attack we have is the greatsword cleave so Soulstealer isn't a high priority pick.
• Psykinetic's Aura is still hugely powerful for auric and is essential for Scrier uptime. Wildfire is controversial because the damage is mostly worthless, but we pick it up here for the extra tougness regen from Souldrinker.
• Souldrinker and Warp Splitting are both core components to the toughness synergy, but in testing I also found By Crack of Bone to be invaluable to hitting max benefits from Scrier's Gaze reliably. Without it I often found myself maxing out at around 20 stacks; with it, I rarely ever exited without the full 30. Since Scrier peril constantly rises, I've found it to be a more reliable option than Battle Meditation.
• Prescience is picked here for the extra crit but could easily be swapped for Seer's Presence, expecially if you swap in another source of permanent crit chance, such as a greatsword perk.
• Precognition has great returns with the greatsword's wide sweeps at head level; I've found Warp Speed more useful than Endurance since it can get you out of sticky situations and you're usually doing ok on toughness outside of crisis situations anyway.
• Warp Rider and Kinetic Deflection are very powerful. Everyone uses them for a reason.
• True Aim is more or less pointless on the Vraks and Surety of Arms lets you lean on your damage advantage when you're pulling out the big guns.
   

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Gameplay Notes:

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Activate Scrier's Gaze before engaging with a horde to activate your Soulblaze Blender.
Activate Scrier's Gaze before engaging a boss or gunner pack to activate your Bullet Blender.
Activate your Smite when Scrier's Gaze has gone on cooldown and you've reverted to your noodle-armed Dr Jekyll persona.
Hordes -> L1 spam, Crushers/Maulers -> charged overheads, specials / gunners / bosses -> juiced up autogun, bulwarks/dog swarms -> smite

Image Credit: Alexandr Elichev (KoTnoneKoT)