DON'T TOUCH MY BABIES
 Veteran Build - Warhammer 40k: Darktide 

This build may be a bit unorthodox, but In my opinion this is one of the best ways to play the good ol' veteran. 

As tempting as it may be to be a specialist and elite killing machine, at the end of the way a mission of Darktide is a war of attrition, and no matter how good you are, playing a player down is very hard — which makes it suck tremendously when the zealot charges headfirst into a trapper, gets gunned to death, and now you're missing a frontliner.

I'm sure everyone had that experience at least once: steamroll through most of the mission fairly easily with a hiccup here and there, get to a difficult part near the finish, one guy gets downed, and suddenly it turns into a cascade of shit that ends up with everyone dead and the mission forfeit. This build is my attempt to counteract that by turning the veteran into a tanky support machine.

With this talent tree you get all the best babysitting traits, including of course the infamous Voice of Command for raising downed allies. It has a lot of toughness regeneration and damage reduction for you and teammates, as well as some damage buffs and of course Krak Grenades for big burst damage on monstrosities or Crushers/Bulwarks if needed. You forgo weapon choices like the revolver or plasma gun in return for the Boltgun, taking Inspiring barrage for quick and easy toughness regen when needed, and pretty much any other blessing of your choice. Cavalcade is nice when you're pouring a magazine into a monstrosity or a big group of crushers if you're low on krak grenades. There are many melee weapons that work with this build. You can take the duelist sword or power sword if you want a more damaging options, but I actually like running the claw sword. You're not gonna be able to deal with things like maulers and crushers too well, but it's highly effective against hordes of cannon fodder with its' cleave and makes easy work of ragers with the parry. 

This build also comes with a change in perspective and gameplay. You're not gonna want to be leading the charge and killing all the elites. You're gonna NEED to stay back and watch the party; proc all of your buffs, and of course use the boltgun aimed fire to take care of pesky gunners, snipers, and other ranged threats as much as possible. 

Voice of Command is a beast of an ability; some say it's the best in the game, and using it correctly can mean life or death in higher difficulties. Often times, you have to ask yourself: Should I use it now? Should I save it for later? In my opinion using Voice of Command comes with checking off some criteria:
1. Is someone down?
2. Is picking them up a threat?
3. Is my toughness broken/about to be broken?
4. Is a teammate's toughness broken/about to be broken?
If someone is down and there's a horde of crushers of gunners/maulers and basically anything else that may stop you from realistically being able to pick them up, go ahead and pop VoC. If they can be picked up after dealing with a small to moderate amount of enemies without really putting your strike team at risk, it's better to save it.
As for 3 and 4, I personally ALWAYS pop VoC when toughness breaks during a heavy firefight. Replenishing your team's toughness, staggering enemies, both of those are great ways to prevent someone going down in the first place, which is always gonna be more valuable than picking them up when they do.