SPICY'S META HAVOC 40 ZEALOT
 Zealot Build - Warhammer 40k: Darktide 

PRAISE BE! THE META HAVOC 40 ZEALOT.

Some personal choices were made but this is as good as it gets. A thoroughly researched, tested, and hyper-optimzied build. Also an excellent blueprint for your own builds!

Your role as a Zealot is to pick out Elites, hold the line, and give your ranged characters space to allow them to deal massive damage as often as possible. In Havoc, unlike Auric, your squad doesn't benefit from you zipping around and surviving while they struggle with heretics. Get involved! With a decent team, the only threat to the mission should be the "oh shit" moments featuring five bosses and monstrosities. This is when you become a support character. Stay with the squad, kill what's ailing them, and book as much as possible. Offense > Defense. This is how you win. One-man clutching is hardly possible and should be avoided at all costs. Live with the team, die with the team! For the emperor!

Happy to take any questions or feedback @randomspicy on discord. 

SOME CHANGES ARE NEEDED DEPENDING ON YOUR SQUAD!

• If no one on the team requires grenade pickups, consider using your preferred flavor of grenade and Bolt Pistol — or Spearhead if your squad will struggle with boss damage — with Surgical and Puncture. This offers improved Specialist sniping at the cost of weaker crowd control. If there is a veteran with Survivalist I recommend using Zarona Mk IIa Quickdraw Stub Revolver with Surgical and Hand-Cannon instead of the Bolt Pistol (when using grenades).
• Coherency buffs don't stack, so if there is another Zealot on your squad with Beacon of Purity, grab Benediction. The same applies to Infectious Zeal, so if needed swap it for something like Enemies Within, Enemies Without.
• This is also a great build for Combat Blade with no changes needed.

Weapons:

Relic Blade

• Why?

  Best weapon for swarms of enemies with great cleave, while still offering excellent single-target damage. Often you can safely chain attacks in situations where you'd be forced to block and retreat with other weapons.

• Configuration

  I've chosen blessings that reduce heat to keep the blade empowered for as long as possible, however I've selected 76% heat management since it provides the same heat generation as 80%. Cleave blessings and Rampage only help in hordes (as in groups of horde type enemies) where it already excels. Energy Leakage only stacks at higher heat — for example it only reaches max stacks at 91% heat.

Purgation Flamer

• Why?

  Offers unrivaled mixed crowd damage with an unstoppable AOE. When paired with Blades of Faith to pick out Specialists and Elites, you can make the difference when the squad is overwhelmed by twenty Crushers. 

• Configuration

  Blaze Away and Penetrating Flame are the best blessings to increase damage from both your flamer and your allies. Damage and burn stats max out the burn damage at 75%, leaving us an extra 10% for mobility. Getting a flamer with these specific stats will require a lot of RNG, so 60% mobility will also do fine.

Perks

Carapace damage is a first-choice perk on any weapon. Flak, Unyielding, Maniac, and Elite are all great second choices. Personally I like +10% Elite damage on the blade for versatility, and +25% Flak damage for the flamer since its main purpose is to deal with swarms of those enemies.

Talents:

• The improved Zealot tree makes the character a lot more powerful while giving more freedom to choose damage or defense. Here, we are able to pick nearly all the important damage and combat buffs while setting aside a few points for effective damage resistance perks such as Good Balance, Enduring Faith, and Stalwart. Backstab hits are tough without Shroudfield, especially with Relic Blade, so we ignore most of these. However, I pick Backstabber over Disdain, because like Rampage, it only helps in hordes where Relic Blade already shines.
• Beacon of Purity is more effective than Benediction in most high havoc levels, and can keep your squad from becoming corrupted little gremlins on The Blight Spreads or pox levels (when in rotation). 
• Chorus of Spiritual Fortitude is truly powerful and arguably the crux of this build. Support abilities are key in high havoc. Especially useful as a cool-down period for your blade!
• Infectious Zeal may be controversial, but now that it can be selected alongside Righteous Warrior, giving three other rejects +10% crit chance nearly all the time is a very powerful buff for just one talent point.
• Despite being able to choose any blitz without punishment, I stick with the blades. As mentioned, this creates a highly effective synergy with the flamer for both crowd clearing and Elite sniping. Plus, no need for grenade pickups!
• Riposte is generally hard to stack using Relic Blade, and with the recent nerf it's not worth the three talent point trip. However, it would be a valid choice to reach Hubris for a more defensive build.
• As tempting as Unfaltering and No Respite are, they don't seem to do a whole lot for the Relic Blade. Even Punishment rarely triggers, only when attacking hordes when it's not too useful anyway.
• Blinded by Blood isn't impactful enough to spend a point on.

Curios:

I definitely lean on the toughness side of the toughness/health curio debate, but the health boost from just one curio is noticeable. Relic Blade doesn't benefit from stamina so much, and with a block efficiency and stamina regen perk the curio is not needed. Ability regen perks stack additively, and with book's long cooldown period these are valuable. Damage resistance perks stack multiplicatively, so I only pick one gunner damage resistance perk. (ex. Adding a third Gunner damage resistance perk would only grant an additional ~10% resistance) 

Now that +12% revive speed affects all assist interactions with your teammates, this is a strong perk to consider. Feel free to swap some of my choices out for this if ye have little faith in your team.

Tips:

• Side-slide-dodge while booking to travel furthest!
• Weapon switching twice can deactivate the Relic Blade faster than your special action button. Personally, I have a macro on my mouse to do this in an instant.
• When using the Relic Blade, sprint before charging a heavy attack to guarantee a strike attack that deals higher single-target damage.
• When weapon swapping to flamer, right when you see the flamer, knife throw to cancel a portion of the draw animation.
• Now that book has a longer cooldown, be selective about its use, but don't save it like you would a medipack!
• If you're modifying this build, I would dump Thy Wrath be Swift, Purge the Unclean, and Abolish Blasphemers in that order. Enemies Within, Enemies Without is a great talent to consider.
• Dodge, duck, dip, dive, and dodge.

Credit to Tanner Lindberg on Youtube, DLCI and Retr0_ on Steam, u/Namyria-_-, u/Vermallica, and many others as sources of information on this build. 

For the EmperorI