Arbites Best Friend's Build
 Arbites Build - Warhammer 40k: Darktide 

How a dog does dog stuff?

In this game, the dog has two types of attacks. One is when it pounces on the enemy, literally biting them, as everyone knows, and the other is a kind of “pounce” that’s more effective against non-human-sized enemies, like ogryns, mutants, hounds, or bosses, since they don’t have a human shape. And bosses have a special consideration where, if they get pounced on, they can get stuck. With that in mind, whenever a human-sized enemy, like a mauler or any special human-sized foe, is knocked down by the dog, they are at their maximum stagger. That’s important.

In this build, we’re going to consider all three types of abilities, namely bleeding, brittleness, and shock when it pounces, because we have the maximum base damage potential, which comes from these three unique upgrades.

Talent Distribution

Keep in mind that I like using Kill Order in the Ability modifier, but of course, you can adjust the build however you like. You could swap out the Ammo Belt for Hold the Line, which is a very strong perk since it grants free damage resistance. But, of course, you can tweak the build as you see fit, as long as you keep its core focus on the dog.

Why choose "Go Get' em!" and not "Unleashed Brutality"

Why choose ranged enemies and not special ones? The first reason is that it can attack the Poxburster, which, for me, is a major inconvenience. Sometimes you want to make a precise push during a wave to prevent it from exploding on you, and the dog can sometimes mess that up. And no, it’s not because of a higher damage percentage, but rather because when the dog is around you without any specific command or hunt order, it has this kind of sweep or patrol area. Enemies within that radius, that zone around you, will be attacked automatically by the dog. So, by choosing the aura that focuses on ranged enemies, that aura’s range increases significantly—up to 60 meters—allowing it to easily hunt down a sniper, for example, from far away without needing to mark them. 
 

This is especially useful with the Arbites class, which is quite slow, and it also boosts the overall damage potential, even if you don’t directly see the effect. But if you do need to take down a special enemy or something similar, you can always mark that enemy, and it will still deal significant damage.

Now, an important part is that sometimes you might wonder why the aura isn’t working. The ranged enemy needs to be aware of your presence, they need to be aggroed onto you, and they must have line of sight on you. For example, sometimes you want to hunt down a sniper, but you’re behind a wall, and the sniper knows you’re there, they’re marking your position. In that case, the dog won’t go after them, because the dog needs both of you to have a line of sight. Otherwise, it won’t chase them. So, contrary to what you might think, even if the enemy is there and knows you’re there, nothing will happen if there’s no direct line of sight.

Weapons

In a Cyber-Mastiff–specialized build, you need to keep in mind that the perks and blessings on your weapons also affect the dog. With that in mind, we can approach weapon choices a bit differently.

• Any blessings that grant Damage vs. Electrocuted or Damage vs. Staggered (including bonuses like +% Damage on Hit scaled with Stagger) are god-tier for the dog.

It’s important to have good blessing choices, but one thing to keep in mind is that any Arbites weapon can be used in this build.

Personally, I prefer using the Shotpistol And Shield, mainly because of No Respite and Pinpoint Targeting. You don’t strictly need Pinpoint Targeting—you could run Fire Frenzy for higher close-range damage, or Full Bore, which is also a valid choice.

That said, Pinpoint Targeting is consistently easier to use, since you can mark targets while staying safely behind the shield. When combined with No Respite, it works very well: No Respite mainly benefits the dog, while Pinpoint Targeting effectively benefits both you and the Cyber-Mastiff.

If you wanted to fully commit to buffing the dog, you could run No Respite and High Voltage on the shield. However, that means both blessings are entirely focused on the dog, which I don’t find very interesting. You should have at least one blessing that also directly helps you while using the shield.

As for melee weapons, since I’ve already shared this build with some friends, they’ve had success using both the Shockmaul and the Suppression Shield. With the right blessings, the overall results are very similar. The main difference comes down to playstyle—you’ll play either more defensively or more aggressively. One potential issue is dealing with Crushers, where the Shockmaul has an advantage thanks to its overhead attacks that can deal significantly higher damage.