After almost 900 hours of this game, there is only thing I have to say about this game : BY TAAL, FIGHT, KILL, DEATH.

But Im gonna tell you more anyways.

The blood, gore and death, the killing, maiming and the sheer slaughter. The animalistic violence and impossible odds this game gives to you in the midst of a deep and dire setting is a gift that only the warhammer franchise can give to you. This game is perfect, despite the flaws and a few funky gamemodes. It was my gateway drug into Warhammer Fantasy as a whole, but instead of moving to new drugs, I simply cant stay away from this specific one: The Slaughter of the Pactsworn and all that worships Chaos.

It merely promises you one thing and that is: Chaotic Slaughter from the view of 5 very different people. (Really great gameplay, characters and lore too)

So by Sigmar, Taal, Grimnir ,Isha, and Myrmidia do your duty to push back The Tide.

Christ bless you.

peanut would love some pets and treats :)
　　 　　🌸＞　　フ
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　　 　／` ミ＿xノ
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　　 /　 ヽ　　 ﾉ
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／￣|　　 |　|　|
| (￣ヽ＿_ヽ_)__)
＼二つ

I have thought about reviewing before, back around 500 hours in, but I felt like even back then, I didn't have the necessary understanding of the full-scope depth of the game. There's a lot to it.

I've played every gamemode, every difficulty, and maxed out my progression to the point I'm done needing anything. This was achieved about 900 hours in, so you have quite a lot of content if you're into the gameplay loop. Due to my ownership of the additional classes, weapon packs and all, I have a lot more weapons than the base game offers, and I've tried every weapon, every class, with each one on Red/Veteran rarity, which is one long grind.

Progression relies on playing the Chaos wastes gamemode or collecting "books", aka tomes, and grimoires. These allow you to upgrade the chest rarity you get at the end of each deployment, and these chests then have higher and higher chances of giving you legendary/veteran rarity weapons which have better stats and traits. This means if you care for your gear, these will be the two main gamemodes you have to play.

Versus was fun when it launched, though I think the playercount no longer supports it sufficiently. This is a PVP gamemode where one side plays as skaven, the other as the regular crew, against eachother. As seen on steamcharts, this game was more alive when I started in 2024, and was still well healthy in 2025. In 2026, mostly veterans and new players remain - the usual end of lifecycle mix of low tier and top tier players as observable in many other games in similar stages.

Nevertheless the game is not dead, and there are always lobbies for these two modes. Versus is a little harder, and due to the pricetag, the Winds of Magic gamemode that is Weaves sees basically no play unless you find a friend that also has it like I did.

The gameplay is where the game shines, primarily. When I started, the bots were a bit better, especially because there were working mods that fixed bot behavior. Today, these mods no longer work, and the bots have become much worse, for some reason. They stand there blocking but doing nothing at best, or with their gun out but not actually shooting with a horde in their face at worst. Unfortunately once this game loses enough players, playing alone will be too miserable even for me.

You'll find most of your players in the Veteran and Legend difficulties - new players starting in veteran trying to get their first legendary, and aspiring players with like 50+ hours in Legend trying to get their heroes to lvl 35 and their first Red weapon, typically. Champion difficulty was once more popular, but if that's what you like, you can certainly solo that difficulty if you have any mechanical skill.

The weapons remain viable at all difficulties, though you'll need to distribute your perks more wisely to ensure you're really doing well with any weapon you try out. They each have their strengths, and if you don't lean your build into those strengths, you'll not be performing well. There are many guides out there, but I can't recommend bothering with them. Everytime I tried a guide, I decided I'd just read up on the base game mechanics like Stagger and THP generation rather than getting and copying a build. The problem is they become obsolete quickly, and a lot of people like standing in corners with their full team, able to do nothing on their own. You don't need a build for that - you need a build when you're about to be screwed, and we all handle a crisis differently as players.

Playing like that takes forever, and in a game that already takes a long time to grind for progression (like 500 hours for my first full Red equipped hero), it's really best to always be moving forward... a point many don't understand, and die fighting a horde that surrounded them. That is where the individualism of your build comes in, as players will die, and you will need to handle hundreds of truly deadly enemies on your own until you can reunite.

Speaking of progression and moving forward, the aforementioned tomes and grimoires are scattered around the Campaign maps. These are not easy to find and people usually look them up and practice them in a lower difficulty, as later maps such as DLC additions or the latest maps added in 2025 and 2026 updates are more and more convoluted, for the worse.

Righteous Stand, the first map you'll be put on right out of the tutorial, has a bunch of books hidden near the path you're supposed to take. It takes a little detour, and one clever jump that teaches you how to not fall off a cliff or high ground. Later, sometimes even tomes - the less important book - take 2 minutes to get, requiring a detour just to be able to access a deadly jump the unathletic will likely fail a few times (and die trying). Sometimes, this causes players not to care about books anymore, unfortunately, making Chaos Wastes - the roguelike start-with-nothing mode - the preferable method of Chest acquisition, as it gives you two high-rarity chests at the end just for completing its longer (~40 minute compared to ~20-25 for missions) gamemode.

I had to take a break from late 2025 all the way to middle 2026 due to real life circumstances, and upon return to one of my favorite games, I unfortunately found it in a sloppier state. At the time of the review, the sound has gotten worse, I find a new bug every game, and despite being a hosted game, meaning the game originates from the PC of the lobby host, the networking has deteriorated resulting in random latency spikes and 300 ms lobbies every so often. This is especially noticeable in later hours of whatever server you play on. How a game can get it this wrong when I never have such issues in for example Deep Rock Galactic (another similar, host-based horde shooter) is beyond me. Every lobby is 50ms minimum, one of the most unattractive parts of the game for sure.

The game has gotten much in the way of content over time. We have had new maps both DLC and non-DLC, several cheap DLC heroes, weapon packs and the entire Versus gamemode that came from nowhere and was a lot of fun. Even this year, it's getting very on-point balance changes that buffed some of the weapons I already have tried but found them not very viable even with my skill level and my experience. Every year, you find you can do more and more with weapons you've previously written off as trash you need to tryhard for.

But every year, tech debt also adds up, and as playercount dwindles - because Darktide is already out as well, and because Helldivers released, and because Space Marine released, so there's much more competition than there was for this kind of game years ago -, the quality of the game due to how bad the bots have gotten only becomes worse.

The game is cheap and was free to some as well, but as ever, a cheap game tends to mean a more toxic community due to ease of access. The game is frustrating, and punishing, and hard, and when things get tough, bad people will of course be taking that out on you. You'll find the perseverant patient ones, and you'll also find the toxic hosts that disband the lobby for the whole team and waste your time - as there's no reconnect; if the host decides this game is over, it is, and you get nothing.

And when playercount goes lower, it'll also be up to the host as to whether they have been able to figure out how to properly equip their bots. I think once the playercount is only in the 1000s, I'll no longer be able to recommend the game, as it'll be too difficult to avoid the bad lobbies. For now, it's a gem made with love, but that only goes so far against years of tech debt and what happens to every game as it naturally ages.

Overall: 8.8/10, the best medieval fighting game I've ever played. Ranged, melee, and magic all play very well. It's just that there's only so much you can do on your own, unless you stick to only the very best classes, with the very best weapons.