[Update #2]: March's Tools of War update has brought in 10 new weapons and a whole bunch of improvements.

[Update]: Darktide will be buffing Psykers and Ogyrn in early March, while a much bigger update will be coming in late March.

After getting pushed back over and over again since December, Darktide's big crafting and endgame progression update has now arrived. It brings with it major improvements to the quality of items found in missions and the in-game stores, the ability to collect blessings from weapons and then apply them to other weapons in the same family, as well as a significant reduction to the amount of grinding needed for the weekly quests.

The good news doesn't end there, however, as Patch #4 - Blessings of the Omnissiah has also brought in a whole bunch of improvements, balance changes and quality-of-life tweaks, some of which Fatshark didn't even mention until they was already in the game. As such, you now have access to loadouts so you can quickly switch between different builds, dogs will do their best to avoid breaking every known law of physics in order to slobber all over you, while many of the UI icons have been overhauled in order to make them easier to discern at a glance.

Even the Hunting Grounds 'event' has been reworked, and for the better. Instead of constantly sending a couple of dogs after any player that has dared to break away from the group for even a second, the new Hunting Grounds will unleash a dozen mini-dogs at the players at the same time! These plague puppies are less deadly, pin you down for a shorter amount of time, have a lot less health, and most importantly, are a whole lot more fun and interesting to fight against!

When it comes to the balance changes, I'm happy to say it's mostly a bunch of buffs for previously underpowered or simply unpopular weapons, as well as minor reworks of essentially useless blessings. For example, the dueling sword's Riposte now no longer gives you 5% critical strike chance for 5 seconds after a successful dodge, but rather 20% chance for 2 seconds. Despite the lower duration, the new version is far more reliable and far, far more enjoyable to actually utilize in combat.

So if you were disappointed with Darktide's somewhat unfinished state and decided to take an extended break, I'd say the Blessings of the Omnissiah update is well worth checking out. There's still a bunch of issues that need to be sorted out, don't get me wrong, but this is definitely a massive step in the right direction and hopefully the start of a brand new chapter for Darktide.

Whatever the future might bring, I'll make sure to let you know. For now, however, you can read more about the Blessings of the Omnissiah update and its accompanying changes over at the official website. Enjoy!