With thanks to the folks at Frontier Foundry, we’ve been taking a look through their new DLC to bring you our review for Warhammer 40,000: Chaosgate – Daemonhunters: Duty Eternal. As ever you can find our full review in video and extended written format below, alongside our common-sense parent’s guide. If you want to know if Duty Eternal is worth it, if it’s suitable for children or just what it’s about, you’ve come to the right place
It’s worth mentioning that this is an add-on DLC and requires the base game. We also provided a full review of Warhammer 40,000: Chaosgate – Daemonhunters which you can find just here.
The Basics – What is Duty Eternal About?
Duty Eternal is the first major DLC for the excellent turn-based Warhammer 40,000: Chaosgate – Daemonhunters. As well as (somehow) making the title longer, it brings a fair bit of new content to the title. This includes new narrative, a new knight class, a secondary ship and the star of the show – the Grey Knights’ Venerable Dreadnought.
Duty Eternal plays alongside the main game and the first mission will pop up around day 100. The first mission, Allies Under Siege, will unlock the Techmarine class, and also let you have your first play with the Dreadnought itself. This is the first of four story missions within Duty Eternal, which you’ll dip in and out of as you progress through the main campaign. Some good news is that you don’t have to start a completely new game, and Duty Eternal can be enabled within a mid-game save if you do have one available.
Within the new story missions you’ll aid the Adeptus Mechanicus in combating an additional Technophage outbreak alongside the Bloom of the base game. As you progress through each of the dedicated Duty Eternal missions, you’ll unlock new elements of the DLC, as well as new tools, strategies and Technophage enemies.
So What’s New In Duty Eternal?
The Techmarine
Following the first mission you’ll unlock the Techmarine class. The Techmarine is a technical expert, who can help to repair your machine allies while disrupting Technophage and armoured enemies. This unit comes paired with a little Servitor helper which can provide varying benefits for the entire team while in battle.
The Techmarine really excels when facing off against technical enemies, but other than that it does seem a little underpowered. I’ve taken to leaving mine in the Baleful Edict for the most part, however where the Dreadnought or Lunete join the missions, it is incredibly useful. The helpful little servitors do provide some good benefits for the team, whether this is supporting fire, rocket blasts or armour breaking rounds, and echo the spirit of the tabletop game quite well.
The Venerable Dreadnought
A short while after beginning the base game’s Act Two you’ll find the second Duty Eternal mission, Honour of the Ancients. Within this you’ll unlock the Venerable Dreadnought itself, allowing you to bring it on future Technophage missions alongside your regular Grey Knights. Importantly, the Dreadnought will only join your team on Technophage-based missions, and won’t be available on regular missions. That said, a Technophage mission is included within every bloomspawn event, so there are still plenty of opportunities to get a lot of use from it.
The Dreadnought is an absolute behemoth of a unit, with heavy armour and even heavier firepower. Being made of mostly-dead grey knights, the Dreadnought cannot be healed using the traditional Apothecary, and you’ll instead look to the Techmarine to repair it in the battlefield. Back on the Baleful Edict you’ll have to use servitors to repair the Dreadnought, which can be a bit of a pain. This makes it wise to be mindful of damage, even with its overbearing presence on the battlefield.
Archeotech
Soon after mission two you’ll also unlock the ability to generate archeotech, a new in-game commodity which will be fairly familiar for Warhammer fans. Archeotech allows you to upgrade weapons, armour and accessories for the Dreadnought and Techmarine classes. In addition to archeotech and loadouts, the Techmarine and Dreadnought also come with their own new tech trees, allowing you to choose your own path through promotions.
The Gladius Frigate
Lastly you’ll unlock the Gladius Frigate. This secondary ship allows you to send grey knights out to battle in one event while you move to tackle another. After picking your knights you’ll receive a chance of success and injury rating, and must choose whether or not to send your knights to battle autonomously. While you’ll not unlock new tools or seeds, knights that you send do pick up experience (as well as injuries!) along their travels. It also really helps you to fight the battle on multiple fronts at the same time.
Is Duty Eternal Safe for Children – Our Common-Sense Parent’s Guide
Rating: 1 / 5: Adults Only
Duty eternal mostly takes our parent’s guide rating from the base game for Warhammer 40,000: Chaosgate – Daemonhunters. Both are rated by PEGI at 18 and above, and by the ESRB at a mature 17+. Duty Eternal is really no different from our previous rating. The battlefields of the far future are a bloody affair and the title is packed with gore and dismemberment. In addition, there are a number of relatively scary enemies and fear (and disgust) does play a large part. Overall this isn’t one which I would play in front of our Micro-Bandits and it’s one which I’d suggest is left for the slightly older members of the family.
Is Duty Eternal Accessible?
Rating: 3 / 5 Tricky
The base game received a higher 4/5 rating of Low Barrier, however for accessibility Duty Eternal is a little tougher to manage. Fighting battles on multiple fronts, and the inclusion of some incredibly tough enemies, does make it a little harder to get along here. Even on the easiest difficulties Duty Eternal can be a tough (while enjoyable) slog and it’s not one for the faint hearted.
The Run Down – Our Five-Point Rating for the Duty Eternal DLC
Gameplay – 4/5: I really love the new elements which duty Eternal brings to the Chaosgate base game here. It’s a shame that the Dreadnought can only be used within Technophage missions, however from what we’ve found there’s a Technophage mission available within almost every bloomspawn event. While it doesn’t restrict things too much it definitely would have been nicer to have a little more free rein. The Frigate is a great addition to the galactic battlefield and while the Techmarine is a little useless within it’s hulking dreadnought counterpart it can still be of some use throughout.
Visuals – 4/5: Visual rating here is the same as the base game, with no huge changes. Up close things can look a little clunky at times but overall the visuals have been well crafted and the mini event cutscenes such as breaking down doors and pillars are always a joy to watch
Audio – 5/5:Again taking from the base game for the most part, Duty Eternal keeps on with excellent voice acting and superb music and effects.
Narrative – 3/5: There is a nice little narrative for the four story missions here, but I would have liked to see a little more. I wasn’t hugely keen on splitting my focus between the story for the base game and Duty Eternal, but overall I just wanted more of it.
Replay – 4/5: There’s some definitely replay value added on here. Duty Eternal can be played from relatively close to the beginning, or from a mid-game save which can help you to jump back in. The various different upgrades and gameplay brought by the Techmarine, Dreadnought and Gladius Frigate are also great touches
The Verdict – Is Duty Eternal Worth It?
Pixel Bandits Heresy Level for Chaoegate’s Duty Eternal DLC is a Respectable 8/10. I’ve really enjoyed my time with Duty Eternal and it has provided a significant number of hours of additional play time. I’d definitely have liked a little more in the way of story and (with my rapidly addling brain) to have it separated a little more from the main story. But even with that considered I’ve still had a lot of fun with it.
It’s a little awkward that the star of the show – the Grey Knights’ Venerable Dreadnought – can’t be taken with you on every mission. However, there are a significant number of Technophage missions which you can take it on throughout your whole game after beginning Act 2. With Technophage missions appearing alongside every bloomspawn event, it’s actually harder to find a time when you can’t take the Dreadnought with you.
The Techmarine does have some nice features. It does come across a little weak when not paired with its larger Dreadnought mechanical brother, but playing around with its loadout a little has made it more useful in general. The Gladius Frigate may seem like a small addition, but it’s actually one of my favourite parts of the game. While I’ve found there to be an overwhelming number of concurrent tasks, access to a second ship allows a battle on two fronts, which can be incredibly helpful.
Overall, while I’ve got some niggles here and there, Duty Eternal has been a very welcome addition to my library. While it’s far from invincible, the Venerable Dreadnought is an imposing presence on the battlefield and it’s one which I have had a great time with.
As ever, to provide this review and common-sense parent’s guide, we received one free copy of the Duty Eternal DLC from the folks at Frontier Foundry.