# Warhammer 40,000: Darktide Free Update - Patch 1.12.0 out now! Skitarii later today - Product: Warhammer 40,000: Darktide (https://whatsnew.fyi/product/warhammer-40-000-darktide) - Vendor: Fatshark - Date: 2026-06-23 - Original notes: https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1361210/view/679627615118562101 - Permalink: https://whatsnew.fyi/product/warhammer-40-000-darktide/releases/2026-06-23-free-update-patch-1.12.0-out-now-skitarii-later-t What's New is an index, not a publisher: every entry below links to the vendor's own release notes, which are the authoritative source. Entries are labelled where they are hand-curated sample data, pre-releases, or drawn from a secondary source such as a developer blog. Reuse: the summaries, labels and curation here are © What's New. Quote freely with attribution and a link back; wholesale republication of the corpus is not permitted — terms: https://whatsnew.fyi/terms. The vendors' own release notes remain their publishers'. --- - **added** — New enemy type Scab and Dreg Vanguards, melee bruisers equipped with breakable shields - **added** — New Plasma Gun Mk III variant available to Veteran and Skitarii classes with focus on explosive power - **added** — New time of day Dawn in Expeditions - **added** — New Scavenge Zone, Sites of Interest with electric hazards, and Deadsider Sanctuary in Expeditions - **added** — Ability to mark Sites of Interest, Scavenge Zone exits, and extraction points on the Auspex by up to four players - **added** — Data Reliquaries now show on the Auspex once picked up for the first time - **added** — Hog-tied players displayed on the Auspex - **added** — More respawn points added to all Scavenge Zones - **changed** — Packmaster enemies now appear outside of Expeditions in other gamemodes starting from Heresy difficulty - **changed** — Packmaster mobility improved to keep up with retreating players - **changed** — Amount of Pox Hounds spawned with Packmaster changed to be based on difficulty with increased armoured version at higher difficulties - **changed** — Reduced amounts of Bulwarks throughout missions alongside new Vanguard enemy release - **changed** — Tech-Remnants now use shared team pool instead of personal pools - **changed** — Pressing equip button for Auspex while already equipped now switches back to previously equipped weapon or item - **changed** — Auspex map no longer starts in focused mode if player is moving while equipping it - **changed** — Prologue completion title can now be equipped by all classes and displays class-specific variants - **changed** — Poxburster targeting behaviour made more predictable and prevented from changing targets during lunge state - **changed** — Poxbursters now always enter explode state after being staggered by melee weapon push - **changed** — Poxbursters only initiate lunge when facing the player - **changed** — Ogryn Borovian Mk III Delver's Pickaxe now allows sprint during Light 3 and Heavy 2 attack windups - **changed** — Ordo Docket and Experience rewards improved for failed Expeditions runs ##### Warband! We’ve just released a major new update, containing tons of changes and fixes, alongside some new enemies! **The long-awaited Skitarii DLC class release later today,** as will a new live event to go along with it! ##### Special Live Event: Heretical Artifacts - 14:00 CEST _The Admonition have been sighted gathering relics and sacred effigies and doing…unnatural things to them. Strike teams have been tasked with retrieving these stolen artifacts and returning them to Tertium's clerics._ Starting from **later today, at 14:00 CEST**, players can participate in the event by joining missions with the ‘Relics in Ruins’ modifier to recover relics from the cultists. Once back in the Mourning Star, visit Sire Melk to deliver your recovered relics, and choose which faction to give them to. - The **Adherents of Saint Messelina**, which will bestow players with an increased coherency radius, alongside boosted attack and movement speed. - The **Scourge of the Faithless**, which endows players with increased damage, burn damage and burn duration. Participating in the event will reward players with Ordo Dockets, Plasteel, Diamantine, and this brand new Portrait Frame! ##### Enemies ##### New enemies: Scab & Dreg Vanguards _A new threat approaches…_ - Human melee bruisers equipped with breakable shields, these new enemies will bolster the enemy hordes and make them tougher to crack! - The Scab variant is equipped with a harder more durable shield that will last longer, but comes in more scarce numbers, while their Dreg equivalents are more numerous but only equipped with scrappy handmade shields that are more prone to breaking - Even without the shield, these vanguards are stronger than their non-shielded counterparts. ##### **Balance Changes:** As part of our ongoing balance commitment continuing on from the previous reduction to Ogryn enemies (and at the time, specifically the Crusher), with the release of the Vanguards we’ve reduced the amounts of Bulwarks throughout the missions. ##### Packmaster _The Packmasters have moved beyond the wastes of Atoma to reinforce their brethren in Tertium_ - Packmasters will now appear outside of Expeditions, across the other gamemodes starting from Heresy level difficulty and up. - **Improved mobility:** the Packmasters will now have an easier time keeping up with a retreating player - The amount of Pox Hounds spawned with the Packmaster has been changed to be based on the difficulty, with an increase of the armoured version at higher difficulty levels. ##### Plasma Gun Mk III A brand new Mark has been added to the Plasma Gun, the Mk III! Available to the Veteran class and the (releasing today!) Skitarii class, this Plasma Gun variant has less focus on piercing through enemies in favor of devastating explosive power. Give it a try! ##### Expeditions Update This update also sees an injection of new content into the Expeditions game mode, as well as various quality of life changes and reworks of certain systems! - **New time of day: Dawn** - **New Expeditions level content**, including: - New Scavenge Zone - New Sites of Interest, with electric hazards! - New Deadsider Sanctuary. - **Reworked how Tech-Remnants are shared**. - Players no longer have a personal Tech-Remnant pool. Instead, Tech-Remnants picked up by a member of the strike team are added to the team’s shared pool. - Whenever a player dies (does not apply to bots), the team’s pool is reduced by 25%. - This only happens if the team has more than 100 Tech-Remnants. - 50% of this value is dropped at the spot where the player died. - The team can retrieve the remaining 50% of the deducted value if they rescue the player that died. - If a hog-tied player is teleported to a Deadsider Sanctuary, the Tech-Remnants attached to them are lost. - For each alive player missing from the Valkyrie at the moment of extraction, 25% of the pool is reduced in the End of Round screen. - **Improvements to the Auspe _[Truncated at 4000 characters — full notes: https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1361210/view/679627615118562101]_