Steam Deck

Warhammer 40,000: Boltgun Best Steam Deck Settings

Wage war against the powers of Chaos with these settings for an optimized FPS experience on your Steam Deck.

The boomer shooter is making a huge comeback, and as retro gamers, we're all for it. Warhammer 40,000: Boltgun is a high-octane science-fantasy romp set in the iconic Warhammer 40k universe that both fans of classic first-person shooters and the tabletop game are sure to love. Better yet, it runs great on the Steam Deck, making it a great addition to your library for some fragging on the go.

We've tinkered and toiled to find the settings that deliver the perfect balance of battery life and performance. Read on to find the Warhammer 40,000: Boltgun best Steam Deck settings.

Warhammer 40,000: Boltgun Best Steam Deck Settings

Compatibility Settings
Proton Version Default

On release, Boltgun was a sub-par experience on Steam Deck. Frequent crashing, stuttering framerates, videos failing to play, and generally poor performance were the most common complaints posted by users. Thankfully, at the time of reading, a post-launch update has brought major improvements that make Warhammer 40,000: Boltgun finally playable on the Steam Deck. So for the majority of users, getting Boltgun to run is as simple as hitting the "Play" button in Steam.

For the unlucky few who are still getting performance issues, make sure you're running the game with Proton 8. Your Deck should launch with this version by default, but you can always switch to Proton Experimental or Proton Hotfix and see how they work for you.

Recommended — Performance Settings (720p@60fps | ~2h)

When it comes to boomer shooters, framerate trumps all. Faster framerates mean less delay between inputs, which makes controls feel snappier and more responsive. Unfortunately, the graphics options in Warhammer 40,000: Boltgun are limited, and other than resolution, none of the settings really impact performance that much. The good news is that the pixel-heavy art style of the game means you can drop the resolution without greatly impacting visual quality. So, for the sake of raw performance, these settings drop the in-game resolution to 720p.

We can even save some battery life by capping the Steam Deck's Thermal Design Power (TDP) Limit to 8 Watts. This keeps the Steam Deck from pushing itself harder than it needs to, extending your play time on a single charge.

While a TDP Limit of 8 Watts works fine in most situations, you'll probably find framerates begin to drop in the later stages of the game, where battles can get crowded and frantic. Don't be afraid to turn up the TDP Limit (or remove it altogether) when performance starts to tank.

Video Settings
Resolution 1152x720
Fullscreen Fullscreen
Resolution Scale 100%
Vsync On
Framerate Cap 60
Horizontal Field of View 90*
Gore Pool Size medium
Anisotropic Filtering 8
Post Processing Quality High
Ambient Occlusion On
Material Quality Medium
Display Settings
HDR Off
Brightness 50%*
*Set to personal preference
Steam Deck Performance Menu Settings
Refresh Rate 60
Framerate Limit 60
Allow Tearing On
Half Rate Shading Off
Thermal Power (TDP) Limit On
Watts 8
Manual GPU Clock Control Off
Scaling Filter Linear

Recommended — Battery-saving Settings (720p@40fps | ~2h30m)

These settings will give you the most play time out of a single charge at the cost of performance and a bit of visual fidelity. This is mostly the same as the above settings but with the screen refresh rate and framerate limiter capped at 40Hz and 40 frames per second, respectively. Thankfully, Warhammer 40,000: Boltgun is one of the slower-paced modern boomer shooters, so the lost 20 frames per second don't impact the gameplay or feel too bad.

Video Settings
Resolution 1152x720
Fullscreen Fullscreen
Resolution Scale 80%
Vsync On
Framerate Cap 60
Horizontal Field of View 90*
Gore Pool Size medium
Anisotropic Filtering 8
Post Processing Quality High
Ambient Occlusion On
Material Quality Medium
Display Settings
HDR Off
Brightness 50%*
*Set to personal preference
Steam Deck Performance Menu Settings
Refresh Rate 60
Framerate Limit 60
Allow Tearing On
Half Rate Shading Off
Thermal Power (TDP) Limit On
Watts 8
Manual GPU Clock Control Off
Scaling Filter Linear