Argenta Build Guide: Heavy Bolter Dakka (Arch-Militant)
TL;DR: Take entity:argenta down the entity:soldier into entity:arch-militant path, hand her a entity:heavy-bolter, and prioritize BS, STR, and PER. entity:heavy-weapon-proficiency lets her wield heavy bolters at 35 STR instead of 60, and the rest of her talents turn sustained rate of fire into encounter-clearing Righteous Fury turns. She is among the strongest companions in the game.
Build: 1dee55ed0ad0Why Argenta is a top-tier companion
Argenta is a Sister of Battle from the Adepta Sororitas, recruited in the prologue, and she is the party's premier ranged damage dealer from the moment she joins. Her archetype is fixed as Soldier, which suits her perfectly. Soldier is the cleanest ranged carry chassis in the game, and it feeds directly into the Arch-Militant exemplar path that defines her best build. Recent patches also classify her as a Priest, so on top of all that damage she contributes party-wide buffing utility. A companion who tops the damage charts and buffs the rest of the squad earns the upper bracket of the roster.
Her ceiling is the heavy bolter "dakka" build, where she stacks rate of fire until a single Righteous Fury turn can clear an entire encounter. That mix of raw output and party support is rare, and it keeps her on most Unfair-difficulty parties.
Archetype path: Soldier into Arch-Militant
Argenta's path is Soldier (fixed) into Arch-Militant into entity:exemplar. You do not choose her Tier 1; she is locked to Soldier, which is the ideal foundation. Soldier supplies the mobility-plus-damage tools that keep a heavy gunner relevant while repositioning, and Arch-Militant supplies the engine that makes her output snowball.
The Arch-Militant payoff is entity:versatility. The exemplar's signature mechanic builds stacks as Argenta cycles between weapon types and attack types, and those stacks roughly double her output over the course of a fight. The longer the battle runs, the harder she hits. A heavy bolter, with its high ammo count and high rate of fire, is the perfect weapon to feed that stack, because every burst adds proc volume and keeps the cycle turning. Pair Versatility with entity:heavy-gunner from the Arch-Militant tree and the heavy bolter becomes the centerpiece of her kit.
The heavy bolter "dakka" engine
The whole build is organized around firing as many high-quality bolter rounds as possible per turn. Five talents make that happen:
Heavy Weapon Proficiency. Heavy bolters normally demand 60 STR. This talent drops the requirement to 35 STR, which frees Argenta to carry a heavy bolter without dumping every point into Strength. It unlocks the entire archetype, so take it first.
Rapid Reload. Reloads cost 2 less AP. Heavy bolters burn through ammo fast, and a dakka build that has to spend its turn reloading is a dakka build that has stopped shooting. Cutting reload cost keeps the trigger pulled.
Unfaltering Fire. Rapid Fire normally trades damage for volume. Unfaltering Fire removes that penalty, so Argenta can spray on full auto without losing per-shot power. This is the single biggest multiplier on her sustained damage, because it lets her stack rate of fire and damage at the same time instead of choosing between them.
Overpower. More crit chance and crit damage with heavy weapons. Every extra round in the air is another chance to crit, so crit scaling compounds hard with high rate of fire. Overpower turns a wall of bullets into a wall of critical hits.
Heavy Gunner. This is the Arch-Militant talent that pairs directly with the heavy bolter, tying the exemplar's Versatility cycle into her primary weapon class. With Heavy Gunner online, the weapon she fires every turn is also the weapon that powers her stacks.
Run these together and the result is the Righteous Fury turn that defines her: a sustained burst that builds rate of fire into a single encounter-ending volley.
Stat priority: BS, STR, PER
Three characteristics matter for Argenta, in this order.
Ballistic Skill (BS) is her hit chance and the backbone of all ranged damage. Every point makes her shots land and crit more reliably, so this is the stat you raise first and never stop raising.
Strength (STR) clears the heavy bolter's wielding requirement. With Heavy Weapon Proficiency taken, you only need 35 STR rather than 60, so you can hit that threshold and then redirect the rest of your investment back into the stats that scale her damage.
Perception (PER) rounds out the ranged kit and supports her accuracy and damage scaling alongside BS. It is the third priority once BS is climbing and her STR requirement is satisfied.
Keep BS leading throughout the campaign. STR is a threshold you clear once; BS and PER are values you keep pushing.
Priest status: party buffs on top of the damage
Argenta's Priest classification is what separates her from a pure damage companion. As a Priest she layers party-wide buffs onto the squad, so she contributes every turn even before she fires a shot. This is why she earns a permanent slot rather than a situational one: she is a carry who also makes the rest of your party hit harder. In a game where the action economy decides fights, a damage dealer who doubles as a support node is worth a great deal.
That dual role is also why she synergizes so well with the Officer "double-turn" engine. An entity:officer can hand Argenta extra attacks, and a heavy bolter carry with Versatility stacks and Unfaltering Fire turns those extra attacks into some of the highest single-turn damage the party can produce. For more on that pairing, see the Officer build guide and the Soldier build guide, which covers the Soldier chassis Argenta is built on.
Gearing and where to take her
Her weapon class is the heavy bolter: high ammo for stacking rate of fire, sourced from the Fellowship of the Void shop. Build toward the best heavy bolter you can field, keep her supplied, and let Versatility compound across long fights. Because her path is fixed and her talent tree is so focused, she is one of the easiest companions to build correctly, which makes her a strong pick for new players as well as veterans optimizing for Unfair.
For the wider roster and where Argenta ranks against the rest of the crew, see the companion tier list and the full builds hub.
Verdict
Argenta is a fixed-archetype companion who happens to land on the best damage chassis in the game, and the heavy bolter dakka build leans all the way into it. Heavy Weapon Proficiency unlocks the weapon, Rapid Reload and Unfaltering Fire keep her firing at full power, and Overpower plus Heavy Gunner turn volume into crits while her Priest buffs make the whole party better. Slot her early, build BS first, and she carries from the prologue to the endgame.