This post will only include feedback from a player who has purchased the game involving personal experience with the title. The feedback will include all personal biases that should be ignored where they go against the intention of the development team.
Firstly you guys have done amazing work, and the game is clearly a labor of love. I’m writing this post to help make the experience better, because I love the potential in the game, and I want to see it grow and improve.
Here’s what I think having played Battle Brothers for roughly twenty hours.
There is no clear path of progression: The starting quest is a good way for players to get their feet wet, but afterwards they are dumped in a world full of equipment, skills, and dangers and no way to cope beyond trial and error. For the masochist in me, that’s fantastic. I love it. Games that don’t hold the players hand and count on player growth are fantastic. There’s a laundry list of games i play just for that challenge, and Battle brothers is the newest addition. For new players though, it may be a real turnoff.
The game needs quite a bit of balance work:
I legitimately enjoy the combat, and there are instances where I feel an intelligent decision made all the difference, but that feeling is currently the exception to the rule (queue jokes about my intelligence). Combat, fun as it is, rarely allows me to feel that anything goes beyond good starting position and dice rolls. Neither of which I have control over. It’s one thing to lose two soldiers in a scrap. Its another thing when you only lost one of them because your archer missed 4 consecutive shots at 51% hit rating. The random nature of the game can even turn a ‘good’ dice roll into an unfortunate one. For example, hitting a soldier on the head is supposed to be a good thing, but turns out to be a terrible turn of events if their body armor is broken, and getting a killing body shot would have saved someone on the next turn.
The random nature of starting positions can even turn a favorable engagement into a poor one. Attacking a group on open ground seems to set both sides visible and opposite each other arrayed in a battle line. This does not seem to be the case when the player decides to attack an outpost and instead of having the feeling of raiding the compound, the player winds up on the defensive in what appears to be an ambush scenario. This is even more problematic when the player initiates against a hostile group in the forest because the opening positioning still puts the battle brothers on a defensive ambush footing. What this means is that instead of having the choice of going on the offensive by turning on a pursuing group of bandits, I as a player just have to hope and pray that I get favorable positioning when the battle starts.
All of these factors make the current build seem more like one big dice roll than anything a player has the ability to influence, which removes half of the incentive to play. Why take pride in building a veteran battle brother into a tank, when he can be killed by by a bad spawn and a particularly sprightly orc young? Just moving about the map can be an exercise in patience. I’ve been ambushed by fairly large packs of werewolves in broad daylight several times. The inability to predict when i should stay off the roads and when i should travel to avoid losing my rookie band of soldiers is infuriating. This could be avoided if there was a reliable way for a band to cut their teeth and grow, but i’m just as likely to run into a well tooled group of bandit raiders early game than i am to run into a group of thugs.
To be both blunt and short, the game as it is, does not allow me to feel that growth is significant. So much of it is randomized, that I feel like I’m playing cards, not dealing with a persistent world, where my persistent characters should get better and more competent with time. I recognize that a lot of it has to do with my current ignorance of the existing systems. I’ll get over some of these gripes as I play and learn what to take advantage of. For new players already taking a risk on a new unfinished IP, the lack of information and control could be a deal breaker.
As the title of this thread suggests, I would love to see this grow. I could easily see myself putting 100+ hours into an expanded version with more balance and more content. I would suggest that version of BB to every gamer friend I have. If there’s anything I can clarify, or anymore feedback I can give to help develop Battle Brothers, please let me know. Best of luck to you Overhype.
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