Gameflow: How you end up playing?

[mrbunnyban]

Just curious; how do you folks end up playing the game? What activities do you do to get your band ahead?

I’m still poking at the early game, but the general strategy I keep coming back to is baiting those deadly bandit groups around the map into the proximity of local militia and patrols. That way I can minimise my own loses while picking up loot from groups of enemies that I can’t normally take on myself.

I think I’m having trouble finding brawls that are an appropriate challenge for my band of battle brothers. Am I being to risk averse? I also feel this kind of desperation to find money ASAP due to the high wages (normal diff). But that’s what I end up doing most of the time, even once my men hit level 5.

What do you guys end up doing?

[Sky]

The first band was made at the very start of EA, in a world pretty dense. It was a beggar army, the lowest possible cost guys on the market. Avoided orcs and went for bandits and especially undead. As the core leveled up started to explore and raid everything. Never depended on any npc force but tried to help then when could. It was a very fast rise in resources equipment. Became a test party since have resources to last over a game year. It was a full on assault group rushing any enemy.(normal)

The band I started with the .38 update had a very very nice world generated, very spread out with a road ring. This party is basicly the survival of the fittest kind, my casualty counter already broke. At day 26 have more times the casualties than the test band above. With this I tend to focus on missions but since everything is so spread out it’s way harder to manage the resources. The feel of the game is much better than it was before. So far my plan is to stay alive and reach a stability in management. So far it’s the try and keep alive few core members till they level up while the others can and are sacraficed to reach the goal.(hard)

Tipps for new players
BB Wiki

[Meeky]

For my main game, the Lucky Laggards…

Early game: Bought a few guys I wanted to keep, but also got some throwaways. Used throwaways to distract the enemy, kept others alive. Fought bandits mostly, kept the roads clear of their camps. My map had next to no undead at the start, so instead I tackled orc youngs after that.

When money was tight I’d take delivery jobs and caravan escort quests. My best money, however, came from raiding bandit hideouts and camps, so that’s what I did. I did my best to avoid forest battles and instead fought on the plains whenever possible; it’s much easier to take out bandits when they’re charging at your shield wall with archers behind it.

Orc warriors remained a big “no please no” opponent, and I wound up losing some guys to a fight with them when I tried to save a village.

Also, I trained 4 archers as soon as possible and made them respectable. They were hugely important for fighting bandits and orcs. I was lucky enough to get a Wildman early on too; his high fatigue made him a natural choice for a two-handed warrior. I forced him into heavy armor, slapped a greatsword into his hands and never looked back. Walter the Wildman has been my highest damage dealing character since.

Mid game: Had lots of pretty tough guys and a small body count for the throwaways. By now I was able to buy the REALLY good guys (Weaponmasters, Hedge Knights, etc.), so I did, though I couldn’t hire them all at once. Trained them on bandits again, then went tackled orcs and orcs and orcs and orcs and orcs. Still no undead around, really.

Late game: Now I can fight orc warriors with no real problem. My 4 archers from before are ridiculously useful at this stage; with Berserk and -33% fatigue on kill and the ability to fire all day long until they lose fatigue, well… these guys are a real pain train, and orcs with their melee focused armies can’t really do much. It’s easy for me to train the Weapon Masters and such that I picked up now; I weaken things with a hail of arrows, then I finish them off. It’s a great way to hit level 11 on everyone.

At this point I started replacing characters that I didn’t really want (my miner and my shepherd, for instance) with actually useful backgrounds. Again: Weapon Masters, Retired Soldiers, Hedge Knights, Adventurous Nobles… You name it. A couple of these guys die during training missions, but those that survive reach level 11 pretty quickly since I can tackle REALLY tough fights without much of a sweat. My army is effectively complete.

Presently: Sitting on 232 days worth of pay (61k gold), 202 days worth of food, 605 tools, 149 ammo, 1947 medical supplies. Half my inventory is made of identical equipment I can swap to in case my other equipment gets badly damaged and I need to throw myself into a fight. I’ve started new games since then. I’m looking at coming back to this main game later after a few updates, but I feel like I’ve “won.” It’s day 82 and there’s not much more progression to be had. I’ve thrown my armies at enough undead dungeons (they finally started spawning) to get a feel for the challenge they presented. Sadly, there haven’t been any werewolves for me to fight yet.

What I’ll do in later games: Use throwaways still, but I’ll get 12 guys ASAP rather than waiting to build up to that point. More bodies on the field is a huge advantage. Replacing guys with bad stats was the right decision to make, and I’ll be sorely tempted to do that toward the midgame rather than late game.

For my army composition, I’m thinking 4 archers, 2-3 two-handed weapon fighters, 2 captains and 3-4 “tanks” of some kind may be the way to go. I’ll definitely be using Weaponmasters again; they’re just amazing at holding the line against orcs with an einhander build. Two captains is good, by the way, because you get both Inspiring Presence and Rally the Troops, two must-have abilities that affect the whole team. Plus, it means you can fight on two fronts without either front having a low resolve. Not bad.

[Anonymous]

For my main game, The black eagles :

Early game : I recruited every person who ever want to fight by my side. I encountered a group of bandit. Five of my group of seven mercenaries died. I flee in a hurry to narrowest city. I recruit people. They die, killed by a team of orcs. But the core of my team survive and start to gain experience ; and they begin to be very powerful, and then, to cover the rest of the team.

I tried numerous builds and i ended with three bowmen, two billhooks men – my main DPS- , one double-hand axe man – who often surprise me- , and the rest are spearmen. I have a turnover on two person, one billhook who died against orcs (my bad) and the second is my double handed axemen which never survive long but is very useful. The rest is hitting level 12, and my bvowmen are very deadly against the most of enemies, even skeletons.

Actually : I explore boards of the map, fighting every enemies with “deadly” or “challenging”, wainting the others to be more powerful. I only have one men lasting of my first group, Owen the disowned. I think that if he die, i will abandon this game and starting another.

[NewAgeOfPower]

In my current playthrough, I played very conservatively until I had an elite team of battle-hardened mercenaries. Even with my careful play, s*** happens. I’ve lost a founding brother, and at least half a dozen men.

However, by now my party cannot be beat in an open fields formation. I have had one single bowmaster kill 21 (!) ghouls in one turn.

(I’ve posted this picture in another thread before, but it’s the same party.)

The most critical key of my army are the members I call my ‘Sergeants’. One is a Fearless Apprentice who started with a incredibly high Resolve rating, 60ish, IIRC. The other is an squire who rolled a 54 starting resolve. At level 11, these men have a morale rating of 95 and 94 (!), respectively. This is before bonuses from Confident or Captain kicks in.

With an enormous +23 (observed in combat) Resolve rating, even the most craven and worthless scum stand their ground like fanatical zealots.

More importantly than that, however, is the ability to permenantly Rally The Troops. With the Sergeant’s shouting affecting each other, my entire front line can spam Spearwall + Shieldwall every turn. If my archers or other carries get unlucky on their first Perfect Focus run, they can just wait for a recharge from the Sergeants yelling at them.

The Seargents start out with Heavier mail and billhooks. Early on, they basically act as a second line damage source once the ranks close. I level them up in a Melee/Ranged/Resolve pattern on even levels and Melee/Fatigue/Resolve pattern on odd levels. Late game, they are armed with two crossbows, a shield, and a billhook, and are armored in scale vests and fitted with padded kettle helms, however, they rarely do anything but use Rally The Troops.

My army’s endurance is only limited by their ammunition and weapons durability now. In an open-order battle, as long as I am not completely boned by positioning, I can fight an Orc force up to 5x my size.

The ‘Lieutenant’, whom quite appropriately is an naive noble idiot, is fitted similarly to the standard frontline defensive heavy infantry. I chose him to be the “Inspirational” Officer since he already has the Determined perk, allowing for a uniform Confident Start. The standard rotation of Melee Skill/Melee Defense/Ranged Defense works well for him, with a few levels devoted to Endurance. Since Nobles are idiots who don’t know the true threat of arrows, he must use a kite shield to compensate. You can see his exact setup in the first picture.

The ‘Grunts’ I use 4 of. They are fitted at the beginning with basic mail, boar spears, and shields, upgrading to full mail, nasal helms and heater shields, then to plated coats and mailed flat-top helms. They level Melee Attack, Melee Defense and Ranged Defense, occasionally trading melee skill for endurance.

They prioritize the basic defenses and Rotation, then take a point in Sundering, then goes back into utility for Pathfinding, aiming for Brawny by level 10. I haven’t figured out what to put the final point into for level 11, but having the basic defenses, Rotation, Sundering, and Brawny makes for a very powerful lineup of tanky characters, that when armed with spears, will connect extremely frequently. These are the most expendable dudes in the army.

Your bowmen are practically useless until they hit 70 weapons skill. Even then, you need to take Fast Adaptation to make Quick Shots useful, and even with Sundering, they still bounce off Armored Orcs.

Why not use Crossbowmen instead, who are semi-reliable with just 60 weapons skill, and dish out incredible anti-armor performance, instead?

Firstly, the Hunting Bow outranges the Crossbow- it is very important that your own skirmishers can reply in kind to opposing skirmishers. Secondly, once you can reliably connect, the Hunting Bow will significantly out-DPS the crossbow. Finally, Perfect Focus builds plain just don’t work well with crossbows- the Fatigue/Damage ratio is just too poor.

These factors, especially the last two factors, ensures that for an end game build, the Hunting Bow is the tool for specialists. With the powerful combination of Battle Flow and Perfect Focus, an skilled Bowmaster can singlehandedly wipe out entire armies of light opponents. Even better, the bow does not suffer degradation of durability, a huge bonus when comparing to melee Perfect Focus carries; I have had a Perfect Focus Hedge Knight shatter 3 greatswords (Original, Quick Hands, Beserk recovers AP for another switch) in one turn.

That is not to say Archers are flawless- it is rare for your bowmen to kill an Armored Orc in one turn, and vs Skeletons they can only hope to chip away at your opponents armor. Indeed, they are so useless early game I often have 2/3 bowmen carrying their billhooks into battle instead. Still, late game, they are unrivaled vs light opponents that do not resist piercing .

Early game, I have them just wear padded surcoats and other light armor. However, an battle with some heavy orc warriors saw my front line broken, my mailed Sergeants bleeding, but my unarmored Archers dead. Once my frontliners had enough endurance to swap to heavier gear, my archers were refitted in mail.

The other two characters are my Glass Perfect Focus/Battle Flow Hedge Knight and my nimble Jedi Swordmaster. Their builds are self explanatory.

Note of warning: You may be tempted to give your Jedi Swordmaster nothing but a sword and a woven tunic, to minimize encumberance and maximize Dodge bonus, for further Nimble Multiplication. Do not do this.

No matter what your total defense skill is, chance to hit/get hit cannot fall below 5%. Eventually your extremely skilled, rare, and expensive asset will get hit.

With his terrible HP pool and the absurd damage levels on late game weapons (My Hedge Knight, if using Split Man with an Orc 2H Axe deals 148-215 damage, 311-457 armor damage. He isn’t even Brutal…) he will probably die. Put some goddamn armor on your Jedi- it may not look cool, but it will keep his butt alive.

My suggestions:
A Nimble Nerf
Student Buff
Quest Stacking, Increased Rewards
Quick Hands Rework Thanks, Dev Team!

[mrbunnyban]

Looking at what other folks do in their games have been very helpful – thank you all for that. I think I’m improving my game, bit by bit. I’ll probably be happy restarting yet another time trying to get my own battle line combinations right, haha. I’m even more surprised that someone was able to make spearwalls work in the late game!

So an update: Looks like I’ve reached the point in the game where I can stop relying on patrols to do the heavy lifting on behalf of my Battle Bait… I mean Battle Brothers. *cough* I do occasionally pull the odd deadly orc group to town militia and patrols for support, but my party has grown strong enough that I can even raid the occasional bandit hideout. I’ve even started investing in high grade troops since I have the finances to pull it off. I guess when the party grows in

I kind of wish towns always had quests waiting to be completed. I running around from town to town hoping for a worthy task but drawing absolute blanks is just a little frustrating. Not a big problem, but just mehhhhhh.

[Quidman]

For my part, I made 4 games.

For the first two I just randomly select guy with good narrative background, and select what perks seems good without thinking too much about it. Most of the time, I chose skill depending on the character previous stats, wich lead to a very various team, with each of each guy’s having a different build with no global logic.

The first game endend up pretty quickly the first time I encounter Orc warriors (It was my first time encountering them, a group describe as “slightly weaker”). They break throug my formation. And I try to last, and finaly flee with only one guys, and with pretty much no money or so…. and who dies on his way to a village, unable to escape from bandits.

The second team, pretty much on the same way stand long. Only one Loss in 80 days! This time I took better care of money and food to avoid desertion, buy more shield and armor before buying new members. And even my throwaways surprinsignly didn’t dies (the only one who dies was in fact an really precious archer with really good stats and all, but orcs warriors break through…) I stop a few time after, just because I wanted to try something else.

The third team was the min/max option, with carefully build team… and it wasn’t that good (I’m really bad at min/maxing) but still, I manage to lead a really good team with all character to Level 11. 2 archer, 3 hammer/spear/Cleaver/shield/heavy armor guys (mostly defense tree, quick hand, sundering strikes, pathfinder), 3 Axes/shield and 2handed weapons (mostly offense tree, with quick hand). Two captain (with rally the troops) one with a billhook/mace/shield, the other sword/mace/shield and taunt (wich never effectivly work, sadly. He was almost never attack while taunting…). And the two last, where my jack of all trade. Axes/shield/billhook/crosbow, with both offense and utilities tree, and battle forged/brawny.

I build that team as a build almost specific to orcs, because they are by far the only foe that I feared (I mean by that, high fatigue/shield/sundering/lot of axes and hammer/armor/…) And it worked well! Too well that it quickly became boring, as I always played the same way, turtling (rotation is really a good perks!), waiting opponent, cleaning light armored or archer guys with mine archers. Shielding and rallying often.

the team worked pretty well, I reach level 11 very quickly with all my guys. Early game, I only do caravan quest, never leaving roads until I could afford good weapons and armor for at least 2/3 of my team. And then assaulting bandits and undead camps (for these one, I always have a second set of lighter armor, to have much more fatigue, so I just wait them to come dying against y spear wall. And then running to kill the necromancer. And since I’m turtling around my archer, vampire never really are much of a problem).

And now, my last team, wich will wait a few time to being played, since I already played too much of this game and I’m running late on my works. A vinking teams. Wich by that mean only shirt/mail/lamellar armor, only round (and may be kite) shield. Lot’s of axes/spear/sword, and less mace and hammer, a few javelins, not the best helmet. I want to see how much time I can last like that, and how to adapt perks to these condition.

[mrbunnyban]

So it’s day 56 and I’ve taken out the main orc encampment. Think that’s pretty much the highest challenge in early access right now. At an earlier point my band of 12 took out 35 bandits in one battle. So I restarted to get a feel for the early game again.

Early game, I find caravan quest pretty dicey (I’m almost certain bandits spawn for the quest!). I seem to have better success baiting bandits to nearby castle/watchtowers, then gaining the equipment from the fallen bandits. Most of my costs go into hiring troops and buying tools.

Early-mid game caravan quests become more viable as well as the occasional easy raid, although I find myself running from battles which generate too much loses (sorry caravan!). Main objective is to gain a stockpile of equipment and crowns in preparation for hiring troops with better backgrounds.

Mid-game caravan quests become consistently winnable, and I start switching out members for troops with better backgrounds and try to level up.

Mid-late to late game I find going hunting and raiding more viable.

[RVallant]

My early strategy is to build the ‘core’ forces. I pick backgrounds that don’t have fatigue penalties, so I look for Farmhands, Lumberjacks, Hunters anything that can hold a sword the right end up without being exhausted.

I aim for a squad of;

3 Spears, 2 Axes, 2 Maces/Warhammer, 2 Swords, 3 Archers/Crossbows.

The absolute priority is Spearmen though, the idea is to have a wrap-around battle line, spear in the middle and on the flanks with the axes, maces and swords ready to deal damage as needed. I sometimes pull the swords deep ‘behind’ the spears on the flanks because I like to try and keep them somewhat mobile enough to take out anything that loses its armour. Axes deal with shields asap, Maces wear out the armour along with the spearmen who spearwall anything and everything or forces the enemy to split into pockets that I can overlap with the swordsmen (in theory!)

Priority for armour and shields go to the Spears at first as losing a good spear-user is an absolute pain in the butt as the game progresses as rookie spear users tend to be a weak link in the line. I think I can make that strategy a lot more effective once Deployment is introduced, at the moment its luck of the draw whether I get my line set up in time for battle (absolutely no chance against Werewolves who just blitz into the bloody line).

Money is the priority so I usually take a caravan contract right out of the gate, if they are available! These usually give some nice coin for reasonable fights, but sometimes you’re looking at an instant game over tbh, my last ‘failed’ game had my mercs do a caravan contract for almost 1,500 crowns. The trek was huge(!) We fought off two bandit groups, an undead group and then a pack of werewolves and finally literally two steps away from the destination a hunting party of fully grown Orcs went to town on us. No chance! I reckon the caravan guards knew so too as they kinda just let my men get ground to mincemeat before they bothered half-heartedly poking at an Orc! Yeah I could have ran away at that point but… After all those battles it seemed a shamed to give up right at the destination point. :(

I don’t bother with delivery quests, they don’t offer enough to bother with. I’ll take up scouting missions sometimes depending on the terrain and I’ll do raze missions versus bandits, but I’ll abandon them if they send me to an Orc stronghold (learnt that lesson in my first ever game, OHKO head lopping? No thanks!)

A tip for those engrossed in the battle system; Rest, and rest often. I chain missions so often I once ended up fighting a bandit camp with a team half-wounded and with tattered armour. We won, but it was stupid and I didn’t realise we ran out of repair tools, so that was pretty dumb. Ironically, on the way to the castle to get repair tools I got hunted down by werewolves, so yay!

[Game Over]

Hi everyone! Here i bring you some builds ive been using with some of my characters. Some of them are more fancy than effective, but anyway.

Check out the freaking defence of the First Blade (88) and the 50% hit head chance of the Psyco! See you!

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[Game Over]

The First Blade has 88 in the stats screen, but in the battlefield he gains +16 to both Ranged and Meele from Dodge and +10 from Confident. So he ends up with about 114 meele and 29 ranged. Pretty Nimble, i send him alone vs the orc warlords while the rest of the party kills the rest of the army. Since i dont mess up with bandits and undead too often, the low ranged deff isnt too awful. Plus, he has the top meele skill in my party 101+10 from confident. But above all, he is a really sexy character, not much a damage dealer but fun to play.

[NewAgeOfPower]

My issue with your design for your swordmaster is that his armor level is wayy too low.

Minimum chance to hit is 5% – that means, no matter how much dodge you have, you’ll get hit 5% of the time. An Orc Boss can easily pump out 200+ damage on a hit, so armoring your swordmaster. to at least survive the freak hit happening is advisable.

My suggestions:
A Nimble Nerf
Student Buff
Quest Stacking, Increased Rewards
Quick Hands Rework Thanks, Dev Team!

[Jaffai]

I Have never found drunk and strong swordmaster :(
I made few mistakes when choosing perks too, for both I should have taken “Shield Expert” instead of “Battle Forged”
And Rally guy should have taken “Brawny” instead of “Battle Flow”
I dont know if there is a bug in code but none of my swordmasters havent been hit as long as I can remember.

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[NewAgeOfPower]

5% Chance is very low. But it happens. I’ve had 2 swordmasters die in melee now.

My suggestions:
A Nimble Nerf
Student Buff
Quest Stacking, Increased Rewards
Quick Hands Rework Thanks, Dev Team!

[ManaSeed]

I started out with 3 people, looking forward to everything excitedly. Loitering around some peaceful towns, and decided to take some messenger/caravan quests. I found out the pay is incredibly low, so I began to hate the devs. Then I realized what happened and began to pity the devs, they must have an incredibly hard life before this. I completed quite a number of errand boy brother missions. Everything is so peaceful and serene, just nice- wait a minute. Why are there no enemies at all?

I created a new world and start the game again. This time, enemies are everywhere. Even the shortest route for errand brother quest is guarded by multiple badass bandit groups. There is absolutely no way to complete even the meager pay missions. In addition, the quest dealer always propose raid quests with 4800, 3000 rewards. Do I look like I can take on these quest with just 3 people? Are you stupid?

Since the quests are unreasonable, I started to prey on enemies by luring them to guard towers and defeat them together with guards. After the first time I sold equipments found, I decided to never take on quests anymore. I’ve been reluctant to recruit new member as I want to try things out with just 3 members. Later, I realize this is not viable as enemies are far too strong for me to mess around with. This is the prequel before my brothers rise.

However, today I only wish to post about a new role I’ve discovered recently.
====================================================================

I call this role “Half tank”. You require a brother with Swordmaster background.

Half tank ==> you can use other weapons for offensive purpose, but you’re advised to use Noble Sword for Riposte to maximize and utilize the defensive functions of this role. Especially good against light armored enemies.

Half tank + Indomitable = role “Guardian” ==> choose Fortified Mind to cope Ghost’s mental attacks, Anticipation to cope archers, or Rotation to keep your allies alive. This role is excepted lure/group enemy and hold them for very long time. Indomitable is essential to avoid getting knocked back (stunned) by shields (orcs). Despite Indomitable’s skill description says you’re no longer able to dodge, you still can dodge like normal.

Half tank + Rally the troops = role “Paladin” ==> you can choose any tier 2 utility perk as they are quite useful for different styles. This role provides better offensive functions than Guardian. Also, Indomitable is only useful if you’re going to lure & tank all enemies by yourself, which is less practical as you always fight with other brothers with a battle line.

1 brother against 13 orc youngs and 1 orc berserker. Despite the name says “Paladin”, he is actually Guardian.

You can switch between basic mail shirt and mail shirt.

Stats growth priority
　　　　Melee skill ==> increase this stat almost every level
　　　　Melee defense ==> increase this stat moderately (will be explained at below)
　　　　Max fatigue ==> increase this stat almost every level
　　　　Ranged defense ==> increase this stat moderately (will be explained at below)
　　　　Resolve ==> depends, but I doubt you have spare stats points for this

When melee def is 92, orc youngs have about 5% (7/130) chance to hit me.
When melee def is 80, orc youngs have about 6% (12/180) chance to hit me.
When melee def is 68, orc youngs have about 11% (14/126) chance to hit me.

The experiment above is performed when 6 orc youngs have surrounded me. *Result might not be extremely precise because I didn’t separate the overwhelming effect which enemies inflicted on me, but the result should be practically precise/useful as enemy will overwhelm me in combat. As a reminder, I think different enemies might have different chance to hit.

In my case, I increase my melee defense to around 60 (30 multiplied by 2 due to Nimble), and the Hold Out perk will further increase it by 20 (so I have about 80 melee def in total). Then I spent my spare stats point on ranged def. You can increase Resolve for your Paladin if you think he is good enough to survive in various situations.

I might post other roles of my main force later. I never go for defensive style, so this is probably my first and last role with defensive functions.

[Author]

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