Sekata

[Sekata]

That’s a fair observation. Sometimes the player will get screwed. What I said was that the player is rewarded for carefully stacking the odds in his or her favor. There is randomness involved in the game design, and it can lead to losses. However, that randomness is secondary to careful planning on part of the player, and that planning is meant to shuffle the deck to favor the player with better equipment, choice of engagement terrain, etc.

I’m not saying randomness doesn’t exist as an important factor. I am saying that I don’t believe that randomness is the only thing that matters in battle brothers, and random events can be future proofed by careful consideration. A group of bandits with many marksmen can be engaged at night to diminish the effectiveness of crossbow units, and the same with goblin archers. The player can train units to have indomitable as a clear level goal to avoid being pushed around by orc warriors. The player can trade between shields to better account for ranged vs melee oriented enemies. There’s a lot the player can do to influence the dice roll. That’s the reason I say battle brothers is about risk management, as opposed to being a gambling simulator where virtually everything is completely out of the player’s control.

Full disclosure, I am not a 1337 player. I save scum, I do it shamelessly, and will until the full release hits. Here’s the thing though. In just about every instance where I take serious losses, and look back honestly, there was something I could have done to avoid the worst of the losses.

Fighting 22 skeletons with nobody on my side using cleavers and a necromancer far in the back lines. I might have lost a few brothers, but the losses are much worse when I don’t have an item to permanently put down an enemy.

Fighting a group of goblin ambushers in daylight with no wardogs. So much bad here, I don’t even know where to start.

Forgetting to replace the shield or helmet for a unit that lost one or the other in the previous battle. He’s dead jim.

Going up against raiders and not equipping the flails or handaxes to remove their advantages and press my own.

Letting my heavy get surrounded on all sides, when it was obvious that I was placing him within easy movement range of several units.

Certainly, the game can be unforgiving and some losses are unavoidable. If I had to throw a(n) (arbitrary) number on it, i’d say 30% of losses during my gameplay experience have been things I couldn’t have prepared for. That remaining 70% is absolutely my fault.

[Sekata]

Edit: To your actual question :How to recover from crushing losses

This is a management question, and all I an do is tell you what my experience of the game is. This is not the only way to recover, and I’m sure there are other methods that other players can share. Here is what I suggest.

Do your best in the beginning to create an insurance pool of cash. Save money from contracts up to a cap that you decide upon in the event of a long gap in pay or the loss of many units. Early game, run fairly easy missions that will allow you to save up money with relatively little risk. When you reach your target amount of cash, do not under any circumstance, allow your gold to go below that number. As your mercenary band becomes more developed and more expensive to maintain, raise the cap. Always keep an insurance pool of cash on hand based off of the current performance and equipment of the mercenaries you’ve got hired. The cap also allows you long periods of time to take on longer quests that have a more nebulous payday. Only treat the money that you have in excess of that number as disposable income. In this way, the hardest part of the game becomes reaching and maintaining that cap. Hope this helps.

I’ve lost up to four out of seven mercenaries and kept playing. Anything more and I would have reloaded. It is possible to be successful after heavy losses with the proper amount of cash on hand. Money fixes everything in Battle Brothers. The best cure to an empty roster is a full wallet.

Bottom of the barrel missions are delivery ones. You have to be VERY careful on the overhead map for these though, as I’m pretty sure the missions trigger ambush spawns on the route to destination. I encourage finding an off road delivery route to avoid the worst of potential ambushes.

++Info posted BEFORE question clarification++

Don’t feel bad about save-scumming. I know this isn’t a popular opinion, but I’ll stick to it, and here’s why.

1. Firstly and MOST importantly, this is a game and only serves its purpose as one if the player is enjoying him/herself. I understand that there is an elitist current in gaming culture that wants you to play a certain way because “I can do it, why can’t you”, but the people that support this view didn’t buy your copy for you. You bought the game. As long as you aren’t doing something illegal, enjoy your copy of it. If that means avoiding high blood pressure by reloading the game after a bad shake, then reload away.

2. The game is in alpha. Some things are very rough around the edges, like the rating system for enemies on the map. It is very difficult to judge good fights for new players, as an “even” band of bandits is nowhere nearly as dangerous as an “even” band of orcs. There is no official user manual or guide, so unless you’ve spent considerable time on the forums or watching the dev lets plays (which all new players are not going to do) you have no idea why fighting that “even” group of goblin ambushers is a death sentence for your fresh faced band of mercenaries. There are also a few bugs and inconsistencies that put the player at a disadvantage, and It’s doubtful that these things will make it into the new build, but they affect current user experience. If you want to feel terrible for save-scumming, feel terrible on full version release when all pieces are in their proper place. During alpha, have fun, poke at things, experiment, try and break systems to report bugs to the devs, but again for the love of God ENJOY YOURSELF.

On the matter of this game being about random and suffering, i’ve got to respectfully disagree. Battle Brothers will not (and should not) unduly punish you for doing everything correctly. If you’re starting a campaign and you see a caravan quest paying 1415 gold, chances are it will get your company killed with the number of ambushes, don’t take it. If night time is on its way and you’ve got to travel through a thick patch of forest, bunker down at a nearby tower and wait for day because any group of werewolves get a movement buff during night time, and early game that means death for your squad. In my experience failure in this game comes from gaps in knowledge or carelessness. I’ve died most when taking my eyes off of the overhead map and walking into an ambush, or failing to prioritize crossbows, axe units, and other dangerous targets. Sure, there is an element of randomness in the hit chances and game design. Events can affect the trajectory of your play, and a bad roll can crit and kill your best unit, but the player is rewarded for careful game play that stacks all odds in his/her favor. The game is at most about risk management, but it is not a gambling simulator the way some games are, and it is not all random.

[Sekata]

Ammo is easiest to buy from the castle location on the map. The icon looks a bit close to the icon for a quiver of arrows, but a quick hover over a possible candidate should clarify. I’m not entirely sure when ammo is deducted from the bin to refill quivers though, and since i have not paid enough attention to say accurately, I won’t speculate. Just know that ammo is easiest to buy at the castle, and sometimes the city. It’s hard to find it anywhere else.

[Sekata]

Best way to go about killing the undead is equipping a few brothers with millitary cleavers (extremely expensive) or the rough cleavers that you get from killing orcs. The decapitate skill puts enemies down to stay down. If you’ve got someone in your group with the “fatality” stat, you don’t even have to give him a cleaver, any edged weapon ensures a decapitation if I understand the perk properly. If you’ve got a utility unit with Rally, then undead battles where you use cleavers, even the orcicsh ones, become fairly simple. It may be the cheapest option as well, since millitary cleavers are pretty expensive to buy.

Hope this helps!!

[Sekata]

As a response to point 7, there is an event in the game where a new soldier breaks down and the commander addresses him after fighting. Its not unaccounted for in the game. Even more, competence at the job of hacking and slashing is heavily reflected in the starting stats of the various professions. That fisherman has a much lower chance of holding his own in a fight than either a hedge knight or a raider.

Having spent time in history academia, I’ve gotta say that a LOT of these other “facts” are incredibly suspect. I’m inclined to discount most of them, especially since there is little to no citation.

[Sekata]

I just recently hit the point where I can’t play anymore. Which is a shame. I see all these awesome map features like black monoliths and sunken castles. I clear em out and get a whole lot of nothing. Not exactly a fair reward for the risk.

[Sekata]

I don’t dislike holdout. It gives double buff on confident status. If there’s a captain on the field with inspiring presence, that’s a strong early fight advantage. I might be missing something though. Hit me.

[Sekata]

My only worry about the commander suggestion is the departure from the all chips in feel of the game. A character that gets special treatment would remove a quality that I think bb has, especially in the early game which is that of mercenaries desperately fighting to make a living and keep each other alive. It’s not all that desperate a fight if there’s a plot armored character in the mix.

If it was a deal where you chose a character in the roster to promote to the level of commander then that would make some sense, considering that the other factions have a clear sort of “leader” character in their roster. I’d argue that those exist for the player currently though, in the form of ‘captains’ with inspire or rally. I’d love the idea if it could be done without making the player’s band seem “special”. If the tactician can die like everybody else, then fantastic.

[Sekata]

It’s a pretty good game. One of those titles that sucks away 100 hours before you realize it. That’s even before you realize how many mods expand it to make it even more detailed. It’s the kind of game some people have to uninstall for their own good.

All that being said, its not perfect. It lacks quite a bit of polish, and rules that apply to the player do not at all apply to the rest of the world. There aren’t even other mercenary companies to contest with. The player is the only one who happened to have that million dollar idea.

In some ways, BB is already more successful in my book. Instead of feeling like an anomaly, the player feels very much like a part of the world. That will be even more reinforced when competing mercs get added.

[Sekata]

Sky wrote:

It can not become too much like M&B. It’s not like MB, it just seems that way because the world map movement of your unit, that’s all they have in common. When the faction conflicts will be added, that too would be similar to MB and to any other faction conflict mechanics game out there. Apart from the world map everything else is quite different.

But it could become even more than it is now. By giving the characters more of a personality, not only by traits and backgrounds but by adding in some characterizing one liners like the Darkest Dungeon has. It would require some work but would add immensely to the atmosphere of the game. Be it curses and whines on the battlefield, or disappointment frustration or cheering up on town or management screen as they get better or worse equipment and jobs.

Having played both extensively, i’m pretty sure that i’m capable of coming up with an opinion of what “too much like” is from my own frame of reference. I’m aware of the differences, thanks.

I just wouldn’t want to see BB take all of its cues from mounts and blade, when its got so much personality from the features that make it different.

[Sekata]

I’d love all of the above, I just sort of worry that it might become too much like M&B, which has a lot of ‘nation equivalents’. It lacks all of the supernatural elements and polish though, widely loved as it is. B&B could really be something distinct and remarkable. The more content the better, absolutely.

[Sekata]

I can agree with all of that. M&B combat is separate from the world map though, and not nearly as intimate as xcom or BB.

I’m going to disappoint myself if I keep thinking of all the possibilities in this game. I’d love the chance to catch a noble. Capturing one would raise your reputation. Killing him would lower it with all parties, since you both failed the mission and killed a highborn. Those would have to be some high paying contracts.

[Sekata]

Update:
So as I expected, a lot of my failures early game had to do with the nature of the game, and my complete inexperience. Learning how to handle the early game from this forum helped clear that up. Orcs seem much more reasonable now that my soldiers aren’t fighting them with leather caps on.

The hit percentages are of course just the nature of the game. I’ve hit people at 8% and missed at 95. I retract all complaints that i had about the hit ratings.
I would like to see a choice for whether nor not to aim for the head or aim for the body. If an enemy has no armor but a full integrity helmet, then i definitely want the option to try for the chest. I understand why that wouldn’t be a desirable choice on the programming side though, as it would require percentage chances being split between the head and the body.

New maps to facilitate raids, and the removal of the ambush mechanic if the brothers initiate combat in the forest are still desirable.

Other than that, I was wrong on all counts. Leveling and equipping brothers appropriately makes a HUGE difference. Knowing what weapons work for rookies as opposed to vetrans helps too. Knowing which enemies you can deal with at any given point is equally important. You guys at Overhype have done an amazing job.

If you need an editor or writer for content, I’d love to volunteer. Anything to help this project.

[Sekata]

Are you sure about the stun thing? I’ve put some pretty good hours into Xcom across about two finished (long) playthroughs and a heck of a lot of unfinished ones, and i’ve never had a stunned target wake up. Get blown up by a stray grenade sure. Explode to bits from a poorly aimed rocket sure. Don’t know if I’ve ever had one get up. If i’m not wrong at least twice a day, its only because i haven’t spoken. Can you send a source to confirm?
Best I can find is this:
http://www.gamefaqs.com/boards/655782-xcom-enemy-unknown/65310084
But the interwebs can be full of contradictory info. If you find something that proves the contrary, please let me know.

That aside, lets take m&b for an alternative example. Units can be knocked unconscious and are in a death state. Never ever ever get up. Granted, bodies disappear in M&B and it doesn’t have the same…. fidelity of style that BB maintains, but the game still provides an example of prisoners being obtained through a pseudo death state.

As for the lethality of maces, a system doesn’t have to be complicated. You have a % that the target goes into the current model (face smashed) or a different model (just on the ground out of the fight). One would show that the target will not be joining any sequels, and the other would imply unconsciousness. I suppose that’s what you mean by subdual though.

It is absolutely possible to accidentally kill targets in the current combat. It’s also possible to fudge existing missions by not paying attention and running into a bad ambush on deliveries, or failing to protect a caravan target. A capture mission would be one among many where the player has to make a choice to stay true to the iron man model, or pansy out and start over. To be honest, the fact that other people are going to do that doesn’t bother me. Let them play their game. I’ll play mine and try to learn from the mistakes that failed missions and lost soldiers like Rumold and Grimald and Engelbert… I’m gonna need a minute.

Weapons can be added that specialize in capture, not that they’d be necessary. A few items have functions that lend to set up for a capture even now. The stun on the mace, the armor crushing move of the warhammer, etc. In real life apprehension of a living creature, human, quadruped or otherwise comes with the risk of killing said entity. Nothing new, or unexpected there.

I don’t know, i just imagine a lot of different things being added to the game. It’s got insane potential for expansion in so many different directions.

Edit: Even my forum posts are iron man mode T-T. Those are man tears. I’m not gonna correct the mistake on that reference post. I did goof there. I will clarify though. My experience is with enemy unknown, but I see that units did wake up on the original title. The concept still works in the more recent iteration, where a stun completely removes the alien from combat.

[Sekata]

We’re in agreement for half of that. A capture would essentially count as a death state. The model would be on the ground as though dead, and would be incapacitated for the remainder of the fight. No question there, I don’t consider it an issue. If the status requirements for inflicting it are high enough then it becomes the same as having earned the kill. Same for the mace. Lets say you have a brother fighting a raider and the raider is wielding a mace. The brother takes a blow to the head that would have zeroed out his hp anyway. Ok, he’s no longer a factor on the field, but instead of death being the only option, the brother goes into a state of unconsciousness. Not something that would have to happen every time, and as you’ve mentioned that the possibility could be influenced by a unit that is already going to be added to the game.

So yes, in my mind the captured state would essentially be the same in-game as the death state, just having different consequences post battle.

I don’t see how any of this would incentivize save scumming. Ideally to me, this game would be as brutal as ironmode xcom . On that subject, xcom does feature a capture mechanic that is treated the same as a death state. It’s not unworkable or awkward.

If people want to find a way to cheat then they will. Resources spent trying to circumvent people who don’t want to play the game as is, are resources that can’t be spent on spectacular features that real players will enjoy. Put an ironmode checkbox at the start of a playthrough that prevents save loading and be done with it.

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