Battle Brothers Hits Early Access

Thanks for clearing that up.

The game is quite easy to get into in terms of the basic mechanics. Enjoy the discovery process :).

I’ve started playing this again recently and I’m doing better thanks to tips from you guys, but it sure is brutal. I don’t like to lose any men, especially in an easy battle. I’ve got to remember how dangerous enemies with two-handed weapons can be.

Just think Darkest Dungeon. Sometimes, that poor dude is there so that he can buy you a turn to finish off that high value target!

Yeah, when a battle starts and I’m sizing up who I want my marksmen to poke full of holes on the first turn, I first look for 2-hand wielders. They don’t have shields and are very dangerous so they get the first priority.

This. And those without helms, are targets for my flail wielders.

Edit: Also, it may be useful to swap the bows for a pike when facing undead. Basically, think of your own line up as a dynamic team instead of a static locked-in group. Just identifying what each type of foes is weak to can carry you extremely far!

To you guys getting into the game, remember this:

Your little dudes? They are going to die. It’s just the way of Battle Brothers.

I finally fought my first real battle. I took some bumps and bruises, but the little guys didn’t falter.

As a loose comparison, it feels like a more in depth version of the tactical battles in Fallen Enchantress: Legendary Heroes, where the characters get abilities based on the weapons they wield. Also, they both use an initiative based system, attacks of opportunity. Battle Brothers adds elevation differences, line of sight rules.
I like the system. I wish I could click on an enemy and get more detailed info because I don’t remember which weapons give what types of attacks. I like the pop up on mouse over, but from there I wish I could then drill down.

I’m also enjoying the writing in it more than I would have expected for a game like this.

I haven’t had to travel much yet, so I don’t know how the food and travel time play out…

Attacks can be pretty brutal, so it definitely seems like an unlucky roll or two, or leaving your guy exposed could cause many untimely deaths. I’m playing at the middle difficulty since that seemed like what the game was balanced for.

The part that gives me pause is equipment management. I’m worried I’ll be required to constantly look at store inventories and juggle equipment around.

Keep writing! I also just started an Ironman Veteran settings game, having been inspired by @jpinard. I had to play very conservatively but I’m alive with 9 recruits at level 3-4 variously.

I had to run from a number of battles. But with some dagger work, they are all now wearing armours ranging from 80-110. The cash reserves are still lowish for my comfort and the map is tough to travel but I’m happy with the conservative progress.

But keep posting your thoughts and your progress. Makes interesting reading.

Something I didn’t realize for a while, you can hover over the food and money to find out how long they will last. The real challenge from there is estimating travel time based on terrain.

I got caught by expiring food before. So be sure to double check that the food is not something that will rot in a day or so.

iWith my team of 9 brothers wearing decent armour and having 3K gold as reserves I got cocky and took on a 700gp paying job to get rid of some nachazers.

There was a giant one with a mid-sized one with 7 smallers ones. The battle was quite hairy, but rotation saved the line up with no deaths. But with the victory, everyone also ended up with wounds. Not bad I thought and did the most stupid of things next.

I saw a group of 8 raiders on the way back to collect the money and got greedy and chased them thinking to get some easy loot.

Forgeting that my line up were full of wounded men… the fool of the captain ordered the men in and I realised my mistake when the teams closed in and I saw some of the guys looked hurt…

I panicked and hit surrender option, incurring massive wounds…

Limping back… I saw in horror how many days the men would be out. They had multiple wounds and needed medical supplies.

The next few days were horrible, the 3+K in funds were used up as the wages and supplies were replensihed to heal the hurt. The funds drained to 500, which would last for a couple of days. But the men needed 3-6 days to heal…

Getting desperate, I took on a lowish job. And barely survived with only 6 of them remaining alive, 2 of them seriously hurt and had to be in reserves. 2 of them had torn shins and could not move properly.

I’m down to 4 fighting men. And the funds drew down to 400.

In a span of a few days, I went from a healthy 9 man team leveled up to 4 levels, decently equipped with 3K as reserves, to a 4 person team battered and bruised looking at a financial disaster.

The “retire” button beckoned me, give in to the dark side it said. And I almost gave in.

But I decided to press on. And had a first break, a delivery job for 190 gold!

We jumped at it. A short convoy job followed and fortune smile on us as we didnt encounter any horrible ambushes.

More delivery and convoy missions followed in the next few days. Trudging between villages we rejected anything that required combat while the poor dudes healed.

After 6 days, we recruited 2 newbies and gave them the old weapons and spare armours from our dead. And we are back to 8 men in strength.

Yes, 4 of them are newbies. But the 4 remaining seniors are battle hardened veterans who had stared death and failure in the eye and came back. With 800 cash in reserves and food, we approach the next village for the next mission…

Dont give up, even if all seems lost.

(It occured to me that we can take up a high paying job and demand an advance if we are really desperate for cash. Just abandon the quest after getting the funds. And avoid the town for a while. The 200gp may determine an early retirement or a successful career. I was not that desperate yet. Note that this may make the town hate you so bad that they send bounty hunters after you!.)

Looking back, I should have fired almost everyone when I still had that 3k and rebuilt the team after my core members had recovered. But I would not have a comeback story to tell. :)

Instead of hitting the retreat button right away, you can first move your men to the “retreat” hexes at the edge of the map and then hit retreat. When you do it that way, you don’t incur wounds.

I know but I spent the first turn engaging them haha.

That’s a good story cicobuff. Probably one of the biggest negatives of success is over confidence :-)
Way to hang in there.

I giggled as soon as I read this. Oh how many times that happens in this game hehe.

It’s so funny as you wrote I could picture the same feelings. You’re looking at your group of messed up men, lack of funds, desperation and you have this dazed look in your eyes. “What happened? Two days ago I was so great and now?” The visualized, realistic wounds really drives that gut punched feeling,

After the success of our first battle…

Sorry, I went into too much detail

a couple of our men found the time to work on some new skills. Randolph brushed up on his melee defense, meditated to strengthen his resolve, and worked on some techniques to improve his health. Since he was already pretty effective at hitting his target with his spear, he worked on his ability to cause wounds with each strike (crippling strikes).

Ulfert the Dog, armed with his crossbow took some target practice to become more skilled at hitting his target, sharpened his senses to become a little quicker on the draw, and did laps around our camp to reduce how fast he gets fatigued. We told him to shut up and sit down because he was going to draw unwanted attention, but he wouldn’t listen. Then he surprised us. Drawing diagrams into the dirt, he went over the scenarios where he missed his shots and visualized what he should have done differently. He felt he would learn from his mistakes during the battle now and after a bad shot be able to correct for it (fast adaptation).

Before we left the current town, I stopped by and bought some drinks for the local townfolk. They let us know that Tiefenhaven was looking for guys like us to solve some problem, so off we went - after restocking some supplies. It was only around a days journey.

We learned that they were having some problems with grave robbers so we traveled to the site immediately. When we approached, be could’t see anyone there. As we entered the graveyard we realized that maybe we didn’t see anything because we were looking for an ‘anyone’, instead of looking for an ‘anything’.

6 Nachzehrers (ghouls) charges at us from just beyond our vision. They moved quickly. Never having actually seen one of these things I didn’t know how dangerous they were, but I could tell how terrifying they are. They had been feasting on the bodies of the recently buried. I’m proud of my men for not fleeing at that moment.

Ulfert, the man you don’t really want to be left out on his own, was… well… left out on his own. He took to some high ground and missed his first shot (57%).

Randolph took up position between a tree and a rock, plugging a hole to their approach. He had time to ready his spear for their charge (spearwall). Rebe, with his pitchfork, fell into position behind him. Reimond and Hagen also approached but didn’t take the front line.

They moved faster than we expected and closed the distance to Ulfert. The enemies clawed at Berthold’s patched shirt, but met the sharpt end of Randolph’s spearwall on multiple occasions, getting wounded. The rest were ineffective, but did manage to give Berthold second thoughts (wavering).

Ulfert tried to bide his time, hoping that his allies could take care of the enemy that was in front of him. Berthold tried to stun it, but missed his shot. Luckily Hagen split it in half with his ax and left its corpse where it once stood. Rabe wounded another with his pitchfork, but Reimond couldn’t finish it with his bow. Randolph took up the task and felled it while also wounding another. Ulfert was now able to get of his shot without a monster in his face and pierced the hand of another ghoul.

Armor and shields absorbed the enemy’s blows with other attacks completely missed.

Rabe Hagen missed a attacks they should have made. Once again Ulfert has an enemy in his face, preventing a shot with his crossbow. I’m beginning to think that Reimond has never shot a shortbow before, because I could tell he wasn’t comfortable with it. Randolph was able to hit another one. Ulfert was still blocked by the enemy, which had multiple wounds, so Ulfert decided to risk moving out its range. The monster missed. Ulfert moved away and reloaded.

One of the ghouls feasted on the corpse right in front of our eyes. We weren’t expecting that. We also didn’t expect the horns that grew out of his head and his body seemingly repairing itself. The other enemies missed. Their wounds probably reducing their abilities.

Rabe should have stayed on the farm, because he missed again with his pitchfork. Hagen hacked at another, severing some arm sinew. It tried to flee and was rewarded with another blow from the ax. Another feasted. I’d like to say that you get used to it, but you don’t. More enemies were injured, but none fell.

The enemy tore at Berthold, destroying his hat and cutting the flesh on his head. Another ripped through Randolph’s padded leather. Hagen, Reimond and Berthold missed, but Ulfert landed a shot with his crossbow. Randolph struck back and hit another ghoul. Two enemies try to flee and are cut down.

Now that our armor has been taking a beating, blows are more frequently cutting our flesh. Hagen fells one more.

Smooth sailing the rest of the way.

I LOVE this statement as it brings me right back the first several times I encountered them and had a WTF moment when they ate :)

Hagen is awesome. Was your guy called “the dog” or did you name him?

The game named Ulfert ‘the Dog’.

Those enemies were a change from the bandits you get in the first mission. These guys had a fairly hit attack skill and went first in every round until I started wounding some of them.

This was a good example of why I wish I could drill down into the enemy cards for details. I can see they had these injuries, but I didn’t know what the effect would be. I guess I’ll learn them as my guys get the injuries, then I can see their tool tip.

How should I use rotation? Just have a guy who’s equipped for the front line but keep him in reserve until someone gets hurt and needs to be replaced?

Why are you sorry? Details are awesome! =)