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Battle Brothers Pre-Release Thread

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Sacred82

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The basic bandit was often recruited of destitute peasants. But I get your point, usually bandits prefered small groups, because they earned a larger share of the loot. I am quite convinced there are some examples of several smaller bandit groups joining forces for awhile in human history, though.

not only that, peasant uprisings weren't anarchistic in nature. For peasants it makes sense to gather under a leader and in large numbers.
 

rapsdjff

Overhype Studios
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Dev Blog #84: Mood and Desertion
As you may know from studying our roadmap, the upcoming update will also overhaul some minor worldmap mechanics. This week we’re taking a look at what’s going to change with the mood system and desertion mechanics. Let’s go!

Mood and Desertion
Battle Brothers is, of course, a game about managing a mercenary company. There’s a bunch of things to manage, more so now with the introduction of injuries, but one thing that never really took off as a full-fledged gameplay mechanic is managing the morale and discipline of the company on the worldmap – the company’s mood. Balancing the needs of your men against one another and against the needs of the company should be part of your job as commander, so we’re doing a couple of changes to shape the mood mechanics into a more integral part of gameplay.

mood1.jpg


The mood of all your men is now more closely tracked and at all times visible both in the roster view and in detail as a status effect. Every day, a character’s mood trends towards roughly neutral – more so if they’re an optimist and in a bad mood, or they’re a pessimist and in a good mood. Events, and your choices on how to treat your men and others, can change the mood of characters drastically. In addition, characters react to more things that are just part of their mercenary life – for example, a battle won will raise the mood, a comrade lost will lower it, and being stuck in reserve forever may make a character feel useless depending on their personality.

Your men in Battle Brothers have their own thoughts on how things are going for them, and their mood now better reflects this. To make it easier for you see exactly what is influencing a character’s mood, the last couple of mood changing events, positive or negative, are always listed when hovering over the mood icon.

mood2.jpg


So that’s how mood changes – but what about its effects? The biggest change is with how desertion now works. Characters no longer just randomly leave you if you can’t pay or feed them just once. Instead, their mood suffers. A greedy character will take more offense on not being paid, as will a gluttonous character when having to go to bed hungry, whereas a spartan will be a bit more lenient on this. Once a character’s mood drops to the lowest state, angry, there’s a chance that they’ll desert you. Again, character traits influence this; the chance of desertion is lower for loyal characters and higher for disloyal characters.

By coupling desertion with mood mechanics, characters may now choose to desert the company for other reasons than just not getting their due wage, but only after giving you some time to react and do something about whatever their qualms may be. The better you treat your men, the better their morale in combat, and the more of a safety cushion you have until thoughts of desertion even enter their minds. Pay for a round in the tavern every now and then, the lads have earned it and it will raise their spirits!
 

rapsdjff

Overhype Studios
Developer
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Messages
330
ancient_header.jpg

Dev Blog #85: The Ancient Dead, Part I
We’ve put to rest the old skeletons only to resurrect them as the ‘ancient dead’. This week we’re taking a tour through their new lore, weapons and armor, fighting style and enemy types. Let’s delve in!

Introduction
The very first opponents in Battle Brothers were the undead. They were a good starting point for testing combat mechanics and developing the AI, but this early in development we didn’t yet put as much thought into their design as we’d do with later opponents. Moving on to develop orcs and goblins, we made sure that those had a certain level of cultural background reflected in their visuals, and in their choice of weapons and armor, and that they had a fighting style of their own, one that challenges players in unique ways and requires different tactics to beat reliably. In contrast, there isn’t really anything unique about how skeletons fight in the game, or about how they look. They’re just your generic fantasy skeletons – until now.



The world wasn’t always like it is now. Ruins dot the map, mass graves, sunken castles. But where did they come from?

Many hundred years ago, in a different era, an empire of man spanned much of the known world. What has fallen into ruin now, what was abandoned to nature and beast, what has long been forgotten, all this was that of man once. An empire, not of petty noble houses, but one of a dozen provinces, from the frozen tundra of the north to the blistering sands of the south, of a dozen peoples under one banner.

So many peoples, so many cultures and ideas under one roof, all vying to pull the empire into a direction of their own. Could those not be reconciled? Did they, in the end, just pull the empire apart? As remote lands became provinces of the empire, so could local cults become religions that swept across its entirety. Was the authority of the emperor lost to religion? Was it the gods that punished man for worshipping spirits that promised to give what they would not?

Does it matter now what brought it down? The ancient dead are rising again, not living and yet not dead. Long lost legions heed the call of their emperor. They march once more, tirelessly and without emotion, to claim again what was once theirs. What brought down the empire in the end, and what is bringing it back to unlife, is for you to piece together based on clues hidden within the world, if you want to learn more.

The Ancient Legions
The bulk of the ancient dead is made up of the ancient legions. They are what conquered most of the known world once, and they may well do so again. Legions that never tire, legionnaires that know no fear, a cold machine that ever marches forward. What could stop them?



The legions fight like they did hundreds of years ago – in tight formation two ranks deep, with shields in front and polearms in the back. They rely quite heavily on the front row providing protection with their shields and locking down the enemy, while the second row uses polearms to inflict heavy damage on their opponents. A formation like this doesn’t charge like undisciplined rabble, but advances slowly and makes heavy use of shields to protect against arrow fire. They don’t possess any ranged weaponry and don’t do flanking maneuvers, preferring to simply walk through any enemy. Because much of their strength is in their formation, they’re at a disadvantage when fighting in difficult terrain, such as forests. They are also the missing piece of the puzzle that makes resolve an important attribute, as fighting them continually puts a test to the morale of the men.



The ancient legions come with a whole lot of unique armor, helmets and weapons. It’s old, it’s brittle and sometimes broken, but it can still be deadly. All of it, except for some cloth rags, is lootable and can be equipped by your Battle Brothers.

Ancient Auxiliary
Recruited from local vassals was the light infantry, the ancient auxiliaries. Because Battle Brothers, at least for now, focuses on a pseudo-germanic region of the world, the equipment of these auxiliary troops is based on the look of ancient germanic and celtic warriors.



An auxiliary is armed with spear, short sword or falx – a new weapon unique to them. They’re lightly armored, often just with the remains of cloaks sporting the pattern of their ancient clans, and sometimes helmets passed down through the family. Time has taken a toll on both weapons and armor, and so you may find them attacking with broken swords seemingly unaware of it

Ancient Legionary
Ancient legionnaires make up the medium infantry. Once professional soldiers, legionnaires enlisted for several years to be trained and used in the empire’s campaigns in exchange for land they could settle at and call their own. Legionnaires are well-armed with metal armor, sword and shield, or pike.



Legions from all the different eras of the empire answer its call, so you’ll find legionnaires that died a hundred years apart, all with different armor, helmet and shield design, to march together.

Ancient Honor Guard
Recruited from the ranks of veteran legionnaires are the ancient honor guard, once used as personal bodyguards and as heavy infantry to tip the scales of battle. The highest honor a common legionary could hope to achieve, joining the honor guard involved a symbolic death to shed the weakness and frailty of man, and being transformed into a tool of the emperor. No longer a man, but the manifestation of the emperor’s will, the honor guard was encased entirely in armor that did not show any flesh, becoming essentially a living, moving and fighting statue.



Honor guards make use of heavy weaponry from all corners of the ancient empire, such as the warscythe, the rhomphaia and a two-handed cleaver. They were once among the finest and most dedicated warriors of their time, and although now but bones in rusty armor, their skill still echoes through their every swing of the sword.

But wait, there’s more!
We’ll conclude our presentation of the ancient dead in next week’s dev blog with the overhauled vampire, as well as the introduction of an entirely new enemy to fight against. How exciting!
 

agris

Arcane
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rapsdjff

amazing. how do you guys have such throughput and cash for art? I've read multiple indies talk about art assets as the most costly to produce aside from VO, maybe.
 

Trash

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That looks simply amazing. I really hope you guys are succesfull with this game. Not just because I want to see what you'll come up with next but also to see some of the other ideas you had during development be turned into dlc.

No matter what, I've played this game already more than anything else since I got it. Can easily see the final version get a place on my 'do not uninstall' folder, next to Master of Magic and Ufo: Enemy Unknown.
 

rapsdjff

Overhype Studios
Developer
Joined
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Messages
330
amazing. how do you guys have such throughput and cash for art? I've read multiple indies talk about art assets as the most costly to produce aside from VO, maybe.
We don't outsource any art. We are a core team of three people working full time on this, including one artist who creates all the art for the game.

That looks simply amazing. I really hope you guys are succesfull with this game. Not just because I want to see what you'll come up with next but also to see some of the other ideas you had during development be turned into dlc.
Yeah, it'd be pretty damn awesome if creating DLC for the game turned out to be viable. We have lots of ideas still lying around, and there's lots more potential to unlock here.
 

Cyberarmy

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Divinity: Original Sin 2
"No longer a man, but the manifestation of the emperor’s will, the honor guard was encased entirely in armor that did not show any flesh, becoming essentially a living, moving and fighting statue."

:shredder:

I'm running out of :bounce: s...
 

vonAchdorf

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Messages
13,465
I like the spirit. "Skeletons were the first enemies, but they aren't good enough for our current standards anymore, so we brought them up to par."
 

Luka-boy

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Legions from all the different eras of the empire answer its call, so you’ll find legionnaires that died a hundred years apart, all with different armor, helmet and shield design, to march together.
Holy shit, this made me smile.

What a simple idea, yet it's so damn cool both from a lore and gameplay (another way of getting more varied loot) perspective. How did you guys come up with it?
 

Taka-Haradin puolipeikko

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Codex 2016 - The Age of Grimoire Make the Codex Great Again! Grab the Codex by the pussy Bubbles In Memoria
Undead. As a blight on the country, fighting humans.
In that case I want my orc campaign.

edit. With all troubles that come with keeping unruly green bastards in line.
Perhaps occasional inner party battle and definitely single warboss character that you have to keep alive. But who does have to get into thick of it to keep party loyal.
Economy probably needs to be overhauled for such thing. I don't think that orcs care about soft yellow metal.
 
Last edited:

Latro

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Legions from all the different eras of the empire answer its call, so you’ll find legionnaires that died a hundred years apart, all with different armor, helmet and shield design, to march together.
Holy shit, this made me smile.

What a simple idea, yet it's so damn cool both from a lore and gameplay (another way of getting more varied loot) perspective. How did you guys come up with it?
finally an :incloosive: enemy faction
 

rapsdjff

Overhype Studios
Developer
Joined
Jan 31, 2014
Messages
330
ancient_header.jpg

Dev Blog #86: The Ancient Dead, Part II
This week we conclude our presentation of the ancient dead with the reimagined vampire and an entirely new opponent. If you haven’t read the first part yet, it’s recommended you do so here first. Otherwise, read on!

The Necrosavant
As the ancient empire conquered most of the known world, so would foreign and remote lands turn into provinces. What was local custom or cult once, hidden away and not spoken of elsewhere, would suddenly find itself a part of the empire, and sometimes would creep deep into its very heart. From the blistering deserts of the south came a secretive cult that had its followers not worship fertility as they did in the capital, not strength, not humility and not compassion. They worshipped a perversion of death, the promise to transcend mortality, to exist beyond life and death, forever.

When you have nothing but misery, it’s easy to let go, to welcome the warm embrace of the gods that sets you free from all earthly burden and hardships. But it’s those that have everything on this earth, power and wealth, that cling to it at the end of their life, that clutch to it in desperation, that bargain, that curse, that would pay any price to stay. And it is those who would embrace not the gods, for their touch is not salvation for them, but whose touch would tear them away and apart from the earthly things they prize above all, the things that they have chosen to become. It is those who would forsake the gods and turn to the cult of death instead, that would die over and over again, and yet never leave this earth, forever bound to it, forever paying the price.

Whether an ardent cultist once, or a decadent noble seeking eternal life, they have long since become a being that measures time no longer in years but in lifetimes: a Necrosavant. It will wither away and die in time, again and again, but never leave this world as long as it is rejuvenated with the blood of the living.



Mechanically, the Necrosavant is more or less identical to the Withered Vampire it replaces. The new visuals, however, tell a story on their own, and better reflect how this being exists. The less hitpoints a Necrosavant has, the more it will visually wither away, and the more hitpoints it gains again by savouring a victim’s blood, the more it will rejuvenate until its appearance is almost that of a healthy human.

The Necrosavant retains the ability to turn into a flock of bats to quickly position itself on the battlefield, making it perhaps the most mobile opponent in Battle Brothers. However, it doesn’t wear any armor or shield, leaving it vulnerable to being attacked itself, especially if bereft of its major strength by being stunned or immobilized.

The Ancient Priest
The empire had countless religions and cults, and each had priests spreading the word of their gods, performing rites and proclaiming miracles. The ancient priest was one such individual once. Now brought back to unlife, his very existence is making a mockery out of his faith. His work is turned into a perversion of what he once devoted his life to; no longer does he bless acres, he brings foulness and rot, and no longer does he bring comfort, he brings but horrible visions of a world beyond ours.



The ancient priest joins the ranks of the few spellcasters in Battle Brothers, and like all spellcasters fills a support role. He’s of little danger all by himself, but with ancient legionnaires holding the ranks, he can slowly work to rout a whole company. And then, there’s always his ancient honor guard protecting him.



The ancient priest’s first skill is to summon miasma, a thick mist of foulness and rot that is harmful to any living being. Miasma is created in an area of 7 tiles and sticks to these tiles for several rounds. Any living being ending its turn on a tile affected by miasma will lose hitpoints – it’s only a few each round, but no armor does protect against breathing in the foul fog, and it does eventually add up if you don’t move out your men.



The ancient priest’s second skill is called ‘Horror’, and as the name implies, it brings horrific visions to it’s unfortunate victims. It’s an area-of-effect spell, like ‘Miasma’, but targeted at people and not tiles. Anyone affected will have to make a morale check – the higher the resolve, the higher the chance that they won’t be affected at all. If a character fails the morale check, their morale will drop by one level. Additionally, if the character fails critically (meaning with a dice throw higher than 140% of their resolve, subject to change) they’ll be affected by the new ‘Horrified’ status effect for one turn and be unable to act.

While ‘Horror’ can be quite powerful against a company of weak-willed and deserters, it can be countered by investing into the resolve attribute of your men, picking certain perks, and making use of the ‘Rally the Troops’ skill. As mentioned last time, the ancient dead are the missing puzzle piece to make the resolve attribute worth investing into, and together with some general rebalancing, also to make morale management in battle a more interesting and active part of gameplay.
 

rapsdjff

Overhype Studios
Developer
Joined
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Messages
330
They are a faction of their own, like orcs or goblins are. However, just as orcs and goblins will combine forces in the 'Greenskin Invasion' late game crisis, so will the undead in the 'Undead Scourge' one, which should pose different tactical challenges from what you usually have to deal with outside of one such crisis.
 

Latro

Arcane
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Out of curiosity, will there be anything in the map to reflect the "end game faction crisis" scenarios? Maybe something like blighted landscape during the Undead scourge, or lots of shit on fire during a greenskin invasion, etc.
 

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