Incline Battle Brothers + Beasts & Exploration, Warriors of the North and Blazing Deserts DLC Thread

[Shadowfang]

Two handed hammers are great instead of the spearmen.

Nah, proper spearman can hold flank for as long as you want. Only 5% chance for enemies to invade his safe space and with spear mastery it's only 1 at a time. If you add crippling strikes and spare spears, two flank spearmen can win almost any battle against living melee opponents without help from others.

What if the enemy has a shield held up?
It seems the odds are much worse against those guys.

 

[Reinhardt]

What if the enemy has a shield held up?

Veteran spearmaster can hold ork warriorz and ancient undead. Not kill - it's not his job, but they still in 5%.

 

[Reinhardt]

Only werewolves can screw spear defense because they move first.

 

[Parabalus]

What kind of formations are you guys using?

I usually go with 2 rows. The first with shield bearers and a couple of two handlers and then 2 archers, 1 crossbow dude and a couple of halberds in the back.

- 2 spearmen to watch the flanks (spearwall isn't very effective against tough enemies but it prevents them from approaching from the sides and buys me time to deal with the rest of them); they carry axes for schrats and daggers for armor harvesting.
- 3 back-row guys (2 polearms, 1 two-handed hammer)
- 3 two-handers in the middle: sword, mace, axe. The axeman can switch between bigger short-range axe and longer two-tile axe. The mace guy can switch to one-handed mace and shield when facing lighter enemies like goblins, but his two-handed mace works wonders against orc warriors and leaders.
- 4 rank and file shieldmen: a swordsman, a butcher, a hammer guy, and an axeman; mainly to watch the flanks

A crossbowman and an archer in reserve, called in when needed.

IMHO:
Try shifting all shield dudes to twohanders, if you are worried about defence, get them quick hands and a shield in the bag. Past a certain point the zweihander AOE attacks become too good to not use en masse.

If your 2h frontline has quickhands you can have them start with shields by default (usually kite), swap to a 2h when you need to attack. You lose like 5-6 fatigue from the shield, but can forgo RD, and have a nice backup if you miss and thereby don't trigger RA.

 

[Murk]

I can have a cultist prophet?

Oh hells yeah.

 

[hivemind]

if you get him rename him mahomet xD

 

[Reinhardt]

You can name all your characters with variations of muhammed and still have lots of spare names.

 

[k0syak]

Nah, proper spearman can hold flank for as long as you want. Only 5% chance for enemies to invade his safe space and with spear mastery it's only 1 at a time. If you add crippling strikes and spare spears, two flank spearmen can win almost any battle against living melee opponents without help from others.

True, but I'd rather grind everyone into pulp as fast as possible instead of holding them back
Spears are godlike early-mid in any case.

If your 2h frontline has quickhands you can have them start with shields by default (usually kite), swap to a 2h when you need to attack. You lose like 5-6 fatigue from the shield, but can forgo RD, and have a nice backup if you miss and thereby don't trigger RA.

I'm more of a RA man, even after the nerfs, but yeah, both work, it's mostly a matter of preference.

 

[Reinhardt]

True, but I'd rather grind everyone into pulp as fast as possible instead of holding them back

You can't grind dozens of ork boyz or honor guards fast enough. That's where speabro shine - you only have to deal with amount of enemies you want. Others will wait their turn.

 

[Vault Dweller]

True, but I'd rather grind everyone into pulp as fast as possible instead of holding them back

You can't grind dozens of ork boyz or honor guards fast enough. That's where speabro shine - you only have to deal with amount of enemies you want. Others will wait their turn.

Precisely. 24-40+ orcs can quickly overrun you, surround the flank bros and quickly kill them, so holding the flanks becomes the most important aspect of your strategy.

 

[Teut Busnet]

I went from having two dedicated Spearbros to just more two-handers. For the 'Sea of Tents' I take 9 or 10 2H Bros and put them in a 'V' (or '>', in BB sight) formation - like the Mighty Ducks.

Holding off Orcs was the only reason to have Spearbros in the company, and they weren't even reliable at that. Adding two more Hammerbros instead made fighting large Orc groups much more pleasant.

 

[Cosmo]

Holding off Orcs was the only reason to have Spearbros in the company, and they weren't even reliable at that.

I found two passive shield guys were ideal for holding flanks, while my 2h brothers clear the space.
And in non-ork battles they double as mace specialists.

 

[k0syak]

Frontliners are all about the damage and that means neither shields (unless quick-handed), nor spears. If shit goes bad, the backliners are built for utility - rotation and indomitable to rescue a bro in need, quick hands to switch from a polearm to a mansplitter.
Also, since the DLC, enemies love breaking shields too much, can't rely on a single (non orc) shield to last you through a battle.

 

[Reinhardt]

To break shield of spearbro you must first get close to spearbo.

 

[Orma]

http://battlebrothersgame.com/dev-blog-123-tools-of-death/

Dev Blog #123: Tools of Death

The ‘Warriors of the North’ DLC for Battle Brothers will be released on May 9th with a whole bunch of features. You can read up on those and add the DLC to your wishlist here. In the meantime, let’s talk about an important topic we haven’t touched on yet: New weapons! With the DLC, you’ll also get your hands on new tools of death, including hybrid and niche weapons to create new builds and tactics with. Let’s take a look!

Bardiche
The Bardiche is a variant of the Greataxe with a differently shaped head and a longer shaft. Like the Greataxe, it comes with the ‘Split Man’ skill for great single-target damage. But while the Greataxe has more damage potential against up to six targets with its ‘Round Swing’ skill, the Bardiche instead comes with the ‘Split’ skill of Greatswords for more surgical precision and hitting two targets in a straight line at once. Like the Greataxe, the Bardiche is excellent in destroying shields and penetrating armor.

Staff Sling
A simple weapon used since ancient times, and the favorite of many a shepherd, the Staff Sling is used to hurl stones towards the enemy. It’s not particularly accurate or damaging, but it’s cheap, and with stones abundant everywhere, it will never run out of ammunition. Two stones can be hurled each turn, and on hitting a target in the head it will inflict the ‘Dazed’ status effect.

Scimitar
An exotic curved sword from the south, the Scimitar and its higher tier cousin, the Shamshir, are excellent for cutting deep wounds. They’re less suited for thrusting than straight swords, however, and therefore have a harder time penetrating armor. Like other swords, they come with the ‘Slash’ skill, but unlike those, they don’t have the ‘Riposte’ skill as a second. Instead, they have the ‘Decapitate’ skill of cleavers.

Heavy Javelins & Heavy Throwing Axe
For users of throwing weapons that long for an extra bit of oomph, the DLC adds the Heavy Javelin and Heavy Throwing Axe. They’re sometimes used by barbarians and can be looted off of their cold dead hands.

Warfork
A pitchfork re-forged into a battlefield weapon, the Warfork is the pride of any militiaman, and looks right at home with the new ‘Peasant Militia’ company origin. It’s a lower tier variant of the Spetum, which has in turn been slightly buffed. Like the Spetum, it is a specialized polearm that can be used to form a more deadly yet more fatiguing ‘Spearwall’ than with a one-handed spear. Particularly useful against non-sentient beasts, but also against humans if your battle line is long enough.

Battle Whip
The Battle Whip is a specialized weapon with plenty of strengths, but also a clear weakness. Covering a whole 3 tiles, it has the longest range of any melee weapon currently in the game. Hitting an enemy with the ‘Whip’ skill will inflict two stacks of the ‘Bleeding’ status effect at once, and because the weapon is classified as a cleaver, this skill also benefits from taking the ‘Cleaver Mastery’ perk for further bleeding damage. However, the weapon doesn’t have a high base damage, and while it can be deadly against unarmored or lightly armored targets, it performs dismally against armored ones.

Luckily, it brings another bit of utility to the table. Its second skill is called ‘Disarm’ and on a hit will inflict the new ‘Disarmed’ status effect on a target, preventing it from using any weapon skills for one turn. Some targets which are immune to being stunned, like Orc Warriors, can still be controlled this way, but unarmed targets, like Direwolves, can of course not be disarmed. Disarmed targets can still move and use non-weapon skills freely, just not attack. Barbarians also have their own variant of the Battle Whip, called the Thorned Whip, which has slightly different stats.

DLC Supporter Edition
Thanks to the overwhelmingly positive response to our announcement of the ‘Warriors of the North’ DLC, and many people expressing their desire to support us again even beyond the asking price, we’ve decided to also offer it as a special Supporter Edition again. This Supporter Edition includes the ‘Warriors of the North’ DLC, as well as an additional new player banner and shields with a nordic motif as a thank you from us to you. The bundle will be priced at $18.99, and you can already add the second part of it to your wishlist here as well.

 

[Cyberarmy]

Cultists with whips <3

 

[Alienman]

Sling, totally unexpected addition, but damn awesome.

 

[Nirvash]

Where do you guys find so many 2handers recruits? You need at least 2 stars mdef and stars in both stamina and melee to make them truly work.

 

[Strange Fellow]

I can already tell the Bardiche is my new favourite weapon

 

[Prime Junta]

Cultists with whips <3

The whip sounds like it could be a pretty neat sidearm. With the 3-tile range you could give it to your rangebros for self-defence and to switch them from archery to boss control, e.g. when dealing with a knight, orc warlord or similar.

 

[Modron]

The decapitate attack was pretty strong single target ability, if those scimitars have higher damage than cleavers they could be pretty brutal.

 

[Alienman]

I wonder how many will name their whip guy Indiana Jones. Should be a stat on that.

 

[Sarissofoi]

Cool.
Especially Berdish that gonna replace 2h axe in most tasks. Sling is great addition too.
Scimitar is kind of overgrown Falchion that t o be honest should get similar treatment.
Warfork is decent addition for low level 2 range weapon, especially with septum boosted. Throwing weapons isn't my specialty but again - nice addition.
Whip is kind of silly. What next chakrams?

I wonder how many will name their whip guy Indiana Jones. Should be a stat on that.

Just add bonus for whips from Historian background and we all set.

 

[Reinhardt]

I will equip my trading caravan of muhammeds with scimitars.

 

[HoboForEternity]

started playing it's fun and combat is good so far. the game told me i have to get my company to dozen bros, but i keep it at 7 so far (day 8).

been doing delivery contract and it's cool you can make extra money by trading. for example this village i visited is on hunting season so venison and skins are rich in supply, bought it cheap, and sold them in neighboring town for 1.5x the price. that town made bricks so i bought bricks and sold them again in other town for profit. extra nice.

i wonder if Fluent play this game. seems to be up your valley. it is a mix of procedurally generated world and some scripted events thrown with randomly generated events.