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

[Strange Fellow]

How has this bro survived to veteran levels without getting picked off by pesky poachers? I don't know, but he has, and look at him now

 

[tindrli]

I hope the dude with the two handed flail thing has really good defenses and/or HP... These two pikemen are ready to rip him a new one

this is my f2H flail bro. he barely made that one. i made a stupid move to support that 2h sword bro. and then 2 pikeman came out from nowhere

 

[Zanzoken]

I've stabilized on my Ironman attempt right now. Thankfully the game gets easier once you leave the very early game behind. Those 5% extra hit/miss make more of a difference than one would think.

But there is a significant difficulty spike when you reach the late game heavily armored enemies

This is where I am right now. I thought I was in a pretty good spot with the following (Day 80-ish).

- 8 melee bros levels 6 to 8, 75+ matk, mail armor, 200HP helmets, heater shields and tier 3 weapons or pikes / billhooks
- Sergeant with 100+ res, battle standard, 200HP armor + helm
- 3 archers with 70+ ratk, mail armor, war bows

These guys breeze through bandits and have also consistently won against orc young & berserkers, goblin skirmishers and ambushers, nachzherers, direwolves, wiedergangers + necromancy, ancient dead, spiders, alps, hexen, unholds. Pretty much all low- and mid-tier enemies the game throws at you.

Then the Noble War starts and I took the "join a battle" contract or whatever it's called, where it was me and an allied noble house vs another noble house. And even though our side won the battle, I lost 6 guys and the allied house lost quite a few as well. In a hypothetical 12 vs 12 against professional soldiers, my bros would not be the favorite and even if we did pull off a win it wouldn't be without heavy casualties.

I reloaded to just before the war starts, but I'm a little shook because I thought we were ready and apparently that isn't the case. I know we definitely need better armor, and to start transitioning to 2H weapons. But other than that idk.

 

[tindrli]

how the hell you made with bro with 100+ res?

 

[Darth Canoli]

- 3 archers with 70+ ratk, mail armor, war bows

70 ranged attack and you call them archers ?
I guess their specialty is friendly fire ?

 

[Jrpgfan]

Why?

To assert your dominance.

Survival > Pride.

I was under the impression that axes are good generalist weapons, so I have roughly 2-3 spears and 3-4 axe guys plus 2-3 archers/crossbows.

Axes are good but no more than the rest (2 handed wise).
A good party takes advantage of every weapon (well, i rarely use flails but i might next time to try something different)

For example, my last company used 2x 2H swords (it just happened, i didn't plan to have 2), 1x (2H Hammer, 2H Mace, 2H Axe, 2H poleaxe, 2H Pike), 2x Archers, 1x shield/cleaver/whip and 1x Fencer.

Since i have been mistreated by Schrats, my backpack is full of different axes, just in case.

Swords are the most versatile though due to the attack variety(can AoE attack forward and in half-circle) and higher THC. I always have atleast 2 greatsword guys in my roster.

 

[Murk]

how the hell you made with bro with 100+ res?

My guess is he meant total res and not base res. That's not that difficult with perks + gear, even if you don't use someone like a Cultist, Noble or Squire.

Also, dude, ditch those godawful Lamellar armors -- their fatigue cost is heinous.

 

[Darth Canoli]

this is my f2H flail bro. he barely made that one. i made a stupid move to support that 2h sword bro. and then 2 pikeman came out from nowhere

For your 2H Flail, i would have picked colossus and head hunter instead of gifted and underdog (a 2H flail guy has no business being surrounded, specially with his mdef)

Swords are the most versatile though due to the attack variety(can AoE attack forward and in half-circle) and higher THC. I always have atleast 2 greatsword guys in my roster.

Sure, but it feels redundant, besides, it's a barbarian origin and the first 2H swordman is a barbarian while the second one is alright but not as good, lacking in mdef, mostly so they feel like Batman and Robin ...
And of course, Robin always gets it, he's almost the only one getting wounded.

Besides, there is an interesting 2H Axes variety, i'd rather have 2x 2H axemen, one with the circular attack and the other one with the 2 targets in straight line attack and the 1 target attack hitting both the head and the body (the one i'm using actually), it's insanely destructive.

 

[Zanzoken]

how the hell you made with bro with 100+ res?

My guess is he meant total res and not base res. That's not that difficult with perks + gear, even if you don't use someone like a Cultist, Noble or Squire.

Right. I got a noble with 3 stars in Res + Fearless and he's now level 8 with Fortified Mind + Sergeant Sash.

 

[Tigranes]

how the hell you made with bro with 100+ res?

My guess is he meant total res and not base res. That's not that difficult with perks + gear, even if you don't use someone like a Cultist, Noble or Squire.

Right. I got a noble with 3 stars in Res + Fearless and he's now level 8 with Fortified Mind + Sergeant Sash.

 

[Payd Shell]

I've stabilized on my Ironman attempt right now. Thankfully the game gets easier once you leave the very early game behind. Those 5% extra hit/miss make more of a difference than one would think.

But there is a significant difficulty spike when you reach the late game heavily armored enemies

This is where I am right now. I thought I was in a pretty good spot with the following (Day 80-ish).

- 8 melee bros levels 6 to 8, 75+ matk, mail armor, 200HP helmets, heater shields and tier 3 weapons or pikes / billhooks
- Sergeant with 100+ res, battle standard, 200HP armor + helm
- 3 archers with 70+ ratk, mail armor, war bows

These guys breeze through bandits and have also consistently won against orc young & berserkers, goblin skirmishers and ambushers, nachzherers, direwolves, wiedergangers + necromancy, ancient dead, spiders, alps, hexen, unholds. Pretty much all low- and mid-tier enemies the game throws at you.

Then the Noble War starts and I took the "join a battle" contract or whatever it's called, where it was me and an allied noble house vs another noble house. And even though our side won the battle, I lost 6 guys and the allied house lost quite a few as well. In a hypothetical 12 vs 12 against professional soldiers, my bros would not be the favorite and even if we did pull off a win it wouldn't be without heavy casualties.

I reloaded to just before the war starts, but I'm a little shook because I thought we were ready and apparently that isn't the case. I know we definitely need better armor, and to start transitioning to 2H weapons. But other than that idk.

Noble war is the hardest crisis if you don't know what you're doing. Noble armies don't have any particular strength, but they also have no weakness that you're able to exploit, they're just as versatile as your own company. That being said, the danger comes from their backline. Polearms and crossbowmen will wreck you if you don't take care of them first. Bring ample archers with good ranged attack (90+ ideally) so you can snipe their crossbows and billhooks. Your frontline needs 250+ gear in order to survive a few attacks. Their frontline isn't that dangerous, they're just there to keep you away from their backline. If you want to rely on melee only, it's much harder and the gear requirements go way up, you'd want 300+ gear / famed items to brutforce your way through the frontline.

It's a goldmine even if you aren't ready for it, though. You can raid caravans all day long and after the war, relations will turn back to 'cold'. Don't take contracts for sieges or great battles, just those for raiding settlements and caravans. If you do that, you also help the other houses and contribute to ending the war.

 

[Reinhardt]

Noble war is the hardest crisis.

Yes. It really fucks up your trade.

 

[vazha]

I've stabilized on my Ironman attempt right now. Thankfully the game gets easier once you leave the very early game behind. Those 5% extra hit/miss make more of a difference than one would think.

But there is a significant difficulty spike when you reach the late game heavily armored enemies

This is where I am right now. I thought I was in a pretty good spot with the following (Day 80-ish).

- 8 melee bros levels 6 to 8, 75+ matk, mail armor, 200HP helmets, heater shields and tier 3 weapons or pikes / billhooks
- Sergeant with 100+ res, battle standard, 200HP armor + helm
- 3 archers with 70+ ratk, mail armor, war bows

These guys breeze through bandits and have also consistently won against orc young & berserkers, goblin skirmishers and ambushers, nachzherers, direwolves, wiedergangers + necromancy, ancient dead, spiders, alps, hexen, unholds. Pretty much all low- and mid-tier enemies the game throws at you.

Then the Noble War starts and I took the "join a battle" contract or whatever it's called, where it was me and an allied noble house vs another noble house. And even though our side won the battle, I lost 6 guys and the allied house lost quite a few as well. In a hypothetical 12 vs 12 against professional soldiers, my bros would not be the favorite and even if we did pull off a win it wouldn't be without heavy casualties.

I reloaded to just before the war starts, but I'm a little shook because I thought we were ready and apparently that isn't the case. I know we definitely need better aarmor, and to start transitioning to 2H weapons. But other than that idk.

If you ve lost 6 guys and the noble ally less than half of their units, you re doing it wrong. Use them as screen / cannon fodder as much as you are able to and seeing as you only have mail shirts maybe give your frontliners polearms for such battles and keep them safe. Footmen can soak up damage pretty well, so a massive advantage in dps should easily turn the battle in your favour. Target enemy zweihanders with your polearms whenever possible but try not to get into the range of their "split" ability. Rotation works wonders for that. If you ve got a good archer, snipe their archers. In short try to achieve a superiority in certain aspect and then rely on said advantage to win the whole thing. After 2 battles you should have enough heavy armor to get involved in melee to your hearts pleasure.

 

[Darth Canoli]

I just tried the new Legends mod build on Legendary difficulty, 4 factions, 28 cities, solo Berserker beginning (he can expand his company later at the cost of perks but every second veteran level gives a perk, i think).

5 battles or so against few enemies (the berserker starts with berserk and gives berserk to allies in battle and 80ish melee attack but no def, of course also he starts with a retarded Orc two handed weapon flail or axe, yes, i tried my luck )
- 3 bandits + 1 bandit poacher -> the fucking poacher almost killed me, he had higher ground, had to run when he caught back, i barely had time to kill the 3 others to get to him.
- 3 Thralls and a Reaver, almost died
- 1 direwolf, this one was easy, not sure how i'd have fare against 4 ...
- 6 Thralls > Almost died ...
- 4 Nachos escorting a caravan > they killed one caravan hand and got me under 40% hp ...
- 3 Webnechts (Berserker lvl 6; levelling is fast; 95+ matak, 25/35 mdef with shield, 100+ HP) ... Was trying a mace + shield, didn't check my equipment >> Would probably have died, quit before it was too late, these fuckers have a tough skin, not sure they have armors on the vanilla version, well, i know why i hate 1H maces, that's really the worst weapon ...

TLDR
Legendary difficulty add perks to all the monsters and apparently adds champions versions of every mob.
Barely played and didn't expand the company yet but it really seems this legendary difficulty mode is for masochists. (It's probably meant to be played with the "party" beginning)
I know you're there, if you read me, that's the mod/difficulty for you.

 

[Tigranes]

Re. above on noble war - one easy and safe way to do it, if you're struggling, is use the first turn to see where enemies and allies go, and make sure that all the enemy polearms / nameds are up against your allies. You're targeting instead the weakest enemy units with least potential to fuck you up (e.g. surrounding and shivving shield footmen, instead of going up against a two-hander), fanning out very wide to circle the enemy if need be.

After all, the allies can generally hold their own quite well, they won't be steamrolled - so there's ample time to spread panic in the enemy with a few easy kills, or just whittle their numbers down. If you're higher level then your archers can also reliably take down their polearms / banner-bearers.

For me the main challenge is the visual clusterfuck. But the loot is worth the pain.

 

[Strange Fellow]

For me the main challenge is the visual clusterfuck. But the loot is worth the pain.

Funny, in my opinion they're the best fights the game has to offer. The slow tide of battle with shifting flanks, sending polearm-users to and fro protecting vulnerable areas, pinning down advancing troops, etc. They're as tactical as BB gets, and offer something different from the regular brawls, while retaining all the benefits of brigand fights. They do drag on, of course, but they haven't been too common in my runs, maybe 3-4 per war (of which I've only had 2 in total). The loot you get is great, but I would enjoy the noble war fights even if it weren't.

 

[Tigranes]

Oh, I do love them, I tend ot always select War as the first crisis. I certainly prefer the human variety to, say, a dozen Undead swarms. I'm saying that once you get used to handling the big numbers and your allies, it's generally a very manageable challenge for players.

 

[vazha]

Looks like everyone and their mom got their champions (even gobbos, lol) but no noble war troops. Seems to be an oversight. If the undead can have sir Roland the Hollow, why cannot a noble house have his brother, sir Richard The Wholesome? Would be neat and also would give you more incentive to actually attack noble houses even when its not war (I always do anyway, those orc war camps beg for some kiting)

 

[Payd Shell]

I've been building my lone wolf brothers with battleforged in mind, the whole frontline and backline, with the exception of a nimble bannerman and a nimble flanker with a fencing sword. Melts bandits, undead, noble troops and other mercs. Barbarians are tricky, but so far I've seen some good results, though I spam disarm against most dangerous enemies. Sure I'm missing some dps but taking one enemy completely out of the game for a round is pretty nifty, especially since you can do that from two tiles away. Haven't fought greenskins yet, I don't think orcs will be much of a hassle, but goblins might be. What sucks is that if you use battleforged hybrids, you have to use helmets that impair your vision significantly. Armored crossbowmen mow down everything that advances to your formation, but enemy archers generally stay at range.

 

[Darth Canoli]

Funny, in my opinion they're the best fights the game has to offer. The slow tide of battle with shifting flanks, sending polearm-users to and fro protecting vulnerable areas, pinning down advancing troops, etc. They're as tactical as BB gets, and offer something different from the regular brawls, while retaining all the benefits of brigand fights. They do drag on, of course, but they haven't been too common in my runs, maybe 3-4 per war (of which I've only had 2 in total). The loot you get is great, but I would enjoy the noble war fights even if it weren't.

They do drag on, a 20/30 soldiers on each side fight can wear you off and make you quit the game for a couple of days but i agree, they're quite interesting.
The next challenge being protecting your allies and getting no losses and fewer losses as possible for your ally.
Most would agree to say their billmen and pikemen are quite dangerous but i try to rush 2H swordmen before they can get in position and strike (which is usually not that hard, they're swamped by their own troops and can't strike before long) and you don't want to end up in close combat with a knight and his goons either.
A Fencer can help a lot to route them fast mowwing down their crossbowmen and billmen.

Legend Mod in Legendary difficulty wise, i took my save back, spent 2 perks points i was saving, got the lone berserker to lvl 7 and it finally turned alright, looks like i only had shitty rolls for the first 2 weeks or so.
Then i added a +6 roster upgrade after a couple more of level up and recruited (i overlooked theearly +2, +3 and +4 roster upgrades), it's now business as usual.

Still, all the brigands have the nimble perk (didn't notice at first) so do the webnecht and the Unholds now regen like 30-40% HP a turn instead or 10-15% ...
Also, Wielderganger now poison you and unlike the goblins poison, it doesn't wear off and increase in power, leaving you with 3AP after a couple of turns ...

 

[Covenant]

Speaking of saving perk points, anyone got any tips on curing myself of that behaviour? I'm terrible with it in games. Used to have over a hundred stat points saved in Diablo II (Hardcore, mind you) at any one time. In Battle Brothers I frequently have at least a couple saved on two or three guys, because I'm invariably thinking 'IF they get great Fat rolls from this point I'll do X, if not Y', or 'This guy is amazing, what weapon mastery should I give him? Hmm, I'll see what famed items I find'. 'Should I make this guy a hybrid? Let's see what his ranged rolls are like'.

Obviously allowing us to re-spec would be decline (though doing it in a limited fashion - and attaching a large cost - would be a great alternative use for the veteran's hall, which is currently pretty boring), so I need to break the habit if I'm ever going to beat the highest-tier shit like Black Monolith or Goblin City.

 

[hivemind]

Speaking of saving perk points, anyone got any tips on curing myself of that behaviour?

Spoiler

have sex

 

[Covenant]

You're not my type, Jessica.

 

[hivemind]

I am serious btw

obsessing over dumb shit like mimaxing opportunity with saving up perks(in an economic attrition simulator of all things) is a symptom of a high inhibition cowardly life view

you just have to become more reckless as a person overall and stop stressing over the little bits, just put that perk point in and see what happens, become more decisive and if whatever decision you made ends up being the wrong choice learn from it and make a better snap decision in the future, this is the only way to live and learn with your head held high and its the true difference between the chad and incel(other than, of course, maxilla development during adolescence)

 

[hivemind]

you can not make a truly correct decision without first making several wrong ones and understanding why this was the case