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

[Kaivokz]

Alright, so I had been playing on ironman veteran economy/combat, but I decided veteran economy felt too grindy (as in, I was just doing more 1 skull contracts and farming more low level bandits rather than having more challenging battles). It also seemed to make recovering a company very hard.

I decided to play beginner economy/veteran combat. (Starting on veteran/veteran without playing the tutorial was fun though.) I’m a few weeks in with monster hunter background, have a squad of level 3-6 bros and 3000 gold in my wagon.

I recruited a couple good ranged bros early on and decided to try a play style based around them. Two archers and two crossbowmen. Four shield bros. Two pike bros. Two 2h sword bros.

Working pretty well, but I think I need to recruit some better 2h weapon guys—nobles or sell swords or something. Just unlocked noble contracts for the first time but I haven’t done any yet.

Anyway, I’ve taken down a couple pairs of unholds and monster hunter background gives you tons of materials. Haven’t really found anything good to craft yet except extra large quivers. I fought a fallen hero/necromancer combo, which was pretty fun. The fallen hero had some crazy armor with tons of durability. Too bad it seems like I always destroy the armor so I don’t get to loot it.

There a good way of not destroying the armor? Maybe use flails to hit the head?

 

[Reinhardt]

but I think I need to recruit some better 2h weapon guys

You just need higher level men. Level 3 bros is not when you go 2h.

 

[Eastwood]

There a good way of not destroying the armor? Maybe use flails to hit the head?

Daggers have a puncture attack that can bypass armor. I usually try to stall the fight with fallen heroes until I can surround them with high attack dudes. Then I split their shields, use nets to reduce their melee defense and stun them with maces so they can't do any harm.

 

[AwesomeButton]

There a good way of not destroying the armor? Maybe use flails to hit the head?

Daggers have a puncture attack that can bypass armor. I usually try to stall the fight with fallen heroes until I can surround them with high attack dudes. Then I split their shields, use nets to reduce their melee defense and stun them with maces so they can't do any harm.

Speaking of which, when you get to the right level, try rondels as daggers. Crazy damage

 

[Reinhardt]

Just rondels? Not famed? Peasant.

 

[Darth Canoli]

Do codexers play BB on ironman?

I just lost another company to some nachez-whatevers. Some bad luck (my spearwalls all got broken after 1 or 2 hits, despite some high melee skill), some bad tactics and they got around my flank. (I actually managed to beat them with 8/12 bros left, but right after that a band of very well equipped brigands appeared and chased me down).

But, now I know how to fight Nache-things. They seem to prioritize going for corpses when they can, so I figure (1) kill them isolated from their allies, (2) cover the bodies as you go, and (3) kill the big ones first so they don't grow bigger. One of the very big ones (maybe 2nd biggest size?) was responsible for killing 3/4 of my bros who died even though there were like 20 of them.

Anyway, I'm going to start a beast slayers group and specifically go after monsters because I keep losing my company to not understanding monster mechanics.

Not really ironman because i'm only playing Legends and it'd throw at you some impossible fights every now and then, usually, you get a murderous band of orcs around day 50, Warlords, champions, orcs warriors, even with an elite group, the warlords skill giving raising his troops morale while decreasing yours is just overpowered so if you get 2/3 or these, warriors, behemoths and champions being really hard to kill, you're screwed, you could win (or get wiped out, if you didn't play your cards perfectly) but not without heavy losses.
Sometimes i beat them with only one guy down or i get lucky and he gets a harmless or useful permanent wound and i only lose 1/2 fresh recruits.
Sometimes, i just flee and cancell the mission if it was one.

You need at least 2 elite level 5+ bros with AoE 2H weapons, swords + hammers are my priorities but later, i have one of each, even 2H maces are really good.
By elite, i mean swordmaster, sellsword, hedge knight, good starting guy, ...

Early on, just go for a shieldwall + the best pikes you can afford and the extended range axe + maybe one or two crossbows.

But i think you're getting it, once you understand every monsters mechanics, party wipes don't happen so often, only when you can't recognize a stronger opponent or if you get ambushed by frenzy direwolves early on because they're faster and you can't run away fast enough from them.

Alright, so I had been playing on ironman veteran economy/combat, but I decided veteran economy felt too grindy (as in, I was just doing more 1 skull contracts and farming more low level bandits rather than having more challenging battles). It also seemed to make recovering a company very hard.

I decided to play beginner economy/veteran combat. (Starting on veteran/veteran without playing the tutorial was fun though.) I’m a few weeks in with monster hunter background, have a squad of level 3-6 bros and 3000 gold in my wagon.

I recruited a couple good ranged bros early on and decided to try a play style based around them. Two archers and two crossbowmen. Four shield bros. Two pike bros. Two 2h sword bros.

Working pretty well, but I think I need to recruit some better 2h weapon guys—nobles or sell swords or something. Just unlocked noble contracts for the first time but I haven’t done any yet.

Anyway, I’ve taken down a couple pairs of unholds and monster hunter background gives you tons of materials. Haven’t really found anything good to craft yet except extra large quivers. I fought a fallen hero/necromancer combo, which was pretty fun. The fallen hero had some crazy armor with tons of durability. Too bad it seems like I always destroy the armor so I don’t get to loot it.

There a good way of not destroying the armor? Maybe use flails to hit the head?

Nice, there's a background, northern raider maybe which allow you to get armors even at 0% durability.
Also, Legends now let you get named items even at 0%.

Well, there's still the hexens, the alps, schrats and lindwurm to "look up" to but it looks like you're on a roll.

 

[Kaivokz]

But i think you're getting it, once you understand every monsters mechanics, party wipes don't happen so often, only when you can't recognize a stronger opponent or if you get ambushed by frenzy direwolves early on because they're faster and you can't run away fast enough from them.

Yeah, pretty much every company I’ve lost has been to unknown monsters—finding the right strategy for each battle is probably my favorite part of the game.

The first time I fought unholds, for example, I thought—alright, big lumbering beast, what the best way to kill it? Maybe surround it with shield wall and poke it to death with pikes? Until it grabs a shield bro and gets in melee range with your pikes. So my strategy for the last two pairs of unholds I fought was something like this: surround with shield bros, fill with arrows and slash it (no shield wall) as much as I can until it knocks them back (they don’t seem strong enough to one shot a shield bro with good armor). If that went well it will be between 1/2 and 3/4 health, so then everyone collapses in (including pike bros who were standing one tile away from back line) and I can usually finish it on the second round of combat. My original strategy sounded good, but it was too slow and underestimated the agility of unholds. But if I overwhelm the regen and don’t let it get to the back line, I haven’t lost a bro yet to them.

Well, there's still the hexens, the alps, schrats and lindwurm to "look up" to but it looks like you're on a roll

Hah, I haven’t seen any of those yet... I’m tempted to wiki them since I don’t really want to die and start from the very beginning every time I meet a new enemy.

You just need higher level men. Level 3 bros is not when you go 2h.

Yeah, I have them alternating between dual grip single axes or swords and actual 2h weapons now, depending on the defenses of who I’m fighting. Once I can reliably use 2h weapons things will change...

 

[Darth Canoli]

The first time I fought unholds, for example, I thought—alright, big lumbering beast, what the best way to kill it? Maybe surround it with shield wall and poke it to death with pikes? Until it grabs a shield bro and gets in melee range with your pikes. So my strategy for the last two pairs of unholds I fought was something like this: surround with shield bros, fill with arrows and slash it (no shield wall) as much as I can until it knocks them back (they don’t seem strong enough to one shot a shield bro with good armor). If that went well it will be between 1/2 and 3/4 health, so then everyone collapses in (including pike bros who were standing one tile away from back line) and I can usually finish it on the second round of combat. My original strategy sounded good, but it was too slow and underestimated the agility of unholds. But if I overwhelm the regen and don’t let it get to the back line, I haven’t lost a bro yet to them.

Everyone probably had epic fights with unholds at some point.
Nowadays, i don't fight them until i have at least 2 good 2H bros and 1/2 good archers as long as their numbers are adequate.

Really, nothing beats a full 2H party with ranged support to crush them, you just wait and prepare and bait one, when he bites, you just hit him with everything you have.
Of course, your archers "prepared" him with overwhelm so he misses his attack and you kill him in one turn, two at most.
Raw damage is the only valid answer but a good shield bro with rotate close by to rotate any wounded 2H is a nice security net.

As for the other ones.
Hexens

Spoiler

2/3 god-tier archers with high initiative and you kill one or two before they can even act, best defense is a good offense.

Alps

Spoiler

Full 2H, if you can OS them, the Alps aren't a threat at all.

Schrats

Spoiler

Axes to break their shield (or whatever weapon with a high shield damage) over and over again, high def, nobody behind the close combat attackers, archers far away with overwhelm and a free line of sight.
Best strategy is to avoid them though, they're a real pain.

Lindwurms

Spoiler

I have no idea but i only attack "small" groups (for runes in Legends) and destroy them with the same tactics. Archers + overwhelm, 2H guys doing the work. Hallberds and 2H pikes being useful but AoE 2H + Close combat works well if you have a good defense on a nimble bro and an anti lindwurm acid armor.

 

[Kaivokz]

Thanks for the advice; my company will sing songs in your honor.

The advice of old Canoli,
did surely save our arses, bros

Raise your glass to Darth Canoli,
no need be melancholy, bros


(I don't hire bards, but every company needs some marching and feast songs)

 

[Kaivokz]

I tend to hire every monk who is looking for work if I can fit them in my company because I am partial to men of God (particularly the background of the one who saw corruption in the church and decided to go out and right wrongs with his own hands) and I've had a couple good interactions because of it.

Spoiler

 

[vazha]

Get some random cultist in there to convert god tier bros into cultists. As soon as he does, let him die for it. From now on:
1. The converted cultist bro will convert other bros that fall under convertable condition, thus dramatically reducing wages you'll pay for them *laughs in Shylock*
2. Each and every cultist will pick up a fight with your monk at some point. Let them beat the monk up for juicy +2 resolve. This event spams indefinitely and has a short cooldown.
????
PROFIT

 

[Kaivokz]

I made a bad choice and took on a 3 skull noble contract to hunt down a barbarian king.

Spoiler

Not pretty, but could have been much worse. Lost one of my crossbowmen and the guy I was training up to be a 2h bro. Almost lost one of my shieldmen... or all my men.

I think the only reason I lived is because my bros are awesome and love me. (I hit the tavern between most contracts and these are my first main-group casualties in 60 days of play--plus my standard bearer is my sergeant and has 80 morale or so.) No one broke--Eugen had confident morale even as he was being pummeled to death by two giant skull clubs (only ended up losing an ear though). The barbarians did break and 2 of them fled mid-battle. Ivar, Arnold, Ulrich and Ferdinand managed to take on the Barbarian king by themselves (destroyed his armor ;( )while the rest of my bros fended off the 8 reavers. Barbarian tactic of surrounding with 2h, destroying shield and then clobbering the defenseless person is scary.

With the money I earned from this contract I should be able to hire an adventurous noble to be a 2h bro.

edit- changed my mind, I think I'll go for some squires or militia since I'm sitting around 6k gold. Nobles can come later.

 

[Darth Canoli]

I tend to hire every monk who is looking for work if I can fit them in my company because I am partial to men of God (particularly the background of the one who saw corruption in the church and decided to go out and right wrongs with his own hands) and I've had a couple good interactions because of it.

You should do a Legends Crusader run or a Legends Cultist one for the other side (cultist is way better with legends due to morale camping bonuses).

 

[Kaivokz]

You should do a Legends Crusader run or a Legends Cultist one for the other side (cultist is way better with legends due to morale camping bonuses).

I’ll look more into legends after I exhaust the base game, I think.

I’m getting a pretty good understanding of the economy, what backgrounds to take, to focus on growing and protecting bros with good rolls, and how to fight most kinds of enemies.

Now that my B/V/M ironman run is going well, I want to do some E/E/L ironman runs.

Just have to decide what background to take (poacher? monster hunter seems good late game to get more valuable monster parts, but -10% prices would make early game slower), and then I think I’ll focus on one particular section of the map, try to make as much money as I can and far outclass the enemies I fight generally. Going to try daggers and flails against bandits so I can get their armor early (I almost always destroy it with pole arms, spears and swords).

 

[Darth Canoli]

Poacher isn't worth it because you won't chain hunt high level monsters, firstly, they're rare and secondly, even if they don't kill anyone, you'll need to tend wounds, repair and heal for a while after each decent battle.

And the named weapons are extremely expensive so 10% is a lot, you'll also heavily rely on selling loot for cash by mid/late game.

I don't care much for vanilla backgrounds aside from the northern raiders and cultist but cultist it's a pain without legends camping because half your company will just quit after a sacrifice if you're not extremely close to a tavern.
Never played lonewolf, legends customized "lonewolf" are so much better.

Forgot about the gladiators, it's really fun and powerful, the +1AP per kill thing is just amazing on a berserk 2H (sword, axe, hammer) bro.

 

[Kaivokz]

Man, this game is great. I know I’m late to the party and I’ve said this a few times, but I’ve been having a blast playing it. Started an expert/expert low-funds ironman beast hunter company. On day 60 with about 150 tools stored away.

Clubs + daggers are awesome early game for stripping armor off of brigands. Around day 25 I had 12 suits of mail, something I hadn’t been able to do in 60 days before (relying on pole arms, spears and swords). It’s pretty gruesome to imagine 6 bros clubbing a guy and stabbing him to death through his armor while trying not to damage it—but good gear means my bros will live.

Farmers are awesome early recruits because of how much fatigue matters with heavier armor and longer battles. I still don’t feel great about my company composition; 2 archers, 4 pole-arms and 6 shield bros (2 dagger/flail, 3 mace/dagger, 1 sword/dagger). I haven’t had enough money to buy lots of recruits to try to get good stat allocations. I’ve got a level 6 bro with 70 melee skill, but even in heavy armor playing around the flank with a 2h he was getting smashed pretty hard, especially if the enemy pulled out throwing weapons. Not really sure how to build them survivable on expert w/o a shield.

The -10% price penalty is pretty harsh from beast hunter (I think it only applies to buying, not selling, at least), but with an allied village I can still get 195g tools and cheap food. Sell monster trophies and gear at big cities and I’ve managed to stay on top of my funds. Working on befriending a noble house now since those contracts seem to rake in gold.

Funny, but my company is stronger on expert/expert than they were on beginner/veteran.

 

[Eastwood]

What's the best way to build an archer? Just started my first Poacher run with all the DLC and am wondering in which direction I should take my hunter bro.
Thought of two builds. One is a pure archer that can more easily snipe high value targets and goblins from afar: https://tumult.cc/bb-calc.html?1-1&2-8&2-2&4-11&5-5&6-1&6-3&7-3&1-8&2-1
The other is a throwing archer hybrid that is more flexible and effective against heavy armor: https://tumult.cc/bb-calc.html?1-5&2-7&2-8&4-11&4-12&6-3&6-1&7-2&1-8&5-5

 

[vazha]

Specialist > Hybrid, in 9 out of 10 cases. And even when you've got that one god tier hybridbro, argument could be made that you'd have benefited more from another specialist.

 

[Eastwood]

Specialist > Hybrid, in 9 out of 10 cases. And even when you've got that one god tier hybridbro, argument could be made that you'd benefited more from another specialist.

Good to know, thanks. I think I'll just make the first hunter a ranged specialist and try out the hybrid later, if I get a good candidate.

 

[vazha]

Another quick tip: hunters usually are reserved for bow & crossbow duties, for gunners you'd ideally want a recruit that has inherent resolve bonus. Witchhunters, for example, make great gunners.

 

[Eastwood]

for gunners you'd ideally want a recruit that has inherent resolve bonus. Witchhunters, for example, make great gunners.

This is for the reworked Fearsome right? I'll keep it in mind, thanks!

 

[Infinitron]

Hmmm, the devs have been doing some community event stuff: https://steamcommunity.com/app/365360/discussions/0/3002177675802692156/

Monthly Challenge #1: The Band of Knights-Errant
Good day everyone! I'd like to welcome you to our brand new Monthly Challenges, a community thing I've wanted to do for some time now. Battle Brothers is almost literally an endless game -- you can play it for hundreds and thousands of hours without running out of things to do. Even so, at some moments some players might feel they are running out of challenges or ideas -- or might want to experiment with the limits of the game. That's why I thought of this idea. Roughly once per month, I will post here an open challenge. It can be a specific battle (for which I would share an edited savefile that you can download and use) or an idea for roleplaying a new campaign, like this one. Some will be harder than others, but there is no winning or losing these challenges -- it's just for fun (and, at most, bragging rights if it's something particularly difficult).

Just to be transparent, the devs aren't designing these challenges, so any problems in balancing or difficulty or whatever are absolutely on me -- and nothing I write here is canon or a hint of future official content. Also, I want to thank @Turtle225, @JCSato and @Abel, who have very kindly given me feedback and/or created tools to help me design this stuff.

All this said, let's start with the first challenge, something fun and light for you to play over this Christmas -- let's play Knight-Errant! I invite you to post your optional rules, headcannon and stories from your run in this same thread.

Monthly Challenge: the Knights of the Valiant Order

Where you play as a band of knight-errands, set on a quest to protect the innocent and smite Evil wherever it can be found

Rules

Economic Difficulty: Expert (knowing you are of noble origin, vendors will try to squeeze extra coin from you)
Starting Funds: High (you are noble after all!)
Combat Difficulty: we recommend Expert for a more exciting challenge, but up to you!

Starting bros: 3 adventurous nobles (you can download a save here[we.tl], pr BB-Edit the initial bros yourself if you prefer to use your own seed. I picked the seed for this one from this thread).
The Round Table: You can only hire highborn backgrounds (Adventurous Nobles, Disowned Nobles, Bastards, Hedge Knights), plus Squires, Minstrels and Historians (for singing their mighty deeds) and Monks (for the wellbeing of their souls).
Chivalric code: Your goal is to protect the innocent and weak. You cannot accept raiding contracts nor take part in quarrels between nobles (no escorting spies or plundering other nobles’ lands). In the event of a Noble War, you can only take part in defending peasants against nobles’ armies.
Not in this for the money. You cannot haggle for better pay when accepting a contract. You do need money for your adventures, but you’re not in this to get rich but for honor and glory, and knights are supposed to be generous.

Looking for an extra challenge? If you want a harder version of this roleplay, follow the Commandments of Chivalry: on top of defending the weak and innocent, once engaged in combat you cannot flee from an enemy (as it would be dishonorable), and if a Holy War begins, you have to fight for the North. You can also make Fortified Mind a compulsory perk (because your knights have to be the bravest and noblest of all) and forbid Ranged weapons (because it's dishonorable to attack an enemy from afar instead of facing them in single combat).

How do you “win” this scenario? You can play this just as any other origin and retire whenever you feel you’ve “beaten” the game. However, thematically you shouldn’t retire before reaching at least one of these conditions:

Reaching “Legendary” renown (you got the everlasting glory you were searching –
now you can go back home as a hero)
Beating at least one of the hardest legendary locations (you wanted to defeat Evil, after all – what better way than clearing the Black Monolith, the Sunken Library or the Goblin City!)

Background

As a highborn, you’ve lived a life of luxury and comfort, destined by birthright to rule over the lesser men. You spent your childhood mastering the blade in the training hall, and your youth commanding your father’s troops in campaigns of conquest. But you always dreamed of more: of a higher cause than the petty squabbles of the nobility; of honor and glory, like the stories of the knights of old. After being severely injured on the battlefield facing another noble’s scion, just like you, you came back home and decided enough was enough. You convinced three of your childhood friends, sons of other noble houses, to join you with promises of everlasting glory. You left your rooms in the middle of the night, grabbed whatever gear you could raid from the armory, saddled your horse up, and set to the roads to become knight-errands, protect the weak and the innocent, and fight against the many Evils that beset the land.

https://steamcommunity.com/app/365360/discussions/0/3113645835772327510/

Monthly Challenge #2: The Rogue Noble House
When you enter the old lord's chamber, you find him leaning out the windows, wide open despite the fierce cold. The man looks at the hills like if he was trying to pierce the night with his eyes.

"I'm glad you're finally here, sellsword. Close the door behind you -- walls have ears these days." You follow his command and walk closer to the fire, burning too low to be of any use against the wind. "You know how it is among us the highborn -- we might get into a scrap every now and then, burn a few farms or kill some poor devils standing in the way... But at the end of the day, no serious harm is done”. You refrain from pointing out that the peasants who get massacred in their “scraps” would probably disagree with that. “When it’s all said and done, we know it’s us against the world. There are manners in war. Rules. Traditions.” The old lord sighs. “Or there used to be.”

“One of the Noble houses have… gone rogue. Apparently, they have decided these long-standing traditions do not apply to them. They have convinced the Northern savages to fight for them. They have allied with the Southerners and their false god. Even the greenskins are now on their side, for goodness’ sake! They are set to destroy all the Noble houses and unite all the lands under a sole banner.”

His voice quivers in suppressed rage and fear. It’s obvious that in his mind, this is just not just wrong -- it’s plainly unthinkable. You wonder how no one else has tried it before – you don’t believe for a second it’s out of principles, so you wonder if nobles are really that naïf or it’s just no one could talk their traditional enemies into working for them.

It takes a moment for the lord to put himself together, and when he continues, his voice is almost a whisper. “They want to conquer the whole continent, sellsword. Our troops couldn’t stop them. Now I hear word from other nobles that they are considering if they should join the winning side while they still can and pledge fealty to avoid utter destruction. But my spies have discovered something. They are escorting ambassadors back to their lands. We can plant evidence to make them think they have been betrayed. Their alliance is as powerful as it is fragile. Kill these ambassadors and their escorts, sellsword, and you’ll save us. You’ll save everyone.”

As if you cared whose is the banner that flies on the lords’ castles. As if it made any difference at all for the people who toil in their lands. You tell the old noble that salvation doesn’t come cheap, but he promises a fortune, even land and titles for your men. Looks like the Battle Brothers have a new mission…

Welcome to our new community challenge! This time it's not a custom Origin, but a series of battles. If you don't know what we're talking about, you can take a look at the previous one: https://steamcommunity.com/app/365360/discussions/0/3002177675802692156/. Since we are discussing if noble armies need a buff, I thought it would be fun to fight a noble army with some... additions.

Now, a warning: these battles are not designed to be balanced, just to offer a challenge that you can't find in the "normal" game. I'm not a game designer and I've not exactly run tests to make sure they are balanced or whatever. I'm sure they will seem unfair or unwinnable to some (or most) of you -- I'm hoping, though, that at least you have some fun with these weird combinations of enemies and the unexpected synergies that will probably appear.

That said, another warning: I want to make clear that the devs are not involved in designing this in any way. Any fault you find is mine.

Huge thanks to @Abel for writing the mod that allowed me to create these scenarios, and to @JCSato for the immense patience he's had to help me learn how to do this (I couldn't code my way out of a cardboard box).

HOW TO PARTICIPATE IN THE CHALLENGE

1. Download ModHook: https://www.nexusmods.com/battlebrothers/mods/42?tab=files&file_id=2417

2. Drop the ModHook zip in the Battle Brothers /data folder (typically C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\Battle Brothers\data), without unzipping it

3. Download this: https://we.tl/t-ep2Jwb5uJL

4. Go to your /data/ folder and create a folder /script/!mods_preload. The path should be something like this: C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\Battle Brothers\data\scripts\!mods_preload

5. Pick the .nut of the battle you want to fight, drop it in the /!mods_preload folder you have created, and rename it to santoTool.nut

6. Open the game and load the savefile you want to play with. Press CTRL + G, then B. As soon as you unpause the game, the enemy party will appear in front of you and attack you.

I have not experienced any problems, but I strongly recommend keeping a backup of your savefiles just in case.

I encourage you to experiment with different party compositions and equipment -- BB-Edit is your friend!

If within a few days we realize they are too difficult (or too easy), I'll follow your suggestions and edit them again. I hope you have fun!

 

[Teut Busnet]

Specialist > Hybrid, in 9 out of 10 cases. And even when you've got that one god tier hybridbro, argument could be made that you'd have benefited more from another specialist.

I strongly disagree.

What does the 'specialist' have that the 'hybrid' doesn't? 'Bullseye', 'Executioner', 'Fast Adaptation'? Not great perks.

Against what enemies does it make you better? Those you can wipe the floor with anyway.

The armor destruction/ignoring capabilities of throwing weapons however make hybrids very versatile and extremely effective against Chosen and Ancient Undead - fights in which a specialist is useless.

 

[Kaivokz]

I think one of the reasons I am enjoying this game so much is that you really do need to accept that some bros will die or go down. If you break formation to try to save a bro who got unlucky or a new recruit who is isn’t skilled enough yet, you’ll almost certainly lose more bros in the process.

My E/E ironman run is going great. Having a dagger and a wooden stick on everyone’s belt is very useful.

Fought my first hexen (and then a couple more after). Have a good bannerman so most bros resisted charm, but if a dangerous bro gets charmed... everyone around him pulls out wooden sticks to stun him, while the rest of the company moves toward the hexen. Almost lost my good archer to the first hexen, since he was hexed and I shot her with my other archer (took him down to 10hp)—I didn’t expect one arrow to do quite that much damage, and the hex share damage seems to bypass armor—but the arrow killed the hexen so it worked out.

Unholds are easy now where they used to be game enders.

I’ve got a huge (+10% melee damage) berserking pikeman with 75 some melee skill at level 7 who can down two enemies on most turns. Once I get some good bros with enough m. skill and endurance, I’m excited to try some 2h builds. Have about 7k gold stored (even as monster hunters with expert economy—though I did kill two packs of 20 nachez-whatevers and got enough monster parts to make ~2k gold) so I’ll probably start hiring some militia or squires to build as mid game 2h’s and more defensive shield bros.

 

[vazha]

Specialist > Hybrid, in 9 out of 10 cases. And even when you've got that one god tier hybridbro, argument could be made that you'd have benefited more from another specialist.

I strongly disagree.

What does the 'specialist' have that the 'hybrid' doesn't? 'Bullseye', 'Executioner', 'Fast Adaptation'? Not great perks.

Against what enemies does it make you better? Those you can wipe the floor with anyway.

The armor destruction/ignoring capabilities of throwing weapons however make hybrids very versatile and extremely effective against Chosen and Ancient Undead - fights in which a specialist is useless.

Sure, let's discuss. Specialist ranger (bowman) is an elite unit used for sniping priority targets (witches, necroes, shamaneros, them annoying hero types) half across the map. You do need them at their absolute best to perform as intended. Both bull's eye and adaptation help them excel at their task.

As for hybrid throwing shenanigans against chosen and the lot - I think you are deceived by being pleasantly surprised that they do their job, against your expectations if you will. When compared, an average hybrobro will do always worse against toughies than an average two-handed bro would. God tier hybrids with poison are very good against the ridiculous arena foes that the tournament pits you against, but that's about it. If allowed I'd still take a duelist / fencerbro for gimmicky schtick.

Not to say hybrids cant work / are shit, they are just suboptimal when compared to specialists.