The game is at a point where its never been easier to build a viable bro, especially with the new toys the DLCs gave us.
Absolutely, the game is now full of 'pay to win' options (i.e. consumables) or alternatives that have no trade-off or drawbacks, or things that eliminate even the 5% failure chance (which, in a game that is all about risk-management, is a BIG deal).
Nets are sure-hit, dirty cheap, and trivialize high-defense enemies. Grenades are expensive, but also have a 100% chance to work. A 110 MAtk Swordmaster has more chance of failure against a 1hp, stunned, dazed, netted, fleeing goblin than a primitive concoction (which will infallibly work).
Throwing weapons trivialize the lack of ranged skill: at range 2, the difference between a bow quick shot and a throwing weapon is a staggering 24 (a bow has -4% per tile), i.e. six levels' worth of max rolls. At range 2 your 40 RAtk thrower will hit like a 64 RAtk bowman. Then if you want you get an absurd amount of damage increase with mastery, and a 25% to ignore armour with duelist. Only drawback is ammo cost/capacity (which are also a factor for bows, albeit less so), i.e., another 'pay to win' (so to speak) option.
Taunt and whips trivialize non-beast scary enemies. At the very least whips should check against MAtk, not MDef: the way it is, your 45 MAtk, 40 MDef Peddler has like 95% less chance to drop his weapon than an Orc Warlord.
Quick Hands trivializes positioning: why should I wreck my brain in order to position the most appropriate bro to face the most appropriate enemy, when I can have a Swiss Army knife (with even the option of ridiculous Billhook-Two Handed Cleaver combos in the same turn, for free)?
Dodge completely trivializes what is by far the most difficult part of the game, i.e. switching from Raider gear to next tier armour. It also works 100% of the time (I played like a moron and got myself stunned, dazed, netted, goblin-poisoned, panicked, exhausted, etc. etc.? No problem, still works like a charm!), and always at 100% effectiveness (while Battle Forge works increasingly less as soon as your armour gets degraded). It also has no drawbacks/trade-offs whatsoever (no fatigue penalty, no huge expenses in order to acquire good or great armour, or dealing with the chance of it not being available). I can afford even more sloppy play, because my risk to get wounded plummets. It also removes a strategical element: you need tools, a lot of, and money, to repair heavy armour, while hp regeneration is quick, free, and always available.
So while I wholeheartedly agree that it's never been easier to build viable bros, perhaps calling it flexible is slightly misleading: now there are quite a few of high reward-no drawback options that give dumb plays a huge pass (nimble, throwing weapons, consumables, etc.), plus a few extremely expensive and much more difficult to implement options that are relegated to niche cases or that give you a bit of extra edge in some selected end-game fights.
Forge has certainly lost a step compared to Nimble (I assume you mean Nimble when you use Dodge above). A good buff for BF would be to reinstate the old damage reduction calculation i.e. reduction is 5% of maximum total armor value rather than current total armor value. Would make the investment a bit more worthwhile and consistent. I don't think you could realistically revert to old Nimble with the way the game is now, too much enemy AiD floating around with the DLCs.
The Greatsword could use a little buff up too, nerfed as it has been into a pitiful state. The AiD and armor damage are now too low to make the flexibility worth it AND it is handily outperformed in specific roles by the other tier three 2-handers or polearms; all of which happen to be cheaper than the GS. Very sad. Fond memories of running an all GS AoE massacre frontline.
To be honest, I don't even see it as an issue of balance. [edit: I personally like BF the way it is: it forces you to keep track of your armour degradation, i.e., it adds a further factor to take into account]
Nimble is a really clumsy attempt to make light armour relevant in later game (why not medium armour then?). Conceptually, it's ridiculous: at the cost of one perk, you have a magical, infinite, eternal, permanent, always active, non dispellable super-stoneskin. You keep twisting your body just the right amount to get only 40% of the damage even if you are stunned, rooted, netted, exhausted, panicked, etc. etc. A two-handed mace strikes you down? No prob, in those two turns you are prone (and possibly surrounded) you will still be wiggling your ass just fine in order to dodge (but not quite) blows. It only checks armour and helmet fatigue: you can go around in raider gear, with an sead splitter in you right hand, an orc metal shield in your left, and four mansplitters strapped to your back, and you'll still be just as nimble as if you were naked, while at the same time not being able to even move a step because you are already fatigued out from turn 1 if you have less than 128 base fatigue.
Mechanically, in a game that is mostly about gear, it's an absolute disaster. BF works better if you have better armour: more expensive, more difficult to find, riskier to acquire. That is fine. Nimble works better if you have worse armour: cheaper, easier to find , less risky to acquire. Should I select one perk and be fine with raider gear until the endgame, or select one perk (actually two, since you typically also need Brawny) and spend an enourmous amount of money, time and take huge risks in order to acquire heavy armour in order to make decent use of that perk? It greatly diminishes risk-management: you will never -ever- again take full damage, no matter the situation, only 40%. With BF, at least you have to take care of your armour: you lose it, you get full damage.
Then, subjectively speaking: to me the best thing of Battle Brothers is the nail-biting whenever I have to make a hard choice or I didn't take some factor into account and now my mercenary is in a risky situation. With nimble, it's a snoozefest. Chain-berserker who can one-shot my 110hp, 300/300 armour battleforged bro? With nimble, it will take three shots at the very least. Armour piercing weapons? Nimble, and stop worrying. Chosen? Nimble! Lindwurm? Nimble-tank! Schrats? Nimble! Ifrits? Nimble! And so on, and so on. Oh, but Nimble is weak(er) against cleavers and poison. Well, poison doesn't one shot you, and neither does bleeding: even late game, it's mostly about the 5% hit that can one-shot a brother, not about the "I played like an ass for 5 consecutive turns, and my bro now has six bleeding stacks, and nobody in my company has bandages, nimble is weak against cleavers!" Similarly, having eaten 30 goblin arrows means you had oh-so-many opportunities to correct the situation.
As I would like it: since light armour already has its own reward, which is a truckload of extra farigue and initiative, give the player extra ways to make (better) use of that fatigue/initiative. From the top of my head, it could be anything among:
[As a premise: make Nimble dependent on total equipment fatigue, make Quick Hands cost 1 AP but make it reduce throwing nets/bombs to 3 AP]
- the less equipment fatigue, the more chance to re-roll a hit (similar to the Lucky trait, but better).
- Dodge is increasingly less dependent on current initiative, depending on how light your equipment is.
- Rotate and Footwork have heavily reduced farigue/Ap cost, depending on how light your equipment is.
- Quick Hands has 0 AP cost.
- Nine Lives gives increased bonus when activated, and for more turns
- Anticipation grants also some damage reduction proportional to the lightness of your equipment and to the distance (the only case where the 'twisting your body' thing would make a modicum of sense).
[edit] - a successful attempt to get rid of nets/roots costs you 1 AP, one quarter of the fatigue; an unsuccessful one 4 AP, half fatigue (after all, you are nimble: you slip from under the net, don't necessarily have to break it)
[edit] - some chance to shrug off the stunned/dazed effect, proportional to how light your equipment is
And so on, I'm sure there are much more talented people than me could devise much more interesting options. The point is, Nimble if based on things like these would make things MORE interesting: wouldn't you take some additional risks with wearing light armour if it allowed you to get to the enemy line, disengage twice with Footwork for a reasonable fatigue/AP cost and then get to that Arbalester/Necromancer/Shaman/Hexe/etc.? With all the risk that ending up deep into the enemy lines would entail, of course.
Instead, we got brain-dead perma-stoneskin, the epitome of the Sawyeristic approach to balance.
And before some genius has the epiphany of a lifetime and tells me "if you don't like Nimble, don't take it, duh!", that's exactly what I do: I play with no Nimble, no Taunt, no Quick Hands, no Whips, no Throwing Weapons, no reserve (only 12 men, everybody fights, and I include at the very least one monk and one historian in every run). But it's still a huge missed opportunity.
