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I'm new to the game also and had a similar problem. I think starting with High funds kinda spoils us at the start - we want to blow it all recruiting bros who we then can't feed or pay without constant work. For my next run I'm hoping to not live so much "hand to mouth", with enough food and gold in the bank to last a few days. The plan is to keep a small crew and only do level 1 missions for a while instead of trying to rush that "12 bros" Ambition and starving. Assuming that's sustainable, maybe they can level up enough to start handling level 2 missions, or profitably hunt bandits. Basically working harder to keep expenses lower than income at all times.
Last game I also realized a great new profit strategy for certain 2-skull missions.
On "artifact guarded by ancient skeletons" missions, go to the shrine, grab the artifact, listen to spooky dialogue from skeletons, run like hell from their slow asses. All the money, none of the danger.
I restarted again a couple of times and I'm trying a new starting strategy. I was spending most of my starting money recruiting more than 3 guys, but being butt naked and armed with sticks is just a lottery if they survive or not in the first battles, so now I spent most of the money on better equipment. I bought in the first town a half repaired mail armor and a metal helmet, and was lucky to loot another mail from the battle with the Weasel, so on day 2 I have two chain mail armors. Let's see how it goes.
BTW I've got two lousy cripples with two-handed weapons in my band of bros now AND THE FUCKERS REFUSE TO DIE. Now they've leveled up a few times and I've gotten a bit fond of them.
With a combination of survivor, nine lives, steel brows etc you probably can get unkillable characters, but also very soon useless because they accumulate so many permanent disabilities that they are dead weight on the battlefield.
I decide now to share some of my unlimited wisdom with the new folks. Praise me.
Starting game:
>if you want to play longer game or on higher difficulties choose War as 1st conflict, Noble War can be ignored so you have more time to level up and get better sharp things and armor
>choose high starting funds so you actually start with some resources and can afford basic weapons and armors for all your new recruits or afford trade
>choose beginner economic difficulty on any level as higher not only make you earn less but also increase prices on everything and limit amount of tools/supplies you can carry
>start on beginner until you are familiar with basic tactics and enemy types THEN switch to veteran, game can be hard and RNG can fuck you over easily even more than your basic mistakes
Early game:
>arm your front-line with spears and shields(best accuracy and survival) with back-line armed with pikes and xbows, do not forget about hats or light armor, no hat=1hit headshoot, if you can not afford back-line just throw more guys with shield and spears and envelop enemy
>check markets for used(damaged) gear - you can find it pretty cheap
>start investing into at last one high resolve Rally the troops sergeant early, ignore banner - in most fights its not worth taking to battle
>start investing into 2-3 archers early but use them as pike/xbow back-line as early bows are no effective(or even as shield-wall) just level them right
>Colossus, Dodge and Rotation can save more of your guys than you think
>ignore Student - its a newb trap, it have some uses but only as catch up perk later
>learn your enemy and yourself ->check Sun Tzu for more information
>Raiders are your main source of new gear and weapons
>armored zombies can be pretty easily farmed for mail armor and helmets
>damaged armors/helmets have much lower chance to drop, so use either flails or daggers to get them undamaged(kill weak and dangerous enemies first then surround and try farm armor - trying to farm them early in battle can tire your troops easily)
>use high ground
>beware enemy ranged(especially goblins)
>repair only 2nd or higher tier weapons before selling, armor only if you plan to use or really high tier
Mid game:
>invest in better recruits
>train your archers - 3/4 archers with good perks and high tier bows can easily win most fights on lower difficulties against most(not skeletons) enemies
>start training 2 hander users - they become monsters late game and your main-line
>invest in armor
>beware Shamans
DO NOT FORGET TO HAVE FUN
And blame Germany at once one time in the week.
Also do not forget than NETS are one of the most useful item in the game. Dogs are helpful if costly.
I picked up this game too and I love it so far, but the difficulty on Veteran is driving me insane. I started directly with Veteran/Ironman of course (indulging with high starting funds). However, it seems the wandering parties scales up very quickly, by day 20 when my party is average level 4 I encounter only difficult warbands that kills 1-2 at best, or wrecks my party totally. If I avoid the difficult encounters then I waste days wandering from place to place without gaining any experience or crowns. I restarted many times, and sometimes the map is so screwed up that even the first mission takes two days of walking forth and back over the mountains. I usually restart at days 20-30 when I start losing veterans and I feel I could not recover. Should I continue playing, can you recover by mid game without good equipment and always recruiting new soldiers?
Don't forget to trade along the way, maybe even make it your main source of income the first 20-30 days. Keep a smallish group of about 6 Bros, take delivery missions and buy solid gear - like the brownish / red leather armor, Caps and shields for every Bro - before taking riskier contracts.
There's also nothing wrong to play a 'Beginner' campaign for about 50 days, so you get to know all the game mechanics. Veteran can be a bit overwhelming at first, don't let it frustrate you.
only take one-skull jobs until you have at least some kind of chainmail and non-shit-tier weapons on most of your frontline
caravan escort jobs are suicide
artefact recovery jobs are easymode because you can run away and still finish them
package delivery jobs pay so little they're only worth it if you're going in that direction anyway
tracking down thieves and clearing bandit camps are bread-and-butter -- do all of these you can to get decent equipment
graveyard clearing jobs are okay, they're usually not too hard, pay reasonably well and sometimes you get decent drops
you heal faster when resting
make use of spearwalls, they especially rule against nachzehrers and wiedergangers who'll just walk straight into them
if you see a group of bandit thugs (not raiders), get them and take their gear, when you've done that, rinse and repeat for bandit raiders
buy all the big shields you can find
trading is a nice supplemental income -- become Very Friendly with a big city (for good sell prices) and some villages (for good buy prices) and look out for deals, you need some operating capital tho or there's no point
nets are da bomb, use these for any and all bosses or major threats
if you have bros with both decent ranged and decent melee, give them thrown weapons and the Quick Pockets perk, and put them in the frontline -- you'll often get several attacks in before the enemy has even closed, and they'll be wounded and demoralised when they do
when leveling up, don't bother clicking on something if it's only +1 or +2
shields for the whole front line until you're bigger and tougher
if you manage to recruit a genuine talent, give them a reach weapon and keep them safe until they've levelled up a couple of times
recruit cheap, except if you see someone with a decent weapon and the recruitment price isn't much more than you'd pay for it (=buy weapon, get bro for free)
cripples are really fragile but some of them punch like a freight train or have a really good aim, and health isn't that important anyway
darwin FTW - if you recruit a hopeless case, strip 'em naked, put a bag on their head, give 'em a woodcutter's axe, and use them as shock troops
That's about it for early game. The rules change a bit for the later game (you'll switch to two-handers and away from shields etc) but you'll figure it out.
Don't forget to trade along the way, maybe even make it your main source of income the first 20-30 days. Keep a smallish group of about 6 Bros, take delivery missions and buy solid gear - like the brownish / red leather armor, Caps and shields for every Bro - before taking riskier contracts.
(1) Trading is only worthwhile after you've gotten a rep both at the buy and sell points, and you need about 2000 operating capital to make it work. I.e. it's kind of a non-starter very early on.
(2) Don't stay at 6 bros, go for 12 as soon as you can -- but only recruit the cheapest scum of the earth, and go full Darwin on them: keep the good ones and let the bad ones fall. Low-level bros don't cost all that much, being able to take losses early on will drastically increase your learning potential, and it'll keep your band relatively balanced -- one where half the group is level 6 and the other half level 1 doesn't work great. I usually keep 1 or 2 low-level ones growing, but more than that is trouble.
(3) This is only a partial disagree. Shopping for cheap/used armour and even weapons is a good idea, and yeah shields are a no-brainer. Caps you'll get from the battlefield mostly, as well as better armour, eventually.
The banner is only a slightly weaker pike in combat (with the same + to hit bonus) so it's absolutely worth using just for killing things if you get it early when you don't have many 2h weapons for the second line. The morale bonus (or banner morale bonus + sergeant sash + rally combo if you really want to keep them from fleeing) can be useful in niche situations vs ghosts but is pretty negligible otherwise.
Armor hunting with flails and daggers has been mentioned before but the Reinforced Wooden Flail is one of the best weapons in the early game and often overlooked. It's super cheap and easy to get, can be used regularly for the first attack which does ok damage and ignores enemy shields (better hit-chance, like spears), the second attack always hits the head and early game bandits (thugs, but often raiders too) usually wear no or very bad helmets and can be killed in 1-2 hits leaving their body armor for you to loot, it's a great way of collecting bandit gambesons (which are better than regular gambesons for some reason) and rusty mail, making bandit fights in the early game much more profitable. You should start the fight by positioning your flail users to intercept melee enemies with no helmets and taking them out first, this often causes the rest to rout. You should still have 2 spears on the edges of your formation to funnel enemies.
Stars can be s trap sometimes. It doesn't matter if a guy has 3 in ranged skill if he starts at 30, he will be ok-ish at best after you invest every level into it, when he could be more effective if you concentrated on melee/defense/fatigue with average rolls on each level. Same goes for pumping things like bravery, hp or initiative for bros who don't need those just because you got a high roll thanks to stars.
Speaking of that, don't just look at stars and traits. Unequip everything from new recruits and compare their stats that way, it doesn't say anywhere when a new guy has a very high initial fatigue roll for example and you might miss it if you just give them a random spear/shield/mail combo.
Zombies without weapons do basically no damage so always deal with them last. They still contribute to surrounding you, so bear that in mind. You can pick up weapons from downed zombies and they will be unarmed if they come back/get resurrected by necromancers.
Always have a dagger backup on everyone. There's no reason not to and it's very useful for armor hunting. Same goes for archers, if you don't have a 2h pitchfork/pike for them, give them a shortsword or something, it won't come up often but when it does it might save you a few lives and an archer without a backup weapon can't do anything but skip turns until you get rotation or footwork.
If for some reason you have to fight goblin archers or a group of bandits with marksmen and you know you can't out-shoot them it might be a good idea to rotate archers to reserve (or change their equipment), give everyone shields and attack at night.
(2) Don't stay at 6 bros, go for 12 as soon as you can -- but only recruit the cheapest scum of the earth, and go full Darwin on them: keep the good ones and let the bad ones fall. Low-level bros don't cost all that much, being able to take losses early on will drastically increase your learning potential, and it'll keep your band relatively balanced -- one where half the group is level 6 and the other half level 1 doesn't work great. I usually keep 1 or 2 low-level ones growing, but more than that is trouble.
Seconding this. 12 bros should be your first ambition, it's much easier than the other one and completing ambitions increases contract rewards (I think?). You don't necessarily need to get beggars and cripples at 50 gold, but getting brawlers, farmhands, millers, fishermen etc (cheaper militia or deserters if you see them) at 100-300 is the way to go, you'll also see a larger sample of recruits and overwhelming your enemies is a viable strategy, as long as you can give everyone a spear+shield or a pitchfork (2h axe for the really bad ones) and a cheap armor you're good.
(2) Don't stay at 6 bros, go for 12 as soon as you can -- but only recruit the cheapest scum of the earth, and go full Darwin on them: keep the good ones and let the bad ones fall. Low-level bros don't cost all that much, being able to take losses early on will drastically increase your learning potential, and it'll keep your band relatively balanced -- one where half the group is level 6 and the other half level 1 doesn't work great. I usually keep 1 or 2 low-level ones growing, but more than that is trouble.
Seconding this. 12 bros should be your first ambition, it's much easier than the other one and completing ambitions increases contract rewards (I think?). You don't necessarily need to get beggars and cripples at 50 gold, but getting brawlers, farmhands, millers, fishermen etc (cheaper militia or deserters if you see them) at 100-300 is the way to go, you'll also see a larger sample of recruits and overwhelming your enemies is a viable strategy, as long as you can give everyone a spear+shield or a pitchfork (2h axe for the really bad ones) and a cheap armor you're good.
Really? You're not guaranteed multiple contracts in any single settlement (especially early on), and even if you see them they might be delivery/caravan to the other side of the map. After the tutorial you should have 6-7 people, getting another 5-6 is much easier than doing consecutive contracts for one place. You can even get to 12 right after getting the reward for the Weasel if you want to.
Getting more cheap guys (and losing them or dismissing) when keeping your core(sergeant and ranged safe or in reserve so they do not level up) can be also used to slow leveling to slow down level scaling.
I assume this is not that useful on veteran or below but on Expert it can be quite handy.
It can tell you that something is not right with the design when you purposely do not want to get your company stronger.
To be honest most fun happen early in game with all this cheap backgrounds, cheap weapons and paper thin armors and expendable guys.
At this point I think that leveling was a mistake.
Really? You're not guaranteed multiple contracts in any single settlement (especially early on), and even if you see them they might be delivery/caravan to the other side of the map. After the tutorial you should have 6-7 people, getting another 5-6 is much easier than doing consecutive contracts for one place. You can even get to 12 right after getting the reward for the Weasel if you want to.
I grow my band organically -- whenever I have some spare gear, I look for another cripple to use it. I also find a suitable starting area and circulate in it. By the time I'm at 8-10 bros or so, I will also be at Friendly or better with at least one village.
tl;dr if I don't pay attention at all to the goals and just concentrate on getting my warband going, Friendly comes first, 12 comes next
Dunno, I tried the 'befriend settlement' thing once and it took me a lot longer than getting to 12 bros, there just wasn't enough good contracts to do even when I wanted to get it over with. I also like visiting a lot of settlements in the starting area to see what they sell and if they have interesting recruits.
Getting more cheap guys (and losing them or dismissing) when keeping your core(sergeant and ranged safe or in reserve so they do not level up) can be also used to slow leveling to slow down level scaling.
I still don't know how the scaling works. Is for max level bros? Average level? Reputation? Ambitions done? Days? Difficulty? All of the above? None? Why am I fighting the same group of brigand raiders for the 30th time again?
To be honest most fun happen early in game with all this cheap backgrounds, cheap weapons and paper thin armors and expendable guys.
No there is no reason to hurry. You can bottom feed as long as you like!
Hm I don't know about the combat log, good question. I rarely had it expanded though
If you want get Noble Missions then yes but overall do not bother - it will come eventually by just doing missions and stuff.
Not really. Also log is pretty bare-bones and you will not get much info from it.
Ok sure but "bare bones" is too much to say. You get detailed info about where and how much damage was dealt. Ok you don't see the rolls for a couple of things but what would that change? Just to be able to cry about rolls or what?
No. I want to know how things work. Or why they do not work as I thought.
I can cry about rolls without that knowledge.
What exactly log show?
Accuracy rolls and not even full damage info.
Log is barebones not only because it was added like 5min before launch but also it keep information from the player on purpose(as intended).
No. I want to know how things work. Or why they do not work as I thought.
I can cry about rolls without that knowledge.
What exactly log show?
Accuracy rolls and not even full damage info.
Log is barebones not only because it was added like 5min before launch but also it keep information from the player on purpose(as intended).
