Battle Brothers Pre-Release Thread

[Prime Junta]

I stopped using shields altogether, I find the extra wallop a two-handed axe gives is more than worth it. So far anyway. I haven't had too much trouble with skirmishers (goblin or otherwise), they go down pretty quickly when you tap them with an axe and follow up with a strike or two from polearms. I do try to put my axmen on high ground though whenever possible.

So you have no bro with a shield, and you rush the enemy archers and all? Damn, my men would die so fast. Do you use heavy armor? I suppose you have to be pretty mobile, but on the other hand since your soldiers rely only on armor for their protection, it's tough to give them light armor. What day & difficulty setting are you at?

Veteran difficulty. I'm not sure what day I'm on (I can check later today), but I'm at the point where I've just specialised some of my vets and am clearing ~800 crown contracts without too much difficulty, if it's over 1000 I expect to lose someone.

I play defensively: I look for high ground and retreat to that in the opening, then wait for the enemy to come to me. This leaves the archers lagging behind so it'll be a couple rounds before they even manage to start shooting, plus I can plink them with my crossbowman once they do come into range. I also fight at night whenever possible, if the enemy has archers, 'cuz they're useless in the dark.

I only start losing bros if they get mobbed, near the flanks usually. I've got chainmail on most (various types, between shirt and hauberk), lamellar on one or two second-line newbies.

I go for the heavy-hitters first (i.e., anyone without a shield), then I peel off the shields with the axmen and take care of those. Only once I have an armoured bro or two free, I rush the archers, with war dogs if I have them -- at that point they'll likely be retreating anyway.

The shields didn't really help against archers because they'd be targeting my un-shielded back row anyway, and by the time my frontline was free to rush them the battle was pretty much won anyway. I find the tradeoff of being able to clobber their melee guys faster is ultimately better. Might be that'll change with tougher enemies, but that's my feelz at this point anyway.

 

[Jimmious]

I actually am changing my mind about crossbowmen.. They are good and all that, but when the enemies have Marksmen or something similar the extra tile of range is critical. I'm thinking to go 2 bows 1 crossbow from now on.
Also I really can't imagine how playing without shields is survivable, at least in Veteran.. I mean you might win but you're going to lose men for sure.

 

[Prime Junta]

Also I really can't imagine how playing without shields is survivable, at least in Veteran.. I mean you might win but you're going to lose men for sure.

I'm losing fewer now than when I was playing with shields. Sure it took them longer to beat my guys down, but it took me longer to do the same to them and they tended to win the attrition game. Fucking orcs especially, those things hit like a freight train.

However, that could be because I was really bad at playing this back when I used shields. I'm gonna collect some hand axes and shields, equip my axmen with them, and see how it plays with a shieldwall. Could be I was doing something else wrong.

 

[Skittles]

Going without shields is most viable once you've got Reach Advantage and you can run in scale or better with good fatigue. You're best served if you've been pumping fatigue and one of your defenses every level up in order to do this. Your guys will be more vulnerable at first than they would be with shields, since your defense only skyrockets after you start landing blows and your ranged defense will suck, but once you're engaged, you're usually safer vs. melee attacks than a shield bro and only moderately more vulnerable to ranged (since you get some cover still from enemies). That early vulnerability is why armour is so important for these guys.

Dodge seems like it might be a viable route now, but I'm set in my ways and slow to experiment now with really lightly armoured bros. I'll see if I can get a naked berserker to a high enough level to take advantage of Nimble, too.

 

[Jimmious]

I hope that for the release version there is a "scoreboard". I'd like to be able to see the names of my companies and how they did. Maybe compare with the Codexians here for the lulz.
Also some more ego stats would be cool company-wide. Like most damage dealt, most damage taken, hardest enemy beaten etc. The are some per Brother but not for the whole company afaik

 

[Reinhardt]

Earliest day to raid Black Monolith on expert ironman.

 

[Humanophage]

LTTP but anyway. What do your bros look like?

1 2 3 4 5 6 7
A B C D E

1 and 7 = fast expendable skirmishers with adrenaline rush and dogs, often with spears. Good against archers, ghosts, wolves. Can be sacrificed to stop a tough orc.
A, B, E = high melee and ranged, negligible defence except dodge. Usually use crossbows and long axes. Carry a spare shield for tough situations. I take cripple early on with them, so the enemy usually reaches my ranks with serious debuffs.
D = as above, but a bowman. Usually has the highest ranged skill among ranged brothers.
C = captain with the banner and a spare shield. High melee and morale because of resolve.
2, 4, 6 = versatile brothers with shields and high melee. A couple of my bros are brutes (+15% head damage), so they carry flails. I never use swords, non-kopesh cleavers, or maces. I should start using daggers probably. If possible, brothers with high melee get the goblin pike, which is superb (low fatigue, only 5 AP for a long-range stab).
3 = brother with the best melee skill and high stamina. Carries a two-handed sword and a goblin pike. Gets the best armour.
5 = brother with the second-best melee skill. Starts like 2-4-6, but carries a two-handed hammer.

I generally buy all unarmoured dogs in fortresses with kennels. The armoured ones are a little overpriced, and their armour is too meagre to be real a obstacle. I am a huge fan of dogs: they are brilliant versus ghosts, useful to surround and distract orc warriors, and obviously exceptional against archers if you plant them close enough.

1 and 7 have high mortality and trauma rates, but it is relaxing to be able to afford to lose troops. The rest almost never die, though there were a couple of distressing deaths of high-level bros, which inevitably happened when I came home tired after work. I am at day 100 or so, and I still have two of the starting brothers in perfect health.

I organised them more or less spontaneously, and I am certain the situation could be vastly improved. E.g., though my captain has 100 morale, he never manages to give the morale bonus when he rallies, as the mechanic got somehow changed, but I have not yet checked how. The banner, thus, seems like a lousy weapon.

 

[Marten Broadcloak]

With only pikes, flails and one hammer, don't you have trouble against armoured opponents?

 

[Humanophage]

With only pikes, flails and one hammer, don't you have trouble against armoured opponents?

Oh, I do have hammers. I edited the post and accidentally deleted that phrase. I carry two one-handed hammers in the inventory, and one on a brother as a spare weapon.

The pikes are spare weapons for 2-4-6, not their main weapons.

At any rate, my impression is that most of the damage to non-orcs is usually dealt by the second row with longaxes and the two-handed swordsman.

 

[Mr. Pink]

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=809103470

 

[Stavrophore]

Can't crack the fucking orcs, or brigands with 4-5 marksmen, the latter almost always guarantee the death of my BB by ranged fire. The orcs though are real pain in the melee, i've lost my ironman run on veteran[day 55], just because i've went against orc warriors[not the youngs], 10 warriors, 2 youngs against my 12 BB of level 6 with mediocre 120-130 armor. They've massacred through like hot knife through butter. The lesson learned:
1. Lots of heavy hitter two handers -swords but preferably warhammers: orc armor is really tough
2. No amount of shieldwall will help -they will get through easily -you have to use adrenaline, to position your heavy hitters, and kill 1-2 each round, you have to gangbang and use overwhelm to get better hitchance, and later a morale checks to get lower their skills
3. Second row with 2 hand long axes -to break their shields and attack from second row
4. Crossbow are usable when you have height advantage, but its still better to switch to long axes when you are in melee range- you will need to destroy their shields, from second row, and then use your heavy hitters in the front row to land juicy hits
5. Kill a few and then try to retreat through the edge of battleground -its best to do that with crossbow men, or some duds with throwing equipment because they can then move to the edge and retreat. Kill one or two, retreat, rinse and repeat, then attack when enemies are manaegable in number.
6. If situation goes south, dont hesitate to reatreat, because orcs will tear you the moment something goes wrong -you missed three hits with your warhammers in the row and didnt kill a single orc, while putting your BBs in front line, overwhelmed by orcs -just hit the retreat button.
7. Terrain is king -dont fight against orc in plain terrain if you dont have to
8. USe all shit on your disposal -dogs, shrroms, nets
9. Dont ever take contracts against orcs if you dont have to -they are mostly not too profitable if you count armor repair, healing cost and replacement for new mercs
10. Just fucking PRAY, pray a lot because you will need it.

 

[RK47]

orc warriors[not the youngs], 10 warriors, 2 youngs

my 12 BB of level 6 with mediocre 120-130 armor

I wouldn't even bother engaging. That's just suicidal.

 

[tilting_msh]

Fuck me this game is good. Bought the supporter upgrade last night because the devs are awesome, and I will buy everything else they make.

Also, I noticed the Codex got a thank you in the game credits

 

[tindrli]

how many times i wished just one fireball.. just one god damn fireball maybe even flask with oil and fire with 70%+ chance to selfburn.

 

[Trash]

Yeah, some AOE attacks would be fun. Although I'm not so sure I'd enjoy goblins chucking molotovs into my shieldwall.

 

[tindrli]

i can only imagine..

 

[Stavrophore]

orc warriors[not the youngs], 10 warriors, 2 youngs

my 12 BB of level 6 with mediocre 120-130 armor

I wouldn't even bother engaging. That's just suicidal.

Yeah i've learned it the hard way. So could you tell me what level, composition of my army and tactics to employ? In what day of campaign do you take on orcs?

 

[Jimmious]

You can't take on more than 2-3 warriors unless you have armors on the 200+ range. At least that's my experience.
Unless you have crazy weaponry and melee skills and so on and can deal an insane amount of damage fastly

 

[RK47]

orc warriors[not the youngs], 10 warriors, 2 youngs

my 12 BB of level 6 with mediocre 120-130 armor

I wouldn't even bother engaging. That's just suicidal.

Yeah i've learned it the hard way. So could you tell me what level, composition of my army and tactics to employ? In what day of campaign do you take on orcs?

You take them on when it becomes sustainable to endure the losses for the payout.
That's my rule anyway. There's hardly anything worthwhile to salvage after killing orcs.
Undead has the same problem but at least they don't destroy your company's roster/gear with high dmg output and retreating against low initiative undead is not as hard.
It's not a guaranteed defeat against orcs, I could win against orcs with that kind of load-out sure, but I'm not willing to take casualties when the contract profit is just awful.

 

[tindrli]

i found out that keeping/repairing/ selling orc equipment is rewarding except maybe shields

 

[Prime Junta]

Yeah, some AOE attacks would be fun. Although I'm not so sure I'd enjoy goblins chucking molotovs into my shieldwall.

I really like the way it plays now. I think grenades or magic might break the spell that makes combat so engaging. Too strong and it becomes "find high ground and lob your grenades." Too weak and they won't be worthwhile. Too expensive and you'll be facing enemies who use them while hoarding yours. And ultimately I don't see how they'd make things more fun.

 

[thesheeep]

Also, war dogs. Does anyone know if it's possible to upgrade their armour? I just picked one up off the road and he doesn't have any, but of course he's the company mascot so I have to be doubly careful.

Dog armor DLC!

 

[Jimmious]

Butchers can actually make provisions from

 

[Reinhardt]

First part of korean dlc?

 

[Ignatius Reilly]

I'm addicted to this game even though it hurts me. Nerd rage uninstalled, then reinstalled this morning.

how many times i wished just one fireball.. just one god damn fireball maybe even flask with oil and fire with 70%+ chance to selfburn.

Having just finished ToEE, I get this feeling often.

Any sort of AoE would be terrible for the game, but would enjoy as a bonus after finishing game under certain conditions or something. Recruit a Wizard. Can cast FB/MM/CloudKill. Can only wear cloth armor. 20 HP max. Good luck.