Kenshi - open-ended sandbox RPG set in a desert world

[Zanzoken]

Did you got them bounties or what? The only place I know that pays for bounties is far away in the united cities, but I didn't collect any. I think I'm the only know who didn't got into a bar fight.

Unfortunately no, the police at Squin wouldn't give me the bounty for them. (no dialogue option or anything) I'm guessing it's because the men I captured were wanted in the Hub, and the Squin authorities didn't care, but IDK.

If you click on the NPC and mouse over their bounty icon it will show you which factions are willing to pay the bounty. Some criminals are only wanted by one, others by multiple.

 

[Zanzoken]

This game is hard to love.

Spoiler

This was a gang....

... and this was the result.

After I've sold their equipment I bought this.

You must be leaving out a few details since the gear from those Hungry Bandits would only be worth about a thousand cats, and a damaged Bughouse + the materials to repair it would cost several times that.

Also your guys may be taking credit for the victory but they would have no chance on day 4 against a dozen enemies, no matter how weak. The Hub guards would've had to pick up the slack.

 

[MadMaxHellfire]

damn, this is truly a hard game to love. terrible interface and controls paired with unforgiving and obscure gameplay is not something which puts me in good mood. ugly, painful graphics don't help either.
it's clear there's a gem hidden somewhere, buried under this huge pile of shit. i don't know how long i'm willing to dig to look for it.

 

[toro]

This game is hard to love.

Spoiler

This was a gang....

... and this was the result.

After I've sold their equipment I bought this.

You must be leaving out a few details since the gear from those Hungry Bandits would only be worth about a thousand cats, and a damaged Bughouse + the materials to repair it would cost several times that.

Also your guys may be taking credit for the victory but they would have no chance on day 4 against a dozen enemies, no matter how weak. The Hub guards would've had to pick up the slack.

On Day 4 they were killed by Hub guards. There is no way my 2 retards could take them down.

Note: I was joking. I did not take the credit for killing them

But thanks to them I managed to get 10k caps and buy that house. Look at the money in the second picture.

Note: Many of the bandits had complete sets of heavy armor + swords/sticks. They were worth like 600+ caps per bandit.

On Day 10 I only needed one more building material to finish it.

 

[toro]

damn, this is truly a hard game to love. terrible interface and controls paired with unforgiving and obscure gameplay is not something which puts me in good mood. ugly, painful graphics don't help either.
it's clear there's a gem hidden somewhere, buried under this huge pile of shit. i don't know how long i'm willing to dig to look for it.

Exactly my thoughts. The game is a mishmash of broken mechanics.

Building outside of the city is triggering wave after wave of enemies. The implementation is so bad it's hilarious.

By day 10 I already owned like 3 building within the Hub and at some point I've built an Iron forge !? (for Iron Plates) outside of the Hub.

Now, suddenly that Iron forge has become my Outpost and it's marked with an X on the map.

3 days after that I got a visit from the Holy Nation (priest + paladins). They threatened my Iron Forge and then they left.

3 days later I get another visit - from some bandits (full party - 12 people). They threatened my Iron Forge and then they left.

In both cases my characters were sleeping in the Hub

Now, I know that I'm asking too much but the AI should check if there are any people in your outpost or not.

 

[ShaggyMoose]

I had very low expectations and the game managed to blow my mind. I'm simply amazed how much fun this completely shit-looking game turned out to be.

Really makes a change from how awesome, fun looking games often turn out to be completely shit.

 

[Grampy_Bone]

Scaling raids ala Rimworld would make more sense. I had raids within one hour of plonking down a single shack. 25 guys showed up and had their way with my 4 helpless noobs.

They make it so you can't build a proper resource chain in town because certain buildings are exterior only, but then make building outside ultra dangerous. Yet once you get over the hump of defeating the raids, the game has nothing more to throw at you. Such a shame. I know the developer is all autistic about "herp derp no scaling" but come on.

 

[Zanzoken]

In my view basebuilding is not really intended to be for early game, but you can always import a save and turn down the size and frequency of raids.

I haven't built a base since 1.0 launched so maybe the raiding has gotten a bit out of hand.

 

[Zanzoken]

In case anyone gives a damn, an update on my escaped slave playthrough. Previous posts in spoilers:

Spoiler

I started a new game today with the "Slave" beginning and played for a few hours. It's a decent challenge to try to escape Rebirth. I waited until both of my characters were mining outside the wall and then made a break for it. It looked for a second like they were both going to escape, but then my guy took heavy damage to his leg. I turned him around to stall for time so my girl could get away.

I knew Flotsam Village was somewhere nearby, but since I wasn't sure of the exact location I decided to head for World's End. My girl had managed to steal two bottles of grog before the escape attempt, which I planned to exchange for food, clothes, and a haircut. Things were looking good until she ran across a gang of Holy Nation Outlaws and was beaten down. I was terrified they were going to steal the grog, but luckily they left it alone. Battered and nearly starved to death, she finally made it, and the immediate danger was over.

Now she is back to good health, is no longer wanted as an escaped slave, and has stolen and fenced about $10k worth of goods. Next step is to formulate a plan to help my dude escape, and then begin the long journey toward burning the Holy Nation to the ground.

Spoiler

I spend about 3 weeks in-game training for the rescue mission. First off, my girl (named Grey) mined an inventory full of iron and marched up and down the streets of Sho-Battai with a bonedog carcass on her back. I figure dude (given the incredibly original name Kenshi) will be too starved to run and therefore she needs to be prepared to carry him out.

Now that Grey is a stronk independent womyn, it was time to train stealth, lockpicking, and assassination. I spend night after night running roughshod over Sho-Battai and Heft, cleaning out noble houses and merchants for loot and playing knockout game with the empire peasants unlucky enough to cross my path. The Shinobi are ideal partners in crime by providing early stage training, taking all stolen items off my hands, and setting me up with ninja gear giving 33% bonuses to assassination and stealth. Even with the guild's 50% cut I pulled down about $30k during this time.

Keep in mind that while the UCs may be a great big pussy waiting to be fucked, sometimes they fuck back. One of the gate guards tries to shake Grey down with a hashish possession charge, so I picked up a $2k bounty and had to skip town for several days. I decide to head toward Rebirth and try my luck on the rescue, but first I take a short detour through the Bast region and snag a couple of disguises off remnants of the neverending HN/UC warzone.

I make it to Rebirth just before dark and put on the HN clothes, which the game estimates give Grey a 60% chance of pulling off a disguise. Kenshi is tied to a pole near the center of the prison, but has already unlocked his shackles and is ready to make a break for it. I'm hoping I can just stroll through the front gate, give him the HN disguise, and (with luck) stroll right back out without causing a fuss.

Unfortunately Grey gets made almost immediately and has to initiate plan B, which is run like hell. The guards manage to wound her going in but it's to the chest and not bad. She scoops Kenshi up and, remembering that there were turrets on the way we came in, I send her toward a different exit and she is able to outrun the guards. We head back to Heft but I'm not sure how to get in, given that my party is one criminal and one escaped slave. But luckily we aggro a group of Outlaw Farmers near the gate, who draw the ire of the samurai guards and give us a chance to sneak into the Shinobi tower unnoticed.

Needless to say, the last couple of play sessions have been a blast. This is my first time developing a stealth-focused character and it makes the game is drastically different. If anyone is just starting out and not sure what to do -- or on the fence about the game because it doesn't have traditional quests or other RPG elements -- hopefully stuff like this shows you what is possible. The stories come out through the gameplay and your creative ability to respond to the dangers and unpredictability of this fantasy world.

Now that both my slaves had escaped Rebirth, regained their health, and were clear of being recognized, it was time to figure out our next move. Since Grey is the much stronger of the two, I started training Kenshi to get him up to speed, but with stealth-focused gameplay having a teammate felt like more of a hindrance than an asset. I also didn't feel too invested in Kenshi as a character since he'd been locked up for the whole game so far, so I gave him some clothes and a sword and sent him on his way. Characters you release from your party stay in the world as NPCs, so maybe I will cross paths with him again one day.

I robbed a few more merchants with Grey, and in the Ranger shop I happened across a badass Specialist grade Oldworld MKII crossbow. Perfect, since I have never trained a crossbow character so why not give it a try. And also, being able to fight from a distance makes tactical sense for a solo character. There wasn't a ton of action around the UCs, but I knew one place where there would be no shortage of targets -- one of my favorite regions on the map -- the Foglands.

Despite its reputation, Mongol is a great town for early- to mid-game adventurers. I volunteer to help defend the city from the relentless Fogmen attacks, and Grey's archery improves fast. And man oh man, this crossbow is carnage. I have dropped tons of Fogmen in their tracks with a single hit, and blown off many arms and legs. The creepy fucks deserve every bit of it.

One thing I've realized though is that playing solo comes with a lot of risk. In addition to ranged I have also been doing some melee training, but one time I messed up and let her get KO'd. The bastard Fogmen started to carry her off but luckily a few of the Mongrel guards were nearby and saved the day. If not for that bit of good fortune she would have certainly been fucked, so the lesson is, it is vitally important to know when to flee a situation because if you go down, there's no one coming to save you.

I took a couple of screens for the hell of it. This is about 20 hours of gameplay:

Spoiler

Spoiler

I think at this point she probably has the skills to begin exploring ruins in search of Ancient Science Books, Engineering Research, and other rare items. It will be helpful to already have those stockpiled for when I start doing research later on.

 

[Lyre Mors]

In case anyone gives a damn

Always enjoy reading these stories in this thread.

 

[Emmanuel2]

Solo is really, really fun. The thought of outmaneuvering or just head on 1v20-ing legions of enemies, robots, and the freakish aliens give a ton of satisfaction.

I have a near capped out Martial Artist and the journey from being a worthless fuck towards becoming basically Ken from Fist of the North Star but with robot arms (round house kicking entire swarms, single punching heads and limbs off) was great.

Too bad you can't solo melee a Leviathan though. Found that out the hard way.

 

[Beastro]

Gave in bought the game rather than wait on a sale.

Think I'll give a slave start a try, then turn things around to align with the Holy dudes in the end.

 

[toro]

I think I'm losing my mind. I never played a game which makes me want to puke so much and still ... I'm playing.

I lost like 2 weeks of progress fucking around with useless buildings like farming and shit. But the truth was obvious: the HUB is surrounded by a desert therefore I decided to focus on mining and smiting.

This is my operation:

Spoiler

Hobbs is mining Iron day and night.

Then he puts the Iron Ore near the Iron Forge (in that storage box).

And the resulting Iron Plates go to the master smith Liff

I can sell a Sabre sword for 1108 caps but that still too low for my war needs!!!

I think soon I have to prepare my guys for fighting cause all of them suck balls.

Also the The Wall is a resource drain. 1.25x Hunger. I think I will kill him soon.

One criticism: Food is way too expensive. And you can buy a house for like 4 bowls of Rice.

 

[Deleted Member 22431]

Kenshi has some gym cosmetic mechanics

The increase in certain skill and stats (e.g., STR) improves the bulk of your character, while others (e.g., DEX) increases the definition. When you gain in bulk, you lose in definition, and vice versa.

 

[Deleted Member 22431]

One criticism: Food is way too expensive. And you can buy a house for like 4 bowls of Rice.

The cheapest route is to attack animals that are moving alone or in pack, and then run to the gate to let the guards kill them for you. You will collect a ton of raw meat, which you can cook using a campfire that costs nothing. This will provide you with abundant source of dry meat. No need to buy food.

 

[Deleted Member 22431]

I lost like 2 weeks of progress fucking around with useless buildings like farming and shit. But the truth was obvious: the HUB is surrounded by a desert therefore I decided to focus on mining and smiting.

That's why you need to use prospecting to determine the resources in the region. You should also consider trying to do this in other places that are less inhospitable such as Okran's pride. The downside is that you need to subject yourself to Holy Nation and they are a pain the ass.

"Okran's Pride is a fertile valley controlled by the Holy Nation. Okran's Pride surrounds the same river which flows through Wend to the north and through the Border Zone to the south".

There are also some nice cliffs around World's End that are not controled by the Holy Nation, but they are remote.

 

[Deleted Member 22431]

Noice tits!

 

[toro]

One criticism: Food is way too expensive. And you can buy a house for like 4 bowls of Rice.

The cheapest route is to attack animals that are moving alone or in pack, and then run to the gate to let the guards kill them for you. You will collect a ton of raw meat, which you can cook using a campfire that costs nothing. This will provide you with abundant source of dry meat. No need to buy food.

I know but there are no animals around Hub.

 

[Deleted Member 22431]

I know but there are no animals around Hub.

They appear from time to time, you need to pay attention. They are more frequent near Squin though.

 

[hivemind]

looks like complete garbage

why does this even have a codex thread

 

[rusty_shackleford]

looks like complete garbage

why does this even have a codex thread

because it's for people with autism

 

[PrettyDeadman]

What's the most dangerous place to put a base?
Stealing gives you pretty much infinite money, with that and a bunch of skeletons I would soon fully complete tech tree.
Want to have some fun with high end turrets...

 

[PrettyDeadman]

The game is quite fun to play for munchkism but I have to say it severely lacks content.
All cities and factions look the same and behave the same with some very minor diffirences.
Most combat encounters are either a group of wandering enemies or a group of enemies in some very small building (they feel like they were designed by a brainlet).
No dungeons. No quests. World simulation / reactivity isn't that great either...
Still, a great skeleton of a game and very enjoyable experience. I have 99 hours already and probably will have more...

 

[jungl]

Game is goofy Started a fight with nomads near this kral base their ai with wonky and started attacking the kral after kicking my groups ass. They ended up getting their asses kicked but then traveling traders got into the brawl kicked the injured krals ass then I cheesed the whole thing and looted the downed kral and their yellow gear. Turned in their leader for 30k. Its funny cause their is no way my group could take them out at their current strength 5 members.

Its fun trying to find all the yellow gear and playing the game in small doses and focus on exploring. Keep your crew small maybe add someone new if you find unique recruit and legendary gear for him to wear. Otherwise buy a bull and one large bag to carry all ur stuff.

 

[Beastro]

Wtf do you do to start toiling as a slave? I've been locked up for 5 days now.

Edit: I'm also starting with 6 guys. I thought slave start began with only 2?