Battle Brothers - The Retinue, Part 2

Battle Brothers has another dev blog about The Retinue.

Dev Blog #128: The Retinue, Part II

Last week we introduced a new gameplay mechanic with a retinue of non-combat followers coming with the 'Blazing Deserts' DLC. This week we're taking a closer look at a selection of three more of these non-combat followers in order to give you a better idea on how all this is going to work.

There's a total of five slots available for you to fill, but several times as many followers available to choose from. Choosing the right set of followers for your company is another way to customize it to your playstyle and to make each company and playthrough feel more unique. Do keep in mind that everything you're about to learn is still under development and therefore subject to change depending on how testing goes. This is doubly true for numbers, which is why we're not showing any of them this week. Onwards, then!

The Surgeon

A studied man from the south, the Surgeon is a walking tome of anatomical knowledge. A mercenary company seems the perfect place both to apply that knowledge in healing, but also to learn more about how the insides of men are made up.



With the Surgeon in your retinue, characters that fall in battle have a significantly improved chance to survive with a permanent injury instead of dying outright. A permanent injury can still end a career, of course, but it can just as well end up being but a reminder of a particularly hard-fought battle. The important point is that now it's up to you and no one else to decide whether to let go of a character or keep them on the roster - which can be particularly helpful in the late game and with experienced and key characters. In addition, the Surgeon also looks after injuries of the non-permanent kind, and helps your men to recover from them faster, which reduces downtime.

The Scavenger

Whether the son of one of your men or an urchin you took pity on, the Scavenger pulls his weight by collecting bits and pieces from every battlefield.



With the Scavenger around, each armor destroyed will grant you a certain amount of tools and supplies after battle, the exact amount depending on what kind of armor it was. This makes the Scavenger a useful choice for heavily armored compositions that need a lot of tools and supplies for upkeep, but also for companies that destroy most enemy armors with hammers and so can't loot those, but in this way still receive some loot anyway, and when fighting lots of Greenskins. The Scavenger also returns a part of all ammunition you spend during a battle, making ranged-heavy companies more self-sufficient, and the use of throwing weapons less expensive.

The Cartographer

The Cartographer is a man of culture and knowledge, but he also realizes that traveling in the company of well-armed mercenaries is one of the best ways to safely see the world and explore places that few visited before.



Available once you've found at least one legendary location, the Cartographer will pay you for each location that you discover out in the world on your own. The further away from civilization a location is, the more he'll arrange for you to be paid. And legendary locations pay extra. The Cartographer is one example of several followers that further support specialized playstyles - if you're more interested in heading out on your own terms, explore the world and raid locations rather than doing contracts, he'll make this a more profitable venture. In a similar vein, there are other followers available that support playstyles like banditry, trade and hunting enemy champions for bounties and loot!

More information.

This would announce a large rebalancing.

Surgeon: BB started with a time pressure, a progression curve etc All this was removed as players do not like it. Reducing downtime is no longer a necessity and already addressed by herboristry.
Permanent injuries are already listed by streamers, some bearable, most unbearable. Having more of them will not change the list.

Scavenger:weirder. Could have make sense in the original settings when tool workshops could be terminated. Builds are heavy armoured based, there is no to few light armoured builds. Armours usually is destroyed in the process of killing an enemy, it takes work to avoid it. Hammers change nothing in that: it means that hammering could deliver more tools.

Cartographers: streamers already go relic hunting, missions are located to the place, at the moment, that is piece of equipment plus mission money. Cartographers will only add.

So a huge rebalancing on the horizon to give thickness to the new features.
Or mod quality level with cool features that were added because cool.

Will take a few months off BB and wait for this DLC. Then it's time for another bloody campaign. Thinking of the peasant militia next time and crush every snooty nobleman I see.

Peasant militia is the best!

I had a blast with the peasant troop but it was tough keeping every one happy with a full troop the reserves got bitchy if you didn't use them enough. On open maps you could surround the enemy and pound them to scrap, but tight maps like the Forrest were a pain.

Originally Posted by Terry
On open maps you could surround the enemy and pound them to scrap, but tight maps like the Forrest were a pain.

A streamer going by the name of Matt_Gambler is used to playing peasant militia origin stuff. Watching his streams could help allievating the struggle.

Originally Posted by Terry
I had a blast with the peasant troop but it was tough keeping every one happy with a full troop the reserves got bitchy if you didn't use them enough. On open maps you could surround the enemy and pound them to scrap, but tight maps like the Forrest were a pain.

That's interesting. When I saw the drill sergeant retinue member I thought he was pretty boring, but it sounds like he'd be really good with the peasant militia.

I like the cartographer, he's definitely more interesting then the other people we've seen and could actually change the way you play.

This game was good, until Mighty Magnificent Fantabulous Urtuk: The Desolation came and conquered the scene. Urtuk's combatants have legs and are many types in a very well designed world, where frequently some global calamity affects everybody. Urtuk has maybe less magic as BB contained, when the latter first was released on Steam. Blackguards, Fallout and XCOM are the only comparable ones, to the "Battle Brothers"-Beater Amazing Urtuk: The Desolation, which is - even in its current very unfinished and to be well expanded state - way more addictive than BB ever was.

Do you know when Urtuk leaves early access? I will definitely give it a shot.

I never predicted all this additional content would come out for this game back when I first played it, I'm really looking forward to my re-play at some time!

Originally Posted by mercy
This game was good, until Mighty Magnificent Fantabulous Urtuk: The Desolation came and conquered the scene. Urtuk's combatants have legs and are many types in a very well designed world, where frequently some global calamity affects everybody. Urtuk has maybe less magic as BB contained, when the latter first was released on Steam. Blackguards, Fallout and XCOM are the only comparable ones, to the "Battle Brothers"-Beater Amazing Urtuk: The Desolation, which is - even in its current very unfinished and to be well expanded state - way more addictive than BB ever was.

No love for the very legfull Glorious Companions?

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1…us_Companions/

Urtuk was pretty interesting and creative. I really didn't like the full on Oblivion style level scaling though . I'll probably check back later to see if they fix it.

A Scout option for the Retinue could be useful: increase movement across difficult terrain and reduce odds of an encounter.

Originally Posted by mercy
This game was good, until Mighty Magnificent Fantabulous Urtuk: The Desolation came and conquered the scene. Urtuk's combatants have legs and are many types in a very well designed world, where frequently some global calamity affects everybody. Urtuk has maybe less magic as BB contained, when the latter first was released on Steam. Blackguards, Fallout and XCOM are the only comparable ones, to the "Battle Brothers"-Beater Amazing Urtuk: The Desolation, which is - even in its current very unfinished and to be well expanded state - way more addictive than BB ever was.

Originally Posted by fadedc
Urtuk was pretty interesting and creative. I really didn't like the full on Oblivion style level scaling though . I'll probably check back later to see if they fix it.

*sigh* First I get riled up by Mercys post since I've found that when he posts positive things you better listen. Then I saw Fades post which totally destroyed my anticipation.

I already had Urtuk wishlisted, but level scaling seems like a really, really bad idea to me in a game like this. I'm much more inclined to accept it in an action RPG.

Originally Posted by Capt. Huggy Face
I already had Urtuk wishlisted, but level scaling seems like a really, really bad idea to me in a game like this. I'm much more inclined to accept it in an action RPG.

I'm not inclined to accept it at all. Time scaling is a different thing and perfectly fine in these kind of games, meaning you can fall behind or get ahead of the curve depending on how you play.

Level scaling is the devil. I love in BB how it took me 100's of hours to finally beat the Black Monolith. Also, it's really fun to crush bandits with your high lvl merc company.

There's a little lvl scaling in BB but it's just the world gets more dangerous as time goes on, which I enjoy.

Originally Posted by Hastar
Level scaling is the devil. I love in BB how it took me 100's of hours to finally beat the Black Monolith. Also, it's really fun to crush bandits with your high lvl merc company.

There's a little lvl scaling in BB but it's just the world gets more dangerous as time goes on, which I enjoy.

Exactly, this also makes time a resource which I like. Games like the original Xcoms does it the same way.

Originally Posted by mercy
This game was good, until Mighty Magnificent Fantabulous Urtuk: The Desolation came and conquered the scene.

Matt Gambler streams it too.

Originally Posted by Hastar
There's a little lvl scaling in BB but it's just the world gets more dangerous as time goes on, which I enjoy.

It gets so much more dangerous that the probability of losing the company is the highest at the start of a run.