Battle Brothers: The Western Wildlands

Part of the Fate of Heroes series - spoilers ahead!

Hearing about their planned expedition to the wildlands, the hedge knight Redbeard Reborn joins the Spears just before they head out. Their first stop isn't even on the border though, it is at the newly built tomb of Sir Magnus, which was already crawling with zombies and geists!

The living will never outnumber the dead.

The banshees terrify Kruglov and Emile who abandon their position like cowards, leaving Bes to be surrounded and torn apart by the zombie hoard before the others can clear them out. Despite the loss, the company continues Westward and find themselves in green skin lands - careful to avoid combat this far out.

On their travels they find a great goblin city, a massive orc war camp, and beyond... a black monolith which Sid, Sahkarov and a few others claim to be the "Wish Granter". Curiosity gets the better of them and they approach, only to find it defended by an army of ancient skeletons led by vampires!

There are simply too many so the Spears retreat despite Majorn's blood lust to destroy them. "Another time," assures Big Mike as the disheartened company makes their way back to civilized lands - their objective of finding 8 new locations complete. With low morale, a question about the Sun from Emile leads Sahkarov and new cultist R4W3C into a brawl based on beliefs. Big Mike is too tired to stop them.

Battle Brothers: Good Times

Part of the Fate of Heroes series - spoilers ahead!

Despite the mounting injuries, the Spears take on a contract to eliminate a small orc encampment. On the way Majorn finds a necromatic site he declares they must cleanse, so the Spears take on the usual zombies and necromancer, but this time with two fallen heroes flanking the mage.

They are quite sturdy which is bad given the lesser zombies keep standing up, but Raven manages to axe the shield off one which enables the Spears to pincushion it to death. The other is peppered with arrows until Bes singlehandedly defeats it  - much to Sunbro's amazement.

Useful when you actually have people that can shoot.

At the orc camp the team encounters berserkers leading the regular orcs. These scary creatures don't wear armor though, making them prime archery practice. Fanatic was foolish enough to let one get close and knock him on the head, leaving him with permanent brain damage (ironically one of the best permanent injuries to have in this game).

Apprehending some thieves afterwards, Big Mike is happy to report to the company they now have over 50,000 coins in funding. Gander further cheers everyone up with a cow tipping session (lol) and as icing on the cake, Sunbro reports the nobles are discussing terms. The war is over!

When he asks with true concern if the Fabled Spears of the Church are now going to disband, he is met with laughter and cheer. "Not bloody likely!"

Battle Brothers: For Glory!

Part of the Fate of Heroes series - spoilers ahead!

With the Spears of the Church eager to spill more House Grimmund blood, Big Mike could only distract them momentarily with a contract to fetch the Elderstone (again) from a skeleton infested manor. The company made good use of the rotation skill to destroy their tireless and fearless enemy, with Bes being the stand out combatant.

Finally they are offered a contract from House Ruhmolt to assist in a besieging Gerwold - a House Grimmund city, which Faltran practically jumps at to get revenge for Bloodfire. The Spears meet up with Sir Albrecht Kettilmund's forces just as a Grimmund relief force attacks in attempt to lift the siege. They do not break the lines and are killed to the last man.

Look at all the free loot!

Seeing this, the remaining defenders of the city led by Sir Magnus "the Black" attack and are surprised when all of the spears use ranged weapons while Sir Albrecht and his remaining troops take the brunt of the attack. Most of the Ruhmolt soldiers are killed, but with the spears still all fresh and his troops dropping in equal measure Sir Magnus eventually surrenders.

Victorious, Gaius raises the Ruhmolt banner over the town, before departing back down the mountain and out of enemy territory. Sir Albrecht remains and publicly executes Sir Magnus a few days after the Spears depart.

Battle Brothers: Davkul is Coming

Part of the Fate of Heroes series - spoilers ahead!

Finding another necromantic ruin in the swamp, Majorn is pleased when he and the Spears wipe out the zombies and their necromaster while suffering only minor wounds against a force twice their number. While camped, Fanatic converts Kamots to the cult of Davkul which leads to blows against Sahkarov who still had hope for the poor fisherman. Not anymore.

I'll beat the heresy out of you!

By happenstance the company also runs into a blood sacrifice to Davkul on the way back to town. The man, another cultist named Mole, is bleeding and speared to the ground but not yet gone. Gander removes the spears while Fanatic urges him to join the Spears so he does.

To combat the growing number of cultists in the ranks, Big Mike recruits Raven Fatbastard - a merchant business acquaintance of Sid as well as Emile the thief and Bes, a retired soldier. Together they defeat more bandits and wolf packs. On their journeys Faltran notices House Grimmund forces taking Wiesendorf village from House Folsach. Mike reminds all of them to march on and to not get involved.

Luckily they run into a troupe of traveling performers whom Sir Julien convinces to perform for free. This greatly raises in the morale of the troops.

Night of the Full Moon

My journal through Stalker Soup - a mega mod for Shadows of Chernobyl! You can follow the rest of the story here!

My second task at Agroprom was to locate Ghost's diary for Kruglov. The idiot placed it on a highly irradiated hill guarded by pseudodogs. After sniping said dogs it took me a few goes using anti-rad to locate the thing only to then suddenly take fire from a nearby hill. Since it was night time and a storm had begun pouring rain from above I had no hope in fighting back from that open location so instead I opted to make a wide run back to the facility where the friendly stalkers were camped, losing my pursuers in the process. There was no point in going back out there with poor visibility so I decided to nap only to be woken up by another blowout at midnight. Once it passed, so had the storm and the full moon lit up the surroundings enough for me to travel. Returned to Garbage after killing a pair of would-be robbers and traded in some dog parts for equipment and cash from the fat trader. From there I decided to cross over to the Dark Valley to try wrap up more quests and was pleased to find a Duty Squad guarding the Western woods of the area. I proceeded North where Fox had joined Bes and Mole's camp, and handed in Strelok's armor to Bes as I promised earlier.

Decided to try retrieve a laptop from the lab here too so I circled around the bandit buildings, killing their lone sentry as well as a wandering burer then remembered to detour into an abandoned house where the injured guy I left here from last time was still bleeding out. Must have a lot of blood? Anyway gave him a medkit and he accompanied me to the lab entrance where I eliminated a random mutant camp (rats, snorks and bloodsucker) before continuing downstairs to face the pair of poltergeists that survived my previous venture here. Finally cleared the place but they managed to smash my armor. With the laptop in hand I made my way back to the surface only to find a new military APC had parked itself right outside the gate! I used up what little grenades I had left but the damn thing was still alive. There was no way I could outrun it's autocannon and no cover to run to from there so I made my way upstairs to the roof and did some parkour to the next building. It was a long drop from the roof, but was the only way I could see to get out of the perimiter without passing the APC. Needless to say, it hurt. - but I lived!

Did a huge circle around the area again, passing Bes' camp and the Duty team to avoid the APC and reach the bunkers in the bottom part of the region. There I was meant to hunt down a stalker called "Vampire" which turned out to be pretty easy as he was just chillaxing by the fire. Punched his lights out to complete the quest then took the South path to return to Cordon.

I like to think this is what he looked like.

Descent into the Dark Valley

My journal through Stalker Soup - a mega mod for Shadows of Chernobyl! You can follow the rest of the story here!

I noticed on the map a new way to reach my destination - something called the Forgotten Forest. I only got to its outer zone when I was beset by packs of dogs, a pair of snorks, blood suckers and zombies that get up after you "kill" them. Did a good job pushing me outta there and rethinking my route. With exo armor at less than 50% I hoofed it back to the Duty outpost and used the Northern path instead which, while being more radiated, was a whole lot easier to traverse.

Upon entering the Dark Valley I met up with "Bullet" who had just taken down a small group of bandits (I had to put one out of his misery though), and he asked me to help him free his fellow guild members from the bandit controlled buildings in the northern section. Turns out their leader holds a key I need to get into my main target = laboratory x18. After helping Bullet save one guy being transported it was up to me to infiltrate the base and rescue "Shaggy" and his team.

Of course I was attacked by a bunch of bloodsuckers en route but the first part of their compound was surprisingly lightly guarded by only 1 dude. I imagine the bloodsuckers did take a few of them out though since I found their bodies. The next few sets of bandits were asleep so I took the liberty of point blank shotgunning them to the face, Just as they deserved. This of course alerted the numerous remaining scum but they were no match for me. Alas I found Shaggy in the dungeon - dead. He was either executed or it was suicide, regardless I got the key from the bandit boss and made sure all hostiles were dead before leaving the compound.

I was surprised to find Mole and Bes camped outside, and completed a few tasks for them while I was there which earned me a nice Tommy-gun from Mole which would come in very handy in the next place I was going to visit. The laboratory had a few more bandits lurking outside (one with an RPG - yikes), but the true horrors were within the heavy sealed door.

 

Burers are a lot more dangerous now, but still just as ugly.

The entry was crawling with izolms along with a few snorks. Also killed me a few burers and a number of very annoying poltergeists further in while trying to find codes to open two locked doors, behind one of which was another pseudogiant. I eventually find the files I was after, but that nice tommy gun was totally dry of ammo and my exo-skeleton armor was pretty much falling to pieces.

Another Mans Treasure

My journal through Stalker Soup - a mega mod for Shadows of Chernobyl! You can follow the rest of the story here!

After camping out to recover and continued up the road north when the sun was up which was a good call since I ran into a pack of around 20 doggies. Shot what I could as I sprinted back to Stargazer's team who helped me clean up the rest. Pushed on to the checkpoint guarded by two bandits who were easily dispatched. FINALLY I get a 2 shot short-rifle from them. Also found an amusing TV inside, displaying a clip from Silent Hill. Once it started to loop, I made my way to the next area: Garbage.

The first thing I ran into was a group of three thugs robbing another Stalker so after sneaking to a good spot I took them out before they knew what hit them. The dude I rescued was thankful but also in a hurry since another blowout was on the way. Not knowing where the nearest shelter was I decided to backtrack instead and hide out at the checkpoint which protected me pretty well. Back at Garbage I came across a vehicle graveyard occupied by a squad of stalkers led by Bes - he asked if I could help them kill some inbound bandit reinforcements and I agreed instantly. Soon enough the fire fight began, the enemy outnumbering Bes' well-armed squad. I let them take point while I waited from an opportune position and that's when I heard something lurking in the tall grass nearby. Spinning around I saw the beast do an incredible leap towards me but I dodged just in time and clambered up on a nearby rotting APC.

It was a Chimera!

These things didn't come out till the 3RD game! WTF - Awesome! I took on the beast on my own to cover Bes' flank and managed to take it down pretty quickly with the sawn-off rifle. Advanced into a broken down bus and took down the remaining bandits from there with pistol head shots. At the end, only Bes was left alive and after thanking me he headed off leaving me to pick up the (plenty of) loot from the fallen. Now well equipped I headed to the North part of the Garbage where I was tasked to hunt down a particular bandit. It was easy enough to kill him with my plated combat gloves, having snuck up on him while he slept in the middle of the field.

Not so easy was evading the Merc squad that suddenly showed up right after, apparently they were also after his PDA. Bolted to the nearby silos and used them as cover to take down the 5 man team after me - including their leader who like Bes, was in full power armor. Too bad I couldn't loot that. The next road checkpoint was nearby, controlled by the "Duty" faction so I headed there to trade off some gear and recover. Interesting to note that non-merchants no longer trade ammo, it certainly makes the game more challenging. :)