Battle Brothers Perk Guide

Overview

The inspiration for writing this guide were the same continious questions about game mechanics on the forum: they got answered again and again, answers get buried and questions pop up again and it looks like infinite cycle. This was mostly perk guide, but with time I expanded build and game mechanics sections since raw perks are not interesting by themselves.

Stats preview

Stats in game

Health (essential) – how much HP your merc has. If it reaches 0 he dies. Especially important early game when you have little or no armor. Its importance decreases over course of the game once you start getting decent armor. Also affects probability of receiving wounds during combat.
DLC: Became decent stat for Nimble build mercs (See Nimble perk).

Important note: There is chance that merc will not die when deceased on battlefield, but instead survive with permanent injury. See combat log at top left corner in game to find out if you merc survived (you’ll see “Gunnar was struck down” if it happened). Struck down mercs cannot be raised as “zombies” by Necromancers. Survivor trait increases chances to be struck down up to 90%. Fatalities like head chopping always kill your mercs.

Important note: To receive an injury merc should suffer at least 10 HP damage and for most injuries it should exceed 25% of his total health. The more damage hit inflicts to HP, the more likely merc will suffer an injury and more likely a serious it would be.

Fatigue (very important) – spent on various actions in combat together with actions points. Each round 15 Fatigue is refilled. Usually drained really fast thus for most of your mercs you want Fatigue to be as high as possible. Also each attack hit or avoided by your merc spends some amount Fatigue (See Melee Defense).

Note: Trait Iron Lungs (+5 Fatigue recovery) gives +20 Fatigue recovery per turn total, trait Asthmatic (-5 Fatigue recovery) gives only +10 Fatigue recovery per turn total.

Resolve (essential) – represents morale in game. Used during various morale checks (merc getting surrounded, enemy killed, ally killed, rolls against morale attacks like Fear). If check fails, morale of merc drops by one level (see Morale), with each morale drop Resolve is usually decreased thus it has domino effect where chances to lose next morale check are increased with every failure. That’s why it is important to have sufficient amount of Resolve at least on your key mercs (somewhat around 50 Resolve).
DLC: New enemies like Alps and Hexes utilize resolve based attacks making high resolve important when fighting them. Companies with overall low resolve might have hard time against them.

Morale – represents current morale of your merc. Morale level changes are affected by various Resolve checks. Possible morale levels:

• Fleeing – merc is fleeing and cannot be controlled. Melee attack/defense, Ranged attack/defense, Resolve are decreased by 30%
• Breaking – Melee attack/defense, Ranged attack/defense, Resolve are decreased by 20%
• Wavering – Melee attack/defense, Ranged attack/defense, Resolve are decreased by 10%
• Steady – default morale level. Usually all your mercs start battle at this level unless influenced by other factors
• Confident – Melee attack/defense, Ranged attack/defense, are increased by 10%. Resolve is not increased! Mercs can start battle at this level if they are happy or have Confident perk.
• Unbreakable – unit is not affected by Morale. All undead has this morale level. Unreachable for living beings.

Initiative (situational) – how fast your merc is. The characters with higher current(!) Initiative act first in combat. Affected by Fatigue level at 1:1 ratio: for every 1 Fatigue point spent, Initiative decreased by 1 point. The same rule also applies to gear character have equipped: the heavier the gear, the less Initiative he has. Initiative level ups are only worth picking for specific type of builds: archers, duelists, sometimes for pikemen. For all others there are better ways to spent stats (unless you have some crazy sh*t in your mind)

Note: Trait Strong (+10 Fatigue) affects Initiative as well: first 10 Fatigue points “eaten” by your gear don’t drop your Initiative.

Melee attack (very important) – how good your merc fighting at melee. It is very important for melee oriented characters. Chances to hit are calculated by simple formula:

Important note: Polearm characters attacking from 2 tiles away get the same surrounding bonus as melee guys engaging the target: if target already engaged by 2 mercs at melee, then polearm user will get the same +5% surround bonus as each of melee guys (no extra 5% for being 3rd guy attacking the target).

Range attack (very important) – how good your merc with ranged weaponary. It is very important for range oriented characters. Chances to hit are calculated by simple formula:

Note: Ranged chance to hit deteriorates with range, but it is already included into Attack modifier since penalties are also included into attack tooltips.

Melee defense (very important) – how good your merc defending against melee attacks. Very important for melee oriented characters.

Important note: Every successful hit your merc suffer increases his Fatigue by 5 points. Every successful dodge/block increases Fatigue only by 2 points. Same rules apply to NPC characters. This mechanic actually makes Melee defense exceptionally good stat helping with Fatigue management in prolonged fights.

Note: Maces effectively inflict 15 Fatigue damage on hit (5 base + 10 from mace) as opposed to 5 Fatigue damage from other weapon hits.

Range defense (essential) – how good your merc at avoiding ranged attacks. Quite important for characters not using shields (archers, pikemen, duelists, to lesser extent for 2handers) since helps them staying alive under enemy fire, for shielded ones this stat is good to have but not necessary.

Action Points – spent on various actions in combat (move, attack, shieldwall and so on). Cannot be increased. Refilled each round of the combat. Action points not spent previous round are lost. Most of your enemies have the same amounts of action points as your mercs, i.e. 9 AP. Some, like “zombies” have only 6 AP and some, like direwolves have 12 AP.
DLC: New polearm mastery reduces polearm attack cost to 5 AP making polearm users much more mobile.

Level ups and stat distribution

With each level up player can increase 3 stats of his choice. Actual values are not fixed, but randomly chosen from stat value range.

Note: You cannot savescum to get better rolls on level ups! They are defined on character creation.

Default stat distribution on level ups:

• Health: 2-4
• Fatigue: 2-4
• Resolve: 2-4
• Initiative: 3-5
• Melee attack: 1-3
• Range attack: 2-4
• Melee defense: 1-3
• Range defense: 1-3

Stars (talents) – affects stats disribution on level ups

* – stat gets +1 to minimum roll, for example character with * at health gets 3-4 health on level up instead of 2-4
** – stat always gets maximum roll on level up, so character with ** at health always gets 4 health on level up
*** – on top of that ** already does, provides +1 to maximum roll, thus character with *** at health gets 4-5 health on level up

Every recruit is guaranteed to be talented into 3 stats. At the very minimum it would be 3 * talents. Never got full *** talented guys myself, though had some with 2 *** and 1 **.

You can use table below to estimate how much stats recruit will get by level 11 if you will be picking up that stat each level up.

Expected stat growth

Tier 1 perks

Fast Adaptation (situational) – pretty self-explanatory: adds stacking +8% chance to hit on each miss. On hit bonus is reset.

The key feature of this perk is that to make it work, you need to miss a lot, which is actually not a good thing by itself. Because of that this perk is for low/average skilled mercs only, high skilled mercs don’t benefit much from it. Below are results of simulations for that perk with 1 mln repeats:

Please note, that relative hit chance increase only helps estimate usefulness of perk in different situations and due to the nature of the game actual results will be more spread out from fight to fight.

• Especially helpful early game: against Brigand Raiders your early recruits often will have 40-50% hit chances, against Ancient Legions it could even drop to 20%
• I consider this perk worth picking if recruit has high end Melee skill 75 and below at level 11 (all recruits with base skill below 55 and no stars in it automatically fall under this category)
• Would recommend it only for 80 or below skilled archers
• Helps even late game against shieldwall spam used by Ancient Legions and Noble House Footmen
• Should never be picked for crossbowmen because with their low rate of fire benefit is laughable

Notable enemies having this perk: pretty much all mid-late game Human enemies.

Crippling Strikes (specialized) – with this perk threshold to inflict injury is 16.7% HP damage. It helps to cause more injuries to your enemies and overall increases probability of inflicting heavy injuries.

• Decent pick for early game since most enemies lack heavy armor thus with each attack you’ll inclict at least some HP damage having chance to inflict injury
• I actually find this perk not so useful for archers late game: warbows successfully penetrate armor of most of the enemies, it just feels like paper already without the perk
• Pairs well with Executioner (+20% damage against wounded)
• Unfortunately doesn’t work against undead, which is big minus since Ancient Legions considered one of the strongest enemies
• Not worth it for Warhammer users
• Synergizes well with Duelist perk – helps causing reliable and heavy injuries

Notable enemies having this perk: Pretty sure all Goblins have it.

Colossus (good) – increases HP by 25%, also reduces injury probability.

• Excessive HP is never a bad thing, especially if you already have high base HP (60+). Pretty good early pick when you don’t have access to high quality armor, less useful during late game, but still retains some value helping against piercing crossbow bolts
• Good pick for “tanks” and frontline guys
• I usually target 75-80 HP as result when picking this perk
• DLC: Good pick for Nimble builds

Nine Lives (specialized) – once per battle upon receiving a killing blow, survive instead with few HP left.

Good at preventing occasional death from random crossbow headshots. Good for specialized “tank” and “cannon fodder” builds to help them last longer.
DLC: Lost its value for archers with new Nimble perk. The only use I see is “cannon fodder” builds and may be sergeant (if he dies, it might be problematic to find decent replacement).

Notable enemies having this perk: Necrosavants, Bandit Leaders.

Bag and Belts (specialized) – adds 2 inventory slots.

Never pick this perk if you want more arrows for your archers. From my own experience even late game you’ll hardly ever use more than 1.5 quivers per fight thus existing inventory slots are just enough. Only worth picking if you want to carry various utility staff like nets or making builds specialized at throwing weapons since they only have 4 ammo per stack.
DLC: Got nerfed and no longer reduces weight of shields/two-handed weapons.

Pathfinder (good) – halves Fatigue cost for movement up to 2 Fatigue per tile, reduces AP cost by one for moving through rough terrain, merc no longer spends additional AP when traversing through different height tiles.

This perk is god savior when fighting in rough terrain. You will feel extremely crippled without it there. Despite it being pretty good for these situations it is not must have pick and is matter of choice. I do just good without it at most situations. I always pick it for archers though since they benefit from positioning more than others (helps with high ground and taking good shot positions) and light armor duelist builds for Fatigue conservation and mobility.

Notable enemies having this perk: Ancient Undead, Goblins, Orc Berserks, Nachzehrers, Direwolves, Webknechts.

Adrenaline (specialized) – for 25 Fatigue cost guarantees that merc will act first next round.

• Highly specialized perk. When picked on right mercs provides ability to inflict very high burst damage possibly “solving” the fight (some players build their companies around it), but it comes at the high Fatigue cost, so most of the time used only once per fight
• Valid builds for that perk: 2-handers and polearm users, also high attack values are much desirable: there is nothing more frustrating when activating Adrenaline and missing your hit
• Absolutely never pick it for shield users! They have better ways to spend their Fatigue
• I recommend pairing this perk with Recover otherwise Fatigue management could go out of control
• Helps with charges against turtling enemies. Wait -> Adrenaline -> move -> wreck havoc. Especially good against goblins.

Recover (average) – spend 9 AP to restore 50% of accumulated Fatigue.

This is late game perk despite being Tier1, so you could delay picking it until higher levels.

• Must have for 2-hander swordsmen because they use very Fatigue heavy attacks most of the time and after 2-3 rounds of intensive slashing they usually find themselves Fatigue capped, which cripples their offensive capabilities significantly. Better spend one turn to bring them back to full power instead of trying to “influence” battlefield with one single attack per round
• Good pick for shield tanks as well, since I usually find them exhausted due to amount of enemy attacks they block(2 Fatigue)/soak(5 Fatigue)
• Helps to recover during fighting in rough terrain and after extensive use of active skills (Rotation, Adrenaline, Shieldwall)
• Some players pick it for archers, however usually my archers run out of arrows before they are fatigued
• Helps when fighting hordes of undead zombies (even midgame) and large number of enemies in general
• You can use both Recover and Adrenaline on the same turn

Hint: If merc has Berserk perk picked he can kill enemy using 4AP attack and still be at 9AP to use Recover this round.

Notable enemies having this perk: pretty much all Human enemies.

Student (good) – spend perk to get 20% XP gain boost until level 11. At level 11 perk point is refunded.

• Pretty good pick if you want to powerlevel, don’t know which perk to choose or haven’t decided how you want your merc specced
• Pick at level 1 for the most benefit
• It pays off only around level 7 which would take a while. Thus pick it for your best recruits you want to keep and choose something more vital for others

Tier 2 perks

Executioner (specialized) – adds 20% damage against injured enemies.

• Usually requires Crippling Strike perk on number of mercs to work more or less reliably, therefore I would recommend it for specialized builds only
• Good pick for dedicated polearm users to increase their killing power and trigger Berserk more reliably
• Some players pick it for 2-handers in addition to Killing Frenzy. Having Crippling Strikes on archers helps apply injuries before clash happens on number of enemies. Then 2-handers can capitalize on injuries delivering devastating blows.

Bullseye (good) – reduces penalty for shooting into obscuring target from 75% to 50%.

If you want to snipe backline targets such as necromancers, pikemen or other archers, then this is your pick. Without it countersniping enemy archers would be troublesome. I pick it for all my archers. Nothing more to add.

Notable enemies having this perk: Pretty much all competent archers including notorious Brigand Marksmen.

Dodge (specialized) – adds 15% from merc current(!) Initiative to his Melee/Ranged defense.

• Good for light armored builds with high Initiative such as archers and duelists. Archers however benefit from Anticipation much more, but you can have both if you want
• Its benefit deteriorates over course of the fight since merc becomes fatigued -> his Initiative drops -> bonus from Dodge drops as well
• I also pick it up for lightly armored mercs with shields, high enough Initiative and low Stamina. I field them only during early game and usually replace by better recruits (or evolve into duelists)
• For me required Initiative threshold for this perk is 100 (after all gear and weapons). You may have lower standards

Fortified Mind (specialized) – provides 25% bonus to Resolve.

• Specialized pick for sergeant builds
• Recently found it to be decent on dedicated tanks to help against morale drop because of being surrounded by 3 or more enemies
• Sometimes worth picking on “trash” recruits if you don’t want to waste stat level ups on Resolve

Hold Out (???) – reduces duration of negative status effects (bleeds included) by 1 to a minimum of 1 turn.

DLC: This perk might be worth trying since it can help fight new enemies such as Hexes and Alps. Cannot say more now since extensive “testing” in the field is required. Might be worth it midgame on tank characters to help against Orc Warriors with cleavers, but this is highly situational.

Steel Brow (average) – hits to the head no longer critical. Also reduces probabality to receive head injuries.

• Good pick for low HP mercs (swordmasters/flaggelants) or lightly armored mercs (archers/duelists) to prevent oneshots from crossbows or pikes to the head. All times I picked this perk it was totally worth it. Saved a number of swordmasters during my playthroughs, which would die otherwise
• DLC: works well with Nimble builds reducing HP damage to the head, however became less mandatory because of Nimble changes.
• Also valid pick for full tank builds
• If merc have high enough HP(70+) and heavy armor, this perk is a waste unless you want this merc to survive no matter what

Notable enemies having this perk: Sword Masters, Sergeants.

Quick Hands (good) – once per round allows to move item to/from invertory for free.

• One of the best perks if you are looking for tactical flexibility. Allows swapping between different types of weapon depending on situation (spear/main weapon, melee/ranged, pike/2h, insert desirable combination), also allows replacing quivers for free (however I never pick it solely for that purpose)
• Almost always picked for archers, however all my latest playthroughs I never did it and it worked fine
• Considered must have for hybrid archers (archer/polearm users)
• Highly desirable if merc have Bag and Belts with number of utility items in his backpack (otherwise it is not possible to use them effectively)

Notable enemies having this perk: Goblins, Mercenaries, Bounty Hunters

Gifted (average) – spend perk point and gain 3 different stat level ups of your choice with max rolls

• Lost its superior position with introduction of Veteran levels (beyond level 11)
• Stat boosts help a lot early game, that’s why still good early game, but loses its value in late game
• For archers, most of the time Gifted is better than Fast Adaptation
• It is matter of choice wherever or not pick this. I value actual perks more than stat boosts, that’s why almost never pick it myself (rarely to reach some threshold values for recruit)

Tier 3 perks

Backstabber (average) – doubles surrounding bonus (5% -> 10%).

• On average this perk is better than Fast Adaptation (but Fast Adaptation is Tier 1 pick) since it provides hit chance increase without requirement to miss your hit, also most of the time you have at least 2 mercs adjusted to enemy which is sort of guarantees this perk to be active.
• Good pick for polearm users to ensure hits. I always pick it despite them already having high attack values. Helps them hit no matter what.
• Decent for low/average skilled recruits fighting in formations
• Wouldn’t recommend it for 2 handers, since they kind of AOE builds, but it all depends on tactics you use
• Not recommended for already high skilled frontline characters

Anticipation (good) – provides additional 1 + 10% Base Ranged Defense per tile against ranged attacks.

• Must have pick for your archers and pikemen (sergeant too). When you meet Brigand Marksmen you’ll understand why.
• Threshold value to be effective 15+ Ranged Defense (the more the better)
• Ranged defense from Dodge/Shields doesn’t count when Anticipation is calculated. Only base Ranged Defense counts!
• Wouldn’t recommend picking both Dodge and Anticipation. It works better if you choose only one of them and pick Steel Brow/Nimble/Nine Lives/Colossus as second defensive perk
• if merc is planned to be heavy armor wearer (240+/240+) Anticipation will lose some of its value since heavy armor users tend to have Battleforged which already offers decent protection against most ranged attacks

Notable enemies having this perk: seems all Goblins have it, Necrosavants, Master Archers, Sword Masters.

Shield Expert (average) – reduces damage to shields by 50%, also increases defense values of shields by 25%, which applies to Shieldwall bonus as well. DLC: Knock Back skill gains +15% chance to hit.

Improves shields:

• Round shields (+15/+15) -> (+18/+18)
• Kite shields (+15/+25) -> (+18/+31)
• Heater shields (+20/+15) -> (+25/+18)

• Effectively doubles damage required to break shields. Try breaking shields of Ancient Auxiliaries, feel the frustration, then look into their stats
• Good pick for shield users, without it shields could go away with 2-3 hits from “Destroy shield” attacks leaving merc exposed, especially helps when fighting orcs
• Sort of must have pick for Unique shield users, otherwise soon your lovely red glowing Unique shield will be split into pieces
• DLC: Added more crowd control abilities to shield users with this perk. Be wary of that when fighting Noble House units/Ancient Legions

Notable enemies having this perk: Noble House Footmen/Knights, Ancient Legions, Bandit Leaders.

Brawny (good) – reduces Fatigue and Initiative penalty for wearing armor and helmet by 25%.

• Every heavy armor user must have it
• DLC: Nimble builds no longer benefit from it (See Nimble perk)
• DLC: Penalty reduced was lowered: 30% -> 25% which together with Nimble changes made this perk worth it only for dedicated heavy armor users. Good news however is what all others got free perk point to spend.

Rotation (good) – for 3 AP and 25 Fatigue allows switching places with another ally(!) character which is not stunned, rooted or otherwise disabled. Zone of control is ignored.

• You can switch places not only with your mercs but with other allied characters too
• Might not look good on paper, but it is the best utility perk in game with various uses:
  • Offensive, when different mercs rotate to hit the same target again and again effectively focusing fire
  • Defensive, allowing you to rotate wounded/exposed mercs from danger
• Some players build entire 2hander companies fighting in two line formations: while 1st line wrecks havoc, 2nd rests, then they switch places
• I always pick it for my shield users and pikemen, sometimes for 2handers, archers get Footwork instead

Notable enemies having this perk: pretty much all Human enemies, Ancient Legions.

Rally the Troops (specialized) – allows to Rally Fleeing mercs or improve morale for Breaking/Wavering. Doesn’t improve morale beyond Steady.

• Picked for specialized sergeant builds with high Resolve stat
• Some players field more than one sergeant for fights against geists

Notable enemies having this perk: Standard Bearers.

Taunt (extremely specialized) – for 3 AP and 15 Fatigue taunts target forcing it to attack the taunting character.

• Overall very rarely picked by players
• This is highly specialized perk for “tank” builds which I don’t pick myself so cannot advise on this one

Tier 4 perks

All Tier 4 perks are weapon masteries. They are pretty self explanatory and available in game, so instead of going through all of them I just make some general points:

• Most of masteries are worth picking solely because of Fatigue reduction on attacks, this especially helps during prolonged fights
• DLC: Polearm mastery became great making polearm attacks cost only 5 AP which makes their users quite mobile – now they can attack and move 2 tiles. Pair it with Pathfinder for even more increased benefit (mostly to get high ground). Brings new possibilities (WORKS ONLY WITH POLEARMS – axes use different mastery and thus not affected):
  • Againt Orc Warriors polearms now could be kept at safe distance by using following tactic: move forward to position yourself at backline -> hit -> move backward to avoid being at enemy reach in case if frontline gets pushbacked.
  • Hit (-5 AP) -> kill and proc Berserk (+4 AP) -> Hit (-5 AP) -> move 1 tile ( 9 – 5 + 4 – 5 = 3 AP left)
• Spear mastery is rarely picked because spears are bad late game weapon and mostly used for crowd control then. Against Ancient Legions HP damage from Spears is reduced by 50%, however spears still do their full damage to armor.
• Axes provide best DPS against armored targets (granted user has high melee skill)
• Cleavers provide best DPS against low/unarmored targets (unless these are Orc cleavers). Orc cleavers have high armor damage and are possibly best duelist weapon in game (especially Unique ones). There were reported cases when Orc Warlord was almost dying after 4 hits from duelist equipped with Orc cleaver.
• All Orc weapons come with harsh penalties to Fatigue (see tooltips) and therefore unusable without mastery. Also high Fatigue pool and Iron Lungs are much desirable for Orc weapon user.
• Warhammers are the best weapons against armor, however their HP damage is the least in game.
• Some goblin weapons have attacks affected by different masteries, for example bleed from Goblin pike is affected by Cleaver mastery while Fatigue cost for the attack itself affected by Polearm mastery
• Goblin pike cost 5 AP to use making its user very mobile
• Flails are the best weapons early game for looting enemy armor since most of the enemies in that period come with no or little head protection. Also showing good results against Shieldwall spam used by Ancient Legions and Noble House Footmen
• Puncture skill from dagger is not affected by Double grip (+25% damage to onehanded weapon when offhand is free)
• Crossbow mastery is that actually makes enemy crossbow users so deadly
• Maces are good crowd control weapons with decent damage. Could be used to stun Necrosavants and also good against Orc Warriors granted you don’t have high enough DPS to bring them down fast. They eventually become so fatigued that will be able to use only one action per round and if surrounded they prefer to spam shieldwall.
• Swords have their niche mid game, but they are not so effective against armored opponents. Late game mostly used by 2-handers and duelists.
• The most universal 2-handed weapon is sword. It offers 3 different types of attacks, while others (hammer/axe) offer only 2
• Hammer is the best 2-handed weapon against armored opponents such as Orc Warrios.
• Advantage of 2-handed axes is their devastating single target attack (at least twice as much as any other 2-handed weapon)

Tier 5 perks

Reach Advantage (good) – adds static +5 Melee Defense for each successful hit of two-handed weapon up to 5 stacks. Bonus lasts until character(!) next turn, thus it will last until character gains next turn even if he acts last in the round.

• DLC: 20% Melee Defense increase per hit replaced with static bonus of +5 Melee Defence per hit. Aslo number of stacks reduced 5 -> 6. This severely nerfes this perk for campaigns aiming past 11 level (several late game crisises), but buffs it for early-mid game allowing usage of two-handed weapons earlier. Single late game crisis campaigns almost not affected because of average mercs statline at 9-11 levels.
• Just in case: doesn’t work on misses
• Good pick for AOE two-handed weapons such as swords, decent pick for hammers, axes and berserk chains. For only single attack two-handed weapons this perk pick is debatable.

Notable enemies having this perk: Zweinhanders, Billmen, Ancient Honor Guards, Hedge Knights.

Overwhelm (average) – applies stacking Overwhelmed (-10% to all attack values) debuff against enemy character with each hit or miss. Works only if attacker acts before defender made a turn.

• Requires high Initiative to be effectively utilized thus usually picked for archers and light armored builds
• Can be applied to several targets per one attack (either through AOE hit or ranged scatter hit)
• Somewhat shines with dagger specialized builds with 3 attacks per round, but these builds are highly specialized and thus very rare
• One of the few debuffs which works against Ancient Undead, another one being stagger from two-handed hammers

Notable enemies having this perk: Bounty Hunters, Mercenaries, Knights, Zveinhanders, Frenzied Direwolves, Bandit Leaders.

Lone Wolf (rare) – adds +15% to all character stats except Initiative when no ally within 3 tiles.

• Very hard to use since isolating your merc usually leads to his death
• Might look good on paper, but isolated mercs don’t live long unless they are supermen with exceptional stats and exceptional gear, therefore not recommended

Notable enemies having this perk: Zweinhanders.

Underdog (good) – character no longer suffers from surround penalty. If attacker has Backstabber perk then effect from that perk is negated and replaced with usual +5% bonus hit

• No brainer pick for “tank” and 2handers builds
• Very good on mercs fighting at the edges of your formations
• Generally good pick for mercs fighting in line however not really “must have”

Footwork (average) – for 3 AP and 25 Fatigue allows leaving zone of control without triggering an attack.

• Generally picked on archers to escape Goblin Wolfriders and Orc Warriors, other than that rarely used, but these cases alone make it totally worth it
• Could be replaced with Rotation

Notable enemies having this perk: Goblins.

Tier 6 perks

Berserk (good) – once per round refunds 4 AP for killing an enemy.

• No brainer pick for pretty much every damage dealer build. Even worth considering for shield users.
• Worth it even for dedicated crossbowmen since helps to overcome mobility issues they have
• The only downside of this perk is that it speed ups Fatigue consumption

Notable enemies having this perk: Orc Berserks, Direwolves, Zveinhanders, Knights.

Head Hunter (rare) – on body hit adds stacking +15% chance to hit the head. On hit to the head chance is reset.

• Good pick for dedicated crossbowmen and polearm users (for oneshots), also very good when picked for axes
• Highly specialized perk which synergizes with certain:
  • backgrounds: Killer on the run (+10% chance to hit head), Jester (+5% chance to hit head)
  • weapons: Flails (+10% chance to hit head), Berserk chain (+15% chance to hit head), 1h axes (+50% damage to the head)
  • traits: Brute (+15% melee damage to the head)
• You need high attack values to make it work

Notable enemies having this perk: Necrosavants, Master Archers, Sword Masters.

Nimble (specialized) – reduces HP(!) damage taken by up to 75%. This value is affected by total Fatigue from armor/helmet and lowered exponentially (the lighter armor you have the more you benefit)

• DLC: Got reworked. Now provides guaranteed defense which makes it must have pick for archers
• DLC: Provides excellent defense against crossbows for light armor users
• DLC: The more HP your merc has the more he benefits, but it shouldn’t be considered main defense tool for lightly armored mercs. High defense values still remain their main defense tools. Nimble acts only as backup.
• DLC: Traits Strong (+10 Fatigue), Fat(-10 Fatigue, +10 HP) and Old are no longer affect Nimble perk
• DLC: Seems now could be used with shields without penalties allowing possibilities for new builds. Needs to be verified.

Notable enemies having this perk: Sergeants, Bounty Hunters, Sword Masters, Mercenary archers.

Battle Forged (good) – damage to armor is reduced by percentage(!) equal to 5% of current total (body and head) armor value. For example having 300/300 armor equipped will result at 30% less damage dealt to armor

• Must have pick for heavy armor users, especially 2-handers
• Shines against low damage enemies (for example goblins), effect is minimized against 2-handed weapons
• Difference already notable at 210/210 armor
• Can provide almost total immunity to arrows, to lesser extent helps against bolts, however at higher armor values it might require couple of hits before bolts can seriously penetrate it
• Sort of “economical” perk since results at less tools spent for repairing armor after battle

Notable enemies having this perk: Knights, Mercenaries.

Tier 7 perks

Fearsome (very specialized) – attacks now trigger morale check even at 1 HP damage.

• Doesn’t work against undead
• This perk is too specialized to be common, there are better picks at this level
• Synergizes well with warhammers since they guarantee at least 10 HP damage on hit
• When used against merc with Deathwish trait overrides it causing morale check on HP damage

Notable enemies having this perk: Ancient Legions, Fallen Heroes.

Duelist (good) – one handed weapons receive +25% to ignore armor damage if offhand is free (no shield)

• Picked for duelist builds which have the biggest single target damage in game because ignore armor stat is really good – it allows you to bypass armor to do HP damage instead of destroying armor first.
• Works with thrown weapons
• No longer adds +25% damage to Puncture skill of daggers

Notable enemies having this perk: Necrosavants, Sergeants, Sword Masters, Goblin Wolfriders.

Killing Frenzy (good) – grants +25% damage increase on kill for 2 rounds. Each kill resets buff duration. Must have pick for any damage dealer class.

Notable enemies having this perk: Hedge Knights, Orc Berserks have sort of equivalent called Rage which procs on hit – beware!

Indomitable (specialized) – for 3 AP and 25 Fatigue reduces all damage taken by 50% and makes user immune to stun and knockback effects for 1 turn.

• Greatly increases merc survivability doubling effective armor and HP merc has. Tanking Orc Warriors with this perk is no longer scary.
• Reduces damage from bleeds and poisons by half when active
• Helps when fighting Orc Warriors since negates their pushback skill when active
• Sometimes picked for 2-handers to help with survivability. For example, your merc completely missed his AOE attack or gained only 1 stack of Reach Advantage, he still has 3AP to use Indomitable if you feel pressed enough
• Consumes a lot of Fatigue on use, though only mercs with high fatigue could use it more or less reliably. Iron Lungs trait greatly helps here

Footman

BUILD SECTION MIGHT BE OUTDATED WITH NEW DLC. IT MIGHT TAKE TIME BEFORE IT GETS UPDATED.

“Standard” fighter with shield in medium/heavy armor used to maintain frontline and protect more squishy fighters:

• This build is core of any early company
• Early on equipped with spears/swords. Later starts using heavy weaponry as his melee skill increases (70+). If recruit s*cks at melee you can always give him spear/sword/flail.
• You can have dedicated Pikeman build, but I usually use some Footmen for these needs after obtaining some polearms.

Pretty much everyone with 50+ Melee skill and 60+ HP, however best cheap ones are brawlers, farmhands, butchers.

• Melee defense
• Fatigue (target 130-140 before gear by level 11)
• Melee attack
• Resolve (up to 50, at the very minimum – 40)
• Range defense (if other stat rolls are pretty bad)

Colossus – footmen are frontline fighters therefore they take hits more than anyone else. This perk helps them last longer under pressure, reduces injury probability and overall helps staying alive. Pick this perk to bring your merc up to 70-80 HP and invest stat level ups into other areas. Usually one of the first picks. Could be skipped if recruit already has high base HP (70+).

Rotation – tanking is footmen primary role and this perk helps them with that by allowing rescue of other mercs ended up in trouble. Also could be used to rotate perk owner out of danger if he took too many hits or put damage dealers into striking position. However latter could be tricky. I recommend picking this perk as soon as it becomes available on level 4.

Brawny – allows wearing heavier armor and still having adequate levels of Fatigue(80+, at the very minimum – 70). Pick it right after Rotation.

Shield Expert – shield is core equipment of footmen. Loosing it leaves them into exposed position and often strips them from their tanking roles. This perk not only increases shield defense values but also greatly increases its lifetime. I can remember only single cases when shield was lost with this perk picked, without it would happen much more often.

Underdog – this perk is kind of must have for tank classes since the lesser you hit the better and eliminating penalties for surrounding provides solid help in that direction.

Weapon mastery of choice – some time later in game once merc has adequate levels of attack (70+) you will want to specialize him into one dedicated weapon. Pick it based on your needs:

• Spears – for crowd control and securing flanks
• Flails – if your melee skill is expected to be low by level 11 (around 75)
• Warhammers – to counter heavy armored opponents
• Maces – for crowd control and decent damage, even 2 mace users is enough to Fatigue cap Orc Warrior at 1-2 turns
• Axes – for damage and shield breaking
• Cleavers – if you like it
• Swords – for good steady damage output, however they do less damage vs armor

Battleforged – pick it to toughen up your armor. 210/210 is borderline when it becomes effective, however 140/150 works too if it is the best you have. Especially helpful when facing Goblin Wolfriders while most of your company undergeared. For example, I had 2 fighters with 210/210 armor: one without and one with this perk. By the end of the fight first one was barely alive with his armor broken to pieces while second one still had at least half of his armor.

Recover – last core perk, pick for tough fights late game (100+ days). Mostly used against undead or when fighting in rough terrain without Pathfinder perk. You can skip it for recruits with Iron Longs trait and high Fatigue pool.

That’s it for core perks. On top of them you can pick any perks you like to use or which suit your playstyle better: Quick Hands, Pathfinder, Berserk, Fortified Mind, etc. It is just not possible to mention all variations of this build: everyone has its own tastes. Below I’ll give you couple of build variations I use.

Early game footman

– I use this build early game for recruits which I plan to replace eventually therefore it is given for every such merc not depending on his stats. Please note addition of Fast Adaptation to help with hitting the target. Especially helpful against Ancient Legions with their shieldwall spam.

Shield tank

– I keep couple of such mercs usually equipped with maces/warhammers/flails. Their role is to tank multiple enemies (especially dangerous ones such us Orc Warriors) while damage dealers do their job at other parts of the battlefield. This particular merc below has Fortified Mind to help with his Resolve since I was facing undead crisis (to help against Gheists and Ancient Legions/Fallen Heroes). I also found Fortified Mind pretty helpful if merc usually find himself surrounded by 3 or more enemies which is common for shield tanks. Took Fearsome for this merc since it synergizes well with warhammer which provides guaranteed HP damage.

DPS footman

– I employ pretty aggressive gamestyle and found that “DPS footman” build suits me better than its tank counterpart. For these builds I pick “failed 2-handed recruits” (high attack, decent stamina, but not sufficient melee defense). I equip them with axes/maces/cleavers and give Berserk with Killing Frenzy. They can tank equally well as their full tank counterparts while providing better damage output, however they are less resilient to surrounding due to lower Resolve.

Archer

Merc specialized in bows, deadly against low/medium armored enemies:

• Starts with crossbow and with enough ranged (60+) transitions into bow
• “Old” hybrid builds with polearms are obsolete, however some players take long axes for shield breaking
• Under Killing Frenzy proc warbows guarantee injury on hit against most of the enemies

Hunters (even with no stars they receive +30 to range skill on average by level 11), Poachers/Bowyers/Sellswords/Witchhunters with at least 1 star in ranged (it depends on their initial skill), any other talented recruits with expected 85+ Ranged attack by level 11.

• Ranged attack (85+ by level 11)
• Fatigue (target 120-130 before gear by level 11)
• Ranged defense (at least 15-20 by level 11)
• Initiative

Student – archers shines at higher levels, therefore the faster you bring them there the better.

Pathfinder – I convinced that archers benefit from positioning more than any other fighters, therefore ability to quickly take higher ground or being mobile at rough terrain will pay back itself later in the fight.

Bullseye – as I said earlier without this perk it would be troublesome to snipe enemy archers and casters since AI usually try to position them behind obstacles or put some other fighters in front of them.

Anticipation/Dodge – your archers usually will be subject to enemy archers fire and therefore need to compensate their lack of shields with additional defensive skills. Pick one of those for additional Range defense. I prefer Anticipation, but Dodge will work almost as good as Anticipation at least at the beginning of the fight when enemy archers are still alive.

Bow mastery – must have pick for every archer due to Fatigue reduction on attacks and additional range.

Nimble – general weakness of archers is that they cannot put more than 90 armor helmet since all helmets above provide penalties to vision range which is not acceptable (unless merc has Eagle Eyes trait). But these helmets alone doesn’t offer enough protection from crossbowmen shots (which are quite numerous among your enemies) and when your archers hit by one of them, it usually puts them at death door range even on body hit (sometimes oneshots them if it was headshot) and any other hit after will just outright kill them. Relying that your archers will never be hit is basically relying on luck, which may lead to frustrating results, therefore I recommend picking Nimble as second line of defense for your archers. It even prevents injuries on body hits granted it procced. My best result so far was the fight when my archer took 3 crossbow bolts (enemy was at higher ground) and only dropped to half HP without injuries – without Nimble he would be outright dead.

Berserk – one additional shot or 4 AP for movement is always good. For top end archers will proc quite often.

Killing Frenzy – if you picked Berserk, then there is no reason you shouldn’t pick this one for additional benefit. Not only it will increase your archers damage output, but allow proc Berserk more reliably.

Footwork – you need some skills for getting out of trouble for your archers since there will be plenty situations of those: Necrosavants, Orc Warrios, Goblin Wolfriders. Better go safe and pick this perk in case it happens.

That is it for core perks. You can go supersafe and pick Nine Lives/Steel Brow in addition to Anticipation and Nimble or you can pick Crippling Strikes/Executioner to make your archers real killing machines or it could be any other choice of yours. Bring up your fantasy!

Below an example of nimble archers I field. Their standard equipment includes warbow, goblin sword, 2 quivers and 90/90 armor (which grants them 60% Nimble chance). Particular one below is more of debuffer version with Crippling Strikes/Overwhelm taken and has Fangshire helmet:

Heavy 2-hander

Fighter in heavy armor wrecking enemy lines with big 2-handed weapon:

• 2-hander builds are really demanding to recruit gear and skills, therefore viable mid-late game only. Don’t try to use them early game – they will die fast
• For this type of the build, Iron Lungs trait especially helpful since Fatigue consumption is insane
• Usually leveled as backrow pikeman or frontline guy with the shield and transitions into 2-hander at higher levels

Wildmen, Militias, Squires, Raiders, Sellswords, Knights, any other talented recruits (see stats section)

• Melee attack (85+ by level 11)
• Fatigue (target 130-140 before gear by level 11, but it is never enough for that type of the build)
• Melee defense (around 30 by level 11, the more the better)
• Resolve (50-60)
• Range defense (if possible try to patch it up to 10, but it is not critical)

Student – same as for archers – 2-handers shine at higher levels, also they have strict requirements for perks which are high at the tree, therefore you want to get there as soon as possible.

Colossus – the same reasoning as for footman. It will save life of your merc someday like happened in that case (see description): Took 2 punctures from Thug and military pick hit

Brawny – must have for heavy armor users.

Weapon mastery of choice – I usually grab this after Brawny because the only other choice available at that level is Recover which I don’t need yet:

• Flails – if planning to use Berserk Chain (Iron Lungs or 140-150 Fatigue pool by level 11 is highly recommended), but Chain overall is exotic choice
• Hammers – great against Orc Warriors and Knights, also capable of one-shotting Ancient Legionaries, I usually try to find 90+ Melee characters for hammers
• Axes – devastating single target attack (twice as much as any other 2-hander), but it could be tricky to pull off AOE attack. It just happens that I had an axeman only once 🙂
• Swords – most versatile one which offers 3 types of attacks, but shows average performance against heavily armored opponents
• Cleavers – the only choice in game is Crypt Cleaver which is moderate level 2-hander: it provides slightly better damage than warbrand (65-85 range, 25% ignore armor, 115% armor damage), but offers only single target attacks

Underdog – must have since most 2-handers are AOE damage builds and therefore “prefer” to be surrounded.

Battleforged – pick it, equip at least 300/300 armor and watch how arrows can barely scratch your mercs. This is core survivability perk for 2-handers.

Reach advantage – this is active defense of 2-hander builds – the more you hit, the harder it becomes for enemies to hit you. Invaluable.

Berserk – wanted 2 AOE attacks per turn? With this perk it is quite possible, but watch out your Fatigue.

Killing Frenzy – pick it for even more killing power, also helps 2-handed swordsmen to dig through that armor of Orc Warriors.

Recover – last core perk, you will not use it every fight, but for these engagements when clash lasts more than couple of rounds, you will quickly understand value of that pick.

I always found 2-hander builds tight on perk points since at the end it is usually only one free perk point left to spend on fancy things.

Swordsman

– Just general 2-hander equipped with greatsword. This one has Gifted taken to patch up his attack/defense stats (he still was pretty lucky with his melee defense rolls), he had too juicy Fatigue pool to discard him (150 before gear). Note that this one doesn’t have Colossus due to his already high HP pool (took one +4 roll). Also took Rotation for him, even used it twice – once even saved another merc by that, but I’m starting to think that Adrenaline would probably have saved him better 🙂 (if you know that I mean)

Hammer master

– General greathammer user. Still thinking how to spend last perk point. Drifting towards Adrenaline – pretty helpful against these pesky goblins.

Sergeant

Specialized build for holding soldiers in line, usually equiped with company banner.

Any high resolve backgrounds with stars in it: Monks (however their combat skills usually s*ck), Brawlers (with 2 stars), Cultists, Adventurous Nobles (watch out for their penalties to ranged defense), Squires, Gamblers.

Note: Fearless and Iron Lungs are the best traits for sergeant recruits. Last one is especially valuable for these fights with Gheists where you spam Rally like mad.

• Resolve
• Melee attack (to guarantee even that weak attack from banner to succeed)
• Range defense (15-20 by level 11)
• Fatigue (no generic requirement, however 110 is bare minimum)
• Melee defense (it always nice to have some)

Student – just pick for faster level ups.

Fortified Mind – 25% to Resolve is solid addition, affects even those +10 Resolve from sergeant stash.

Rally the Troops – this perk is sole reason of this build. Usually spammed every round against Gheists.

Brawny – pick it once you start giving your sergeant heavier armor.

Anticipation – you need to compensate lack of shields by picking this perk.

Rotation – for getting yourself out of trouble or saving other mercs. However don’t expect sergeant to tank hits long enough.

Recover – against big packs of Undead and Gheist it is likely that your sergeant hits Fatigue cap, therefore pick it or he will just become useless.

Sergeants are pretty simple. On top of this core you can either go for offensive picks to squeeze out everything from that relatively weak banner attack (I usually go that way) or defensive to prevent your sergeant from occasional death since he is imporatant member of the company – finding/raising his replacement could take a while, or you can choose balanced approach.

One of the examples below. Took Executioner/Berserk/Killing Frenzy just for these fights where I don’t need his Rally and his passive buff is just enough:

Another one (level 9) – this one with Backstabber to ensure hits:

Pikeman

I rarely use dedicated pikeman builds – at max 1 or 2 such mercs, but they usually end up in reserve (unless they have exceptional stats) since they are outperformed by hybrids and archers. I use 2-hander recruits or footmen as pikemen until I have roster of archers. The only case when I field pikemen often is Undead Crisis.

Any high attack recruits preferably with stars at melee. Also stars in ranged defense are desirable.

• Melee attack
• Fatigue (around 120 by level 11)
• Range defense (15-20 by level 11)
• Melee defense (10-15 by level 11)
• Initiative

Brawny – pikemen wear medium-to-heavy armor and therefore need this perk.

Rotation – for getting out of trouble or protecting more squishy mercs.

Anticipation/Dodge – to compensate lack of shields. Pick it depending on your merc stats – with high enough base Initiative (120+) Dodge is better.

Weapon mastery of choice – after experimenting a bit, I found that perk useful enough even for Polearm pikemen.

Berserk – allows 2 attacks per round.

Killing Frenzy – for even more killing potential and reliable Berserk procs.

Battleforged – usually good pick for medium-to-heavy armor users. Helps against arrows.

Note: Some players build pikemen into Initiative and use Warscythe with Overwhelm for debuffing multiple targets.

Below not finished version of my pikeman (as I said they rarely see battlefield rather than during Undead Crisis). The general idea was to use Warscythe for AOE and Billhook for single target damage. Planned picks were Quick Hands (to switch beetween Billhook and Warscythe), Recover and Battleforged. Took Executioner as filler perk for better damage output.

Duelist

Fighter in light armor relying on Nimble and high defense against enemy attacks:

• Has the best single target damage in game
• Probably one of the trickiest builds

Recruit archetype: high melee attack, high melee defense, low fatigue, high initiative, some ranged defense.
Pool of recruits: Thiefs (with right talents), Veteran Soldiers, Swordmasters, Sellswords, Raiders, Squires, Nobles.

• Melee attack (85+ by level 11)
• Melee defense
• Health (I bet you are pretty surprised, thing is that most best recruits come with low base health which needs to be fixed)
• Range defense (at least 10 by level 11 if you cannot afford more)
• Initiative (at least 100 Initiative after gear)
• Fatigue (100 before gear is just fine, however 110 is better)
• Resolve (around 50)

Student – duelist killing perks are very high at the tree, you want to get there as fast as possible.

Colossus – if you planning to use your duelists more or less as frontline fighters then better set the same standards for them as for other frontliners: 65+ HP. For assasin like use when they go for specific targets and have other mercs to back up them, you can stay satisfied with 55-60 HP. Everything lower needs to be patched, otherwise injury on hit is not a possibility, but a reality.
DLC: Until NImble is “fixed” this perk is too good for Nimble builds to skip it.

Pathfinder – I personally like this perk on duelists – it gives them that sense of mobility they need in my opinion, also helps with Fatigue consumption since they will be moving more than 2-handed mercs – could be considered passive equivalent of Recover perk. Also helps with maintaining higher defense numbers provided by Dodge perk.

Dodge – pick this perk to take full advantage of high iniatiative duelists already should have. Also they wear light armor and therefore need to rely on avoiding hits more than other builds – any help in that direction is highly appreciated, especially if it helps with that usually lacking ranged defense.

Note: For Swordmasters and Veteran Soldiers it may be not worth it unless they have stars in Initiative which allows reliably increase it.

Weapon mastery of choice – mostly swords, sometimes cleavers or axes:

• Swords – light (good for Nimble), provide +10% hit chance to ensure hits, low Fatigue cost per attack helps merc not to run out of gas for longer periods, also there are plenty good unique swords – the only problem is to get them
• Cleavers – provide better damage output than swords, but heavy – that’s why I recommend it for Strong recruits or heavy duelists
• Axes – viable pick for duelists, just don’t forget to take Headhunter as well due to increased head damage axes have
• You could use any other weapons however swords/cleavers/axes are usually the best choice

Underdog – as I said, any help at not getting hit is much appreciated. Highly desirable, however with careful positioning and usage of your duelists you can get away with not using it.

Nimble – core defensive perk. Target 60% Nimble chance as minimum, more is better. It is there reduce damage from rare (at least that’s how it should be) hits you duelists will be taking.

Duelist – this perk is why you are using this build in first place. As mentioned earlier ignore armor is very good stat allowing to bypass armor even at higher armor levels.

Berserk – as I said before, this perk is must have for any damage dealer builds since they will be killing a lot.

Killing Frenzy/Executioner – always good to pick one of those (if you can pick both – go for it):

• former is safer against undead armies which are not affected by injuries
• latter is easier to utilize by duelists against low/medium armored enemy since first hit usually causes injuries thanks to increased ignore armor damage

Note: You may want to replace one perk from core with Nine Lives/Steel Brow – it is up to you to decide which one. Not like these survivability perks are required, but by not taking one of those you are accepting the risk of sudden death if Nimble failed for strong headshot attack – not like it happens often, but until you find unique gear, your duelists will be quite squishy.

You used all your 10 perk points! Yes, duelist builds are even tighter on perk points than 2-handed ones. But you still may vary them by not picking this perk or that and taking other choices. That’s why best recruits with traits like Tough/Strong are extremely valuable for duelist builds since they allow freeing some perk points to take fancy staff like Headhunter, Overwhelm, sometimes Indomitable (for Iron Lungs or high Fatigue pool recruits only).

Below some examples of duelists I had in my quite duelist heavy company:

1) Sellsword:

2) Veteran Soldier:

3) With Headhunter:

4) Note this Swordmaster health (probably was too overzealous with it):

5) Super Swordmaster (however I made mistake by taking Dodge on him – his Initiative is a bit low):

Crossbowman

I was quite sceptical about crossbowmen in game until I was forced to use them on one particular map where I struggled finding archer recruits. Well, it turned out crossbow has its strong sides:

• Very strong attack with high after armor damage. Even mercs with 240/240 armor and Battleforged receive around 10-15 HP damage on hit.
• Where you need your bow hit 4 times to kill the target, crossbow needs only 2 (sometimes even 1)
• Crossbow (with spec) outperforms Hunting Bow against Brigand Raiders, however for T3 weapons (Warbow and Heavy Crossbow) situation is evened out
• Crossbows show better result against goblins because of their +15% to hit and the fact that they have lower range (goblins have Anticipation which becomes only stronger with range). Also “one shot – one kill” is the very true when used against Ambushers/Skirmishers.

I was trying to use dedicated crossbowmen, but found them lacking for following reasons:

• 1 attack vs 2-3 those of bowmen just too big of a difference, especially against high HP low armor opponents such as Orc Youngs
• Bows are better at destroying armor due to their rate of fire
• While crossbows are good at inflicting after armor damage, if you are not mass use them it becomes hard to capitalize on that since other weapons don’t have that high ignore armor damage, therefore they need to break armor first to start doing damage. Bows help them with that by breaking armor while crossbows – not so much.
• Crossbows have mobility issues due to high AP cost for reload – either you move, either you reload your weapon

To compensate all of the above, I eventually ended up using hybrid versions of crossbowmen which is not hard to build due to the fact that crossbows don’t need too much of a perk points for effective usage on the battlefield.

Bounty Hunter

– crossbowman also carring throwing weapons and utility items. Very mobile. Capable of besting Brigand Raider or Orc Young at single combat, however he is not suited for prolonged melee engagements or fighting greater foes (such as Orc Berserk).

Any recruit not passing threshold check for becoming archer, but with expected ranged (75-85+). Stars in ranged defense and initiative is a plus.

• Ranged attack
• Fatigue (around 120 by level 11)
• Initiative (around 100 after armor)
• Range defense (15+ by level 11)
• Melee attack (occasionally, usually max rolls)
• Melee defense (if you have free points – up to 10)

Student – this particular build shows its true power at max levels, which is actually makes hard to replace loss of Bounty Hunter. New recruit will be suboptimal until he hits level 10.

Pathfinder – this is my preference. I prefer mobility for my ranged units, also helps with Fatigue when moving.

Dodge – I prefer Dodge for that build because Bounty Hunters usually operate at closer range (effectiveness of Anticipation lowers with range) and occasionally end up at melee where Dodge helps a bit.

Bullseye – every capable archer should have it – makes your life easier.

Crossbow mastery – for 20% more ignore armor damage.

Berserk – 4 AP on kill good even for crossbow user, especially if crossbow already loaded at the beginning of the round. Also helps overcome mobility issues crossbowmen have.

Killing Frenzy – for even more killing potential.

Quick Hands – all hybrid builds are not effective without cabality to quickly switch their weapons. Bounty Hunter is not an exception.

Throwing mastery – for more damage from throwing weapons.

Duelist – pick it to buff throwing weapons. Javelins get 65% ignore armor damage with this perk which is almost as good as crossbow bolt. Also helps in close combat situations.

Bags and Belts – final pick, allows carrying supply of throwing weapons as well as some utility items.

Some words about usage: you start combat by shooting bolts at enemy and with distance closing eventually switch to throwing weapons – with Duelist, Killing Frenzy and Berserk they greatly outperform crossbows. Their only issue is range and ammo supply. Also even against Undead Crisis these mercs retain their full effectiveness since you can switch to Throwing Axes and do full damage both to HP and armor.

This merc below is one of the first mercs I tried to build that way and therefore has suboptimal stat distribution:

Crossbowman/Polearm user

– this is more classic version of crossbowman, which is widely used by community of players, however I don’t like it that much and rarely make it.

Any recruit not passing threshold check for becoming archer, but with expected ranged (75-85+). Stars in melee is a plus.

• Ranged attack
• Melee attack
• Fatigue (around 120 by level 11)
• Range defense (15+ by level 11)
• Melee defense (if you have free points – up to 10)

Bullseye – every capable archer should have it – makes your life easier.

Quick Hands – to quicky switch to your polearm. Allows shooting crossbow and then hitting with polearm on the same turn.

Anticipation – tried without it and turned out that even heavily armored hybrids are hit too much by enemy archers. Picked it later.

Crossbow mastery – for 20% more ignore armor damage.

Berserk – good both for crossbow (helps with mobility) and polearm (allowing two attacks per round).

Killing Frenzy – for even more killing potential.

That’s probably it. The rest is up to your choice: you can take mastery perk for your polearm – many do this for axes to allow comfort shield splitting, pick Student for faster leveling or take Battleforged to make your hybrids more resilient.

Below is highly successful merc I used in one of my campaigns – he even had more kills than some of my 2handers, but he has beastly talents. Took Recover for him since he often ended Fatigue capped while killing big number of enemies with his axe. That Battleforged probably saved his life – he is now recovering from Man Splitter round swing which hit him to the head leaving only 4 HP.