I beat 11 Alps in a Forest, but...

[deducter]

I think Alps right now are significantly overtuned. In fact, I only won because I had the legendary lightning sword which can kill up to 3 nightmares in a single swing. I only killed 9 out of 11, the last 2 ran away.

Video here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yIZfSDF04H0

This was a 2-skull contract which felt on par with the Black Monolith for difficulty. I lost 3 brothers, whereas in the fight against the Kraken I lost only 1. 3-skull contracts were trivial by comparison. In part 129 I did a 3-skull orc warlord contract taking literally 0 damage, and in part 131 I did a 3-skull hexen contract with no problem. Compared to those 3-skull contract, this Alp fight was way harder. I would say to do large number of Alps even semi-reliably you need the lightning sword, which no other contract requires.

Now, I do think there are several places where I can improve. I should've equipped spears and dogs on every single bro. I should not have gotten my bros except for the lightning sword user separated early on. I think could've saved my hedge knight bro if I positioned/thought about it a bit better.

I think the general design of these new alp fights is fine, but the numbers and mechanics need some adjustment:

1. The nightmares should not have ZoC. Right now, it is basically impossible to move unless you kill all the nightmares. Getting rid of ZoC on the nightmares makes the positioning/tactics so much more interesting. Players who do not plan ahead or think about positioning will be punished.
2. The nightmare damage needs to scale much better with resolve. My 86 resolve + 20 from the bonus witch hunter was taking about 10 damage per nightmare hit, and broke in just 2 rounds of getting surrounded. Even my 131 resolve bannerman was taking 10 damage per hit. Nimble has no effect on damage, both my witch hunter and sergeant had nimble. No other enemy in the game does anywhere near as much, since this is guaranteed, unmitigated armor-piercing damage. In general the damage needs to be lowered slightly, maybe like 7-8 damage on 50 resolve bros, and on 100 resolve bros it should be like 2-4 damage. This also potentially allows you to use a resolve tank.
3. The graphics ideally should be updated. Right now it is really hard to actually see if a shadow is on a hex, because it is dark at night and they blend into the black miasma on the ground.

I think these changes should be sufficient to make the new Alps an interesting and consistently beatable encounter for their power level.

[Tephros83]

Well done! But other than the legendary sword not an ideal setup. Forest makes it harder too. Warbrands would be better than greatswords. No need for armor. Pikes or warscythes would be better than halberd or polehammer. There's probably more but that was what I noticed on a quick view.

[just.dont.do.it]

Originally posted by Tephros83:

Well done! But other than the legendary sword not an ideal setup. Forest makes it harder too. Warbrands would be better than greatswords. No need for armor. Pikes or warscythes would be better than halberd or polehammer. There's probably more but that was what I noticed on a quick view.

You shouldn't be needing a special equipment setup for your entire company just to do a 2-skull contract without losses.

[thebadman]

Originally posted by Tephros83:

Well done! But other than the legendary sword not an ideal setup. Forest makes it harder too. Warbrands would be better than greatswords. No need for armor. Pikes or warscythes would be better than halberd or polehammer. There's probably more but that was what I noticed on a quick view.

Do not forget 100+ matt bros to counter the 25 mdef.

[Hollow]

This means most people will likely never do any alp mission under the current build on ironman expert no matter what stage they are at and no matter how good their gear is. Why would any sane person risk their entire company for some ♥♥♥♥♥♥ 2k mission when you can easily get more with 3 skull bandit mission? Developer, if you think ironman is the way it is meant to be played, why do you keep pump out enemies which pose fatal risk yet yield no reward that comes even remotely close. Outside of people who just get bored and look for challenge, hardcore streamer and people who alt f4, who is going to do this? When a common enemy is more challenging than your end game boss, you know the balance is screwed up.

[timmonsisold66]

No reward for the increased risk. I avoid altogether sadly. Some fights just are not worth the time or hassle when trying to play the game.

[Russian Sly]

Alps are too much hassle to bother at the moment.
Contracts involving them are extremelly underpaid, leading me into situation where I completely ignore anything that involves alps.

[Stal Hamarr]

Well, that's good to know, coming from a very good player.
By the description the new alps seem way more interesting than the original. But it looks like they are far from balanced.

[deducter]

I agree my setup was clearly not optimal. I think having more spears, warbrands, and even a warscythe would be useful. Also, I should get dogs on everyone, which would help a lot. I also made some positioning mistakes. I think with the right setup I can do this fight without death.

Yes, stripping naked would help, but before the nimble nerf all nimble characters were running around naked, which seemed silly. No other fight in the game requires you to unequip armor on every single character.

But no matter your party, if you make even a mistake or two vs Alps that could mean a wipe. In most other fights if you made a mistake or two you could lose a bro, but unless you make mistakes continuously you should not have a wipe. No other fight has mechanics this punishing.

If this was a legendary end-game fight, I think it is fantastic. The problem is that this 2-skull contract is on the same difficulty level as a legendary fight. From what I understand, these Alps are meant to be a mid-tier enemy like raiders or orc young. I do not shy away from other content, for example I do not think any of the other DLC content like unholds/hexen/schrats/kraken need changes, but I think the current iteration of Alps is too much, and I won't be doing them unless they get some major nerfs.