Any tips?

[Cornbread With Salsa]

Im getting my ass kicked and im slowly losing interest in this game. It was great during the tutorial province but now that Im headed to the second one every single patrol just kills me in like 3 turns. I thought I was supposed to get 3 mechs once the tutorial finished? and how do I get more supplies?

[MyUrp1]

Originally posted by Cornbread With Salsa:

USE THE RETREAT BUTTON!!!

Gotta get my mechs to the retreat zone first. Not easy when they're getting shot at.

And then I got intercepted on some farm map with no retreat option at all and got obliterated.

I'd prefer to press forward into a new province rather than hide in my tutorial province... what is the story with supplies? I'm acquiring plenty of ordinary supplies from scrapping mechs, but there seems to be some liquid repair kit that I'm depleting and I'm not sure how to recover. Is that something I can build on my transport or do I have to retreat to a friendly province to recover?

[Donovan]

Originally posted by MyUrp1:

Originally posted by Cornbread With Salsa:

USE THE RETREAT BUTTON!!!

Gotta get my mechs to the retreat zone first. Not easy when they're getting shot at.

And then I got intercepted on some farm map with no retreat option at all and got obliterated.

I'd prefer to press forward into a new province rather than hide in my tutorial province... what is the story with supplies? I'm acquiring plenty of ordinary supplies from scrapping mechs, but there seems to be some liquid repair kit that I'm depleting and I'm not sure how to recover. Is that something I can build on my transport or do I have to retreat to a friendly province to recover?

They mean the retreat option on the over world map. There's a button that'll instantly pop you back to the nearest captured territory unless I'm mistaken.

Far as the liquid fix goes, head back to friendly territory. Should be a town/location you can go to that'll let you rest and resupply to replenish the liquid fix.

[MyUrp1]

Oh, wow, that's kind of twinky... I found the button you were talking about, and it instantly catapaults my transport to the home base, no need to evade enemy patrols on the way back.

Seems like cheating, but I guess since it means I get to keep all four of my mechs I'll go with it for now. Thanks for pointing that out!

And yes, looks like I can get my liquid fix at the base too, all good!

[Cornbread With Salsa]

Originally posted by ccuancc:

first, start a new game. Do the tutorial. Conquer your first territory without delay. Then chill, fight a couple of patrol then go back to your captured zone and wait there for a day. Use the time control on the top right to do that. Then go back there and farm those patrol until you get your 3rd and 4th mech. I barely got any damage in most of the patrol and convoy mission. Equip 2 of your mechs with Assault rifle - 1 with handgun or smg and another with shield for 2ndary. then 3rd mech with Missile, ML6 is good for starter. And 4th mech with Sniper or markman rifle - I myself prefer a sniper.

For your mech parts, focus on speed (more power/less mass) and heat dissipation since you will barely getting any damage. The rest is how well you plan out your move. Find cover or use the enemies as cover. Use missile mech to shoot at tank, usually 2 salvo on the first turn should get them downed or destroyed. Then focus fire to take them out 1 by 1 if possible. Read the guide to learn about heat and weapon damage.

Don't be afraid to wait for escalation to go down, wasting time in your territory has no disadvantage. Learn to dodge missile. Plan your move then add the attack. Its ok to overheat in some occasion to dash and dodge missile or heavy damage. When firing sniper rifle, put the wait action. Don't move or the accuracy will go down (scatter). AI is so stupid, they will only attack predetermined unit so use that to your advantage. See which units will get attack by moving your cursor over the timeline then prioritize defence (hiding behind hills, building or their mech/tank) over everything.
And always salvage upper body to get more materials. try to spend all your salvage budget, it reset every battle. Only recover thing that you are going to use - look for parts with high heat dissipation. And let me remind you again, plan your move first then add attack later on - AR has no aim penalty while moving. Oh and try not to let escalation goes over 200 until you fell comfortable with the game mechanic.

That's all I can think of right now.

Theres a salvage budget? I just kinda press the salvage button... does it explain how that works??

[Cornbread With Salsa]

Originally posted by Cornbread With Salsa:

Originally posted by ccuancc:

first, start a new game. Do the tutorial. Conquer your first territory without delay. Then chill, fight a couple of patrol then go back to your captured zone and wait there for a day. Use the time control on the top right to do that. Then go back there and farm those patrol until you get your 3rd and 4th mech. I barely got any damage in most of the patrol and convoy mission. Equip 2 of your mechs with Assault rifle - 1 with handgun or smg and another with shield for 2ndary. then 3rd mech with Missile, ML6 is good for starter. And 4th mech with Sniper or markman rifle - I myself prefer a sniper.

For your mech parts, focus on speed (more power/less mass) and heat dissipation since you will barely getting any damage. The rest is how well you plan out your move. Find cover or use the enemies as cover. Use missile mech to shoot at tank, usually 2 salvo on the first turn should get them downed or destroyed. Then focus fire to take them out 1 by 1 if possible. Read the guide to learn about heat and weapon damage.

Don't be afraid to wait for escalation to go down, wasting time in your territory has no disadvantage. Learn to dodge missile. Plan your move then add the attack. Its ok to overheat in some occasion to dash and dodge missile or heavy damage. When firing sniper rifle, put the wait action. Don't move or the accuracy will go down (scatter). AI is so stupid, they will only attack predetermined unit so use that to your advantage. See which units will get attack by moving your cursor over the timeline then prioritize defence (hiding behind hills, building or their mech/tank) over everything.
And always salvage upper body to get more materials. try to spend all your salvage budget, it reset every battle. Only recover thing that you are going to use - look for parts with high heat dissipation. And let me remind you again, plan your move first then add attack later on - AR has no aim penalty while moving. Oh and try not to let escalation goes over 200 until you fell comfortable with the game mechanic.

That's all I can think of right now.

Theres a salvage budget? I just kinda press the salvage button... does it explain how that works??

How does this work? I can get get rewards I cant salvage anything from the enemy mechs?

[Hellstorm901]

Originally posted by Cornbread With Salsa:

Originally posted by Cornbread With Salsa:

Theres a salvage budget? I just kinda press the salvage button... does it explain how that works??

How does this work? I can get get rewards I cant salvage anything from the enemy mechs?

When you win a battle you have to choose what you want to take with items having a cost to either loot or break down for materials. The sort of in-game explanation is you can't hang around forever grabbing everything so your guys are having to select some items they can load on the truck before the enemy comes

When you win a battle salvage goes like this. There's captured salvage, allied salvage, damaged salvage and undamaged salvage

Captured Salvage - You usually get from a convoy or base raid. It's loot that is basically already on a truck ready to go so the game lets you take this salvage for free, it's pretty much your reward for the mission

Undamaged Salvage - Stuff that wasn't destroyed in the battle, it costs no extra points to take as your guys are pretty much just detaching it from the mech and taking it away. You will normally get this type of salvage from knocking out an enemy pilot with concussion damage or by getting a cockpit kill without destroying anything else on a mech

Damaged Salvage - This is stuff you shot off the enemy mechs in battle or recover from a dead enemy mech, it costs more than undamaged salvage because your guys are picking up the bits and pieces to put it back together

Allied salvage - This is stuff that was shot off your mech in battle or your mechs if they were knocked out. This type of salvage is automatically selected after a battle. It costs points to recover and when you recover it it's automatically reattached to whatever mech it was broken off from. You should always recover anything shot off your mech unless something the enemy has is much better to replace it with

[ccuancc]

Originally posted by Cornbread With Salsa:

Originally posted by Cornbread With Salsa:

Theres a salvage budget? I just kinda press the salvage button... does it explain how that works??

How does this work? I can get get rewards I cant salvage anything from the enemy mechs?

After the battle, it shows you your reward and below the reward, it a list of part you can recover or salvage. All of them is set to the right option (leave those part and get nothing). There you can check the left option to recover ( send them to inventory) or middle option to salvage them (get material). If the enemy mech is intact (not thoroughly destroyed), usually by dealing concussion dmg or pilot eject, then you can recover or salvage those parts at a cheaper salvage cost. You can find your salvage budget at the right side of the screen 0/90 etc. Try to spend as much as you can since it reset every battle.

And please read the guide in steam, it a bit long but it help me a lot too. I think it called comprehensive guide or something.

[Cornbread With Salsa]

Thanks to all here, im doing great! i took the second province and have all 4 mechs. I have a light sniper that deals many insta kills, a lighter-melee focused build on one mech and a heavy gatling-gun mech that usually gets me a concussed mech or two to salvage. And I have my last mech use a starburt mls to really rattle the enemies.

[ExoduS]

These two guides really helped me when I was starting out:

https://indiefaq.com/faq/phantom-brigade-general-faq.html

https://gamepretty.com/phantom-brigade-weapons-guide-variants-and-damage-types/

Most importantly:
Open world:
1) don't rush capturing territories. every time you do everything levels up to your level.
2) don't stay too long in one territory. hit a camp/outpost/farm then move to another territory while the 'threat' buildup cools off.
3) Do that until you scrape together enough resources to unlock stealth and overdrive for your base. THESE SHOULD BE YOUR FIRST TWO UNLOCKS
4) with stealth and over drive unlockeed hunt 'Equipment Convoys' they are typically lightly armed (2 mechs, maybe a tank as well) and give you crafting blueprints.
5) You can level up your crafting and therefore your mechs quickly by un equipping everything from all mechs, crafting one grey arm for each mech. equipping only that piece of gear. All of your mechs will show as being that level Boom. now your crafting level is increased by 1. eg. if you crafted 3x Lv 6 arms and equipped only that item on all 3 of your staring mechs, your crafting level will now be level 7. rinse, repeat. once you level up crafting a few levels (say 3,) then you can craft weapons at that level and use them to whoop ass.

Combat:
Spend a minute or two reviewing the first turn. find out which enemies will target which of your mechs and at what point in the turn, precisely. move your mechs into and out of cover accordingly. (or equip and use a shield if cover is not readily available). Your objective is to use the information the game gives you about the turn and counter it accordingly. Be in cover or shielding while being shot at, move out & shoot when not. This gets easier the more mechs you have, so after the mobility upgrades forgot the part salvage on one mech and take it's frame instead (or craft the frame in the workshop).
You want the 3 and 4 size mech bay ASAP. STOP THERE DO NOT UPGRADE FURTHER. you can only field 4 mechs, and they auto repair after each mission (over time). don't both with having spares, the downsides for increasing mech bay storage past 4 are not worth it.

Weapons:
Early game assault rifles and sniper rifles are decent, however:

**Missiles, Railguns and UHMG's are OP AF. Get them ASAP. Kill them ASAP**

Railguns make almost every kind of direct fire weapon obsolete.
They shoot through terrain (including cliffs & mountains), they shoot through and hit enemies in a line, but unlike beam weapons do not require a damage build up time nor do they hafve a long duration active time making them ideal for the type of shoot and scoot tactics this game requires. (infact you don't even have to move out of cover to shoot, you can shoot through it).
My personal favourite is the RF flux. it has a small cone spread, like a shotgun but waaayyyy better optimal range. more or less same range as a machine gun or assault rifle, but much shorter active time (therefore easier to fit into your timeline and also hit multiple enemies when they are lined up briefly), higher damage, higher stun, hits multiple mechs in a line... it's just crazy good.

Missiles shoot over cover and deal concussion damage, which KO's pilots while leaving the mech intact for cheaper (therefore more) salvage each mission.

UHMGs are stupid amounts of Concussion damage on a very big stick. literally KO's one enemy each turn. Likewise, will KO your pilots if the enemy has one. if they do, make this your priority target, or make sure there's a hill or mountain between him and whoever he is aiming at.

[ccuancc]

Originally posted by Cornbread With Salsa:

Thanks to all here, im doing great! i took the second province and have all 4 mechs. I have a light sniper that deals many insta kills, a lighter-melee focused build on one mech and a heavy gatling-gun mech that usually gets me a concussed mech or two to salvage. And I have my last mech use a starburt mls to really rattle the enemies.

congratz!!!! Enjoy your game.