D.E.C.K.

The Deadly Experience Campaign Kick-back is experienced veteran players who start a new account, changing the dynamic of the way the game is played from the beginning. Credit goes to Game Knight for his original D.I.E challenge.

To Kick-off your Kick-back, download this profile and overwrite your profile (back it up first). It is a new account with all Vet tasks that can be reasonably completed without playing and a couple deliveries.

You have 1 Vet skill and can use all resources at your disposal with the following exceptions (rules):

1. You must always treat, pay and rest your warband (end the day) before any other Warband Management is allowed. All other activities do not count so you can send shipments and sell items before "resting" your warband. Warriors are never fired, they can only leave the warband through death in battle.
2. All warband slots will always be filled for missions (recovering, training or active warriors all count).
3. Filling a warband slot must come first from any active (not training/recovering) warriors in reserve slots. If there are none available, you can use a non-active warrior from the reserves or hire a new one. Leader, Hero and Henchmen types are the requirement for the respective warband slots. I.E. You don't have to put a henchman in a hero slot but you can.
4. Warriors may only be put into reserve slots if they are recovering from injuries or training. If you bench a warrior, you must fill the slot according to #3. Directly before entering a mission (warband is full, ready and mission is picked) recruits can be hired in the Reserve Slots to feed the warband on the next day (rule #1).
5. If you enter a scenario that is not deadly, you must abandon the mission as your first action (excepting counter-attacks). This includes the first Normal mission. This mechanic gives a veteran player a veteran warband to play with from the start. This can also be used to lower your rating through injuries to enter a deadly campaign mission (see below).
6. You must always Launch Mission NEVER Launch and Deploy.
7. Backtrack rule: If you ever accidentally, strategically, or unavoidable cross a movement flag (other than the one your currently on), movement ends at that flag. The warrior may use all available SP (and OP) but cannot move. If the flag is positioned where you cannot stop on the flag (friendly threat zones, for instance) the warrior moves to the closest open area and ends the turn (cannot use SP/OP or do anything else). Although, if there are multiple places that are the same distance away, the player chooses which place to end the turn.
8. You may not use the overhead map except during campaign missions.

Winning condition: Complete the Campaign (see below).

Losing condition: Miss 1 shipment or fail to treat/pay your warband

Score: (Enemies Out of Action - Days Spent) \* (Missions played) / Allies Out of Action = Score
Note: This is the same as Game Knights D.I.E v2.1 Challenge and may need adjusted.

Modifiers: You can add modifiers to your final score, totaling up to +100 depending on how you play. For instance, if you play Undead with a Doomweaver you can only get +80 unless you use Reserve Slots, etc.

+ 5 each: Disabling DLC warbands\*

+ 10: Not using the overhead map during campaign missions

+ 10: Disabling Wagon Beacons

+ 10: Not using the Reserve Slots

+ 15 each: Disabling DLC Hired Swords\*

(\*) Any DLC counts as disabled if it is never used.

Points are distributed according to value versus practicality. For example, not using your Reserve Slots would require many more injuries to your warband and it has restricted use so its lower than its actual value. Also, players can use warbands that they have not played before and can use the Overhead Map during campaign missions if needed so the value is lower than its actual impact.

## Campaign Ratings

To enter a campaign mission as deadly, you can lower your rating by keeping recovering or training warriors in your warband if your rating is to high. If you do not have injured warriors in your warband to lower your rating, you can enter a mission and abandon it for recovery time and/or injuries. Alternatively, you can opportunistically "build" a warband capable of winning the campaign in the Reserve Slots over time. Remember that allocating points, skills and equipment (as well as injuries) affects your rating.

Below is a chart for rating reference:

## Notes

The Reserve Slot manipulation has a huge RNG element where the only control the player has with the warband slots is training a warrior or purposefully causing RNG injuries. There is a buffer of sorts by hiring new recruits in the Reserve Slots to feed the RNG injuries and substitute for any warriors that are set aside for the campaign. Injuries themselves lower the warband rating by up to 15 per injury, making it possible to take a leveled warband into a deadly campaign, if everyone has multiple injuries.

Having a beginner profile allows the player to do whatever they like with the extremely limited resources. The player can go for more vet tasks to open the cramped play. It also increases the difficulty by having only 2 map locations. Remembering what new players go through is fun and challenging. On the one hand, it is extremely limiting. On the other, it is fun to hear "Task Complete" happening often again. This is a difficulty that Veteran Players have not had to deal with in a long time, especially with the limited play (scouting without the map) that the challenge forces.

The difficulty of Launch Mission is high, especially in strike teams (potentially scattering single warriors to the wind). You can offset this by investing all in alertness and using dagger/dagger as the initial set to start with. If you get to go first, you have a much better chance at a cohesive defense (or offense) and can enter any scenario (even scattered/scattered) for when a deadly pops up.

Range (in particular, long range) weapons and spells get a buff with the ability to target. Not using the map means that enemy resistances, stats, etc. remain hidden until a melee is in close combat. Range can scout the enemy weaknesses (and names for Marked for Death) as well as current health and damage modifiers (armour absorption, etc.) the enemy has.

## Notes on Backtrack

The most difficult is scouting. With not being able to backtrack or use the map, loot and (especially) secondary objectives become extremely difficult to obtain. Using perception is the best bet but can put your warrior out of a workable formation very quickly without the ability to backtrack.

The Backtrack rule is worded to allow very limited scouting ability. It is possible to do a U-turn and double-back, spending all SP (being careful not to cross SP points) and return to your original (or any other previous) SP point ending the scout turn with a stance. This is especially true if you are straight-line scouting and see an enemy or realize the direction your going isn't panning out. Even if all your SP is spent, you can reverse course, hitting your closest "forbidden" SP point and end in a stance.

Bottom line is that scouting has a very limited range plus moving through narrow spaces and buildings is problematic since it can be difficult not to cross your own SP points to get out. The Backtrack rule is worded so you can climb (spending SP), grab a loot point (spending SP), take back the "forbidden" SP point at the jump point (ending your movement), use the SP to jump down (without moving), and use whatever OP/SP is available (except moving) before ending the turn.

Most of the time you can only get a bit of loot from a battle if your keeping a mobile tactical formation. The Backtrack rule doesn't forbid taking SP points back, it forbids moving after a SP point has been taken back. This gives a slight variation that treats previous SP points as an SP pick-up that ends movement. Used strategically, there is slightly more loot and scouting tactics that can be reasonably done given the deadly environment. A quick double-back just may save a warrior or two. Remember that winning is the best way to gain money.