Owhaul, my Brute Captain, finished speaking with Melende, his second in command. She was telling him about how thrilled she was to develop her thieving skills in his band, and her hopes for the future. He told her to keep her head high, things would only get better from here. Their relationship increased, and they truly loved each other after that night. [companionship +2

A few days of travelling later, after crossing the border into a new province, they ran into some merchants being accosted on the road by bandits; a tough group, by the looks of it. Melende pleaded with Owhaul to leave them be, that they could come back and scavenge the remains later. But he insisted that the right thing to do was to help.

Melende buried Owhaul on that very same roadside after a hard fought victory; their camp cook also fell in defense of those cowardly merchants, who "rewarded" them with a pittance of gold for their losses. Melende swore to take up Owhauls banner, but to never help traders again.

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I'm not very far into this game but damn it grabs you. Stories and Characters emerge through the sandbox seemingly effortlessly, and the challenge of managing your party is engrossing!

It's like Bannerlord but a finished game instead

Tried this game for the first time last night and 6 hours later I was like hmm I gotta go to bed.
It is an open world turn based sandbox. I have only played it with every dlc but the tavern is fun for exploiting and getting infinite money. The rats nest are really crazy, but so are the profession minigames like blacksmithing for superior items. Building the camp is super important and grants huge bonuses. I didn't realize you could assign people to structures for a while but that made a huge difference too.
Overall this is one of those games you can sink time into and go insane.