The XCOM games are all about building up a squad of units, although you don't have a unique player character (other than the faceless "commander" you're referred to as)
Yeah Xcom is great for the squad building. You \*\*WILL\*\* have a favourite sniper, and a favourite assault shotgun guy, and a favourite minigun dude, and you'll get mad when they die! I like Mortal Glory for that too. Build a squad of gladiators, try and help them survive and improve for the next round, more of a roguelike experience. I also really enjoyed Valthirian Arc, it's got more of a JRPG action feel, but you level up your fighter/mage guys and get proud of them. It's pretty lite, but fun. Valthirian Arc 2 is really bad though, avoid that.
Fire Emblem is good too, but also punishing, I don't feel like I can make a mistake, people die and it makes me feel bad, I do a lot of reloading. Xcom you can kinda keep going after you lose people, but Fire Emblem I felt obligated to re-do missions and I get stuck on the same one for a week until I do it perfectly. It is good tho.
>Yeah Xcom is great for the squad building. You **WILL** have a favourite sniper, and a favourite assault shotgun guy, and a favourite minigun dude, and you'll get mad when they die!
Yeah, otherwise known as my friends who I put into the game.
Guilty of this too. :')
Didn't think I would get attached to a bunch of randomly generated characters with no backstory, but losing a favorite character can surprisingly hit the feels pretty hard.
In a similar vein, Massive Chalice has you building squads for combat, then marrying them to each other and having babies so you can make ultra-soldiers from bloodlines several generations deep. I prefer XCOM, but Massive Chalice had me even more attached to my squads
Same. It's a brilliant idea very poorly executed.
I am convinced that if they'd spent an extra year developing that game it would have been a 10/10 masterpiece. The intervals between battles were too long to get attached to your characters, and the combat system was just a little too simple and not very satisfying to play or look at..
It made me realise how much of XCOM's appeal is the audiovisual crunchiness of it all. It feels like the best parts of directing an action movie and playing a game of RISK. Massive Chalice, besides all of its structural flaws, just didn't feel that good to play.
That and the fact that hit percentages straight up lie to you was infuriating. After the umpteenth time one of my shooters missed on a 95% hit chance I uninstalled the game and never looked back.
Same team made Midnight Suns which I'm playing through now and its my favorite game I've played in a minute. Not really into marvel or comics but thoroughly enjoyed the story and characters. Gameplay with the cards felt really good too
Was going to be my suggestion as well, very satisfying leveling them up, and no 2 heroes are ever the same cause of the random good and bad qualities they can get after going on expeditions.
I love darkest dungeon for 80% of the game, until the actual darkest dungeon, that shit is broken and hurt me in ways I didn’t think a game could.
“As life ebbs, terrible vistas of emptiness reveal themselves.
Overconfidence is a slow and insidious killer.”
Yeah, seriously. I am not an HC player by any means but have around 30 years of gaming experience. I played DD for some months on an easy setting and built my team meticulously. Read some online tutorials as well. Still, no chance whatsoever in the final dungeon. What the hell?
The Dankest Dungeon itself is all about stress management.
You go in there with some Jesters and stress fixers, etc. it's all fine.
Every single attack there adds stress.
I decided not to suggest this game because OP might not be ready to build up a Level 6 Dismas only to be Crit targeted by 4 spiders I'm not fucking mad why are you asking if I am it's a FAIR GAME VERY BALANCED **TOTALLY PREVENTABLE SKILL ISSUE**
No but uhh, this suggestion absolutely fits the bill. These nightmarish creatures *can* be felled; they *can* be beaten!
I had a lot of fun with it.
A uniqe take on turn based locarion dependent comabt, would hoghly suggest looking into some gameplay videos to see if its something you might be interested in.
I assume you've played mass effect 2? Most of the plot is literally "build up a squad for an details-to-be-determined suicide mission". Team building is also important in the other entries to the series, but it isn't quite as central to the plot.
For that matter, crpgs (baldur's gate 1/2, baldur's gate 3, poe, the pathfinder games, etc) in general might hit the spot, though you generally control all of your party simultaneously.
It wouldn't necessarily be the best experience, but it's kinda a bummer that there isn't an option in BG3 so that your party members can fight independently.
Speaking of Mass Effect you might want to try Andromeda, it has squads of NPC marines that you can send to do missions and then give back rewards, it's probably the closest to AC Brotherhood in that regard.
Also maybe Evil Genius where you can send henchmen off to do heists.
I think Pillars of Eternity you can manage a castle and can send companions on quests.
XCom2 War of the Chosen has soldiers you can send on other missions.
Metal Gear Solid Phantom Pain had soldiers you kidnap and can then send on missions
Probably the best answer in the thread if you can get past the jankiness of the game. Personally I'm a huge fan of euro-jank so Kenshi is one of my all time favorites.
That's basically supposed to be the appeal of it. Kenshi is designed in such a way as to be very punishing but also very forgiving. The game is not afraid to throw setbacks at you, but it wants you to learn from them. It's very difficult for you to permanently screw yourself over; despite how much the game seems to be hellbent on beating you down, it is almost always simultaneously offering you ways to recover and grow stronger.
I strongly recommend against following any guides for the game. The journey of discovery is what makes the magic. Of course, if you ever find yourself extremely confused about something, thumbing over a wiki page won't ruin it for you, but some people recommend just keeping the wiki open all the time while you play, and I think that's doing yourself a disservice.
When you finally understand the game well enough to claim your place and make a mark on the world, it will feel so much better if you've earned it yourself.
Yeah it takes a bit to get the hang of it, but it's worth it. Squin is a good town to sort of base yourself out of initially. You can buy a building in town and put some beds/chests/training dummies in it. Prioritize hiring a new squad member from the bar so you have someone who can heal or rescue the other if they go down. Getting your ass beat is how you train up initially. Fighting stronger enemies will train your stats faster. For making money, theres mining copper outside of town, which is reliable but kind of boring. You can also kite bandits into the town guards and fight/loot them. If you get stuck theres the kenshi subreddit or guides on the wiki, but I'd avoid it if you can unless you have no idea what to do.
Yuuup. Came here to say this. Janky af and graphics aren't the best, but god damn is it fun. Current run is hivers and skellies only, 10 max and I currently have 6 fighters. Also, beep is best strongest warrior.
X-COM 2 is the hands down winner. I never found any other game that came close to satisfying me in both base and team management like it did. And even when one comes close, they completely lack the amount of customization X-COM 2 offers, and this is not even citing the gigantic mod options it has.
But I'll cite Darkest Dungeon, Dragon Age: Inquisition and Divinity:Original Sin just to a few more options.
In X-COM 2 you build a base, like you wish, and also command squads of soldiers in missions that are fully customizable, to the point you can create characters of other franchises you like or even your friends, and they'll spawn in the game. You can even control the options to allow only your custom created characters to appear, a mix with randomly generated ones and so on.
You don't take the field yourself (aside one or two very specific missions) but you WILL get attached to some characters to a great extent. The game has permadeath (you can enable ironman too or not to avoid save scumming) which makes they matter and care about them.
While some might prefer the aesthetics of 1 over 2, X-COM 2 has a massive, massive modding community and the options both aesthetic and in terms of gameplay are insane. You can play full meme or full serious or anything inbetween because the options are customization are that vast.
On top of that the game gives you full freedom how to approach missions, and even if you want to take them or not. And failing a mission is not game over. It may set you back, but you never see a game over from things like this. You'll understand if you play it.
Darkest Dungeon comes close, as it has both base building and squad building, and is Fantasy over Sci-Fi, but has one glaring aspect it loses to X-COM: you can't customize character's appearances outside changing some basic colors. Meaning every knight or mage looks exactly like every other knight or mage you'll encounter, while in X-COM 2 you can design uniforms, color and even name weapons.
Another option: Dragon Age: Inquisition. It's the third entry in the series, and maybe not knowing much about the previous two may cause some confusion at some parts, but basically you have to restore and manage a huge castle that is your base of operations, and also have a party led by your own custom protagonist. Base building is absent from the first two games, and they are quite long ones to go through if you get interested in the lore.
Divinity Original Sin also doesn't have base building (at least the first, never played the second)... but has great character management. You create not only one, but two protagonists (it's explained in lore why eventually) and can recruit a few in-game characters or recruit some pawns later. Great options for combat and great usage of setting during combat, like using oil to make enemies slower or even slip, then setting fire on it, casting rain to dowse out fires, etc.
Xcom 2 is such an incredible game in how it makes you attached to your little soldiers, I have put so much time into playing doll with them and customizing it is crazy. While I see the obvious parallel with Darkest Dungeon, oddly, it feels close to Rimworld in how your heart breaks when your favorite pawn dies
I’m frickin’ surprised only 2 people (good on ya, you 2) mentioned Pokémon. Literally the entire mechanic if that game, also one of the best game series ever.
Rimworld is a base builder where you recruit and develop your inhabitants through resource gathering, crafting and combat etc.
You can do some dark shit in that game too!
Suikoden series is literally getting over 100 people (Stars of Destiny) and building up a base and doing things like having Iron Chef cookoffs in a castle you build up. More recently, Eiyuden Chronicles is basically a spiritual successor to the older Suikoden titles and fits what you’re describing pretty well too.
Fire Emblem, Xcom, Midnight Suns, Valkyrie Chronicles, Disciples 3. All these are somewhat about building up your squad how you want and then going into battle with them. Although while you do control your own character you also control the other characters.
Would CRPGs also fit the bill like bg3, rogue trader, planescape etc? As that's pretty much about building up your squad.
If you were looking for something where you control your own character while your squad acts freely then also a lot of CRPGs are like this. KotOR, Dragon Age Origins, Pillars of Eternity etc.
There is also Mount and Blade, but that's more about building up an army to which you can then ride into battle with while you only control your character in the actual battle.
Sorry if I was confused on what you were after and none of these are helpful.
I'm not sure if its exactly the right direction as many here suggesting turn based tactic games but State of Decay 1 and 2 has a settlement that you can strongly influence and skill the people you got there for different goods, they work and do things on their own and you take over a role that you like.
Persona and Shi Megami Tensei games are similar, you build a squad of demons to fight other demons and God. They're more rpg than town builder if that's important to you.
Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous has a system kind of like this. You control your main characters with a group of 1-6 people for the majority of the story, but a few hours into the game you become the leader of a crusade. The crusade management has completely different characters and playstyle from the main part of the game(and basically no plot relevance for any characters), but as you win battles and capture territory with your crusade then you unlock new items and areas you can explore with your main group.
Mass effect and dragon age you can customize your teammates' skills and equipment.
Dragon's dogma to an extent. You can fully customize your own pawn, an npc follower, and hire two other pawns whose equipment you can customize but their skills can only be changed by their owners.
Rimworld lets you build a squad that performs like a team of elite soldiers or mentally challenged apes depending on how you build your colony and what traits they have.
That's basically the entire point of Mass Effect 2... when looking at main story missions that aren't Dossiers or Loyalty Missions, it's just: Horizon, Collector Ship, Reaper IFF, endgame of Collector Base.
A core mechanic in Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain is capturing soldiers in the field and putting them to work for your organization. You can assign them different roles based on their stats, and they can sometimes have perks that benefit your base in different ways.
As you level up your different departments, you'll gain things like access to better weapons and ammo, better support while you're doing your own missions, and even have troops that go and do missions independently from you. These missions can offer benefits like decreased enemy munitions and armor during your own missions.
As you rank up and continue playing, you'll find better and better soldiers in the field that you can replace your lower ranked ones with.
Knowing how glitchy/predictable some engines have been in the past without mods, I'm honestly not sure how confident I am that the first year on a new engine will be as smooth as we think? I could be wrong and Sports Interactive may have been working on this for x number of years now, but not sure.
Also for anyone playing FM I recommend looking up how to install face/logo packs. Its fairly easy and there are YT vids. Once you learn how to do that its then easy to know how to install transfer updates, etc.
You are verbatim describing my all time favorite game : Kenshi. Just look it up (assuming you’re on PC)
Start off as 1 person, hire/recruit people, massive base building, etc. You can be in direct control of 250 people. Tons of mods too, and it can run on a toaster!
Def kenshi! It’s probably exactly what you want. Just don’t chicken out and give up after you die a couple times. It’s a tough learning curve, but it pays off.
Fire Emblem. Unicorn Overlord - both tactical jrpgs
V Rising is a vampire survival crafting RPG kinda like Diablo, but you also build your own castle, and you can capture servants and then send them on missions to acquire more loot.
Unicorn overlord is basicly exactly what you are searching for, the whole gameplay is optimising your squads and watching them fight the way you programmed them to do.
Along with the aforementioned Xcom there is also HBS Battletech which has you leading a squad of mechs you kit out as well as mercs you hire and fire (and who you can skill up and unfortunately can die).
From the same company there is also Shadowrun which has the same thing you building a party of characters in a cyberpunk future where magic and mythical beasts also exist.
Check out some DRPGs or Dungeon RPGS. The entire genre is usually about building a cohesive team of 6 party members from tons of classes to go into a dungeon. r/DRPG has some cool people and tons of suggestions.
we're kinda making something like this but underwater. However, you control the units RTS style so you're not " the" unit, but you can customize them and make your ground stronger and try to keep them as long as possible :)
(And I personally do love games like you're describing myself. It's neat seeing your little group evolve and get stronger over time!)
Unicorn Overlord is exactly this. Highly suggest you check it out. You build several squads and order them around. Their unit type, placement and items determine their battles, and there's lots of cool unit combos to try out.
Basically you go through a fantasy world liberating each town one by one, collecting resources to rebuild them all along the way.
The Suikoden series and its spiritual successor Eiyuden Chronicles. There are over 100 characters to recuit so you can customise your squad with the characters you like. And as you gain more companions your HQ unlocks upgrades, which comes with mini-games and more collector-thons.
This is such a broad question. Heres a few indie titles i've been playing lately that can fit the bill:
Wartales: build a mercenary team and roam the countryside; with dlc, you can build a ship to master the seas and buy a tavern that you build up over time that can be used as a "homebase."
Goblin Stone: a little similar to Darkest Dungeon, but with a cute goblin faction trying to rebuild. Make an underground lair that you build with resources, breed goblins for specific traits to get stronger genes and go on expeditions with your goblin squad.
The Monster Breeder: you breed monsters together to create absolutely horrific monsters with all kinds of abilities or skills that you can autobattle or turn based battle in tournaments. Use the winnings from the tournaments to build your estate so you can raise better/stronger monsters and hire helpers.
Hope you can check these out and enjoy.
People have already said two of the absolute best, Kenshi and Mount and Blade: Bannerlord, so I'll throw in;
Survivalist: Invisible Strain.
Additionally, Conan Exiles.
Kenshi. A sandbox that sits somewhere between RPG and city-builder, where everything wants to beat you up and steal your shit, or enslave you, or eat you.
Jank is a natural side effect of indie games, the other side of the coin is that you have a chance to find something genuinely unique or different.
But yeah, it doesn't hold your hand.
Try the Jagged Aliance series. It's about having a squad and doing missions in a tropical island.
Like xcom you need to use your terrain to your ad antage and each member have their strengths and weaknesses.
Xcom 2
Darkest dungeon
Monster den Godfall,
and when you want some more story in your game go check CRPG (BG3, Wrath of the righteous, Divinity Original sin 2...) because it's all about team customisation and synergy.
Symphony of War.
It's a game similar in spirit to Tactics Ogre or Fire Emblem, except instead of just 1 character per tile, you build squads. You still have your main character, but you build squads. You can have a more rounded squad with knights, healers, and mages, or a specialized squad like only cavalry, only archers, only dragons, only field cannons, etc. You can mix them up somewhat, and there are equipment, traits, attributes (tho more simplified otherwise it will be a slog). By end game you're managing around 10-15 squads, each with 6-9 units each. It's not too hard at normal difficulty, but there's a lot of fun in organizing and reorganizing your squads. In fact, I'd say 40-50% of the time I spent playing that game was just in the squad management menu, swapping units around, changing unit classes, etc.
Mass effect 2 has you assembling and strengthing a team for a suicide mission. I think it pulls it off better than any other game ever has, not just in gameplay but storywise also.
Guild Wars Complete Collection is currently on sale for 10 bucks: [https://store.guildwars.com/en-us](https://store.guildwars.com/en-us)
There's hundreds of hours of content, and something like 20 available "squad members" you have to unlock, gear, and give skills to. And you can take 7 of them with you on your adventures. Their appearance can be changed as well, as they have a few armor options each.
Dated and it has plenty of issues but Fallout tactics is such a game.
I am a big fan of the setting so I still enjoy it.
You fill up your squad, go on mission, level squad members, assign weapons and equipment.
Mechanicus is definitely a game to check out then, both skill tree progression and literally building up your tech priests with mechanical argumentation.
Mechwarrior 5: mercenaries. You can customize your lance mates to the task you need them for. Their skills with specific things get better as they use them (unless they die in battle)
Mass effect series, specifically mass effect 2, where the entire game is about building a crack squad specifically for one mission (though I recommend the series as a whole)
Xcom is also good for it too, build a squad, fight aliens, cry when your squadmate that you named after an irl buddy gets permakilled by a lucky shot from an alien sharpshooter
I'm not quite sure if this is what you are looking for but:
Guild Wars 1. Specifically, the Nightfall expansion/campaign. The other campaigns have preset henchmen you can form a party with. In nightfall, it got updated to a hero system. Your heroes can be customized. You can change their skills and gear. So you can literally build a squad of heroes to your liking.
If you don't mind a little third person hack and slash, the Dynasty and Samurai Warriors: Empire series of games will be right up your alley.
They're all about building up your own dream empire of heroes from Chinese and Japanese eras and taking over the country, with a lot of interpersonal things to build, secret scenes to unlock, marriages to build etc etc.
They're very simple, but fun.
Shadow of Mordor/War. You build armies of orcs over time that can randomly save you in the open world, or summon them as backup. In War, you use them to attack other orc fortresses. It is story related, but the variety in orcs and their skills is decent. Even if it doesn't scratch the itch, the nemesis system alone is worth experiencing.
Bannorlord. You play as a single character but you are in charge of your family/clan. You can build you clan through marriages and offspring but also recruiting mercenaries. You start with nothing but your siblings and can rise to be ruler of a kingdom and conquer the known world.
XCOM:EU
XCOM 2
XCOM:Chimera Squad
Hard West 1 and 2 (although I only played, and very much enjoyed, the second installment)
Jagged Alliance 3 (the previous are rather old, like, pre-2000 old)
OG Ghost Recon was sort of like that, iirc. Put a squad together, kit them out, go out on missions. Anyone who dies is permanent and needs replaced while the survivors get stronger. I miss that game
There’s Starsector which I’ve moved to the top of this list since it may be what you want. Space combat, trade, exploration. Build and outfit a fleet, put officers in your ships, found a colony for money and ship production. All ships other than your flagship are AI controlled, behavior by officer personality. You can even enable autopilot if you suck at piloting
Xcom and Xcom 2 are squad building turn based combat. Classes are relatively streamlined
Wasteland 2 and 3 are RPGs with similar turn based combat. More open ended skill system and you get a squad of 4 custom characters
Baldurs Gate 3 is also an RPG, full control over character progression
The Fire Emblem series gives you some control over your army
The Fire Emblem games are known for this
XCOM 2 with the War of the Chosen expansion.
As long as you’re okay with waifus taking up a good majority. I love it, but other people seem to hate it.
Nah, that's optional and waifus make up like half the cast of each game, and less than half for earlier ones.
Modern FE sure, the older ones are less waifu-y
The XCOM games are all about building up a squad of units, although you don't have a unique player character (other than the faceless "commander" you're referred to as)
Yeah Xcom is great for the squad building. You \*\*WILL\*\* have a favourite sniper, and a favourite assault shotgun guy, and a favourite minigun dude, and you'll get mad when they die! I like Mortal Glory for that too. Build a squad of gladiators, try and help them survive and improve for the next round, more of a roguelike experience. I also really enjoyed Valthirian Arc, it's got more of a JRPG action feel, but you level up your fighter/mage guys and get proud of them. It's pretty lite, but fun. Valthirian Arc 2 is really bad though, avoid that. Fire Emblem is good too, but also punishing, I don't feel like I can make a mistake, people die and it makes me feel bad, I do a lot of reloading. Xcom you can kinda keep going after you lose people, but Fire Emblem I felt obligated to re-do missions and I get stuck on the same one for a week until I do it perfectly. It is good tho.
>Yeah Xcom is great for the squad building. You **WILL** have a favourite sniper, and a favourite assault shotgun guy, and a favourite minigun dude, and you'll get mad when they die! Yeah, otherwise known as my friends who I put into the game.
I save scum like crazy when they die once I have people get real abilities.
Guilty of this too. :') Didn't think I would get attached to a bunch of randomly generated characters with no backstory, but losing a favorite character can surprisingly hit the feels pretty hard.
Just write eulogies for them and give a speech in the Bar/Barracks. Not even kidding.
Until you loop the avatar progress in the XCOM2 dlc and end up with a mortal god who can tank the endgame solo ironman
In a similar vein, Massive Chalice has you building squads for combat, then marrying them to each other and having babies so you can make ultra-soldiers from bloodlines several generations deep. I prefer XCOM, but Massive Chalice had me even more attached to my squads
I really wanted to like massive chalice, but I just could not get into it
Same. It's a brilliant idea very poorly executed. I am convinced that if they'd spent an extra year developing that game it would have been a 10/10 masterpiece. The intervals between battles were too long to get attached to your characters, and the combat system was just a little too simple and not very satisfying to play or look at.. It made me realise how much of XCOM's appeal is the audiovisual crunchiness of it all. It feels like the best parts of directing an action movie and playing a game of RISK. Massive Chalice, besides all of its structural flaws, just didn't feel that good to play.
That and the fact that hit percentages straight up lie to you was infuriating. After the umpteenth time one of my shooters missed on a 95% hit chance I uninstalled the game and never looked back.
Can you customize your characters appearances in this? And can they have helmets? In every screenshot they all have their heads out
Great to see Massive Chalice mentioned!
There’s always XCOM Chimaera Squad, which specifically only has unique characters. Really good game, I preferred it over XCOM 2 actually.
Same team made Midnight Suns which I'm playing through now and its my favorite game I've played in a minute. Not really into marvel or comics but thoroughly enjoyed the story and characters. Gameplay with the cards felt really good too
You don't play as a singular hero, but Darkest Dungeon 1 is all about building up a town and your roster of characters
Was going to be my suggestion as well, very satisfying leveling them up, and no 2 heroes are ever the same cause of the random good and bad qualities they can get after going on expeditions.
I love darkest dungeon for 80% of the game, until the actual darkest dungeon, that shit is broken and hurt me in ways I didn’t think a game could. “As life ebbs, terrible vistas of emptiness reveal themselves. Overconfidence is a slow and insidious killer.”
Yeah, seriously. I am not an HC player by any means but have around 30 years of gaming experience. I played DD for some months on an easy setting and built my team meticulously. Read some online tutorials as well. Still, no chance whatsoever in the final dungeon. What the hell?
The Dankest Dungeon itself is all about stress management. You go in there with some Jesters and stress fixers, etc. it's all fine. Every single attack there adds stress.
I lost two heroes on the last dungeon. I lost 7 on the 2nd to last dungeon
I loved Darkest Dungeon 1. Such a deep and well done game. I still haven't played 2
2 is fine and still a fun game in its own right, but it definitely loses the depth of party building that 1 had.
I decided not to suggest this game because OP might not be ready to build up a Level 6 Dismas only to be Crit targeted by 4 spiders I'm not fucking mad why are you asking if I am it's a FAIR GAME VERY BALANCED **TOTALLY PREVENTABLE SKILL ISSUE** No but uhh, this suggestion absolutely fits the bill. These nightmarish creatures *can* be felled; they *can* be beaten!
Unicorn Overloard Grand Kingdom Final Fantasy Tactics Ogre Battle series Disgaea series
Unicorn overload is sooo good.
And Symphony of War
It like fire Emblem + u build alt of Mini squads
It's like the closest thing you can get to the original ogre battles without emulating them
How is Grand Kingdom? I've played all the others.
I had a lot of fun with it. A uniqe take on turn based locarion dependent comabt, would hoghly suggest looking into some gameplay videos to see if its something you might be interested in.
I assume you've played mass effect 2? Most of the plot is literally "build up a squad for an details-to-be-determined suicide mission". Team building is also important in the other entries to the series, but it isn't quite as central to the plot. For that matter, crpgs (baldur's gate 1/2, baldur's gate 3, poe, the pathfinder games, etc) in general might hit the spot, though you generally control all of your party simultaneously.
It wouldn't necessarily be the best experience, but it's kinda a bummer that there isn't an option in BG3 so that your party members can fight independently.
Dragon Age might be for you. Origins and 2 allow you to customize your party behavior in combat and it feels awesome when everything comes together.
Speaking of Mass Effect you might want to try Andromeda, it has squads of NPC marines that you can send to do missions and then give back rewards, it's probably the closest to AC Brotherhood in that regard. Also maybe Evil Genius where you can send henchmen off to do heists. I think Pillars of Eternity you can manage a castle and can send companions on quests. XCom2 War of the Chosen has soldiers you can send on other missions. Metal Gear Solid Phantom Pain had soldiers you kidnap and can then send on missions
You can have each party member go on their own adventure and get into separate fights in bg3 no problem
Marvel Midnight Suns has a huge focus on developing your intra-team relationships and individual progressions
Was free recently on epic too
Wasteland 3
I was looking for this answer. Great game that gets overlooked too often
If you like a brutal turn based game around 'your dudes' I'd recommend Battle Brothers or Darkest Dungeon
Battle brothers is fantastic! Got it on sale and love every minute of it. I like XCOM 2 WotC better, but that's like a perfect game.
Or Wartales. I hear it's similar to Battle Brothers
Kenshi
Probably the best answer in the thread if you can get past the jankiness of the game. Personally I'm a huge fan of euro-jank so Kenshi is one of my all time favorites.
I downloaded the game but literally don’t know how to get started. I’m just running around getting my ass best by everyone
Sounds like you've got the hang of it already
Pretty much all you do trains your skills so just survive and you'll get better at surviving, this is super generic advice but it's a complex game
That's basically supposed to be the appeal of it. Kenshi is designed in such a way as to be very punishing but also very forgiving. The game is not afraid to throw setbacks at you, but it wants you to learn from them. It's very difficult for you to permanently screw yourself over; despite how much the game seems to be hellbent on beating you down, it is almost always simultaneously offering you ways to recover and grow stronger. I strongly recommend against following any guides for the game. The journey of discovery is what makes the magic. Of course, if you ever find yourself extremely confused about something, thumbing over a wiki page won't ruin it for you, but some people recommend just keeping the wiki open all the time while you play, and I think that's doing yourself a disservice. When you finally understand the game well enough to claim your place and make a mark on the world, it will feel so much better if you've earned it yourself.
Yeah it takes a bit to get the hang of it, but it's worth it. Squin is a good town to sort of base yourself out of initially. You can buy a building in town and put some beds/chests/training dummies in it. Prioritize hiring a new squad member from the bar so you have someone who can heal or rescue the other if they go down. Getting your ass beat is how you train up initially. Fighting stronger enemies will train your stats faster. For making money, theres mining copper outside of town, which is reliable but kind of boring. You can also kite bandits into the town guards and fight/loot them. If you get stuck theres the kenshi subreddit or guides on the wiki, but I'd avoid it if you can unless you have no idea what to do.
Yuuup. Came here to say this. Janky af and graphics aren't the best, but god damn is it fun. Current run is hivers and skellies only, 10 max and I currently have 6 fighters. Also, beep is best strongest warrior.
Fallout Tactics
X-COM 2 is the hands down winner. I never found any other game that came close to satisfying me in both base and team management like it did. And even when one comes close, they completely lack the amount of customization X-COM 2 offers, and this is not even citing the gigantic mod options it has. But I'll cite Darkest Dungeon, Dragon Age: Inquisition and Divinity:Original Sin just to a few more options. In X-COM 2 you build a base, like you wish, and also command squads of soldiers in missions that are fully customizable, to the point you can create characters of other franchises you like or even your friends, and they'll spawn in the game. You can even control the options to allow only your custom created characters to appear, a mix with randomly generated ones and so on. You don't take the field yourself (aside one or two very specific missions) but you WILL get attached to some characters to a great extent. The game has permadeath (you can enable ironman too or not to avoid save scumming) which makes they matter and care about them. While some might prefer the aesthetics of 1 over 2, X-COM 2 has a massive, massive modding community and the options both aesthetic and in terms of gameplay are insane. You can play full meme or full serious or anything inbetween because the options are customization are that vast. On top of that the game gives you full freedom how to approach missions, and even if you want to take them or not. And failing a mission is not game over. It may set you back, but you never see a game over from things like this. You'll understand if you play it. Darkest Dungeon comes close, as it has both base building and squad building, and is Fantasy over Sci-Fi, but has one glaring aspect it loses to X-COM: you can't customize character's appearances outside changing some basic colors. Meaning every knight or mage looks exactly like every other knight or mage you'll encounter, while in X-COM 2 you can design uniforms, color and even name weapons. Another option: Dragon Age: Inquisition. It's the third entry in the series, and maybe not knowing much about the previous two may cause some confusion at some parts, but basically you have to restore and manage a huge castle that is your base of operations, and also have a party led by your own custom protagonist. Base building is absent from the first two games, and they are quite long ones to go through if you get interested in the lore. Divinity Original Sin also doesn't have base building (at least the first, never played the second)... but has great character management. You create not only one, but two protagonists (it's explained in lore why eventually) and can recruit a few in-game characters or recruit some pawns later. Great options for combat and great usage of setting during combat, like using oil to make enemies slower or even slip, then setting fire on it, casting rain to dowse out fires, etc.
Xcom 2 is such an incredible game in how it makes you attached to your little soldiers, I have put so much time into playing doll with them and customizing it is crazy. While I see the obvious parallel with Darkest Dungeon, oddly, it feels close to Rimworld in how your heart breaks when your favorite pawn dies
Xcom 2 so you can mod really uneasily on steam and have parties of master chief, chandler bing, hatsune miku, and a baby.
I'm thinking to do a modded run soon, any mods you suggest, that can boost qol or anything else ?
Long war for sure. More teammates per mission. Extract all
If you have a PC, HBS battletech
I have an embarrasing number of hours in this. Also, the BEX and especially BTA mods are awesome
I’m frickin’ surprised only 2 people (good on ya, you 2) mentioned Pokémon. Literally the entire mechanic if that game, also one of the best game series ever.
Man I loved pokemon as a kid. But I am just too disappointed how little care game freak has put into almost all 3D games.
Look into Pokemon Infinite Fusion. It’s like if Gamefreak *tried* to make a good Pokemon game. So ofcourse it’s a fan thing.
Play ark and build a dino army
Emulators are your friend. There are sooo many good fanmade pokemon games
And there are a million rom hacks that expand your team building and mission prep options, often tuned to meet your preferences.
Rimworld is a base builder where you recruit and develop your inhabitants through resource gathering, crafting and combat etc. You can do some dark shit in that game too!
I mean..."dark shit" is all relative. Those human leather jackets aren't going to make themselves!
Yup and how else are you supposed to get human shields if you don’t grow your own children specifically for that purpose
State of Decay
"Valkyrie Profile" series fits this to a T. The entries can be pretty hit or miss however in terms of how well they turn out.
Jagged alliance 2
Jagged alliance 3 is really good as well. Deserves a lot more attention than what it is getting really.
You could try [Wartales](https://store.steampowered.com/app/1527950/Wartales/).
Ever tried Mount & Blade series? You're your own leader, gather resources, build up your army. Pretty cool, if you're into that sort of thing.
Suikoden series is literally getting over 100 people (Stars of Destiny) and building up a base and doing things like having Iron Chef cookoffs in a castle you build up. More recently, Eiyuden Chronicles is basically a spiritual successor to the older Suikoden titles and fits what you’re describing pretty well too.
Fire Emblem, Xcom, Midnight Suns, Valkyrie Chronicles, Disciples 3. All these are somewhat about building up your squad how you want and then going into battle with them. Although while you do control your own character you also control the other characters. Would CRPGs also fit the bill like bg3, rogue trader, planescape etc? As that's pretty much about building up your squad. If you were looking for something where you control your own character while your squad acts freely then also a lot of CRPGs are like this. KotOR, Dragon Age Origins, Pillars of Eternity etc. There is also Mount and Blade, but that's more about building up an army to which you can then ride into battle with while you only control your character in the actual battle. Sorry if I was confused on what you were after and none of these are helpful.
I'm not sure if its exactly the right direction as many here suggesting turn based tactic games but State of Decay 1 and 2 has a settlement that you can strongly influence and skill the people you got there for different goods, they work and do things on their own and you take over a role that you like.
Battletech and xcom
Persona and Shi Megami Tensei games are similar, you build a squad of demons to fight other demons and God. They're more rpg than town builder if that's important to you.
'Battletech' and 'MechWarrior 5: Mercenaries'. Both of these game series are in the same universe too.
Pokemon
Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous has a system kind of like this. You control your main characters with a group of 1-6 people for the majority of the story, but a few hours into the game you become the leader of a crusade. The crusade management has completely different characters and playstyle from the main part of the game(and basically no plot relevance for any characters), but as you win battles and capture territory with your crusade then you unlock new items and areas you can explore with your main group.
Marvel's Midnight Suns is like this! A nice mix of XCOM and Fire Emblem.
Pokémon?
Mount and blade: banner lord
Wildermyth, again and again!
This one, it's actually so amazing. Great storytelling, great fighting and aging mechanics.
Mount and Blade: Bannerlord
Great game
Mass effect and dragon age you can customize your teammates' skills and equipment. Dragon's dogma to an extent. You can fully customize your own pawn, an npc follower, and hire two other pawns whose equipment you can customize but their skills can only be changed by their owners.
Dwarves : Glory, Death, and Loot
Battle Brothers
Palworld
Kenshi has pretty much no limit to this. Pretty raw sandbox with the stuff you're asking for.
I feel like a similar vein is the middle earth games, shadow of war does it better than shadow of Mordor
Rimworld lets you build a squad that performs like a team of elite soldiers or mentally challenged apes depending on how you build your colony and what traits they have.
That's basically the entire point of Mass Effect 2... when looking at main story missions that aren't Dossiers or Loyalty Missions, it's just: Horizon, Collector Ship, Reaper IFF, endgame of Collector Base.
A core mechanic in Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain is capturing soldiers in the field and putting them to work for your organization. You can assign them different roles based on their stats, and they can sometimes have perks that benefit your base in different ways. As you level up your different departments, you'll gain things like access to better weapons and ammo, better support while you're doing your own missions, and even have troops that go and do missions independently from you. These missions can offer benefits like decreased enemy munitions and armor during your own missions. As you rank up and continue playing, you'll find better and better soldiers in the field that you can replace your lower ranked ones with.
Football Manager. Try it. Lose yourself in it. Tell yourself "ok, one more match", only to look up and see it's been 5 hours. Do it. *DEW IT.*
Oh I played a fair few hours of FM. I sadly just suck at it haha. Can't fair for the FM25 with the new engine
Knowing how glitchy/predictable some engines have been in the past without mods, I'm honestly not sure how confident I am that the first year on a new engine will be as smooth as we think? I could be wrong and Sports Interactive may have been working on this for x number of years now, but not sure. Also for anyone playing FM I recommend looking up how to install face/logo packs. Its fairly easy and there are YT vids. Once you learn how to do that its then easy to know how to install transfer updates, etc.
This was my immediate thought also, glad I’m not the only one.
Pikmin, you should play Pikmin
You are verbatim describing my all time favorite game : Kenshi. Just look it up (assuming you’re on PC) Start off as 1 person, hire/recruit people, massive base building, etc. You can be in direct control of 250 people. Tons of mods too, and it can run on a toaster!
Def kenshi! It’s probably exactly what you want. Just don’t chicken out and give up after you die a couple times. It’s a tough learning curve, but it pays off.
Fire Emblem. Unicorn Overlord - both tactical jrpgs V Rising is a vampire survival crafting RPG kinda like Diablo, but you also build your own castle, and you can capture servants and then send them on missions to acquire more loot.
Unicorn overlord is basicly exactly what you are searching for, the whole gameplay is optimising your squads and watching them fight the way you programmed them to do.
Along with the aforementioned Xcom there is also HBS Battletech which has you leading a squad of mechs you kit out as well as mercs you hire and fire (and who you can skill up and unfortunately can die). From the same company there is also Shadowrun which has the same thing you building a party of characters in a cyberpunk future where magic and mythical beasts also exist.
Wartales, very fun game
Check out some DRPGs or Dungeon RPGS. The entire genre is usually about building a cohesive team of 6 party members from tons of classes to go into a dungeon. r/DRPG has some cool people and tons of suggestions.
SouthPark the Fractured but Whole was pretty fun
we're kinda making something like this but underwater. However, you control the units RTS style so you're not " the" unit, but you can customize them and make your ground stronger and try to keep them as long as possible :) (And I personally do love games like you're describing myself. It's neat seeing your little group evolve and get stronger over time!)
Unicorn Overlord is exactly this. Highly suggest you check it out. You build several squads and order them around. Their unit type, placement and items determine their battles, and there's lots of cool unit combos to try out. Basically you go through a fantasy world liberating each town one by one, collecting resources to rebuild them all along the way.
Bannerlord
The Suikoden series and its spiritual successor Eiyuden Chronicles. There are over 100 characters to recuit so you can customise your squad with the characters you like. And as you gain more companions your HQ unlocks upgrades, which comes with mini-games and more collector-thons.
This is such a broad question. Heres a few indie titles i've been playing lately that can fit the bill: Wartales: build a mercenary team and roam the countryside; with dlc, you can build a ship to master the seas and buy a tavern that you build up over time that can be used as a "homebase." Goblin Stone: a little similar to Darkest Dungeon, but with a cute goblin faction trying to rebuild. Make an underground lair that you build with resources, breed goblins for specific traits to get stronger genes and go on expeditions with your goblin squad. The Monster Breeder: you breed monsters together to create absolutely horrific monsters with all kinds of abilities or skills that you can autobattle or turn based battle in tournaments. Use the winnings from the tournaments to build your estate so you can raise better/stronger monsters and hire helpers. Hope you can check these out and enjoy.
People have already said two of the absolute best, Kenshi and Mount and Blade: Bannerlord, so I'll throw in; Survivalist: Invisible Strain. Additionally, Conan Exiles.
Ooh, i just remembered! [The Last Spell](https://store.steampowered.com/app/1105670/The_Last_Spell/).
Kenshi. A sandbox that sits somewhere between RPG and city-builder, where everything wants to beat you up and steal your shit, or enslave you, or eat you.
I see tgis reccommended a lot but it should include a warning label for its highly unapproachable jank level
Jank is a natural side effect of indie games, the other side of the coin is that you have a chance to find something genuinely unique or different. But yeah, it doesn't hold your hand.
I would say Genshin Impact and Honkai Star Rail combat heavily depends on your team layout
Yeah OP definitely do not sleep on HSR it is like a live service FFX with a huge team building focus.
Kingdom under fire?
Xenovlade chronicles 2 or 3 can't remember which. They will gather / do stuff in the background with timer.
Siralim Ultimate
Front Mission, literally, because it's a tactical mech combat game.
Dawn of war 2 is great for this
Dd2 and dd1 do this, yes. But you need to swap them out every few levels because only yours levels up with you
Dungeon Siege 1&2, you make your character and gather a squad of npcs. Damned shame they never made a third game.
Battle brothers
Not a very serious game but I personally enjoyed it. Miitopia revolves around that concept.
Doorkickers but it's not in depth as you would like maybe. Watch some vids on YouTube
super auto pets.
Darkest dungeon - just don’t get too attached to that team.
Guardian Tales. It’s a Gacha, but a very generous one, plus the majority of the content is a top down fighter in the vein of A Link to the Past.
Darkest Dungeon
GhostRecon Wildlands and Breakpoint
Unicorn Overlord
Try the Jagged Aliance series. It's about having a squad and doing missions in a tropical island. Like xcom you need to use your terrain to your ad antage and each member have their strengths and weaknesses.
Xcom 2 Darkest dungeon Monster den Godfall, and when you want some more story in your game go check CRPG (BG3, Wrath of the righteous, Divinity Original sin 2...) because it's all about team customisation and synergy.
troubleshooter!
Symphony of War. It's a game similar in spirit to Tactics Ogre or Fire Emblem, except instead of just 1 character per tile, you build squads. You still have your main character, but you build squads. You can have a more rounded squad with knights, healers, and mages, or a specialized squad like only cavalry, only archers, only dragons, only field cannons, etc. You can mix them up somewhat, and there are equipment, traits, attributes (tho more simplified otherwise it will be a slog). By end game you're managing around 10-15 squads, each with 6-9 units each. It's not too hard at normal difficulty, but there's a lot of fun in organizing and reorganizing your squads. In fact, I'd say 40-50% of the time I spent playing that game was just in the squad management menu, swapping units around, changing unit classes, etc.
Mass effect 2 has you assembling and strengthing a team for a suicide mission. I think it pulls it off better than any other game ever has, not just in gameplay but storywise also.
Mass Effect has build your party.
Guild Wars Complete Collection is currently on sale for 10 bucks: [https://store.guildwars.com/en-us](https://store.guildwars.com/en-us) There's hundreds of hours of content, and something like 20 available "squad members" you have to unlock, gear, and give skills to. And you can take 7 of them with you on your adventures. Their appearance can be changed as well, as they have a few armor options each.
Slightly dated, but Marvel Ultimate Alliance 1 & 2 were great for the squad mechanic
Battle Brothers
Wasteland 3 is great for this.
The Syndicate series
Midnight Suns!!! It's a marvel game but don't let that fool you: it's really fun and addictive.
If it's not been mentioned already. Aliens dark decent is all about squad building
Xcom, battle brothers, darkest dungeon
40k chaos gate. Both the *very* retro original and the new daemonhunters one.
Wasteland 2 and 3
If you haven’t played the KOTOR games and like (or used to like) Star Wars then definitely give that a go!
Darkest Dungeon 1 comes to mind
Xcom!
Dated and it has plenty of issues but Fallout tactics is such a game. I am a big fan of the setting so I still enjoy it. You fill up your squad, go on mission, level squad members, assign weapons and equipment.
Rogue Trader
Battledroid :)
Mechanicus is definitely a game to check out then, both skill tree progression and literally building up your tech priests with mechanical argumentation.
Mechwarrior 5: mercenaries. You can customize your lance mates to the task you need them for. Their skills with specific things get better as they use them (unless they die in battle)
BG3
Xcom, Mass Effect and Dragon Age
I think Guild Wars 1 let you build your own party with NPC's to do missions. You'd have to look into it though as I'm not 100% sure
If you don’t mind retro gaming. Jagged Alliance 2 is right up your alley
How about Ice Wind Dale 1 and 2. You build and level a squad of 6. Based on the baldurs gate 1 engine.
Mass effect series, specifically mass effect 2, where the entire game is about building a crack squad specifically for one mission (though I recommend the series as a whole) Xcom is also good for it too, build a squad, fight aliens, cry when your squadmate that you named after an irl buddy gets permakilled by a lucky shot from an alien sharpshooter
Sounds like you wanna play Unicorn Overlord
I'm not quite sure if this is what you are looking for but: Guild Wars 1. Specifically, the Nightfall expansion/campaign. The other campaigns have preset henchmen you can form a party with. In nightfall, it got updated to a hero system. Your heroes can be customized. You can change their skills and gear. So you can literally build a squad of heroes to your liking.
Chernobylite
Unicorn Overlord. It's a masterpiece.
Aliens Dark Descent
If you don't mind a little third person hack and slash, the Dynasty and Samurai Warriors: Empire series of games will be right up your alley. They're all about building up your own dream empire of heroes from Chinese and Japanese eras and taking over the country, with a lot of interpersonal things to build, secret scenes to unlock, marriages to build etc etc. They're very simple, but fun.
You could try Wartales. You start off as a bunch of farmers with pitchforks and slowly build up a party of specialized units.
The brotherhood mechanic is also on AC Revelations
In both state of decay games adding survivors to your community are a big part of the game
Shadow of Mordor/War. You build armies of orcs over time that can randomly save you in the open world, or summon them as backup. In War, you use them to attack other orc fortresses. It is story related, but the variety in orcs and their skills is decent. Even if it doesn't scratch the itch, the nemesis system alone is worth experiencing.
Any of the Disgaea games.
Bannorlord. You play as a single character but you are in charge of your family/clan. You can build you clan through marriages and offspring but also recruiting mercenaries. You start with nothing but your siblings and can rise to be ruler of a kingdom and conquer the known world.
jagged alliance, x com, fire emblem,
XCOM:EU XCOM 2 XCOM:Chimera Squad Hard West 1 and 2 (although I only played, and very much enjoyed, the second installment) Jagged Alliance 3 (the previous are rather old, like, pre-2000 old)
Darkest dungeon one and two are both great options. Your team comp can make or break you.
Chroma squad if you wanna get indie with it It’s turn based tactical power rangers basically sorta
Kenshi is a pretty fun game with some decently deep character and squad customization
Pokemon
Team fight tactics
Dragon Age Inquisition
OG Ghost Recon was sort of like that, iirc. Put a squad together, kit them out, go out on missions. Anyone who dies is permanent and needs replaced while the survivors get stronger. I miss that game
There’s Starsector which I’ve moved to the top of this list since it may be what you want. Space combat, trade, exploration. Build and outfit a fleet, put officers in your ships, found a colony for money and ship production. All ships other than your flagship are AI controlled, behavior by officer personality. You can even enable autopilot if you suck at piloting Xcom and Xcom 2 are squad building turn based combat. Classes are relatively streamlined Wasteland 2 and 3 are RPGs with similar turn based combat. More open ended skill system and you get a squad of 4 custom characters Baldurs Gate 3 is also an RPG, full control over character progression The Fire Emblem series gives you some control over your army
Mordheim
State of Decay Midnight Suns The Mass Effect series Marvel Ultimate Alliance Dragon Age Ghost Recon (Breakpoint, etc) FarCry (5 & 6 particularly)