Party members and your decisions Expeditions: Viking Guide

Each one of the party members is described by means of 4 characteristics that reflect their personality. Apart from that they also have their own statistics, and skills and inventory organized in the same way as the main character’s. You can develop them and if he ought that makes them more proficient, using skill points. However, there is no way to change, delete or add them. When you’re recruit new people, for example from Ribe, they receive a random set of characteristics, based on their statistics and skills. Often they will express their feelings in dialogues, or they will comment on your decisions.

Major choices affect many party members

You can affect your party members’ morale while making your decisions regarding quests (refusing to take a quest can also result in specific reactions ), the way in which to complete them (for example whether it will let their young innocent soldiers go or to carry out of the order), while negotiating your reward and sometimes while claiming it (e.g. Whether you claim the reward after clearing the village off bandits, take valuables from poor villagers, who can find use for them), as well as any changes of plans (you agreed to collaborate, but you betrayed your ally afterwards), on the basis of what you did with the enemy that you have defeated (to kill or to set free?).

Apart from such major decisions, often the way you speak to a given character (even a greeting) can affect your party’s favor. If you keep searching for somebody to beat up and going on incessantly about forcible way of solving matters, you will gain in the eyes of the more aggressive party members. On the other hand, however, being full of respect and talking to others in a friendly manner will result in an increase in favour from the more peaceful and honourable party members. Read available dialogue options if you care for what your party members think about you.

While gathering your party, it is a good idea to match your party members with your playing style. If you want to plunder a lot, you will gain favour with aggressive, independent and greedy party members. If you prefer to rely on diplomacy recruit peaceful altruistic party members who are ready to cooperate. Thanks to this you'll avoid dissatisfied companions, which would later on translate into more difficult battles. This is what makes it so important to determine the above-mentioned playing style beforehand, as well as to prepare your character, and match your party members.

Kazdy towarzysz ma kilka cech osobowosci.

Usually, your decisions will affect two opposing characteristics. They often appear in the configuration in which your gain favour with one of the groups and lose with the other e.g. :

1. Aggressive – Peaceful. It aggressive party members will support such behaviour as aggression, looking for fight, cutting out negotiations, frontal attack, etc. The peaceful ones, on the other hand, will favour solutions whose aim is to avoid any confrontation, such as talks, negotiations, compromise, or avoiding combat.
2. Optimistic – pessimistic. These two characteristics often relate to situations in which you are at a specific moment. To some extent that they point to sentiments among your party members and to the way in which you talk to other characters.
3. Greedy – altruistic. Greedy companions will look for opportunities to earn, extort something, they will expect a reward for each quest they complete and each service they provide. Also, on the other hand, they will strive for helping others free of charge, when they are in a difficult situation, and for helping people who cannot solve their problems themselves.
4. Honourable - cunning. The former will fight out in the open field instead of sneaking up. They also want to fight for the cause and not for the money, or for their enjoyment. Viking honour is a bit different - e.g. death in combat is both just and honourable. Cunning party members on the other hand, prefer to act from the shadows for as long as possible, to lure the enemy out using stratagem, deceive others and lead enemies astray.
5. Superstitious – sceptical. This one is self-explanatory, where the superstitious ones fear all sorts of spells and supernatural beings (from the Viking mythology). They will take seriously all sorts of curses and bad omens and they will respond in a negative way to utterances that ridicule alleged believers. Sceptical ones behave in an exactly opposite way and they place knowledge above faith.
6. Open-minded - conceited. The former welcomes new cultures, wisdom, as well as they want to learn about the world, whereas the reactions of the latter are directly opposite.
7. Cooperative - Independent. Your party members will be eager to cooperate, enter alliances and help others, as long as this is profitable for both sides. The independent ones value their freedom and the ability to decide their own fate, and they are neither willing to enter alliances nor speak about it in a positive way.
8. Strength. Strength affects basic damage from swords and axes and it influences physical resistance. You can sometimes use this attribute during dialogues to hit someone or knock them down (the more points the more likely the success). An indispensable attribute for Warriors.
9. Endurance. This attribute effects of the number of points of constitution, for reduction of damage taken and chances at blocking with the shield. It also ensures a bonus to stamina. This attribute is very important for many warriors, especially those fighting in the first line of attack. If you want to create a typical tank, who will be taking the majority of damage on himself, you should invest many points into this attribute.
10. Finesse. To some extent this is an equivalent of dexterity, which affects the amount of basic damage, the situation when your character uses knives and spears. The number of points of Finesse also affects your chances at critical damage. It ensures higher chances during unique dialogue options (e.g. a surprise attack) and during theft.
11. Perception. Perception determines your accuracy while using ranged weapons such as bows and slingshots. Apart from that, it influences your perceptiveness during many conversations, thanks to which it expands the array of your dialogue options. For obvious reasons it is recommended for archers and diplomats.
12. Sense. This attribute affects mental immunity and the amount of stamina. It is still very important in many conversations, partially it plays the role of charisma of other games. Also it is important for diplomats and support characters. It is indispensary for attaining some skills and abilities based on this statistic, e.g. witchcraft or healing.

You cannot satisfy all at once, but you will be surely successful with the majority, if only you stick to a specific playing style. However, in this way you can make yourself unable to pick specific options, which may be easier or better available. Yet, it may be a good idea to risk the favour of your party once or twice, and attain a greater profit or safer solution.