Flotsam Ninjas vs Holy Nation

[HeathGCF]

Hi all, this is my first time posting here. I bought Kenshi recently at GOG and so far I'm very impressed with the possibilities this game has to offer.

One of the things I most enjoy is exploring the huge world, but I've encountered a scenario which is a little puzzling. Firstly, I'll admit that I downloaded a mod to help me with an overpowered crew of 4 to start my current playthrough with exploration in mind:

The Chosen Ones(s) - https://www.nexusmods.com/kenshi/mods/122

While I appreciate that any mods might have an impact on things, it would be interesting to get some feedback on the following problem I've encountered with faction and character interaction.

Wandering the wastelands I happened across the Flotsam Ninjas and their leader, Moll. After talking to Moll I agreed to help bring down the Holy Nation. The first mission she tasked me with was removing the High Inquisitors, Seta from Stack and Valtena from Okran's Shield. I did this successfully by kidnapping them both and returning to Flotsam Village. After handing them both over to Moll and watching her put them in cages, I spoke with her again. This time she tasked me with attacking the heart of Holy Nation power by attacking Blister Hill.

With a small detachment of Flotsam Ninjas in tow, I made my way to Blister Hill and after an entertaining battle that lasted a few hours, even observing that some Shek Warriors had appeared at some point as the battle raged, I managed to capture Holy Lord Phoenix LXII. Needless to say, I slung him over my shoulder and returned victoriously to Flotsam Village, where a delighted Moll swiftly caged him like the two High Inquisitors.

Now this is where things started to get a little sketchy. Moll mentioned that the inhabitants of Blister Hill didn't know what to do without Phoenix to lead them, yet there were still dangerous Holy Nation patrols around. She also mentioned something about Seta leading some of them, despite the fact I'd captured him earlier.

Upon returning to Blister Hill, I found the city locked up, utterly deserted and completely dead, which I found rather strange to say the least, and here's why...

Thinking I'd done something wrong or missed a step somewhere, I reverted to a save ahead of my attack on Blister Hill. This time Phoenix died and after returning to Moll, she mentioned the city being in ruins. However, the city was now highlighted green on the map instead of red as before. I returned there and although most of the city was indeed in ruins, there were Flotsam Ninjas on the gates and people inside the bars. All the traders were closed, but no doubt because they'd been killed in the previous battle.

After that I headed south to stack, where I found the town deserted aside from warriors from the Shek Kingdom. Reading up I'm aware that the Skek Kingdom are enemies of the Holy Nation, but prior to this point I'd had absolutely no interaction with them, which was why I was a little surprised to see them during my leading of the Flotsam Ninja attack on Blister Hill.

Now to my real questions in both these scenarios - what happens to the two former Holy Nation cities in the aftermath?

For the one in which I captured Phoenix and handed him over to Moll, this left Blister Hill completely dead. Population wiped out and I'm guessing, that's the end of any life ever returning there. But what about Stack? Is that now under Shek Kingdom control and will they do anything with the place?

For the other scenario in which Phoenix died, yet Blister Hill became green on the map and controlled by the Flotsam Ninjas, again, what happens next? Will traders reopen or appear in time? As for Stack, same as above now it appears to be controlled by Shek Kingdom.

In both scenarios there seems to be little benefit to aiding the Flotsam Ninjas, or as I've been reading when it comes to attacking the Holy Nation, helping the Shek Kingdom either. The net result appears to be ruined cities, dead traders and closed shops, leaving the sensation that the cities no longer have any purpose within the game world, which is a shame. I thoroughly enjoyed the element of 'taking sides' in a conflict, however, the victories seemed very hollow given the final outcomes of lifeless cities.

Is this intended within the current mechanics of the game, or will the factions now controlling the cities return them to life?

Thanks for reading and I look forward to discovering more about this element of the game.

[HeathGCF]

Would really appreciate some feedback on this please, as it's an element of the factions 'gameplay' I really enjoyed.

Basically, all I'm keen to learn is whether cities taken over by another faction will return to life over time, or not, as the case may be.

[RWild311]

I've only done this with shek as allies and I haven't revisited that save since taking down phoenix so I don't know what happened to blister hill. Stack and the city on the river, forget the name, was taken and the shek completely restored them and had traders up and everythig, I bought a couple of buildings in stack to use as operating base. Some of the buildings did change around a bit but it was because I had to import a couple of times from updates.

[HeathGCF]

Thanks for the reply and details RWild311, much appreciated. Good to know that the conquering faction restore some order to the captured towns eventually.

[RWild311]

Based on what I see in the game editor some of the cities would come back to life depending on which faction bosses are still alive, but some will always have some ruined buildings that would be for sale or not again depends on status of faction leaders. You can open up the editor and just look through the towns section and see the different town names based on states and kind of get an idea of what to expect.

My first reply I now realize was from Shidans mod for reactive world as it was still running the early version so the stack overrides were from that mod, however looking at the world reactions in the updates from the game developer it's really not much different.

[rankstrail]

With the reactive world mod it's seems to be possible to help the shek to rebuild the hub and to help deadcat to reclaim the cannibal plains (still have to be implemented)

I realy don't know what happens to blister hill and im very curious (im sieging it at the moment), but i taked down all other HN centers and inquisitors, and so far still not have seen some flotsam expansion :/ hope blister hill to become moll's territory.... or maybe it will be left as a bunch of ruins, as result of the battle and abandon

By the conditions of kenshi world its hard to expect that after such conflict life will be restored... its hard but not impossible, and even without mod, in the half destroyed cities under military occupation you can buy the destroyed buildings and became the one that bring back trade and cats back

[philthymcnasty]

What would be nice is if we had some refugees come to the towns, like the empire peasants,dead cat, outlaws, and escaped slaves. Maybe even some new farms pop up, and hivers set up shops in the towns, maybe even a few new hive villages. That would be neat, and realistic. After all, there are a lot of angry empire peasants and outlaws that have been screwed over, but can't move elsewhere because of the crazy religion that burns people alive and demands you pray once a week. that is good farmland and mineral deposits, so people should be taking advantage of the change in management. The shek could wander the country side daring the corrupt samurai to pop up, while mooching food off of the farmers.

The loss of the HN should really shake things up for the economy, and change things up a bit. On the same note, cannibals should start moving south and east, as the HN is no longer sending patrols out, so they are unopposed. So the hunters and the samuari will now have more work for them, and have to shift their patrols to compensate. This should also increase bandit count and patrols. Then there are the fogmen, who will not have to worry about hn patrols to kill them, so they should also expand east. Removing the HN should have some consequences, good and bad.

After all, one of the big factions is now gone, so things should change, things should be different, and it should be a mixed blessing as the balance of power shifts.

I am also disappointed with how bug master is done. We should have alerts when near arach of spider attacks and of periodic breakouts. There should be a legitimate chance of new frontlines getting attacked, hard, and possibly falling. The death of bugmaster should see spiders decrease by a lot, and places safe(ish) to explore.

Despite the walls of text, these are minor complaints, i am still very happy with how the game has gone. My only big complaint was the wait for martial arts, but that is no longer an issue.