Graveyard Keeper 2 Battle Guide: All 24 Battles and Defence Power
All 24 Graveyard Keeper 2 battles with their defence power requirement, squad cap and rewards, plus the two checks that grey out the Start button.
How does defence power work in a Graveyard Keeper 2 battle?
Defence power is a single number, and the pre-fight window builds it by adding two things: the quality of every barricade and tower you have placed in the Military Building Area, and the quality of each zombie in a squad you have switched on. A squad left off contributes nothing.
Twelve structures qualify, three tiers each of Barricade, Spiked Barricade, Fortified Barricade and Archer Tower. Every placed copy counts, and the game sums live quality when you open the window rather than reading a fixed value from the balance table, so upgrading a barricade moves the number. The shipped data records no “this barricade is worth N” figure to plan against. Troop equipment is covered in how to get zombie workers and the zombie production line.
Source: gamebalance_full.json → fightDefinitions[] via work/dll/src/UIPrefightWindowData.cs:47-91; names from localization/lng_en.csv, build 25509347.
Why will the Start button stay greyed out?
Meeting the defence power number is necessary but not sufficient. The game runs a separate equipment check first, requiring a body armour and a sword in your tool belt. Without both, the fight is refused and your character says he must equip sword and armor.
Three gates fire in sequence. Carrying more than one overhead item blocks the fight outright. The equipment check then looks for a body armour and fails the moment that slot is empty. Once the pre-fight window opens, its Start button re-checks your loadout for a sword or a bow. Body armour is the one item with no substitute, and a sword alone will not open the fight.
Source: work/dll/src/FightingGameController.cs:757-769 and UIPrefightWindow.cs:278; localization/lng_en.csv → fight_start_equipment_reason, build 25509347.
Why do two battles show no power requirement at all?
Closing the Eastern Floodgate: Part II and Operation POTATO: Part II both carry a lock of zero, and both are the second half of a chain. The code does not read that zero as a free pass. It asks instead whether any other fight points at this one as its follow-up.
If so, the requirement is hidden and the button is never gated on it, so each pair behaves as one difficulty check. Part I of the Eastern Floodgate asks for 80, Part I of Operation POTATO asks for 72, and each second half nothing. The other 22 shipped fights carry a real lock, from 6 for Sewer Cleanup I to 144 for Final Battle.
Source: gamebalance_full.json → fightDefinitions[], fields defencePowerLock and onWinNextFightId; chain logic in work/dll/src/UIPrefightWindowData.cs:44,94-104, build 25509347.
How many squads can I take into a battle?
Every fight sets its own squad cap, and the pre-fight window always builds five slots for you to fill. Sewer Cleanup I and Sewer Brawl I take one squad, most main district fights two or three, and the two hardest take four.
No shipped fight asks for more than four, so the five slots never bind. Squad power is the summed quality of the zombies in the slots you turned on, and a hired mercenary occupies one slot switched on and locked.
Which battles block barricades and towers?
Exactly two: Sewer Brawl I and Sewer Brawl II. They are the only shipped fights with both construction flags set, and the pre-fight window swaps its normal construction line for a single notice that construction is unavailable in this fight.
Sewer Cleanup I is not one of them despite sharing the sewer quest line: it keeps all twelve structures and asks for 6 defence power, the game’s lowest lock. No shipped fight disables barricades without also disabling towers. Structure stats are in defence structures and power.
Source: gamebalance_full.json → fightDefinitions[], fields isBarricadesUnavailable/isTowersUnavailable; text localization/lng_en.csv → ui_fight_construction_unavailable, build 25509347.
When can I start a battle?
Only on Sloth day, the second of the six. The game raises its battle-ready flag at one percent into the day and clears it at ninety-nine percent, so the window covers essentially the whole day with a sliver trimmed off each end.
Those are positions within the day, not clock times. The shipped data stores them as a fraction from zero to one and does not record how long a Graveyard Keeper 2 day lasts in real minutes, so one percent cannot be converted into a time on your clock. Treat the day’s tail end as the only cut-off. The other five days are in the weekly day cycle, and the day-length gap and the clock-time claims it settles are in Graveyard Keeper 2 days and time.
Source: game_logic.csv rows battle_ready and battle_lock, fields day_number and day_time; consts.csv → day_sloth field intValue, build 25509347.
What do all 24 battles require and pay out?
Every fight in the shipped data is listed below, sorted by the defence power it demands. Two balance rows are debug leftovers and are excluded. Seven entries have no English name in the shipped localisation — all offered from the same camp as Break Through to the Bathhouse Basement, so the id is the only handle.
| Battle | Power needed | Squads | Zombie tech | Zombie goo | Gratitude | Other rewards |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Closing the Eastern Floodgate: Part II | 0 (follow-up) | 3 | 200 red | 10 | 8 | — |
| Operation POTATO: Part II | 0 (follow-up) | 3 | 200 red | 10 | 8 | — |
| Sewer Cleanup I | 6 | 1 | — | 4 | 3 | Keys for Looters ×3 |
| Sewer Brawl I | 8 | 1 | 50 red | 4 | 3 | Keys for Looters ×3 |
| Break Through to the Port | 12 | 1 | 50 red | 6 | 4 | Defender’s Emblem ×1 |
| Eastern Districts: Active Scouting | 12 | 1 | 50 red | 6 | 4 | Defender’s Emblem ×1 |
| Eastern Districts Purge | 20 | 2 | 100 red | 6 | 4 | Victory Banner ×1 |
| Market Square Purge | 22 | 2 | 100 red | 6 | 4 | — |
| Sewer Brawl II | 24 | 2 | 100 red | 4 | 3 | Keys for Looters ×3 |
| Central Districts Purge: Part I | 36 | 2 | 150 red | 6 | 4 | Defender’s Emblem ×1 |
fight_AR1_1 |
36 | 2 | 150 red | 5 | 4 | Keys for Looters ×4 |
fight_AR2_1 |
48 | 2 | 150 red | 5 | 4 | Keys for Looters ×4 |
| Central Districts Purge: Part II | 56 | 3 | 150 red | 6 | 4 | Victory Banner ×1 |
| Closing the Western Floodgate | 56 | 3 | 150 red | 10 | 8 | — |
| Battle at the Lake | 64 | 3 | 200 red | 10 | 8 | — |
fight_AR4_1 |
64 | 3 | 150 red | 4 | 4 | Keys for Looters ×5 |
| Operation POTATO: Part I | 72 | 3 | — | 10 | 8 | — |
fight_AR5_1 |
76 | 3 | 150 red | 5 | 4 | Keys for Looters ×5 |
| Closing the Eastern Floodgate: Part I | 80 | 3 | — | 10 | 8 | — |
fight_AR6_1 |
88 | 3 | 200 red | 8 | 4 | Keys for Looters ×7 |
| Break Through to the Bathhouse Basement | 96 | 3 | 200 red | 4 | — | Keys for Looters ×3, Victory Banner ×1, Defender’s Emblem ×1 |
fight_AR7_1 |
104 | 3 | 200 red | 7 | 7 | Keys for Looters ×7 |
fight_AR10_1 |
116 | 4 | 200 red | 10 | 8 | Keys for Looters ×10 |
| Final Battle | 144 | 4 | 200 red | 4 | 3 | Keys for Looters ×3 |
Source: gamebalance_full.json → fightDefinitions[], fields id/defencePowerLock/squads/techRed/rewards[]; 26 rows shipped, 2 debug excluded. Names localization/lng_en.csv, build 25509347.
Break Through to the Bathhouse Basement is the only fight paying no Gratitude, and the only one paying a Defender’s Emblem and a Victory Banner together. Spending it is covered in how Gratitude works.
Where do the tech points from a battle actually go?
Not into your tech tree. The red, green and blue values attached to a fight go to each of your base zombie fighters that took part, added to that zombie’s own stored pool. Your Study Table research and the church tree are untouched by winning.
The scale suits a tiebreaker: 50 red at the low end, 100 across the mid fights, 150 for the district fights, 200 for the late ones. Three pay nothing — Sewer Cleanup I, Closing the Eastern Floodgate: Part I and Operation POTATO: Part I. If you are short of red for a node, tech points farming is where the volume is.
Source: gamebalance_full.json → fightDefinitions[].techRed, granted through work/dll/src/FightingGameController.cs:966-990 into ZombieWgoData.DoTechPointsReward, build 25509347.
How much do mercenaries cost to hire?
Mercenaries are a separate purchase with an escalating price ladder defined in the shipped data. Six money tiers step 500, 750, 1,000, 1,500, 2,000 and 10,000, and a tier only advances after you win — paying does not move you up.
Paying the 2,000 tier starts a quest chain named Inflation, and finishing it opens an alternative costing no money: three Grape Wine. Leave it unfinished and winning at 2,000 jumps straight to 10,000, five times the previous step.
Source: gamebalance_full.json → mercenariesDefs[], fields money/afterPayExpr/afterWinExpr/needItems; slots work/dll/src/UIPrefightWindowData.cs:62-71, build 25509347.
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