Should you Recruit or Execute boss enemies in Unicorn Overlord?

Vanillaware went a little overboard in Unicorn Overlord, crafting a giant cast of characters that you can recruit to Alain’s cause. This is done through a mix of auto-recruitment and some gameplay decisions that could cause you to completely miss a chance to get a playable unit in the future. 

In select missions, mostly side quests that you will encounter while traversing Unicorn Overlord’s overworld, the final battle will culminate in a decision centered on two options—recruiting or executing that quest’s boss or a key character you encountered. It isn’t always that severe of a choice: Sometimes you can just refuse to recruit a character or imprison an enemy instead of letting them go free, but all of these choices will impact the rewards you get from that quest and if you potentially get a new unit for your army. 

Every one of these options is important and can change your playthrough of Unicorn Overlord to an extent. If you are worried about making a choice like this, especially the first time you encounter the option, here is an overview of what you will face on both sides of the decision. 

What happens if you execute or imprison a boss in Unicorn Overlord?

Once you clear specific quests in Unicorn Overlord you will be given two options on how to deal with important characters tied to that storyline. From recruiting or executing the praise-seeking wizard Auch to imprisoning or letting Gammel go free, your rewards and number of playable units through your playthrough hang on your choices.

That is what happens to the character based on your decision, but there is also a secondary effect—your rewards for that quest will be different, too. And that difference can be very significant to your goals for other quests. 

For example, if you choose to spare Mandrin after you beat him during The Winged Knight quest, you will be able to recruit him later. If you execute him, however, you will automatically get 15 Divine Shards, valuable collectibles that you can then exchange with Ochlys for rare items—and eventually use to get the Feathersword to join your army. 

So if you want to speed up the recruitment process for Ochlys, executing Mandrin will help you to that goal but lock you out of getting the archer on your side in the future. This variety in rewards applies to all characters, which makes these choices much more interesting because, with the number of usable characters in this game, it might benefit you to execute key targets to get the extra bonuses since they might not see any action in your deployable units.

What happens if you refuse to recruit a character in Unicorn Overlord?

There is also another type of quest-ending decision you will see pop up somewhat frequently pertaining strictly to recruiting or refusing a new character. These are much less drastic choices that you can easily breeze through. 

If a character is asking to join your army, or you are prompted to either accept their offer/recruit them or refuse them there is no benefit to turning them away. Unlike executions, you won’t get any extra rewards for refusing to recruit a character and will only lose out on them as a playable unit—since these options typically see that unit immediately join Alain’s lineup. For example, the sellsword Berenice will simply say Alain’s decision to refuse her offer to join the army is disappointing and she will simply remain in the surrounding area—this results in her no longer being recruitable. 

Refusing a unit unless you are doing a challenge run or something, there is no reason not to recruit a free unit. Even if you do refuse a character, however, you will be able to hire and customize a unit within that class in the future.