Battle Brothers Guide

Congratulations, you started the game. Now you have to really start thinking.
You dont need many people at the start, 3-4 would be enough (the game becomes harder the more mercenaries you have). But they must be good. Dont hire the cheapest people or the only ones you find in the first village. Take people with good stats and ambitions.
You can hire cheap people and just dismiss them if they arent good enough.
But who is good? Well.. for the beginner, you should look for high melee attack and deffence, fatigue and maybe a little bit of health. Look for the stars next to these stats because they give them bonusses as they level up.
But why these stats?
Melee attack - obviously, higher chance to hit, you want to kill enemies and you want it before they kill you.
Melee deffence - you dont want to get hit, sometimes your mercenary may die because of just 1 single hit and you dont want this to happen, surely not too often.
Fatigue - it gives your people more "stamina", if it runs out during battle your mercenaries cant do anything (they cant attack, move, use skills), they become useless. You dont want this. It also allows them to carry heavier and better armors which is always nice (better protection).
Health - its obvious, people can survive for longer.
Range attack - its very good, but in early game when you shooters dont have high stats they wont hit enemies, its not worth to mention untill you will be in better situation
Range deffence - it can be usefull, but in the early game enemies dont have really good archers and shields provide you usually enough deffence from them.
Resolve - its basically morale and it is important but in the early game death itself is more dangerous.
Initiative - unless you know more about the game, its not important, ignore this.