One guide to kill them all.

[EleventhTower]

About the Loot part, it's incorrect to say you'll get the best loot possible if you run around with just your companions.  They take 10 shares each, you'll get the best loot possible running around with just you and 100 troops of the same type, since it goes by the stack and not the number of troops in the stack.

I believe I read in another thread that companions take 3 loot shares. You mention 10. Is there anywhere to confirm this?

Also, I am not sure I understand what the Loot Share value is used for. Is it used to determine the size of the loot pool you can select from post battle? If so, how does it reduce the available loot quality.

For example: A battle ends, it is determined that 100 pieces of loot are available. Does it reduce that number by the loot shares in your part (X) shares for each companion, and (1) shares for every different stack in your party? If so does the remaining number (say 45 shares left) get randomized for quality and then that is what you see?

I have always wondered how the loot you see is generated. I know the looting skill boosts availability and possibly quality(?) but it seems to be a mystery to me. If it really is a mystery, I am fine with that, but if so, what does it matter knowing how many loot shares a companion takes?

 

[Arctic_Howler]

I've yet to get the option to duel on the battlefield in this mod... So I don't get how that is relevant... Even if I did get the option, I'd do the duel myself even if fresh character as I'm so used to having lower proficiency compared to the basic units....

 

[AlphaOmega]

About the Loot part, it's incorrect to say you'll get the best loot possible if you run around with just your companions.  They take 10 shares each, you'll get the best loot possible running around with just you and 100 troops of the same type, since it goes by the stack and not the number of troops in the stack.

I believe I read in another thread that companions take 3 loot shares. You mention 10. Is there anywhere to confirm this?

Also, I am not sure I understand what the Loot Share value is used for. Is it used to determine the size of the loot pool you can select from post battle? If so, how does it reduce the available loot quality.

For example: A battle ends, it is determined that 100 pieces of loot are available. Does it reduce that number by the loot shares in your part (X) shares for each companion, and (1) shares for every different stack in your party? If so does the remaining number (say 45 shares left) get randomized for quality and then that is what you see?

I have always wondered how the loot you see is generated. I know the looting skill boosts availability and possibly quality(?) but it seems to be a mystery to me. If it really is a mystery, I am fine with that, but if so, what does it matter knowing how many loot shares a companion takes?

You're right, they don't take 10 you take 10, they take 3 just like other Lords do.  So if you have 100 pieces, you take 10, each companion takes 3, then each type of troop takes 1, and any other lord takes 3 as well.  So the best way to get the most loot is for just you and one type of troop no matter the number in the stack.

 

[thermocline]

How does food consumption work? Is it per unit or per stack?

 

[noosers]

AO is right considering the shares, but his example lacks a bit:
Total loot amount is affected by loot skill (+10% per point spent). So you get more of the stuff in total.

This great golden  heap is divided by the number of total shares (10 for the player + 3 per companion +1 per troops stack) which leads to another vast gleaming pile of treasure for the player.

This heap is now sorted by price, starting with the highest. Means the most valuable stuff is first in the list. This is due to the fact that the loot display pages are limited to 3 and if it wasn´t sorted the player could miss valuabe loot.

And that´s the stuff you see after a battle displayed as your loot.

 

[sher]

About the Loot part, it's incorrect to say you'll get the best loot possible if you run around with just your companions.

Indeed. And I didn't say that exactly. What I said was said in certain context.

As for the part that is better to have only troops and not companions to get best loot - it's irrelevant in any part of the game. Early you don't have freedom to organize your party for specific fights since you have no place to garrison your troops and you NEED to develop your companions. Later such reorganizations are just a waste of time to have CHANCE to get better loot since there is no guarantee that valuable items will be generated. So in pure theory it is better for loot to have only regular soldiers and not companions but in reality it doesn't matter at all since you'll lose too much (time, exp, nerves etc) even when you have an option to tune your party composition for particular one fight perfectly. And no loot is better than developed companions.

 

[Alavaria]

Yeah.

Well my thought recently has been develop your characters (and get your looting 10+4) and then just tell them all to go gather intelligence for a week. Then grab your berserkers and go out with yourself + 1 stack of 100 zerkers +1 support companion (if you have one you can't go without) then take a nap as they beat up Noldor for you.

 

[noosers]

Won´t do you much good. 100 is a way too much in that regard. The way loot is diced out and given that most Noldor patrols are around 50ish strong, I reckon you´d far better if you encountered them with 40-60ish zerks on your side.

That should yield some pretty interesting stuff - the more if you have 10+4 looting skill and only one single stack of troops around.
Means 10/11 or 90% of the stuff goes into your pocket.

Due to the equality in power (both strength of troops and numbers) or the slight disadvantage you´ll tumble around in the exact spike-area of that gauss distribution of loot and should get pretty good stuff both quality and quantity wise. The tighter those fights, usually the better the loot.

The more if you screw Noldor and go after the various Rogue Knight parties. Why? The more stuff a certain troop has in it´s inventory (especially if it´s not equipped) the higher is the chance to drop it. Rogue Knights have a large assortment of stuff to pick from, a couple of suits of armours, helmets and weapons and the odd treasure and gold bar.

I´ve pulled many an awesome haul in off those bastards, especially early game, when me and my troops were hardly suited to engage them. You need to pull off every trick in the regist and be damn lucky to survive and win but man you´ll start drooling and fondle that suit of Royal Plate and remember that occasion forever.

And gain like 3 levels through the fight.

 

[Jenurik Name]

Could you clarify why 40-60 berserkers are better suited to autocalcing Noldor than 100? Don't they count as a single troop stack so they just take one share of loot?

 

[sher]

Could you clarify why 40-60 berserkers are better suited to autocalcing Noldor than 100? Don't they count as a single troop stack so they just take one share of loot?

I don't know where that crazy thing about one share came from. Numbers definitely matter, I farmed many noldors with my CKO knights only (and constant companions) to be sure of it.

 

[Alavaria]

There's some adjustment based on your party strength, if you're overly strong you get less.

Since normally I autocalc Noldor with massive campaign armies it isn't as though I'm writing a guide to farming them efficiently..

 

[thermocline]

Due to the equality in power (both strength of troops and numbers) or the slight disadvantage you´ll tumble around in the exact spike-area of that gauss distribution of loot and should get pretty good stuff both quality and quantity wise. The tighter those fights, usually the better the loot.

Does anyone know the mechanics behind how this works, or is it an empirical observation that people are making from playing a lot of games?

 

[noosers]

Both of them. If you care to look it up in detail you´ll finally find quite an interesting article written by a certain person  which definetly played too much MnBoP  and had a certain impact on some aspects of the game  .

 

[thermocline]

hahaha... care to post a link noosers? I've read tons of your posts on this forum, and haven't found the article you're talking about.

These threads have some good discussion, is it the one you're referring to?

http://forums.taleworlds.com/index.php?topic=182760.35;wap2
http://forums.taleworlds.com/index.php?topic=93400.65;wap2

In these threads though, you are posting based on your impressions, but don't quote any formulas other than the shares by companions/army stacks.

 

[noosers]

http://forums.taleworlds.com/index.php/topic,71606.0.html

That one I mean. Sieve it through from the very beginning. It´s linked in the first thread.

We´ve a discussion on the devpage as well. Loot distribution is pretty much hardcoded, if I recall correctly, so not much you can do about it. Most of it is of course learned by close observation as no formula´s were handy nor did we actually care enough to inspect it closer to maximise or tweak the looting for the player - it was no real concern.

And - to be honest - optimizing all the troops (amount of inventory) and items (abundance) for loot is so much work it´s just not worth it. Plus the player still needs the random lucky feeling.

What we did, was suspecting and understanding how it works and trying to influnce it in a favourable way. And anyone who remembers three pages of broadhead throwing spears or 109 rusty Military Scythes off a SNC encounter knows what I am speaking about.

I did a very detailed description of it somewhere but I do not recall nor refound the very post yet. I reckon "Gauss bell curve" should to the trick but honestly, if someone is interested he may as well spend 30 mins of his life to find the thread. And I think I posted it on the old PoP wiki as well but not on the new popwiki.

 

[Alavaria]

And anyone who remembers three pages of broadhead throwing spears or 109 rusty Military Scythes off a SNC encounter knows what I am speaking about.

So farmable, yeah.

One thing though is that having tons of berserkers also means they take less casualties... 100 was just a random number I pulled out as I never actually went 'zerker-Noldor farming. But perhaps I should (I just buy a Noldor Spirit Horse and feel rather satisfied)

 

[noosers]

If you do, since you autocalc, do a few runs for each party composition via save scumming and estimate the outcome. Like 10 tries of 100 Zerks vs 50 Noldor, 90vs50 and so on - list relations, losses, average loot and oustanding pieces.

Applied Sciences at it´s bets

 

[thermocline]

I'll try this when I get to the right stage of my game.

 

[thermocline]

Personally I prefer to be a grandmaster of Order of the Falcon in the end since it seems logical for monarch to be a head of kingdom's main knighthood order. This order hunts Red Brotherhood parties and they can be generated through village quests so there's no problem to complete these quests in late game. Because of knights stats this order is often mistakenly considered weak while it's one of the strongest knighthood orders if not the strongest kingdomwise.

Why is Order of the Falcon the strongest kingdomwise? Because you can easily create orders with 20k and Sir Rayne in any fief, no Qualis, faction affiliation, or specific cities required?

 

[Jenurik Name]

I guess that'd probably be the main basis. Plus, you aren't dependent on noble recruits for their numbers. On the other hand, Maiden Nobles take a really, really long time to train, that I wouldn't consider that to be a real positive. They're more usable than Knights of the Dragon or Knights of the Lion, and probably Knights of the Eventide who have an insurmountable negative relations barrier.