Dev Blog 15/02/18

I am so in love with Byzantine culture 

oooooh I love the sound of a Cossack-like minor faction. I’ll certainly have a look at them.

Great blog!

Improvements to the morale calculations, such as a shock effect from taking down a large amount of troops at once, can make tactics such as flank charges more effective. Imperial cataphracts are also designed for opportunistic attacks that benefit from being timed more carefully than the Vlandian steamroller.

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Interesting, seems like morale will have a bigger impact in the game. I'm guessing it will be something similar to Total War where units start retreating uncontrollably when morale decreases to a critical level. Also, such AI sophistication sounds really interesting. Seems like we will see different behaviors in battles between separate factions. Like Battanian axemen charging at a shieldwall while maybe legionaries take a more careful approach.

We've given them two-handed kontos lances - a slight anachronism, as these are more late ancient than early medieval weapons, but we think it will add interesting variety. Without the shield, a frontal charge by cataphracts might more easily be disrupted by missile fire, but if the enemy doesn't have supporting missile troops, then the extra reach of the kontos can be devastating. Their heavy maces, swung from a fast-moving horse, can also deliver a crushing blow.

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I do like this change. It adds definite flavour to each of the factions and is much more interesting than, for example, having different stats or some other insignificant change.
But I wonder how will heavy cavalry of Khuzaits (or Aserai, Battania...) be different to others?

We can vary a city's economic muscle with the amount of workshops it has, and its defensive might is shown by outer walls that can be one of three levels, with different scenes for each.

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Oh boy, level 3 Theodosian walls!

I hope mass routes are more likely when a side has received heavy casualties (around 50% losses).

Another nice blog! 

Also love the "oldschool" art for its atmosphere, but i have to ask: what's with this artist's obsession with horses that have small lower bodies/legs?? I mean seriously, is it some medieval breed?

Would you please give the video and say you are planning a beta or early access or are we waiting for the full release?

vicwiz007 said:

Not bad but I was hoping we'd be told how you gain power in the empire... I guess we kinda were but this was not what I was expecting by that.

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Well, we can see clearly that the imperial throne room only has 12 guards, so there's a good first bit of Recon.  Get your back alley team to converge on the throne room while starting a riot or fire in a different part of the city.  Make sure you bring javelins and close combat infantry and you should do well against the spears and bows used by the imperial guard.

Could you show us the three different stages of prosperity please?

Empire cataphracts armed with two-handed kontos lances - presumably uncouchable unlike the Vlandian couched steamroller. I’m glad these cavalry need to be employed intelligently - just increases the challenge. Historically, a kontos lance was about 13 foot long vs 10 feet for a Norman lance.

Great imperial throne room.

With the Emperor’s death, his unemployed Nord infantry (Varangians) have formed a minor mercenary faction in their own right. Is their loyalty to the highest bidder? Sounds like a great wild card.

Questions for Gökhan Ura:

1. How large is the campaign/world map for Calradia in polys/faces, and how large a world map will the new engine support?

2. What numbers of polys/faces are used for the LODs which reproduce a Lord/player's actual armour in their map icon?

Awesome stuff! I can already see the enemies of the Empire being trampled into the earth.

Really, really looking forward to the new morale mechanic as well. Bannerlords will be a treat.

Give me a gameplay video or give me death

Can someone give me an idea of what kind of timescale we are looking at for its demo/release etc. I don't know whether to be expecting it in months or years!

Conan_995 said:

I don't know whether to be expecting it in months or years!

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ask again next year. It will be either already released, or you will get a new reply saying to try again in 2020.

Cheers

Does the engine scale well over multiple CPU cores? How many?
How many troops can the engine support in a battle?

And of course we have a faction based on the Varangians, the fearsome Nord guardsmen of the Emperor, who in the tumult after Arenicos' death have formed a mercenary outfit.

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If I play as another faction rather than the Empire, will I be able to recruit these badass dudes?

As some guys already pointed out, singleplayer gameplay videos about the factions will be most welcomed.

AmateurHetman said:

I hope mass routes are more likely when a side has received heavy casualties (around 50% losses).

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How about 75% losses? And the commander of the army dead/wounded. Personally I would not like if half of my troops routed even tho I'm still fighting. I know historically mass routes happend but I would like if my soldiers would fight to the last man, especially if they are elite troops.

Just Someone Weird said:

Does the engine scale well over multiple CPU cores? How many?
How many troops can the engine support in a battle?

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Already answered by Murat Türe in a previous blog:

Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord relies even more on CPU usage than Warband. Hundreds of characters, more advanced animations, an Inverse Kinematics system, individual AI, formation AI, combat calculations, (which do not change in respect to distance or visibility,) and many other requirements really increase the burden on the CPU. In order to accommodate this, our optimisation efforts are more heavily focused on the CPU. We generally try to use Data Oriented Design, which enables us to achieve high amounts of parallelism and core usage. Currently, 60-70% of the frame is fully parallel, which means it can, and will, use all of the cores of current and next gen CPUs for the foreseeable future, (the old engine generally used to use 1, or at most 2 cores.) This means that as new, higher core count CPUs begin to emerge, Bannerlord will scale well with the new hardware and players will be able to test bigger and denser battles. Currently our aim for battle sizes on current generation high end gaming CPUs is at 800 characters, at 60FPS.

http://steamcommunity.com/games/261550/announcements/detail/3244137880934579683

NPC99 said:

Just Someone Weird said:

Does the engine scale well over multiple CPU cores? How many?
How many troops can the engine support in a battle?

Click to expand...

Already answered by Murat Türe in a previous blog:

Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord relies even more on CPU usage than Warband. Hundreds of characters, more advanced animations, an Inverse Kinematics system, individual AI, formation AI, combat calculations, (which do not change in respect to distance or visibility,) and many other requirements really increase the burden on the CPU. In order to accommodate this, our optimisation efforts are more heavily focused on the CPU. We generally try to use Data Oriented Design, which enables us to achieve high amounts of parallelism and core usage. Currently, 60-70% of the frame is fully parallel, which means it can, and will, use all of the cores of current and next gen CPUs for the foreseeable future, (the old engine generally used to use 1, or at most 2 cores.) This means that as new, higher core count CPUs begin to emerge, Bannerlord will scale well with the new hardware and players will be able to test bigger and denser battles. Currently our aim for battle sizes on current generation high end gaming CPUs is at 800 characters, at 60FPS.

http://steamcommunity.com/games/261550/announcements/detail/3244137880934579683

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800 characters at 60FPS sounds great in my opinion.

White Lion said:

How about 75% losses? And the commander of the army dead/wounded. Personally I would not like if half of my troops routed even tho I'm still fighting. I know historically mass routes happend but I would like if my soldiers would fight to the last man, especially if they are elite troops.

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I think it's more like:

a) if you lose 50% of your troops in a single charge, the rest may flee, or;
b) if you slowly lose 75% of your troops and then get knocked down, the rest flee.

White Lion said:

800 characters at 60FPS sounds great in my opinion.

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dont forget the important detail of

current generation high end gaming CPUs

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If we want to be just a bit realistic :

1) when you lose suddenly 10% of your troops there is hi risk of route even in trained troops .

2) If you lose 20% of your troops in a few hours there is serious routing possibility.

3) There should be easier for unexperienced or undisciplined troops to lose their courage .

4) It should anyway be calculated as a possibility and not be fixed at the exact percent of troops lost. For example Even if you have 15% of lose in short time or even more they might steel hold the line, it shouldn't be just nete 10% they flee. It gives a better feeling of worrying in battle about what is going to happen. History is foul of examples of battles gone wrong without any clear reason.

5) It wouldn't be a bad idea if there was a good distinction between disciplined troops and as brave but indisciplined. Ofcourse veteran warriors are always veteran but still ... 

6) Okay i don't insist on the exact percentages. It's more like an example .

7) Finally There might be better if troops killed or wounded be random and not depending on type of weapon . It is realistic that you get killed by a mace or injured by sword . It would also be more likely that better armored troops get more oftenly injured than killed.