The current character progression system feels really annoying to manage and honestly saps my enjoyment of the game.
My main issue with it is that it incentivises in-game behaviour which is immersion-breaking or simply unenjoyable or both. For many of the skills organic growth is far too slow so the player feels forced to resort to "gamey" behaviour such as trading money with every encountered lord, carting a private army around 24/7, removing one's horse when travelling etc. not because it makes sense in roleplay terms but because it's the efficient thing to do. As I play the game I feel myself constantly being pulled out of the experience to consult a whole checklist of things I should be doing to maximise my character's growth. I want those focus and attribute points and I want them badly so I'm consciously optimising fun out of the game. Now that might be just a "me" problem but it sure would be nice if the game's design didn't encourage it.
Consider for a moment how differently Warband handled character progression. The only thing the game asked you to do was to kill dudes. Certainly not revolutionary by any means but the reason why it worked (and the reason why it works for so many games past and present) is that killing dudes is fun. Killing lots of dudes is lots of fun. It's a behaviour the player is eager to engage in regardless of any incentives or lack thereof. To put it in simple terms: Warband rewarded you for doing fun things.
To be clear I'm not arguing in favour of transplanting Warband's character progression to Bannerlord 1:1 or even at all. I'm only trying to signal that right now growing one's character is not as fun as it should and could be.
My main issue with it is that it incentivises in-game behaviour which is immersion-breaking or simply unenjoyable or both. For many of the skills organic growth is far too slow so the player feels forced to resort to "gamey" behaviour such as trading money with every encountered lord, carting a private army around 24/7, removing one's horse when travelling etc. not because it makes sense in roleplay terms but because it's the efficient thing to do. As I play the game I feel myself constantly being pulled out of the experience to consult a whole checklist of things I should be doing to maximise my character's growth. I want those focus and attribute points and I want them badly so I'm consciously optimising fun out of the game. Now that might be just a "me" problem but it sure would be nice if the game's design didn't encourage it.
Consider for a moment how differently Warband handled character progression. The only thing the game asked you to do was to kill dudes. Certainly not revolutionary by any means but the reason why it worked (and the reason why it works for so many games past and present) is that killing dudes is fun. Killing lots of dudes is lots of fun. It's a behaviour the player is eager to engage in regardless of any incentives or lack thereof. To put it in simple terms: Warband rewarded you for doing fun things.
To be clear I'm not arguing in favour of transplanting Warband's character progression to Bannerlord 1:1 or even at all. I'm only trying to signal that right now growing one's character is not as fun as it should and could be.