Last year in May I made a forum post with some suggestions for the game, including the economy which was broken at the time. I managed to make 2mil gold in 10 hours of only trading gameplay which was pretty broken.
Now don't get me wrong, compared to back then, the economy is a lot more balanced now, as it is no longer OP, but through my new playthrough I couldn't help but notice that the balance at the moment is more on the underwhelming side. Most likely all the feedback given back then that the economy is broken got us to this point where almost all forms of income have been nerfed, some to the point of becoming pretty much useless.
The only good forms of gaining income right now are trading goods, which feels very balanced, and selling post-battle loot after fighting enemy lords, which feels OP, and once you get to the point of fighting lords to gain this income it makes all other forms of income (mostly passive income) redundant.
The only issue with trading goods is that it takes time and it gets boring to run around the map trading from city to city, which is why passive income should also be an option.
Some people said that it's a war game with trading, not a trading game with war which explains why other forms of income are so underwhelming compared to battle loot, but if that were true, the war part of the game wouldn't have been so closely tied to your economy; and by this logic why even add other forms of gaining income and make them so underwhelming that they are not even worth investing time and gold in? Seems like wasted development time to me, and wasted potential to add more layers of depth to the current stale state of the economy.
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1. Tournaments
It isn't passive income, but it is part of the economy, especially early game.
The only issue I find with tournaments is how fast they dropoff in value. In around 10/15 tournaments they become redundant and a waste of time.
My suggestion would be to only change the dropoff to affect the tournaments of the faction hosting them. By that I mean if I keep winning tournaments in Vlandia, my bets will in time become less profitable in Vlandia, but it will not affect my gains in tournaments from other faction cities. See it like a separate renown mechanic, for tournaments only, that is separate for each faction.
Also, make the dropoff slowly recover the longer you don't take part in any tournaments in that faction's cities.
This will keep tournaments relevant at all stages of the game, allowing you to return to them whenever you see fit without feeling like you are wasting your time for very small rewards. This will also incentivize you to go around the map and take part in tournaments from other factions and try out that factions weapons of choice.
2. Caravans & Workshops
Caravans
What I noticed from caravans is that they work somewhat similar to sine waves; they are either useless and barely making any money (if at all), or randomly surge for a few days giving some decent income. There is nothing wrong with this trend, I believe it's interesting, but caravans cost a companion. The amount of income caravans give, even in their best days, are not at all worth it considering you are using up one of your companions to run it. Also as I said, most of the time the caravan isn't making you good profits, those surge days are far apart from each other and are very few, maybe like 3/4 days of high income and then return to 40g/day.
I would suggest keeping this up/down trend of caravan income, but increase the lower end of the spectrum and make the high end come more often than it does now.
I know that it's not as simple as just changing a few numbers, because I think the caravans are actually trading real items which dictate their income, and it isn't just a static preset value to how much income they give per day, so it might take more in depth tweaking to get right, or it can be changed to this static value.
Changing it to a static value has its ups and downs, but while not affecting the economy at a deeper level with supply and demand, the supply and demand impact a caravan has really doesn't add that much interesting depth to the game for the player. Changing it to a static value based on the trading skill of the caravan leader is much more easier to balance and makes it more rewarding to the player and incentivize the player to look for companions with high trading skill to make caravans with.
Workshops
Workshops seem to be the only stable source of passive income, and I don't think they require much change, only a few tweaks. Their cost is very low and their income is just as low, even for good ones. I don't find it realistic for a workshop to cost around 14k gold, it is way too low, there are bows that cost more than that. A single bow is more valuable than a workshop? That bow better be made out of Yggdrasil. I suggest increasing both the cost of workshops, and increase their income as well. Make workshops a good lategame passive income investment. Not sure what the price should be, but it should be somewhat significant and have its return rate well worth the investment in the long run.
3. Fiefs
Now I haven't researched these enough, all I can say about them is that compared to how they were in Warband, they feel like more of a burden to have than a privilege.
Even with a good governor and high prosperity, my fiefs struggle to make a decent profit, sometimes even netting me more losses than gains. The only option seems to be to remove the majority of its garrison, which will increase my income but will make it an easy target for the enemy. Perhaps this trade-off is intentional, but in Warband you also had to pay garrison wages, and fiefs were still a good source of income, even with big garrisons. So my only suggestion would be to mimic more how fief income was in Warband. Right now only castles seem to be a somewhat decent fief to be given, god forbid you are given a town that has been sieged over and over again to the point of no return for its prosperity.
What are your guys' thoughts on this?
Now don't get me wrong, compared to back then, the economy is a lot more balanced now, as it is no longer OP, but through my new playthrough I couldn't help but notice that the balance at the moment is more on the underwhelming side. Most likely all the feedback given back then that the economy is broken got us to this point where almost all forms of income have been nerfed, some to the point of becoming pretty much useless.
The only good forms of gaining income right now are trading goods, which feels very balanced, and selling post-battle loot after fighting enemy lords, which feels OP, and once you get to the point of fighting lords to gain this income it makes all other forms of income (mostly passive income) redundant.
The only issue with trading goods is that it takes time and it gets boring to run around the map trading from city to city, which is why passive income should also be an option.
Some people said that it's a war game with trading, not a trading game with war which explains why other forms of income are so underwhelming compared to battle loot, but if that were true, the war part of the game wouldn't have been so closely tied to your economy; and by this logic why even add other forms of gaining income and make them so underwhelming that they are not even worth investing time and gold in? Seems like wasted development time to me, and wasted potential to add more layers of depth to the current stale state of the economy.
_________________________________________________________________________________________
1. Tournaments
It isn't passive income, but it is part of the economy, especially early game.
The only issue I find with tournaments is how fast they dropoff in value. In around 10/15 tournaments they become redundant and a waste of time.
My suggestion would be to only change the dropoff to affect the tournaments of the faction hosting them. By that I mean if I keep winning tournaments in Vlandia, my bets will in time become less profitable in Vlandia, but it will not affect my gains in tournaments from other faction cities. See it like a separate renown mechanic, for tournaments only, that is separate for each faction.
Also, make the dropoff slowly recover the longer you don't take part in any tournaments in that faction's cities.
This will keep tournaments relevant at all stages of the game, allowing you to return to them whenever you see fit without feeling like you are wasting your time for very small rewards. This will also incentivize you to go around the map and take part in tournaments from other factions and try out that factions weapons of choice.
2. Caravans & Workshops
Caravans
What I noticed from caravans is that they work somewhat similar to sine waves; they are either useless and barely making any money (if at all), or randomly surge for a few days giving some decent income. There is nothing wrong with this trend, I believe it's interesting, but caravans cost a companion. The amount of income caravans give, even in their best days, are not at all worth it considering you are using up one of your companions to run it. Also as I said, most of the time the caravan isn't making you good profits, those surge days are far apart from each other and are very few, maybe like 3/4 days of high income and then return to 40g/day.
I would suggest keeping this up/down trend of caravan income, but increase the lower end of the spectrum and make the high end come more often than it does now.
I know that it's not as simple as just changing a few numbers, because I think the caravans are actually trading real items which dictate their income, and it isn't just a static preset value to how much income they give per day, so it might take more in depth tweaking to get right, or it can be changed to this static value.
Changing it to a static value has its ups and downs, but while not affecting the economy at a deeper level with supply and demand, the supply and demand impact a caravan has really doesn't add that much interesting depth to the game for the player. Changing it to a static value based on the trading skill of the caravan leader is much more easier to balance and makes it more rewarding to the player and incentivize the player to look for companions with high trading skill to make caravans with.
Workshops
Workshops seem to be the only stable source of passive income, and I don't think they require much change, only a few tweaks. Their cost is very low and their income is just as low, even for good ones. I don't find it realistic for a workshop to cost around 14k gold, it is way too low, there are bows that cost more than that. A single bow is more valuable than a workshop? That bow better be made out of Yggdrasil. I suggest increasing both the cost of workshops, and increase their income as well. Make workshops a good lategame passive income investment. Not sure what the price should be, but it should be somewhat significant and have its return rate well worth the investment in the long run.
3. Fiefs
Now I haven't researched these enough, all I can say about them is that compared to how they were in Warband, they feel like more of a burden to have than a privilege.
Even with a good governor and high prosperity, my fiefs struggle to make a decent profit, sometimes even netting me more losses than gains. The only option seems to be to remove the majority of its garrison, which will increase my income but will make it an easy target for the enemy. Perhaps this trade-off is intentional, but in Warband you also had to pay garrison wages, and fiefs were still a good source of income, even with big garrisons. So my only suggestion would be to mimic more how fief income was in Warband. Right now only castles seem to be a somewhat decent fief to be given, god forbid you are given a town that has been sieged over and over again to the point of no return for its prosperity.
What are your guys' thoughts on this?
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