An open letter from the Kingdoms of Arda team, and the total-conversion mod community

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Another point on whether or not my feedback would be constructive. If I wanted my feedback to be taken seriously, and make sure that I can work with Lego to make sure I can build my Lego set in the future, I would try and approach the situation as diplomatically as I could. I would make sure that it is known that I am quite upset with the state of my Lego set, but I would make sure I communicate that I want to best for my Lego set and for other people's Lego sets.
We've repeatedly approached them diplomatically for over a year now and gotten exactly jack **** from it. You clearly don't "understand the frustration" since you insist on trying to tone-police everyone in this thread.
 
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TW isn't stupid
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Stupidity can be found on both sides here:

On side of the decission makers at Bannerlord for not trying to communicate open which is not the fault of community managers like Dejan since those cannot say more than they are allowed to. Dejan is as a former modder most probably frustrated about the message himself. Community managers are easy targets at the forum since they are posting more often but keep in mind that they are basically the diplomats of the company, trying to tell you with nice words about what's going on.

You can also find stupidity on side of the Bannerlord modders and I find it always quite hillarious to read the discussions in the thread here. You are simply expecting too much and most of you seem to be just incapable of learning from the past. TaleWorlds stated that the game will be more moddable than Warband but "more moddable" does not mean that everything will be moddable. I am not sure how you could expect that they are removing all internal modifiers, you must have been daydreaming. Yes, it would be nice if they would explain their decission about why they don't do such but as told multiple times before, communication about decission processes have not been their strenght in the past ten years. There is also no financial gain to remove them all at once and all at the beginning. Look again at the past, to Warband. The Warband Engine developed nearly only when some DLC was about to be released. Modders (the scripters that is) got only access to new operations at such occasions, nearly never on request even when it was easily feasible. And now you have a game which is even just in Early Access and you already expect the full moddability? How are they supposed to earn money if not by DLCs, at whose release they also increase the moddability of the main game, to keep some features for DLC purposes? There are not many other options, in-game shops are already cried down at other parts of the forum and not many are looking forward for the console ports as far as I know. And there is not a real financial incentive to just update the game for the next years to keep modders happy since most sales already happened (thanks to the people doing EA-purchases, good job here) and since it also didn't really happened at Warband, to make again the look back into the past. They made some bug fixes but that was it.
Also pick up the offer of Dejan to report the internal modifiers which you need to modify so that he can take a look at the check lists to see if they have some special protection by a developer or are needed for a DLC. Don't crucify him for that offer, it's probably the best he can do within his possibilities.
And while it's not hard to understand the frustration, it's hard to understand the permanent frustration about everything. But again, that's due to the fact that some of you here are not willing to learn from the past two years (and more for people being around since a longer time) and are still expecting too much, so that's mostly on your own :razz:

TL;DR: Don't expect anything, be happy if they do something at all. It's not a good thing but a lesson of the past.
 
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TW isn't stupid
(the picture above isn't targeted at you)
Almost 2 years ago, the people involved in the testing of multiplayer in the alpha/beta gave a huge list of reasoning on many areas of that side of the game and laid out predictions that it would kill mulitplayer and that the competitive scene would be dead on arrival. We told them then, 2 years ago, and they didn't listen then. So some members of the community bypassed TaleWorlds' ****ty vision by creating a multiplayer mod for custom servers, allowing the multiplayer community to test and implement changes. TaleWorlds' response was to shut it all down by making the custom server incapable of working in their following patch. Not only has everything we said come to pass, but TaleWorlds', in it's wisdom, has continually, throughout the entire 2 years, ploughed ahead with it's mindless vision and adopted 0 of the major changes, and almost 0 of the minor changes requested. The result is a totally dead game that almost nobody wants to play, and not a single sign from TaleWorlds they are ever going to change their minds.

You might be right that TaleWorlds' isn't 'stupid', but if they aren't stupid then they are beyond any doubt, completely ****ing insane. It's either stupidity or madness. Personally I think it's both. There is simply no other explanation as to their decisions. Since you're new I won't rag on you or anything, but I guarantee that if you spend 1-2 years here dealing with this lunacy from TaleWorlds, you will end up demoralized and disgusted like the rest of us.
 
Wonder if all these modders act like this in real life at work etc as well. End of the day Bannerlord is a product, and the property of TW. It's not even completed, its a work in progress. Whatever access modders get is based on their will and grace. You are not entitled to anything, or rights to demand access.

Maybe all these modders should just band together and make their own game from scratch. You would have the freedom to do whatever the f you want to do with it.
 
Wonder if all these modders act like this in real life at work etc as well. End of the day Bannerlord is a product, and the property of TW. It's not even completed, its a work in progress. Whatever access modders get is based on their will and grace. You are not entitled to anything, or rights to demand access.

Maybe all these modders should just band together and make their own game from scratch. You would have the freedom to do whatever the f you want to do with it.
Maybe you should stop complaining about complaints, because people have a right to voice them, and move to a country where it's forbidden to complain so you would be truly happy. Or you could take a break from the forums and have the freedom not to look at people complaining.
 
Maybe you should stop complaining about complaints, because people have a right to voice them, and move to a country where it's forbidden to complain so you would be truly happy. Or you could take a break from the forums and have the freedom not to look at people complaining.

Don't see any "valid" complaints, Just see a bunch of tantrums similar of children not get it "their way". Your rights to complain stopped at the "early access" disclaimer of the game.
 
Wonder if all these modders act like this in real life at work etc as well.

If you work for a company that is making bad decisions, only a doormat would just pretend nothing is happening and not kick up a fuss.

End of the day Bannerlord is a product, and the property of TW. It's not even completed, its a work in progress.

1. It's been sold with no restrictions on who can play it, so it's not like they're testing it or looking for feedback. Most games now are patched months or even years after the arbitrary "release" date. Unless you think they will suddenly stop patching the game when they announce the 1.0, there is no functional difference between this and the "release".

2. The current direction the development is heading will not result in a good game. The earlier complaints about multiplayer were ignored and all the predictions of those complaints came true.

Whatever access modders get is based on their will and grace. You are not entitled to anything, or rights to demand access.

The thing is, the internal keyword is functionally identical to the public keyword they should be using, the only difference is that it restricts usage to within the file its found in. It has no performance benefit whatsoever, it's just a compiler restriction. There is no justification anyone can imagine for slapping it all over the place. Most C based languages don't even have an equivalent to internal because it has so few uses in real code. What's more, they could replace all the internal keywords with public in like 10 seconds, and it would make zero difference to the base game (I don't even think the binaries would change). It's completely unjustifiable.

Maybe all these modders should just band together and make their own game from scratch. You would have the freedom to do whatever the f you want to do with it.

A lot of them have actually done that, myself included.
 
If you work for a company that is making bad decisions, only a doormat would just pretend nothing is happening and not kick up a fuss.



1. It's been sold with no restrictions on who can play it, so it's not like they're testing it or looking for feedback. Most games now are patched months or even years after the arbitrary "release" date. Unless you think they will suddenly stop patching the game when they announce the 1.0, there is no functional difference between this and the "release".

2. The current direction the development is heading will not result in a good game. The earlier complaints about multiplayer were ignored and all the predictions of those complaints came true.



The thing is, the internal keyword is functionally identical to the public keyword they should be using, the only difference is that it restricts usage to within the file its found in. It has no performance benefit whatsoever, it's just a compiler restriction. There is no justification anyone can imagine for slapping it all over the place. Most C based languages don't even have an equivalent to internal because it has so few uses in real code. What's more, they could replace all the internal keywords with public in like 10 seconds, and it would make zero difference to the base game (I don't even think the binaries would change). It's completely unjustifiable.



A lot of them have actually done that, myself included.

I'm sure you will create a much better game then Bannerlord then. Got any links and resources to share so we can bask in the greatness? :p
 
We've repeatedly approached them diplomatically for over a year now and gotten exactly jack **** from it. You clearly don't "understand the frustration" since you insist on trying to tone-police everyone in this thread.
No, I do, that’s why I’ve said if this does not bear ant fruit after trying to work with TW then you can be more aggressive if you so wish. My entire point has been to be more diplomatic while you got a response from TW, and who have now acknowledged the problem and said they will change things, for better or worse, in the next update. I get the frustration entirely, I’ve just said to be patient and see what happens in the next update and continue to coordinate with other modders to get what you want.
 
By the standards of some people around here......

The thread is from 2018, it's 2021.. why is it not done yet? Can we mod it yet? Where is the multiplayer? You suck, your game is dead :p

1. I am one person with no money using free software.
2. For 2 of those 3 years I was working a full time job.
3. I have never released anything for money.

The reason people are complaining about Taleworlds is that they are a company of some 100 people with the second best selling game of 2020 after Cyperpunk 2077. They have literally thousands of times more resources, manpower and expertise than I do. The fact that their game is not thousands (or even on par with) some one-person games is worth complaining about.
 
If you work for a company that is making bad decisions, only a doormat would just pretend nothing is happening and not kick up a fuss.



1. It's been sold with no restrictions on who can play it, so it's not like they're testing it or looking for feedback. Most games now are patched months or even years after the arbitrary "release" date. Unless you think they will suddenly stop patching the game when they announce the 1.0, there is no functional difference between this and the "release".

2. The current direction the development is heading will not result in a good game. The earlier complaints about multiplayer were ignored and all the predictions of those complaints came true.



The thing is, the internal keyword is functionally identical to the public keyword they should be using, the only difference is that it restricts usage to within the file its found in. It has no performance benefit whatsoever, it's just a compiler restriction. There is no justification anyone can imagine for slapping it all over the place. Most C based languages don't even have an equivalent to internal because it has so few uses in real code. What's more, they could replace all the internal keywords with public in like 10 seconds, and it would make zero difference to the base game (I don't even think the binaries would change). It's completely unjustifiable.



A lot of them have actually done that, myself included.

Yep, this sums it up pretty well.

In the end, the entire point of this post and it's feedback is to make Bannerlord a better game. I'm a software engineer irl, and I wouldn't be wasting my time on this forum or writing up massive open letters if there wasn't a good reason for it.

Hell, it's going to take several years to make Kingdoms of Arda even if they hotfixed and removed the internal keyword right now. At least my team is in it for the long haul, so not speaking up and pressuring Taleworlds on this issue would be doing everyone (modders, players, and Taleworlds) a disservice.
 
In the end, the entire point of this post and it's feedback is to make Bannerlord a better game. I'm a software engineer irl, and I wouldn't be wasting my time on this forum or writing up massive open letters if there wasn't a good reason for it.
I think everyone can completely agree with this, but the amount of people who are just being toxic about the game are not going to help efferts to make the game more profitable. From a purely pragmatic standpoint, who would TW rather cater to, people on reddit who praise the game or people here who levy insults, warranted or not.
 
I think everyone can completely agree with this, but the amount of people who are just being toxic about the game are not going to help efferts to make the game more profitable. From a purely pragmatic standpoint, who would TW rather cater to, people on reddit who praise the game or people here who levy insults, warranted or not.
I agree with this, but the people representing the modding community here aren't the ones being toxic :smile:
 
I think everyone can completely agree with this, but the amount of people who are just being toxic about the game are not going to help efferts to make the game more profitable.

This argument crops up here almost every day. While it sounds reasonable, it's not applicable to Bannerlord, where criticism was very civil and polite for the first few months of the beta and the later release, even as the developers were ignoring almost everything we were saying. They didn't listen then and they haven't listened since.

The only people they take seriously are within the company at the upper echelons. Some of their own staff have been fired for criticising the development structure too much. What makes you think they're capable of acting on criticism from redditors when even developers like mexxico get stonewalled?
 
1. I am one person with no money using free software.
2. For 2 of those 3 years I was working a full time job.
3. I have never released anything for money.

The reason people are complaining about Taleworlds is that they are a company of some 100 people with the second best selling game of 2020 after Cyperpunk 2077. They have literally thousands of times more resources, manpower and expertise than I do. The fact that their game is not thousands (or even on par with) some one-person games is worth complaining about.

That is a choice you made. You could done crowd funding, Do a kickstarter, open a patreon, create a game studio, hire people. You know... Everything become excuses of things you are not. TW didn't start out where they are today either. But that would involve step out of the shadow of being a hobby project to become accountable to the people investing into you and your project.

Funny you mention Cyberpunk. Imagine they had gone early access or long public beta. They wouldn't released in the sorry state they did. Bannerlord is still early access and not even completed. I don't really care how it is right now. Most important is how it will be at day of full release. If things warrant to bring out the pitch forks then, then do so, but during this stage, not worth it.
 
This argument crops up here almost every day. While it sounds reasonable, it's not applicable to Bannerlord, where criticism was very civil and polite for the first few months of the beta and the later release, even as the developers were ignoring almost everything we were saying. They didn't listen then and they haven't listened since.

The only people they take seriously are within the company at the upper echelons. Some of their own staff have been fired for criticising the development structure too much. What makes you think they're capable of acting on criticism from redditors when even developers like mexxico get stonewalled?
Well, they addressed early in this thread, even though it wasn’t much, that they were going to change things with the internal value. I completely understand that that isn’t a lot, but it is something. Now would be the time to be civil and polite, since you have an audience who may work with you all on this issue further. Dejan was polite in this thread, and he was met with hostility, which I don’t think was very constructive for this matter. As I’ve said before, wait for 1.6.0 to come out and then see how the situation develops and work from that. If nothing gets done for another three months, yeah, they probably won’t ever respond again, but I really hope that isn’t the case.
 
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