Deleted the game and will not come back until at least something changes

[MariusTitus]

I have taken one too many rocks in the face, too many super accurate bow shots in legs, too many throwing spears that were never supposed to hit me, WAY too many slices in legs that instagibed me and had WAY too long reach to hit me (234 long spear vs 45 axe? yea right) while I ran at 200+mph on horse. Why bother fighting in this game when NPCs are this overpowered? You're literally forced to cheese it with ranged weapons to win a fight. 1 guy armored up, using spears vs 10 looters? Stoned to death, about 300 times already. Don't you even dare getting close to them, you WILL lose your legs instantly. Lancing? Literal suicide, you will get shot, stoned, and chopped to pieces if there is but 1 enemy near your target. Running into spears and dying is alright in my book, they are there as anti-cav and it's your responsibility as a rider to keep watch for them, but getting shredded by pickaxes, small hammers that are everything but long weapons, or getting shot in your legs that you can't protect with shield while you zig zag trying to evade fire, and getting stoned to death with shotgun salvo is just plain horse****. Stones being the worst, tell me, why did they even bother with all the fletching in middle ages when all they had to do was to give stones to all their soldiers and it easily took out heavily armored troops? And all this on "normal" difficulty. I sunk nearly 1400hrs into this game since it came in EA, and there were always problems in balance, like armors - they were an expensive piece of tinfoil that gave you 3% more protection, which went on for 2 years before TW finally got around to fix it (they still suck, but it's lot better than it used to be). Such a crucial thing in a game where you fight all the time, and it took two years. Throwing weapons, I remember the EA where they were even more accurate than now (which is extremely accurate), literally laser guided missiles that took you down no matter where you dodged. Now, we're at supposed "full release" which is obviously everything but finished game, and we're still suffering from BS like this? That's some sloppy work.

I'll return back to Warband to find comforting solace of dying only because it was my own mistake and not 850+ skills of Middle Ages terminators.

 

[DennyWiseau]

Taleworlds take on combat is pretty attrocious I agree. No doubt they wanted to apeal to both the casual singleplayer and the competetive multiplayer scene and the result neither cared for.

Luckily, the core system functionality is very solid (tyvm TW coders/engineers) which has paved the way for modders to make impressive and well thought out revisions to the combat system that makes the game taleworlds made a much more enjoyable experience.

You can try out realistic battle mod for yourself: https://www.nexusmods.com/mountandblade2bannerlord/mods/791

 

[RozBritanicus]

I personally find combat too easy one on one or even two on one. But i Get projectile glue effect . Armour needs to be more protective in some cases. Thrown stones should have zero effect once your in padded steel armour from head to toe. I find battles over to quickly there's not much time for tactics. I did use the RBM mod but found archers became pointless but i got Epic line battles. Part of the problem is in Bannerlord your the commander and if you get taken out your Troops turn into brainless fools. There are a few mods to help but i always end modded playthroughs because the game becomes unstable. My bugbear at the moment is the the slow aging it makes getting married and children pointless also your character doesn't age, you look fairly young until like 60 the slowly you start to look older the effect of aging should start a 50. Back to combat get cut through and heal on hit then at least if you get wacked by a stray arrow of spear you could land a few hits and be back in the battle.

 

[Vanthor]

*a rock can’t kill me.
*or a pickaxe!
*that’s just not fair!
Rocks were a weapon of war for thousands of years hucked and hucked via slings and picks were a superb weapon against armour. This is all historically accurate.
>my legs should be invulnerable because they are only legs.
Yeah nobody needs legs, right? That’s why tanks have a little hatch that the crews dangle their legs out of. In the Flintstones.
Heard of Achilles?
I started a new character last night in sandbox, first time he ever travelled with only 1 sturgeon recruit as backup we were attacked by 10 bottom tier rock throwing bandits, my recruit died instantly hacked to ribbons by the mob of utter scum but my guy killed all 10 baddies from the back of a cheap mount with the pitchfork i’d just bought and with the small bow that the setup arms you with. The final one took out my horse just before i rolled and deflected his next blow and skewered him. It was freakin’ sweet to get such a cozy battle victory with a fresh character. Nicely balanced, if i had made any mistake my guy would have died as you’d expect in a 1vs10 fight IRL.
Your problem sounds like a lack of forethought, planning and ability. It’s not a development issue in my opinion.

 

[Ananda_The_Destroyer]

Yeah your complaint is understandable and has been expressed all EA. I break it down into 3 issues that work together.

1 Everything does too much damage, EVERYTHING: because of speed boosted damage and physics all weapons and types of troops are capable of dealing high damage to the player and high end troops. Why? Low tier troops are all too good at using weapons and the speed bonuses often contribute more then the weapon's stats. This include ranged of course too. So even juts moving towards an enemy can make supposedly "low tier" troops and weapons" do high damage.

2 AI on foot is strangely over tuned to hit the legs of a rider, Why? I always suspected it was to make Captain mode MP bots useful against Cav. This is no excuse as it's a huge disappointment when your heavy Cav unit in single player fails a charge very often and are beat down by a recruit. Inversely, CAV AI is HORRIBLE at hitting enemies, in fact it is more successful to put them in SW and move them behind and enemy formation so they ride through them with shields then it is to advance or charge them.

3 AI aims and fires too fast and fixates on the player somehow: The ai does not wait for the recticle to close and doesn't use any "consideration" time, it simple draws/loads and releases in the most accurate position. AI ranged also seem to target the player in situations where they would not target AI troops. We can see this easily with HA troops. Ranged troops are very bad at leading and hitting HA troops, only getting lucky shots into clusters of them or if the HA is stopped do they get them. However if the player rides into range WATCH OUT they suddenly know how to shoot you while you circle around. The Ai is also able to shoot you at the end of a siege map with the ballista, which is very difficult to do for the player. Shooting an individual so far is very improbable and sometimes darkness obscures everything, but the AI is made to do it with no effort.

You're literally forced to cheese it with ranged weapons to win a fight.

Yeah and even then it's no easy thing when it's 20+ looter and you have the noob bow. You have to go way further back then is comfortable for aiming to avoid the rocks.

 

[Brocephus]

*a rock can’t kill me.
*or a pickaxe!
*that’s just not fair!
Rocks were a weapon of war for thousands of years hucked and hucked via slings and picks were a superb weapon against armour. This is all historically accurate.
>my legs should be invulnerable because they are only legs.
Yeah nobody needs legs, right? That’s why tanks have a little hatch that the crews dangle their legs out of. In the Flintstones.
Heard of Achilles?
I started a new character last night in sandbox, first time he ever travelled with only 1 sturgeon recruit as backup we were attacked by 10 bottom tier rock throwing bandits, my recruit died instantly hacked to ribbons by the mob of utter scum but my guy killed all 10 baddies from the back of a cheap mount with the pitchfork i’d just bought and with the small bow that the setup arms you with. The final one took out my horse just before i rolled and deflected his next blow and skewered him. It was freakin’ sweet to get such a cozy battle victory with a fresh character. Nicely balanced, if i had made any mistake my guy would have died as you’d expect in a 1vs10 fight IRL.
Your problem sounds like a lack of forethought, planning and ability. It’s not a development issue in my opinion.

Hot take from the mouth breather.

 

[MariusTitus]

Yeah your complaint is understandable and has been expressed all EA. I break it down into 3 issues that work together.

1 Everything does too much damage, EVERYTHING: because of speed boosted damage and physics all weapons and types of troops are capable of dealing high damage to the player and high end troops. Why? Low tier troops are all too good at using weapons and the speed bonuses often contribute more then the weapon's stats. This include ranged of course too. So even juts moving towards an enemy can make supposedly "low tier" troops and weapons" do high damage.

2 AI on foot is strangely over tuned to hit the legs of a rider, Why? I always suspected it was to make Captain mode MP bots useful against Cav. This is no excuse as it's a huge disappointment when your heavy Cav unit in single player fails a charge very often and are beat down by a recruit. Inversely, CAV AI is HORRIBLE at hitting enemies, in fact it is more successful to put them in SW and move them behind and enemy formation so they ride through them with shields then it is to advance or charge them.

3 AI aims and fires too fast and fixates on the player somehow: The ai does not wait for the recticle to close and doesn't use any "consideration" time, it simple draws/loads and releases in the most accurate position. AI ranged also seem to target the player in situations where they would not target AI troops. We can see this easily with HA troops. Ranged troops are very bad at leading and hitting HA troops, only getting lucky shots into clusters of them or if the HA is stopped do they get them. However if the player rides into range WATCH OUT they suddenly know how to shoot you while you circle around. The Ai is also able to shoot you at the end of a siege map with the ballista, which is very difficult to do for the player. Shooting an individual so far is very improbable and sometimes darkness obscures everything, but the AI is made to do it with no effort.


Yeah and even then it's no easy thing when it's 20+ looter and you have the noob bow. You have to go way further back then is comfortable for aiming to avoid the rocks.

Exactly, on all points! It's a weird, Souls-like gameplay where you get hit so hard even in best armors, except it's not Souls game because those are fair and punish you for your own mistakes, not making it a game of chance.

 

[MariusTitus]

*a rock can’t kill me.
*or a pickaxe!
*that’s just not fair!
Rocks were a weapon of war for thousands of years hucked and hucked via slings and picks were a superb weapon against armour. This is all historically accurate.
>my legs should be invulnerable because they are only legs.
Yeah nobody needs legs, right? That’s why tanks have a little hatch that the crews dangle their legs out of. In the Flintstones.
Heard of Achilles?
I started a new character last night in sandbox, first time he ever travelled with only 1 sturgeon recruit as backup we were attacked by 10 bottom tier rock throwing bandits, my recruit died instantly hacked to ribbons by the mob of utter scum but my guy killed all 10 baddies from the back of a cheap mount with the pitchfork i’d just bought and with the small bow that the setup arms you with. The final one took out my horse just before i rolled and deflected his next blow and skewered him. It was freakin’ sweet to get such a cozy battle victory with a fresh character. Nicely balanced, if i had made any mistake my guy would have died as you’d expect in a 1vs10 fight IRL.
Your problem sounds like a lack of forethought, planning and ability. It’s not a development issue in my opinion.

You sound like you haven't understood at all what I mean. If you get peppered by rocks, it's gonna hurt. But they don't use slings to fire high power shots, they just throw them, with insane accuracy. I'm talking about enemies being able to hit you at 30m range with rocks, shooting you with bows exactly in your weak spot while you fly at inhumane speed maneuvering left and right, and chopping off your legs with 100% accuracy because you dared to invade their personal space. It's funny actually, you're lot safer on foot than on horse, as you're less vulnerable with shield up, and can evade thrown weapons easier - left, right, left, right, and they throw it in opposite direction. I've had all kinds of characters with all kinds of weapons during these 1400 hours and this stays the same:

If you want to win easily, ride a horse and shoot. Doesn't matter if it's bow, crossbow or javelins (these are devastating from horseback btw).
If you don't want to shoot, you're at massive disadvantage because you have to come close, spear over 200 reach is a must.
Lance only targets that are alone, and don't have melee weapons in hand, or better yet, don't lance at all, just fly past and stab them.

Trust me, I've seen and cheesed my way through all kinds of AI behaviour here, but that's not a way to enjoy a game.

 

[Penn]

The game has many flaws for sure. But in this case, it seems you are just bad

 

[Zoonanay]

Horse archery is decent but requires retreating back to refill arrows, which feels pretty cheesy to me, otherwise the limited number of arrows you can carry evens it out for me.

I can kill far more on foot with a swinging polearm or long two hander than on horseback, bow or otherwise. Being so close to both enemy and allied troops makes it harder for ranged units to target you as well.

If I'm horseback with lance I can target Lords and high value targets and one-shot them, something that's far harder on foot, which I feel is pretty fairly balanced with the increased risk from velocity bonus and being more exposed in general.

Haven't played Native for a long time though, so maybe looters are death machines there. Games terrible without mods anyway, plenty I use solve that problem pretty easily, so I'd just recommend use mods and give up on TW changing these things.

 

[MariusTitus]

The game has many flaws for sure. But in this case, it seems you are just bad

Oh, am I? Go ahead then, boot up your game, and try to solo a group of looters from horseback with your sword only. Please come back to report how well it went, and we can have a talk about who's "bad".

 

[Penn]

Oh, am I? Go ahead then, boot up your game, and try to solo a group of looters from horseback with your sword only. Please come back to report how well it went, and we can have a talk about who's "bad".

I do that every new game. Maybe you just need some practise

 

[MariusTitus]

Horse archery is decent but requires retreating back to refill arrows, which feels pretty cheesy to me, otherwise the limited number of arrows you can carry evens it out for me.

I can kill far more on foot with a swinging polearm or long two hander than on horseback, bow or otherwise. Being so close to both enemy and allied troops makes it harder for ranged units to target you as well.

If I'm horseback with lance I can target Lords and high value targets and one-shot them, something that's far harder on foot, which I feel is pretty fairly balanced with the increased risk from velocity bonus and being more exposed in general.

Haven't played Native for a long time though, so maybe looters are death machines there. Games terrible without mods anyway, plenty I use solve that problem pretty easily, so I'd just recommend use mods and give up on TW changing these things.

I mostly prefer Beni Zilal style these days (horse rider with javelins and long spear), my horse archers always had secondary weapon to fall back to once arrows dry out, like glaive or rhompaia. What sucks in this case is the "errant knight" kind of gameplay, a lone horseman with shield + spear type of play - when you're in a group, npc's superior accuracy dissolves and focuses on other units instead of you (unless you come close to an army without others), but alone? Once they realise it's only you, it's like Ananda said, they'll never hit your horse archers, but now you're a golden target and they lead shots real well. It's silly.

 

[MariusTitus]

I do that every new game. Maybe you just need some practise

Post a video, then I'll believe you. New playthrough, no mods, solo on horse against 20 looters, sword only. Otherwise you just mouth off.

 

[Penn]

Post a video, then I'll believe you. New playthrough, no mods, solo on horse against 20 looters, sword only. Otherwise you just mouth off.

First of all, why would you solo 20 looters?
I go after groups of max 10.

All you need to do is attack the last looter in the right side of their line.
Ride away and make them reform the line, repeat.

You'll beat them easily

 

[nyarlathotep1975]

I am relativly ok with how the game handles the combat (not that there isn´t room for improvement). But it does feel weird when the AI isn´t capable to hit a single javelin against other AI, while turning into professional athletes when it needs to hit the player.
And i think a bunch of looters isn´t the real problem here. It´s when you are on battlefield and get shot from multiple angles by dozens of troops. No matter how perceptiv you are, some will hit you and your armor is everything that protects you. Probably the reason why so many players rely on the RBM mod.

 

[MariusTitus]

First of all, why would you solo 20 looters?
I go after groups of max 10.

All you need to do is attack the last looter in the right side of their line.
Ride away and make them reform the line, repeat.

You'll beat them easily

It doesn't matter if it's 20, 10 or 5, once they bunch up, it's a ball of razorblades you must never touch. Only viable uses of 1h weapon on horseback I found are other horsemen or archers shooting/footmen throwing, but may the Almighty have mercy on you if you didn't see one of them in the bunch with a melee weapon in his hand, you absolutely will get cut no matter the speed, so you have to resort to long spears, even better just ride with a bow and shoot them from 3m distance because that confuses their aiming. Do you really find that ok? I'm not saying I'm a pro in combat, more like a decent fighter, all I want is fair game. Not to mention it is disheartening knowing that your heavy cavalry that you heavily invested in will die so easily just because a random recruit has laser aiming..

 

[Life_Erikson]

Yeah your complaint is understandable and has been expressed all EA. I break it down into 3 issues that work together.

1 Everything does too much damage, EVERYTHING: because of speed boosted damage and physics all weapons and types of troops are capable of dealing high damage to the player and high end troops. Why? Low tier troops are all too good at using weapons and the speed bonuses often contribute more then the weapon's stats. This include ranged of course too. So even juts moving towards an enemy can make supposedly "low tier" troops and weapons" do high damage.

2 AI on foot is strangely over tuned to hit the legs of a rider, Why? I always suspected it was to make Captain mode MP bots useful against Cav. This is no excuse as it's a huge disappointment when your heavy Cav unit in single player fails a charge very often and are beat down by a recruit. Inversely, CAV AI is HORRIBLE at hitting enemies, in fact it is more successful to put them in SW and move them behind and enemy formation so they ride through them with shields then it is to advance or charge them.

3 AI aims and fires too fast and fixates on the player somehow: The ai does not wait for the recticle to close and doesn't use any "consideration" time, it simple draws/loads and releases in the most accurate position. AI ranged also seem to target the player in situations where they would not target AI troops. We can see this easily with HA troops. Ranged troops are very bad at leading and hitting HA troops, only getting lucky shots into clusters of them or if the HA is stopped do they get them. However if the player rides into range WATCH OUT they suddenly know how to shoot you while you circle around. The Ai is also able to shoot you at the end of a siege map with the ballista, which is very difficult to do for the player. Shooting an individual so far is very improbable and sometimes darkness obscures everything, but the AI is made to do it with no effort.


Yeah and even then it's no easy thing when it's 20+ looter and you have the noob bow. You have to go way further back then is comfortable for aiming to avoid the rocks.

That sums up the problems with combat in this game precisely. I aggree with all of your points.
I can't count the times I was killed on horseback because some looter hit me in the leg with his 30cm hammer while my 2,20m lance wouldn't make contact. The speed of a weapon should have much less impact on the ammount of damage it does then it does now.

*a rock can’t kill me.
*or a pickaxe!
*that’s just not fair!
Rocks were a weapon of war for thousands of years hucked and hucked via slings and picks were a superb weapon against armour. This is all historically accurate.
>my legs should be invulnerable because they are only legs.
Yeah nobody needs legs, right? That’s why tanks have a little hatch that the crews dangle their legs out of. In the Flintstones.
Heard of Achilles?
I started a new character last night in sandbox, first time he ever travelled with only 1 sturgeon recruit as backup we were attacked by 10 bottom tier rock throwing bandits, my recruit died instantly hacked to ribbons by the mob of utter scum but my guy killed all 10 baddies from the back of a cheap mount with the pitchfork i’d just bought and with the small bow that the setup arms you with. The final one took out my horse just before i rolled and deflected his next blow and skewered him. It was freakin’ sweet to get such a cozy battle victory with a fresh character. Nicely balanced, if i had made any mistake my guy would have died as you’d expect in a 1vs10 fight IRL.
Your problem sounds like a lack of forethought, planning and ability. It’s not a development issue in my opinion.

People wore helmets to avoid getting killed by every random slingshot stone to the head. If the helmets wouldn't work why wear them?
This goes for all armor essentially. Metal armor is immune to cuts of all types. Plate armor specifically is immune to thrusts and can be immune to most projectiles.

Armor does add weight, it does restrict your movement, it is unpractical and unconfortable in everyday situations (situations you would have on campaign were you would be wearing it in case you need it) and it is always a cost factor.

Why in the name of all things holy would you want to wear armor if it doesn't protect you?

This doesn't mean that it isn't possible to defeat armor. Most armor does have weaknesses and gaps. And not all armor has high enough quality / thickness to protect against everything. But generally speaking you are excelently protected against most attacks once wearing armor from head to toe. This is not how the game works though.

The use of specific "armor piercing" or blunt impact weapons designed to be used against armor is quite rare in history. Stuff like maces, hammers and picks don't nearly come up as often as do spears and cut and thrust weapons like swords. The Dacians used the feared falx which if you believe the story could pierce roman helmets of the time. Somehow the rest of the world didn't adapt them and the falx was soon forgotten. It is almost like a) these weapons weren't as good against armor as people believe or b) whilst they worked to some extent they came with drawbacks bad enough that made them unviable.

 

[MariusTitus]

The speed of a weapon should have much less impact on the ammount of damage it does then it does now.

I really wonder now how much different would the combat be without physics and speed boost. Maybe it would be like in good old WB where character's skill mattered and low tiers were weak not just in armor but in damage too. Doubtful there is a mod for that though..

 

[Rossa]

You're literally forced to cheese it with ranged weapons to win a fight. 1 guy armored up, using spears vs 10 looters? Stoned to death, about 300 times already.

You can decrease damage to the player and combat AI to try to make it easier to solo looters. But i agree, combat could be better. It's pretty stupid that combat AI does not scale with weapon skill and how a lvl6 looter can chamber block a couched lance with a hatchet.
To effectively solo looters on horseback you need a spear and a shield, don't charge straight to the blob, change direction on the last second and try to aim the looters throwing stones at you. You can use a sword, but it's tricky, you have to bump the looter with your horse before stricking with the sword, but be carefull, that's when they will stop your horse and whack you to death .