Recent content by Danandur

Awesome idea! Also the looting system needs a total overhaul. I mean after I successfully defeat an army of 600 ppl with considerable amount of elite troops and all I get are some ragged pants, boots and shirts is just horrible. Where are the gears of all those vlanadian banner knights/cataphracts/etc. I personally slew in battle? Atleast there should be a similar system like in VC where you could have the "first pick" of a post battle loot even at the price of affecting your party's morale. Especially that the game almost never spawns high end gear at the city traders. Am I the only one who always wants to collect a full set of elite gear at each cultural region? This is borderline impossible now. Despite sitting on several hundred thousands or even millions of gold.

Maraxus said:

And I can speak from both sides, if I just think back a little more. Just 20-something years ago, my reflexes used to be better then they are now. That if not a thing I "unlearned", it's something I just got physically worse at

Click to expand...

Yeah I edited my previous post since it came to my mind aswell. Anyways I recommend grabbing a shield and trying to practise directional block since unlike in warband you can use shiled directions aswell. But if your reflexes are not that good, then I doubt autoblock would help you, since it still requires the perfect timing of block, you just dont have to bother turning the camera.

Maraxus said:

Blocking not so much: I know that when my Opponent attacks from a certain direction I need to tap into that direction and then press the block button. And I don't manage at and then I try the exact same thing again and I still don't get it and I can try the exact same thing over and over and it does not work and then I really don't need people who do the exact same thing I try to "just learn how to do it", because they can do it and enjoy it. It's not a skill, it's reflexes, basically a physical attribute. You would not tell a short person to "learn" how to reach the highest shelf without a latter because you don't need one either. You would not tell a person with small hands to learn how to play a piano-piece that requires a certain finger-spread-distance.

Click to expand...

Sorry babe, this is totally bull****. Btw when you block, you do not simply tap a little at the right mouse button, but you keep holding it, until the enemy blow lands at your sword. Probably thats why you are unable to block. Besides it is totally learnable skills to the extent of blocking faints aswell. You will get better and better at it eventually. Unless you are an elderly people whos reflexes are somewhat deteriorated over the time. And don't get me wrong I totally approve and admire elderly people who play video games (like my own grandma). But if that's the case, I dont entirely understand why you play real time combat games, instead of like strategy games or such.

Apart from this, while I don't approve or use the auto-blocking because it entirely limits your ability to develop your skills (yes it is still possible to learn it and get better at it), but I would say it would be mandatory to include because it limits the player freedom in cases like yours. (Or at the very least it would help them getting the hang of block.)

@mexxico
It would be awesome if you could assign lot more proficiency point when creating a new character. Right now those 10 points/pick is just way too low. The players start now with often less proficiency points than tier 1 enemies. Right now looters can out sprint my new 2h footman and its tedious getting my athletics leveled up to a solid 60-80 so I actually don't get banged by a group of looters when i want to fight them on foot. Since the latest patch totally nerfed the arena, it is much harder to make my characters combat ready. (Not talking about 200 combat skill leveled characters but atleast a solid 60-80.) Also some skills (for example: smithing, scouting, medicine, leadership or engineering) grow ridiculously slow even with maxed out focus points, lvl 5 attribute points and 10x+ multipliers.

SpectreSC said:

Seems like they adjusted values for Arena and Tourney XP, anyone have any current numbers with the latest patch?

Click to expand...

Well I tried it with a new alt. It took like 4 guys to kill with a 2h in order to advance from 5 to 6 proficiency. (Roughly with 2.5x multipliers) It is roughly 10-20% of the previous XP gained, since previously killing a guy in similar conditions resulted in 3-4 points (from 5 to 8-9). Which means I have to grind ages again in order to advance the athletics skill to like 50-60... They really need to adjust the proficiency values granted from character generation...

eddiemccandless said:

You can't really become a God amongst men combat wise in the current version of the game. Even at high proficiencies try soloing a party of 10 or more forest bandits then let me know how that goes for you

Click to expand...

Speaking of which, I found a way to solo the forest bandits and even sea raiders on foot against a group of 10. Battanian woodrunners gave me the idea. All you need is a good skirmisher (athletics lvl 50+, throwing lvl 75+, a wide shield, two stacks of broad headed throwing spears (costs 1000/stack, cheap as hell), and some proper perk allocation (obtaining perks that increases the stack number of your throwables)). The rest is literally just about timing and precision throw for the head. He's the ultimate forestbandit slayer. But this setup is weak against cav though.

SpectreSC said:

I just feel like that solution you're proposing is already handled fairly well by actual Tournaments in general. That's where those hefty, more experienced fighters, can come out to face you and that's where you can gain the brunt majority of the XP. Maybe divide Tourneys into different types of bouts? Melee Foot? Lance? Archery? etc... so you can gain a good bonus to those specific proficiencies in a competitive format.

Click to expand...

True, but tournaments are held once in every week, thats still an issue. I want my character to be useable in combat. And I understand that it can be weird to level up 5-6 times in a day, but you can approach it from another angle. You start as a 30 year old guy (or gal) on the peak of his strenght, and your initial skill level is nowhere near the average tier 1 troops. Looters out sprint you if you want to play as a footman and dont even dreem about decent footwork which you can control 2-3 opponents attacking simultaniously. Go ahead try to start a 2h footman as Uruk mentioned in his post, you will see what I'm talking about. So consider it like you are making up for getting started with the level of a baby as 30 years old guy. I would certainly give up the arena grind if actually selecting the prehistory of the player would result in obtaining some proficiency (not just 40 points for a fully stacked cav for example at the start of the game, but like 100-150). I guess people wouldn't be forced to make up for the disabilities of his newborn baby 30 years old hero.

As for the possibility to select different tournament types and give these related skills a very heavy boost, seems to be a nice idea. I love the cultural setting of the tournaments right now (horse cultures focus on that, inf focus on this, etc.), instead of making every type of combat present in every tourney, but maybe could sice it up by allowing the player to change the preference of a city if he becomes the lord or lady of the town. (Like a battanian lord obtain a vlanadian town and he can show those fuffy coward what real combat is about. Upclose an personal with an axe on your feet.) I could completly support this idea.

SpectreSC said:

Listen, I understand these points both of you are making but my point is the following and it has NOT changed at all:

The Arena gives TOO MUCH XP per engagement for literally very little if any cost at all. That's the issue here, I'm not against giving XP for these activities because it makes sense! But to sit in an Arena with competition that is hardly worth training on to begin with, getting 100% of the gain and leveling your skills up without much of an issue in this environment is the problem I have. You're supposed to be gaining the MOST from Battles and actual Sieges/Warfare/Quests, etc. Not from sitting in an Arena with rookies and greenies and becoming God amongst men, that's the issue I have here.

I do not have any issue whatsoever with actually gaining XP from these. I just believe the amount of XP gained is far too high for what is entirely a newbie/tutorial arena. In Warband I used these Arenas to learn tactics, weapon handling, etc. It gave you minimal XP and it did level proficiency because of how the leveling system worked for Warband. In this case with Bannerlord, proficiency is directly tied to your level... so to sit in the Arena is essentially powerleveling you. I just don't understand how you don't see that as an issue? The game isn't meant to be easy.

Click to expand...

Look, I already wrote it in an earlier post in this thread, that in the arena you do not only fight against recruits. It sends gradually higher tier enemies at you, until the last 10 guys are usually tier 5-6. (Go ahead take a look at the name of those soldiers you take down. Imperial cataphracts, Strugian berzerkers, Battanian fiann, aserai heavy cav, etc.) They just don't have the armor advantage like in battle. (And why should they? You are running naked aswell! Fair combat against the best AI.)

As I already wrote peviously I would very much welcome a new arena setup, where you can choose your equipment and the difficulty of your enemies and adjust the XP multipliers according to these setups. So fighting against such tier 6 opponents should very well yield normal combat xp levels. It would make a decent narrative RP-wise aswell (like "he was trained by the battanian heroes and fianns, the very best of the local garrison" or something like that.)

SpectreSC said:

Excuse me but I will also take the same stance against you then. If you want to enjoy the limitless and endless amount of XP gain from the Arena then that's all on you. Go enable an XP slider mod and have at it. Or better yet, once they fix the amount of XP gain you receive from Arenas and Tourneys, you can enable cheats yourself and do as you please.

But the Arena has always been meant for one thing and one thing only, practicing with your weapons and learning the game. Not to XP farm. I'm fairly sure a good majority of Warband Vets would agree with me on that one.

Click to expand...

I tested quite extensively the arena ever since the patch, it's very far from limitless XP source. It jumpstarts the first levels until like lvl 10 or so. (Even your compaions start as lvl 16 average).

That's also an opinion, that it was meant to use for this and that. Are you the developer of warband who knows what it was supposed to do when you coded? Nah, you use it for something and others use it for something else. For example I am also a warband veteran with thousands of hours into the game, and every single ranged character, I used the arena to jumpstart my archery skill to like 100-150 proficiency, because in warband low proficiency meant very low hitchance (especially on horse archer characters). In bannerlord I use it to increase my athletics skill, since it's annoying as a footman that I'm unable to run on a decent speed. With the arena I can now take down larger looter parties in melee alone, instead of getting gangbanged like at the start of the game. In the case of bannerlord XP and skill proficiency are tied together, that causes the fuss. I don't want a lvl 50 main character, I want a certain proficiency increased to a certain point until its useable in real battle. Like I always did in the arena.

SpectreSC said:

Or maybe just adjust the XP gained from actual battles vs sim battles and that will resolve the ACTUAL problem with XP gain? It's like people don't even realize the REAL ISSUE here is with combat on the open world in general. Battles against armies and bandits, etc, do not give you NEARLY enough XP to justify doing them or leveling your character in a timely manner.

Using the Arena as a substitute with 100% XP gain against no-name nobodies is just downright stupid and a bandaid on the real issue. Hopefully they revert that change and reduce the XP gain and then fix the real issue with battles themselves.


You can actually but that's if you do spend a majority of time in the Arena, as to your point. I know I came off as entitled or upset but it just baffles me that people are accepting this as the solution to the real issue, which I've pointed out above to the other poster in my first quote.

I'm hoping this is a temporary measure, which I'm sure it is, until they've fixed the issue with XP gain elsewhere. And yes, as much as I was advocating for others to DL an XP "slider" mod I did it as well to reduce XP gain in tourneys and arenas down to something more acceptable. I was mostly bothered because although the XP gain right now is horrendous, barring the Arena/Tourney changes, I don't want this game to cater or dumb down the difficulty to more casual based methods of reaching the "end-game".

Click to expand...

Respectfully, thats your opinion and if you don't like arena, then don't use it. Noone is forcing you to do so. This is not a competetion like "hey guys I reached this lvl like this, while you didn't". Everyone is entitled to enjoy the game the way they see fit and having an opinion that others should do something else doesn't make you right. I myself for example keep creating new characters in every 20-30 hours to explore and entirely different playstyle and yes I want to avoid the tedious looter grind (even if the arena does not offer me renown). I don't see why I should be limited in any way. You have the freedom of ignoring the arena, I have the freedom of using it in the first couple of levels. It's very kind of you for worrying about my and other people's gameplay or how fullfilling it can be with or without the useage of arena, but allow me to make the decision about it myself. No offence, but it's none of your business and as long as a single guy wants to use this totally normal and RP-wise acceptable feature it's perfectly legit to do so. Probably thats why TW enabled (fixed maybe) it in the first place.

Wheem said:

Some poster(s) keep mentioning fighting "peasants" in the arena instead of elite, high tier soldiers, but surely that issue applies to looters as well...

Click to expand...

Also let us not forget that the last 10 contenders in the practise fights are always tier 5-6 chads not peasants. While looters are tier 1 all the time, except for the casual tier 2-3 bandits that wander out of the blue every once in a while. So yeah, in the arena you can practise with the best AI. Not to mention the tournaments with the occasional lords and elites. Arena should be given more setup options for practise fights: like getting to choose which weapons you enter with, or what tier enemies you wish to fight and apply the XP multiplayers based on these values.

Uruk34 said:

The point about real time investment is also a really important one that often seems to be missing. Many people, under normal circumstances, don’t have the time to invest hours in an unrewarding early game grindfest which doesn’t allow you to play the game the way you want to anyway as certain weapon types aren’t viable early on. Telling those people to go play a different game because this one is all about grinding is a little selfish tbh...

Click to expand...

Exactly. (Not to mention in the current state of the game you cannot learn crossbows (nonsense! they were widely used because it was easier to teach the peasants how to use it, than spend half a year to train them in archery), unless you pick the character creation perks correctly, because the only crossbow accessible is limited to lvl 20 skill. Now you participate in a few tournaments in Vlanadia and there ya go.)

Playing one or two hours in the arena and you can set out to travell the world with a character that can actually run. (Average 50-75 skill points in athletics, one handed and throwing/archery)
VS
Chasing 150 parties of looters/bandits to obtain the same set of skills investing 10 hours to find and kill them all plus the recovery time spent in cities.

I think the choice is obvious. This whole topic is all about player freedom. The more we have the better. Arena is fine with xp. Moreover the whole xp system needs a large buff (both "real" combat and arena one). Especially if they want to implement the children system and such, so it wont take that much of a time to train up a new successor to your clan. (Provided they solve the early snowballing that is). What this game would really need, is new features, like baron rebellions in empires which conquered by a single faction. Reemerge of previously eleminated cultures and empire as events (with massive liberation armies, etc.) to keep the player busy on longer time spans and provide a meaning to the offspring system.

Lads, seriously with all this "my character will be unbalanced!" do you realise, if you don't assign focus points to the weapon skill it will only advance with 0.05% eventually and wont really progress above like 75? And why the **** do you care how others want to enjoy their game? Gaining xp in the arena will only affect your game if you use it, but if you say training in the arena is not a real combat and unrealistic, then you are dumber then I originally thought. Many people wrote down examples already, so here is another one maybe it will go through this time: back in medieval times lords and their men-at-arms rarely fought in any "real" combat (unless their whole country was at war, but thats another issue), in the majority of their time, they were fighting in the training fields with wooden swords or totally dulled and pointed practise blades, because guess what, there was no "wounded/recovery system" in real life (if you got injured, you had a fair chace of dieing, unless it was a minor scratch only) and guess what they didn't want to die. And guess why the tournaments were so popular back in time? Yeah, they had no other opportunity to fight other previously unknown knights and experienced soldiers and learn some valueable experience on the top of practiseing their asses off in the training fields. So let's turn this thing around: both realistically and RP-wise it is more than perfect to be able to hone your skills in the game.

If you are afraid of unbalancing your character, well then you should consider improving your self-control. If you want to RP that your character progresses slowly, through multiple days? Then simply play 3 rounds per day. If you are unable to do that, then you should see a therapist. But if you want to lvl up your skills to like 75 in an hour then never set foot in the arena again, then you should be able to. In single player the more possibilities the player has the better. This is not multiplayer, it does not affect you, unless you are unable to control yourself and the flow of the game. So please pull your nose out of other people' business and dont try to limit their freedom by stamina/no-xp-arena or whatever. If you cannot enjoy the game when a feature is enabled then you are the only one responsible for that. TW should turn their eyes to much more important issues. Arena is fine as it is, and offers a sufficient freedom in it's current state. Deal with it.

I don't see why everyone suddenly decide how others should play SP. It's called SP for a reason. Everyone should focus on their own gameplay and TW should provide the widest range of possibilities to the player so they can enjoy the game anyway they see fit. Stamina system for the arena? Blah! Horrible idea honestly. Those players who want to play the arena should be able to, and those who don't, then they wont go anywhere near the place anyways. As for being realistic: haven't you guys participated in a several hours long training in any kind of sports (martial arts, archery, long distance running, fencing, ect.)? In both warband and bannerlord time during battles slows down to real time, while on the map everything seems to stop, because even the close proximity of the armies are several miles away and the smaller 1-2 hundred skirmishes are long ended by the time the armies move on the map. Arena is no different: you enter "real life" time speed, thus no need to pass large amounts of time on the map between a few fights. An arena fight is roughly 5 min max. Why shouldn't people train for an hour if they wish to? I don't think many ppl grinds for more than 1 hour since it will be boring eventually and they wenture out to the "real" combat soon enough. Without gaining XP on the arena the whole thing is useless, except for tournaments. TW did a reasonable step by assigning XP to this activity and those who don't like it don't even use the arena. (Or the anti-xp guys suggesting they keep playing the arena anyways for that 250 gold and they are offended by getting xp aswell now? I simply don't get it.)

And on the other side: let's face it, grining the looters are much-much tedious and could much more easily result in shutting the game off than arena. I guess the majority only play arena for getting a proper gear and a medium amount of XP then they can't wait to jump to the sieges, kingdoms and fiefs part. Why should we prolong the early agony by forcing the ppl to hunt 5000 looters for hours?