Recent content by kab

kab said:

Training troops pays 2400 from day one and requires exactly one group of looters, it's often completed in the same day. Add in deserters, caravan ambush, army of poachers, trouble with brigands, inn and out, bandit hideout all of which largely overlap. Then dump prisoners at a town that needs manual laborers for another 10-15k+ on top.

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Bratok said:

Well, the problem is how the hell am I supposed to get 45 000 gold in just one month? While being dressed in rags and commanding a bunch of peasants?

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Already answered, see above. Typical results are 2x caravan/workshop on day 30 plus a full party of T3 cavalry. Average adding 1 workshop/caravan every 10 days until 6-8 (total) around day 70. That's in addition to building a full party of cavalry, buying pack animals for weight, keeping enough food to level Steward 1-2 points per day, buying warhorses to later be used for upgrades (in the meantime, infantry get to use them to increase speed). Also includes money and diversions to marry both the main and brother (2 wives + brother become first 3 parties). I hardly bother with tournaments, if you want to that makes it faster.

Bratok said:

I have three workshops in a city with three villages that produce iron ore and hardwood. You know, which workshop is the most profitable? Smithy? No (zero profits). Woodwork? No (100-150 profits). It's TANNERY (1000+ profits). I even tried to sell iron ore and hardwood in the city to fill the market with raw materials - it gave zero effect.

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The economy is inherently unstable and especially vulnerable to disruptions from the player. Yeah, it's a mess, on the other hand you can go around removing every Pottery workshop in Calradia and create a monopoly for yourself. I consistently get ~100 from a bad workshop, ~400 from a good workshop and ~200-300 is common (w/ Sweatshops). They never start there, they build to it.

It's usually Wool/Tannery that do well in 1.5.8 for me. Khuzait/Empire cities in particular provide profitable Wool shops nearly across the board. Only time I have three workshops in one town is my own fief for RP reasons. Otherwise it doesn't make sense. With the shop limit you're better off targeting Wool in 3 different towns.

Anyway, that generally turns in to 2-3k of passive income by day 100, and with Frugal + Efficient Campaigner as soon as you do join/form a kingdom I end up rolling around nearly 100% of the time with a clan-only army of 350+ for < 1500 denars and then all of the equipment and prisoners are pure profit. Add in some trading and you've got a couple mil in the bank within a few years. Well, you could, I usually end up spending 1+ mil on tier 6 stuff just to make the companions look baller but what else is there really.

The only way I've found to level Tactics effectively is to spam sacrifice troops, the more the better. I did exactly that to hit 150+ Tactics before beginning leveling other skills so it would have the maximum learning rate. The passive bonus is negligible, some of the perks help but nothing addresses the complaints here.

It's simply not worth it, especially with Cunning being generally bad because Roguery isn't good and Scouts are a dime a dozen.

What does happen is you can auto-resolve 95% of your battles, you get so many prisoners it's a bonanza of future nobles, there's so many wounded that medicine actually levels. But it doesn't matter because you'll still take so many losses that you have to participate even if only to push F1 F3 because your master of Tactics is still worse than simply saying "charge".

It's an effective strategy for farming prisoners and medicine, and that does help make it more viable, but the losses are just unbearable once you're dealing with armies.

Spinozart1 said:

OP is aiming for a playtrough with specific conditions.
No vassalage, no merc contract, no war against kingdom, no trade, no workshop and no settle down.
A kind of nomadic and day-to-day play style.
So except from rebellions, it could be difficult for him to own a fief.

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Right: no trade, no war, no diplomacy. That doesn't leave much.

So the question is, how can an independent party support itself in early-mid game (at least) without allying with kingdoms, doing the main quest or involving into trade/production, and stay profitable and progress at the same time?

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It's odd that you insist on excluding a huge portion of the content. Caravans and workshops don't require you to "settle down", they're best used while independent because you have no enemies.

Regardless, even without any trading or passive income just doing quests for notables alone easily pays 1k or more per day. Training troops pays 2400 from day one and requires exactly one group of looters, it's often completed in the same day. Add in deserters, caravan ambush, army of poachers, trouble with brigands, inn and out, bandit hideout all of which largely overlap. Then dump prisoners at a town that needs manual laborers for another 10-15k+ on top.

With a company of 70+ high tier men (mostly Imperials and some Sturgians) my daily wage is roughly 700 denars, and I don't even have the most expensive troops, like heavy cavalry or noblemen.

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Wages for 70 T5 troops is 864, less with perks. So you've got a party that consists of entirely of expensive, elite troops and it's still trivial to pay for without any perks or passive income just by doing some quests while hunting bandits and selling prisoners.

You could solve the entire problem and pay your daily wages with just two or three workshops. It takes all of about 20 - 30 days to get the first two up and running.

- Get rid of trading and social skills in general, the little leadership you need to maintain morale can be achieved without much attribute points.
- Get more focus points in Steward earlier, the extra party space is nice (cba getting a quartermaster).

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Some things to consider:
1. Leadership has huge bonuses to army size: adds an entire party and makes all of your parties bigger.
2. Definitely get rid of trade since you're not using it, but if you do use it that's easy money and with perks like Caravan Master you can carry half of Calradia in your baggage train with nearly zero penalty.
3. Maybe move the 5 points in Charm? There's not much to talk about in the perks beyond 125 and several of them aren't implemented at all.

Move 2-3 points from Charm to Steward and then you can dump Trade wherever you want.

Eugene Shutto said:

Indeed. I hope they add secondary effects to charm. Right now only 1 decent perk - champion (gives you 10 influence after winning tournament). But since it in social, I prefer to level it up to get higher level cap.

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Don't understand this at all. 10 influence from a tournament is all but useless to me. Respectful Opposition and Young and Respectful turn my ruler into the most popular person in all of Calradia. Not sure if it's related but I've never had the trouble with getting clans to join, or having clans betray me, or having my villages overly raided, or losing lots of caravans, etc. that others seem to have.

Trade is meh too , there are some nice perks , but most of them are meh. Only reason I bother - I never tried this "buy a fief " perk , just curious about it.

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Caravan Master, Content Trades, Insurance Plans, Spring of Gold. The others are meh, sure, but they are worth a little bit and the color coding makes trading a trivial activity. Spring of Gold alone is like adding 3 free workshops that can't be captured.

Most of the skills and perks are pretty "meh" in my opinion to start with. Trade is so easy to level, and shares Social with Leadership which I want as high as possible, that I can't see why I would avoid the income from trading or the perks from leveling it.

Obviously, it's better if you aim to hit maximum available level in preferred skills, like 250 and more, and best of all, if those skills are tied to one attribute, so you can use attribute points with maximum efficiency. Higher skills - higher level cap.

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You would think so but I don't agree.

Take Charm as an example. For a ruler I consider Respectful Opposition and Young and Respectful mandatory to maintain relations. However there is nothing I care about in Charm beyond level 125 and I don't need more influence and relationship bonuses past that. In fact I wish I could lock it at 125 and keep it from ever leveling even a single point beyond.

There's actually a number of 100, 125 perks in various skill lines that I would much rather have over many of the 200+ perks in the skills I put the most focus points and attribute points into. When you consider the insane grind of many skills past 200+ it makes things even worse.

I would like to read what your maximum level was achieved without cheats, and how you've done that.

Also , would be good to read your opinion what kinda of skills are must have, and what are not.

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Usually hit around 24-28 before I restart due to a major update.

Charm to 125 for Respectful Opposition.

Leadership as high as possible, too many good perks including level 200+ that will significantly increase army size for the clan.

Trade as high as possible, too critical for earning money due to limited options, also includes a 1,000 denar passive income (which is bugged and is >1k right now).

Steward for Frugal, Drill Sergeant, Efficient Campaigner, Sweatshops all the way up to Gourmet. I don't think it's mandatory because the party size bonus isn't that large and there's not much worth talking about past Gourmet.

Medicine for at least Preventative Medicine. I don't care for a lot of the 100 - 200 perks and the 200+ perks are too hard to reach.

Engineering up to around 100 to speed up and beef up the engines. Military Planner is nice but you can always cheese for ammo.

Overall, Intelligence is probably the most primed for delegation to companions. However a number of perks are personal not role based, and I prefer not to use companion slots on these, and it's hard to find companions with the correct perks for these. Basically I generally end up with 4-5 points in Steward and 2-3 in Medicine and Engineering each. They climb up to around ~100 while Steward is able to shoot up to 200+.

Roguery is all but useless to me and hard to level. Tactics has the same problem. That leaves Scouting alone, so I usually put a companion on that one, scouts are one of the easier things to find.

Smithing I never touch.

Riding is particularly useful for map speed and cavalry bonuses. Bow is particularly useful due to prevalence of archers and horse archers. They often get up to 5 focus points each. I also find the battles my troops need help with the most are sieges, taking out the siege engine users and enemy archers with my bow is usually more productive than trying to climb a ladder or tower to melee.

I usually want at least some Athletics, but there's not much critical here unless I'm playing hero on foot.

1H/2H/Polearm/Throwing I try to take to 100 - 150 for the bonuses to troops.

Hard disagree with almost everything in OP. Not sure what the game would look like if settlements didn't require armies, if your character could lead an entire army solo without preparation or support, if you could take fiefs without your neighbors and the former owner reacting logically and attacking you, etc. It's not even very hard at the moment.

Bannerlord does need to be more accessible. It requires too much meta knowledge to manipulate the AI. What are some simple options to make this less painful and more intuitive?

1. Give me an option to barter land internally with other lords, or to give away land for influence and/or relations. Then I have a more straight forward means of "moving" my base instead of now being anchored to a location I never wanted by the algorithm. Do not tie this to a perk, limit it to same kingdom bartering (which leaves the trade perk useful for buying fiefs). Do not allow lords to barter away their last fief.
   
   Currently: I can leave the kingdom, forfeit my fief, then (re)join when the kingdom is attacking fiefs in the area I want. This is pretty easy and not too bad, but it's not intuitive at all and very bad for RP as a vassal.
   
   
2. Let me form a clan army as an independent. Then I can more intuitively take a fief, why would my character not be able to gather 3 parties to take a fief? This also gives me a better option for leveling leadership. If I acquire a fief as an independent, it should become a de facto kingdom. Any land without a kingdom is going to get smashed by the other kingdoms, it makes zero sense in any way for you to be invulnerable because independent.
   
   Currently: I can wait until I see a settlement with low garrison/militia and then take it with a single party, or join a kingdom and then leave when I get the first fiefs I want, etc. but here is one place where I do feel arbitrarily limited -- why can't I form an army with my own parties? I seriously can't have my own brother and wife help me attack a rebel settlement to get land?
   
   
3. Let us respectfully turn down a fief. Either as an option when we're awarded the fief, or as an option to take us out of the voting. Right now the pop-up for the decision could have a button that allows us to be excluded so that when we get to the screen we're guaranteed NOT to be one of the 3 options. Therefore if I'm landless, for example, I can turn it down if we're taking places in Battania and I want to wait for a war with the Northern Empire for Amtitatys (as an example).
   
   Currently: no way around it really, have to play meta and join kingdoms that are attacking what you want to start with, otherwise you have to do things like leave.
   
   
4. A less simple change is a targeting mechanism. I'd really like to be able to "target" a fief as a way to communicate to the kingdom I'm in that we should go after this area. Perhaps it requires influence. It could also have an impact on the voting/decision if the target is taken. It represents my character/clan engaging in politics to get the king and other clans to support attacking that kingdom/town/etc. Could be something as simple as a button on the kingdom screen followed by choosing an enemy fief. Could also make it border settlements only as a start, avoid any problems with someone "targeting" the other side of the map and convincing everyone to go on some insane crusade (actually, this sounds awesome).
   
   Currently: absolutely no way to do this. You'll have to form an army, invite the lords and lead them yourself, and then you're still dealing with the decision algorithm meta so you need to get fiefs to fill up the other clans and make sure you've got fiefs close enough to get you on the list.

If the gear they gave troops affected both versions of battle, then any changes they made might impact each version differently.

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You don't have to do that. The value assigned to the troop in simulations can be an entirely separate table from their live battle equipment composition. This actually makes it easier to mold simulation to the live battle results. You don't have to touch the equipment at all, you just tweak the table to make them more or less fatal. Deriving it from equipment would be a way bigger PITA and prone to balance problems.

I'm all for enchantments to the effect of medicine in live battle and/or the survivability of troops, especially high tier troops, however I think if TW would change it they would actually make auto-calc harsher instead of live battle more forgiving and everyone would be more annoyed

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Yeah no doubt.

It would be more forgiving in that there's a lower mortality rate and therefore fewer permanent losses. Less forgiving in that more casualties with far more wounded will slow the player down on the map, lower the prisoner limit, can result in a herd penalty, etc. so might actually make it harder to win successive fights.

In auto calc, all units have a 30% chance to deal blunt damage with each blow (and if the final blow deals blunt damage it will always result in being wounded). In live battles, it's based on the actual weapon's damage type(s) and the way in which it is wielded (i.e. thrusted or swung), along with some other physics based elements like horse charges or striking with the hilt/haft, meaning it is highly dependent on the combat situation.

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That would certainly do it. I think the live battle algorithm should produce a lot more casualties but at a much lower mortality rate.

I am a bit surprised it's that simplified for simulations. I'd have thought it at least considers troop composition.

Other than that though, auto calc and live battles share the exact same survival formula to determine if a troop is killed or wounded, so things like medicine skill shouldn't cause any differences in casualty ratios.

FYI, you will still earn medicine skill for each fallen troop, regardless of whether they were killed or wounded. In live battles, it's 10 raw medicine xp per wounded troop and 10 per killed troop, but in auto calc it is 10 per wounded troop and 5 per killed troop for whatever reason.

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That's interesting, but a lot of the Medicine experience comes post battle while they recover which is lost entirely.

The core problem is how it affects game play. If I play live battles a huge number of the casualties will be fatal, therefore my only recourse is to eliminate the casualty entirely. That in turn means even less Medicine gain from no wounded, no map speed loss from wounded and so on. I'll see what it's like at 100+ Medicine too.

Well i suppose the counter argument there is that in the live battle you have more influence to actually negate casualties via direct tactics and strategy. So it's there to balance out the live battles one might surmise.

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That's not a counter argument though. I don't need to do anything to have fewer casualties, it simply happens by clicking the button. These things do not balance each other, they rest on the same side of the scale and make it more unbalanced.

Additionally the AI is a bit of a dunce and letting it handle everything will also result in at times very pointless casualties. For example one thing the AI likes to do is present your troops as target practice to enemy archers.

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Who cares if the AI is a dunce? It doesn't matter if I let it handle things or not. You take fewer casualties simply by being in a live battle instead of a simulation. Yet somehow mortality rate jumps from 20% to 75% at the same time. So the AI is a dunce, sure, yet somehow manages to take fewer casualties while simultaneously turning most of them fatal? This is silly and unbalanced.

We need to see more casualties in live battle, with far more of them wounded.

My point is the ratio of dead to wounded is wildly off in live battles. A number of complaints including too many dead lords in live battle vs simulation, Medicine leveling too slowly, etc. are at the very least impacted by this and perhaps even caused by it.

The algorithm/implementation of wounding in live battle likely needs a quick balance pass or has a bug.

Edit: To put this in perspective, we're talking about it swinging from a somewhat realistic 1:3 ratio with 10% dead and 40% total casualties in simulations to a 3:1 ratio with 20%+ dead and 30% total casualties in live battles. That's leaving the AI on it's own to do it's thing. That's a gigantic discrepancy and all I can do is reduce the number of casualties, it's still all fatal with very few or no wounded. This is why you end up targeting "zero" which is unrealistic and silly, because anyone who goes down frickin dies unless you simulate.

Almost certainly.

It's one of those maps where you end up with tons of them stuck right behind the wall trying to run through it.