A lack of immersion and purpose

[Roaring Mouse]

Lack of immersion is the biggest factor in my not playing the last 2 weeks.

Its almost there and I generally can fill in the blanks with a story in my head, but once I lose the narrative of my playthrough, I have to stop that playthrough.

I miss the detailed companions backstories that arise through the gameplay like in Warband. I also dislike how your spouse is not a true member of your party. It would be huge for me if I could just walk through a city with my wife, instead of the first companion I recruited.

As a matter of fact, its gotten to where I only recruit my first companion based on whether I can see myself walking around with them. It annoys me.

 

[Pensaci]

I am also just appreciating the fact you made this effort as input at this point.

And also get your point, which I agree with full heart. But I am curious now more what the design guys think of this game. After all, even giving we can get involve via modding, the base is theirs and this is their game that they're supposed to make.

I guess we will have to see. Most likely only in the patches.

 

[Apocal]

He is criticizing Warband for the exact same things, guys.

I played Warband for who knows how many days if not months of my life, but something that always happened in every playthrough is that I got bored, I got bored of the repetitive characters, so many events that can happen, but none of them will be remembered, because the lack of character this game has makes it forgettable.

And yes, I agree that overall Mount and Blade doesn't do much to immerse you in the game world.

There has never really been a good reason to wander around town, Warband just put a band-aid on it by forcing you to track down guild leaders (which was awful) and occasionally having you get jumped by bandits if you went to the market at night. The arena closes, but not the market? What? The local economy has never been especially

The companion backstories have always been barebones and disjointed from events; Matheld was supposed to get enough money and troops to retake her thanedom but no matter how much you paid her, geared her out and let her sift through loot, she would never have enough and take her leave. The only thing they had over Bannerlord currently is that there was an area that would trigger a few lines of conversation. I thought initially the cataphract's daughter ("the Wronged") would have a tie-in quest because of what appeared to be a half-completed hook for a dynamic name entry in her backstory. But no, it was just a bit of text left hanging. The ones who are Daring ***** if you retreat from battle, Merciful (or Honorable, I forget) will ***** if you raid from villages. I assume Generous companions will ***** if you run out of food or money, but I've never run out of food or money with them in my party so I'm not sure.

But the focus in MB has always been on combat in a dynamic gameworld to keep fights at least a bit more fresh and replayable than they would be otherwise and most of the mods don't do much to immerse you in the gameworld either. There are a few standouts that did, but 1257AD for one example, was basically just Warband + some extra scripting. The companions were even more sterile than Warband's, there was still no reason to go into town -- even moreso than Warband because the town scenes were much larger and more intricate, so it was easy to get lost -- and the game world didn't really react to you much other than the same canned responses based on your renown and their personality template.

For what it is worth, I don't think TW ever really intended to go on a deep-dive down that rabbit hole.

 

[Kentucky 『 ＨＥＩＧＵＩ 』 James]

I usually do Baybars roleplay,

Ah yes, a fellow man of culture.

I limit myself to use memlukes only but lack of impact on enemy when I crush massive hostile parties is the biggest con I think.

This was an issue in Warband too, you would defeat an entire field army and capture all their lords, but all you would get is some measly renown (capped at 50 for no meaningful reason other than to prevent snowballing (IN A SINGLEPLAYER GAME???) ), and you would only get +1 relations with lords, and even then only if you actively went and talked to them. In bannerlord this is just as bad if not worse: the game only rewards you with crappy loot and a few other stats for participating in the primary mechanic of the game.

 

[Yukmouth++]

Even your wife talks to you like « Greetings Captain, what do you want from me ? »?

 

[Kentucky 『 ＨＥＩＧＵＩ 』 James]

That's fine, she's into that kind of thing.

 

[froggyluv]

They really missed the boat on this one. Seen a study before where one of the main things sandbox-type players look for is how they effect the world. In a game like GTA it really carried across through physics -its fun to see the chain reaction of events we can create through chaos. In a strategy game -its how are we effecting the policies of the world and how is the game world reacting to our actions. In Bannerlord there seems to be NO REACTION..! They just dont care what you've done, who your are and where your going. this is a huge mistake imo -and one that is pretty easily remedied with a even a small dedicated team to give the gameworld AI some believable reactions. things as simple as calling player "Your lord", blowing a horn when he enters town or being totally dismissive of player when he's just starting out etc... Again, acting is REACTING and the AI are our actors. If they never react to us, it will be a short dismal future

 

[MostBlunted]

In Bannerlord there seems to be NO REACTION..

Fixed it.

I mean you´re totally right. Defeat one Lord´s army? Defeat it over and over and over again.

But it´s EA....

 

[Bob Gnarly]

I have to do a lot myself to feel immersed, like setting my own story, goals, limits and usually renaming and recreating my companions to give them their own personality/story. IMO randomised companions was the wrong decision.

The town and village scenes are cool and all, but there's no real reason to visit them either. The world feels bland an empty currently while the NPCs are too generic.

 

[HeIsHephaestion]

bUt iTs eArlEy aCCess

 

[Tovgiv]

+

 

[badman]

immersion sounds like a lot of work

 

[ShakenSpeare]

When almost decade-old mods are far more immersive and interactive than a 2020 release...

 

[Honved]

There are several ways to create immersion in a game world:

One is to have the NPCs react to your current status, your clothing or armor, your recent deeds, or to major events in the vicinity. Having an NPC tell you for the 30th time that everything is tough, but they're managing, feels generic. Having that NPC ask if you heard about that battle between lord X and lord Y just outside of the village is better, especially if they recognize that YOU were one of the lords involved. Even minor tidbits such as in Morrowind would help, where several NPCs will comment about your clothing ("That's one ugly outfit"), or change their responses based on your Personality stat (going from "We're watching you. Scum!") to ("How may I help you, citizen?"). Without those subtle details, any trip into town or a village is a "once and done" thing, and the time and expense of creating that village scene is mostly wasted after that first visit.

There could be a dozen pre-generated "personalities" and backgrounds with quests and additional dialog, only 3-4 of them used in any campaign and assigned to NPC lords or companions at random, so you wouldn't see the same ones every play-through, and you wouldn't know in advance who had them. The rest could be random stats and backgrounds.

Having your actions affect the armies and economy would be another factor. With a rudimentary economy, raiding could impoverish a kingdom, while bringing goods from producers to customers (for a profit) should improve the state of the kingdom over time. Excessive recruitment after defeats should reduce populations, leaving less recruits in the future, as well as less goods and higher prices due to a shortage of labor. The player and cumulative NPC lord actions (losses in combat, looting of towns, construction of improvements) should be able to alter the prosperity of a kingdom. As it stands, there's no real effect aside of player income and player recruitment.

Then there's diplomacy. Having the same mere handful of options, some at random, really doesn't do it justice.

Overall, Calradia really doesn't make for a very interesting world as it now stands. Hopefully that will change.

 

[Wulfsdottir]

There are several ways to create immersion in a game world:

One is to have the NPCs react to your current status, your clothing or armor, your recent deeds, or to major events in the vicinity. Having an NPC tell you for the 30th time that everything is tough, but they're managing, feels generic. Having that NPC ask if you heard about that battle between lord X and lord Y just outside of the village is better, especially if they recognize that YOU were one of the lords involved. Even minor tidbits such as in Morrowind would help, where several NPCs will comment about your clothing ("That's one ugly outfit"), or change their responses based on your Personality stat (going from "We're watching you. Scum!") to ("How may I help you, citizen?"). Without those subtle details, any trip into town or a village is a "once and done" thing, and the time and expense of creating that village scene is mostly wasted after that first visit.

There could be a dozen pre-generated "personalities" and backgrounds with quests and additional dialog, only 3-4 of them used in any campaign and assigned to NPC lords or companions at random, so you wouldn't see the same ones every play-through, and you wouldn't know in advance who had them. The rest could be random stats and backgrounds.

Having your actions affect the armies and economy would be another factor. With a rudimentary economy, raiding could impoverish a kingdom, while bringing goods from producers to customers (for a profit) should improve the state of the kingdom over time. Excessive recruitment after defeats should reduce populations, leaving less recruits in the future, as well as less goods and higher prices due to a shortage of labor. The player and cumulative NPC lord actions (losses in combat, looting of towns, construction of improvements) should be able to alter the prosperity of a kingdom. As it stands, there's no real effect aside of player income and player recruitment.

Then there's diplomacy. Having the same mere handful of options, some at random, really doesn't do it justice.

Overall, Calradia really doesn't make for a very interesting world as it now stands. Hopefully that will change.

+ 1 to everything. Even the constant "...and then I took an arrow in the knee" is better than the complete silence we now have in towns.
And the population to be a factor, imho, is the must have thing if we're going for immersion.

https://forums.taleworlds.com/index.php?threads/what-do-you-think-about-population.425909/

 

[XDaron]

I wish I had the dedication required to make posts like these

 

[froggyluv]

I wish I had the dedication required to make posts like these

Video game critique takes alot of energy. Pass the Bon-Bons..!

 

[ppga]

This is why as soon as mods like Prophesy of Pendor and Brytenwalda (by the same guys who wound up doing VC later) came out I never, ever, played vanilla Warband again.

Which is why I suspect the lack of immersion in the base game is a feature, not a bug.

 

[Revverie]

I'll contribute with a list of suggestions that I think it can improve the immersion, some of them might be already said by other people or other posts of mine though, and some of them might be too over the top/difficult to make. This list is subject to change or to be expanded in a near future.

Tournaments:
-A town with a tournament becomes more festive, the peasents are aware of the tournament, towns are decorated, etc
-Travelling competitors: Recurring competitors are indeed a thing in this game, it was in warband too. My idea is to expand on them, have them have a personality, you could find them in taverns along his friends or around people admiring them in town. Maybe have one have a special quest, make them create rivalries with the player or other competitors.
-Being recognized: After winning a large amount of tournaments you would be recognized by the commoners and lords, you would win a renown bonus with ladies or marriable characters.
-Bring back dedicating tournaments, even allowing you to dedicate it to lords and kings
-Increase difficulty, give reward to 2nd and 3rd place to balance it. The final fight is against a great warrior you would need to fight well to beat him.

Lord's keep:
-Populate keeps: Bring stewards, lord's children, counselors, high level soldiers who are in your party would rest inside the keep, have drinks, talk with them about current events and bring morale based dialog that would give you an idea on how to improve your party, like a lack of food or drinks or fights.
-Counselors: Instead of having the encyclopedia give you all the knowledge you need without an in game interaction, make talking with people inside the court give you insight into clans, families, and enemies, based obviously on your relation with the lord or kingdom.
-Wife and children: When your son/daughter is born you would find the nest in the keep, with your wife next to it or a maiden taking care of him/her. Your wife gets happy when you visit and gives you a dialog that would improve or rest relation with her (you could be a total **** to her or be nice to her, just to give some character to yourself and your relationship).
-Feasts: I'm going to guess this is a missing feature that is yet to be added, but they're definetly required. Also, make feasts and feast tournaments pop up a quest from here and then. To give an example, in the short book of George RR Martin The Mistery Knight there's a tourney and an enemy of the throne tries to start a rebellion. Events like this can highly improve the experience.
-Allow you to ask the location of the lord to the guards: Instead of finding where a lord is telepathically, you would ask the guards just like in Viking Conquest, its really weird and tedious getting into the encylopedia, finding the person you're looking for and then seek him out, the older way was a lot more engaging and you wouldnt be taken out of control of your character and party to look a wikipedia. I really hate being taken out of control to do this.

Taverns:
-Populate taverns: Taverns are the place of rest not only of common people but of soldiers who are visiting a town. Filling them with already occupied mercenaries who serve other lords would give the impression that people is coming in and out, allowing you to meet interesting characters, like other mercenary companies, mercenary leaders, drunk soldiers, drunk thugs, and tourney competitors, like I've said above.
-Your own party: You can find your own companions in town, which is great, but I would also add part of your party inside the tavern, only that you would find the most common part of your party in it. Talking with them would allow you to improve relation with them, buying them drink, and spending the night with your party getting drunk at cost of renown.
-Fights: In Warband you would find drunken people, I dont know why this isnt a feature here, as I've said, you could find mercenary leaders, for example if one were to pick a fight with you, you could fight him back at cost of renown or relations with the employer lord, same happens if you find soldiers of another party who are making trouble.

Special Companions:
Having random companions allows any lord to have companions without getting into trouble, however, they're very uninteresting and forgettable. Here's what I would like to see in this game
-Companions with a visible backstory: Every faction has 2 o 3 special companions, they live in a specific town, have a specific home/place inside these towns or villages, a wife/husband, children, brothers, etc.
-They require you to complete a quest in order to hire them
-They would talk to you about your decisions, leave your party or require convincing when attacking their own homeland, and request leave or help when their land is in danger (depending on what backstory the character has)
-They have midterm quests, lets say one needed money to help his little brother and joined your party, once he made a good ammount you would need to take him to his land and see him fulfill his quest, allowing you to improve relation with them and therefore improving their stats, or making them give you a gift, like an special legendary sword.
-If they die you would have to take account for their death, for example, you would have to visit his home and pay respects to his wife if you want to, improving renown.

This is all I can write now, I'll write more when I'm inspired, if anyone wants to contribute we could make a special post dedicated to immersion suggestions. Also if anyone writed one of these before please tell me so I can credit you. Thanks all for answering and keeping the post alive, this is very important to me.

 

[Wulfsdottir]

Great list.
I would add some about workshops:

Make people work in the workshops, not just stand idly.
Make room for resources in workshops where you can donate the resources they need directly and affect the production of goods. (For example, not sell the grain to town, where you don't have the control over what portion of it would go to your brewery, but bring that grain directly to workshop. Same with clay, sheep for wool, cows for leather etc.)
Make some special events and quests for workshops maybe? Just an example: Like, your workshop overseer will tell you that he heard that this and this village has better quality clay this time and if you bring him that exact clay the next butch of pottery will be extra good quality. Or maybe there's some component which you can find in specific place on the map.
Maybe make the upkeep of workshops dynamic, like raising salaries for better quality and maybe there will be something like strikes or some quests involving workers?

And please, when you change the production of the workshop, do change the layout and the scene for it. Though I think it is hard coded in every town in such a way that it's impossible So we have to deal walking around smithy, no matter if we turned it into pottery or wool factory.