Anyone else find the progression system really unsatisfying?

[Neofenris]

I have never felt rushed when playing Warband or any of its mods that don't have some invasion script. In Bannerlord I feel rushed to get my companions, rushed to get a workshop-you are in the red daily without one, rushed to get married (age), and rushed to found a kingdom before some of the are wiped out. The whole game feels rushed.

I can relate to that, I purposely join losing factions to prevent them from complete annihilation and balance the factions strengh, but to be useful you need companions's party to be your own army, you won't accomplish much if you are not clan tier 4 with 3 companion's party that have gained XP in the Steward skill, therefore you need to rush the whole process as you said.
For ageing there is a console command to set it back if like me you don't want the CK vibes, 500 hours in never married, never had children, and I don't think I ever will tbh.

 

[JustinTime49]

Because it has never been a concern for me in any of my playthroughs. They end before I cap out on skillpoints, usually around day 600-900 or so.

Thats kind of the issue no?

The leveling system is so abysmal, that by the time the game ends you still wouldnt of been able to achieve max perk skillpoints on heavily focused skills.

Or on the contrary, you believe the perk system is fine because it runs in line to your expectation of game length despite that expectation not working as intended.

 

[Apocal]

Thats kind of the issue no?

The leveling system is so abysmal, that by the time the game ends you still wouldnt of been able to achieve max perk skillpoints on heavily focused skills.

Or on the contrary, you believe the perk system is fine because it runs in line to your expectation of game length despite that expectation not working as intended.

Firstly, this happened to me in Warband as well:

Then I reach end-game at just about the same time as I reach level 22, meaning my 'build' was in play for only a sliver of the playthrough.

The combination of tax skills/attributes (STR->PD for bows, AGI->Riding for horses, AGI->WepMaster for weapon skill caps, etc.) made certain builds near-impossible in Warband with their level scaling. Some mods made it easier by dropping high XP enemies, sure. But for native Warband, I generally stopped at/around level 22-24 on a normal playthrough, which meant attribute and skill point gains were pretty well limited too, then further capped by having to devote some points to certain skills just to make the game playable.

It was a bad design.

Secondly, the only reason I expect BL playthroughs to end in that time is because things tended to get down to conquering/steamrolling/stable mega-factions by that point or I restart to take advantage of new features. 1.4.1 has been a lot better about that -- 880 days and five factions all within 20% power of each other -- so maybe this time it will go on long enough to actually reach the point where I have to avoid skilling up (but why not just put no FP in a skill?) to reach endgame levels.

But even then, I'll still be tickled pink to avoid **** like prisoner or inventory management and getting to use end-game items within 2 hours of starting a new playthrough.

 

[Memoefe]

I dont like warband's progression either but main problem with bannerlord's system is the rewards are too meh. You don't even feel the difference of most perks. They are making adjustment but we will see.

 

[Bob Gnarly]

There was nothing spectacular about Warbands progression system. Most min/maxers would simply go down the Intelligence route which allowed them to accumulate the most skills.

I like the basic idea behind Bannerlords perk system, but it still needs a lot of work which TW are redoing.

 

[Apocal]

I dont like warband's progression either but main problem with bannerlord's system is the rewards are too meh. You don't even feel the difference of most perks. They are making adjustment but we will see.

There was nothing spectacular about Warbands progression system. Most min/maxers would simply go down the Intelligence route which allowed them to accumulate the most skills.

I like the basic idea behind Bannerlords perk system, but it still needs a lot of work which TW are redoing.

Yeah, I've liked perks since I first played the Silverstag mod for Warband, but a lot of the BL perks currently are either lazy (e.g. giving more damage when the skill itself adds more damage) or some completely silly idea, like two perks to couched lance damage when couched lances already one-shot literally everything in the game without a perk.

The revamped one- and two-hander ones are better, but could still use some work.

It was funny when the top-end ones were bugged and basically turned every high-skill lord into an unstoppable combat monster though.

 

[Askorti]

One horrible thing about the levelling system besides the cap is the "learning rate" that is independent from the xp rate, basically the higher your overall skills ie. level, the SLOWER the xp gain from all other skills.
So being a skilled level 200 swordsman will somehow makes your character learn smithing slower, just why is that ? It's terribly pointless as your growth already requires more and more of XP to continue the further you progress in a specific skill.

Actually, I disagree. You should not be able to learn all skills on the same character to the highest levels. I believe that restrictions should be in place to force players to specialize to a degree and then use companions to cover their weaknesses. It is actually something that I really hated about Skyrim, that you could become the absolute master of all disciplines of combat, magic and crafting. And do so pretty easily at that. Skills and abilities that take people a lifetime to master, you do in no time, and then move on to learn another one like it's nothing. I find this horribly unimmersive and gamey.

So to use your example, being a master swordsman means that you put a ton of time and effort into training that skill. Sadly, the game does not reflect learning skills over your whole life, and it's pretty much necessary to learn them unrealistically quickly, for gameplay reasons, but realistically, it would take you decades to become that good as a swordsman. After all this time, you simply wouldn't have enough time in your life to become a master smith as well. Especially back in middle ages. (Extremely rare and talented people notwithstanding)

Yes, I know that using realism to change the way we play games can be a bad idea, as being super realistic is not in itself a good thing. But I believe that realism when applied right can enrich gameplay and make you actually make important choices. Knowing that you cannot master everything just given enough time will make you consider your priorities and actually make you make a "build" for your character. I believe this to be very valuable.

 

[Oakenlix]

One horrible thing about the levelling system besides the cap is the "learning rate" that is independent from the xp rate, basically the higher your overall skills ie. level, the SLOWER the xp gain from all other skills.
So being a skilled level 200 swordsman will somehow makes your character learn smithing slower, just why is that ? It's terribly pointless as your growth already requires more and more of XP to continue the further you progress in a specific skill.

Are you sure it works this way? Any source on that? Seems very odd.

 

[Kentucky 『 ＨＥＩＧＵＩ 』 James]

So to use your example, being a master swordsman means that you put a ton of time and effort into training that skill. Sadly, the game does not reflect learning skills over your whole life, and it's pretty much necessary to learn them unrealistically quickly, for gameplay reasons, but realistically, it would take you decades to become that good as a swordsman. After all this time, you simply wouldn't have enough time in your life to become a master smith as well. Especially back in middle ages. (Extremely rare and talented people notwithstanding)

Those "extremely rare and talented people" were the nobility and military class. Nobles tended to want to learn a bit of everything and would often excel in all of them. In the Renaissance it became fashionable for even middle class men and women to be musicians, swordsmen, writers and painters all at the same time.
As much as it feels ridiculous that the player character in Skyrim is good at everything, a character with that much free time who doesn't just masturbate and play video games all day is bound to have a wide skillset.

Also most people way, way overestimate how difficult it is to learn multiple skills. There is hardly anything that takes decades of training to become highly skilled in. I mean look at the school system: you are expected to learn maths, language, science, literary analysis and sports to a level of total mastery in about 10 years.

 

[Ananda_The_Destroyer]

The combination of tax skills/attributes (STR->PD for bows, AGI->Riding for horses, AGI->WepMaster for weapon skill caps

There's a high INT female starting choice set that pop you out with 4 riding, so you never have to touch AGI. You can easily reach 27 int for max int skills at the sea raiders/merc phase and then pound out Powerdraw as high as you want.

This is not that build, this is a lazy hunter build I use that start with good HA skills and then I crank INT to max, then go back to PD. It's still a perfect monster by the end of the game. This is it at 41 after I took the last castle and dished em out to my good buddies and called it a game. I don't know how you end the game at 22.

 

[Ananda_The_Destroyer]

Are you sure it works this way? Any source on that? Seems very odd.

The source is we look at the learning rate of a skill you have FP in but don't actively level, then level up (without raising that skill's level)and look at the learning rate again and see it is slower even though the skill level is the same.

It's very odd and bad and most people just think "boy it sure is ****y to gain skills at high levels" and don't even know about it.
To make is worse you have all the pro-gamer-Mcgees telling everyone they should levelup a bit of everything like in skyrim to LEVEL UP FAST, not understanding that this is actually punishing if you don't really want those skills.

 

[Askorti]

Those "extremely rare and talented people" were the nobility and military class. Nobles tended to want to learn a bit of everything and would often excel in all of them. In the Renaissance it became fashionable for even middle class men and women to be musicians, swordsmen, writers and painters all at the same time.
As much as it feels ridiculous that the player character in Skyrim is good at everything, a character with that much free time who doesn't just masturbate and play video games all day is bound to have a wide skillset.

Also most people way, way overestimate how difficult it is to learn multiple skills. There is hardly anything that takes decades of training to become highly skilled in. I mean look at the school system: you are expected to learn maths, language, science, literary analysis and sports to a level of total mastery in about 10 years.

Most nobility were not master swordsmen. They were highly trained in fighting, they were competent at it, but they were not masters of it. They simply had too much on their plate for that.
Also, people who actually excelled in all the crafts they took up were rare. Just because you did a bit of everything does not mean you were actually very good at them. People like Da Vinci, Michelangelo were true masters of multiple fields, but there weren't that many peers for them.

Also, I'm starting to think that you're actually kinda trolling here. Because the idea that school system expects you to master anything is laughable.

 

[Kentucky 『 ＨＥＩＧＵＩ 』 James]

Define "master", because if a master is only those people who are the very best at any given time, the number of people who master something is always going to be small.

The reason I say compulsory education makes you highly skilled in maths or science is because these are things that adults pondered over for thousands of years, but literal children are expected to use and fully understand them by their early teens, and many do. Millions of 7 year olds doing algebra and physics should show that multiple skills aren't that hard to learn.

 

[Kipsta]

Spoiler

In Warband, when you leveled up, you had points you could assign. Now, everything related to progression requires you to train in the related skill.

Although it makes sense in terms of realism, it kind of sucks for 4 reasons:

1: When you level up you put a point into something, but that has basically no immediate effect except increasing xp rate so you don't gain anything directly from leveling up. This feels pretty bad since leveling up should mean your character gets stronger

2: You need to be actively doing the thing in order to level it. The biggest offender is Athletics/Riding. If I want to mainly fight on foot I want high athletics but if I want to get the most xp I should be walking on the map on foot, which is just gimping yourself in terms of speed for no reason other than XP. So I wish I could level athletics quickly while still riding on the map and not feel bad about it. Not to mention it's best to start on horse to organize the battlefield before combat.

3: The bonuses you get for reaching certain thresholds are tiny, so you don't really feel them.

4: Every time you make a choice you feel like you're missing out on the other thing. I get the idea of a skill tree but some of these feel really bad to give up! Like the first skill choice of one-handed, you're losing something valuable with either one.

5: You are actively discouraged from doing certain activities to prevent your character gaining skills you don't actually want thereby slowing down skill gain of desired skills.

6: The speed of acquiring different skill in combination with the highly limited amounts of activities which grant those skills is impossible to balance in a fun way leading to some skills which are a breeze to level and some which are a pain to level

7: The current skill progression system doesn't cover hundreds of scenarios which should be granting skill points in their respective field e.g. you get roguery for skill for hiring bandits(so little I don't even know if it's true), but absolutely none for roaming with bandit troops. You could be fielding 200 forest bandits with 10 skill in roguery and you wouldn't get any more for doing so.

8: No incentive to actually fight battles. You don't level your character with fighting anymore, only a small subset of skills, but if I don't fight and instead simulate I level the skill which makes simulating easier. Games encourages me to forgo field battles and instead simulate stack after stack after stack.

9: Companions...seeing your companions reach a new level was such a great aspect of Warband. In Bannerlord you just shrug and hope the new focus point you give them might actually bear fruit in 20 hours when they might get another one or they are already skill capped and unable to level up.

 

[Apocal]

There's a high INT female starting choice set that pop you out with 4 riding, so you never have to touch AGI. You can easily reach 27 int for max int skills at the sea raiders/merc phase and then pound out Powerdraw as high as you want.

4 riding still takes 12 AGI, my dude. When I say you get taxed, I don't just mean having to level the skill; I mean having to put points into it at all. I think I got up to 200 Riding in Bannerlord while still having a 2 (close to bare minimum) in END. That's enough to ride the best horse in the game.

This is it at 41 after I took the last castle and dished em out to my good buddies and called it a game. I don't know how you end the game at 22.

I conquer Calradia.

 

[Captain Obvious]

Yup, so much worse. I basically don't pay attention to it at all now really, and feels like another key feature stripped and replace with something unnecessary and broken. Shame.

 

[Neofenris]

Actually, I disagree. You should not be able to learn all skills on the same character to the highest levels. I believe that restrictions should be in place to force players to specialize to a degree and then use companions to cover their weaknesses. It is actually something that I really hated about Skyrim, that you could become the absolute master of all disciplines of combat, magic and crafting. And do so pretty easily at that. Skills and abilities that take people a lifetime to master, you do in no time, and then move on to learn another one like it's nothing. I find this horribly unimmersive and gamey.

So to use your example, being a master swordsman means that you put a ton of time and effort into training that skill. Sadly, the game does not reflect learning skills over your whole life, and it's pretty much necessary to learn them unrealistically quickly, for gameplay reasons, but realistically, it would take you decades to become that good as a swordsman. After all this time, you simply wouldn't have enough time in your life to become a master smith as well. Especially back in middle ages. (Extremely rare and talented people notwithstanding)

Yes, I know that using realism to change the way we play games can be a bad idea, as being super realistic is not in itself a good thing. But I believe that realism when applied right can enrich gameplay and make you actually make important choices. Knowing that you cannot master everything just given enough time will make you consider your priorities and actually make you make a "build" for your character. I believe this to be very valuable.

I get your point, I believe we could compromise, but what would be considered being a master or good at something ?
You invest a lot of time in a particular domain, you get better at it but how does it translate inside the game ?

For me it would just mean to be way better than other at a specific task, you would be a master swordsman with 50 in onehanded if all other lords had 05-15 in the same skill you don't need to reach the 300 or 350 milestone to reach that goal.
So the NPC are the problem because I find them pretty generic and stagnant with very little room to grow.

In a 800 days playthrough you will be able to gain thousands of skillpoints but what about other lords ?
They will barely gained a few points in medicine they are lacking the ability to evolve and improve even your companions improve if you let them on their own (if they are not captured every single day lol).

You are starting with less so a good amount of skillpoints is just catching up to their level up but this doesn't feel right they are doing the same things as you, they are roaming with army and fighting since longer so why are you as the player able to progress further than them ?

A good game example would be Kenshi, in Kenshi you have immense ability to grow, insane number of skills and progression is not limited by any way, so how does one balance this ?

* Makes every other NPC exactly like the player. If everyone is strong, no one is.

You are right that being a master in something means to invest a lot of time in it, but even if we remove the learning rate, isn't reaching 350+ a very time consuming task ? Especially in skills like medicine, less with combat skills.
Even if you have the ability to, does not mean you will do it and if you spend your whole life striving to be the best, then shouldn't you simply be rewarded at the end ?

The problem with learning rate is that you are punished when you are levelling up all your skills without min-maxing.
The player is forced to avoid certain actions if he doesn't want the get his growth limited, for example if I don't want to get SP in Roguery I will never ever sell a prisonner or raid a village.

From a game perspective it does not makes sense, how could we balance it ? Removing learning rate but making the growth exponentially harder.
the skills already requires more and more SP to reach higher level, if this is still too easy and fast to reach high level we just have to increase the EXP requires for higher levels or set a learning rate that is specific to a single skill instead of taking away growth from other unrelated skills.

You could progress normally up to level 150 then you would have a 90% XP rate in said skill, at 200, 80% at 250... etc etc but never reaching an absolute zero.

I have to invest tons of time in a single skill to master it, yes, I will not be able to do so for all skills, but If at some point I decide to stop and focus on something else, I shouldn't be penalized because of what I precedently achieved, actually that's the other way around if we want to talk about realism.
It's easier to learn when you already have a set of specific even unrelated knowledge, the higher your global understanding the better.

 

[Ananda_The_Destroyer]

4 riding still takes 12 AGI, my dude.

You can have 4 riding and 6 AGI if you know the secrets of char creation! And look at that INT, she'll have max INT skills at level 15. Could be at 13 but I like to start with 3 PD, helps dent the sea raiders.

I think we have an inversion of the same desire: You want to not have to mess around with min/max to get a good char. I WANT to be able to MIN/MAX and get a GREAT char!

I conquer Calradia.

Me too but I get to 41 because I massacre the garrisons with my Warbow!

 

[mylittletantan]

The source is we look at the learning rate of a skill

Yes but not in game, we look at the code.

From 1.4.1 Taleworlds.CampaignSystem.dll, DefaultCharacterDevelopmentModel

public override float CalculateLearningRate(int attributeValue, int focusValue, int skillValue, int characterLevel, TextObject attributeName, StatExplainer explainer = null)
{
float baseNumber = 20f / (10f + (float)characterLevel);
ExplainedNumber explainedNumber = new ExplainedNumber(baseNumber, explainer, null);
explainedNumber.AddFactor(0.4f * (float)attributeValue, attributeName);
explainedNumber.AddFactor((float)focusValue * 1f, DefaultCharacterDevelopmentModel._skillFocusText);
int num = this.CalculateLearningLimit(attributeValue, focusValue, null, null);
if (skillValue > num)
{
int num2 = skillValue - num;
explainedNumber.AddFactor(-1f - 0.1f * (float)num2, DefaultCharacterDevelopmentModel._overLimitText);
}
explainedNumber.LimitMin(0f);
return explainedNumber.ResultNumber;
}

public override int CalculateLearningLimit(int attributeValue, int focusValue, TextObject attributeName, StatExplainer explainer)
{
ExplainedNumber explainedNumber = new ExplainedNumber(0f, explainer, null);
explainedNumber.Add((float)((attributeValue - 1) * 10), attributeName, null);
explainedNumber.Add((float)(focusValue * 30), DefaultCharacterDevelopmentModel._skillFocusText, null);
explainedNumber.LimitMin(0f);
return (int)explainedNumber.ResultNumber;
}

so the result is (Edit:simplified)
base = 20/(10+characterLevel)
explained = base(1 + 0.4*attributeValue + focusValue);

if the skill is over learninglimit ((attribute-1)*10 + focus*30)
explained = explained + (-1-0.1*(how far above the limit))*base

if explained is less than 0
explained = 0

 

[babelfisch]

As much as it feels ridiculous that the player character in Skyrim is good at everything, a character with that much free time who doesn't just masturbate and play video games all day is bound to have a wide skillset.