[Article] Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord Could Make an Amazing Esport

[bblzd]

[Article] Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord Could Make an Amazing Esport

I've thought the game could be an exciting and easy to understand competitive title ever since trying the Beta. I've heard from a few Warband vets that prefer Skirmish and mostly ignore the new game modes, do you think Captains Mode has potential to be played competitively? Does it makes for an enjoyable spectating experience?

 

[Younes]

I honestly can not believe, like its unbelieveable the article called captain mode the esports mode and didn't even mention skirmish. My ****ing god

 

[RCC_God]

Captains mode? Is that a joke?

 

[Surreal120]

Captains mode? Is that a joke?

Come on, we all know captain mode is where the real competition of this game is /s

 

[lawbringer]

This article is retarded l0l

 

[Tork789]

I play skirmish almost exclusively, captains is just not my cup of tea, I tried. But i can understand why it actually might become a popular esport since it combines this total war feeling with action part of the game where you yourself can affect the end result - it's pretty unique so it has a chance to take off. However, I have doubts it's going to happen and if it does happen, I probably won't be a part of it.

 

[GEO_MihaWk.]

I play skirmish almost exclusively, captains is just not my cup of tea, I tried. But i can understand why it actually might become a popular esport since it combines this total war feeling with action part of the game where you yourself can affect the end result - it's pretty unique so it has a chance to take off. However, I have doubts it's going to happen and if it does happen, I probably won't be a part of it.

Stop trolling

 

[Tork789]

Stop trolling

Try and stop me.

 

[pro.fail]

Impossible in current stage.

 

[부부를 넘어서 가자]

Don't see captain having the playerbase and needed AI for it to go esports. Bannerlord could've had that but no with TW current attitude towards MP.

 

[Mabons]

As someone who's played a fair bit of Captain mode, not in it's current state. It needs to take inspiration from MOBAs because that's currently what it feels closest to believe it or not. Total War: ARENA had something similar going on but it was closed down a little while ago for reasons.

Cavalry AI is horrible, only balanced out by Spear Infantry being horrible too, Archers and Shock Infantry work perfectly, but are hindered by having a lack of "Charge/Fire at this target" command. We still can't force our units to use the correct weapons, so a melee fight you should win will be ruined by cavalry walking in and forcing your units to pull out javelins in melee mode.

Then there is picking your class, you have to guesstimate what the enemy will do, there is no co-ordination options with your teammates other than chat, you don't know what side you spawn at the start, etc. etc.

If it was all fixed so things were consistent, realiable and A countered B sort of playstyle then maybe we could see it take off as something casual.

 

[Klausolus]

I really don't see how captain mode could ever become a successful esport. AI at the moment is pretty rough and unreliable and I guess that's understandable considering the current stage of the game, but I really doubt it will ever get to a state where it is competent enough to be the focus point of a competitive scene. A fundamental requirement for a game to be a good esports candidate is that it has to be entertaining to watch for a larger audience, while watching a big battle take place looks really cool the first time, in the end it's just bots fighting bots and that gets old quickly, while individual skill definitely can make a difference in captain battle, it clearly plays a minor role when compared to other modes like skirmish. In my opinion the asymmetric faction balance that Taleworlds goes for doesn't help the case at all since there will be situations were a team is at a clear advantage, and while this also affects other game modes, it just seems more impactful in captain.

The safest bet for a esports mode Bannerlord currently has is skirmish mode and even then I believe that battle (the main Warband competitive mode that somehow didn't make it to Bannerlord) was a much better candidate for a number of reasons. I think the game actually has potential to become a mildly successful esport, just not with captain battle.

The Battle of Bucharest was a nice attempt at trying to make an esport out of M&B but it just wasn't going to take off given how niche Warband was, Bannerlord could change that.

 

[Úlfheðinn]

Although I'd love to be wrong, I don't really see Warband or Bannerlord (or really any games in this genre) as being ideal for E-Sports.

In general the gameplay and resulting footage just doesn't have that much appeal if you aren't already steeped in the games (similar to other genres like flight sims) and even then it's hardly very fun to watch. This isn't a knock to people who played Warband competitively or put in effort to boost the scene, but even as someone who loved Warband MP, I don't think I ever watched an entire cast or recorded match because the footage was incredibly boring to watch.

Looking back at Warband, both in terms of Battle and Duels, so many things that are actually very high level skill or advanced strategy just look incredibly bad or boring (e.g., animations used in duels to trick people look awful). Similarly, if you go say look at Mordhau comp matches, it's just as bad, like I can't imagine many people see Mordhau comp matches, where player character are bending in ridiculous ways to score hits and go "wow, this looks really awesome".

A good real-life comparison is Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, high skill ceiling, obviously some amazing practitioners and professionals, but watching a competitive high level BJJ match is so boring it hurts (to the average person it's two people hugging and rolling around for several minutes).

I think if you compare to a lot of E-Sports, two factors which we don't have (and I can't really see us ever having) are a large playerbase (in terms of population, SP has always been the bread and butter of TW) and gameplay that is intuitively fun to watch.

As fun game modes that can be played competitively in a semi-pro/amateur fashion, I'm sure that with some fixes and changes MP has high potential.

 

[Alyss]

Warband comp matches were fun to watch. It would have been a good esports game

 

[RCC_God]

Warband comp matches were fun to watch. It would have been a good esports game

I think they need player spectating. Having a top view is not as interesting as a POV imo. I am excited the most for dueling becoming an esport

 

[Gianni Tsunami]

Make siege an esport so i can finally go pro as a door closer.

 

[RCC_God]

Make siege an esport so i can finally go pro as a door closer.

“Best door closer Na coming in, amazing reflexes Kent, some people are just born for esports I guess, man closes doors so fast you would think he uses cheats”

 

[Brandis.]

Lack of POV for Warband hurt viewership along with the lack of interesting elements.

Most esports have flashy or key moments with special abilities and a rise and fall to action that casters can form storylines around for individual rounds and the entire match. On that note, the way most Warband matches ended was anticlimactic, except for the rare instances that went to tiebreaker.

CSGO or RocketLeague are the most similar esports to M&B, but even CSGO has extra concepts outside of "shoot gun to kill" such as tactical smokes/nades and gear progression. CSGO and RocketLeague are based on incredibly high skill cielings. Bannerlord has neither.

Skirmish is a disaster of a competitive mode that I've hated since day one. Teams reach the tipping point of round wins too quickly, but then the rounds dredge on for another 3-4 minutes until the eventual snowball is resolved. BETWEEN rounds is even worse, with 390 gold reaching up to as much as +50% value. (Ex: 300g = Knight+Peasant, 390g = Knight+Vanguard.) Respawns make the game problematic to spectate. Melee TTK is still laughably slow against shields, and archery isn't very impressive because everything is slowed down so much.

Captain is fun to play between coordinated teams -- in fact, that's basically the only time that it's fun to play -- but would be incredibly boring to spectate and currently has significant AI and balancing problems. It has a future of being a fun competitive mode, but won't attract much attention outside of those who enjoy playing it.

 

[Jess_the_Hobozerk]

Lack of POV for Warband hurt viewership along with the lack of interesting elements.

Most esports have flashy or key moments with special abilities and a rise and fall to action that casters can form storylines around for individual rounds and the entire match. On that note, the way most Warband matches ended was anticlimactic, except for the rare instances that went to tiebreaker.

CSGO or RocketLeague are the most similar esports to M&B, but even CSGO has extra concepts outside of "shoot gun to kill" such as tactical smokes/nades and gear progression. CSGO and RocketLeague are based on incredibly high skill cielings. Bannerlord has neither.

Skirmish is a disaster of a competitive mode that I've hated since day one. Teams reach the tipping point of round wins too quickly, but then the rounds dredge on for another 3-4 minutes until the eventual snowball is resolved. BETWEEN rounds is even worse, with 390 gold reaching up to as much as +50% value. (Ex: 300g = Knight+Peasant, 390g = Knight+Vanguard.) Respawns make the game problematic to spectate. Melee TTK is still laughably slow against shields, and archery isn't very impressive because everything is slowed down so much.

Captain is fun to play between coordinated teams -- in fact, that's basically the only time that it's fun to play -- but would be incredibly boring to spectate and currently has significant AI and balancing problems. It has a future of being a fun competitive mode, but won't attract much attention outside of those who enjoy playing it.

I would argue that cavalry by itself holds that same flashy feel in regards to bannerlord if it were in a battle game mode. From a spectator's POV, cavalry always feels exciting to watch because their charge holds great suspense as it carries significant weight in the momentum of the battle.

 

[Úlfheðinn]

Lack of POV for Warband hurt viewership along with the lack of interesting elements.

Most esports have flashy or key moments with special abilities and a rise and fall to action that casters can form storylines around for individual rounds and the entire match. On that note, the way most Warband matches ended was anticlimactic, except for the rare instances that went to tiebreaker.

Yeah, like power to people that did casting for Warband, but how do you make "and now they are going to block each other's attacks for the next couple of minutes while waving their swords around in ways that will make no sense to most of you" interesting?

Shooters are at this point so mainstream that the idea of pulling off a bunch of nice frags makes sense to a lot of viewers and RL is basically soccer with more stuff happening.

It's the same reason flight sims are never going to be big E-Sport games or why Mechwarrior Online was never a serious E-Sport games (ironically pretty similar gameplay to Warband where slow, defensive playing ended up being meta for most of the history of the comp scene), if you want to hit it big as an E-Sport you need gameplay that is really easy to understand, looks cool, and like you said has enough depth for the field to grow.