Bannerlord SP First Reactions: Megathread

[GetAssista]

+ graphics and performance (I have a nice rig though)
+ AI behaviour in battles
+ formations and general control on the battlefield
+ yay! it is finally out

- no autoblocking in SP (wtf, really?)
- quests seem few and repetitive, and there is a lot of missed opportunities to insert some quests in the character progression, like for the crafting ability or for the noble status (mods will fix that, but them are some time into the future)
- pointers in scenes. It takes unnecessary effort to get that exact screen position where you can finally pick up a weapon (aargh, arena..) or talk to the npc
- chat options are very limited in cities. you are supposed to be able to ask stuff about the city and the world, if only as a flavor. so many easy options omitted here too, starting with simple directions and national gossip (waiting for mods)
- And here's the main gripe. Battle itself does not give me a brutal feel like WB does. It is mainly due to sounds I guess. Hits, bowstring twangs, arrows all lack "oomph". It does not feel like a guy next to me was hit hard just now. Or when you release your bow it is mildly whelming. Also the fluidity of the crowd stepping aside before player adds to that ethereal out of place feeling. People are supposed to push you

My main interest is modding and since there is no instruments in the release, and probably will not be for quite some time, that's also a con with that completely new modding setup.

 

[bek]

Sheeiitt crossbows are expensive.

 

[Ser Jon]

Honestly besides some instances of bad performance (otherwise runs well) and crashing/bugs, it is wonderful so far. I have 8 friends playing it right now, so clearly it has done well.

(Anyone know how to reduce your criminal record at a city/country?)

 

[Figulus]

Just past training...still have many questions and don't know what the heck i'm doing...stoked to find out. Thank-you Taleworlds!

 

[GodHandApostole]

I can understand that TaleWorlds isn't as big a studio as some of the monsters in the AAA industry and that this is an ambitious project, but damn there's still a LOT of work to do for something that has been in development for eight years...!

Bit underwhelming so far, honestly

 

[Wuzgar]

Everything is going smooth for me. From the purchasing, downloading single and multi. Everything is smooth and running with no crashes so far. While the game has certainly progressed in terms of grandeur, graphics I think it has lost some of the charm. The artwork, although pretty is nowhere as detailed and unique as in the originals. Multiplayer is amazing, I never had decent enough of an internet connection to enjoy the combat on a higher level of skill but here it feels quite fun. Haven't played enough of single player to comment, but so far so good. Thanks for an amazing game Taleworlds, looking to many pleasant hours immersed.

 

[JDZ5]

I started as a female mercenary for the Western Empire

Siege:
- I've joined in on a few sieges attacking with my faction and not once have they built any sort of siege engine (About 8 attacking sieges so far)
- My PC can't handle 240+ people in a siege without dropping to 20ish fps, I've tried tinkering with the graphic settings and going from the highest to the lowest settings. But it only gives a slight 5 - 10 fps boost. It starts out fine, then once the attackers reach the ladders my fps drops really badly
- I went to "custom battles" and tried splitting groups of infantry and archers and placing them on the walls and certain chokes point etc.. BUT WHEN THE SIEGE STARTS, every single one of them goes right back to where they were before I moved them. Why give me the option to freely place them then...?
- On the same wall, there were two ladders. One of the ladders got overrun and the empire troops were able to push through, instead of attacking the enemies literally within melee distance defending the other ladder, they proceeded down the stairs and stood still in the courtyard for most of the siege. Every single one of them ignored that ladder and 25+ enemy troops guarding it. Not to mention the other side of the wall still full of enemies. I think Warband had better AI in sieges.

Field Battles:
- My PC can handle about 380 for battle size on fields
- The AI "Defend our archers by encircling them with infantry" tactic bugged out a few times. The infantry just kept moving around while the archers stayed in a square formation in the center, I only know they're not supposed to do this because I've seen them a U shape around the square formation archers before
- The AI in general for large scale battles are too simple. I watched one Fiann archer take out as many as 10 empire infantry because they were in a line looking the opposite way, and the single archer was BARELY out of agro range. Maybe like 8 ft behind them.

Progression/Game concepts:
- I can't figure out how to progress to Lord status in the Western empire without marrying into it.(I've spent 10 hours ingame still unsure of how much progress I've made towards this. 150+ ingame days.) How much renown do I need to join? Where do I get renown? (I've done quests, killed a ton of bandits, joined tournaments) I figured it'd be from joining the army in sieges... which leads me to...
- There's virtually no incentive to actually go w/ the army on large battles. Not much renown, items, denars, or influence are given in victory or defeat to mercenaries.

PC Specs:
- i5-7400 quadcore 3.0GHz
- GTX 1060 3GB
- 16 GB RAM
- Windows 10
- SSD

Optimization is a MUST.

 

[ZignarutSilver]

Autumn is definitely broken in campaing.

 

[Brandbjorn]

Quite a few bugs, crashes and freeze frames, though that's to be expected.

I entered a tournament, was managing to do 2/3 damage per shot with a sword, then realised I was facing Palatine Guard and Cataphracts on foot. - Perhaps not my wisest decision after betting a total of around 2K gold throughout the rounds.

Apparently I'm famous. Had no idea how, I've just been smacking small bandit gangs and doing herding quests for villages.

The Empire Cavalry training is... Very poor. It takes forever to find the Vigiles recruits and even longer to level them up, meaning when I picked up a "train 4 equites" mission that lasted about 20 days, I somehow failed it despite being in constant combat and searching for the horse recruits.

I got a quest that was hearding sheep from one village to another right next to it. I left the village, walked 3 paces and then instantly failed the quest for time limit (Apparently I had less than a day to do it??)

I'm honestly slightly disappointed with how many (what are considered to be) basic things such as dialogue that are breaking a lot or missing.

I'm not able (or at least I haven't found a mechanic) to give my companions new gear, so they get slaughtered in combat.

No button for the encyclopedia (or I'm blind, either way) - I have to go into quests and click on a guy in there to use the search feature.

However:

Combat is so much fun. Only looters and bandits so far but me and my 30 bois boutta sign up to fight the desert dudes alongside Empress Smug Face (see above)
Levelling up feels more fun, and exploring feels pretty nice.
Only very early game here, so I'll probably have SO much more to talk about later.

 

[Gragnok]

Kill all the looters!!

 

[thanasisxatz]

Dunno if this has been reported but “ambush bandits” village quest can cause a crash, trying to see if I can replicate it

I think it has to do with waiting for some time at a village

For some reason i cannot finish this quest everytime i leave the vilage and press wait here for some time the quest fails

 

[SamuelJackson]

@Brandbjorn You can press N for Encyclopedia.

 

[nposborn]

Finished the spy hunt quest by killing the spy. Apparently that makes you fail it? So confusing

 

[Langdale]

I miss the feature of set up a camp... But amazing game for a EA !

 

[Twezie]

Finished the spy hunt quest by killing the spy. Apparently that makes you fail it? So confusing

i think u guessed wrong on the spy thats why failed

 

[dr0d]

I wonder how frequent content updates will be

 

[glanton]

Economy is a total disaster, as is the world map movement balance. Can't catch up to looters hardly. Also archers are extremely OP. That being said, the framework for a really amazing game is there and just needs some expansion and tweaking. I am thrilled with how far along the game is already. I knew what I was getting into with Early Access and it's better than I expected. It's gonna take some work but this will be game of the decade, possibly more. Good work, Taleworlds.

 

[glanton]

I'm not able (or at least I haven't found a mechanic) to give my companions new gear, so they get slaughtered in combat.

Bro go to your inventory screen and click on the arrows at the top. You can see your companion's inventory screen there.

 

[JuanNieve]

Well so far I have not presented crashes, although the performance of the game is not perfect. A doubt seems to me that the graphics cards of nvidia of the 1000 series for below are not so well optimized for the game?

Does anyone know how to get charcoal?

 

[glanton]

Does anyone know how to get charcoal?

Buy Hardwood (Sibir or whatever the far northern Sturgian town is called has it for very cheap) and go to the Smith. Under the tab "refine" there is an option to make charcoal out of hardwood. Beware they put a limitation on forging though, you can only do so many smithing actions per day before needing to rest.