Bannerlord Story thoughts

[Lord of Banners]

Anyone else wondering how much of a storyline there will be to this game?

Personally,
I think it would be awesome if they started before Arenicos’s assassination and had relative peace in all kingdoms. You find a piece of the dragon banner,move on to find your family after you reach clan tier 1 so you can choose to delay and grow. Find them and go to celebrate at a nearby town but then find out on arrival Arenicos is dead and there are successors and rebellions across the empire. From there you help stop a local rebellion (maybe get introduced to those mechanics?) and afterwards continue on as sandbox. Maybe add a quest for discovering the murderer.

This is all way down the road stuff and we might not see a real storyline. hopefully devs focus on important things, but it’s fun to think about.
Thoughts?

 

[ste636]

Honestly they should just scrap the whole story and concentrate on making NPC more alive and immersive.
A linear story in a M&B title....I so would like to know who thought of it!

 

[MostBlunted]

Honestly they should just scrap the whole story and concentrate on making NPC more alive and immersive.
A linear story in a M&B title....I so would like to know who thought of it!

This!

Even if the story turns out to be good, it will never change. Would be more important to bring live to the world.

 

[Captain Obvious]

Honestly they should just scrap the whole story and concentrate on making NPC more alive and immersive.
A linear story in a M&B title....I so would like to know who thought of it!

Mhm yes. Very tedious atm, and just a barrier imho. It also contributes to making the game feel less sandbox-y with a set main storyline.

 

[ste636]

Mhm yes. Very tedious atm, and just a barrier imho. It also contributes to making the game feel less sandbox-y with a set main storyline.

I use the mod to avoid it (really well done), but this won't bring back the time TW is wasting on that "feature".
Anyways, even without the quest, I still ask myself why do I have to rebuild my clan...what clan?? I am a steppe child banned from my village, I never had a clan...:-/

 

[Terco_Viejo]

I use the mod to avoid it (really well done), but this won't bring back the time TW is wasting on that "feature".
Anyways, even without the quest, I still ask myself why do I have to rebuild my clan...what clan?? I am a steppe child banned from my village, I never had a clan...:-/

Exactly. It's good to have a story line but it should be dynamic and tend to evolve at the pace that the character is evolving, not bolted to a rail.
By this I'm not saying " remove the main story", but rather hide it and let the plot be discovered if the character ever gets to it. The idea is to give the player a great open world populated with opportunities for interesting interactions (random and dynamic through a structured lore). The player should not be limited to a linear plot like a rail, but can interact with the world in any order he/she chooses and when he/she decides.

The Viking Conquest main story (from which Bannerlord clearly draws its inspiration) is correct for the type of historical narrative the title plays with. For Bannerlord, however, I would like our beginning to be the classic M&B.

If you choose "noble family" then you " jump in the mission" but if you choose " vagabond" you will have to look for other ways of interaction to create a clan.

Also, I understand that there are new users who have joined the franchise; however, to force a tutorial/training camp at the beginning of the campaign is to force the wagon to go through a certain rail. In my opinion, the tutorial as such should exist outside of the campaign, as an optional "tutorial" shortcut under the "campaign" shortcut. That said, I do favor the "training camp" as a location on the campaign map seen as it was in Warband (practice-skill gain).

 

[ste636]

@Terco_Viejo , i would scrap the story indeed, it kills replayability and drains resources from the developing process, resources that are already thinned out because of MP.

Not for me, but nowadays the tutorial is a must apparently...and it better be a very hand holding/idiot proof tutorial, god forbids one has to use his brain!
Problem is that Every Single Game I play, has players raging for lack of such catering tutorial, just like here in BL.
BT something is an opt-in tutorial, something else if it's embedded in the gameplay.

 

[Terco_Viejo]

@Terco_Viejo , i would scrap the story indeed, it kills replayability and drains resources from the developing process, resources that are already thinned out because of MP.

Not for me, but nowadays the tutorial is a must apparently...and it better be a very hand holding/idiot proof tutorial, god forbids one has to use his brain!
Problem is that Every Single Game I play, has players raging for lack of such catering tutorial, just like here in BL.
BT something is an opt-in tutorial, something else if it's embedded in the gameplay.

I respect your opinion, I think that the main story can exist as a collateral experience to your evolution within the game (but in a dynamic way). Regarding the tutorial, I'm not talking about removing it. In many games the tutorial is out of the campaign, accessible in the ui of the main menu.

The training camp, I said I would keep it but within the possibilities offered by this place in previous M&B installments.

And referring to the MP. Definitely the MP needs more love right now; compared to SP, the MP is still in diapers.I know many of you are not interested in the MP section, but whether you like it or not, SP and MP go hand in hand (or should).

Here's a pretty realistic dramatization of the panorama.

 

[Lord of Banners]

I never played warband so I can’t really compare the two. I’ve mostly played classic rpgs and strategies like EU4 and civ and total war series. For me it would be nice to have an introduction to the world and it’s state more than just being released into it to figure things out on my own. Something that’s even skipable.

if that doesn’t happen though it’s fine because the game concept is still a lot of fun. But killing and selling **** gets old after a while.

I’ve seen the claim that vanilla warband is 1000% better than EA Bannerlord.
What kept vanilla warband so immersive?

 

[stevehoos]

@Terco_Viejo , i would scrap the story indeed, it kills replayability and drains resources from the developing process, resources that are already thinned out because of MP.

Not for me, but nowadays the tutorial is a must apparently...and it better be a very hand holding/idiot proof tutorial, god forbids one has to use his brain!
Problem is that Every Single Game I play, has players raging for lack of such catering tutorial, just like here in BL.
BT something is an opt-in tutorial, something else if it's embedded in the gameplay.

Agree 100%. I am already tired of being the same character every game. Nobody is going to want to play through this story multiple times, it's a waste of resources.

 

[Svang]

Who even asked for a storyline? The old playerbase rejected it.

The new playerbase lacks the attention span to even follow it.

I don't understand.

 

[ste636]

I never played warband so I can’t really compare the two. I’ve mostly played classic rpgs and strategies like EU4 and civ and total war series. For me it would be nice to have an introduction to the world and it’s state more than just being released into it to figure things out on my own. Something that’s even skipable.

if that doesn’t happen though it’s fine because the game concept is still a lot of fun. But killing and selling **** gets old after a while.

I’ve seen the claim that vanilla warband is 1000% better than EA Bannerlord.
What kept vanilla warband so immersive?

Forget Vanilla Warband, let's say the benchmark is Warband + one of the top overhauls, for me Perisno N1, followed very close by Prophesy of Pendor and 1257 AD (although I don't know how it is ATM).
Those overhauls take a looong time to finish, in comparison to even Native, plus they are considerably more difficult then Native. Not recommended as first try...

I am playing a Vanilla-ish overhaul called "Bannerpage", give that one a try, it's like a mix of all the "tweaks" that happened over the years with mods...

What makes Warband so immersive, is that you gotta actually do stuff for other stuff to happen

For example you wanna get married:

Bannerlord: you spawn, go to any Princess, win RNG, ask father, make money, buy her from father.

Warband:
First you need to find a girl, they appear only at feasts during tournaments, otherwise you don't even see them. Then you need to approach her and see if she likes you by asking her about herself (if asked,she will also say her opinion about memebers of the family, that is how to learn of Lords' personalities).
Let's say she likes you, if you won the tournament, you could dedicate it to her and she'll like you even more, but to see her, her tutor must agree (father, uncle, brother),you must be in good terms with said tutor though, if you are high enough, he will allow you to visit her....if you wanna visit her with her consense, but against the tutor's will, you'll have to pay the consequences of your cunning actions, you could also elope with the chick...the father will be really pissed off!
If otherwise you are honorable, you will need to visit taverns, find musicians and ask them to teach you poems,your lady will send an emissary while you are riding around, asking you to visit her, if you agree, you go vist her, tell her a poem (appropriate to her personality) and do this a few times, when you have a decent rep with her, you can ask her to marry, if she agrees you need to find the tutor, if you are high enough he will agree, you agree on a sum (with dialogue and accuracy)and when there will be a chance, you will marry her in some town with a cerimony (all the lords/ladies you met will be present).

Even if you could not bothered to read the useless wall of text...can you tell the difference???))

In Warband you build "real" relationships with NPC, you care for them get angry with them, wanna help one, by undermining another, wanna be nice with one because maybe in 800 days you will need his help, you will be in deperate need of help while sorrounded by enemies and your friend Lord X rushes in your aid with his huge army (many WB palyers must have had this moment), that idiot of the King giving parties while at war...they are more alive, they give you a reason to like them or hate them.
In BL I am sieging towns just because....but it feels odd as I have nothin against that Lord)

There are many other reasons, I'd suggest you to give it a try, it's bloody cheap and after 4000h I am still actively playing it.

Surely a good deal!

 

[Lord of Banners]

Forget Vanilla Warband, let's say the benchmark is Warband + one of the top overhauls, for me Perisno N1, followed very close by Prophesy of Pendor and 1257 AD (although I don't know how it is ATM).
Those overhauls take a looong time to finish, in comparison to even Native, plus they are considerably more difficult then Native. Not recommended as first try...

I am playing a Vanilla-ish overhaul called "Bannerpage", give that one a try, it's like a mix of all the "tweaks" that happened over the years with mods...

What makes Warband so immersive, is that you gotta actually do stuff for other stuff to happen

For example you wanna get married:

Bannerlord: you spawn, go to any Princess, win RNG, ask father, make money, buy her from father.

Warband:
First you need to find a girl, they appear only at feasts during tournaments, otherwise you don't even see them. Then you need to approach her and see if she likes you by asking her about herself (if asked,she will also say her opinion about memebers of the family, that is how to learn of Lords' personalities).
Let's say she likes you, if you won the tournament, you could dedicate it to her and she'll like you even more, but to see her, her tutor must agree (father, uncle, brother),you must be in good terms with said tutor though, if you are high enough, he will allow you to visit her....if you wanna visit her with her consense, but against the tutor's will, you'll have to pay the consequences of your cunning actions, you could also elope with the chick...the father will be really pissed off!
If otherwise you are honorable, you will need to visit taverns, find musicians and ask them to teach you poems,your lady will send an emissary while you are riding around, asking you to visit her, if you agree, you go vist her, tell her a poem (appropriate to her personality) and do this a few times, when you have a decent rep with her, you can ask her to marry, if she agrees you need to find the tutor, if you are high enough he will agree, you agree on a sum (with dialogue and accuracy)and when there will be a chance, you will marry her in some town with a cerimony (all the lords/ladies you met will be present).

Even if you could not bothered to read the useless wall of text...can you tell the difference???))

In Warband you build "real" relationships with NPC, you care for them get angry with them, wanna help one, by undermining another, wanna be nice with one because maybe in 800 days you will need his help, you will be in deperate need of help while sorrounded by enemies and your friend Lord X rushes in your aid with his huge army (many WB palyers must have had this moment), that idiot of the King giving parties while at war...they are more alive, they give you a reason to like them or hate them.
In BL I am sieging towns just because....but it feels odd as I have nothin against that Lord)

There are many other reasons, I'd suggest you to give it a try, it's bloody cheap and after 4000h I am still actively playing it.

Surely a good deal!

Yeah sounds pretty good I’ll look into getting it! Neevous to pick up another game right now though especially if it’s that good. It’s on steam right?

I guess what I was thinking was giving the game’s NPC’s context through story. Like building a relationship with your brother in game but then find out he is plotting to overthrow your kingdom. Like whatever traits you gain he gains the opposite (honor valor etc.) Kind of like you help people he sees you as a weak ruler or you are Raiding and preventing other cultures from taking over but he sees you as a tyrant. I saw a poster someone else jokingly suggested he killed arenicos and i thought it would make for some good immersion.

 

[stevehoos]

Forget Vanilla Warband, let's say the benchmark is Warband + one of the top overhauls, for me Perisno N1, followed very close by Prophesy of Pendor and 1257 AD (although I don't know how it is ATM).
Those overhauls take a looong time to finish, in comparison to even Native, plus they are considerably more difficult then Native. Not recommended as first try...

I am playing a Vanilla-ish overhaul called "Bannerpage", give that one a try, it's like a mix of all the "tweaks" that happened over the years with mods...

What makes Warband so immersive, is that you gotta actually do stuff for other stuff to happen

For example you wanna get married:

Bannerlord: you spawn, go to any Princess, win RNG, ask father, make money, buy her from father.

Warband:
First you need to find a girl, they appear only at feasts during tournaments, otherwise you don't even see them. Then you need to approach her and see if she likes you by asking her about herself (if asked,she will also say her opinion about memebers of the family, that is how to learn of Lords' personalities).
Let's say she likes you, if you won the tournament, you could dedicate it to her and she'll like you even more, but to see her, her tutor must agree (father, uncle, brother),you must be in good terms with said tutor though, if you are high enough, he will allow you to visit her....if you wanna visit her with her consense, but against the tutor's will, you'll have to pay the consequences of your cunning actions, you could also elope with the chick...the father will be really pissed off!
If otherwise you are honorable, you will need to visit taverns, find musicians and ask them to teach you poems,your lady will send an emissary while you are riding around, asking you to visit her, if you agree, you go vist her, tell her a poem (appropriate to her personality) and do this a few times, when you have a decent rep with her, you can ask her to marry, if she agrees you need to find the tutor, if you are high enough he will agree, you agree on a sum (with dialogue and accuracy)and when there will be a chance, you will marry her in some town with a cerimony (all the lords/ladies you met will be present).

Even if you could not bothered to read the useless wall of text...can you tell the difference???))

In Warband you build "real" relationships with NPC, you care for them get angry with them, wanna help one, by undermining another, wanna be nice with one because maybe in 800 days you will need his help, you will be in deperate need of help while sorrounded by enemies and your friend Lord X rushes in your aid with his huge army (many WB palyers must have had this moment), that idiot of the King giving parties while at war...they are more alive, they give you a reason to like them or hate them.
In BL I am sieging towns just because....but it feels odd as I have nothin against that Lord)

There are many other reasons, I'd suggest you to give it a try, it's bloody cheap and after 4000h I am still actively playing it.

Surely a good deal!

This needs to be pinned on the Wall at TW's studio. I hope a dev with influence to change something like this sees it. It's a real shame.

 

[ste636]

This needs to be pinned on the Wall at TW's studio. I hope a dev with influence to change something like this sees it. It's a real shame.

In 2020 Excel rule, whatever caters the masses is good for figures....at the end of the day making a quality product nowadays is not convenient, I really hope I am wrong, but I'd be surprised if I was.

 

[ste636]

Yeah sounds pretty good I’ll look into getting it! Neevous to pick up another game right now though especially if it’s that good. It’s on steam right?

I guess what I was thinking was giving the game’s NPC’s context through story. Like building a relationship with your brother in game but then find out he is plotting to overthrow your kingdom. Like whatever traits you gain he gains the opposite (honor valor etc.) Kind of like you help people he sees you as a weak ruler or you are Raiding and preventing other cultures from taking over but he sees you as a tyrant. I saw a poster someone else jokingly suggested he killed arenicos and i thought it would make for some good immersion.

In WB that's actually how I play, you don't have infinite companions, just a few, but they all have their very distinct personalities and background stories and you will get to become attached to one or the other, most of mods carry them over,so you can go on adventuring with your buddies in different scenarios.

 

[Lord of Banners]

In WB that's actually how I play, you don't have infinite companions, just a few, but they all have their very distinct personalities and background stories and you will get to become attached to one or the other, most of mods carry them over,so you can go on adventuring with your buddies in different scenarios.

Yeah that would be cool, companions with personalities. I can 100% get on board for that

 

[Killer Kitten]

Anyone else wondering how much of a storyline there will be to this game?

Personally,
I think it would be awesome if they started before Arenicos’s assassination and had relative peace in all kingdoms. You find a piece of the dragon banner,move on to find your family after you reach clan tier 1 so you can choose to delay and grow. Find them and go to celebrate at a nearby town but then find out on arrival Arenicos is dead and there are successors and rebellions across the empire. From there you help stop a local rebellion (maybe get introduced to those mechanics?) and afterwards continue on as sandbox. Maybe add a quest for discovering the murderer.

This is all way down the road stuff and we might not see a real storyline. hopefully devs focus on important things, but it’s fun to think about.
Thoughts?

The issue with the story is that it starts with an expansive fetch quest, essentially. Where you have to talk to 10 lords. Now, that wouldn't be an issue, except it's devilishly hard to find anyone in this game.

 

[ste636]

The issue with the story is that it starts with an expansive fetch quest, essentially. Where you have to talk to 10 lords. Now, that wouldn't be an issue, except it's devilishly hard to find anyone in this game.

The issue with the story is its existence.
This Title is famous to be a true sandbox, if you put a story (or even the clan deal for me), you guide the player in a direction, not ok for me in such a sandbox game.
The story should be a mod or a DLC.

 

[dannazgu]

I think the storyline is just an introduction to your story... Like, the death of Arenicos or whatever.. How the factions changed and the lore of Calradia; I think that was their goal in implement Lore, a world with history. That's my point of view, they just need to work on it properly and change according to culture. I doubt that if you start as Vlandian you'd be much interested in what happened to Arenicos, but more likely how take over Vlandia or build your own kingdom upon her ashes. The same storyline to every faction and culture is weird and I agree... But, this world needs bit of Lore and not just creating your own or mindless warmongering.
I think if they did it like the With Fire and Sword.. I think that was the name of the game.. Where in the end quest you become the new Tsar or King, correct if i'm wrong.. I think this way would engage more the player. Where in the end of the quest for example, in the Empire, you found out the true of Arenico's death and then you had to convice other noble houses to join you to estabilish the Empire again, punishing the culprits.