Chad Warband vs. Virgin Bannerlord

[Zarthas]

Balancing weapon breaking mechanics is useless IMO. Just using Warband mods as an example, most people I have seen on the internet hated this mechanic, and the mods offered an option to disable it altogether due to the scale of this complaints. In VC was even an skill, which translates into another "tax skill" like Inventory Management that will suck the fun of playing unless you leveled it up, limiting builds.

Yeah, but if I remember correctly in VC it applied to all weapons.

It is not an interesting decision to make then, as you say its just a skill sink.

An interesting decision to make is "Do I wail on these 15 dudes in front of me with a Poleaxe, knowing it could leave me without a poleaxe when I really need one, or do I use my Mace and save the Poleaxe for when we storm the walls and I might need it more?".

If weapon breaks only apply to certain weapons (i.e., polearms), and have a durability visible like shields, it can become an interesting decision. Games are just a series of interesting decisions to make. Having a "low ammo" nuclear reach weapon on your back is more interesting than having a ****ty spear that is useless in 3/4 of situations in order to be "balanced".
I've proposed this as a solution to make Lances actually interesting, buffing them in general but making them use durability. We'll have to wait for mods to play around with that.

 

[bonerstorm]

Balancing weapon breaking mechanics is useless IMO. Just using Warband mods as an example, most people I have seen on the internet hated this mechanic, and the mods offered an option to disable it altogether due to the scale of this complaints. In VC was even an skill, which translates into another "tax skill" like Inventory Management that will suck the fun of playing unless you leveled it up, limiting builds.

I dig it. And I'm certainly not suggesting that the VC system be brought back - wasn't it some % chance of breaking BS? And definitely broken weapons should not STAY broken - they should immediately revert to norm after every battle.

I'm just saying that there should be a limit to how many rib cages you liquefy with a single lance in one fight - that polearms in general should be buffed and then balanced with an HP system like shields have.

 

[JustinTime49]

Balancing weapon breaking mechanics is useless IMO. Just using Warband mods as an example, most people I have seen on the internet hated this mechanic, and the mods offered an option to disable it altogether due to the scale of this complaints. In VC was even an skill, which translates into another "tax skill" like Inventory Management that will suck the fun of playing unless you leveled it up, limiting builds.

IIRC that skill was a party skill no? With the many premade companions that you recruit over the game I personally never had too big an issue with the weapon modifier repercussions.

Even if I am wrong here, I remember that if you talk to any of the weaponsmiths/armoursmits in settlements you can ask them to enhance your weapon/armour for a price. Essentially, if your weapon "breaks" to crude, you can pay like 1500 to get it back to the norm, and even pay to get it all the way to masterwork/lordly if you have the funds.

 

[Apocal]

Idduno I've been unable to completely starve out a town in 1.5.10. They will lose troops but it gets to a point where they stop loosing them. Of course I could be overlooking something, but when I've tried it just gets to a point they just don't have the -garrison anymore even though they in negative food.

A test run (hence the crazy high influence, fluctuating food and massive army size)

Spoiler: Sieging down Varcheg (mostly), Spring 12 to Summer 9

Spoiler: Partial siege-down of Husn Fulq (defenders starved to less than a third), Winter 20 to Spring 19

Your call if you consider that working good enough for your purposes.

I could get them all the way down to zero defenders through starvation but it is pretty wasteful when you can just load into the siege assault, casually dust off the last ~100 or so while taking next to no casualties. It is saving on opportunity costs at the price of a little blood. My personal opinion is that being able to take a town from over 500 defenders to around 170 is good enough for for gameplay purposes in most cases.

Still haven't gotten around to besieging 11,000 prosperity Sanala though, I bet that'll be a hoot.

 

[bonerstorm]

A test run (hence the crazy high influence, fluctuating food and massive army size)

Spoiler: Sieging down Varcheg (mostly), Spring 12 to Summer 9

Spoiler: Partial siege-down of Husn Fulq (defenders starved to less than a third), Winter 20 to Spring 19

Your call if you consider that working good enough for your purposes.

I could get them all the way down to zero defenders through starvation but it is pretty wasteful when you can just load into the siege assault, casually dust off the last ~100 or so while taking next to no casualties. It is saving on opportunity costs at the price of a little blood. My personal opinion is that being able to take a town from over 500 defenders to around 170 is good enough for for gameplay purposes in most cases.

Still haven't gotten around to besieging 11,000 prosperity Sanala though, I bet that'll be a hoot.

HAHAHAA yeah that'll do it. A season-month of starvation in exchange for reducing their forces by 2/3? Within the confines of the game mechanics, that's maybe even more than reasonable.

Whether or not the approximation of food stocks makes sense is another question entirely.

 

[Ananda_The_Destroyer]

A test run (hence the crazy high influence, fluctuating food and massive army size)

Spoiler: Sieging down Varcheg (mostly), Spring 12 to Summer 9

Spoiler: Partial siege-down of Husn Fulq (defenders starved to less than a third), Winter 20 to Spring 19

Your call if you consider that working good enough for your purposes.

I could get them all the way down to zero defenders through starvation but it is pretty wasteful when you can just load into the siege assault, casually dust off the last ~100 or so while taking next to no casualties. It is saving on opportunity costs at the price of a little blood. My personal opinion is that being able to take a town from over 500 defenders to around 170 is good enough for for gameplay purposes in most cases.

Still haven't gotten around to besieging 11,000 prosperity Sanala though, I bet that'll be a hoot.

This is consistent with my experiences, but NO I want them to literally starve to zero(should be made to get faster not slower as it goes on) or surrender the town. If I just want to just minimize the enemies (or kill them all outright) I can just do it with my character and not sit on the map for days and days. If I feel like being lazy and have created the map state where I can just sit there like that, I should be able to take them without fighting.

If that's not gonna happen I'd be fine with removing all food related mechanics completely. **** it, if I can't use it it might as well not exist. That goes for every other simulation and eco mechanic too, if I can' t use it and control it, the game would be better with it gutted out.
It's just bull**** and a waste of the mechanic.

 

[bonerstorm]

This is consistent with my experiences, but NO I want them to literally starve to zero(should be made to get faster not slower as it goes on) or surrender the town. If I just want to just minimize the enemies (or kill them all outright) I can just do it with my character and not sit on the map for days and days. If I feel like being lazy and have created the map state where I can just sit there like that, I should be able to take them without fighting.

If that's not gonna happen I'd be fine with removing all food related mechanics completely. **** it, if I can't use it it might as well not exist. That goes for every other simulation and eco mechanic too, if I can' t use it and control it, the game would be better with it gutted out.
It's just bull**** and a waste of the mechanic.

Agreed.

"We literally have no food and over half our garrison has starved to death" should really prompt an automatic surrender at some point.

It's not realistic for a castle to run out of food in 2 weeks but it's definitely not realistic for mass starvation to 100% set in before the leaders give up the ghost.

 

[Apocal]

This is consistent with my experiences, but NO I want them to literally starve to zero(should be made to get faster not slower as it goes on) or surrender the town.

Then wait another ten or so days, they'll go to zero.

edit:
For full context, it was literally impossible before the starvation threshold was changed back to -8.

 

[Ananda_The_Destroyer]

Then wait another ten or so days, they'll go to zero.

edit:
For full context, it was literally impossible before the starvation threshold was changed back to -8.

It hasn't been possible in 1.5.10, at certain point it stop working, I think the garrison must be eating a certain amount to get kicked out and under around 60 (don't remember) it just stops. I could be overlooking something but I tried several times and couldn't do it.

 

[Apocal]

It hasn't been possible in 1.5.10, at certain point it stop working, I think the garrison must be eating a certain amount to get kicked out and under around 60 (don't remember) it just stops. I could be overlooking something but I tried several times and couldn't do it.

So I remembered this post while going through some screenshots from last week and found confirmation that you can 100% starve garrison and militia out. Done in a live game, not a test run like the first of my last examples. There are still defenders left because of two parties I had trapped inside, but I could have easily let them out and then gone back to siege again, no problem.

Spoiler: Full siege-down of Zeonica, Winter 16 to Spring 13.

The biggest problem -- other than the logistical ones, of course -- is that when you play tossing games with a town that has high prosperity, they will kill relatively large numbers of your men in the exchange. The higher the prosperity, the faster they build; the faster they build, the more ballistas are active; the more ballistas are active, the more of your men get hit alongside your siege engines. This town started with 9000 and it took something like nine trebuchets (replacements for fallen, F) before I'd tamed their ballistas and could get the walls fully down*.

*I hate siege assaults in M&B so I usually only attack against breaches, where it is more like a field battle.

 

[Ananda_The_Destroyer]

So I remembered this post while going through some screenshots from last week and found confirmation that you can 100% starve garrison and militia out. Done in a live game, not a test run like the first of my last examples. There are still defenders left because of two parties I had trapped inside, but I could have easily let them out and then gone back to siege again, no problem.

Spoiler: Full siege-down of Zeonica, Winter 16 to Spring 13.

The biggest problem -- other than the logistical ones, of course -- is that when you play tossing games with a town that has high prosperity, they will kill relatively large numbers of your men in the exchange. The higher the prosperity, the faster they build; the faster they build, the more ballistas are active; the more ballistas are active, the more of your men get hit alongside your siege engines. This town started with 9000 and it took something like nine trebuchets (replacements for fallen, F) before I'd tamed their ballistas and could get the walls fully down*.

*I hate siege assaults in M&B so I usually only attack against breaches, where it is more like a field battle.

Are you sure you didn't just kill the last 40-60 with trebs (when destroying ballista)? I've done that before, but as you described, it takes a big toll on your troops too.

 

[Apocal]

Are you sure you didn't just kill the last 40-60 with trebs (when destroying ballista)? I've done that before, but as you described, it takes a big toll on your troops too.

Look at the negative number on the last screen shot: they died hungry.

That does make me realize that against truly high prosperity towns it might just be optimal to not build siege engines at all. Since they can't just bombard your siege camp at random and need a target to miss in order to hit your troops, I could probably save a lot of men by just setting up the siege camp and waiting.

 

[Ananda_The_Destroyer]

Look at the negative number on the last screen shot: they died hungry.

That does make me realize that against truly high prosperity towns it might just be optimal to not build siege engines at all. Since they can't just bombard your siege camp at random and need a target to miss in order to hit your troops, I could probably save a lot of men by just setting up the siege camp and waiting.

Were they loosing 23 militia and garrison a day? I've never seen any where near that many drop off, but I don't know if that's what the -23 means. That looks very different then what I've seen in 1.5.10, was it 1.5.10 or 1.6? Every time I've tried they drop of very slowly like 3 or so a day until they get to a low number then it just sits there. I haven't done it in 1.6 yet though.

 

[Apocal]

Were they loosing 23 militia and garrison a day? I've never seen any where near that many drop off, but I don't know if that's what the -23 means. That looks very different then what I've seen in 1.5.10, was it 1.5.10 or 1.6? Every time I've tried they drop of very slowly like 3 or so a day until they get to a low number then it just sits there. I haven't done it in 1.6 yet though.

Last week, so 1.5.10. And yes, that is what the number next to the garrison/militia count means. For garrison, the formula is pretty simple: -8 food = 1 death, with some rounding applied. For militia, it appears to be the same, but with a few added penalties for starving down, besieged, etc. It used to be much stricter, -20 food, but changed relatively recently, so that's why you might not have been able to starve out towns -- past a certain point prosperity and garrison numbers drop so low that what's left wouldn't starve.

But that's no longer a problem.

 

[mexxico]

The biggest problem there is even killing 3-4 men at garrison + militia per day is so valueable if you will make a simulation. Because at simulations for each defender at fief attacker loses 2-3-4-5 troops (average 3-4, changes according to fief level, siege equipments, strength of sides). However if you open mission you do not even lose 1 attacker per 1 defender. This is one of biggest problems of game currently. So forcing defenders to starve do not make sense most times.

 

[Apocal]

The biggest problem there is even killing 3-4 men at garrison + militia per day is so valueable if you will make a simulation. Because at simulations for each defender at fief attacker loses 2-3-4-5 troops (average 3-4, changes according to fief level, siege equipments, strength of sides). However if you open mission you do not even lose 1 attacker per 1 defender. This is one of biggest problems of game currently. So forcing defenders to starve do not make sense most times.

It makes lots of sense for players because they don't want to lose any troops. Losing even 1 is too many because of how boring it is to replace them.

 

[mexxico]

It makes lots of sense for players because they don't want to lose any troops. Losing even 1 is too many because of how boring it is to replace them.

Actually to get a fief with 100 garrisons without starving them player should lose about 100-150 troops even he has a strong army (like 1000 troops). This lose will be ideal. Otherwise when I watch streams player build a powerful army and take fiefs one by one easily with only losing several troops if defender army could not arrive on time. Even recruiting is boring this is also boring and damaging gameplay.

 

[Apocal]

Actually to get a fief with 100 garrisons without starving them player should lose about 100-150 troops even he has a strong army (like 1000 troops). This lose will be ideal. Otherwise when I watch streams player build a powerful army and take fiefs one by one easily with only losing several troops if defender army could not arrive on time. Even recruiting is boring this is also boring and damaging gameplay.

Yeah, I know how easily you can win some sieges. I'm saying a lot of players (most? not sure) don't like to do it because they spend like four or six hours grinding looters to train up a new party/army afterwards. Of course that is the slowest and most boring way to get your troops trained but people still do it that way because it is safe and people will play safely even if it is really boring.

So starving out defenses is going to appeal to them.

edit: I stopped doing that (all-high tier troops) months ago and found it made Bannerlord a lot less grindy and better to play but my way (use mostly tier 3 troops, don't care if I lose 5-10% per battle) is seen as a kind of min-maxing that other people don't enjoy.

 

[vonbalt]

However if you open mission you do not even lose 1 attacker per 1 defender. This is one of biggest problems of game currently. So forcing defenders to starve do not make sense most times.

This i agree completely, it's quite noticeable how during siege simulations attackers lose a lot of men (as they should) but when attacking in person you can easily win even outnumbered, defenders really should put more of a fight and hold the choke-points better but many times they get into "static" defensive positions and the attackers just swarm them from all sides and kill them all.

Improving this part to give the defenders a much much needed boost would greatly improve the enjoyability of sieges in my opinion.

Take for example Viking Conquest for warband, you had the option to besiege until forcing the enemy to surrender and usually you lost quite a few men during the process but attacking was so brutal if you didn't have mostly elite troops or vastly outnumbered the enemy that it made besieging worth it many times.

The "easiest" sieges were those where you assaulted from the sea because there were no walls making choke-points but only a handful of cities had this option, landsieges were brutal in comparison (and i loved it)

 

[Ananda_The_Destroyer]

Actually to get a fief with 100 garrisons without starving them player should lose about 100-150 troops even he has a strong army (like 1000 troops). This lose will be ideal. Otherwise when I watch streams player build a powerful army and take fiefs one by one easily with only losing several troops if defender army could not arrive on time. Even recruiting is boring this is also boring and damaging gameplay.

I can kill the entire garrison myself and lose zero troops. I would like the option to just sit there and starve them out when I've created the conditions to be able to do so. I have to build my character to actually be able to hold the entire faction prisoner so I can just sit thier in siege with no risk of raids, if I go through all that prep I should get the result. I can take a town the "correct way" by just making disposable troops I don't care about and push them up the ladders with my horse (really), but I would rather just sit thier with my elite force and watch them starve out and not fight at all.