SP - General Cheaper gear, more expensive troops

[The Yogi]

I've been with Mount & Blade since the original game (I'm in the looong community contributor list for Warband), and one thing that has always bugged me and which I hoped Bannerlord would adress is the absurd balance between the price of gear and the price of hiring and promoting troops (which also involves equipping them). The price of a helmet pays for a small army - for the price of a suit of armour, you can equip a company of knights! This makes no sense.

Ideally, I had hoped Bannerlord would let us equip our troops a bit like we equip our companions - of course not having to micro the gear of each man, but make a template calling for certain kinds of equipment and then the troops picking up gear as it becomes available, and replacing it for better stuff as they get it. That is obviously not going to happen, but even retaining the old system with (only) pre-configured troop classes we could have the price of hiring and promoting troops to be at least equal to the cost of additional equipment. Of course, both would have been impossible with the current exorbitant prices for anything except the basest gear.

At the heart of the matter, to me, is this: what should be more expensive; equipping yourself and a small group of companions with good weapons and armour, or raising an army of warriors to conquer castles and cities? To me, pure logic dictates it should be the latter.

So, what I would propose is this:

- substantially lower the price of normal equipment (weapons and armour). Specialty items (gilded/bejewelled/extra fine etc can still be exorbitant)
- rising the hiring and promotion costs of troops, to be at least equal to the cost of equipping them (with the new lower prices). Equipping a Knight should be no more and no less expensive than equipping yourself or a companion as a Knight.

This would make the early game easier, but the later game more difficult, which sounds like an improvement - and we would avoid the absurdity of our troops being far better equipped than their commander and most trusted lieutenants!

 

[jamoecw]

i saw a video in which in order to upgrade a troop you needed a horse. if this means that you can need the equipment (at leas the major piece) to equip your troop when you upgrade them, then this would be like how you wanted it at first. i noticed that some features that were in the game in closed beta have been removed now that it is early access, probably because they need some polished or bug fixing, hopefully things get sorted.

P.S. good to see you back, i come and go myself. the forums aren't what they used to be.

 

[The Yogi]

i saw a video in which in order to upgrade a troop you needed a horse. if this means that you can need the equipment (at leas the major piece) to equip your troop when you upgrade them, then this would be like how you wanted it at first. i noticed that some features that were in the game in closed beta have been removed now that it is early access, probably because they need some polished or bug fixing, hopefully things get sorted.

P.S. good to see you back, i come and go myself. the forums aren't what they used to be.

Thank you jamoecw, actually it still works like that with horses (or did last time I played). For this to work with gear, you'd have to have a list of acceptable and of needed equipment to being able to promote the troop.

 

[King Yngvar]

Maybe a late reply but I used to fix this myself somewhat in Warband by raising costs of upkeep and upgrading troops while also reducing item prices. This seems harder in Bannerlord for now.

 

[Dr-Shinobi]

No you make pleanty of money later which makes top tier stuff balanced but your idea sounds cool. But if thats gonna happen you also gonna have a chance of loosing your personal gear if you loose like in Warband. And making the troops cost more are gonna cause people to wanting to buff em even more in armor which gonna make the games fighting mechanic as boring and spongy as an The Division game

 

[eddiemccandless]

I've been with Mount & Blade since the original game (I'm in the looong community contributor list for Warband), and one thing that has always bugged me and which I hoped Bannerlord would adress is the absurd balance between the price of gear and the price of hiring and promoting troops (which also involves equipping them). The price of a helmet pays for a small army - for the price of a suit of armour, you can equip a company of knights! This makes no sense.

Ideally, I had hoped Bannerlord would let us equip our troops a bit like we equip our companions - of course not having to micro the gear of each man, but make a template calling for certain kinds of equipment and then the troops picking up gear as it becomes available, and replacing it for better stuff as they get it. That is obviously not going to happen, but even retaining the old system with (only) pre-configured troop classes we could have the price of hiring and promoting troops to be at least equal to the cost of additional equipment. Of course, both would have been impossible with the current exorbitant prices for anything except the basest gear.

At the heart of the matter, to me, is this: what should be more expensive; equipping yourself and a small group of companions with good weapons and armour, or raising an army of warriors to conquer castles and cities? To me, pure logic dictates it should be the latter.

So, what I would propose is this:

- substantially lower the price of normal equipment (weapons and armour). Specialty items (gilded/bejewelled/extra fine etc can still be exorbitant)
- rising the hiring and promotion costs of troops, to be at least equal to the cost of equipping them (with the new lower prices). Equipping a Knight should be no more and no less expensive than equipping yourself or a companion as a Knight.

This would make the early game easier, but the later game more difficult, which sounds like an improvement - and we would avoid the absurdity of our troops being far better equipped than their commander and most trusted lieutenants!

This seems very sensible to me. Equipping your troops with your own gear would be, I think, too micromanage-y to be enjoyable, even by using a template approach, but a straight up cost increase would basically accomplish the same thing with less inconvenience for the player. I hope Taleworlds listens to this suggestion.