Companions are not clansmen in this system

[Xratter]

The best use for companions at the moment are as caravan leaders.

I have not "beaten" the game, but in my most recent playthrough I'm over 400 days in and have 6 caravans going. They're making me anywhere from 2000 gold (**** day) to 5000 gold (awesome day) a day. I have 2 cities, and have 5 castles in my kingdom. I have a party limit of approximately 170 right now. If I did not have my caravans then I wouldn't be making money every day.

That was all to say that caravans seem to be really strong, and the best use for companions is as their leaders. The problem is that this is not a clan. Instead, this is a trading company. I want my companions to meaningfully interact with the world and with my journey, not passively generate money. I want to have them be part of my clan and lead parties, and take part in my kingdom, but instead they are glorified merchants. Right now companions are not meaningful. In this game, I want to interact with each part of the game that was developed, but for this, it feels as if I have to choose: do I want companions or do I want financial security in my playthrough?

The way things are, it breaks the intention of the game design to lose you "clansmen" to caravans. It also breaks from how M&B1 had companions be your ultimate traveling goon squad. I don't know if this was intended, but currently this system makes me feel bad, but it's the most efficient way to use them.

To alter the format, you could: a) make caravans more expensive and remove the requirement for companions, b) make caravans upgrade-able (where one of the upgrades allows you to remove the requirement of a companion), c) include a perk in the trade/stewardship tree to remove companions as a requirement for caravans, d) create a something new

Taleworlds, you guys have been great with this game since launch. Keep up the great work!

What does the community think? Do you guys agree, disagree? Let me know!

 

[Midnitewolf]

Well the Governor system obviously doesn't work right now so it is pretty useless to put them there and at least in my campaigns, my parties can't stay intact and uncaptured more the 15 minutes at a time so that make them useless for parties as well.

That leaves Caravans quests which can net a chuck of change but considering you will be swimming in gold at some point, they have a relatively short lifespan and quests.

Using them for quests can be useful if the quest is just boring but at a certain point, doing quests loses it luster because there just isn't enough gain in it. I mean we will again go back to the swimming in gold problem. Eventually the 1000-1500 gold you make from quests becomes meaningless and aside from unlocking a few recruitment slots, relation doesn't matter. Also often as not, the guy you want relationship with, doesn't even have a quest available.

So that leaves the most common use, leaving in your party.

 

[Xratter]

I started out leaving them in my party too. I had no idea what caravans did, how they worked, and was worried about the inconsistent gold that I had read about. Now that I have my own kingdom, the early parts of fighting other kingdoms is very lopsided, so the money allows me to barter for peace. It might take me 40k to buy peace, but with my caravans, the "swimming in gold" part is very useful.

 

[S.O.D Brigand!]

In my experience they don't gain much xp in caravans so I don't use them for that. I strongly disagree that caravans are their best use. Their best use is as commanders of your armies. If you have a troop limit of 190 and each of your companions has a troop limit of 80 and you have 5 of them. That means you have a net troop limit of 590 without costing you any influence.
They also recruit troops for you. Early game is spent travelling around looking to make money. Mid game is travelling around trying to recruit troops. Having them do that for you is a massive time saver and essential in winning wars and expanding your territories. It's also the fastest way to get them to earn xp so you can level them up.

 

[S.O.D Brigand!]

Using them for quests can be useful if the quest is just boring but at a certain point, doing quests loses it luster because there just isn't enough gain in it. I mean we will again go back to the swimming in gold problem. Eventually the 1000-1500 gold you make from quests becomes meaningless and aside from unlocking a few recruitment slots, relation doesn't matter. Also often as not, the guy you want relationship with, doesn't even have a quest available.

Disagree with this. Quests are super important throughout. Even if they are boring. This is the second most important use for companions. If you have 0 relations with a settlement they let you recruit 2 of their worst units. If you have really good relations with them they let you recruit many many more troops and good quality troops. Which you will constantly need to replenish. Especially when everyone and their mother is trying to recruit troops from everywhere. Often those two crappy troops will have already been recruited by someone else so you need to get those high relations troops or leave with nothing.

 

[Ogagon]

When I first saw that you could have your companions create a party, I thought I'd also get renown from any battle they win, unfortunately, it's not like that, and all you get is a party which is roaming around the map, doing whatever the hell it wants and providing a pitiful financial aid.
It's still good if you want to make a kingdom straight out without serving any faction.
Caravans are what I default to as well, since it's just free money, and they usually repay the 15k in a month's time at most.
The bigger problem I'd have with the companions is that they're just very bland atm. If you'd think of companions in warband, you think of rolf, you think of an ex-noble with a moustache, lezalt, the dude that trained the troops of some nobleman, baheshtur, the khergit that's some kin to the khan and who takes 300 denars from you as some sort of replacement for salt which is a khergit way of acknowledging a leader, they've all got something that you'd remember from their backstory.
Oh, and companion complaints, long live companion complaints.

 

[WCGamer]

The mechanics of companions is not too bad. It would be nice to increase how many you can have if you have to use them for caravans as well. Or don't have the caravan leaders count towards companion limit in your party.

Edit: they take much too long to level up right now

 

[Xratter]

The mechanics of companions is not too bad. It would be nice to increase how many you can have if you have to use them for caravans as well. Or don't have the caravan leaders count towards companion limit in your party.

Edit: they take much too long to level up right now

Those are two very good alternatives to the system the way it is right now...

and yes, they take way too long to level up at the moment. It looks like the beta is going to try and work on this by starting them out with worse skills so they will start to level more frequently, even if they start out weaker.

 

[Punchtown Hero]

Honestly companions are great and probably the most useful tool in the game, I would also say they're one of the more completed features currently.

Not every companion is worthy of being counted among your clan heads. Some are great warriors useful as personal bodyguards on the battlefield, while others make great party leaders. I think personally the less skillful companions should be sent out with a caravan only in the early game, once mid game rolls around and you have fiefs the extra income is far less valuable than another companion you can train up to lead an army effectively or even keep as a personal doctor or engineer(useless rn, engineer skills broken)