Development Feedback - Direction

[Androme1]

My vision is to specify ratios of troop type, and possibly further refinement to relative troop quality. I would designate (in percentages) 50 Inf / 30 Arc / 20 Cav. Then no matter what the battle size, the game fills those ratios. If possible, I would also add a quality designation (Elite, Veteran, Common). This way I could field my weaker troops when I come across easy fights as a means of training them, and without putting my veterans at needless risk of death to a stone throw from a lucky looter. Or you could select random for a mix of green and veteran troops. Ratios would be saved in templates for quick selecting each fight, rather than re-designating each time.

One of the best ideas I've heard so far. Troop management to try to do this manually on your own with the tools the game offers us at the moment is such a hassle. If a handy interface prior to battle could be made to do exactly what you wrote, it would be so damn great. I wholeheartedly support something like this, damn it would be nice.

 

[Windyplains]

The biggest remaining hassle for me in Floris, then Silverstag, is troop management. Specifically, getting precisely the troop ratios you want in battle with you.

My vision is to specify ratios of troop type, and possibly further refinement to relative troop quality. I would designate (in percentages) 50 Inf / 30 Arc / 20 Cav. Then no matter what the battle size, the game fills those ratios. If possible, I would also add a quality designation (Elite, Veteran, Common). This way I could field my weaker troops when I come across easy fights as a means of training them, and without putting my veterans at needless risk of death to a stone throw from a lucky looter. Or you could select random for a mix of green and veteran troops. Ratios would be saved in templates for quick selecting each fight, rather than re-designating each time.

Created ticket #1786.  That's definitely within the realm of what I can do with interfaces and could be linked into the Pre-Battle Orders & Deployment setup.

 

[dagg929]

I'd really like to see more of a dishonorable playstyle not necessarily rewarded (can still be hated by all lords, etc.) but with more options.

Fleshing out and maybe adding in some additional high level bandits/merc companies that only follow folks with negative honor would be cool to me.

Something maybe with Emblem's - using these to influence other nobles/monarchs? Like a benefit boost, or pay emblems to follow you, etc.

Paying emblems for prosperity boosts on villages/towns/etc would really be cool as well. I'd do this, whenever I start out as a vassal with a village that is getting raided constantly, I'm always trying to build it up.

Below this would be nice but I'd honestly rather see freelancer fleshed out more/implemented as you are planning to do. I've never really liked it before, but am quite excited to try it once you get the redesign done.

I'd love more of a benefit into marriage or diplomacy with lords. Looking through tickets now:
Marriage benefits, I dig some of the ideas here:
https://www.assembla.com/spaces/windyplains/tickets/471#/activity/ticket:

Pay for a return of a vassal:
https://www.assembla.com/spaces/windyplains/tickets/1428#/activity/ticket:

 

[VictorTadeu]

There is two simple things I'm missing a lot when comparing Silverstag to Floris:

- First is the Floris wider selection of coloured armor and especially horses. Sounds silly, but I had greater immersion and fun making the "red knight", the "yellow knight", the "blue knight" in my companions so they can look cooler and distinc and I can easily recognize then in combat. Right now, even so I have a moderate selection of armour styles for the rider, the horses basically all look the same with few choices of armoured horses, both in style and stats.

- I miss Swadia super heavy cavalry with with lances... the odd part is the Swadia stores still have the armor and weapons they used to carry (like the long couched lances and the crusader helmets), but the unit is no longer around. I think the Swadia Sentinel or Sergeant could be removed in favor of heavier cavalry, in fact maybe the heavier in game, in the shape of the traditional western medieval knight with lance and heavy armour both for the horse and the rider. I know they have the Praven Knight, but it's a city exclusive unit while I think it should be a faction exclusive and instead of the Vaegiran Lance it should be the Great [painted] Lance. And their equipment should not be so standardized in the terms of style, but more colorful in the sense of all the variations of crusader helmets, armoured horse and lance colors so they can look more like a powerful noble arming himself and not a regular standard force.

 

[Androme1]

There is two simple things I'm missing a lot when comparing Silverstag to Floris:

- First is the Floris wider selection of coloured armor and especially horses. Sounds silly, but I had greater immersion and fun making the "red knight", the "yellow knight", the "blue knight" in my companions so they can look cooler and distinc and I can easily recognize then in combat. Right now, even so I have a moderate selection of armour styles for the rider, the horses basically all look the same with few choices of armoured horses, both in style and stats.

- I miss Swadia super heavy cavalry with with lances... the odd part is the Swadia stores still have the armor and weapons they used to carry (like the long couched lances and the crusader helmets), but the unit is no longer around. I think the Swadia Sentinel or Sergeant could be removed in favor of heavier cavalry, in fact maybe the heavier in game, in the shape of the traditional western medieval knight with lance and heavy armour both for the horse and the rider. I know they have the Praven Knight, but it's a city exclusive unit while I think it should be a faction exclusive and instead of the Vaegiran Lance it should be the Great [painted] Lance. And their equipment should not be so standardized in the terms of style, but more colorful in the sense of all the variations of crusader helmets, armoured horse and lance colors so they can look more like a powerful noble arming himself and not a regular standard force.

Yeah I agree with this. So far I feel like the troops of the various factions use really poor looking armour. The Nords look like low level bandits, while the Swadians look like a early/mid level player character in Floris. I think we need slightly more variation in armour and weaponry, and a change in what armour most troops from most factions use, I'd say the Vaegirs and Rhodoks also suffer from this, the Sarranids and Khergits not so much from what I've seen. There could be a bit more Khergit armour in the game though to make them stand out more aswell.

For the Nords ideally I'd like to see more gray, as in chainmail and plate, covered in furs. But the best way to achieve that iconic ''fantasy'' viking warrior look is the helmet, round shield and axes. Scrap all polearms for the nords if they're not wooden spears, get them into gray plate/chain armour, replace all maces with broadswords and axes, remove any non-round shield with a round shield. And only have specific troops meant to be offensive and low defence and low level troops use non-chain/plate armour.

Swadians I'd like to see more impressive looking armour and horses. For example the Man-At-Arms is what I was thinking about when I said low/mid level player character in Floris, they don't look like cavalry at all. They should look more like the Praven Knight(?), with some sort of armoured horse, impressive lance, some sort of kite shield, and more 'bulky' and impressive armour, preferably a fully covering helmet aswell.

The Vaegirs I haven't met that much, in the first and only game I've played so far the Nords quickly wiped them out but if I remember correctly they were mostly okay but were suffering slightly from the same issue as the Nords, most troops looks like bandits.

The Rhodoks could use a bit more green armour on their body, but with clearly gray boots/gloves and helmets, as for their melee only/high level melee troops, they should retain the look they currently got, with the gothic plate and all that, they look mostly good.

 

[BurgherKing]

Simple question.  If you were running the show what would you focus the next version on for development?  This would be v0.28 as v0.27 already has its focus in development.

Reworking the Vaegir troop tree to bring it in line with the other factions' troop trees.

 

[Windyplains]

Reworking the Vaegir troop tree to bring it in line with the other factions' troop trees.

We'd could use more details in what you feel is lacking or what troop types you'd like to see added in.

 

[D3monic]

Well, one thing I noticed while I was briefly a mercenary for Vaegirs, their lack of shields is terrible thing. And to be fair, I have to say nords in 0.26 are kinda OP, they have already conquered Vaegirs AND Swadia, both factions survive just with a few castles.

BTW, Windy, check your steam

 

[Caba`drin]

The biggest remaining hassle for me in Floris, then Silverstag, is troop management. Specifically, getting precisely the troop ratios you want in battle with you.

My vision is to specify ratios of troop type, and possibly further refinement to relative troop quality. I would designate (in percentages) 50 Inf / 30 Arc / 20 Cav. Then no matter what the battle size, the game fills those ratios. If possible, I would also add a quality designation (Elite, Veteran, Common). This way I could field my weaker troops when I come across easy fights as a means of training them, and without putting my veterans at needless risk of death to a stone throw from a lucky looter. Or you could select random for a mix of green and veteran troops. Ratios would be saved in templates for quick selecting each fight, rather than re-designating each time.

Created ticket #1786.  That's definitely within the realm of what I can do with interfaces and could be linked into the Pre-Battle Orders & Deployment setup.

Windy pointed me here. This is a very interesting idea to move to ratios/quality from specific numbers of specific troops. In the interim, are you using the 'pre-battle deployment' options already present to set exactly which troops will join you when the battle starts?

 

[Iron Sight]

Reworking the Vaegir troop tree to bring it in line with the other factions' troop trees.

We'd could use more details in what you feel is lacking or what troop types you'd like to see added in.

I'm glad to see this brought up and I second this as the Veagir have been grossly misrepresented since the beginning of M&B imo. A lot of effort has been put into making some of the other factions more accurate to their historical counterpart. The issue with the Vaegir is that there is not a lot of info on their medieval counterpart, generally, the Slavs. The info that is there is minimal and vague, so I understand when they are just given "whatever" and labeled as an "offensive only" faction. The truth is, and probably the biggest imbalances for the Vaegir are the lack of shields, the inability of the AI to exploit the importance of having such a cheap troop and the inability to conduct an actual ambush. The Slavs were very numerous but Vaegir lords seem to field less than normal amounts in their armies, probably the least of all the other factions, when it should be the other way around. Their inherent advantages where speed, due to less armor but not to exclude shields, and strength in numbers. Let's also not forget that Baltic Slavs were competitive with Vikings as they could fend off their raids and actually conducted their own Slavic raids on Viking villages. Joms-vikings were supposed to be made up of mostly Slavs.
It was in my mind to start my own balancing act with the Vaegir. Namely, I was going to simply add some light shielding to a few troops and create at least 2 new
troops as listed:
  Vaegir Ranger, a non-faction mid tier (4-6) troop that uses speed and weapon diversity. (i.e bow, light shield, spear and single hand weapon) Speed is key;
  Rivacheg Raider, a location specialty mid tier troop that somewhat resembles a nord, kind of like the Jeirbe Sellsword only faster.

I hope this is generally in the same direction as other Vaegir supporters. If not, feel free to collaborate.

 

[Kraven]

I would honestly start focusing more on immersion, politics, day to day army management, etc..
Like have small events that semi randomly triggers like.
"Two of your knights have gotten in a brawl over something, what do you do?"
you then get some options like "knock them out" which is tied to strength, higher strength, greater success.
or try to have them solve it with you as a mediator, would rely on persuasion, etc..
Depending on your choice and level of success, combined with random "personalities" tied to the people involved you would get bonuses and penalties depending on it.
Or one of your soldiers could boldly address your fighting stance and that he noticed a flaw in it, that he would like to practice with you, deny him and you could a morale boost for being confident, accept and you gain some proficiency points to spend.
Etc. All of these handled through menus.
Events would range from small brawls, to sometimes even having your men turn on you if the morale is bad or they haven't been paid and it leading to an actual battle where you are unprepared and not in your armor.
To random adventurers joining you or one of your soldiers have shown exceptional skill and you can promote him to an actual companion and he will get a random name.

As for politics? I would like to see sort of "courts" where people can vote for who will be the permanent owner of a city (will be assigned to a warden until court), ability to through these courts and what not influence the political standing and settings of the kingdom, etc.

A last thing I would love to see is companions having "limited" amounts of lives, that slowly replenishes over time, so they become kill able, but very unlikely to die, mostly cause they can become such insane power houses that they trivialize the game and partly cause it would be cool to get new randomly generated companions and sometimes losing your favorite battle brother.

(Example each hero has 5 lives and replenishes one every ingame month)

 

[TrolKabu]

I do like immersion and politics things, as M&B really lacks this kind of RPG parts.

I always wanted some court dressing while entering a castle, for feast or simple courtesy call. It's weird going to a feast in full armor while everyone wear dresses and noble outfits.
Wearing different outfits would give relation bonus to different persons (a bit like the book which gives +1 relations with ladies for each bonus relation gain) : sort of armor pleases martial lords and adventurous ladies, noble outfit to please conventional ladies and good-natured lords, and so on.
I remember some tickets about this kind of things.

The random events are interesting, but would need a good balance and a lot of testings to occur at a good rate, and shouldn't give a big "reward".

About the political thing, I don't really know what is doable with the engine and hardcoded mechanisms. But it would be very interesting to have more features and different governments types.


I'm not a fan of limited lives for companions, as it takes ages to upgrade and equip them. At least it should be a personal choice, like the "disable complaints" tick.
I'm curious about the random generation of companions. As I know how many things you have to change into the game files just to add a companion on a new game, I'm pretty sure it would be impossible, or at least extremely complicated, to add them directly IG.
Something more doable, I think, would be that instead of randomly generating a new companion, this soldier creates his own group, with the possibility to give him orders or let him roam freely over the lands.

 

[Michael1]

On the day to day army management I'd like the ability to assign auto-recruiting of my troops. For instance say I want 20 archers and 20 infantry I'd like the ability to automatically recruit units to fill my losses whenever I visit a city that has the units I want.  Maybe also the ability to assign my companions to manage to day  to day recruiting of units? For example Bunduk has the Firing captain ability,so maybe I should be able to assign him to manage my crossbow units,as that's what a captain does I thought? Could some peasant crossbow recruits also maybe be added to the Rhodoks,as all they have right now is archers. It would make sense,due to their revolt background history.

 

[Michiko]

Btw this isn't just a suggestion thread, but a thread about what you would do if you were in charge of the Silverstag project and had the capability to do all the modding required and/or had the full support of the team and whatnot.

I don't think suggestions are bad here or anything and it isn't my place to tell people to stop of course, but I think the team already has a lot of suggestions so far. I think they're more interested in seeing how we the players are feeling about the project's direction so far and going forward, which could be the reason for this thread. Hence "feedback."

On that though I'd just like to add that if I were in charge I'd also like to work on certain cosmetic options. In particular:

1. Optional add-on to make face graphics like in Floris. I remember bringing this up before back in the earlier stages, and the team said something about focusing first on the gameplay things first. While Floris faces may not be everybody's cup of tea, they could be an option for those of us that are more used to those. IMO they're certainly better than Native and not as extreme as some other mods.

2. Many of the textures included in the mod (and packaged with Warband for that matter) are not optimized. This leads to longer load times and potential crashes and data swap stuttering on low VRAM/RAM set ups. In many cases, simply optimizing the textures will make them run smoother even on older PCs even without lowering graphical settings, and the optimization if done properly would not impact the visual quality.

3. Optional sound patch(es) for different voice settings.
- The "ah, ah, waughh!" and similar death sounds don't sound appropriate in many cases, such as if a guy is collapsing to his knees in a melee. I would make options to tone these down such as to make them rarer. I like them though and don't want to completely remove them. They sound great when killing a lancer and he's falling off his horse or other falling death options like dying and ragdolling off the rampart during a siege. But not much else.
- While I appreciate the effort of the voice acting, due to the limited number of lines that get said in the "insults" lines (and the intentionally strong accents of many of them), they sound ironically unbelievable in most situations, such as multiple people saying the same thing while in combat, which happens a lot in larger battles. It's also weird for a Sarranid or Khergit archer to yell "FEEL MAH BLEYD!" So if it were me, I would be working on a patch to make them sound more generic, meaning no real words and just typical battlecries like in Native, but more varied.
- A few other sound and voice-related bugs would also be addressed.

 

[Androme1]

In addition to the suggestion someone made above about troop ratios prior to a battle, I think equipment diversity for all troops is something the devs should be working on. An example is the Rhodok Highland Pikeman, who originally can only spawn with Herald Mail with Surcoat, I see no reason why Heraldic Mail along with Heraldic Mail with Tabard can't be added to his equipment table aswell, it doesn't imbalance the game in any way, it just adds the chance for the Rhodok Highland Pikemen to spawn with different looking gear from time to time, adding to the flavour and not making everything look so uniform. Although I do believe veteran troops should be very uniform with a precisely set of equipment they always spawn with, since their numbers will always be low anyways.

About the veteran troops, there should really be more ways than just winning tournaments for them to be available for hire, it doesn't make much sense why we can only gain veteran recruits from only tournament wins.

 

[zapbib]

About the veteran troops, there should really be more ways than just winning tournaments for them to be available for hire, it doesn't make much sense why we can only gain veteran recruits from only tournament wins.

Hmm, its been quite a while that you can get veteran from upgrading troops, its actually almost too easy if you have the money.

For devellopment, I think I would focus on what this mod does best, that is implementing gameplay that is not there in native.

1) I might do a small run to improve the visual. (troop equip, more items)
2)The freelancer thing seems like solid gold.
3)Polishing the attribute system (that is the big thing of silverstag right now)
4) miscellaneous small gameplay thing that add up nicely.
5) i would try to trim down the troop trees (but thats just me)

 

[Androme1]

About the veteran troops, there should really be more ways than just winning tournaments for them to be available for hire, it doesn't make much sense why we can only gain veteran recruits from only tournament wins.

Hmm, its been quite a while that you can get veteran from upgrading troops, its actually almost too easy if you have the money.

For devellopment, I think I would focus on what this mod does best, that is implementing gameplay that is not there in native.

1) I might do a small run to improve the visual. (troop equip, more items)
2)The freelancer thing seems like solid gold.
3)Polishing the attribute system (that is the big thing of silverstag right now)
4) miscellaneous small gameplay thing that add up nicely.
5) i would try to trim down the troop trees (but thats just me)

I mean veteran recruits, not the veteran upgrade for the troops.

 

[Leifdin]

If you dismiss a veteran/elite troop that is T5 or higher (T6 for Rhodoks) you'll get a veteran recruit. So if you hire a T4 unit, level it up and disband it, you have a veteran recruit. But I think that a better system for veteran acquisition in place of this would be nice. Maybe having high relationship(25+) with a city could result in a veterans spawning occasionally? For example you'd have 1% chance of spawning 1-2 veterans for each point of reputation (i.e. 25% chance at 25 reputation). There could even be an ability which could increase this by a flat rate (perhaps 1.25% of spawn chance for 1 point of reputation - that would be 31,25% chance at 25 rep)

 

[Androme1]

If you dismiss a veteran/elite troop that is T5 or higher (T6 for Rhodoks) you'll get a veteran recruit. So if you hire a T4 unit, level it up and disband it, you have a veteran recruit. But I think that a better system for veteran acquisition in place of this would be nice. Maybe having high relationship(25+) with a city could result in a veterans spawning occasionally? For example you'd have 1% chance of spawning 1-2 veterans for each point of reputation (i.e. 25% chance at 25 reputation). There could even be an ability which could increase this by a flat rate (perhaps 1.25% of spawn chance for 1 point of reputation - that would be 31,25% chance at 25 rep)

Whatever new system is put in place, it needs to be a small trickle over time, I also believe this is a perfect opportunity to add yet another nice player ability, something like veteran recruits appearing more often in towns in the faction you're related to for every 100 renown or something, so it scales with the game length.

(T6 for Rhodoks)

Why is this? Just curious, decision or just the result of game mechanics?

 

[Leifdin]

Rhodok T5 units require peasant recruit. It is mostly because of Highland Pikemen who are supposed to be the powerhouse of Rhodoks. They are however tier 5 which is kind of dead tier - it requires a veteran recruit yet offers only one tier higher than peasant recruits who are much easier to acquire. We had two choices - to either make them high tier or do this. We decided to do this since in historical context pikemen were kind of disposable, cheap, yet effective unit.