Easing some restrictions

[MorgTzu]

M&B is a unique and amazing piece of art amongst the crapolla of gaming. The free form and very little "hand holding" makes the appeal to grognard and young skull smasher alike.

That said, I'm posting for the "little" things for native. Some have been mentioned, but I think I have a fresh enough compilation to warrant the thread.

1. In a free form game that is really almost a sim in depth potential, it 'feels' restrictive to yield my independence and trust to a warlord in order to realy unlock half the functionality of the full game. I 'feel' like I should be able to attack/ siege/ take anyone- any castle-town-village at any time and suffer the consequences. Same goes for joining outlaws in battle and being branded an outlaw. Give the option. Is that a future possibility for the honor rating?
Why cant the pc be a fully functional Warlord with his own emerging faction when far less immersive games allow the pc to do that very thing?

2. There is so much potential for tactics on the new battlefields. A few different Infantry buttons or the return of the companion button would go a longgg way. Why are we restricted to just a few grouping buttons? Is there more to come?

3. For those that play mods and native, we are (for the PC, generally) faced with two extreme death options. Why not have some middle ground to ease the 'invincible' for pc and heros and native and the other extreme of sudden death by stray horse/arrow/lance. Why not a bad wound system (that requires semi-realistic heal times) for when you hit 0 (with same for heros), and at least loosing a lot more inventory upon capture (is more pc-in-dungeon liklihood coming?) with death being a very low option. I know this has been kicked around ad nauseum, it just 'seems' there has to be some middle ground eventually for the game design to retain some level of tension. After the mid game, there is almost a bad fantasy feel to being knocked out with all your heros and the next day 'popping' up and sieging the 10th castle...just saying.

4. Some implementation of re-naming (heros, horse, captured towns), something that would just make sense and a 'little' thing that adds to the emotional connection of the player to his game. Just think about how much the 'banners' concept added to the 'identification' emotive for the player.

Nuff...I'm heading for Glunmar where folks know 'strangers ain't welcome'

 

[Oubliette]

1. Agreed.

2. With the grouping, I think it would be better if the player could access their party screen and had an option to choose which troops go in which groups, and also be able to add a new group (there would be a maximum, but we should be able to have more than three groups).

3. I think Armagan will probably flesh this out somewhat, like you said, with the dungeons. I also think surrendering could serve a much better function as an alternative to fighting to the 'death', but that's going off on a tangent.

4. I don't know about the horses. If there was a wider variety of horses, and a better system in place, then it might make sense, but at the moment they're mostly all the same, and the player can also go through them at a rate which makes naming them immaterial. I do agree that you should be able to rename some things though, such as your party, your heroes (if you can give them cosmetic surgery, why not rename them as well?), captured castles and cities (especially for bandits), and maybe even a hideout or base that you could make and name if playing as a bandit perhaps.

 

[MorgTzu]

yep...were just so close. It's those little personal things. I agree about the horses, that's prob a bad example. Having a more personal tower or keep in your "home" village would be a better use of 'naming" like you said.

 

[F50]

Why cant the pc be a fully functional Warlord with his own emerging faction when far less immersive games allow the pc to do that very thing?

Because they wreak immersion?  Actually, I don't think this is a bad idea, but one would have to become part of another faction and split off in order to make a faction that has a chance of survival (including bandit factions).

 

[Volkier]

yep...were just so close. It's those little personal things. I agree about the horses, that's prob a bad example. Having a more personal tower or keep in your "home" village would be a better use of 'naming" like you said.

Whats wrong with naming horses? I don't believe it would be too difficult to add along side with re-naming everything else, and all horses did after all have names. Having said that - obviously in reality even the most battle-hard mercenaries would only on a rare occasion loose a horse in battle compared with some players in game, but that doesn't mean every single player goes through several of them per battle either ::\

 

[Voutare]

Use your imagination, Volkier.


Name your horse outside the computer. There is no restriction saying that because you can't type it in, it can't be named.

 

[Likantropos]

Yes, no one permits naming a horse outside the computer... But it would be so very touching to read not plain "Horse recieved 25 damage", but "Sandstorm recieved 25 damage"... And while reading "Sandstorm crippled..." someone even might cry And one wouldn't sell his beloved Sandstorm just because he got crippled... And one would be very much cautious, for Sandstorm not to get hurt...

 

[Darian]

Ideally, the addition of a naming function would be tied to the ability to heal a lame horse over time (based on your Wound Treatment skill or whatever). If that was added I could easily see keeping two or three individually-named horses and then rotating between them when one becomes injured (or simply when you want a charger instead of a courser, or whatever).

 

[MorgTzu]

I'm honored that you commented Volkier...I'm not against named horses, I just think it would be more difficult in-game than other more static "items". Anyway, the topic is in general 'bout more options, more personalization...so that surely counts. I just don't want to wander to far as it is hard enought to get 'suggestions' taken with much seriousness, generally speaking.

BTW, my middle name is Phillip..."lover of horses"

The whole Idea that so far has only really come close in a few recent mods is Personal Identification. A stronghold, a band, a name, a homeland to defend...only the banner gets close in native, everything else over time feels somewhat 'disposable'.

WHat say you?