Feedback on Prison Breaks

[Ananda_The_Destroyer]

I'm not the guy to talk to about hitboxes, but it's probably a combination of the tight spaces and camera angles making it difficult to gauge how far you are from an object that can block your swing. The inmate you're breaking out tends to back guards into corners too, so your swings are blocked from either side, and your overhead swings might collide with the ceiling or the wall behind the troop, making thrusts the only option.

For AI troops, all of their weapons/shields aside from melee weapons are removed from their loadouts, and they are given a spear as their primary weapon if they don't already have one. I haven't tried altering troops' equipment in the xmls, but just based on personal experience, troops with a shorter side arm do tend to fair better in the tight hallways. For instance, Vlandian Champions are an absolute menace with their short maces. The good news is you can always pick it up and use it for yourself if you manage to kill one.


I finally got around to looking into how it determines which troops to spawn. It chooses troops from the garrison using a weighted random based on the troop's level. Higher level troops have a better chance of being selected. However, to do this, it uses the same code that is used to populate regular scenes with npcs, and for reasons I won't get in to, this can cause problems with the variety of troops chosen. You will sometimes find that all of the guards are the same troop type, which can happen even if there is only one troop of that type in the garrison.

After playing around with it for a bit, I'd say picking a medium-ish length sword with good thrusting damage seems to be the best strategy. Just stab your way through the dungeon to avoid your swings getting caught on walls. Use footwork to avoid enemy swings and get a speed boost to your thrust damage. Take fights one at a time if possible. It's also sometimes possible to bait guards toward you without line of sight by tossing throwing daggers into rooms near a spot you know a guard can spawn, though their behavior is wonky and inconsistant when it comes to investigating such things.

Depending on the quality of troops that spawn, I've gotten to the point that I can break prisoners out fairly consistently if there are 4 or less guards.


Yeah, they kind of leave you to come up with your own headcanon don't they ?. (And thank you too!)


You will spawn in the beggar's outfit if you had to sneak into the settlement with a disguise, and you will spawn with your civilian armor if it's a neutral settlement that you entered freely. You will still get your full complement of equipped weapons in both cases though.


I agree the spawn loctions need some work. With Sturgian dungeons especially, you can get anywhere from 3 to 5 guards spawing all within the final section, and they will all be alerted and rush at you simultaneously, making it nearly impossible to keep the prisoner alive.

I was excited when I found Mekeb to kinda easy, but then I tried a nearby castle and kept getting 4 guards in 1 room
Also, it looks like sometimes it cost -denars to break some NPCs out, didn't catch if it actually gave me denars though.

 

[froggyluv]

I don't know what devs work on this but please I really want to know what part of this did you actually think was enjoyable or worth the player time?

Its pretty clear this is not their M.O for game design features -at least not at this point. More like -"Get something up and running thats functional. If too many people say its too hard, lower the amount of guards. If too easy, raise them"

Such is bannerlord.

 

[Bannerman Man]

Also, it looks like sometimes it cost -denars to break some NPCs out, didn't catch if it actually gave me denars though.

Yep, that's a bug. Been reported already. It does give you the money though.

 

[nyarlathotep1975]

You will spawn in the beggar's outfit if you had to sneak into the settlement with a disguise, and you will spawn with your civilian armor if it's a neutral settlement that you entered freely. You will still get your full complement of equipped weapons in both cases though.

thx for clearing up. wasn´t sure about the reason.
For AI troops, all of their weapons/shields aside from melee weapons are removed from their loadouts, and they are given a spear as their primary weapon if they don't already have one. I haven't tried altering troops' equipment in the xmls, but just based on personal experience, troops with a shorter side arm do tend to fair better in the tight hallways.
You sure? cause i remember running into vlandian guards with voulge type equipped. was pretty rediculous.

 

[Flesson19]

for a Roguery build it is amazing, with just half focus and at skill 8 I gained 23 points from 1 break. I know they need work but thankfully we got a way to get some roguery now

 

[Ananda_The_Destroyer]

Yep, that's a bug. Been reported already. It does give you the money though.

Yeah I caught it the second time it came up

Not much of anything but it's nice to not have to pay

for a Roguery build it is amazing, with just half focus and at skill 8 I gained 23 points from 1 break. I know they need work but thankfully we got a way to get some roguery now

Yeah but that pace will dry right up once you get much over 100 skill
And you have looooong cool down before you can break from the same spot and most towns are wall 3 ..... it's something but it's far from enabling a "roguery build".

 

[Ananda_The_Destroyer]

I haven't figured out how the game chooses which troops to use as guards yet though.

Any luck on this part yet
It's becoming very aggravating to go into a 1 wall low security prison and get greeted by palace guards or legionaries
TW t3 is enough for guards don't make us fight high tier troops in our pajama armor PLEASE!

 

[Ananda_The_Destroyer]

@Bannerman Man
Also I just noticed if I fail a prison break (at neutral fief)they say they take me prisoner, but then I'm free on the map immediately. Is that normal or a bug or for some reason? I could have sworn I was locked up properly when I first tried it, but maybe I just reset assuming so.
Also, do you know how long the cool down before you can prison break the same fief is? I know it's more then a couple days, but evenry time I've tried later they had not prisoners anymore

 

[Bannerman Man]

You sure? cause i remember running into vlandian guards with voulge type equipped. was pretty rediculous.

Yep. I said spear in my last comment, but I meant polearm. If they have a polearm already, they keep it. If they don't, they get a generic spear. The Voulge is technically a polearm ?‍.

Any luck on this part yet

Yep see here:

I finally got around to looking into how it determines which troops to spawn. It chooses troops from the garrison using a weighted random based on the troop's level. Higher level troops have a better chance of being selected. However, to do this, it uses the same code that is used to populate regular scenes with npcs, and for reasons I won't get in to, this can cause problems with the variety of troops chosen. You will sometimes find that all of the guards are the same troop type, which can happen even if there is only one troop of that type in the garrison.

The full answer is a bit more complicated than that, and prosperity actually plays a certain role too. I think the code it uses causes issues, but I'd have to take a deeper look to see exactly what's happening.

If you want to maximize your chances of getting lower tier guards, look for settlements that have a bunch of different types of low tier troops compared to types of high tiered troops (e.g. look for towns with multiple different factions' T1 recruits and T2 troops, and relatively few T5/T6 troop stacks). It's the total number of different types/stacks that make a difference, not the actual quantity of individual soldiers per stack, if that makes sense.

Also I just noticed if I fail a prison break (at neutral fief)they say they take me prisoner, but then I'm free on the map immediately. Is that normal or a bug or for some reason? I could have sworn I was locked up properly when I first tried it, but maybe I just reset assuming so.

If you fail a prison break in an enemy settlement they will lock you up, but neutral settlements release you because they "have no use for you" (meaning no ransom value I suppose):

Spoiler

I think the penalty for failing to break a prisoner out of a neutral settlement is so low because they want it to be an accessible way to train roguery.

Also, do you know how long the cool down before you can prison break the same fief is? I know it's more then a couple days, but evenry time I've tried later they had not prisoners anymore

7 days.

 

[Ananda_The_Destroyer]

Yep. I said spear in my last comment, but I meant polearm. If they have a polearm already, they keep it. If they don't, they get a generic spear. The Voulge is technically a polearm ?‍.

Yep see here:

The full answer is a bit more complicated than that, and prosperity actually plays a certain role too. I think the code it uses causes issues, but I'd have to take a deeper look to see exactly what's happening.

If you want to maximize your chances of getting lower tier guards, look for settlements that have a bunch of different types of low tier troops compared to types of high tiered troops (e.g. look for towns with multiple different factions' T1 recruits and T2 troops, and relatively few T5/T6 troop stacks). It's the total number of different types/stacks that make a difference, not the actual quantity of individual soldiers per stack, if that makes sense.

If you fail a prison break in an enemy settlement they will lock you up, but neutral settlements release you because they "have no use for you" (meaning no ransom value I suppose):

Spoiler

I think the penalty for failing to break a prisoner out of a neutral settlement is so low because they want it to be an accessible way to train roguery.

7 days.

Thanks for the info as always! Since they don't lock me up I've been just breaking out whoever and not getting so mad about it Roguery is much higher then in any other games, so it's something anyways.

 

[five bucks]

I think the penalty for failing to break a prisoner out of a neutral settlement is so low because they want it to be an accessible way to train roguery.

Gee, I hope not. That's a bit counter-intuitive if breaking people out of prison day in and day out is the primary way to train roguery.

 

[Flesson19]

I think the worst thing is hitting the walls all the time, even with a 60 length weapon and the stupid lord getting in the way being able to hit them is so damn hard, I miss Warband when you could tell them to stay behind you.

 

[a_ver_est]

I think the worst thing is hitting the walls all the time, even with a 60 length weapon and the stupid lord getting in the way being able to hit them is so damn hard, I miss Warband when you could tell them to stay behind you.

Maybe smithing becomes useful to build a great dagger for prison breaks

 

[lukkyb]

tbf while it may not work well they now have a base to improve on

 

[Ananda_The_Destroyer]

@Bannerman Man
I have a bug where when I fail a prison break I get a +2wounded, 1 for me and one for prisoner (I guess) but the the one for prisoner never goes away. I didn't realize what was causing it and I've now got a permanent 20 wounded, so I have -20 deployment in battle. I reported it but I just figured out today what was making the phantom wounded count. Do you know any console command or easy trick that might reset it, or why it might happen?

 

[Nakh]

I spend a good chunk of my current playthrough on prison breaks and my feedback is purely negative. This is not something I would ever try to do if I not savescum and even savescumming I stopped to try it. I will not touch prion breaks again until they are completely reworked.

There is my reasons:

1. Failure results is just catastrophic, Very high risk of being captured, lose a part of inventory and all soldiers for basically no benefit.
2. Lack of reward. There no real incentive to ever do prison breaks. Person you trying to free will go home in few days anyway, why bother? Charm exp and relations can be farmed in much more reliable ways.
3. Disgusting environment. Cramped hallways and tiny rooms make this feature really un-enjoyable for me.

 

[Thormodor]

I enjoy the prison break.
Loadout I use is 1 Dagger, 2x sets of throwing daggers and 2h Sword.
The two hander is for the times i have run into a pack of guards in a larger room as i have to deal with them fast. the Throwing dagger is two fold 1. I think its cool. 2. Get some damage in before they reach me. The dagger is the main tool to use i find.
Due to a lack of armor i found fighting very close to them so they cant get a good swing was safer. and it also allowed me to "Tank" for the NPC that is sooooo dum .

My Grief with the system is that i can no longer realy do it due to high renown. and this is a damn Shame. I checked and even with cheating my Roguery Skill to 250 my chance of getting into Town was only 11% and part of why i wanted to do this was so i could level my roguery. I think they need to Reduce the renown effect on Disguise. I also think they need to have the NPC be able to take commands like "Stay Here", "Attack" and so on.

On a side note if anyone know a mod or some way I can Adjust the renown effect on Disguise or improve the effect of Roguery Countering it I would appreciate a heads up

 

[Yukmouth++]

What is even the point of doing prison break ? People stay prisoner for like 2 minutes of real time.

 

[SomeWeirdSins]

What is even the point of doing prison break ? People stay prisoner for like 2 minutes of real time.

it's the only way to level roguery

 

[Yukmouth++]

it's the only way to level roguery

It is absolutely ridiculous that Raiding villages isnt the best way to level up roguery.