Game breaking faction/kingdom snowballing balance problem

[pop087]

I have noticed on several campaigns that the pace of the game is too fast. In all instances by the time i reach clan rank 2 there are only a few factions left. With one controlling about 15-20 cities. The dominant faction is inconsistent. Along with this most lords end up running around with no troops getting captured by bandits.

 

[Marcquez]

It's in the patch notes for 1.0.2 - the current version.

Misread indeed

 

[Hellion_Kal]

Guess I was one of the lucky ones (until my saved games were corrupted, at least). On my first playthrough, up until 1088 the balance of power seems to be more or less...well, balanced.

Only the Western Empire had been relatively weakened, which allowed me to conquer them and start my own Imperial faction.

 

[Rööki]

It looks like a great deal of other players are experiencing this as well. I and many others believe it to be the greatest most glaring problem with the game right now.

Around the year 1085-1090 in game, any given kingdom seems to become unimaginably powerful almost completely nullifying nearly 20 to 23 hours of gameplay seeing as the kingdom in question is completely unstoppable.

It seems that the moment an AI kingdom/faction conquers and controls one or more of another kingdoms lands they become exponentially powerful, stronger than any other kingdom.

Actually one of the devs answered to this, go check it out.

https://forums.taleworlds.com/index.php?threads/southern-empire-took-over-the-whole-map-in-only-14-hours-stalemates-are-to-easily-broken-and-factions-die-way-to-fast.400050/post-9281023

 

[Sgt.Laeffy]

Actually one of the devs answered to this, go check it out.

https://forums.taleworlds.com/index.php?threads/southern-empire-took-over-the-whole-map-in-only-14-hours-stalemates-are-to-easily-broken-and-factions-die-way-to-fast.400050/post-9281023

Thanks. I think it's worth expressing that this is easily one of if not the greatest issue as much as possible however.

It always happens when your character is just starting to reach a formidable level. Which is essentially early to mid game according to warband standards.

I really hope the devs recognise this as one of the greatest problems. It kills saves just when they start to pick up.

 

[Clavicus_Prime]

+1

 

[Kribble118]

Actually one of the devs answered to this, go check it out.

https://forums.taleworlds.com/index.php?threads/southern-empire-took-over-the-whole-map-in-only-14-hours-stalemates-are-to-easily-broken-and-factions-die-way-to-fast.400050/post-9281023

I saw his post, i agree with some points but i think army spamming needs to be slowed somehow. Like with cool downs, only one army, and only clan leaders of clans tier 4 or 5 and higher being able to call armies. On top of all that an empire should start having internal issues like rebellions and unrest if they expand too fast and too quickly.

 

[Boomstomp123]

I haven't played that much because of the lack of auto directional block but what i see on you tube is factions get overwhelmed by one usually one of the empire factions ,it also happens way too fast it used to take many many days for the campaign in warband to resolve itself but now its almost 5x faster, its way to fast there is no time to feel like your living in the world enjoying the missions and crafting building relations with characters and upgrading settlement its just one big rush from the beginning too end .But i know you said there is plenty of balancing to sort out so im not warried .

 

[N T]

+1

 

[bighungryjames]

Yeah, I also wrote a reddit post regarding this matter. It's a good thing that I was not the only one feeling so. In addition, I noticed that none of the lords recruit troops after a major defeat, probably because their party gets weaker than the bandits, which are scaled based on the player's level. My reddit post:

https://www.reddit.com/r/MB2Bannerlord/comments/ftiwee

 

[Gunmars]

Something else that this causes is the game seems to be progressing so fast. In Warband after 20 hours i'd only be starting midgame at best. After 20 hours in Bannerlord is basically end game with this balance, one or two factions left standing and no real way to actually fight back. Instead of a long ass campaign like Warband this game right now feels a two day at most campaign.

 

[Smoggy96]

+1 for me, had 4 campaigns each one lasts about 300 days and then one faction owns everything, gonna play Resident Evil 3 for a few days and see if this has been addressed, haven't seen a response regarding this yet and it seems to be bugging everybody.

 

[John Frederick]

Started a new character yesterday after being told the defection rate was reduced in the latest patch. Admittedly, the snowballing was reduced ever so slightly but eventually this time it was Vlandia eating up the Western Empire and Battania in under 365 days.

I'd have to agree with bighungryjames, I've seen lords trying to scramble across their respective realms only to either be taken out by a small band of looters/bandits, or constantly bouncing back and forth between groups to avoid them. I think the manhunters need a return, or like in modded versions of warband, fiefs with the ability to deploy town militia to curb some of the bandit growth in the region.

 

[unkownrb_goose]

+1

Same here

Completely breaks the game hope its fixed soon ???

 

[Beriko]

+ 1 same here. Will hold off restarting a new game until this has been resolved.

 

[blazerules]

Half the time I see X lord getting captured by looters or bandits, it's both hilarious and sad. And probably contributes to a losing side losing even harder.

 

[Misc4HD]

+1 Played 2 games where this happens kinda makes it pointless to carry on.

 

[TheVenatoS]

So the Dev expects that one faction will become dominating within 20 years if it's fixed..? That's still a bit **** in my opinion. There should be penalties for growing in size and there should be rebellions and conflicts between Lords and the King to hinder that process.
I'm going to start looking through the code to see what's up with this.

 

[Crpgnerd]

this is all related to siege defence.

if catapults worked on the walls, instead of overshooting everything in existence. What should focus on the battering ram giving the defence an actual solid chance of resisting a siege that doesn't have trebuchets. Also that cities and castles cannot manage food stores properly so sieges cant last a month regardless and you cant keep a garrison because of the food issues.

 

[AegisMagis]

It looks like a great deal of other players are experiencing this as well. I and many others believe it to be the greatest most glaring problem with the game right now.

Around the year 1085-1090 in game, any given kingdom seems to become unimaginably powerful almost completely nullifying nearly 20 to 23 hours of gameplay seeing as the kingdom in question is completely unstoppable.

It seems that the moment an AI kingdom/faction conquers and controls one or more of another kingdoms lands they become exponentially powerful, stronger than any other kingdom.

I've played 3 games with the Aserai and every time the Southern Kingdom absolutely stomps them by 1088. Hopefully, they balance it soon. Maybe making captured cities harder to hold or aggressive expansion penalty so that the difficulty increases for more aggressive AI/players?