Marnid, Borcha and Uber Playerhero

[svart]

This thread was made to address the issue of common skill distribution between the heroes (the player, marnid and borcha) and how various elements currently ingame encourage it.

Following a recent discussion at :
http://forums.taleworlds.com/viewtopic.php?p=62654#62654
I've noticed M (Marnid) and B (Borcha) are usually used as party-skills carrier while the hero is the combat skill carrier.
This may seem like exploiting at first, but truth be told that advancement is slow in the game (and i *love it* this way), M and B are pretty useless in battle, and every point of skill counts in the game - Thus other way to spend skillpoints would a big waste of time.

The implications of the above :

1. M and B are known not to keep in formation like other troops and are usually the first friendly troops to die. (making any advancment of a combat skillpoint for them much much less useful than a non-combat skillpoint).
2. If a player puts most skillpoints on combat - on higher levels his power is massive.
   If a player doesn't put most skillpoints on combat - on lower levels combat is living hell. (therefore the player is encouraged to put most of his skillpoints on combat)
3. (Edit: i'm the only one holding this opinion, thus this problem/suggestion is obselete, )
   Personally I find it quite hard to believe someone like M and B who spend half their life in the battle field will have null skillpoints
   I do not suggest M and B will be any better than other troops, but i want them not to as useless as peasants.
   And also i find the difficulty to be set around the hero spending all his/her skillpoints on combat skills and the leadership skill, and on M and B spending all their points on party skills.
   This in my opinion, encourages the player to recruit both M and B, be an uber combatant on later levels and M and B to be wimps.

 

[svart]

Various fixes i thought of :

1. M and B should either
   • respond better to your commands
   • follow you as default,
   • recieve different commands than the normal troops.
2. To directly counter the Uber-Hero -
   • Skills should be harder to advance on higher levels
   • Enemy heroes and better troops with higher skills be introduced.
     This, coupled with the already implemented feature of increasing number of enemies parallel to your level (thanks Narcissus) - can address the Uber-Hero issue in a nice manner without introducing changes to the current system.
3. To counter the combat/noncombat exploiting.
   (removed as stated above)

So far, for me it seems the best way to fix the issues would be 1c,2b.

 

[Narcissus]

Wow! You put quite a bit of thought into this.

Most of your ideas are good and could be effectively used ... although I think I am leaning towards 2b.

As you increase in power (whether that power is in loads of combat skills, loads of non-combat skills, or a mix of the two) so do the enemies and number of enemies. To further increase the strength of enemies that you would face and further increase the numbers of those enemies seems the easiest to do and a very fair way to balance skill progression.

Narcissus

 

[Wywern]

In my game M and B didnot die so much as my normal troops. I had some casulties in every battle and M and B could die only if I attacked something bad like a war party. This was in my late game when I had the best equipment and also M and B had plate armors.

Enemy heroes would counter balance many of the problems you pointed out. Meaning leaders whom are as strong as the player or much stronger.

I think dividing combat and other skills to two sections would spoil the choosing between a tradesman and a warrior. Like anyone would want to be only a trader, but maybe it will be more interesting in the future.

Better AI for those stupid heroes and other troops would fix some problems.

Still in late game heroes and especially the player will be über killers. There is nothing besides skill limits to prevent this.

 

[Skanky Burns]

3b would be a good way of encouraging variety while still allowing you to specialise your heroes in both combat and non-combat skills. Unless forced to, it is not effective using their points for combat skills as opposed to party skills. When they get knocked out their combat skills are useless, but their party skills still remain valid.

 

[Narcissus]

3b would be a good way of encouraging variety while still allowing you to specialise your heroes in both combat and non-combat skills. Unless forced to, it is not effective using their points for combat skills as opposed to party skills. When they get knocked out their combat skills are useless, but their party skills still remain valid.

Agreed. The problem lies in effectively taking away some of the player's freedom in choosing where to spend skills. This is an RPG and the more choices, the better.

 

[svart]

Wow! You put quite a bit of thought into this.

Most of your ideas are ...
.. As you increase in power (whether that power is in loads of combat skills, loads of non-combat skills, or a mix of the two) so do the enemies and number of enemies ...

Thanks for contibuting and mentioning the increasing numbers of enemy troops.
I totally forgot about this feature and this changes 2 upside down. This fact coupled with 2b makes 2a obselete !

This is good, because 2/3 of the problems would be solved by adding features rather than changing current features (and i also think suggestions to change things rather than add are harder to implement and agreed by devs)

3b would be a good way of encouraging variety while still allowing you to specialise your heroes in both combat and non-combat skills. Unless forced to, it is not effective using their points for combat skills as opposed to party skills. When they get knocked out their combat skills are useless, but their party skills still remain valid.

Exactly my point, this *freedom* is a double edged sword, and you explain it nicely here.

Like i said this is a rather complex issue.

...I think dividing combat and other skills to two sections would spoil the choosing between a tradesman and a warrior. Like anyone would want to be only a trader, but maybe it will be more interesting in the future.

Better AI for those stupid heroes and other troops would fix some problems.

Still in late game heroes and especially the player will be über killers. There is nothing besides skill limits to prevent this.

I thought about the same tradesman and combatant example too, but i immediatly thought otherwise because trading is *1 skill* while combat has *10 skills*.
If you happen to know uncharted waters, a trade captain vs. war captain worked well, because the game nicely balanced between the two.
This game on the other hand has a much more emphasis on combat and probably always will (and most of the players including myself like it this way), what you say is true to some extent that a player can be passive and let his troops do the fighting (having high leadership, trading, prison management, surgery etc), but M and B can already do that for you. (for only 9.99$ )

 

[Destichado]

Simple fix to all your problems - GO INFANTRY!

Screw those ranged weapons, give them polearms and sword&board.

 

[okiN]

Marnid and Borcha respond just fine to your commands, they use the same AI as everyone else. The problem is with the ranged AI, try getting a bunch of crossbowmen and see if they're any more obedient. If you want M and B to do what you tell them to do, make them mélee only.

 

[Destichado]

Even better, capture a bunch of khergits, steppe bandits or (in the Mag 7 mod) raise vaegir archers.

That's right! They're just as bad as Marnid and Borcha ever were. ^__^

 

[NikkTheTrick]

Just try to get your horse archer to dismount in the arena!

 

[Sir Prince]

Great minds think alike!

As I have said numerous times, I do make M a healer trader and basic combat. B is a hunter and archer.

 

[svart]

Simple fix to all your problems - GO INFANTRY!

Screw those ranged weapons, give them polearms and sword&board.

Were you sarcastic about saying "all your problems" ?

 

[Destichado]

...not really? I mean, I wasn't being sarcastic, saying it's going to fix you social life or something, if that's what you mean. I was talking about the problems being addressed.

Using your heroes as infantry only is the best way to control them. And if you take away their ranged ability they're even more biddable. (eg: in the mag 7 mod I gave them all range, just using M and B I keep them strictly melee.)

You get a choice -mounted and chaotic, or infantry and orderly. I think they're better killers when they're infantry.

 

[svart]

heh man, i guess it's true that nobody read those long posts except for the first sentence. (and i'm not perticulary good at explaining myself either)

The big point is, it's pretty useless to give them combat skills, they do much better with using the major part of their skillpoints on party skills, and also mainly lvling their intelligence stat.
I do it, you do it, everybody does it.

So now we got that part straight.
Wouldn't you rather have them develope some combat skills with time (to par them with the other troops) without hurting your party skills ?
Or on the contrary, having your character possess *a few* party skills (without damaging his combat skills at the same time ?)

It would help a player that *doesn't* want those two stooges on the team (or only wants one of them) to maintain the same combat skills, and also be free to select a handful of party-skills he'll use.

For me the current freedom between skills actually takes freedom away.
let's take 4 points of tactics i have, under the current system, why difference would it be if *i* have this skill or *marnid* ?? nada, so it encourages me to do the most effecient thing and only up my combat skills.

And if you're still not following me, then i just lost faith in humankind.

 

[Destichado]

No, I'm just disagreeing with you. I am godly enough without needing to max out every combat stat. If I'm going to be inteligent at all, I don't see why I should waste precious levels on M & B by giving them inteligence points to squander.

Oh sure, I'll let Borcha do scouting and pathfinding and tracking -but they'll never go past four ranks, and it'll be late in the game before they go past 3- and maybe I'll let Marnid do something non-critical like first aid just as a place to put points while he's stalled for a level or two, but in general I find their fighting ability -WHEN USED AS INFANTRY- to be more useful than sticking them in the back lines as resident smart people. *I* am the resident smart person.

In the Mag 7 mod I did do inteligence dumping, but not in the standard game.

 

[svart]

Yes, i see your arguement with the stats, something i neglected when thinking about skillpoints.
I'll add that to the cons of the third suggestion.

I was hoping to hear suggestions of how to fix problem number 3 but it seems nobody cares if marnid and borcha aren't use for combat, therefore i got the wrong impression for suggesting it in the first place.

I'll edit my first posts accordingly and keep the first two suggestions.