Merc's NPC Creation 101
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I don't think anyone would deny the Alyssa character is based on Merc. Some of the others are apparently based on forum members and/or contributors to the mod, which explains the choice of names for some of the characters.
We've re-written some of the dialogue (so it makes a bit more sense) for the next update, but we've left the incomparable Thorgrim dialogue as is. No idea who Thorgrim is based on, but he sure ain't no Mary-Sue.
We've re-written some of the dialogue (so it makes a bit more sense) for the next update, but we've left the incomparable Thorgrim dialogue as is. No idea who Thorgrim is based on, but he sure ain't no Mary-Sue.
Josef_the_Pretender
Squire
Hmm, do you mean in regard to the Alyssa/Queen Katilus/Lady Larktin triumvirate?
I dunno about that - if you look at their dialogue in-game, Larktin and Katilus have none, or nothing new anyway, and Alyssa hasn't got a huge amount. So you could say that they are just an attempt to get some female characters into the game. They don't differ hugely from the likes of Thorgrim, who I'm assuming had a fondness for 'herb' in real life
Making the Mary Sue connection is a bit of a stretch for me; surely more characterisation would be involved?
In the History of Calradia section of the subforum though, where the fan fiction's at, there is probably quite a bit to go on, though I think LL is the only female to make an appearance there.
On the subject of tropes, I guess there's bound to be a vulnerability to that kind of thing due to the makeup of the forum regulars anyway. For example Average Joe Peasant asked for some book recommendations recently, but not in the fantasy or historical fiction genres. 90% of the books then recommended were then in those genres. That's what people who are interested in a medieval combat video game are interested in, period.
On the subject of mods in general, I'm not aware of any massive effort to introduce new dialogue or different characterisation for the NPCs that escapes the 'cliche' of the fantasy/medieval thing, but then I don't play many mods. It's interesting that in the mods where this type of thing is attempted, it's the same person (Fawzia) who is responsible for the dialogue etc. (PoP, Wedding Dance). It would be nice if more modders attempted it, but I guess there are bigger fish to fry when you're a modder. Also, it's kinda hard to top Taleworlds' original dialogue for the characters.
Am I rambling yet? I'll stop now.
I dunno about that - if you look at their dialogue in-game, Larktin and Katilus have none, or nothing new anyway, and Alyssa hasn't got a huge amount. So you could say that they are just an attempt to get some female characters into the game. They don't differ hugely from the likes of Thorgrim, who I'm assuming had a fondness for 'herb' in real life
Making the Mary Sue connection is a bit of a stretch for me; surely more characterisation would be involved? In the History of Calradia section of the subforum though, where the fan fiction's at, there is probably quite a bit to go on, though I think LL is the only female to make an appearance there.
On the subject of tropes, I guess there's bound to be a vulnerability to that kind of thing due to the makeup of the forum regulars anyway. For example Average Joe Peasant asked for some book recommendations recently, but not in the fantasy or historical fiction genres. 90% of the books then recommended were then in those genres.
That's what people who are interested in a medieval combat video game are interested in, period. On the subject of mods in general, I'm not aware of any massive effort to introduce new dialogue or different characterisation for the NPCs that escapes the 'cliche' of the fantasy/medieval thing, but then I don't play many mods. It's interesting that in the mods where this type of thing is attempted, it's the same person (Fawzia) who is responsible for the dialogue etc. (PoP, Wedding Dance). It would be nice if more modders attempted it, but I guess there are bigger fish to fry when you're a modder. Also, it's kinda hard to top Taleworlds' original dialogue for the characters.
Am I rambling yet? I'll stop now.
Pfft.
Who cares whom or what the characters are based upon?
What matters is how well they fit into the game. Balance and believability, i.e. ensuring that "fantasy" is kept to a minimum within the context of the game. You could call a new NPC "Lord Boner" or anything else you want, but it's still a hacked-up NPC with god stats and impenetrable armor.
It is sad that to many "challenge" means "set all stats to max and give them 100/100/100 armor"
Who cares whom or what the characters are based upon?
What matters is how well they fit into the game. Balance and believability, i.e. ensuring that "fantasy" is kept to a minimum within the context of the game. You could call a new NPC "Lord Boner" or anything else you want, but it's still a hacked-up NPC with god stats and impenetrable armor.
It is sad that to many "challenge" means "set all stats to max and give them 100/100/100 armor"
Given the lousy M&B AI, do you see any other way?
It all boils down to Warband I'd say.
ThunderClaw
Sergeant at Arms
Merc said in the Ultimate Challenge thread that Larktin is a self-insertion, so yeah.
For example: Heavy cavalry have no business being incredible on foot. As it stands now most heavy cav are just as effective, if not more so, than equivalent infantry. This is because they have sky-high dexterity, maxed out ironflesh, etc, exactly like infantry does, and then they're given the incredible weapons and armor to make the difference.
Solution: Bust heavy cavalry down to 10 dexterity, 0 athletics, 2 or 3 ironflesh. This will not affect them at all while they are on their horses, but if they are unhorsed and have to tangle with heavy infantry that has 20 dexterity, 7-10 athletics, and 7-10 ironflesh, you will suddenly find the cavalry DYING after losing their horses on a foolish charge! Why? The Heavy Cav will be almost totally unable to move with such low dex and higher encumbrance!
And/Or if it's possible, just make a flavor thing Iron Boots item called "Warhorse Spurs" or something that gives +75 encumbrance. The protection might be linked with encumbrance though so that might be a wash.
There's a number of things you can do like that which I have suggested repeatedly but nobody's ever paid attention. It's no skin off my chin, really, because I've tried and since nobody's listened I feel fine about using things like Lady Knights, which have no business being anywhere near as powerful as they are. At this point though you'd have to completely redo the troop trees to make sure they all fit into a reasonably balanced formula so you could make some tweaks later as opposed to constantly throwing random silliness at the troop trees and hoping to christ they work out.
Yes, actually. The problem Merc got into (and one I brought up to her and Jinnai on multiple occasions) is that there was no enforcement of weaknesses in unit types, and each unit line was not treated as a role so much as some thematic line of pirated culture.
For example: Heavy cavalry have no business being incredible on foot. As it stands now most heavy cav are just as effective, if not more so, than equivalent infantry. This is because they have sky-high dexterity, maxed out ironflesh, etc, exactly like infantry does, and then they're given the incredible weapons and armor to make the difference.
Solution: Bust heavy cavalry down to 10 dexterity, 0 athletics, 2 or 3 ironflesh. This will not affect them at all while they are on their horses, but if they are unhorsed and have to tangle with heavy infantry that has 20 dexterity, 7-10 athletics, and 7-10 ironflesh, you will suddenly find the cavalry DYING after losing their horses on a foolish charge! Why? The Heavy Cav will be almost totally unable to move with such low dex and higher encumbrance!
And/Or if it's possible, just make a flavor thing Iron Boots item called "Warhorse Spurs" or something that gives +75 encumbrance. The protection might be linked with encumbrance though so that might be a wash.
There's a number of things you can do like that which I have suggested repeatedly but nobody's ever paid attention. It's no skin off my chin, really, because I've tried and since nobody's listened I feel fine about using things like Lady Knights, which have no business being anywhere near as powerful as they are. At this point though you'd have to completely redo the troop trees to make sure they all fit into a reasonably balanced formula so you could make some tweaks later as opposed to constantly throwing random silliness at the troop trees and hoping to christ they work out.
ThunderClaw 说:
This is a good point. You'll have to wait for Wellenbrecher to reply as he's doing the troop fettling to see whether he's worked on this. Despite what you say, knights did train in full armour and when un-horsed were quite capable of getting up and running around killing and ****. There's plenty of documentation to back this up. They were some mean mother****ers, those knights, which is why they enjoyed the status they held, as everyone was scared to **** of pissing them off. I think the most I would do is drop the athletics, so that "Run away! Run away!" tactics and archers have a chance against them.
Wow. Look at all the language. You can tell I've had a drink.
I didn't do anything like that. To be honest I haven't touched the troops' stats at all.
But ThunderClaw has a more than valid point and it's something that I'll do with the patch after .585, if there will be one.
It would require sorting the items and troop files though, since I have left them in a horrible mess. And that will take some time.
But ThunderClaw has a more than valid point and it's something that I'll do with the patch after .585, if there will be one.
It would require sorting the items and troop files though, since I have left them in a horrible mess. And that will take some time.
ThunderClaw
Sergeant at Arms
Yeah, during the Crusades knights that had lost their horses often simply served on the infantry lines. You can see this documented and even implemented in the Medieval Total War games.Pellagus 说:
That doesn't mean it's fun with regard to M&B, though.
Hm, how about this:
Next week, or rather next weekend, I'll create an "experimental" setup where heavy armoured Knights will be slow as **** on foot. Should be interesting to see how this works out.
Especially when sieging something.
Next week, or rather next weekend, I'll create an "experimental" setup where heavy armoured Knights will be slow as **** on foot. Should be interesting to see how this works out.
Especially when sieging something.
ThunderClaw
Sergeant at Arms
If this test goes off well, I have a procedure I used to balance another game of mine that I'd happily give you to keep the troop trees reasonably balanced.
daumor
Knight
Lol I forgot I said that, hehe. And look at those silly English guys who often fought on foot (knights that is) to protect their wimpy welsh guys with wooden staves. Personally I have no problem with knights being equivalent to infantry on foot. But perhaps make them more expensive and limit the number each week that one can recruit. In my last few games I would farm them to where Swadia would give me 100 or so pages and then 70% or so would make it to Cavalier... Make it to where the recruitment rate starts at 0-1 and maxes at 5-7 or so with 100 relations with the town. And superficially increase their level without equivalent stats to inflate their weekly cost. I think that would be a much better way of balancing than an arbitrary nerf.
ThunderClaw
Sergeant at Arms
Not possible. Weekly salary is indelably tied to level, and giving units high levels has a lot of other ramifications, including autocalc balance, strike priority in battle, et al. To make cavalry prohibitively expensive for their current power, you would have to make their levels over 100, which would just overpower them in other ways. Your suggestion has been vetted before on this very forum and it's been found wanting for scads of reasons.daumor 说:
Does not change the fact that 30 cavalry can dominate 150+ infantry in game thanks to a concerted charge ripping so much health out of an infantry line. Even if you only wanted 5 a week, from a few sources you could have plenty of heavy cav to make combat trivial in less than a month. You can already see this with the super-elites from the ivory palace, halls of glory, etc. 30-50 of them can be had in roughly a month even from simply 2 sources and they can easily decimate everything in their path - they make combat trivial just as much as heavy cavalry.
This suggestion is not arbitrary. It enforces the cavalry's role on the field as a powerful mounted warrior that is brilliantly effective at charges and ineffective in close quarters, instead of simply letting them be a diety of battle. Cavalry have no business being godlike on foot when there's already entire troop trees that have that role. Realism be damned, NE is not and never has been a 'realism' mod. If you want to see 'arbitrary', look at the bizarre balance of the trees we have now. The Rhodok bow archery line is a good place to start, you can also investigate the Lancer line of the Khergs, the heavy infantry lines of the Nords, the archery lines of the Swads, and the peasant cavalry line of the Vaegirs. All of them have a blatantly obvious strength disconnect (Arcus -> Partisan, Ranger level of the Swads, Praetorian -> Praetorian Knight, also Ivory Watchman -> Ivory Sentinel, Huskarl level on the Nords, heavy lancer -> arban) because their stats were blindly entered into the mod with only the slightest regard for the larger picture. Incidentally, your suggestion falls into the same picture because you are not taking into account the entire picture of what level does in the engine.
The other possible suggestion is to modify the spear bracing maneuver to do an equal amount of damage to the rider and the horse, so if cavalry blindly charge a spearman line they are dead as doornails regardless. However I doubt people would consider that very fun since you as the player are very often mounted and instantly dying from a spear that magically hits 360 degrees around it isn't the coolest thing in the world.
