I'll go with you on this one. In as much as the new engine is different, and presumably the modding tools/scripting is still evolving, and as mentioned the artwork is in a state of transition, and for that matter simply making a campaign map may be a difficult task -- consider that the modding community has more aggregate bandwidth, available at cheaper wages (you endure our banter and blather but at least we're free*)...
Please just get us tools to mod and any stripped naked base that runs, and we'll at least make SOMETHING.
Pretty much everything after that can solve itself, with less total time. Artwork can start converting /making from scratch,
tools for mapmaking (ideally third party fractal terrain generators used to output a file that can then be input as the new map -- make campaign maps in the same day), fewer soft caps (more than 16 skins for example would have been nice for Perisno 8 or Warsword Conquest, but whatever there is can be worked around. It's more valuable or us to explore what those soft caps really are and kludge accordingly than blow developer time over marginal returns). Need more quests? That's a community problem. If the game engine is the huge value add, focus on beta tools for using that engine and Viking Conquests, etc will surely follow. Viking Conquest released with bugs galore. Fine. But the total number of copies sold using the engine probably added 20% immediately to the total installed base for Warband. In my opinion, by now very few people indeed (only the playstation closed environments) play "Native". Everything else is mods, poor that they are. Should mods be better - sure. It'd be nice if they paid a little to justify the time, but even as a pro-bono summer thing they're interesting. I personally think they could and would be much better if Warband didn't seem to be end of life, but now we're at the point where news of Bannerlord somewhat stifles Warband, but Bannerlord may not be arriving anytime soon. It's that painful "Soon" (TM) that scares people. I've used the phrase too, so I understand how time passes by some sort of Einsteinian relativity around coders.
I'd personally love to be able to have a campaign map that was pointer based so I could flip maps as a player enters a portal and end up with a stack of maps for heaven, Buddhist hell, a dream world, the real world, a parallel world with/without magic, a world of Efreets, or whatever. But if that was inconvenient because of the need to refresh icons and plot AI behaviour based on the last check of what was nearby I'm fine with that too. I'm actually happy that anything works, and willing to shrug if pet feature #5 on my list of top 10 things just isn't there and never will be. I'll adapt. If something slick I tried fails, I'll assume its my fault and not hound devs on it. But priming the pump, as you've done by discussing modding elsewhere, is precisely the interaction actually needed.
Fanboys & haters: I expect the dev team is still trying to build tools to build worlds; figure out mechanics on quests; still trying to make a "playable" native game. But ask yourself this -- was Warband something you bought for Native game, or because some mod needed it to run? For me, the native game was cool for about 3 weeks. Just until the first mod I downloaded showed that ALL the rules could be rewritten, if only someone had the patience to do so. (Shortly after that I found I could create 5 bugs for each fix, which is how people end up becoming pure consumers again.) So, this said, if in a pinch for something to do -- give us tools, for even elementary modding, and we'll make something fun "eventually". Who knows, maybe modding Bannerlord could be good for a resume (unlike Warband), if only because it has more elements of "real programming". Warband was fun and fairly easy to mod. I expect Bannerlord will be a lot more work, but we have bigger PCs and a little more practice now. Use the community for what it does best --- while waiting for that perfect public "native" release.
I'd at least like something in 2018 if 2017 seems too aggressive, but hey -- unless I'm spending a few grand on a dev kit (and I assure you, I cannot), "beggars can't be choosers". Except I'd like some beggars that are good for quests, including at least some that are Dervish in disguise or one that leads to a flying carpet or a map full of Djinn. Something, anything except Native.
I expect to put the content in myself, so native, whatever it is, is only relevant as an example template. All the rest is expendable data.
I'm sure there must be at least 50 similar people looking to do something "unexpected", in their doubtless undervalued spare time...
- GS
