Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord Developer Blog 10 - Materialistic Approaches

<p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; line-height: 0.34cm;">Hello all Mount & Blade players, curious individuals and accidental Mount & Blade blog readers! We hope you are having a wonderful 2015, so far and that you enjoyed our previous blog by Finn Seliger, covering the music of Bannerlord.</p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0cm; line-height: 0.34cm;">This time, the blog comes right from us and we're going to be touching on an interesting new feature for the single player, something we know a lot of you want to hear about.</p></br> Read more at: <a href="http://www.taleworlds.com/en/Games/Bannerlord/Blog/12">http://www.taleworlds.com/en/Games/Bannerlord/Blog/12</a>

 

[Al_Mansur]

"Bannerlord is being worked on precisely for consoles"
http://www.turunculevye.com/haberler/goster/mount-blade-2-bannerlord-is-coming-for-consoles-8933

 

[Adorno]

That's a short, not very informative article. Is it trustworthy?

 

[Do not look here]

Will we seriously now go through same thing as we went through in Bannerlord thread? Here, have our Turkish sleeper agent quote

I asked him that are they planning to port Warband to Android or IOS.And I also asked him are they planning to make Bannerlord and Warband for console.
- Porting Warband is not necessary, focusing on Bannerlord and then porting it is sound more logicall. But I heard that there is some works to port Warband to different platforms.I can not give informations about platforms.About porting Bannerlord to console  , there is nothing clear.We are planning to port it after game release.We want to release it to PC before releasing it to multiple platforms.They are not talking about that too much but I heard some PS4 around the conversations.

So guys , Bannerlord is not a console game, atleast for now. They are just "planning" to release it for consoles. But even this is NOT certain.

Just click the quote, our Turkish friends worked hard on clearing up what looks like poor translation.

 

[Adorno]

What do you mean? "Precisely for consoles" sounds like a perfect translation 

 

[kalarhan]

What do you mean? "Precisely for consoles" sounds like a perfect translation 

Bannerlord thread exploded with a hundred doomsday posts about console not a week ago 

(probably the reason why we got a new dev blog too, to make people change subjects  )

 

[dragos]

"Bannerlord is being worked on precisely for consoles"
http://www.turunculevye.com/haberler/goster/mount-blade-2-bannerlord-is-coming-for-consoles-8933

Again? As Do not look here said, we translated the video of interview for a hundred of thousands times

Just don't worry, the article in Turuncu Levye's website is a mistranslation. All Armağan Yavuz says that they also want to release the game for consoles but it's still a possibility until Taleworlds makes an announcement. So it means that the game is under construction for computers, they just may develop it for consoles too just like Warband. Yes, they've been developing a console version of Warband for a while as far as we see from the interview videos.

 

[Sforzesco]

It would be super if you could barter PROMISES, instead of direct real things:

* you don't have a real fief (for now), but you are at war and are respected leader and expected to win the war. So you could PROMISE a fief for a lord defecting to you!
* or PROMISE money for a mercenary group (of course I will pay, later...)
* or PROMISE secret support once a claimant declares war (a bit like Crusader Kings II / Sengoku) plotting system.

 

[redwood36]

It would be super if you could barter PROMISES, instead of direct real things:

* you don't have a real fief (for now), but you are at war and are respected leader and expected to win the war. So you could PROMISE a fier for a lord defecting to you!
* or PROMISE money for a mercenary group (of course I will pay, later...)
* or PROMISE secret support once a claimant declares war (a bit like Crusader Kings II / Sengoku) plotting system.

that's a good idea. Then if you burn too many people word gets out and no one will trust you. You can earn it back, but if you burn someone else once you go back to no one trusting you. It would give players options though in extreme circumstances.

 

[Sforzesco]

Yes exactly. Lannister always pays his debt, what about you? Promises is very much and widely used through history. Think about Molotov-Ribbentrop etc.

 

[masterhound3]

is it just me or is anyone else getting a bit frustrated that we wait months to get a update and its kinda meh.

No, apparently there are many people like that. I don't get them. I mean, this update implies a lot, between the info that AI will also be using the possibility of barter and mentioned previously in-faction politics and feuds, I'm getting a feeling that even during peacetime being a vassal or sovereign will bring more options than "Welp, time to garrison my army and trade/kill the bandits till next war".

Maybe they could have a thing like Rome 2/Attila where you have a political problem and there are certain consequences depending on what option you choose.

There actually is a rather rudimentary system which determine factions to take revenge if any other kingdom occupies their original territories. For example, Swadia and the Rdokods are at war. Swadia manages to capture Grunwalder Castle and then both factions agree to a truce. After the truce expires, the Rhodoks are likely to launch another war for the sole purpose of recapturing Grunwalder Castle. Sometimes you can ask lords about the state of war, which would result in them telling you: (e.g.) King Graveth is eager to recapture the lost territories.

Of course, this can be expanded to a much larger extent. I hope they improved the mechanics on this domain.

+1 there are so many in game systems that can be revised.

 

[monoolho]

It would be super if you could barter PROMISES, instead of direct real things:

* you don't have a real fief (for now), but you are at war and are respected leader and expected to win the war. So you could PROMISE a fief for a lord defecting to you!
* or PROMISE money for a mercenary group (of course I will pay, later...)
* or PROMISE secret support once a claimant declares war (a bit like Crusader Kings II / Sengoku) plotting system.

THIS. This would be an excellent addition. Something like a TRUST meter. It would be far logical to begin the game with zero trust and then work your way up through quests and negotiations (this sort, not simple marketplace "bought 4 packs of rice now you can trust me"). Even if we couldn't use the promises, the simple trust meter could be used to lower your price in the bartering system, although that wouldn't be as cool, it's still functional.

But promises, that's... That's something very neat that could work very well, even if you could only use 5 options, like "I promise to pay [####] until [##] date",  "I promise to follow your army when [xxxx]", "I promise to [capture/take/give] you [xxxx] fief by [##]date" and so on. A Simple system that would add a lot of gameplay options. Although it could be a bit late to add it now.

 

[Red River]

they are still working on this? what's taking so long and where's open beta?

 

[Reapy]

I'm not really into the web 2.0/civ 5 style UI, I like a more medieval manuscript style going on to keep it in theme. I haven't really ever found much excitement in barter / diplomacy windows with AI, but I haven't played a lot of recent strategy games to see if they have improved.

Generally I find the AI has no real concept of what is valuable or what it needs to succeed or even preserve itself in the long run by holding your civ back. Sometimes a trade might look good on paper, but put the AI in a terrible position once it succeeds. I'm looking at this barter screen and thinking 'diplomacy' screen to some extent, but playing the trading guessing game with AI is really tedious and boring, even with the hard work put in to generate sensible values and exchanges.

I can't say that I've ever enjoyed a trade/diplomacy screen in any game, ever, because it often feels clueless and nonsensical, and really ruins any moment you had where you might have felt like you were playing a real opponent and not AI.

I hope what was said above makes it in, that you can just see what the AI will value and have some way of extracting or learning (perhaps a higher trade skill) what the AI wants most during the trade.

So this isn't to say that it isn't necessary to have this, maybe perhaps it is the not the most exciting feature, and it is a hard one it seems to actually be done in a way that it enhances a game.

Good luck! And hopefully more blogs on the horizon!

 

[original]

Hey all,

It's been a very long time since I last played M&B.

I just wish to ask whether it will be possible to play a benevolent lord in Bannerlord.

When I first played M&B1, I did not participate in the large scale battles to get castles. I just wanted to nurture my first village and make it prosperous. I would watch my villagers go back and forth the main town, to protect them, and hopefully with every trip my village becomes prosperous. I would earn money and build all the constructions. I would do all the elder quests. Then I was hoping I would reap the rewards with a higher tax. Yes I know, it was silly but I liked the roleplay.

It turns out that in vanilla M&B, with the default formulas, a village will never reach Very Rich prosperity, no matter how much you help it.

In Warband, with the revamped formulas, I understood the hardship formula, but again it was flawed, and prosperity of my Town did not increase despite my best efforts to help it.

It was very upsetting that I could not nurture my village or Town, and it was one of the main reasons I left the game. I know the game is mostly about large scale battles, mounted combat and gaining heaps of lands, but I only need one land to call my own, and the ability to nurture it from ground up.

So I want to know, is it possible to play the game the way I want it in Bannerlord? Being able to proactively improve your holdings if you put time into it?

 

[killer-blead]

@ Original,

That's a very interesting perspective. I think most people play it differently (being the murderous warlord and all) almost noone stops and takes the time to enjoy and nurture the little things like that tiny hamlet, which instead of pillage, you could also help grow into a very rich village.

 

[original]

@ Original,

That's a very interesting perspective. I think most people play it differently (being the murderous warlord and all) almost noone stops and takes the time to enjoy and nurture the little things like that tiny hamlet, which instead of pillage, you could also help grow into a very rich village.

I don't think it's that difficult to add it to the game. All you need to do is just tweak the formulas a bit.
Put in more construction options.
Put in more missions.
Change the prosperity so that every time you help the elder by bringing cattle, prosperity increases. Or make it so that prosperity increases based on cattle. This way as cattle increases, the village prosperity increases.
It doesn't require much, just for people to tweak the formulas a bit. But it would add a lot to the game.

Warband had a few formulas that were flawed, that is why settlements could not recover from poor prosperity. I documented it properly on the bug report to show the developer what went wrong, but the developer at that time (nijis?) didn't want to tweak the formulas because he was worried he might break it further.

It's a shame, they purposely put in the hardship index to simulate a vibrant economy, but the economy didn't work the way they intended because they didn't want to fix the formulas.

 

[ToyBoat]

Yeah, I play quite similarly to you, original. I've never even raided a village. I just like to take a small piece of land and nurture it. I don't have any interest in conquering the entire peninsula.

 

[Syndrella]

I would like to see a much deeper economy and city management in this game. Make your own kingdom to conquer or just if you have enough rescources and people your own cities, villages, hamlets and forts. Maybe as a mod at least could be implemented but I would like to see something similar or this idea I think it's just cool and if you tired to wandering then you can caretake your own land.

 

[kuwhar]

Looks great, keep up the good work.

I for one appreciate the time and effort being put into the game.

 

[Stevebob]

In Warband, with the revamped formulas, I understood the hardship formula, but again it was flawed, and prosperity of my Town did not increase despite my best efforts to help it.

I never did a lot with the villages but the towns will grow in prosperity but it has to be through caravans so long times of trade will make your town great. you can talk to the gild master about the wealth of the town... sorry you were disappointed with the First and Second   if it helps the king always gives you the hardest off village.