Dark Viper
Recruit
Hi, I thought I'd take the time to list my feedback and suggestions. I know this might somewhat break the "suggestions" rules as there may be a fair few. I do apologise for this in advance but if I were to however list all of them on separate threads with clear titles you might ban me for spamming your forum? 
I'm passionate about this game and love how it's turning out so far. I don't say this lightly. I'd say in my older age I'm extremely hard to please but I just love the feel, immersion and most of all gameplay style you've adopted here with Bannerlord! If anything I say comes across as negative or dis-pleasing I do apologise. I've been told the language I use sometimes may appear so. This is simply feedback because I love the game so much and want to take my own time to pass that on to allow you to possibly make the playing experience even better than it already is. I'm going to list my points as clearly and concisely as I can below to get straight to the point and with possible solutions/ideas where possible.
Battles - Troop Spawning
I'm not sure if anyone else feels this way about this but when you have random spawning particularly in the middle of a pitched battle where all hell is breaking lose it can be particularly frustrating and can get tedious to micro manage. Especially when the AI drops deeper back on the terrain (in a defensive posture) at the start. The reason the spawning then can effect this badly is because your melee troops will eventually get stuck in (maybe after some skirmishes via missile/cav) and then get spawned on from behind creating a sandwich effect. Being attacked in the rear almost at random when you were actually gaining the upper hand in battle due to spawning can be extremely annoying. I understand certain limitations cause this to be an issue with engine or peoples computer performance and so on but possibly there's a better way to do it?
Since spawning is of course a limitation of peoples computers/game engine perhaps have a square marked on where the spawn point is even if it only shows you at the start with some top down view? Maybe with a count down during battle itself? The other idea I had was that all respawns/reinforcements come from the very rear of the map from where you initially spawn? This would still cause the attacker to be at a disadvantage but at least the player wouldn't have to be worried about being completely out-flanked when gaining the upper hand.
Battles - Formation based attacks
This for me is a big one. Probably number one. Being able to say for example 3/Cavalry attack this formation and they remain attacking THAT formation till either is defeated rather than going off in all directions breaking their formation and whom they launch their attack upon. This is also is extremely frustrating to micro manage as they (even though not close) can charge straight into a group of spearmen causing their demise. Again it just gets tedious having to manage this battle after battle. I'd love to do a playthrough via being un-mounted but this combined with managing the enemy troop spawns puts me off doing so as I like to keep my parties casualties to a minimal to increase their longevity of how many battles I have and keep down on the recruiting and training up my soldiers. I've spoken with Strat (the nice youtuber that actually interacts with his audience) today briefly about it and he did mention that he think's that a modder addressed this issue and had achieved this at some point although he believes it's currently un-supported and not functioning with the latest patches.
Maybe a skirmish mode for ranged units in general would also be a good idea. Similar to total war I suppose. So when a ranged unit gets too close to an enemy they drop back away (hopefully keeping some sort of formation line. So when I say for my arches to attack cav at range. If the cav then charge they'll try to drop back and I could then potentially push my spears in front of them ready to brace. The spearman brace with pikes/spears also should also be automatic when cavalry get within a certain range for the FRONT line (unless in square). That way if engaged from the rear via cav. Well tough luck, they out flanked you. However from the front this needs to be made like a wall of spears that makes it impassable for cavalry and frankly a slaughter. Unless in square of course as that would make cavalry an all over bad choice to use to engage them completely. Square of course already has the perfect down side of lack of mobility and the time it takes to hit that formation. Which is pretty spot on at least in my opinion
Campaign/Battles - Map Mirroring Terrain.
I'm pretty sure this IS already being worked on as you did the battle terrain system in 1.7.0 In short, keep, I beg you to keep expanding upon this. If I pick the scene to fight on the campaign map I pick it for a reason. All great tacticians historically did this. For the high ground or terrain they desire their troops to fight on. We need more battle maps maybe that mirror this and mirror it more accurately? There's nothing more disappointing than when you make the choice, rub your hands together with a cheesy grin knowing you've got them right where you want them, then only to see the battle map appear nothing like what you planned for on the campaign map. Please add more and more battle maps that then match small segments of the map for us to scrap over
Campaign/Battles - Two handed Maces
I first played Bannerlord on release like many others and Warband before it. In Warband by far my favourite weapon and one I try to use in other games where possible is a Two-Handed Morningstar. I loved the mechanics of it in warband. The fact I could switch to one hand when I needed my shield in dangerous missile scenarios to brining out the power with two hands when it was needed. It did come with some downside which would probably translate to bad handling one handed in this game. I can't remember the term. I think it was "Unbalanced"? Anyway I digress, I came back a few patches ago once things had settled down a bit and to my amazement still noticed the lack of two handed maces that were craft-able via smithing or in the game at all. Naturally I want my huge headed beasty Morningstar back that I once used. However I'm sure others also desire other weapon heads to be available within the two handed mace category. This is me more begging you please add some nice large two handed mace heads into the game. I say large because all the one handed mace heads seem really small?
Campaign - Lords execution penalty
This might be a more controversial one in my list. I really dislike the way your hugely disliked by every single lord/clan (at least that's how it feels) on the entire map just because you execute one lord. Since I actually find executing ALL lords once I've grabbed a few for my own faction the most efficient way of slowing down a kingdoms progression and/or counter attacks toward me the absolute best way of dealing with them (other than prisoner hording them)
It seems to me lords recover way too fast and gather mass armies way too fast after defeat upon release. So I feel boxed into doing this. That and my political feeling to these other lords in general perhaps
Of course one would say "keep them prisoner" but that just slows me down literally via party/army speed. The execution mechanic is brilliant for shaping the future world away from wars with just one leader for me and gets rid of these annoying village raiding and hoarding armies that come flying back at you quicker than a fly does to a terd. In short this really needs some re-balance. The ideas I have are possibly leader personalities and relationships? So for example other cruel leaders don't care about you executing others? Maybe unless they're friendly with said person? Maybe your relationship rolls against that as well. So if you have a higher rating with a clan than the person being executed they don't care about the out come? That would make friendships and relationships you and they have built far more meaningful. The other possible idea is perhaps increase their downtime upon defeat. Stop them leaving their fief they respawn at for a far longer period of time? That way they can still guard the fief if attacked with the garrison but can't go back immediately on the full offensive. It just makes the feeling of defeating them somewhat pointless unless I gather them up in my party (stop them escaping via perks) and roam around with them.
Anyway I hope my feedback does make it your way despite its length and detail but I like to be precise as I friggin love this game and was happy to take my own time to at least try and aid in some areas the best I could. Just to clarify none of this was intended in a negative light but purely for a feedback perspective. My current game time is approaching 1k hours and I've played since launch just to give you some background on my experience. I've light dabbled in some modding via visual studio as well. If there is anything you need or have questions/answers on for further clarity or what ever. Let me know. I'll happily use any spare time I have to help!
Thankyou Taleworlds for all the current fun so far! You're so far an example to other game companies on how to build on a game far after its launch and not whore monger down with fluff DLC and the alike! I respect your design ethics and what you've created so far and I can safely say I love how its going!
Viper
I'm passionate about this game and love how it's turning out so far. I don't say this lightly. I'd say in my older age I'm extremely hard to please but I just love the feel, immersion and most of all gameplay style you've adopted here with Bannerlord! If anything I say comes across as negative or dis-pleasing I do apologise. I've been told the language I use sometimes may appear so. This is simply feedback because I love the game so much and want to take my own time to pass that on to allow you to possibly make the playing experience even better than it already is. I'm going to list my points as clearly and concisely as I can below to get straight to the point and with possible solutions/ideas where possible.
Battles - Troop Spawning
I'm not sure if anyone else feels this way about this but when you have random spawning particularly in the middle of a pitched battle where all hell is breaking lose it can be particularly frustrating and can get tedious to micro manage. Especially when the AI drops deeper back on the terrain (in a defensive posture) at the start. The reason the spawning then can effect this badly is because your melee troops will eventually get stuck in (maybe after some skirmishes via missile/cav) and then get spawned on from behind creating a sandwich effect. Being attacked in the rear almost at random when you were actually gaining the upper hand in battle due to spawning can be extremely annoying. I understand certain limitations cause this to be an issue with engine or peoples computer performance and so on but possibly there's a better way to do it?
Since spawning is of course a limitation of peoples computers/game engine perhaps have a square marked on where the spawn point is even if it only shows you at the start with some top down view? Maybe with a count down during battle itself? The other idea I had was that all respawns/reinforcements come from the very rear of the map from where you initially spawn? This would still cause the attacker to be at a disadvantage but at least the player wouldn't have to be worried about being completely out-flanked when gaining the upper hand.
Battles - Formation based attacks
This for me is a big one. Probably number one. Being able to say for example 3/Cavalry attack this formation and they remain attacking THAT formation till either is defeated rather than going off in all directions breaking their formation and whom they launch their attack upon. This is also is extremely frustrating to micro manage as they (even though not close) can charge straight into a group of spearmen causing their demise. Again it just gets tedious having to manage this battle after battle. I'd love to do a playthrough via being un-mounted but this combined with managing the enemy troop spawns puts me off doing so as I like to keep my parties casualties to a minimal to increase their longevity of how many battles I have and keep down on the recruiting and training up my soldiers. I've spoken with Strat (the nice youtuber that actually interacts with his audience) today briefly about it and he did mention that he think's that a modder addressed this issue and had achieved this at some point although he believes it's currently un-supported and not functioning with the latest patches.
Maybe a skirmish mode for ranged units in general would also be a good idea. Similar to total war I suppose. So when a ranged unit gets too close to an enemy they drop back away (hopefully keeping some sort of formation line. So when I say for my arches to attack cav at range. If the cav then charge they'll try to drop back and I could then potentially push my spears in front of them ready to brace. The spearman brace with pikes/spears also should also be automatic when cavalry get within a certain range for the FRONT line (unless in square). That way if engaged from the rear via cav. Well tough luck, they out flanked you. However from the front this needs to be made like a wall of spears that makes it impassable for cavalry and frankly a slaughter. Unless in square of course as that would make cavalry an all over bad choice to use to engage them completely. Square of course already has the perfect down side of lack of mobility and the time it takes to hit that formation. Which is pretty spot on at least in my opinion
Campaign/Battles - Map Mirroring Terrain.
I'm pretty sure this IS already being worked on as you did the battle terrain system in 1.7.0 In short, keep, I beg you to keep expanding upon this. If I pick the scene to fight on the campaign map I pick it for a reason. All great tacticians historically did this. For the high ground or terrain they desire their troops to fight on. We need more battle maps maybe that mirror this and mirror it more accurately? There's nothing more disappointing than when you make the choice, rub your hands together with a cheesy grin knowing you've got them right where you want them, then only to see the battle map appear nothing like what you planned for on the campaign map. Please add more and more battle maps that then match small segments of the map for us to scrap over
Campaign/Battles - Two handed Maces
I first played Bannerlord on release like many others and Warband before it. In Warband by far my favourite weapon and one I try to use in other games where possible is a Two-Handed Morningstar. I loved the mechanics of it in warband. The fact I could switch to one hand when I needed my shield in dangerous missile scenarios to brining out the power with two hands when it was needed. It did come with some downside which would probably translate to bad handling one handed in this game. I can't remember the term. I think it was "Unbalanced"? Anyway I digress, I came back a few patches ago once things had settled down a bit and to my amazement still noticed the lack of two handed maces that were craft-able via smithing or in the game at all. Naturally I want my huge headed beasty Morningstar back that I once used. However I'm sure others also desire other weapon heads to be available within the two handed mace category. This is me more begging you please add some nice large two handed mace heads into the game. I say large because all the one handed mace heads seem really small?
Campaign - Lords execution penalty
This might be a more controversial one in my list. I really dislike the way your hugely disliked by every single lord/clan (at least that's how it feels) on the entire map just because you execute one lord. Since I actually find executing ALL lords once I've grabbed a few for my own faction the most efficient way of slowing down a kingdoms progression and/or counter attacks toward me the absolute best way of dealing with them (other than prisoner hording them)
It seems to me lords recover way too fast and gather mass armies way too fast after defeat upon release. So I feel boxed into doing this. That and my political feeling to these other lords in general perhaps
Of course one would say "keep them prisoner" but that just slows me down literally via party/army speed. The execution mechanic is brilliant for shaping the future world away from wars with just one leader for me and gets rid of these annoying village raiding and hoarding armies that come flying back at you quicker than a fly does to a terd. In short this really needs some re-balance. The ideas I have are possibly leader personalities and relationships? So for example other cruel leaders don't care about you executing others? Maybe unless they're friendly with said person? Maybe your relationship rolls against that as well. So if you have a higher rating with a clan than the person being executed they don't care about the out come? That would make friendships and relationships you and they have built far more meaningful. The other possible idea is perhaps increase their downtime upon defeat. Stop them leaving their fief they respawn at for a far longer period of time? That way they can still guard the fief if attacked with the garrison but can't go back immediately on the full offensive. It just makes the feeling of defeating them somewhat pointless unless I gather them up in my party (stop them escaping via perks) and roam around with them.
Anyway I hope my feedback does make it your way despite its length and detail but I like to be precise as I friggin love this game and was happy to take my own time to at least try and aid in some areas the best I could. Just to clarify none of this was intended in a negative light but purely for a feedback perspective. My current game time is approaching 1k hours and I've played since launch just to give you some background on my experience. I've light dabbled in some modding via visual studio as well. If there is anything you need or have questions/answers on for further clarity or what ever. Let me know. I'll happily use any spare time I have to help!
Thankyou Taleworlds for all the current fun so far! You're so far an example to other game companies on how to build on a game far after its launch and not whore monger down with fluff DLC and the alike! I respect your design ethics and what you've created so far and I can safely say I love how its going!
Viper
