That 2015 trailer shows some interesting things, the city scene appear much more alive and to enter the tavern requires no loading screen. Wonder what went wrong.
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Siege tower: current or 2015 model?
- Thread starter Terco_Viejo
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Something surely happened along the way, i suspect that at a certain point an "investor" came in and started "trimming" costs on Excel and pushing for more profitable ways to sell the game (MP was developed and released before SP for this reason), this translates in many features cut (like the amazing no loading screen scene showed).
If somebody invested, they want results ASAP, most probably they know where and how to milk, they don't care for the consequences, they only care for the figures on Excel TODAY.
So if a Dev sells his soul to the devil for whatever reason, he is under constant pressure from somebody who is not from the game industry, doesn't have a clue about programming or gaming, yet said Dev has to face US....not a good deal.
That probably (almost certainly), led to internal frictions among the Dev teams and, lacking strong management, all went upside down.
Note that I never blame the Devs, they are clearly very talented, but if what I suspect really happened, their fault could only be a bit of "naiveness", after all it's their name and reputation that is taking a hit, the other guy maybe already ran away to approach some other Company developing a gem to ruin...
Thats something I've also been thinking, defenses need to be a lot stronger before we make attacking any better. Right now you actually hurt yourself by chosing to defend in the battle scene instead of autocalc the battle. Also we need destructible walls so the in scene catapults and trebuchets actually have a purpose. Also allowing us to decide the pacing of the battle, like when to send the siege equipment. Maybe i want to destroy the walls before sending the troops, maybe i want to let my archers clear the walls before approaching. The siege on tracks was fun the first few times but now its just the same siege over and over. Honestly the most fun i have in sieges is defending in scene even though its a massive disadvantage.
NLCRich
Squire
Most of the siege weapons are so useless, you have better success attacking the castle with just ladders. In some cases, even adding the battering ram is a huge disadvantage because your men all stand around it and get shot up by archers. With the siege towers, only if you are lucky enough to get the one with the ramp, does it have any positive effect on the siege at all. The ones with ladders, your units should be climbing these ladders and getting to the top before bringing down the ramp, but they don't... Also, they seem to pathfind slightly better on the regular ladders than the towers. The result is that building the towers often gives you a disadvantage in the siege.
With the projectile siege weapons, the defenders get to build theirs right away, while the attacker has to wait. Then when you can build them, you have to hide them right away so as to prevent their destruction.Nevertheless, the enemy always gets a few hits in. So the ballistas are totally worthless because they instantly lose 2/3 of their health right after building them. I'm not sure why they had to program in this extra fallacy when the defenders already get a huge time advantage with the siege needing to set up. The onagers are only useful if you get them all built and then put them all out at once.This is so boring and tedious though because of the high build costs, I never have the patience to wait it out, not to mention enemy armies coming to distract you or attack their other fiefs. Think it is ok and you can just play defense? Guess again, your units will jump off the walls to their inevitable doom.
The result is that sieges have been and do remain the biggest weak point of the game. Both the battle and the mini-game prior remain boring, ineffective, and just plain frustrating. That which when depicted in their trailer looked like it would be a huge advantage... I'm really not sure what version of BL they were playing to make that video... they must have faked it somehow.
With the projectile siege weapons, the defenders get to build theirs right away, while the attacker has to wait. Then when you can build them, you have to hide them right away so as to prevent their destruction.Nevertheless, the enemy always gets a few hits in. So the ballistas are totally worthless because they instantly lose 2/3 of their health right after building them. I'm not sure why they had to program in this extra fallacy when the defenders already get a huge time advantage with the siege needing to set up. The onagers are only useful if you get them all built and then put them all out at once.This is so boring and tedious though because of the high build costs, I never have the patience to wait it out, not to mention enemy armies coming to distract you or attack their other fiefs. Think it is ok and you can just play defense? Guess again, your units will jump off the walls to their inevitable doom.
The result is that sieges have been and do remain the biggest weak point of the game. Both the battle and the mini-game prior remain boring, ineffective, and just plain frustrating. That which when depicted in their trailer looked like it would be a huge advantage... I'm really not sure what version of BL they were playing to make that video... they must have faked it somehow.
@Terco_Viejo I remember that video and seeing it again makes me sad.
I like the old style of siege ladders from the video, but I'd be more that happy if we had something akin to what was used in Warband as long as the damn ai can figure it out.
I like the old style of siege ladders from the video, but I'd be more that happy if we had something akin to what was used in Warband as long as the damn ai can figure it out.
paladinx333
Sergeant at Arms
Endless redesigning. We should really be playing Mount and Blade III by now. They had many good ideas, most of which seem to have ended up on the cutting room floor.
well, basically a massive downgrade is what happened.
The game's in a really bad place atm, still incomplete, bugged, missing some essential stuff while other stuff got literally "downgraded" like the siege equipment.
What I can't understand is why? They've had the superior stuff ready back in 2015...
Yesterday, in the Discord Channel, @Younes123 talked about the problems with the current siege tower model. As part of the conversation, I added that the model in my eyes looks unsatisfactory because it lacks an upper level to give covering firing and the access ramp should be sloped downhill favoring the attackers (over the battlements in a horizontal position by default; if there is no battlement the ramp is supposed to be sloped in favor of the attackers.).
The thing is, I remembered in 2015 Taleworlds showed us this:
Here you can see an early version of the battering ram and the siege tower. The current ram, morphologically, makes more sense since its lack of protection favors the gameplay; the shape of the old one provided too much protection for attackers.
In contrast, I think the early model of siege tower makes much more sense than the current one; mostly because of the upper floor and larger dimensions. Perhaps, due to navigation pathfinding problems, the early model with sinuous stairs was replaced by a new one with straight stairs. Under that premise I have thought a simple solution to my way of seeing that it combines a fast vertical deployment (as it is currently) along with an upper floor for support work or covering fire.
For the MP section I think it would work great if players coordinate their attack. While the siege tower is moving towards the walls, a group of shooters may be positioned on the top floor. It would work the same way in the SP section, you would just have to provide an additional path for the AI through the trapdoor ladder (just like in the 2015 video).
I know that this is more of a suggestion and that it should be in the corresponding section. However, I would like to know the opinion of the player's pool (SP and MP) by means of a survey of interests. Both MP and Sp players are aware of the current problems of the current siege tower.
Could a siege tower design in line with what was in 2015 provide an improvement in gameplay?
I think so, but first let's check out the general interest.
As always you bring good points. I endorse your ideas, although I still believe there are better ways to achieve balance regarding sieges, the most critical one is some way to control troop positioning to counter-act siege-engines. Curve line formations and melee defensive blobs come to mind as to "formations" to be available on sieges. I mean, to me, we need both positioning control of troops on siege scenes for both sides, auto-managing troop movement (which we should be able to chose who goes where, and condition triggers for retreats, repositioning, etc), and a more realistic AI for archers on both sides (where they shoot and hide behind cover). As well as siege exclusive formations...
To me keeping the new model is fine, as long as said siege-tower is made faster to build, while making the better one significantly slower. This way you can "rush-siege" with the bad engine whilst still being able to opt for a more cautious approach.
If TW manages to pull those off, sieges will be just perfect. Then there's the "map-screen" balancing for auto-calc, which should nearly wipe-out attacking armies each time by default, and toning down the "winning" occurrences for attackers. Basically make sieges the ultimate "army killer" as it should, or forcing AI to wait-out when really determined, also as it should.
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I know that many of you are SP players, however the idea is to apply equally in MP (so I would like to). From having the current one to having one similar to the model with upper floor, there is a notable tactical difference.
I agree, though MP balancing should always be done secondary to SP balance. It's not unusual to see cut-content when playing MP version of many games. To me they should basically treat each as a single thing entirely...I know that many of you are SP players, however the idea is to apply equally in MP (so I would like to). From having the current one to having one similar to the model with upper floor, there is a notable tactical difference.
For balancing a more decent siege tower for MP I'd guess they'd need to make the entire scene revolve around it instead of trying to place it over any scene. This way you can guarantee that the best siege weapon is always balanced (towers are meant to be the ultimate siege tool anyway)
When playing the game months ago (2 patches prior I think), my experience was basically: "wtf? this is kind of retarded" when seeing any of the elements involving sieges... Auto-calc is trash, the mechanics are trash, and even the siege-tools look like they were made by completely retarded people (logic wise). The "new siege tower" is just too stupid to be taken seriously, it places you in a extreme disadvantage while still working due to garbage siege AI + zerg rushes from attacking armies. I mean, 90% of the time the defending AI will just sit in place like morons taking hits and being surrounded by invading troops, it's just mind-boggling (many times due to attacking AI being able to phase-through enemies going behind them, while defending AI is phasing-through to position themselves on already lost entry points)... The most notorious is the group supposed to block the gates, which they never do, enemy AI can rush past them with easy, it's like watching a river flowing around a rock. In SP the only siege defense you have is stopping the AI from passing any of the initial thresholds, whenever they do, the siege is already lost, again, because of garbage AI behavior for the defending side.
Attacking side, on the other hand, was almost entirely bugged back than (have no idea now), and they'd glitch on every choke-point, either by getting stuck running against walls, staying put on the bottom of ladders, not path-finding siege-towers, etc...
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As for MP I don't see any balance problem if we put one more floor to the current siege tower.
The defending artillery will always aim at the tower while it moves to the walls and the attacker should support the tower. With an upper floor on the attacking tower a reduced number of archers (maybe <10) could be positioned to support both the deployment and the assault on the wall. For SP, the problem again lies in the AI not in whether we put in another ladder or put in another ramp.
makes sense. Haven't touched the MP on BL yet so I have no useful input. SP I've tested thoroughly and gave up on it after seeing that the AI was not being worked upon (which's the most broken part of it). Since the patches are slower to release I guess I'll do good at steering clear from the game for now, it'll only serve to stress me out atm.
Wulfsdottir
Sergeant
Off-Topic but... what structure it was near the village Corenia? Didn't look like a classic castle
With some metal reinforcements it does not look bad XD
Already the original model seems to be taken from the wettest dream of a Warhammer fan, as if to put additional metal panels.
(joking)| Current model | Ideal structure for wet dreams |
|---|---|
| 
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rektasaurus
Squire
Yeah model on the right is way better. The planks on the outside are not necessarily for structural support so it makes zero sense to add extra weight with haphazard planks like the model on the left. If I were building a siege tower I’d also cover the sides for protection, maybe a consideration.
Yeah, that's the small part. I'd add some side reinforcements and wooden parapets on the top floor, too. With the model on the right, I mean more of a chassis ( skeleton - the structural shape).
rektasaurus
Squire
Got it. Right. Yeah. The ladders especially are way better than the ramp and the topmost platform is very cool. Great ideas all around I’d love to see any of them instead of the current tower.
Content in the right direction.Similar threads
