Some thoughts and critiques from a professional game developer and ex-modder of M&B/Warband.

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Just posted this over on the subreddit, I figured I would post here too!

Managed to put in 34 hours on bannerlord SP and wanted to share some feedback and critiques as a game developer. I will focus only on SP as I havent given the public MP a go yet. For this feedback I figured I would do something roleplay-y and pretend I am making a mod and writing down the changelist of said imaginary mod.

So this is a list of the first things I'd work on if I made "Better Native Mod!" after my limited exposure to the game so far. Assuming I had perfect mod tools. I will ignore bugs and crashes and so on, assuming these will be ironed out over time.



Better Native Mod!

Download > www.m&bmods.com/thisisanimaginarymod

Changelist, v1.0



CAMPAIGN

  • Looter and bandit groups will merge over time capped by the scale of the players strength, avoid uncatchable clutter on the map.
  • Every party you hover over now has a colour coded strength stat based on troop types and size so you can figure out wether they are stronger than you at a glance. Accuracy based on scouting skill.
  • Entirely new workshops can be built in cities, depending on the city size. Hefty price. These are accesible via the menu only. (artisan playthrough)
  • The game does not autosave after a loss.
  • Added a quickload key. Quicksaves are entirely seperate from manual and auto saves.
  • Small village title cards still visible when zoomed out on the world map
  • Garrisons are less likely to sally, only when overwhelmingly outnumbering siegers
FACTIONS

  • Added 3 extra minor factions for every major area/faction in the game. Big medium and small scale, to ease transition from bandit fights to nobleman fights. These will never ally one another but may temporarily fight for major factions.
  • As a vassal your influence gained is based on your relation with every lord of the faction weighted by their clans influence. (eg, 100 relation might give +1 influence per lord, x whatever their influence factor is).
  • Factions that grow too large are prone to rebellion and break up to prevent steamrolling. The rebellious faction will stem from a city and will take on the Major Faction that city originally belonged to.
  • General balancing, providing resource and recruit bonuses to underdog factions (auto self balancing)
QUESTS/EVENTS/MECHANICS

  • Removed hideouts entirely, replaced with a minor camp siege assault quests. (using your entire force). No siege equipment or buildup, bandits have a small camp with minor fortifactions - spikes, trench and mounds.
  • These new camps are hidden by default, you have to seek them out based on quest info.
  • Added several minor events in cities to make visiting more interesting (bandit ambush, a gift from a fan, shop discount offer, special trade offers by random citizen, companion asking to join you in the streets..)
  • Added several new lord quests: a fine gift - sometimes lords may request a type of weapon for you to smith for them. (Lords also have a favorite weapon type which can be gifted to gain relation, a fine sword for a fine man!)
  • Added several new lord quests: smithing weapons order for troops (en masse), you are given the raw resources
  • Added several new lord quests: partake in a full scale trainig/sparring match with allied lord and their army (XP/relation reward)
  • Added several new lord quests: same as above but a friendly duel instead, only when lord relation is already high.
  • Added several familiar lord quests: gathering troops and resources at a noblemans request, dealing with deserters, ...
  • Added several familiar midgame combat oriented quests (Search and destroy bandits, village infested bandits, ...)
  • Added the ability to 'wait' at lumber and mining camps and produce raw goods. More low level troops yields more goods up to a maximum capacity. (knights wont work, only peasants and the like)
  • Lowered the overal give and take relation nature of existing quests, quests mostly benefit you.
  • Removed being caught for law breaking quests immediately in the city you just took the quest (anti climactic) Instead you can be caught / questioned about your goods at the city you try to sell them.
COMBAT

  • All troops have 0.5x HP but effects of armor is doubled. (No more 3 arrow headshots to kill a peasant)
  • Lord AI is more reserved with move orders so it's easier to keep up as a sergeant. In general lords will try to not 'tire' their infantry units.
  • Player HP is doubled (Its a bit easy to die, which in general is not fun, since AI takes over.)
  • Alternative: you can play on as your companions after you die, including giving orders.
  • Horse archers who run out of arrows will act like regular cavalry AI instead of being useless (this may be a bug)
  • Archer AI is more reserved about going melee, eg - when a single enemy cavalryman is dismounted into your archer line, they wont be swamped by 20 archers, but maybe only 5. Archers will prioritise shooting unless directly threathened.
  • Shieldwall formation has significantly more stopping power against cavalry.
  • Holding shift allows you to select multiple troop groups like in Warband (am I missing something?)
UI/UX

  • Campaign dialog loading screens are removed entirely, all campaign map instagated dialog is now an overlay showing a 3D character just like in the encyclopedia with some preset backgrounds based on the environment.
  • Troops gain training XP and level up more in clusters, which leaves a notification.
  • Added the ability to load a save from any of the main menus, uncluding during combat
  • Loot or inventory items that are an objective improvement over equipped items (of the same class) are highlighted green.
  • Clicking during any waiting state in the campaign stops the state, as in warband - no need to actually click 'stop waiting' button
  • City menu now gives you the ability to spawn in certain districts, assuming you've explored them and unlocked them.
VISUAL

  • Upped brightness and contrast on all night and evening scenes. (Alternative, depending on the performance impact: added a torch/lightsource to some units during night battles)
  • Character default face is revamped to look more neutral. Nose is smaller and has wider slider range, and eyes have been redone to remove the odd pupil scale/placement and the 'mascara'.
  • Lowered the weight of assymetrical faces in randomly generated characters
  • Removed some unsettling static animals such as the standing cats in the city scenes
  • Motion blur is disabled by default (Maybe its just me...?)
OTHER

  • Smithing jobs can now be queued and then you automatically enter 'waiting' state at the city while the blacksmith jobs resolve, exactly like how raidings works with the same UI, but reversed.
  • Removed some of the actual reddit memes in this actual worldwide commercial game, or at least made them way more obscure easter eggs
  • Accessing traders is only possible from the actual city scene and from the correct traders untill you hire a local runner for 5000g, which then unlocks the current 'trader' option in the city menu.
  • Using a runner (campaign map trader option) may yield less money as you are not doing the transaction directly and your trade skill is not used.
  • Selling items to the correct trader yields an additional small bonus.
  • Relation with a trader increases as you deal with them, prices improve over time.
  • You can buy up and then store goods in your workshops, similar to Warband.
  • More variation and custom made companions across Calradia
  • Added the ability to buy the Taverns, exactly like any workshop
  • Players may own as many businesses as they like but must manually retrieve the money they make from the city the shop is at.
 
This list is great, but I'd like to add a few things:


QUESTS/EVENTS/MECHANICS:
  • Expanded townsfolk rumors to mention recent conquests, political decisions, and their opinion about it.
  • If you get caught in a lawbreaking quest, you can resist arrest (either fight or run) or bribe your way out of it (Roguery, Trade, Charm).
COMBAT:
  • You are no longer able to hold 'alt' to bring up an icon of an enemy formation in the field unless you have line of sight to them, or have a really high Scouting skill.
 
I agree with pretty much all of these. Only exception being with the accessing trader via runner -- while I understand the immersion of this, it detracts from the QoL of being able to open the trade menu from the get-go when you enter a town and accessing all of the various goods therein, and I'd like to avoid the tedium of loading both the city scene where the trader is, hunting him down, and then loading the trade menu for each different type of trade good, when I could just load the trade menu for all goods and be done with it.
 
Again, other individuals in the community can fix these issues that Taleworlds just can't seem to figure out in less than a week. Is this Bethesda development here? Just let the modders do all the work?
 
I agree with pretty much all of these. Only exception being with the accessing trader via runner -- while I understand the immersion of this, it detracts from the QoL of being able to open the trade menu from the get-go when you enter a town and accessing all of the various goods therein, and I'd like to avoid the tedium of loading both the city scene where the trader is, hunting him down, and then loading the trade menu for each different type of trade good, when I could just load the trade menu for all goods and be done with it.

Even if you could just unlock that option by investing a bit into the city?

The rationale behind this was to give players a more physical experience of visiting the city. They are beautiful.So much work went into them. They are entirely useless atm. In the same feature I wanted you to be able to invest into cities a bit more (purchasing the runner/menu option and trader relation) so in the early game you are more anchored to a homebase. (if you wanna be efficient)
I also wanted the district spawning to minimise annoyingly walking too much and wanted to readd spawning on a horse (forgot that one) So there would be a 'spawn in market' feature and the traders are all just there.

Either way in my mind this was all just for the early game or first experiences with a city, after that you get a runner and trader are as they are now. Unless you are RPing a trader character and want every little bonus you can get.
 
To increase the usage of cities: the thing that turns me off the most about them is the like 1 mile long walk from the spawn to the Gate... if you'd just load in in the towncenter or at least the gatehouse, that'd be great
 
I agree with most of that but disagree with the "runner" idea. It would ruin the experience of playing merchant. I'd say that trading needs even more QoL improvements.
 
To increase the usage of cities: the thing that turns me off the most about them is the like 1 mile long walk from the spawn to the Gate... if you'd just load in in the towncenter or at least the gatehouse, that'd be great
This should really be an option, like in some Warband mods, "approach the city/castle" or just "enter town center/castle".
 
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