SP - General What Is not fun or engaging in bannerlord.

[overtyped]

I've played for about 100 hours now, and I think I got a decent feel for the game.
What's not fun:
1: high lvl companions with their tier skills set. You don't get to decide where you want them to become, so you get much less attachment to your companions. (There is one way to raise tactics, but not really. When I gave a companion his own party, it took 100 days to raise his skill in tactics by 1) Why did you think this was a good idea?

2: There is no ability to train your companions in stuff like tactics/trade/charm etc. Not only did you do this foolish thing, but you also made it so many quests need these skills at a certain lvl before you can send your companion to handle it instead of you. HOW DID THIS GET THROUGH?!

3: Horses are very very overpowered and dirt cheap. Why don't you test some kergit horseman vs any other bandit group with double their numbers and see which one wins? Horses being strong has been part of warband, I get that, but even with spears, without any sort of crippling effect when horses take a certain amount of dmg it's not enough. Perhaps ontop of horses getting crippled from dmg taken, perhaps arrows and all other weapons should deal more dmg to them(like double).

4: Archers in general are too strong and need to be toned down significantly. You see that group of forest bandits with less numbers than you? RUN YOU'RE GONNA ALL GONNA DIE! Or if you get some companions, with the worst bow and a cheap sumper horse, you can take on anything. (I'm not including the player, because you could always solo anything by running circles slowly around mobs on your horse and picking them off was a warband thing as well) This is about the npcs not the player!

5: SHIELDS: I get that shields are worse, and that's fine, but npcs straight up don't use them most of the time. I don't bother equipping shields to my companions because shields are just a decoration to them. Sure, they will use a shield in melee combat, but those arrows flying in the sky ? "Nah, too much effort to raise my arm"

6: The game is very heavily focused on cavalry, but can you at least make footman riding a horse(from your inventory) equal to them in map speed? It is simply not fun and makes little sense to intentionally gimp yourself by not using cavalry when it comes to moving around the map. See that bandit group running away from you? Well your troops aren't cavalry so good luck catching them, it doesn't matter if all your footman are riding inventory horses BECAUSE.

7: The clan tier system is good and bad. Once you're very late in the game, and you finally reach the final clan tier, you will probably find yourself thinking, I DON'T WANT ANOTHER COMPANION TO LVL AT THAT POINT. IT'S PAST THE POINT OF THAT! Make the first 3 clan tiers give +2 companions, and past that, there should be no more +companion rewards. This makes way more sense if you played the game to that point.

8: Sea raiders: They are strong, BUT selling them to ransom brokers is pointless because they sell for next to nothing, and the loot they give.. good god the loot. It's not good. You would make more money engaging with looters.

Sea raiders in warband and brytenwalda/Viking conquest were a good way to get good armor early, but now they are horrible creatures with shields and spears and.. throwing weapons that will mess you up early game and give you nothing in return. SURE 5% OF THE TIME YOU GET A29 ARMOR HELMET, BUT THE MONEY YOU MADE FIGHTING LOOTERS INSTEAD COULD OF AFFORDED YOU A BETTER ONE. HOW IS THAT FUN OR REWARDING? THEY ARE POINTLESS

 

[Ragemaster9999]

Companions are a joke. Aside from their passive skill boost and ability to form a party they do absolutely nothing. I decked out my combat companions with best in slot gear costing over 60,000 denar. I send them in with the infantry they might get 1 or 2 kills before they die. Might as well have a regular combat troop instead of a companion, atleast regular combat troops dont require you to go fetch them from random cities after your party wipes.

 

[Beau Vine]

I can't tell if these are gripes with Bannerlord or medieval warfare.

I agree with some points, but others depend on other features and player savvy. IE the only times I lose troops to sea bandits is if it's a 20-stack and I want to train up recruits super fast so I just fling them at them with minimal support.

If you time archers volley right, they'll raise their shields and lose 1 volley of javelins. They're also super prone to Idiot-magnets, so alone or with heavy cav you can make half of them waste second volley and have your infantry close to melee.

Then there's the matter of purpose. I clear high stacks to get low stacks that then can be recruited and put into your castles, as well as to weaken their lairs, to wipe them when they're on 1-2 groups inside.That's actively reinforced by game mechanics.

#6 - Everyone is in reality running dragoon armies like this. There will come a point when you have to make the call - have fast cav, or be able to up-train troops. A middle ground if having specifically dragoon units (infantry that matches cav speed if saddle horses are provided), but in general this is an issue warfare centred around still in WWII (the infamous pictures of Polish cavalry charging German tanks - the cav units were used for transporting anti armour guns between ambush positions), and most ages before (Mieszko I is thought to have conquered early Polish tribes with ~100 very mobile mounted soldiers, talk about an exploit!).
At least with perks not working, crossbows are still weak. Vatican (Urban II in 1096 andf Innocent II in 1139) had to issue a patch in real life to combat that power creep.


As for companions - I'm currently scouting the map for companions with tactics skill - they're rare and expensive (2k+) which can make us prone to getting the crappy ones if we want someone fast, but require taking your time if you want an actual commander. Having had very little luck finding ones with tactics I somewhat symphatize, but this again is dependant on player execution, the pieces are already there.

 

[Dr-Shinobi]

Archers arent to strong ffs you just spread your troops out and send archers out first then the troops.in shield formation or if not also spread em out. If you have a cav on the side then no problem...Im playing on highest difficulty setting and have no problem what so ever. Im also using a Berserk character with no armor along with an army of berserkers and can easily sig sag and take some shots if im unlucky. And for last i enjoy making a foot character from time to time and have no gripe there. Its more fun then being a cav and you really have to be on your toe with tactics as well as picking your fights....But sure for the archer part then you can argue about the Battanian Highborn Champion archers expensive though with 20 denars on the payroll each but heck well worth it if you got the patience to look for em or getting high leadership to be able to convert prisoners in to em

 

[overtyped]

I can't tell if these are gripes with Bannerlord or medieval warfare.

I agree with some points, but others depend on other features and player savvy. IE the only times I lose troops to sea bandits is if it's a 20-stack and I want to train up recruits super fast so I just fling them at them with minimal support.

If you time archers volley right, they'll raise their shields and lose 1 volley of javelins. They're also super prone to Idiot-magnets, so alone or with heavy cav you can make half of them waste second volley and have your infantry close to melee.

Then there's the matter of purpose. I clear high stacks to get low stacks that then can be recruited and put into your castles, as well as to weaken their lairs, to wipe them when they're on 1-2 groups inside.That's actively reinforced by game mechanics.

#6 - Everyone is in reality running dragoon armies like this. There will come a point when you have to make the call - have fast cav, or be able to up-train troops. A middle ground if having specifically dragoon units (infantry that matches cav speed if saddle horses are provided), but in general this is an issue warfare centred around still in WWII (the infamous pictures of Polish cavalry charging German tanks - the cav units were used for transporting anti armour guns between ambush positions), and most ages before (Mieszko I is thought to have conquered early Polish tribes with ~100 very mobile mounted soldiers, talk about an exploit!).
At least with perks not working, crossbows are still weak. Vatican (Urban II in 1096 andf Innocent II in 1139) had to issue a patch in real life to combat that power creep.


As for companions - I'm currently scouting the map for companions with tactics skill - they're rare and expensive (2k+) which can make us prone to getting the crappy ones if we want someone fast, but require taking your time if you want an actual commander. Having had very little luck finding ones with tactics I somewhat symphatize, but this again is dependant on player execution, the pieces are already there.

That's not the issue, you can't even train them in tactics

 

[CharlieMRCR]

To OP's question, all the stuff I thought would be implemented but aren't. And I'm not talking about features that don't even appear to be present. I mean playing an Aserai only to realize caravans are not cheaper, then realizing your bonus to trade isn't working, then realizing NONE of the culture bonuses are working.

Also taking a talent like +3 arrows to quiver but then not getting those +3 arrows. Meanwhile, other talents seem to work just fine. I was like,"Ohhhhh, so this is REALLY early access."

 

[Schoulayer]

3: Horses are very very overpowered and dirt cheap. Why don't you test some kergit horseman vs any other bandit group with double their numbers and see which one wins? Horses being strong has been part of warband, I get that, but even with spears, without any sort of crippling effect when horses take a certain amount of dmg it's not enough. Perhaps ontop of horses getting crippled from dmg taken, perhaps arrows and all other weapons should deal more dmg to them(like double).

I agree. Somebody else made the suggestion that cavalry should take up two spots in your party. So you could have two infantry or two archers for every cavalry unit. That seemed like a really good way to balance things.