Which leveling system do you prefer Warband or Bannerlord?

[Experimental]

If you've even played an Elder Scrolls game, you know the leveling there is a grindfest, no doubt about it. You try to find any easy way to level your skills, especially those less combative skills. Smithing, for example function in the exact same ways. Spam out tons of low quality swords to increase your level, rinse and repeat. The skills page also somehow looks pretty darn awful, looking like oblivion 2006 images.

I'm not saying the skills page for looked any better but at least it functioned at release for gods sake.

 

[stevehoos]

Yes Mount And Blade was a grind, but it was a fun grind in the early game, this is not.

 

[Wuzgar]

I'd rather have some exp points to redistribute on skills as most of them are highly situational and thus a nightmare to level up. It is a grindfest

 

[guisadop]

I can't say I dislike the new system, especially the "talent points" which you learn after X levels in a skill, but I think these should be combined with the old system, say, you level all the skills as in MB/Warband and are able to choose the "talents" after X levels in each.

 

[Experimental]

My favourite issue with this new leveling system.

Lets pretend you'd like to use a crossbow at some point down the line. The current crossbow requires a 20 crossbow skill to use.
But during character creation you focused on other points and didn't think about it. Now your crossbow skill is at 15.
You'll never be able to use that one crossbow that's in the game EVER.

If that isn't a problem with how the leveling functions, I don't know what else to say.

 

[VincentNZ]

My favourite issue with this new leveling system.

Lets pretend you'd like to use a crossbow at some point down the line. The current crossbow requires a 20 crossbow skill to use.
But during character creation you focused on other points and didn't think about it. Now your crossbow skill is at 15.
You'll never be able to use that one crossbow that's in the game EVER.

If that isn't a problem with how the leveling functions, I don't know what else to say.

That is not representative of the leveling system and would have been the same in the old, if warband at some stage had usage limits. It is simply an oversight.

 

[Honved]

There were mods for the TES games which divided the experience points you earned toward skills into two groups: those that were applied directly to the skill you used to gain the experience, and those that were put into a pool you could use to raise any skill. You got better at doing X by doing X, but it also contributed, to a lesser degree, to whatever else you wanted to focus on. That allowed you SOME voluntary control over development, while still leaning the character toward whatever they did the most of. In short, you COULD grind, but you didn't NEED to grind.

That's half the problem with the idea, the other half being that balancing the skills and the rates that they increase at can vary from skill to skill and from player to player, which can be difficult. Clearly, Taleworlds has not had much (if any) prior experience with it, and will need to rebalance it in future patches.

 

[Lord Irontoe]

People seem to be saying Warband's leveling system was not a chore. That getting your skills or your companions' was not a grind. What the hell people ? Are your memories this short ? Of COURSE it was a bloody grind, and worst of all, the only way of leveling was by killing stuff, basically. Quests gave some too and, sure, not all quests involved heavy fighting, but damn.

It never felt like a chore to me, because everyone got experience doing the main thing that you want to be doing in a Mount and Blade game: fighting and killing stuff. The early game progression was so fast you level up in almost every battle and each level is a small jump in power that you can feel immediately. And all the companions are leveling up right with you. To me, that's such a fun part of the early game.

This new system just feels so slow. 100 days in and I'm still just level 10. Not one of my 4 companions has leveled even once. Even my main combat skills level so slowly, the ones I use less often don't progress at all. It just feels like a drag. And when you do actually gain a level, you don't really feel it. You only get an attribute every 3 levels. Focus points are kind of abstract since they only increase the rate of gain but you don't feel anything right away. Its all about the perks, but their effects seem pretty minor for the most part. It just doesn't feel as good at all.

 

[stevehoos]

It never felt like a chore to me, because everyone got experience doing the main thing that you want to be doing in a Mount and Blade game: fighting and killing stuff. The early game progression was so fast you level up in almost every battle and each level is a small jump in power that you can feel immediately. And all the companions are leveling up right with you. To me, that's such a fun part of the early game.

This new system just feels so slow. 100 days in and I'm still just level 10. Not one of my 4 companions has leveled even once. Even my main combat skills level so slowly, the ones I use less often don't progress at all. It just feels like a drag. And when you do actually gain a level, you don't really feel it. You only get an attribute every 3 levels. Focus points are kind of abstract since they only increase the rate of gain but you don't feel anything right away. Its all about the perks, but their effects seem pretty minor for the most part. It just doesn't feel as good at all.

Yep, exactly. The idea of building companions has turned into a bore.

 

[bantad87]

I like this system, it makes sense, and it's more natural. You should level up performing the tasks that you enjoy doing, and performing those tasks should make you better at those tasks.

Where TES system was flawed, was capping skills at 100, which required a player to grind skills they had no interest in using, merely to level up. You can easily solve that issue by uncapping skills, allowing them to constantly build your level. You prevent ridiculous skill bonuses by having diminishing returns on what those skills provide you.

Then you can do combat to your hearts content, without need to grind smithing for extra attribute/focus points. Or you can smith without needing to level leadership.

I hate leveling or class based systems, they're unrealistic.

 

[VincentNZ]

There were mods for the TES games which divided the experience points you earned toward skills into two groups: those that were applied directly to the skill you used to gain the experience, and those that were put into a pool you could use to raise any skill. You got better at doing X by doing X, but it also contributed, to a lesser degree, to whatever else you wanted to focus on. That allowed you SOME voluntary control over development, while still leaning the character toward whatever they did the most of. In short, you COULD grind, but you didn't NEED to grind.

That's half the problem with the idea, the other half being that balancing the skills and the rates that they increase at can vary from skill to skill and from player to player, which can be difficult. Clearly, Taleworlds has not had much (if any) prior experience with it, and will need to rebalance it in future patches.

This is kind of in the game already with the attributes as increasing it it will increase the multiplicator for the governed attribbutes. It is just not very good right now, since attributes are only raised every 3 or 5 levels and levels themselves are getting further and further away.
I think they should tweak it on multiple ways and you are on the right track in my book, any form of XP score is not needed though. The biggest issue is raising minor skills that only come really in effect at a later stage and that are hard to level.
I think raising one skill, for example archery, should also increase the governing attribute as well as 1-2 other skills/attributes slightly. For archery from foot it should also slightly raise athletics and riding on horse (which it might already do) and the strength stat. This is authentic, as learning chess, for example will also train your mind.
You could also think about Riding always raising your Scouting skill, and scouting a hideout increases thievery, while selling prisoners increases thievery and trade. Solving quests non-violently should give Charm and Leadership/Trade, to offset the skill bonuses you would get from fighting.
Putting a focus point into something could also increase the skill by 5-10.
So you could keep it dynamic and players could adapt to getting new skills with less time effort, while your stats would still accurately reflect how you play your game.

 

[Phyro]

Better? Yes. Grindy? Also yes. Would love it to just be faster.

 

[Lesbosisles]

I like that system, but it needs to be rebalanced a bit when it comes to increasing you level. My troops are already WAY much better than me while I still can't even increase my One-handed weapon skill since I do a ridiculous amount of damage to almost any of enemy troops. But in general, I like the new system.

 

[Captain_Octavius]

I like the new system, but many skills are just way too slow to level, especially considering our characters will die. I'm also not sure whether I like the perks with "external" effects, such as a party morale bonus in a Polearm perk. This incentives grinding skills that you don't actually use, which is the main weakness of the concept.

 

[mamastoast]

I like the new system, but many skills are just way too slow to level, especially considering our characters will die. I'm also not sure whether I like the perks with "external" effects, such as a party morale bonus in a Polearm perk. This incentives grinding skills that you don't actually use, which is the main weakness of the concept.

Indeed.. isn't the main argument for this kind of system that you get better at what you like to do? If so why are things like morale and health increases spread out on seemingly random skill trees. It means that if i want to be a great leader I have to use polearms for some reason?

What it means is that some things are effectively impossible to focus on without going the "jack of all trades" route just to get some side benefits through random perks.

 

[velimirius]

i like the system, needs tweaking tho as well as the rest of the game, im nowhere near finished skilling my character and the map is almost one faction painted.

 

[stevehoos]

Indeed.. isn't the main argument for this kind of system that you get better at what you like to do? If so why are things like morale and health increases spread out on seemingly random skill trees. It means that if i want to be a great leader I have to use polearms for some reason?

This^. The skill tree is a jumbled mess.

 

[Gmaxhunter]

Only if leveling in and of itself is more of an incentive than maxing a skill. Generally the best implementations of this system avoid that - in an ideal world, once I've hit the maximum in my chosen skills there's no longer any purpose to levelling up my character because doing so won't benefit my chosen playstyle.
The issue with the system at present is that you can't top out a given skill without investing in a bunch of other skills simply to be able to raise your level to the point you can top out in your chosen skills, which forces the opposite behaviour - if I want to max my one handed, I have to invest in every other skill in order to be able to invest in one-handed.

I suspect it'd be easily fixed if they just removed the skill caps and had focus points purely increase the speed at which you gain in a given skill rather than limiting how much you can gain in the skill, and allow companions to cover for skills you don't want to invest in.

Well... I think that's exactly how it works if i'm not mistaken

I'm acuatlly loving the new system. It IS more realistic and at the same time, allows you to level up in any area you feel like, even if slower from the lack of invested points.
You gain levels slower than before, but it's still nice when you do. Companions are too slow indeed, i agree with who says that, but other than that, the system is great IMO

 

[Gmaxhunter]

People seem to be saying Warband's leveling system was not a chore. That getting your skills or your companions' was not a grind. What the hell people ? Are your memories this short ? Of COURSE it was a bloody grind, and worst of all, the only way of leveling was by killing stuff, basically. Quests gave some too and, sure, not all quests involved heavy fighting, but damn.

The feeling I get from readingyou guys' posts is that you want to be quickly done with the core of your character's leveling and skills and then get onto the relations / renown grind. Basically, how Warband was played in theory (once again, skilling up in Warband definitely was a chore too).

A lot of the more obscure skills are easy to level up in Bannerlord. And at least, with this system, I get to choose the way I want to play with the confidence that the vast majority of productive actions will net me some advancement towards the next level. I LOVE the new system. Sure it takes longer to become a uber war machine, and sure it makes it more tedious to level companions up the way you want them to.

I will agree with one thing though : it could use balancing, and perhaps better means of leveling some skills (trainers and books, basically). Maybe make it faster in general ? Not even sure about that one, maybe put it as a setting?

EDIT : I also want to say, after reading some stuff about having companions that are "blank slates". It would indeed break immersion for me to find grown adults with absolutely 0 skills. However, we have (or will soon have) the ability to have children ! Isn't that exactly what we need here ? If you want an elite doctor in your clan, just get your first character to make moneyz so that you have the resources for it.

Yes, you said exactly what I think.
+1

 

[Gmaxhunter]

Yes Mount And Blade was a grind, but it was a fun grind in the early game, this is not.

Yes it is. You're just trying to play warband when you are actually playing bannerlord. Start playing bannerlord, using the new systems, doing things that were hard/impossible before (like being a bandit or a merchant). You'll see it's actually a LOT better than before. If you try to grind your way to nobility by fighting bandits alone, you'll find it boring indeed. Embrace the new