Which leveling system do you prefer Warband or Bannerlord?

[Kentucky 『 ＨＥＩＧＵＩ 』 James]

Looking back at Warband it just seems silly now how you could get smarter by bashing heads in.

It's silly, but the alternative is to design the entire game so that the player doesn't intentionally do grindy stuff to get skills. It's something that requires total unity of game design, which taleworlds has never really been capable of.

I don't think it's just a question of numbers. I don't think warband's game loop (which is what bannerlord is basically) can support passive skill accumulation because it is inherently grindy by nature. You have hundreds of settlements which you capture the same way, infinitely respawning enemies and very little player skill involved along the way. There is no easy solution but I don't think just increasing the xp will do it.

 

[GetAssista]

The speed of skill development feels like the developers want us to feel the same frustration during gameplay that they felt during the 8 year development of the game

But this can be fixed with mods (when the instruments are there). The speed of leveling, the bonus points earned here and there, the skill teachers etc

 

[MrCookie]

I don't see the problem with players intentionally grinding stuff, any game can come down to that. I do see the problem with the amount of it required.
I don't see how it hurts to scale down the numbers. You are completely right about hundreds of settlements, this is exactly why this system works (with right numbers), because your character gets more and more expererience. I am not sure how skill is supposed to be involved in this though.

 

[Kipsta]

While I do like the system, I would also like it if we will see the more traditional M&B system in Bannerlord at some point through mods hopefully. Kinda missing the good feeling from seeing fat xp numbers when you kill elite troops and being able to spend points freely made it possible to plan out your character more easily. Then again maybe it all comes down to the current xp rates being whack and not even being able to experience the current system properly.

 

[rwhit85]

...at the end of the day the "learning by doing" method just incentivizes doing things to level up your character, rather than doing things because it's actually fun to do them.

This 100%. Games are supposed to be fun.

 

[Sundeki]

I'm not inherently opposed to the new system(It's not quite so anti-RPG as I thought, and I thought I'd dislike it more), it's just everything is downright tedious. Warband's system while 'uNIMmeRsIVE' created a leveling system tied to the most enjoyable part of the game: combat. And you could then choose what non-combat skills to level up from that in order to indirectly represent what your character is doing while they're e.g waiting in camp/town, moving around the world map, etc, and your growth as a character was tied to being skilled at the game with good combat ability and overworld time/resource management. You felt like you were in control of your levelling ability, once you understood the game mechanics. I feel like a passenger in my Bannerlord game right now.

And don't even get me started on the ****ing stamina bar for smithing.

 

[Deadh34d]

I actually really like the new levelling/skill system, but I do expect the numbers to be tweaked eventually. I like the perks too; I just wish that picking one wouldn't lock out another if there's multiple in the same tier.

 

[Friendly]

Personally I like the new leveling system, but I think the exp rates need to get changed for sure.

 

[Odione]

I have been playing for 10 hours in the same game and not a single companion has leveled up.

Most of them have too many levels so it's ultra slow for them to gain xp….

 

[Ken_Udigit]

After reading this, IMO I think most of you are just trying too level up too fast and be a jack of all trades. I'm not saying it's perfect, crafting for example is a bit of a chore, but overall it's not as bad as you all make it out to be.

1) Try putting more focus points into just 1 or 2 categories and see how fast they start going up when you use them. Even more if you have high attributes.

2) Tournaments and arena fights don't level up your skills AFAIK (although they should IMO), you need to actually fight battles in order to increase weapon/horse/movement skills. I think for every 2 or 3 looters I kill with my OH sword my OH skill goes up by 1, and I only have 1 focus on it, and 2 or 3 vigor. It doesn't feel like it's taking longer than in Warband at all.

3) Some one complained about medicine, in my second character I started with 2 intelligence, 0 focus in medicine, I get 1 or 2 wounded per battle. After a handful of battles and healing my guys, medicine went up by 2 or 3 (that I saw, could be more).

4) Again, this is supposed to take a while, otherwise by the time you've played 2 or 3 hours your character is invincible and you have no where to go. Keep in mind, most of the basic troops you can recruit start out at level 6, your character starts at level 1.

 

[Hachaman]

I love the new levelling system, if you want fun, play Assasins Creed. This is Mount & Blade: blood, sweat, and tears.

 

[Archonsod]

It's silly, but the alternative is to design the entire game so that the player doesn't intentionally do grindy stuff to get skills. It's something that requires total unity of game design, which taleworlds has never really been capable of.

I don't think you'd need to. The problem is the stat roadblock under the current system; since your skill cap is dictated by it's associated attribute you need to raise those attributes to raise the cap, but as you only get an attribute point every three levels, and levels are tied to skill gain, you end up hitting the skill cap fairly early and are forced to do something else simply to get the next extension to the cap. This leads to a vicious circle - if you want to focus on a specific stat you're only raising the skill cap for it's associated three skills, assuming (as seems quite likely) you hit the cap on those three skills before you can maximise the attribute you're now stuck in a bit of a rut with relatively low attributes (and thus skill caps) in other areas but needing those skill advancements to be able to increase the skill cap in the area you're actually interested in, thus forcing you to grind in other areas where possible simply to increase the one skill you're actually interested in.

Removing the cap would remove the need for grinding, albeit you could still do it should you wish. Without the cap the skills you actually use advance naturally while those you ignore can remain ignored, and you'd level alongside your skill progression up to the point it hits the limit, at which point leveling shouldn't be an issue to begin with.

 

[Maelstrom8]

Like that other post said, the game is pretty much over by the time you are able to get the perk that allows you to upgrade bandits in your party. Everything just needs to be tweaked or reworked.

 

[Rhugar]

The system is good, just unbalanced at the moment. Like everything concerning the pace of the game.

This!

Levelling is slow as heck. Where on the other side the nations are at warring eachother at an alarming pace. Roleplay and immersion? Not easy when all the lords are constantly on campaigns with the armies. I don't think I've seen more than 4 lords in theirs castles in my 20 hours of playtime.
So player progress is slow, where-as the world becomes one or two colours before you can even lvl up a companion xd

 

[Sekij]

I like it too as an idea. Everyone too. It sounds immersive, right? Makes every playthrough different. In theory. What if Final Fantasy had that too? Well they did, in II (JP). They scrapped that afterwards.

That sounds like bad war propaganda Journalism xD of course they (FF2) Scraped that... they always do a new System from Game to game.

 

[Ironking]

I like the new system but like other said it need some tweaking with the number.
Saying that there still needs to be some way to improve a skill without grinding to better customise your character.
One thing I could think of are trainers who you can pay money to train you in a certain skill.

 

[Horrux]

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 trading isn't actually an infinitely repeatable task in the usual sense, such as the "craft 10,000 potions" you would do in TES to get good alchemy. Trading takes time, and you can't just trade WHATEVER, you have to think things through. So it may be technically "infinitely repeatable" but in reality you can't do ONLY that. You have to at least move around and look for opportunities. But then again WHY WOULD YOU do only that when there are so many more things to do in a M&B game!?

 

[Timmortal]

The new system is vastly superior to the old one, but it needs balancing, some skills needs other ways to earn XP, for instance a camp function that gives you, or the companion you you give the task enigneering xp. Sending you companions out on scouting missions that gives them scouting xp (something i personally think will come to the game.) Some numbers are off, Taleworlds will get the numbers from the thusands of people now playing and tweek them over time. Remember, this is an unfinished system, Taleworlds have said perks and things are still missing. My main beef so far has been that we might be getting companions at a too high level and you barely see them get any progress before you start having several major battles. would be more fun if they were lower level and we had more of a choice in their development. but i dont think, that in the future in Bannerlord, we will be getting more tasks for our companions, that will help them level up certain stats, like setting our rogue companion up as a local gang leader will lead to xp in that catagory. as such all skills will end up having tasks that give them xp.

 

[Marcquez]

Needs tweaking, but like the concept and basics

 

[Bladeson]

Yep, the leveling concept is cool BUT... it's horribly balanced currently. I'm sure TaleWorlds didn't intend for it to be this bad, hopefully XP gains are increased soon.