Which leveling system do you prefer Warband or Bannerlord?

Which has the better leveling system?

  • Warband

  • Bannerlord


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Starting with 1, Your character still can't be good at things you don't train for. One game I made a Xbow user. Next I made a sword guy. You get bored of the playthrough eventually, map is already mostly painted or going to be, or you just want to write a different story. It's not like your guy can pick up a weapon they've never used and dominate with it. Considering that the rest of the group who specializes will be able to fight way harder guys than the dude who tried to be a martial artist - xbow user. But, the martial artist - xbow user can run really fast and dodge well, so there is a class unto itself, not as good at shooting as pure xbow, or at fighting as martial artist, but good enough at shooting to be ok and able to keep alive long enough for help to arrive.

What you're looking for in variety is better served by more meaningful alternatives to being a mercenary/slaver/farm pillager/venture capitalist until you become king. What if they fleshed out banditry and there were legitimate reasons to use throwing weapons and have a bad reputation, that this could be another path to being king and ruling through fear instead of honor. Or maybe you can 'redeem' yourself in the eyes of the people and turn your life around depending on what you do. That would be really interesting for reasons that have nothing to do with focus point allocations.

Making it so because you are good at managing a settlement and fighting you can't also be good at running an army too because running an army and running a settlement use different stat points but for some unknown reason you can be a good medic is a fairly obtuse way to force 'unique' characters.

Actual gameplay variety is the order of the day to get what you desire here, and there are much better ways than simple character stats.

2 Technically Kenshi is a large scale warfare game in many of the same ways that M&B is. Battles can easily feature a similar number of onscreen combatants as in Warband in some areas. Both games have rudimentary strategy in terms of positioning and attack orders, but nothing to the level of a tactical wargame or a CRPG. So I make a very fair comparison. Especially considering you can have any number of 'castles' and villages that you can build and defend against sieges while destroying other factions. Its a lot more similar than you think. We certainly seen a lot of Warband refugees hungry for something similar while waiting for Bannerlord on reddit when Kenshi came out. They all made the same comparison - not exactly the same but quite similar feeling of starting a nobody and becoming whatever you want if you work for it. The interface is certainly different, and Kenshi is just giving orders not action like M&B, but very similar in a lot of ways.

Also consider that you get actual quests in Bannerlord. With actual dungeons no less! - bandit lairs - that you clear for loot(!). That's pretty 'open world' and 'adventure' to me. Hell, M&B has a lot more in common with most adventure style games than you're letting on. :razz:

3 The softcap is more of a way to make reaching 100 a challenging quest in itself. You'll have to capture at least 1 of the strongest boss type characters in the game and fight them arena style. It's not undoable, but it's not something that you're like 'OK, gotta go get the hardest guy and fight him for skillups before I leave the beginning area.' Type of thing. Think of it this way, if you conquered essentially all of Calradia, the last challenge you might decide is to reach level 63. So you might keep a kingdom alive just to farm xp till you get there. Not something that will define the playthrough, but something to do before you reroll. If you're into that sort of thing. I don't see how the softcap in WB enraged anybody, I don't think that's a very fair point. :razz:

One final point, addressing your changing classes on the battlefield, that is actually kinda realistic. To some extent. Depending on how liberal your interpretation. In medieval Japan samurai would first dual with bows, then fight with spear and sword. So they change from archer to spearman with backup sword. They were also the ruling class who were able horsemen that practiced horse archery. So very high level archery, spear, sword, horse riding and settlement management. Oh, and many of them were talented poets on top of it all. That this is impossible in Bannerlord is very unrealistic, at the very least. Certainly very disappointing that it isn't even an achievable long term goal like ruling the world.

Because it being easier to literally conquer the world than be good at leading an army, fighting in close quarters, engaging in archery and managing your community even though people did those very things in real life and it was no more or less uncommon than talented university students. That's good gameplay?

Actually you can pretty much pick up any weapon and wouldn't notice a bit of difference no matter what your skill is. Most enemies you'd one shot, you'll still one shot, most you'd two shot, you'll still two shot... you might save one swing every 10-15 kills but there really isn't much difference.
 
Actually you can pretty much pick up any weapon and wouldn't notice a bit of difference no matter what your skill is. Most enemies you'd one shot, you'll still one shot, most you'd two shot, you'll still two shot... you might save one swing every 10-15 kills but there really isn't much difference.

And that's the problem with the skill/weapon proficiency currently, it seem almost completely meaningless to train it, cause those perk mostly just useless. That make peoples complain the slow progress even more cause eventually they will feel like it was a chore, especially in early game with some skill soft lock and some abilities so hard to train.

Starting with 1, Your character still can't be good at things you don't train for. One game I made a Xbow user. Next I made a sword guy. You get bored of the playthrough eventually, map is already mostly painted or going to be, or you just want to write a different story. It's not like your guy can pick up a weapon they've never used and dominate with it. Considering that the rest of the group who specializes will be able to fight way harder guys than the dude who tried to be a martial artist - xbow user. But, the martial artist - xbow user can run really fast and dodge well, so there is a class unto itself, not as good at shooting as pure xbow, or at fighting as martial artist, but good enough at shooting to be ok and able to keep alive long enough for help to arrive.

What you're looking for in variety is better served by more meaningful alternatives to being a mercenary/slaver/farm pillager/venture capitalist until you become king. What if they fleshed out banditry and there were legitimate reasons to use throwing weapons and have a bad reputation, that this could be another path to being king and ruling through fear instead of honor. Or maybe you can 'redeem' yourself in the eyes of the people and turn your life around depending on what you do. That would be really interesting for reasons that have nothing to do with focus point allocations.

Making it so because you are good at managing a settlement and fighting you can't also be good at running an army too because running an army and running a settlement use different stat points but for some unknown reason you can be a good medic is a fairly obtuse way to force 'unique' characters.

Actual gameplay variety is the order of the day to get what you desire here, and there are much better ways than simple character stats.

2 Technically Kenshi is a large scale warfare game in many of the same ways that M&B is. Battles can easily feature a similar number of onscreen combatants as in Warband in some areas. Both games have rudimentary strategy in terms of positioning and attack orders, but nothing to the level of a tactical wargame or a CRPG. So I make a very fair comparison. Especially considering you can have any number of 'castles' and villages that you can build and defend against sieges while destroying other factions. Its a lot more similar than you think. We certainly seen a lot of Warband refugees hungry for something similar while waiting for Bannerlord on reddit when Kenshi came out. They all made the same comparison - not exactly the same but quite similar feeling of starting a nobody and becoming whatever you want if you work for it. The interface is certainly different, and Kenshi is just giving orders not action like M&B, but very similar in a lot of ways.

Also consider that you get actual quests in Bannerlord. With actual dungeons no less! - bandit lairs - that you clear for loot(!). That's pretty 'open world' and 'adventure' to me. Hell, M&B has a lot more in common with most adventure style games than you're letting on. :razz:

3 The softcap is more of a way to make reaching 100 a challenging quest in itself. You'll have to capture at least 1 of the strongest boss type characters in the game and fight them arena style. It's not undoable, but it's not something that you're like 'OK, gotta go get the hardest guy and fight him for skillups before I leave the beginning area.' Type of thing. Think of it this way, if you conquered essentially all of Calradia, the last challenge you might decide is to reach level 63. So you might keep a kingdom alive just to farm xp till you get there. Not something that will define the playthrough, but something to do before you reroll. If you're into that sort of thing. I don't see how the softcap in WB enraged anybody, I don't think that's a very fair point. :razz:

One final point, addressing your changing classes on the battlefield, that is actually kinda realistic. To some extent. Depending on how liberal your interpretation. In medieval Japan samurai would first dual with bows, then fight with spear and sword. So they change from archer to spearman with backup sword. They were also the ruling class who were able horsemen that practiced horse archery. So very high level archery, spear, sword, horse riding and settlement management. Oh, and many of them were talented poets on top of it all. That this is impossible in Bannerlord is very unrealistic, at the very least. Certainly very disappointing that it isn't even an achievable long term goal like ruling the world.

Because it being easier to literally conquer the world than be good at leading an army, fighting in close quarters, engaging in archery and managing your community even though people did those very things in real life and it was no more or less uncommon than talented university students. That's good gameplay?

1. Yeah, they can implement a press F5 to win and make the game unnecessary shallow as well. But it's nothing wrong to give the game more depths, tactics, layer etc. If you only train some of the skills in 1 playthrough then it's the same as the system in Bannerlord.

E.g. It's like let you creating your army instead using a 5 factions army setting, if you can create your own army then you will feel more "freedom", but in the end it would make the game more monotone / shallow and that's not a good thing in game. Game need tactics, lore and depths to be a masterpiece just like any arts. It's like saying why not using acoustic instrument to compose a heavy metal. You can, but it's a trade off and not improvements.

2. I certainly don't see me rolling and dodging vs some boss in singleplayer/multiplayer in Bannerlord. But given you compare it to warband i can maybe understanding a bit. I generally prefer Fire and Sword over Warband cause Warband is too focus on RPG element that it make you too OP after certain level and equipments in game. Fire and Sword is more balance in a way even you had highest tier armor and proficiency on you you can still 1-2 hit by the "fire" they add in their game . So in some way you still quite OP in term of cheesing those AI but it required you to have actual tactics and skill and not a brainless hack and slash RPG game like Warband character after certain level.

3. I mean the rewards, if there is no rewards in maxing that stats (plus some enraging not realistic progressing speed) then it's not a progressing system, it's a bad design chore. And a chore should not existed in game cause nobody will buy it.

4. It's still realistic in Bannerlord, just not "EVERY" weapon. They give you a max of 25 focus points, which you can max 5 kind of skills out of 15 or be top in 3 skill and mediocore in other 3-4 skills, the choice is yours.
 
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The current leveling system is, at best, irrelevant. I can complete a whole game (definition of "whole game" will vary) without ever bothering to look at the character skills screen. With so many other productive things to focus on it's just not worth the effort.

It's like quicksand: Early on I was lead to believe that it would be more important than it actually is.
 
The current leveling system is, at best, irrelevant. I can complete a whole game (definition of "whole game" will vary) without ever bothering to look at the character skills screen. With so many other productive things to focus on it's just not worth the effort.

It's like quicksand: Early on I was lead to believe that it would be more important than it actually is.

Yeah, that's the issue currently. You can currently shoot normally in bow without even had more than 10 point in the skill, they should make you suffer accuracy, drawing speed, damage and holding opened bow length etc, and not just 9-10 extra damage from perk.Currently I just assumed they haven't even finished the skill system yet cause some perk only partially work and some even don't work.

Also, the encounter qualities need to be increase considerable to make this game a little challenging, however fun the combat is, you can only charge 7-15 looters with 200 armies for that long.
 
I feel the levelling system is the worst thing about the game. There are plenty of other issues but I can at least see how those can improve, while I feel like progression is doomed by design. Things take forever to advance, its not possible to advance all skills equally, and even when you do advance most of the time it doesn't actually have an impact on gameplay. Swinging a sword feels exactly the same at 100 skill as it did at 10 so whats the point? I also hate being capped arbitrarily, and attributes are totally meaningless. Having also watched similar system fail hard in other games I just can;t wait till someone mods it out in favour of something less pants-on-head.
 
As you and others have said, I think it's too slow... and the more time I've invested in the game, the slower it seems to get. I'd also like to observe that my companions, one of whom I picked up at the beginning of the game, as far as I can tell, level so slowly as to almost never level. As far as I can tell, one of my four companions has received one a single skill point (in one-handed swords). That's it. On that topic, since you can assign roles to companions, shouldn't they become experts in those areas?

The renown system also progresses slowly. I understand this game is a slow burn, but this seems like barely a simmer. Perhaps starting options would be a nice addition. I just installed the tweak mod to play with it, but am not sure it's working with my existing saves.

As an aside, I hope that all of the grammatical errors and that female characters seem to have been added as an afterthought will be addressed (the main character is referred to as a man, except when people say that they've heard about the woman who can fight as a man, of course).

All this typed, I'm loving the game and only hope that, like a few other titles I followed through alphas and betas, that I don't get burnt out on it before it's even done. It's great. That I'm enjoying this title so much, oddly, is the only reason I'm nitpicking... but I want to belay all of that with letting people know how great it is.
 
Yeah, that's the issue currently. You can currently shoot normally in bow without even had more than 10 point in the skill, they should make you suffer accuracy, drawing speed, damage and holding opened bow length etc, and not just 9-10 extra damage from perk. Currently I just assumed they haven't even finished the skill system yet cause some perk only partially work and some even don't work.

Also, the encounter qualities need to be increase considerable to make this game a little challenging, however fun the combat is, you can only charge 7-15 looters with 200 armies for that long.

Ha! I can't shoot "normally" with bows worth my life. The mechanics don't make sense to me. The system presently appears to be broken. Why? While on horseback, arrows don't shoot where you're aiming - They travel in the direction your horse is facing. I've not used a bow on foot. According to... reality, arrows normally shoot where you're pointing. If not, that'd be a neat trick. As things move fast in battle, especially while on a horse and swiveling to target enemies, bows become useless (and I regret having put several points into the skill - especially since leveling is so slow). EDIT: Surely I'm not the only person experiencing this. I know. Don't call you Shirley.

When you have that large an army, aren't you supposed to be conquering the world? Also, I'd think that at that point, with certain exceptions (those enemies who've been konked on the head), enemies would smile and lay down their arms instead of fighting - either because of the size of your army and/or your renown. Since there's a dialog option there, it's my hope that this is a feature that just hasn't been addressed yet.
 
It's hard to level but every level is rewarding. An extra companion, workshop, army capacity, create army etc etc.
Hard to level because there's so much activity split example
roguery levels by walking on difficult terrain and raid hideouts that's something you don't do so often
charm by talking and gifting to nobles another skill thas useful but very boring to level
strategy By simmulating battles, something I only do when i'm sure no one is lost
Bit by bit my character levels in different points. I like this I just hoped some of the skills weren't so boring to level
 
To be fair the leveling system wouldn't be so bad if the game had more content. For instance quests to level up blacksmithing by creating X amount of swords or combat by fighting in arena. I think the biggest problem as of right now is that the game itself is entirely too easy once you get past the initial part of being a bum. Once a kingdom starts to get a leg up they steam roll the map with or without your help, and since this game is built around that as a concept, it is essentially over once that happens making the demanding leveling system pretty worthless. In Warband, even if a faction got a leg up, it actually became more difficult because everyone would go to war with you and certain lords would hate you. Here it seems like none of that is implemented as of yet so the more land, the more power. If they were to make the game somehow last longer per playthrough, (a lot longer) or add in more quest type content that independently raised levels slightly faster, it would probably sort it out, either would suffice. As of now, which it is in early access, the leveling system doesn't really fit the game, but I hope they have a plan.
 
To be fair the leveling system wouldn't be so bad if the game had more content. For instance quests to level up blacksmithing by creating X amount of swords or combat by fighting in arena. I think the biggest problem as of right now is that the game itself is entirely too easy once you get past the initial part of being a bum. Once a kingdom starts to get a leg up they steam roll the map with or without your help, and since this game is built around that as a concept, it is essentially over once that happens making the demanding leveling system pretty worthless. In Warband, even if a faction got a leg up, it actually became more difficult because everyone would go to war with you and certain lords would hate you. Here it seems like none of that is implemented as of yet so the more land, the more power. If they were to make the game somehow last longer per playthrough, (a lot longer) or add in more quest type content that independently raised levels slightly faster, it would probably sort it out, either would suffice. As of now, which it is in early access, the leveling system doesn't really fit the game, but I hope they have a plan.

Variety in quests like this is a really good idea. It can let players concentrate on what they want to concentrate on to progress their character, while not ultimately feeling like they are wasting time or grinding as much.

As far as it being easy, yeah I'm pretty bad at the game and really railroading armies once you figure out a couple tactics.
 
There it is. I'm hopeful the system will feel a lot smoother once we have more to do and games strength a little longer.

Same, I'm very optimistic about all this. Despite all the current issues, I think the developers did a great job at setting themselves up in a way that allows them to pump out content as they see fit.

Obviously they need to kink out the bugs first and foremost in my opinion, but with how active they have been I'm very pleased!
 
Same, I'm very optimistic about all this. Despite all the current issues, I think the developers did a great job at setting themselves up in a way that allows them to pump out content as they see fit.

Obviously they need to kink out the bugs first and foremost in my opinion, but with how active they have been I'm very pleased!

Agreed! It's not every day a developer goes a full week with daily patches right out of the gate, let alone while working from home. I'm really impressed with their work.
 
I also hate being capped arbitrarily, and attributes are totally meaningless. Having also watched similar system fail hard in other games I just can;t wait till someone mods it out in favour of something less pants-on-head.
I guess there are no caps. It is just a bug that slows down progression to zero without focus points,
 
The current leveling system doesn't exist.

XP gain is bugged to the seventh hell.
XP multipliers are bugged to the seventh hell.
Perks are bugged to the seventh hell.

That being said, I reallly like the idea behind it. I really like the idea of getting better at trading by conducting profitable trade operations, if that wasn't bugged. Or getting better at charm by trying to convince other NPCs, if that wasn't bugged.


But the way it's set up right now, makes you want to level up non-relevant skills in order to level up, which is stupid. The main attributes shouldn't influence XP growth, or at least not by much. And they should make them have a relevant effect like in Warband, otherwise the 'ding' you get from leveling up your character instead of feeling rewarding makes you feel dread knowing now you have to somehow get 125 new SP to level up again.
 
That being said, I reallly like the idea behind it. I really like the idea of getting better at trading by conducting profitable trade operation
But the way it's set up right now, makes you want to level up non-relevant skills in order to level up, which is stupid.
Thats why they need to change only ONE thing to make it perfect.

Make the "global" XP bank that will lvl up you instead of just "rise few skills 100 times to lvl up" Becouse it is obvious that it is more easy to rise skill from 5 to 6 then from 300 to 301. Thats why right now you are super swardsman and archer, but you are throwing axes to looters cos want another lvl up.
 
The current leveling system doesn't exist.

XP gain is bugged to the seventh hell.
XP multipliers are bugged to the seventh hell.
Perks are bugged to the seventh hell.

That being said, I reallly like the idea behind it. I really like the idea of getting better at trading by conducting profitable trade operations, if that wasn't bugged. Or getting better at charm by trying to convince other NPCs, if that wasn't bugged.


But the way it's set up right now, makes you want to level up non-relevant skills in order to level up, which is stupid. The main attributes shouldn't influence XP growth, or at least not by much. And they should make them have a relevant effect like in Warband, otherwise the 'ding' you get from leveling up your character instead of feeling rewarding makes you feel dread knowing now you have to somehow get 125 new SP to level up again.
Another problem is that fighting skill level doesn't have much of a noticeable effect. Playing a 5 skill One-Handed character or a 125 skill One-Handed character doesn't feel that much different which takes away a lot from the sense of progression. The perks are one way of rewarding progression but they shouldn't be the only thing. I think the balance they striked in Viking Conquest was perfect. Your character never felt overwhelmingly godlike, but there was still a concrete sense of improvement over the course of time.

Right now, after 40 hours of gameplay my character feels the same as when I started except I have more money and renown.
 
Another problem is that fighting skill level doesn't have much of a noticeable effect. Playing a 5 skill One-Handed character or a 125 skill One-Handed character doesn't feel that much different which takes away a lot from the sense of progression. The perks are one way of rewarding progression but they shouldn't be the only thing. I think the balance they striked in Viking Conquest was perfect. Your character never felt overwhelmingly godlike, but there was still a concrete sense of improvement over the course of time.

Right now, after 40 hours of gameplay my character feels the same as when I started except I have more money and renown.
It is true.

For example in original MnB or warband horse archery with 1 bow skill is just impossible task. And with 400 you are the frkn Robin Hood.
 
Thats why they need to change only ONE thing to make it perfect.

Make the "global" XP bank that will lvl up you.
So you would still level up trade by doing trade, but level up your char not by number of SP but by the global xp accrued?
If that's what you mean I guess that makes sense and seems like a simple enough solution, yeah. (y)

(But please, still make the main attributes do something besides speeding up XP)
 
So you would still level up trade by doing trade, but level up your char not by number of SP but by the global xp accrued?
If that's what you mean I guess that makes sense and seems like a simple enough solution, yeah. (y)
Exactly. It is simple as hell(becouse we already have XP from all active actions) and it solve all problems.

And we need just one another tweaks to make it perfect:

XP from kills or more XP from damaging high lvl foes. To reward player for fighting harder enemies

I already sugessted it. But i guess my english is too bad(my teacher of english was Game of Thrones and Breaking bad), so no one can understand what am i talking about.
 
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