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SP - UI Why was Old Troop Assignment System removed?
- Thread starter AngryPanCake
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I also would like the old system returned. I believe it gave the player alot more control over where I could place my troops! I could make any type of formation of troops with the old system! I can make companion or training groups. I also could mix and match different types of troops If I wanted to, I could separate my bow and crossbowmen. With the current filters especially as they are bot working correctly I have no control just 4 basic groups!
AngryPanCake
Sergeant
I don't think the "old system" is going to return.
The new OoB has probably taken some time to create/Test/Implement and doubt they are just going to discard time/effort to go back.
Personally, I thought the old system worked just fine and I did not read any posts complaining about it.
There was already an OoB prior to 1.7.0 for siege battles and I feel they just needed to add it to non siege battles. That would have been the simplest way to improve the battle system and there would have not been any of these conversations. No need to reinvent the wheel, just expand what was working and nobody had complained about. This would have also saved a lot of time and effort to focus on what people complain about and try to fix actual issues.
But again, I remain hopeful they will fix the new OoB as it does bring a few new features such as ammo for missile troops and assignment of formation leaders...etc. .
Adryl
Regular
I frankly cannot believe that they removed the ability to assign Companions and family members to specific formations. Whaaaaat! One of the fundamental gameplay loops is to assign all clan members to a formation, have them follow and attack together as a clan. Hello! WTF. I bet at least 90% of players do this at some point. Removing this capability is so out-of-touch it's hard to even fathom. It's literally one of the few gameplay loops that a player can even do that isn't just massive battle after massive battle. Basic M&B gameplay 101.
Yes, give us back the ability to assign companions/clan members to one specific formation as troops. Obviously. Can't believe this even needs to be stated.
Yes, give us back the ability to assign companions/clan members to one specific formation as troops. Obviously. Can't believe this even needs to be stated.
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the new system is less versatile. I can no longer mix troops as i please.
I assume there was a reason to remove flexibility and choice from the player,
Why, just WHY?
from my point of view it looks like wasted programming time, something TW clearly can't afford to waste looking at the state of the game after 2 years
I assume there was a reason to remove flexibility and choice from the player,
Why, just WHY?
from my point of view it looks like wasted programming time, something TW clearly can't afford to waste looking at the state of the game after 2 years
AngryPanCake
Sergeant
I think the goal was to add formation captains, which in my opinion adds a lot to the battle system. They also added pre-battle deployment to all battles instead of just sieges. Which could have been added without removing the old assignment system.
However, what @MRay said that because companions were "fluid" in their equipment, it was not possible to assign them on the Party UI then reassign them in the pre-battle deployment screen. Which is understandable.
In my opinion, they just need to expand the filters to allow tier assignment in addition to the current armor/equipment filters.
However, what @MRay said that because companions were "fluid" in their equipment, it was not possible to assign them on the Party UI then reassign them in the pre-battle deployment screen. Which is understandable.
In my opinion, they just need to expand the filters to allow tier assignment in addition to the current armor/equipment filters.
+1 For mixing old and new system.
For the love of whatever the Calradians believe in, I can't fathom, why it was necessary for the old assignment system to be removed, design wise they don't bite each other.
Bring back as an addition, NOT as replacement for the new system, to sort the troops into formations once again from the party screen.
And honestly, if it is an issue with the coding side, that for whatever reason they can't coexist, then retract the new system and bring back the old system.
Atleast I didn't ask for this pre-battle ordering of formations feature, I can't remember other players having specifically asked for it. I was perfectly used to order my troops quickly in the old system, before enemy units approached my position (in some cases the enemy AI was waiting and not moving, giving more time to do so). So I could live with it, if you roll back this feature, bring back the old formation management via the party screen, adapt your new, fancy pre-battle formation system, so they can work together.
For the love of whatever the Calradians believe in, I can't fathom, why it was necessary for the old assignment system to be removed, design wise they don't bite each other.
Bring back as an addition, NOT as replacement for the new system, to sort the troops into formations once again from the party screen.
And honestly, if it is an issue with the coding side, that for whatever reason they can't coexist, then retract the new system and bring back the old system.
Atleast I didn't ask for this pre-battle ordering of formations feature, I can't remember other players having specifically asked for it. I was perfectly used to order my troops quickly in the old system, before enemy units approached my position (in some cases the enemy AI was waiting and not moving, giving more time to do so). So I could live with it, if you roll back this feature, bring back the old formation management via the party screen, adapt your new, fancy pre-battle formation system, so they can work together.
Not only "tier assignment", we need to return the ability to assign any unit to any group. For example, sometimes it is necessary to mix pikemen on foot and on horseback in one detachment, in some cases such a mixture is appropriate
But you can't foresee everything, in reality people play in ALL POSSIBLE ways, so the old behavior needs to be returned
2021: developers broke sorting
2022: (hopefully) the developers fixed the sorting back (harder and worse, probably)
What should I play now? Please fix it soon
Yes good idea, please when can we get the extra card formation slot specifically for heroes? As i use heroes as my bodyguards, your recent updates to the game have remvoed the party formation interface so we now want something that can compensate this such as a specific hero card slot. We would also like to have the ability to use are strongest troops as a bodyguard (although you have said previously that migh tnot be possible) Alot of us are short on time, we work alot or have busy lives and don't have much time to read all the forums on all the games we play, suggest, vote or provide constructive criticism on continiously but I know the vast majority of M&B Bannerlord players DO WANT THIS sorted. The removal of previous party formation/trrop assignment selection in the Party screen (To move, set and adjust troops/heroes to our liking) was a huge killing and did affect the majority, of course we know about swings and roundabouts, bad comes with the good, fully understand game is still in development and all of this but please just try and find a way to sort this so we can atleast have a HERO formation card specifically for them in battle.... But just keep in mind if a hero specific selection card is brought in (Which most of us do want) we still want the ability to place our Heroes as commanders of other formations (Troops like we have now) Hopefully this can come with next update or soon as you can... Thank you!
P.S - Have you peeps got an update yet on the hero formation card implementation?
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ClickForFreeBeer
Recruit
If merging the old system with the new Order of Battle system is unfavourable, then there's a few additions that must be made to the new system to restore the previous system's functionality:
- 'Hero' filter. Most players used the old system to keep non-combatants off the front lines or to assign personal bodyguards to the player. The AI seems to chuck spare heroes (who aren't leading a formation) into their own formation anyway, so seems weird we can't do that too.
- Tier filters. Checkboxes for each tier (maybe just underneath the slide bar?) would allow us to exclude certain tiers from a formation and would return the functionality of having a unit dedicated to training new (or quest) troops, as well as keep veterans in reserve for when they're needed (like real-life triarii).
- Fixing the preference filters to be more strict, rather than have some kind of RNG as they seem to now. If the players wants to make a javelin or a shield regiment, for example, then troops who don't meet those criteria should NOT be moved to the new regiment unless all those who do have been selected already.
ClickForFreeBeer
Recruit
Hard disagree with this bit.
The old system was in no way perfect:
- The amount of micro-management was tedious, especially when done often or when one has a lot of different troops in their party (the amount of times I switched a formation around and forgot about the one troop type who died and thus was in a formation by themselves when I next recruited one, etc.)
- Couldn't be done immediately before battle due to the party screen being blocked, which was incredibly annoying when getting caught.
- Most people seemed to hate having to rush to assess the terrain they've just been plopped down in with the enemy rushing towards them, and then order people about/split up groups. It's fine if going for simple formations but a lot of people want to try more complicated stuff which requires time to set up... not to mention how imprecise the movement orders can be on some terrains. People were moaning about the old level 25 tactics perk (which said it'd allow you to place troops before the battle actually begun) not actually working, so clearly people wanted this.
The new system is so much better for using the terrain to your advantage (before it was like the player was asleep on their horse and woke up right before the battle) and for convenience, it just needs improving to restore the most important bits of functionality the old one had.
We're working on some UI design changes to support "assigning lords in the encounter". This is experimental and not %100 confirmed yet. So stay tuned.
We're also working on tier preference filters for formations. Prefer High Tier and Prefer Low Tier.
We thought about this before implementing the feature but after some internal tests it was clear that it caused bad user experience. We had to disable filters across formations allow troops to go to at least one formation. Since hard-forcing filters would make some troops start the encounter formationless and we don't support that.
Second, this makes sliders less useful. %50 on a slider doesn't mean %50 of the troops of that type anymore. When the filtered troop number is reached, increasing the slider doesn't move any more troops/change troop count in the formation. Which feels weird. Or the slider needs to represent "%50 of infantry that has thrown weapons and shields". Which in turn makes the OoB as a whole hard to use. "%50 of infantry that has thrown weapons and shields" + "%70 of infantry troops" is hard to understand, sum up and keep track for the player.
All in all, it results in a bad experience.
let's hope everything works out
Nice!
Totally understandable, thanks for the heads up!
ClickForFreeBeer
Recruit
Good to hear!
Also good news, but I hope it won't work like the heavy armour one, where it works up until a point and then shoves troops in randomly regardless of their relative armour rating.
I wasn't advocating for that, I'll be more clear that what I suggested is similar to how the sliders work now, I was just saying that the filters are quite vague at the moment and don't work well to distinguish a particular troop type, especially when we have to negatively filter (e.g. i have a shield preference formation so the unfiltered regiment would be my shock troops, but there would still be a few non-shielded in the shielded and vice-versa). It might help this to just have a lot more filters, especially those associated with that troops role (e.g. shock infantry, skirmisher) and have corresponding tags on the troops. For example, troops with throwing knives and rocks are included in the thrown weapon formation but that's not really useful to making a skirmisher formation.
Yeah, I was commenting on this aspect of the suggestion. Selecting a filter and only moving troops that are applicable to that filter, messes with the slider since let's say the slider is at %50 and shield filter is active. If less than %50 of the infantry have shields, the slider now means something else. Even though the slider is at %50, the formation won't have %50 of the infantry. And that's hard to keep track.
Hope I'm understanding your point correctly.
ClickForFreeBeer
Recruit
Not quite. I'm saying in this particular example there are simultaneously both shielded troops in the non-shielded formation and unshielded troops in the shielded at the same time, as in there are still troops who fit the criteria who have not been included, in favour of those who don't. I think it mostly happens when multiple filters are active and interacting with each other, but it's making the sliders a bit more a of a chore than they should be.
Actually you've reminded me that it's also a pain to continuously adjust the sliders every battle due to wounded/killed/recruited affecting the overall percentages of the formation. You have to watch the formation closely to see the point when random troops get included, which gets annoying and tbf the old system did have the advantage of being able to 'fire and forget' with particular units, so that all troops of that type would be automatically filed into the correct formation without constant micro-management. It'd at least be nice to get some indication on the UI when you've run out of the preferred troops so you don't have to manually scour both formations to see if they're all there.
Perhaps if you guys were planning to implement the other formations tags other than the main four (infantry, ranged, cavalry, and horse archer), such as 'Skirmisher', then this would be less of an issue? I don't know if you guys stuck with the main four for simplicity, or to not get in the way of a player's custom formations, but with the current system I find merging two formations is much easier than splitting one into two. Perhaps maybe reintroduce them as some sort of sub-class of the main troop type (as I'm assuming it'd mess up the sliders if for example Battanian Wildlings didn't count as infantry but instead a skirm), because the current filters aren't all that helpful for making custom regiments unless you just have a favourable troop combination. For example, the 'polearm' filter isn't particularly helpful because most infantry and cavalry (not inc. HA) have a spear of some kind, so you have to play around for ages, put filters such as 'shielded' on other formations, just to get something of a pike line. Every troop line should have be designed with a role in mind, so if they are designated a role in the .xml then they should perform well in that role in the game... if they don't, then that's just an issue with troop design, not OoB.
Yep, that would be very good!
The tooltip of the number of troops, in the top right corner of the formation card, shows the preferred troop number and the formation number. If formation number is higher than preferred troop number, it means you've run out of preferred troops. This might help if you guys were not aware of it.
oh i didn't know that, thanks for the info!
