Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord

Tuco said:

Good news about most complaints is that, with a few exceptions, the game's framework and engine is solid. It's just the tuning on a lot of stuff is uhh, way off. It feels like they just barely got the framework in place and did almost no user-level testing of singleplayer before the early access.

Click to expand...

the early access is the user testing.

It's even right there in the name.

If the fundamentals are sound, modders might fix most of it. The first one wasn't that interesting as a base game either. As a platform though it was something special.

Bethesda revived their brand with this business plan. And then abandoned it because they blow. But still. Providing a solid engine for modders is a respectable market. And these guys could tap into an array of fps, tabletop army, and trainset nerds.

Harm do you have to start a new game for these patches to take effect or will they work on old saves?

The rapid patching does show this is being treated as a soft launch. They want the immediate good word of mouth to get more sales.

As opposed to a "this EA is a long term alpha beta test, where we might add some things, might add some other."

Which has some good and bad with it. As a soft launch... that generally means they feel this is feature complete, and just needs minor fixes. Letting mods do the heavy lifting as stated. Think Conan Exiles, Wolcen..

EA as a long term alpha also has its hits and misses. you have Rimworlds, Minecrafts, Oxygen not included, Path of exile. which just kept adding new stuff over and over and over. Then you also have untold EA horror stories that just peter out and abandon the game. kindof like GNomoria, starbound.

Man they are patching this game crazy fast. Seems like every day we have a fat list of fixes and even balance changes.

This is my map y1087.

I spent most of the timeline, as a bandit/looter slayer. staying neutral.
Khuziates started aggression early. Attacking Northern Empire, and taking Amprela early, and a bit later Myzea.
Empress of southern empire took Husn Fulq early. Minor fighting over Lageta by Batts/Western empire back and forth.

the map settled down for quite a while then.
Around 1086 the Empress went on a Massive southern Campaign. Took Razih, hubyar, and a ton of castles down there.
At the same time, Western Empire set their sights on the Northern Empire, taking Diathma, Saneopa, and finally Epicrotea. Seeing the Western Empire was preoccupied, Batts, pushed south, taking Ortysia, and Quyaz. They established a very firm hold on Quyaz. but, the western empire was able to quickly regroup and take Ortyisa back.
Northern empire is crushed. Only a few castles left.

The Southern empire turns its eye north. stamping out the Last of the northern castles, but one. Taking Saneopa, Diathma, Argoron. Then turning west to Lageta, Ortysia, Jal, and Rhotae.
The Western Empire is fighting battles on two sides. As Batts also step into the fray.

At this point I also make the decision, Lets try Mercing. Batts are actively at war with West/South Empire. I like batt archers alot. And Southern empire would be too easy of a win.
I had just made a trade run through Aserai territory, and visited Quyaz, as Caladogs army was there. I signed up as a merc. And we went North. I turned his 400 man army into a nearly 500 man one. and almost immediately we ran into the Empress with her 600 men, between Ortysia and Jalmarys. I was given lead of the cavalry. it was a rout. with the Empress being taken captive. we took Jalmarys, Rhotae, and a few castles. we have Epicotea surrouned atm. Defended a few.

I took some heavy infantry losses doing a 90 vs 200 solo hit on a Southern Empire army. (won but lost 40 infantry) But recovered them fairly quickly with prisoners.

Batt and Southern empire declared peace.
Southern empire leads with 7700 power. Vland, and khuzites both have about 4500 power according to the kingdom sheet. Sturgian 4000, and Batts despite our wins, are at like 3700. Maybe that number will grow, as they recover from war losses, and those recently taken cities recover.


Anyone know of a way to provoke war between two other factions?

Also saw a pretty funny, PSA on reddit.

For anyone that wants to try Crossbows, but didn't get xbow training in character creation. There IS a way to train up xbows in game from zero, and get the 20 required to use the only one in the game.

Get/train an xbow troop. Put that unit at the top of your unit list, and enter bandit hideouts. Murder that xbow troop yourself. pick up the xbow, which will not have the 20 req use. you will now be able to skill up xbow skill, with that xbow while in the hideout. do this a few times till you get the 20 req for the good storebought crossbow.

you probably can use garrisons or second parties to fill your party entirely with xbow units to aide in this.

I was excited about this game but sounds like it needs to bake for another 6 months before it's ready for consumption.

Another new patch today. Honestly the game is very fun right now but buggy. Imo it’s the perfect sort of game to sink tons of hours into if you find yourself trapped indoors like many of us. I don’t regret buying it, but I also had a few hundred hours of Warband so I knew I’d love it.

Yet, I get hit with 40 looter stones on horseback when I try to go before the rest of my group.

I've got 40 hours played and part of that was starting over tonight. I have a healer, rogue, tactician, and scout in my party now. I read that this would help but it did not.

The game opens up all at once once you hit tier 3 I'd say. You start making more money but you are crippled by the path you choose early on. My max army size with 200K Denars was 104. Strong possibility I don't know what I'm doing.

I do find that the game evolves a little regarding trade. The same items you are able to make money on in the beginning start to get harder to find such a good deal for. It's best you have enough funds to join an Army and keep your troops happy for a few events and then go from there. Then again, I probably don't know what the hell I'm doing.

There is a lot of work to be done. Quest are repetitive. The companions in your group are not true companions but rather stat gains for your party. Still haven't quite figured out the controls. My archers and infantry are often times grouped together so I if I want one to charge then the archers will stop firing.

Warband is the better game at the moment.

The clan changes are promising though. If you install a Governor I'd like if they actually upgraded your castle though, rather than you having to travel there. You should also be able to see some kind of change in that area of the map. I did not. I maxed out the castle upgrades and nothing seemed to change. Once you are pretty deep into the mix it becomes next to impossible to stop the top 3 kingdoms from maintaining a foothold on every aspect of the map.

Despite all of the above, I get lost in this game big time. 3-4 hours of gameplay seems like 1 hour. Perhaps that's the appeal of Early Access because it's certainly not a cakewalk.

I just died