Looting & Trading - here's why I think these skills are a failure in Warband

Most skills in this game become more useful as the game progresses, especially the skills that are governed by Intelligence attribute. Being able to see further, move faster, heal faster, even the odds against larger armies, lose fewer men. All of those things become more effective as time passes.

However, the skills I mentioned in the title don't become more effective. Well, technically they do, but their actual usefulness becomes completely irrelevant. As you advance in the world and start more and more enterprises and get awarded with new fiefs, you'll start to generate a very large weekly income - one that will be more than enough to finance your weekly wages and even generate extra denars to spend on luxuries, like butter.

The only part in the game where you would actually want to have a high Looting & Trade is in the beginning, when you're collecting all the junk you can.
The problem is, it's impossible to actually have enough points in Looting and Trade to make them useful while they're still relevant. These skills don't belong to the Intelligence attribute like the rest of party skills. Looting is an Agility skill and Trade is a Charisma skill. This makes it difficult to actually improve them to a high rank.

Looting is a bad skill, but Trade takes it to a new level. Unlike most skills that scale linearly with each point, Trade gives you the biggest boost only when you reach the high ranks. But that's not all. When you think of "trading", you think of buying and selling goods but the actual Trade skill barely effects the prices of those goods. It's main purpose is to improve the prices of weapons, armor and horses that you loot in battle.
If you want to be a trader, you don't actually have to put a single point into Trade because at 14 Trade skill you will reduce the cost of goods by 7% and improve the price of goods you're selling by 7%. That's practically nothing for the huge investment that you'd have to make by putting points into Trade skill.

These skills should have a lower skill total (like 5 instead of 10) and provide a bigger effect for each skill point you put into them. As it is, putting points into either of these skills is a complete waste and you're better of making your character stronger in battle or a more competent leader. Denars are easy to come by but skill & attribute points are not.

That's how I see it, anyway.

Submitted May 27, 2018 at 09:53AM by maluxorath https://ift.tt/2kuZURR