A response to all the complaining about the recent economy changes

I dont mind complaining about things that make sense. This is after all an early access game, so feedback is encouraged and needed. But the complaining lately has just been ridicolous, and even worse, all the thought-out comments get buried amongst "hurr durr taleworld hate people making money". I wanted to make a serious response to what I think is poor and exaggerated feedback.

1. You bought an early access game. You then opted into the voluntary beta branch, which had explicit warnings that it could contain gamebreaking bugs. And you are now upset and complaining about that it contained a gamebreaking bug? This is just ridicolous, like going to a waterpark and then complaining you got wet. And in spite of all that, Taleworlds also quickly released a hotfix within days. So I really dont get these complaints. But Im aware that most complaints arent about this, but about the Caravans being nerfed.

2. The big complaint is about caravans and the economy. So many people are whining that Taleworlds are "nerfing all the ways to make money". If you miss caravans so much, install a mod that gives you 1k gold every day. Because thats exactly what caravans were. As soon as the played had saved up around 40k, he could just buy two caravans, and spend the rest of the game making 2-3k per day without any skill or effort involved. Two caravans produced as much money as TWO TOWNS combined did, whilst only costing 30k. And despite anecdotal complaints, caravans barely ever got taken out. This was insanely imbalanced, and whilst caravans will need further fine tuning (like lower starting costs and raising the cap back to around 50-60), it was needed for a balanced game. Because it leads to the same issue as all the other "fun ways of making money that Taleworlds cruelly nerfed", which is that the player ends up having way too much money. There is no challenge in the game if I can gear up myself and my party with full tier 6 gear, roll around in massive 1000 man elite armies etc, all after like 500 ingame days. And no, Taleworlds cant just "add more things to spend money on". We already have horses, saddles, armor, weapons, troops, fiefs, trading with vassals, garrisons. There really isnt much more to add, instead prices and economy needs rebalancing. So caravans and workshops needed to be nerfed, because they were literally a "press a couple buttons then get massive amounts of riskfree money for the rest of the game" mechanic that made most other ways of making money obsolete. And in spite of what all the incessant whiners would have you believe, workshops still work just fine, and the caravan 30 cap was likely a bug that will be fixed soon.

3. Why are Taleworlds nerfing all your "fun ways of making money" instead of focusing on things like perks and features. Well you gotta start somewhere. Things like caravan raiding and wars giving too much money will also be balanced, but its more complex than nerfing caravans and workshops so it will take a little longer. And as for perks/features, you do realise there are people working on several things at once? Caravans/workshops giving too much money is something that only takes a couple days of testing to see that oh, this is a bit too OP. Perks/features take a lot longer to test their balance, usefulness etc. Most of us havent even unlocked half of the perks in a skill, so of course it will need further testing and feedback before something is done. As for adding new features, did all the people complaining literally just sit on their ass all game whilst workshops and caravans made you passively rich? Im sorry to personally attack your merchant roleplay, but theres a lot to do if you want to actually, you know, do stuff.

4. Dont exaggerate the feedback just because something you liked got nerfed. This is the biggest issue, because it provides biased feedback that the devs might listen to. Overly pandering to fans reactionary feedback has ruined several games, we shouldnt let it happen to Bannerlord. Ive seen many people claim that the entire game is broken (towns were broken only in Beta branch which is now fixed), or that workshops/trading is useless now (trading is still very strong, workshops are just fine), or that there arent any ways of making money (raiding caravans or fighting wars gets you 10k per party defeated, fiefs generate thousands of denars a day). Exaggerated feedback like that wont lead to proper balancing. There is nothing wrong with complaining/feedback, but atleast do it in an honest and unbiased way. Open your mind to the possibility that maybe, a single workshop/caravan generating as much riskfree revenue as an entire town, was a bit too OP. There is still a lot of rebalancing around the economy to come, we are only in the first weeks of the game. Caravans will be improved a bit, raiding/war profits will be nerfed, prices will be adjusted etc, but only if people provide serious feedback.

TLDR: Just because you liked making ridiculous amounts of money from caravans/workshops, doesnt mean that it was a good game mechanic. Taleworlds are trying to balance an early access game and need serious feedback, the exaggerated and emotional feedback of late wont help a bit with that. There have been many games ruined by listening too much to poor fan feedback.

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EDIT: Im happy I got some traction, I thought Id get buried in downvotes. To reiterate my point, Im completely fine with people saying "Caravans need rebalancing in order to be a working and fun mechanic". My problem is people saying things like "Taleworlds are incompetent and are ruining the whole game by nerfing something that I liked, reverse changes immediately!". People are feeling personally attacked by having something they liked nerfed, and then give biased and exaggerated feedback. Just because you like an OP mechanic the way it is, doesnt mean it shouldnt be balanced. And I think its unfair to turn on Taleworlds so soon, since they have been putting out patches at incredible speed. For those who are saying that Taleworlds are prioritising the wrong things: do you really think the entire team is working on the caravan nerf? Im very sure/hope that the main team is working on the bigger things like diplomacy, storyline quests etc.

Personally I think caravans should have lower starting costs, a cap of atleast 60 members, lower but more consistent profits, let player choose what troops are in them (so we can put only cavalry for extra speed), and that the player should have some control of which routes it takes to avoid hostile kingdoms. This is how to give feedback in a concise manner, without exaggerating or acting like you were personally attacked.

Submitted April 18, 2020 at 06:50AM by ForceCommanderII https://ift.tt/2VE7Din