Attributes in Viking Conquest

[Droz1937]

Does anyone have recommendations for the spread of attributes in Viking Conquest? I know I could cheat or import/export to get attributes maxed...but if I wanted a straight character...what would be the best setup rec in VC? Right now it would appear STR is the most important...but in WB I would try to focus on INT...

EDIT: After checking the personal skills it would appear to go CHA, STR, AGL then INT...only because trainer maxes out at 5 points. Does that mean that unless a book requires it that INT doesn't need more than 10 points?!?

[Tuidjy]

Just like in Native, Strength and Agility are important for a combat character, Intelligence is important for Generals, and Charisma is worthless. With a legit character, you can easily max combat stats, and have good Intelligence. In a similar way, you can max Intelligence, and have reasonably high Strength and Agility for a general.

A few things to keep in mind:
- you can unlock every skill with 20 in the relevant stat.
- strength 14 will allow you to use almost every piece of equipment in the game
- strength 9 will allow you to use equipment that is almost as good as the best available
- you will have very few stat points on level up, so your stats will barely change
- you will have a ton of skill points, so you will probably max your skills for their stats
- you can get at least 4 extra stats from events, books, and a druid sacrifice
- party size and morale work differently, charisma is super worthless, even more so than in Native
- Engineering is extremely important, Healing skills are just as important, i.e. Intelligence rules
- Looting is extremely powerful, i.e. Agility rules
- Agility now controls Path-finding and Spotting, i.e. it is even more important
- equipment has encumbrance penalties at full difficulty, reducing skills, i.e. agility yada, yada
- if you plan on fighting in the shield wall, you need heavy armor and health, i.e strength matters

Here is a legit, high level character. He was my first, so he did not get the optimal stat gains from events, and has very spread out weapon skills, because I learned the mod with him. He is higher level now, by the way, and his javelins have caught up with his one-handed.

[Droz1937]

There are major things I do not do on my personal that yo did. I avoid party stats like the plague and max my personal/leader stats. I leave the other stats for my party members to complete.

So based off that, you can rule out Engineering, Looting, Path-finding, Spotting, First-Aid, Surgery, etc. Making STR and CHA the two most important...unless things have changed that much from native to VC.

The only real reason to increase INT from my experience is to be able to read the books and get the freebies.

[Droz1937]

For those that do not know, the first playthrough is the hardest. After you become a lord and have a chest you can put stuff in...the game becomes broken. The import/export character feature allows you to parabolically increase your wealth...and also allows you to max your attributes via reading books.

If you want to skip that entire process you can just edit game files.

The info here is meant for those that want to legitamately min/max their character.

[KalkiKrosah]

Originally posted by Tuidjy:

Just like in Native, Strength and Agility are important for a combat character, Intelligence is important for Generals, and Charisma is worthless. With a legit character, you can easily max combat stats, and have good Intelligence. In a similar way, you can max Intelligence, and have reasonably high Strength and Agility for a general.

A few things to keep in mind:
- you can unlock every skill with 20 in the relevant stat.
- strength 14 will allow you to use almost every piece of equipment in the game
- strength 9 will allow you to use equipment that is almost as good as the best available
- you will have very few stat points on level up, so your stats will barely change
- you will have a ton of skill points, so you will probably max your skills for their stats
- you can get at least 4 extra stats from events, books, and a druid sacrifice
- party size and morale work differently, charisma is super worthless, even more so than in Native
- Engineering is extremely important, Healing skills are just as important, i.e. Intelligence rules
- Looting is extremely powerful, i.e. Agility rules
- Agility now controls Path-finding and Spotting, i.e. it is even more important
- equipment has encumbrance penalties at full difficulty, reducing skills, i.e. agility yada, yada
- if you plan on fighting in the shield wall, you need heavy armor and health, i.e strength matters

Here is a legit, high level character. He was my first, so he did not get the optimal stat gains from events, and has very spread out weapon skills, because I learned the mod with him. He is higher level now, by the way, and his javelins have caught up with his one-handed.

Not entirely true about charisma. If I recall correctly your charisma stacks with the charisma of all those other heroes in your warband. So you can get army sizes just as large or larger than that of kings.

And army size also dictates the amount of prisoners you can take. So investing in charisma will help your wallet out in the early and mid game.

[Julius Geezer]

Originally posted by KalkiKrosah:

Originally posted by Tuidjy:

Just like in Native, Strength and Agility are important for a combat character, Intelligence is important for Generals, and Charisma is worthless. With a legit character, you can easily max combat stats, and have good Intelligence. In a similar way, you can max Intelligence, and have reasonably high Strength and Agility for a general.

A few things to keep in mind:
- you can unlock every skill with 20 in the relevant stat.
- strength 14 will allow you to use almost every piece of equipment in the game
- strength 9 will allow you to use equipment that is almost as good as the best available
- you will have very few stat points on level up, so your stats will barely change
- you will have a ton of skill points, so you will probably max your skills for their stats
- you can get at least 4 extra stats from events, books, and a druid sacrifice
- party size and morale work differently, charisma is super worthless, even more so than in Native
- Engineering is extremely important, Healing skills are just as important, i.e. Intelligence rules
- Looting is extremely powerful, i.e. Agility rules
- Agility now controls Path-finding and Spotting, i.e. it is even more important
- equipment has encumbrance penalties at full difficulty, reducing skills, i.e. agility yada, yada
- if you plan on fighting in the shield wall, you need heavy armor and health, i.e strength matters

Here is a legit, high level character. He was my first, so he did not get the optimal stat gains from events, and has very spread out weapon skills, because I learned the mod with him. He is higher level now, by the way, and his javelins have caught up with his one-handed.

Not entirely true about charisma. If I recall correctly your charisma stacks with the charisma of all those other heroes in your warband. So you can get army sizes just as large or larger than that of kings.

And army size also dictates the amount of prisoners you can take. So investing in charisma will help your wallet out in the early and mid game.

Yeah but early game how will the extra army size help you when you can't afford the troops? Surely its more optimal to just invest in agility over charisma, and then increase your looting stat, especially given how much money loot brings in.

[Tuidjy]

Originally posted by KalkiKrosah:

Originally posted by Tuidjy:

Just like in Native, Strength and Agility are important for a combat character, Intelligence is important for Generals, and Charisma is worthless.

Not entirely true about charisma. If I recall correctly your charisma stacks with the charisma of all those other heroes in your warband. So you can get army sizes just as large or larger than that of kings.

And army size also dictates the amount of prisoners you can take. So investing in charisma will help your wallet out in the early and mid game.

Charisma in Viking Conquest is worthless, because it only has a few benefits:
1) Persuasion is a damn useful skill to have. But by picking the right options at startup, you can start with Persuasion 7. Read the right book for 8, then retain the story line book for 9, to end up one point short of the maximum, no matter how low your charisma.
2) Army morale. Not an issue if you keep your army under half its maximum size. My combat beast, who keeps his renown over 4500 due to his combat stats, can lead 1700 men. Keeping my army under 850 is not something that pains me overly much.
3) Army size. See above. With eight companions who can each add some leadership, why bother with extra from the player instead of using the stats on awesome skills like Looting, Path-Finding and Engineering.
4) Success with the ladies. Charismatic and persuasive characters can pressure a woman into marrying before she is ready. Well, my butt ugly guys had to work hard for their spouse, and not one of them has ever had any marital trouble, as they all needed relation over 90 to marry. On the other hand, I hear about all those charismatic cads being cheated on.

So, basically the good skills are on Agility (combat and mobility) Strength (combat) and Intelligence (siege and durability) Sure, if you are cheating by exporting and exporting, you may want to waste skill point on Charisma. But if you want the best character in full difficulty, every point in Charisma is under-optimal.

[White Knight]

I rather like my like my character's non-optimal "flaws".

I'd heard a rumour (in here) that there was a Special Trait to be had by courting many ladies, so I played a Don Juan and was reciting poems for as many as I could meet (well over a dozen). My whole game was about sneaking into castles in the dead of night and fetching amber, etc. The only ladies I considered for marriage were the ones who got to 100.

Either I didn't try hard enough or the rumour isn't true. Dating fifteen or so ladies and trying to get them all up to 100 relations isn't enough to do it, I know that much.

In the end, I went with the hometown gal I first met and the rest are now really awesome friends who can help me repair relations with other lords, anytime I like. I think so anyway...I never actually see them. Perhaps we aren't such "awesome friends" after all?

The downside is feeling kind of sleazy and upsetting a bunch of other lords/fighting duels, etc.

I wonder if all those bruised egos contribute towards the aggression levels later in the game?

[Tuidjy]

Originally posted by ЯтR Droz1937:

There are major things I do not do on my personal that yo did. I avoid party stats like the plague and max my personal/leader stats. I leave the other stats for my party members to complete.

So based off that, you can rule out Engineering, Looting, Path-finding, Spotting, First-Aid, Surgery, etc. Making STR and CHA the two most important...unless things have changed that much from native to VC.

The only real reason to increase INT from my experience is to be able to read the books and get the freebies.

In Native, the difference between having maxed engineering on a companion as opposed to your player character is the difference between building ladders in two hours, or being able to assault a castle on the fly, before the enemy chasing you can reach you. It is also the difference between taking a whole day to build a siege tower, and arriving at midnight, level your troops, and have the tower ready at daybreak.

In Viking Conquest, with all the things that go wrong during sieges, being able to assault before your men's sнIт seeps into the well, before the enemy ambushes your scouts, before frostbite disables a dozen of veterans, etc... is priceless. With Engineering 10+2 you can conduct a siege in daylight, from beginning to end. With Engineering 10+4 you can avoid practically all ill effects, even in winter. Engineering 10? Not so much, and do not forget that it takes a while to level a companion to Intelligence 20.

There are many ways of playing the game, and you can have fun every which way. But for a character who wants to be the best, either at fighting, or as a conquering sovereign, every point in Charisma is wasted. 20/20/10/x is possible at level 41, and so is 14/16/20/x. The former is a combat beast who can lead his army through the paths less trodden, and get 50K in loot from a single battle. The latter is a leader who can keep his men alive through battles and sieges.

A charismatic character? He would have a much harder time uniting the map, or even creating a stable kingdom controlling even one of the four quest zones (The Irish Isle, the Breton lands, the Pictish lands, or the Northmen lands)

Originally posted by White Knight:

The downside is feeling kind of sleazy and upsetting a bunch of other lords/fighting duels, etc.

I wonder if all those bruised egos contribute towards the aggression levels later in the game?

Absolutely. Lords love burninating the villages of those whom they hate. Most lords have no one they hate automatically, and even the most quarrelsome ones usually have only a few enemies, mostly neighbors that are on the same side in a conflict. Once war starts, your villages will be irresistible, and unless your walled fiefs are well garrisoned, they will attract a lot of attention as well.

In my experience, the easiest time is had by a intelligent lord who appears altruistic and tolerant, and who avoids antagonizing even those weaker than him. As I have always said, the only way to tell a Lawful Good character from a Neutral Evil one is to see them once they have achieved absolute power. I have no idea what Brant will turn out to be, but with eight cities and half the map, he is a paragon of virtue.

[meridian6644]

@Tuidjy, what do you say about this thread: https://forums.taleworlds.com/index.php?topic=357356.0

Without 20 charisma / 10 leadership, rebellion chance is through the roof? Is it possible to have a large stable kingdom without maxing charisma?

[Tuidjy]

Originally posted by meridian6644:

@Tuidjy, what do you say about this thread: https://forums.taleworlds.com/index.php?topic=357356.0

Without 20 charisma / 10 leadership, rebellion chance is through the roof? Is it possible to have a large stable kingdom without maxing charisma?

My best character controls three quarters of the map. I have starting charisma, and have not had ONE single rebellion, or riot that destroys an improvement, or a single desertion.

What charisma does for other people, I achieve by being at 90+ with both religions, with all my vassals, and with all my cities (I hold only cities, and all cities my kingdom controls, taxes be damned)

Charisma lets you take shortcuts. Just like in real life.

Those shortcuts often lead places you do not want to go. Just like in real life...

----

Basically, employ only reliable lords, treat them right, and whenever the dice rolls against you (happens to me about once a month) drown the affected lord in cash, gifts, etc...

Unless of course, he is a saint anyway (he should be, he is your vassal) and your honor has brought his relation to you so far over 100 that his effective relation is not even brought below 100.

You'd be surprised how many of Gotcha! events are totally eliminated by being honorable, tolerant and be planning ahead.