There are some fundamental flaws for the level scaling system

[Macavity]

I do love this game and the developers are diligent. So I'm willing to write this hoping to provide it as a constructive feedback.

Both free/region locked mode has its major flaw.

Free mode is simply anti reward system of your brain, to think that you were punished by getting a stronger enemy simply because you worked hard to get stronger? The concept is simply so unrewarding. If I build a bigger army, I ought to feel stronger. Am I already punished by a heavier consumption on food and wage gold? Shouldn't I be rewarded by having good food/eco management that I worked hard to afford a larger army? Also, this mode also blocks out the option to create a meme army. Want to create an army of wolves or converted prisoners? Nope. The game punish you for that. You were forced onto an optimized min/max build. And if unfortunately the game is imbalanced (I'm not saying whether it is the case for this game), then your valid options will be narrowed down to only one or two.

What I suggest here, is significantly increase the gold and food cost once the party member went past 10-11 (to reflect party cohesion issue maybe) but do not scale up the enemy that much. The players do need a sense of progression at least.

Region locked mode has the stat bloat issue that several level ahead/behind is making a too big difference. This game is still a sandbox game after all, and we were required to trade in a different region or go to some area to retrieve some key items (lute for example). However the crazy thing about the Region locked mode is, I'm getting the same level of reward by defeating trivial lv1 enemies (boars will drop the same meat, capturing them and send them to prison yield the same amount of -crime rate) and I'm getting no reward whatsoever when having a very good fight and defeating a group of high level foes (gears are un wearable). Which means I'm spending my whole effort on finding a "matching" fight once I reached lv 4 or 5. And there is no reward for fighting more difficult enemies.

There a a few suggestions that I have. One is a hybrid of Region locked mode and free roam, because we do need the reflection that swamp enemies are more unforgiving and challenging than farmlands and enemys in gosenburg are more elite. Also we probably want the weaker enemy to somewhat scale to around the level to the players, in order to prevent players from cheesing lv1 enemies, at least when at harder difficulties. We also need a meaningful reward if we managed to defeat a stronger enemy.

The other solution might be to adapt battle brothers "scale enemy as time goes by". I personally like to take my time and do not prefer to put everything on the clock. But this still seems to be a better option comparing to the 2 options that we currently have.


TLDR:

Free mode is unrewarding, and region locked mode has balancing issues that make it unfun after first few hours.

[WingT74]

Origineel geplaatst door Reddz:

Here's the thing. The level scaling was always fine. The endless complaints about it were all pretty much invalid.

You DO feel stronger as you level your party. Between strong character builds, strong gear, valour points, and tactics that come from a human brain instead of a simple ai, you are much stronger than the enemies at your level. This is a simple fact.

The scaling also had a range. You could encounter enemies slightly lower or slightly higher than your level. Leaving enough room for people to seek out the easier fights when they're having a hard time.

Locked mode was never going to be very good. It wasn't how the game was supposed to be, so of course it doesn't feel natural. Its issues, fights that are too easy, inconsistent rewards, they are unavoidable. But it accomplishes what it was meant to accomplish. It lets players who couldn't really figure out how to play the game grind and beat up weak enemies.

Right, I remember the first time I played....I spent every krown i could recruiting new members, getting a ton of animals, without much focus on gear upgrades, and got my butt kicked. Now with the training dummy....I can always have two newer members of the squad with everyone else at about the same level, plus if it gets too hard, just eat my pig :)

[Anson]

The scaling system is bad especially for the regional boss, my team were mostly lv 5 (of 13 champions) and the boss drop a lv 11 weapon after I fought it. This is stupid.

[Wolf]

+1 for some sort of change/rebalance or a completely different difficulty setting altogether - like the OP said it's just not very fun, imho. For those that like the current systems, great. More options never hurt anyone though, especially since they already have a way to toggle between two different modes, adding a third or even fourth shouldn't really be a big deal once a system has been created and no one should complain about having more choices.

Also to the idiots saying "bruh dont touch my gAmE", seriously? Dude is offering legit criticism and even SOLUTIONS because he LOVES the game not because he's trying to take away your favorite blow-up doll. /palm

[WingT74]

Origineel geplaatst door Anson:

The scaling system is bad especially for the regional boss, my team were mostly lv 5 (of 13 champions) and the boss drop a lv 11 weapon after I fought it. This is stupid.

Just one boss is like this I have found (big 2H axe)...others drop level appropriate elite weapons.

Origineel geplaatst door Wolf:

+1 for some sort of change/rebalance or a completely different difficulty setting altogether - like the OP said it's just not very fun, imho. For those that like the current systems, great. More options never hurt anyone though, especially since they already have a way to toggle between two different modes, adding a third or even fourth shouldn't really be a big deal once a system has been created and no one should complain about having more choices.

Also to the idiots saying "bruh dont touch my gAmE", seriously? Dude is offering legit criticism and even SOLUTIONS because he LOVES the game not because he's trying to take away your favorite blow-up doll. /palm

Yeah also wish you could change the difficulty mid game. Late game is SO much easier than early game....

[Nasarog]

10 to 11 party members.. Do you include non-humans? What about pack animals?

[darion-neclador]

I agree that the character stats, like armour and damage scale to much with level. The game goes for a fairly realistic feeling overall, it's just that 3+ level difference is just such a massive difference that it does break my immersion fairly hard. The progression system is already set-up to be somewhat incremental, i feel that more rubber-banding would make those differences less jarring, while giving the opportunity to play with content that is not strictly your level, keeping low level encounters more relevant and overall add to the atmosphere of the game.

[Nasarog]

Origineel geplaatst door darion-neclador:

I agree that the character stats, like armour and damage scale to much with level. The game goes for a fairly realistic feeling overall, it's just that 3+ level difference is just such a massive difference that it does break my immersion fairly hard. The progression system is already set-up to be somewhat incremental, i feel that more rubber-banding would make those differences less jarring, while giving the opportunity to play with content that is not strictly your level, keeping low level encounters more relevant and overall add to the atmosphere of the game.

They just released a new patch, and I think that it's a terri-bad one at that. I usually support dev's but this update is tone-deaf!

[Macdallan]

Origineel geplaatst door Nasarog:

They just released a new patch, and I think that it's a terri-bad one at that. I usually support dev's but this update is tone-deaf!

Yeah, I just read the patch notes and there were more than a few changes that I don't agree with at all.

[Nasarog]

Origineel geplaatst door Macdallan:

Origineel geplaatst door Nasarog:

They just released a new patch, and I think that it's a terri-bad one at that. I usually support dev's but this update is tone-deaf!

Yeah, I just read the patch notes and there were more than a few changes that I don't agree with at all.

I don't mind changes, not at all, but the unilaterally affect the game difficulty in the wrong direction. If this was something restricted to the highest difficulty? I don't have as big an issue. But still, they are making the game harder in weird ways.

For example, they are reducing animal packs to reduce combat frequency, but what are they replacing it with? How do you feed a large merc group? More money for food? I use the animals to feed my people and to exp-them up. Also, with less frequent contact, what will we do in our down time? Walk all over the place and do what? There aren't enough events as it is. But I guess it's just me.

[Dorim]

They reduced the ratio of animals to your units in combat, which makes sense since animals would always body block eachother. I don't think they've reduced the frequency of animal packs spawning in the overworld.

As for how to feed your troop, buy food from town and cook it up?

[Thor]

Get gud.

[Macavity]

Origineel geplaatst door Thor:

Get gud.

Whattt>?????? I was literally complaining that the game was not difficult enough lolol

[Macavity]

Origineel geplaatst door Dorim:

They reduced the ratio of animals to your units in combat, which makes sense since animals would always body block eachother. I don't think they've reduced the frequency of animal packs spawning in the overworld.

As for how to feed your troop, buy food from town and cook it up?

I partially agree with the change, because animals are inefficient after the number goes over 6 or 7... On the otherhand it takes away the satisfaction to block a chokepoint and blaze the stucked animals with bombs

[darion-neclador]

Honestly, the change reads great.
Less focus on raw dmg stats, more active abilities to play around, i think those are steps in the right direction. It's also nice that they seem to fully support the traditional style with fixed levels.

[Nasarog]

Origineel geplaatst door Dorim:

They reduced the ratio of animals to your units in combat, which makes sense since animals would always body block eachother. I don't think they've reduced the frequency of animal packs spawning in the overworld.

As for how to feed your troop, buy food from town and cook it up?

For sure, but in early game? Buying food is a killer.

Origineel geplaatst door xi the pooh:

Origineel geplaatst door Dorim:

They reduced the ratio of animals to your units in combat, which makes sense since animals would always body block eachother. I don't think they've reduced the frequency of animal packs spawning in the overworld.

As for how to feed your troop, buy food from town and cook it up?

I partially agree with the change, because animals are inefficient after the number goes over 6 or 7... On the otherhand it takes away the satisfaction to block a chokepoint and blaze the stucked animals with bombs

Yes, and this is where you have a chance to test new tactics, at least for me.

Origineel geplaatst door darion-neclador:

Honestly, the change reads great.
Less focus on raw dmg stats, more active abilities to play around, i think those are steps in the right direction. It's also nice that they seem to fully support the traditional style with fixed levels.

For the most part, but the no-nerf to the leaders is a huge problem, especially early on. They already get a massive boost, so you have to hunt them down as fast as possible, and in the meantime, your party is being torn apart. Not fun.