Just installed Floris mod

[Qwar]

And I'm very pissed. At first it looked great. New options, revamped UI, new diplomacy. Then you get to the unexplainable absence of low level bandits and getting your face smashed in by forest bandits/sea raider/deserters/steppe bandits/whatever again, and again, and again.

Is the only way to do anything to get yourself a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ of loans and mercs so you can do ANYTHING at all? That doesn't sound like "rags to riches" to me anymore. And I don't see why anybody would lend thousands of denars to the first idiot who comes by. Anyway, I've lost my army again to an army of deserters. Now I'm even poorer than when I had nothing.

It's cool that you can select the weapons you want to use in the tournament, but seriously, that arena sucks IMO. And why do the tournament organzers let you choose what kind of teammings will the match have escapes my comprehension.

All in all, it has a good deal of features that I'm really liking, but some others than I hate beyond words and that are going to bar me from playing this mod.

Is anybody else out there not liking it? Because reading forums looks like everyone and his mother loves it.

[wilhelm_schultz]

I really like the gameplay mechanics improvements that Floris brings and some of the new weapons and armours. Dimplomacy was good, so it's good to see that incorporated and various other things like your heroes picking up excess items are great. But I don't care much for the rest of the new weapons, armours or any of the new shields. I like my shields to show heraldry, none of the new ones do, so I'll never use them. But you can't stop your troops from using them without editing the source code. I did have to edit the source at one point to re-enable the heavy board shield, since the new pavises did not have heraldry on them! Heralry is important, otherwise, what's the point of having a banner?

The bandits are ridiculous. You can't leave them alone without them becoming an invincible force. I agree that maybe there weren't enough bandits in vanilla, but Floris has way too many, and I don't like the idea of having bandit "heros". Bandits are just a faction you can kill when you're not at war with anyone.

The new tournaments are just a big no. Vanilla does it better, even with the random weapon assignment and having to use just throwing spears if that's what it gives you. Floris' "vanilla" mode of tournament still gives you a sword to use which makes whatever weapon the game gives you pointless.

I do like the expanded troop tree, but again with the items, I would've liked to have seen more heraldry displaying armours and shields.

And the titles are an interesting concept, but I think it's better the way that vanilla does it, sorry. Especially the Khergits, I know it was for being able to find them in a list, but Khan Sanjar doesn't sound right!

Also, sieges are much better in vanilla.

So yeah, if we could get a fully customisable version of Floris, that would be great.

[What larks!!]

You can edit the bandit troop sizes and their (re)spawn frequency with tweakMB if you're getting tired of them.

[wilhelm_schultz]

Yeah, but it's more about the bandit leader which every other bandit seeks out and follows. There's probably an easy way to edit that out, but I haven't found it yet.

[Kemmler]

no way id get rid of the bandits you need them so you can train experienced troops late game without fighting other lords armies.

[What larks!!]

Another way to deal with the bandits would be to modify the manhunter party sizes and beef them up a bit. Done in conjunction with lowered bandit party size and respawn frequency, bandit leaders can usually end up running about just by themselves-easy pickings imo.

[wilhelm_schultz]

It's not the number of bandits, it's the annoyance that they all head straight for the bandit leader as soon as they spawn, making a group of 10+ bands of bandits which end up numbering 1000+ troops in total. You have to fight all of them at once or try to separate individual bands from the group which can take a very long time. If they never grouped like that, it wouldn't be an issue, you'd just pick off the individual bands one or two at a time, not all at once.

Basically, what I'm saying is get rid of the bandit leader and just have the normal bands that roam without them all assembling into one mega army.

[What larks!!]

I know what you mean; I was tired of dealing with fights like that. I got around that problem through the tweaks I mentioned before; why deal with 1000+ if you can lower it since Bandit Leaders usually only spawn with a party size of about 100 when you're lvl 40+.

Anyways Floris is no longer in development but the lastest version (2.55) has the option of turning off Bandit Heroes/Leaders.

[BoromiR]

Originally posted by wilhelm_schultz:

It's not the number of bandits, it's the annoyance that they all head straight for the bandit leader as soon as they spawn, making a group of 10+ bands of bandits which end up numbering 1000+ troops in total. You have to fight all of them at once or try to separate individual bands from the group which can take a very long time. If they never grouped like that, it wouldn't be an issue, you'd just pick off the individual bands one or two at a time, not all at once.

Basically, what I'm saying is get rid of the bandit leader and just have the normal bands that roam without them all assembling into one mega army.

you can disable bandit leaders, as well as edit number of groups accompanying them from ingame mod menu ( from camp )

[wilhelm_schultz]

Really? I must have missed that one. Thanks!

[Stevenson Family]

Bandit groups are slow as hell.

Only time ive ever been caught is when ctrl and spacing across the map, which is my own damn fault.

Then when you have 150-200 troops all lvl 4+ they are a minor nuisance as best.

[Horus]

Floris sucks and here is why:

1. Bandit armies. Bandits exist in this world for ONE purpose: rob people, mainly caravans. How does splitting the loot from a single caravan among 2,000 bandits work out? It makes no sense whatsoever. There never were bandit armies in the real medieval world for any length of time, because bandits, by definition, shun order, hierarchy and structure. Plus, they need LOOT, which they don't get if they split a caravan's load among thousands of bandits.

Plus, after 1,000 days or so, they can rival in size some kingdoms' entire armies, nevermind just the lords who show up for a campaign. Sure, if you have enough men, you can plow in there and hire their huge numbers of prisoners and thus replenish your ranks hugely, so that's ONE thing they are good for. But, frankly, thumbs down. I could see single parties of bandits that are 200-men strong, sure. But not 1,000 divided among 15 small, fast-moving parties. That's both too OP and unrealistic. I've also seen a manhunter party of over 2,000 strong, moving at such a slow speed that they can't catch anyone. Yeah, way to go. NOT.

2. Sieges. There was a reason why vanilla had a single ladder in sieges, and that is to SIMULATE actual castle assault. In Floris, defending a castle often requires MORE men than the attacking army has. This is completely, utterly illogical and game-breaking. Storming a castle is supposed to be VERY hard. Vanilla Warband has the correct ratio of attack/defense power, namely, you need about 3x the force when attacking, or you risk losing. That's the way it should be. In Crusader Kings 2, the ratio is about 5x and it makes PERFECT SENSE.

3. The factions are too well-balanced. It takes forever until one is weak enough that you can do a claimant quest and take it on, and by then, you have at least one faction that has grown humongous, so that founding your own means you will get wiped out as soon as that big faction declares war on you.

It has some good points however, namely:

1. Other investments than the paltry "profitable enterprise". You gotta think there were other ways to make money back then, and buying land is realistic, fun, and useful.

2. Female troops for hire. It may not be too realistic, but it's fun.

3. Chamberlain, and other employees. And recruiting/training. Nice.

4. PBOD. Then again, that's its own mod...

[Horus]

Originally posted by PHAT Doctor Kittensworth:

Originally posted by Horus:

I like your points, except the second reason. The one ladder thing is horrible, units get bunched up and cant walk due to poor ai and movement, theres a reason they are fixing this in Bannerlord.

It is a good stand-in for the actual difficulty of assaulting a fortress.

Getting even ONE ladder to stay up was nearly impossible. People in the castle would push it out with long poles, or if for some reason that failed, pour oil (boiling?) all over it. Of course, after a bit, it would be covered in blood, which is a whole other level of slippery.

Of course, another design might have been better, or AI not jamming the ladder, but the fact is, actual ladders were bound to be clogged a LOT during actual assaults. Think of the guy getting shot by an arrow and slipping his limbs between the rungs. Now you have a nice armored corpse blocking the ladder. At least in Warband everyone slips OFF it when they die...

No, the Warband way of doing sieges may have been somewhat clumsy, but it makes the odds EXACTLY as they should be.

[Qwar]

Originally posted by Horus:

Things

Well said. Exactly my thoughts.

Originally posted by Horus:

3. Chamberlain, and other employees. And recruiting/training. Nice.

That's not even from Floris mod itself, it's from Diplomacy...

[Unkil Olaf]

I don't like the arena but I do like the troop trees and the different equipment

[Snowskeeper]

Floris is great. I didn't have any trouble with the bandits. If anything, Floris' Sea Raiders are even easier to deal with than they were in Native. Just don't try to take on the three-hundred-strong mobs and you'll be fine.