Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord Developer Blog Q&A

Korneel Guns, the gameplay programmer responsible for Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord’s multiplayer, is the latest TaleWorlds Entertainment developer to participate in their in-house Q&A. He starts by answering a couple of general questions and then moves on to multiplayer-related topics. So, if you’re interested in that particular aspect of the upcoming RPG, you should check this Q&A out. An excerpt:

WHAT DO YOU NORMALLY DO DURING YOUR DAY?

“Most of the time I work on multiplayer features, optimisations and bug fixes. What I actually do varies from day to day, depending on what we’re trying to achieve that week. Lately, I don’t get to write much code at all and instead most of my time is spent preparing our internal playtests, monitoring the sessions, gathering feedback from the participants and planning for the next test.”

WHAT DO YOU LIKE THE MOST ABOUT BANNERLORD?

“There are many things…

Sometimes, I just open a custom battle, put the troop count into the many hundreds, give command over my troops to the AI, and just watch as the armies clash. There’s something very special about seeing this many troops doing their thing.

Lately, I’ve also been trying my hands on the scene editor and I’m just blown away by how easily I can make something that looks pretty nice. I believe we’re going to have a lot of mods with an amazing visual quality.”

“But I have to say that I’m mostly excited for the multiplayer part of the game. Before joining TaleWorlds, I spent a lot of time playing Napoleonic Wars and I regularly attended line-battles. It was always such a thrill to be a part of these huge organised battles, with disciplined regiments moving around in formation (only to be struck down by a single cannonball), the smoke from the musket fire, the surprise cavalry charges… It was an amazing experience. I can’t wait to see what the modding scene comes up with for Bannerlord as the possibilities are much greater than they ever were for Warband.”

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WILL WE STILL BE ABLE TO CHOOSE WHAT SERVER WE JOIN, OR WILL IT BE PICKED FOR US?

“We will still have the server list, just like we have in Warband. It will contain both official and unofficial (community-run) servers. On top of that, there is also a matchmaking system which ties in nicely with our more competitive game modes (see question below).”

WHAT KIND OF GAME MODES CAN WE EXPECT?

“Siege has received a full overhaul. It is still all about attacking and defending an entire castle, but now with a full range of different kinds of siege weapons (ballistae, catapults, siege towers and battering rams).

Then, there are some game modes that are entirely new, such as Captain Battle: a team-based mode where each player gets command over a regiment of AI troops (just like in singleplayer). You win by either eliminating the other team, or by controlling the battlefield.

There is also Skirmish Battle, a more competitive game mode that is designed to be played 6 vs 6. You have multiple lives per round, but each troop has a different cost, which means you have to make a choice between fielding a greater number of poorly equipped troops or fewer more specialised ones. Good communication and managing your lives are key in this mode.

We also have a Duel Mode for those who want to test their skills in a more controlled environment.”

HOW DO YOU PLAN TO PREVENT CAMPING?

“The solutions to prevent camping are different for many games. For us, we realized it’s a serious issue and we have designed our new game modes so that they make camping a bad choice: for Skirmish and Captain Battles, you have to be active and either fight the enemy, or move to different locations on the battlefield to control them. It’s also not enough to just move to one location and hold it: you will constantly be encouraged to move and adapt until the very end of each round. We have noticed in our internal playtests that this is working out very well.”