Aside from many bugs (which of course need fixed as well), here is a collection of things that I honestly believe need focused on by Ubisoft after playing for about 170 hours and could greatly improve the future for this game since Ubi plans on servicing this game for a long time according to them:

COMBAT MECHANICS

Combat is poorly imbalanced and stats are unclear of what they do. Which is surprising since Odyssey seemed to have had this down pat for the most part.

• Reworked Stats Page: Simple enough. Things that are percentages NEED to show actual percentages (looking at you Crit Chance and Crit Damage). Further explanations need to be made for certain effects such as [censored] does Poison and Fire do--I hope to God Poison is not just another DoT. Should also have something like increased damage taken or something. Weapons should show their DPS and not some arbitrary number that says "Attack" that doesn't actually add up to damage per hit or anything. I will say this game is more complicated due to the combo animations seem to have varying damage applications (finishers and non finishers) along with different speeds (flails have a slow wind up but become pretty fast after the first 2 swings). But there has to be a MUCH better way to explain DPS in this game.
• Fix the HARD CAP on ATTACK!: I've been stressing this for awhile now but seriously, there are sooooo many build options that are completely gutted because of the hard cap of 30 bonus points put on the Attack stat. Quite simply: if your base value of a weapon is 130, you cannot break 160 with perks (Circle runes are the exception here). And Adrenaline Fiend counts towards this at a max of +15 Attack at 4 stacks. LITERALLY makes so much gear useless. St. George's armor set would actually be quite amazing if it were not for this cap. Surtur Sword and Sinner Skull from the Helix store would not have lost value--[censored] Sinner Skull goes up to +40 Attack yet literally cannot use 25% of that perk EVER....just sad this exists....Here is a video for proof btw:
• Rework Balance between Stats from Skill Tree and Runes/Perks: A major problem in this game is that the Skill Tree holds WAY too much weight for a characters damage output and resistance. Because of this, gear and runes that are not Speed, Fire Damage, or offer utility (such as Parrying creates a ring of fire) are fairly useless and unimpactful. This makes most gear trivial since things like 4.0 Attack may only apply an additional 2.5% increase to DPS or less. My suggestion, scale back a lot of stats from the Skill tree (by maybe 30%), then rebalance Runes and some perks to have greater output such as Attack runes doing maybe +8/5/3. I would also suggest releasing some Runes that offer increases by a percentage to create variety and greater potential.
• Make Enemies More Difficult at Very Hard: Game is WAY too bloody easy. Now granted, a rebalance of skill tree stats and runes could help create greater challenges since players will "feel" the impact of one type of stat being potentially weaker compared to another since we now have a much better "give and take" system. But I would still suggest improving aspects such as enemies parrying (spearman can do this), basic archers hitting a little harder, archers also are faster to nock and fire, faster projectile speeds....little things like this. Currently, I like the Time to Kills while being at level 400. But enemies could afford to be more aggressive and hit a bit harder. I would also suggest creating a "Defense" mechanic where if the first part of an enemies Defense bar is Red, they have 50% resistance to Fire and if it's Green, they have greater resistance to Poison. By breaking this portion of the Defense will allow those elements to deal Full Damage. The elements in this game can be a bit powerful, especially Fire. This will create counters to these measures and expanding on variety in gameplay options. Certain factions of enemies could have greater amounts of elites that show up to counter one or the other.
• Balance between weapon types and dual wields: There's an issue where Dual Spears and Dual Daggers are dealing the same or similar damage to their single spear or single dagger variation. Yet they have 2x Attack speed. No other weapon from what I have tested falls under this relationship--Dual Flails have damage cut in half, Dual Axes hit for the same damage as a single Axe when swung at the same time....little things like this. This gives Daggers and Spears a significant base advantage unless another weapon type has a solid perk.
• Buff to Great Swords & Dane Axes: Great Swords are a bit weak. Could use a minor damage buff. Dane Axes are slow and clunky in dual wield but not bad when a single Axe is used (gain increased Speed). I do think they need a minor damage buff but I think they run into an issue of weak perks to work with and maybe a bit better Stun Damage. I would also like to see their initial strike in the Light Combo be a bit faster. It's a little slow which can create that clunkiness to properly counter attack.
• Speed up Flails 1st strike in the Light combo: Flails are unique in the sense that they actually have decent Speed and can output fairly adequate damage. But they are troubled by a very slow wind up time to initiate the 1st strike. Speed this time up a little bit on the very 1st strike.
• Buff Critical Chance Circle Runes: Crit is hard to gauge how much it needs to be buffed but I can definitely say this is probably the 1st game I've played where Crit builds are some of the weakest. I RARELY Crit with certain weapon types (such as Dual Flails) because it seems like Crit is applied differently to those. Not only that, but the only way to gain an actual impact for Crit Chance builds is to absolutely have Viper Bow equipped (or at least have that rune) and Niflheim set which happens to be Helix gear so that's out of the question for many. And even then, it's not the most reliable. Circle Runes that give 3.3 Crit.....yeah it does nothing. It seems Crit is whatever the weapons value is divided by 4. This seems to be the closest to accurate (except for when I dual wield some weapon types) and IF this is accurate, 3.3/4 = NOT WORTH IT! lol. So definitely a major rebalance here.
• Rework GRIT: This one I have to stress. Grit is op as a survivability mechanic and it's easily obtainable since it's apart of the Skill Tree. So here is my suggestion: Synchronize it with "Low Threshold" perks. Most of these perks are triggered when below 50% HP. My suggestion is make Grit only active when you are below 50% HP. THEN it will ONLY heal you up to 50% of your Max HP. Thus, if you have a max HP of 100, Grit cannot heal you to above 50 no matter what--this would only occur if you took a blow that knocked you below your 50% threshold mark. This can allow a player to build confidently around Low Threshold perks with a safety net such as Grit to make sure they still have some sustainability. Of course, they now lose half of their HP so heavy blows from enemies could be absolutely fatal but thats the "give and take" situation. But Grit is still functional as a safety net perk for all other builds.
• Fix Bugs with Runes Not Working: Obviously a given but here are two videos showing a couple runes not fully function: Draugr Set does not proc
   & Heavy Finishers that drop bombs deal no damage a majority of the time for me
  There's most likely many others.
• Rework to Heavy & Light Stats????: Honestly, I have little idea how these are actually applied to the whole formula aside from it increases Damage and Stun Damage for Light or Heavy attacks depending on what they correspond to. And from my testing, it seems to be a simple flat rate thats equivalent to Attack and Melee stats. If this is the case......Rework it. My suggestion is to convert these into a perk type system where they increase Damage for each successful hit for that specific attack type. Light would stack up to 10x and Heavy up to 5x (Heavy could have higher percentages to offset but this is to help with slower speeds from Heavy strikes). For example, Light stat could show 5%. This means each stack increases Light Damage by 5% up to a max of 50%. So if your first attack from your Spear dealt 30 damage, it would then deal 45 damage. The stacks would last for 4 seconds or until you take damage. Here is the catch, both Heavy and Light stats would benefit from the same perk meaning you could deal 5x Light attacks then convert over to a Heavy Attack to deal a strong burst damage from the improved Heavy attack. Hopefully this creates "combo" potentials. This also means a major overhaul would have to take place for all Light and Heavy stats in the game so they are not overpowered. We should probably start at a base of 2.5% for Light and 5% for Heavy and the Skill Tree could max us at 5% for Light and 10% for Heavy. This will mean the Skill Tree caps at 50% increased damage for both stats when max stacks. From here, the Rune system will have a bit more impact. A Major Light Rune could offer 1% (20% increase on top of what the Skill Tree offers). This is a percent based mechanic so it works in cohesion to the Attack and Melee stat that are flat rate increases. Meaning, sometimes flat rate increases will offer greater benefits to certain weapons vs a percent increase.

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RIVER RAIDS

• Jomsvikings Need More Than Just Be Cosmetics: No denying they could use some improvements with AI. But some functions around this would be to give them special abilities through a class system as well. Ideas are 3 class types: Healers, Warriors, and Raiders (call them what you want of course). Healers will have additional Rations and can use them to revive fallen allies (they will not use the last one just so they can use it on themselves for emergencies). Warriors will be tankier and Melee focused but also have a special ability that could potentially taunt or disrupt nearby enemies. Raiders will increase the amount of silver, ore, and supplies looted (say 5% to 10%) and also are Ranged focus unless an enemy is close them. Jomsvikings could also go further by having their own Rune system. I would also like to suggest giving the Lieutenant an Elite status similar to enemies. He would have increased/improved HP and could even have his own skill tree we can use to diversify his kit.
• Start with some Rations: Starting with no Rations seriously slows Raids down by A LOT in the beginning if it weren't for the game being so easy to begin with. But assuming the game is made more difficult, Rations for the player will become a greater necessity. Because of this, you're practically forced to hit a farm early. These farms are a joke and boring. GRANTED, they need to be easy to allow a player to recuperate from losses. But don't force a player to go to a farm right out of the gate. Let us get straight to the good stuff.
• Allow use of Raven: Why??? Why is this not implemented at the beginning? My right thumbstick is gonna be broken just from me spamming to look for the chests....
• Expand on commands for Jomsvikings: Allow us to give "stay here," "Follow," "Get Off Boat," "Get In Boat," Commands. This will allow for better gameplay when handling 'road' blocks such as chains and could even open up the opportunity to finish a raid to immediately run over to another location and invade vs always having to go to the boat. Just more potential and variety.
• Greater enemy density at farms: 2 enemies at a starting farm........not even a challenge. Since we are starting the game with max rations, we can now make these a bit more challenging.
• Too many archers defending forts and monasteries: Don't need to say much more here. But it seems most of my raids are polluted by archers with spears.
• Greater existence of Elites when higher Alert levels: Coincides a bit with above but Elites could be a little more existent at tougher locations with high alert levels.
• Upgrades to Boat to Improve capabilities: Damn these boats suck lol. Have the ability to improve turn speeds, overall speed, stamina increase, and maybe the ability to add 2 permanent archers who just stay in the boat to fire arrows at enemies (could be useful at blockades).
• Create a Timed Scenario Mechanic: Have a more competitive feature that is a timed situation to raid as many places as possible in an allotted time frame. Each type of place would consist of a point system when completed--Farms being the lowest of course. Raids that start at higher difficulties due to alertness will have bonus points and rewards also. Points can be recorded and published publicly to other players.
• Have enemy boats and archers: A simple addition where every now and then, you may randomly come across smaller boats of enemy 3 or 4 archers. They would show up when alertness is higher. Players can ignore them but they simply add a little more "theatrics" to the monotony of traveling from place to place. Helps give the sense of increased intensity from higher alert levels much like the "star" system in GTA or Red Dead Redemption.
• Add an Enemy Reinforcement from Boat mechanic during a Raid: When Alertness levels are maxed out, the enemy could ring a loud bell that would bring in a boat of a dozen or so reinforcements that would include a single Elite. Also, while alert levels are maxed, if you take too long during a raid (say 5 minutes), a boat of 4 or 5 reinforcements may show up via a small boat.
• Random Boss encounters: Have a 20% chance of a boss existing at a Monastery or Fort when low Alert levels to start the game and (1) guaranteed at High Alert levels when starting River Raids with an additional 35% chance at other places--of course, the enemy is gonna bring in the big guns to better reinforce themselves. Each type would have a different kind of boss such as Zealots or Priest-type figures protecting Monasteries and Nobles or High Ranking Officers defending Forts. These bosses will each have unique mechanics and weapon types and the fight will occur while the raid is still going on (no cut scene needed but just an announcement of their existence lol). Jomsvikings can help you but of course they may get their asses handed to them. To counter this, their AI will need to be improved of course. I would suggest having it where the boss will focus on you primarily and Jomsvikings will primarily focus on lesser enemies. Also, these bosses would be guaranteed to drop Major runes and Tungsten. Lastly, bosses could count for their own points when killed when playing the "timed" trial mentioned above.
• No more camera panning around Eivor when blowing the horn....: Self-explanatory. Allow the player to remain in full control of movement and camera while blowing the horn. No reason for theatrics here.
• Allow for Eivor to call in for Reinforcements once per River Raid AND ONLY ONCE: Now this could be epic if done well. This will be a mechanic that will do 2 things: (1) allow Eivor to replenish any lost crew mates. (2) bring in more soldiers to handle a tougher and much larger battle. And that's where this could be fun. So this will be a new building type at our settlement. This building will allow us to outfit a "reinforcement" crew of vikings. As we upgrade this building, it will allow boat to hold more reinforcements. This will consist of 4 levels where each level expands our boat numbers to 6/8/10/12. Pretty straight forward. While we are raiding, we can have the chance at any time to use a horn to call in these reinforcements--even right off the bat to signal both boats to charge in! This will bring in the 2nd boat of reinforcements to support us during this specific raid. After the raid is over (or when Eivor manually ends it) the reinforcements will fill in any lost men in our main boat and then the rest will head back to the settlement. This perk will only be usable once per River Raid. This could also create potential for greater difficulties at much larger fortresses/monasteries when dealing with larger numbers of enemies.
• Give Foreign Supplies a better circulation in the whole economy for replayability: Simply put, players need something important to do with a sole resource from a specific game mode to give it replayability. There is nothing to do with Supplies once you unlock everything in the shop. I expect more to come for this but figured I would put it here since it's important to note.

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A lot of what I mentioned above can greatly improve gameplay and make it more fun due to greater variety in build potentials and also improved River Raids. And with the implementation of some "competitive" aspects such as timed trials and bosses, this increases replayability through just getting the best score along with improved resource drops. But I also believe the combat mechanics being reworked is crucial to the longevity of this game. Because right now, there is ZERO reason to buy or grind for new gear except because of cosmetics. Gear is way too trivial and the game is too easy. Making the game more difficult will redefine the importance of optimizing gear.

I love when someone has a real improvement ideas;)

I agree at all, i Just want to add 1 thing: stamina and weight are too low impactant.


I would loce to have a reason to wear light armor or heavy armor.

Weight should affect : dodge reactivity, dodge lenght ( a light pg sgould dodge more far) , running Speed, climbing speed and stamina conduming.

If i want to be a heavy Warrior, i have to be more "static" that a light assasins.

I can take more damage,be stunned a few time, Do more damage, but slower.

And a light warrior, csn be stunned mord frequently, but is very fast, can dodge far avay and climb easy.

Now valhalla has only a stamina consume, that don't affect game because every light hit charge stamina.
Totally useless at High level,i can Attack every second.


Other OP mechanics is parry.

I think this ahould different from weapon to weapon that use in left hand.
With a small weapon we should not parry a enemy with a mace or 2h sword,for example.

I know that our ideas remain in a forum, but is good to try to find Better solution;)

Nice ideas, but tbh, I think that they hardly read anything, and if they read, they won't change a thing...

The game is how it is, it won't have almost changes. If you like it, fine, if not, it won't improve much, think on getting other game.

It's hard, but it's the truth

Great suggestions! I'm also for stopping the finisher animation from swinging the camera around so Eivor is completely disoriented when they are over.

As for the farms, I don't even see the point in them. They increase alert level = more enemies = Jomsvikings even more likely to die. I skipped them for this reason, which also means it's pointless to have them above level 1 (which seems to only increase their ration capacity).

@kreutzgang yeah farms just seem a bit pointless. Its hard to say if there's much of a way to improve them beyond giving anything other than rations and basic resources like ore and leather. Now granted, if the game was more difficult, then just maybe this would give them value. I would like the idea of having some sort of competitive feature that maybe was timed (such as 30 minutes to hit as many places as possible). Farms could also be a form of extending your time by a little bit. I guess there's a lot they could do to make them worth something in regards to that. Maybe also have Farms be a way to replenish fallen vikings. Small farms could have a single Dane that is jailed and when we save them, they are added to our boat if a Viking has been killed.

May not be much but could help add a little value to them. Currently, I just go straight for the forts and monasteries and solo them. Game is just way too easy. Hell I even shut off Grit. I tried just going through as a Level 1 but I got 1 shotted a little too much hahah.

Another suggestion to this is Stun and enemy Defense:

-  For those that don't know, Stun is damage you deal to the Defense of an enemy--that bar that sits on top of the HP bar. The lower the Defense bar, the more damage you deal. I have not been able to pinpoint how much more damage this deals, whether it's a percentage increase or flat rate. In reality, it's not worth focusing on because EVERYTHING deals Stun Damage to the Defense. Heavy's a little more so than Light. But no matter what, you will shred through both the HP and Defense so naturally.....it's kind of a pointless mechanic except in certain builds that quickly delete Defense bars like Weak Points and Thors Hammer which opens enemies up to Death Blows (massive damage increase which can be obtained by pushing the proper button for the animations or simply dealing a Heavy strike on the enemy which leads to massive numbers for damage lol). Because Stun and Defense are kinda just....there, I recommend implementing new enemy types to give greater benefit. In reality, I would suggest a major overhaul by doing what Ghost of Tsushima does with the "block" mechanic--you deal zero damage to HP until you break an enemies Block or manage to counter attack them. It's very well balanced and engaging. But that won't work here because it would require a chunk of development of the enemies and their animations and just the overall combat system too.  So creating enemy types like Defense bars resistant to elements (mentioned above in main post) can mean that Fire Builds may also need to implement some Stun damage to deal with these enemies--first half of an enemy Defense bar could Red which means they take 50% less damage from Fire until this bar is broken. Nothing game breaking but offers variability potential for the stat itself. If I had a better idea of the numerical values Stun gives for extra Damage, it would definitely be a lot easier to gauge how to balance things.