Skills guide

Bannerlord v1.5.7 · checked 2026-11-12 · updated 2026-11-13

This guide explains how skills and perks work in Bannerlord: what a skill level unlocks, the two halves of every perk, who has to hold them and which heroes they work for, what the per-point skill effects do, how several bonuses on the same number add up, and which perks and skill effects really do what their tooltip says. It was read from game v1.5.7. NavalDLC adds three skills (Mariner, Boatswain and Shipmaster) with their perks and skill effects, adds naval roles such as navigator and first mate, and extends (runs the base formula, then adds its own terms) or replaces many of the base game's models. StoryMode extends the combat XP, XP multiplier, renown, troop recruitment cost, prisoner conformity and party size models in the story campaign only.

Every skill has its own guide with every perk explained, linked in the table below. For the full data, see the Skills and perks catalog. For exact formulas by area, see the deep dives: Combat agent stats, Combat damage, Battles, Sieges, Party and map, Settlements, Crafting and trade, Characters and politics, Naval campaign and Naval battles.

The 21 skills

18 skills are in the base game and 3 come with NavalDLC. Each naval skill belongs to two attributes.

In total there are 436 perks (374 in the base game, 62 from NavalDLC) and 49 skill effects (43 and 6).

What unlocks what

Perks come in tiers, one tier every 25 skill points:

Skill needed for a perk = 25 × its tier

• Tier: the perk's row in the skill's perk tree, from 1 (skill 25) up to 11 (skill 275). Only Trade has a tier 12 perk, Everything Has a Price, at Trade 300.

At almost every tier you choose one perk of a pair; the other one is gone. 412 perks come in 206 pairs. 24 perks have no partner and are the only perk at their level:

Trade still has a pair at 275 (Man of Means or Trickle Down); Mariner and Two Handed have no perk at 275.

Skill effects need no unlocking: they grow with every skill point from the start.

Two halves per perk

Every perk has a primary half, and 406 of the 436 perks also have a secondary half. The two halves usually do unrelated things and usually work through different people. Taking Wrapped Handles (One Handed 25), for example, gives you +20% handling with one handed weapons (primary, personal) and gives +30 one handed skill to infantry troops in the formation you lead (secondary, captain).

Each half has a role: who has to hold the perk for the half to count, and who benefits.

Most primary halves are personal (222 of 436). Most secondary halves come from the captain (113), governor (112) or party leader (101).

So a weapon perk usually helps you fight and, through its other half, the troops you lead.

Two roles have a catch:

• Captain halves come from the troops' formation captain. A captain never receives his own captain halves: a captain half on your character helps the formation you lead, not you.
• Governor halves mostly need the governor to hold the perk and be in the settlement. Some are read from the governor with no presence check, and village bonuses read the governor of the town the village belongs to or trades with. Settlements lists which is which.

Who the perk works for

The heroes of your clan come in three kinds:

• You: the main hero. When you die or retire, your heir takes over and becomes you.
• Relatives: your spouse, children, siblings and other family members in your clan.
• Wanderers: the companions you recruit, for example in taverns.

A half works for a hero when he holds the perk in the place its role asks for and the game accepts that kind of hero there. Four rules decide which kinds count:

• Some halves read only you. The game asks for the main hero's perk by name, so the same perk on a relative or wanderer does nothing. Persuasion, barter, ransom, tournament bets, trade rumors and several conversation perks work this way.
• You can never be a governor. The game refuses the main hero as a governor, so governor halves work only on relatives and wanderers.
• Your clan leader is always you. The clan leader changes only when your heir takes over as the main hero, so clan leader halves work only on you.
• Party roles fall back to the party leader. A party role half (quartermaster, scout, surgeon, engineer, navigator, first mate) reads the hero in that role; while nobody holds the role, it reads the party leader instead.

The tables count every perk half and skill effect once per kind group and once per place it can take effect. A half that works in two places counts in both rows of the second table.

Worked example. Deep Pockets (Roguery 50) has one half of each kind. Its primary half raises the most you can bet in a tournament from 150 to 300, and the game reads it only from you: a wanderer with Deep Pockets changes nothing. Its secondary half, −20% wages for bandit troops, reads the party leader: a wanderer who leads one of your clan's parties with Deep Pockets pays 20% less for the bandits in it. Each skill guide lists the halves that do not work for every hero.

Skill effects

A skill effect is a bonus that grows with every point of one skill, with no perk needed. The game works it out as:

Skill effect value = starting value + per-point bonus × skill level, kept within the effect's limits

• Starting value: 0 for most effects. Six start elsewhere: Dismount resistance 0.4, Knock back resistance 0.15, Knock down resistance 0.4, Sneak attack damage 0.5, Mounted weapon damage penalty −0.2 and Mounted weapon speed & reload penalty −0.3.

• Per-point bonus: fixed for each effect. Most are percentages (41 of 49), for example One handed weapon damage adds 0.0015 per point. The other 8 are flat amounts, for example Increase party size adds 0.25 per Steward point.

• Skill level: the skill of whoever holds the effect's role. Most skill effects are personal (33 of 49), but some read a party role: Increase party size reads your quartermaster's Steward, Track detection radius reads your scout's Scouting, Healing rate increase for troops reads your surgeon's Medicine, Faster building production reads the governor's Engineering.

• Limits: 45 of 49 skill effects have no real limit. The four with limits are the Riding penalties Mounted weapon damage penalty and Mounted weapon speed & reload penalty, which start negative and are capped at 0 so they can never become bonuses; the Mariner Naval Battle Combat Penalty Negation Effect, which stops at −1; and Naval battle underwater breathing duration, kept between 0 and 20.

Worked example. Faster building production (Engineering) adds 0.0025 per point to a settlement's daily construction power, as a percentage. A governor with Engineering 150 gives +37.5%. The next section shows that number in a full calculation.

Effects of every skill level

The game reads a skill level directly in places that have nothing to do with perks. These effects work with whichever skill is checked, so they are listed here once; each skill guide lists the effects tied to that skill alone.

How bonuses combine

Most game numbers that perks and skill effects change (party speed, party size, construction power, weapon damage, healing rate and so on) are built the same way:

Result = (base + all flat adds) × (1 + all percentage bonuses added together), then kept within the number's limits

• Base: the starting value, set by the game (for party speed, by party size; for construction, by prosperity).
• Flat adds: every "+N" bonus, from perks, skill effects, buildings, policies and other terms, added to the base first.
• Percentage bonuses: every "+N%" or "−N%" bonus is added together and applied once to the base plus flat adds. A +5% and a −40% make −35%; they do not multiply each other.
• Limits: applied last. A number with a minimum of 1 never goes below 1, however many penalties pile up.

This standard rule covers the base, the flat adds and the summed percentage bonuses. A few of these numbers also have a term that multiplies the result directly or replaces the base; the full form is in the Skills and perks catalog.

134 of the 360 traced game numbers use this rule. 70 apply their terms one after another in the game's code order, where the terms the game applies in the same step (for example several weapon speed perks) are added together and applied once, 155 use a formula of their own, and 1 takes the largest of its terms; each skill guide and deep dive says which rule a number uses.

A large, overloaded, disorganized party marching at night. Flat adds go into the base first. All percentage factors are added together and applied once. The limit is applied last. Inputs: men in the party 500, overburdened effect -0.3.

The Night Runner +5% is worked out on 2.4870 (the speed after the flat add), not on the speed left after the other penalties. Without the minimum of 1, the party would crawl at 0.9948.

Worked example. A town with prosperity 4000 and its Mason at level 2. Its governor has Engineering 150 and the Carpenters perk (+12% build speed for projects in the governed town) and stays in the town.

1. Base: prosperity × 0.01 = 40.0000.
2. Flat add: Mason +6, so 46.0000.
3. Percentage bonuses: Carpenters +12% and Faster building production +37.5% are added together and both worked out on 46: +5.5200 and +17.2500.
4. Result: 68.7700 construction power per day.

A town with prosperity 4000 and Mason at level 2; its governor has Engineering 150 and Carpenters and stays in the town. Inputs: prosperity 4000.

With these inputs, daily construction power of a town or castle is 68.7700.

Tooltip versus game

Every perk half and skill effect was checked against what the game really does with it, and got one verdict:

• works: does what the tooltip says, or more; broader effects are noted.
• differs: narrower, different or extra conditions or values compared with the tooltip.
• unused: never read by the game.
• ui_only: only shown in the interface.

A differs half still does something, just not exactly what the tooltip says; each skill guide says how. These twelve do nothing in play, or only change what the interface shows:

The four Trade markers are explained in the Trading guide.

Some halves are read by a piece of code that never runs in a campaign (dead). These places are ignored for the verdict, so the half keeps the verdict of the places that do run:

Practical tips

• If you choose between two perks, read both halves of each: the other half often works through another role, so a perk you take for yourself may also help the formation you lead, the settlement you govern or your whole party.
• If you lead a formation in battle, its captain halves help the troops of that formation, never you.
• If you appoint a governor, keep him in the settlement: most governor halves count only while he is there.
• Governor perks belong on relatives and wanderers, clan leader perks and the "only you" halves on your own character: each skill guide's Who the perks work for table lists them.
• If a companion has more Steward, Scouting, Medicine or Engineering than you, put him in the quartermaster, scout, surgeon or engineer role: those skill effects and perk halves read the hero in that role.
• Percentage bonuses on the same number add together. Stacking two of them gives their sum on the base plus flat adds, not one on top of the other.
• If a number has a limit, penalties or bonuses past it do nothing: in the party speed example the speed was raised back to 1.0000.
• If you pick Naval Bombardment, its shipboard ballistas never fire during sieges.
• If you plan around a tooltip number, check the skill's guide for differs first.