How to improve skills in Mount and Blade II: Bannerlord

Skills are how you do a majority of things in Mount and Blade II: Bannerlord. For those who want to be good at firing with a bow, or you who to be up close and fight another combatant with a sword, you need to rely on your skills for this. When you first start the game, your upbringing determines the type of skills you start with, but you need to improve them throughout your time in the game.

The skills are broken down like this:

• Vigor:
  • One-handed
  • Two-handed
  • Polearm
• Control:
  • Bow
  • Crossbow
  • Throwing
• Endurance:
  • Riding
  • Athletics
  • Smithing
• Cunning:
  • Scouting
  • Tactics
  • Roguery
• Social:
  • Charm
  • Leadership
  • Trade
• Intelligence:
  • Steward
  • Medicine
  • Engineering

The primary trait above every skill details how easy it is for your character to learn a skill underneath its umbrella. For example, if you have a high degree of control, your character will learn bow, crossbow, and throwing skills far more than they would if they had a lower intelligence, which means they will not learn steward, medicine, or engineering skills as quickly.

Whenever you want to improve skills for your character, you need to use it more in the game. The more you use your bows, and fire from long distances, the more points and experience you’re going to receive for it. You can see what each skill requires for you to do if you want to improve by going to the character sheet, clicking on the skill, and checking the “How to learn” area, directly above the skills’ perks.

The more social skills, such as leadership, charm, trade, roguery, and others, require you to focus on how you play your character rather than how they fight. For example, if you want your character to receive more roguery skills, they will need to raid caravans, recruit and lead bandit troops, infiltrate enemy towns, give bribes, and escape captivity when caught. You always want to inspect a skill you want to improve to ensure you know the best way for your character to learn it. Again, your character’s primary trait, such as social or cunning, will determine how quickly they learn this skill.

Skills are an essential aspect of making your character an influential leader in Mount and Blade II: Bannerlord. Flesh out your character by giving them time to learn your favorite skills, and create a unique individual during your campaign.