Help me defend my town

This is my first play through of this mod and I was a mercenary for the fierdsvain army at day 200+ having around 60+ mixed of cavalry units(adventurers, rogue knights, mercs and various other horsemen) and enterprises in almost all towns. I earn my gold by capturing Lords and asking for ransoms and collecting taxes for Lords but not returning them.

So one day I saw the notice that the Noldors are sieging Laria and I decided to take the opportunity to have a town for myself. I don't know how to prematurely end my mercenary contract so I ask the fierdsvain king to make me a vassal so that he can grant me as lord of the town. I scare some Sarleons villagers without attacking them to get hostile status so I can siege Laria and then I rode to Laria. Laria was already sacked by the Noldors when I reached there leaving around 40 soldiers who surrender the town to me without a fight.

And here comes the problem. Fast forward a few days, I have 100+ troops garrisoned in Laria and we are at war with the D'Shar. Before I know it the D'Shar are riding towards my town fielding a total of 1600+ strong! I tried to defend the town with another lord who happens to be in my town(he only have 30 soldiers).

But when we get into the fight, only a total of 6 of us spawn vs the enemy with more than a 100! Madness! Even our reinforcement comes in waves of 6! It's impossible! No matter how high tier my units are they can't survive being hit from all directions.

So please help me, I do not want to lose my first ever town in warband(I only got the game recently and this is my first town). Is it a bug that my forces spawn with only 6 soldiers vs their 100+ or is it meant to be this way because of our number difference? Battle size is set at 150.

I have tried to find ways to prevent the siege itself like trying to exploit the AI by looting a village to see if they would rush to the village's aid but they have done sieging it after I travel half of Pendor across to their desert.

So great Kings, Captains and Lords of Pendor, what would you suggest that I do to defend Laria?

Keeping towns is almost never that easy early on in the game, especially if you're new. Your garrison is far too small to defend against anything really, let alone enemy kingdom armies.

You have two options, off the top of my head;
1: Find a minor faction army such as the Snake Cult, Jatu, or Noldor (if you're still enemies with them) and lead them towards the D'Shar army. They'll scatter off into several directions, because individual lords often run away scared from minor faction armies even if the kingdom's forces can defeat them as a combined group.

2: If you can't find a minor faction army to chase you into the D'Shar, or the enemy army grows a pair and takes on the army and wins...

You could just let them take Laria, and then take it back again later. The garrison will still be weak as long as the town doesn't get assigned to an enemy lord.

3: Go completely manmode, kill all 2000 troops (actually you'll only need to kill around 300-350 in a single siege battle to win and get the D'Shar to f*** off) and drink the marrow from their bones.

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To be honest, you've gotten yourself into a pretty bad situation to begin with. You need to gather lots and lots more troops, and I mean you need to start MASS recruitment if you want a chance of defending any towns.

First off, 100 is actually a pitifully small garrison to put on any fief you actually want to keep. You need to build up a lot more troops by that point in the game, and train them up faster.

Preferably, 200-400 units per town is a good ballpark to get started, and if you want a fief to stay safe from all but the most determined attackers, put 700+ defenders in the town.

Remember the 3:1 rule for siege defense : if you're defending, you have a massive advantage, but if the enemy outnumbers you 3:1 with equal level troops they can defeat you. By having 700 troops in a town, you scare off all attackers but the largest campaigns by enemy kingdoms.

When creating a garrison, you need elite units in the garrison (top tier commoner units such as Ravenstern Rangers, Empire Armored Crossbowmen, Fierdsvain Huscarls and D'Shar Bladesmen/Scorpion Assassins) to scythe through the enemy invaders.

But if you make ALL of your garrison elites your bills will be HUGE (I made this mistake - I lose 30,000 denars a week even with all enterprises in town because I have 500 elites in Windholm and 400 elites in Senderfall + other troops and 300 strong party).

So what do you do to make a strong but affordable garrison?

Let's assume you have 700 dudes;
150 or so strong/elite archer units
100 or so strong elite infantry or cavalry units (Huscarls, Bladesmen, or any Heretic Magnuses/Jatu Lancers/Rogue Knights you just happen to have on hand, throw them in)
100-200 mid-tier infantry/archers of your choice (think upkeep 10-40 a week)

Finally, use around 250 T2/T3 units (think upkeep 1-3 per week).

The idea behind this strategy is that your initial defense waves are just as strong as a garrison with 700 all elite units thrown in. However, this is much *cheaper* than doing that.

Don't be an idiot like me, who put 700 high upkeep troops in Windholm, and now has to run across Pendor like a madman with a blunt lance just to barely break even with the troop bills. You'll regret it.

Good luck.

PS: I'm not sure if 6v*100* is normal in those odds, but yes you are meant to be massively outnumbered in the actual battle if the troop numbers are that different.

One of the enemy commanders could have a high level in Tactics, which increases battle advantage (and therefore increases troop numbers spawned) which could really screw you over reaaaaal fast if you don't take out the enemy lords first, retreat, then fight the second round again after all enemy lords are knocked out.

Good luck.

SataSata said:

This is my first play through of this mod and I was a mercenary for the fierdsvain army at day 200+ having around 60+ mixed of cavalry units(adventurers, rogue knights, mercs and various other horsemen) and enterprises in almost all towns. I earn my gold by capturing Lords and asking for ransoms and collecting taxes for Lords but not returning them.

So one day I saw the notice that the Noldors are sieging Laria and I decided to take the opportunity to have a town for myself. I don't know how to prematurely end my mercenary contract so I ask the fierdsvain king to make me a vassal so that he can grant me as lord of the town. I scare some Sarleons villagers without attacking them to get hostile status so I can siege Laria and then I rode to Laria. Laria was already sacked by the Noldors when I reached there leaving around 40 soldiers who surrender the town to me without a fight.

And here comes the problem. Fast forward a few days, I have 100+ troops garrisoned in Laria and we are at war with the D'Shar. Before I know it the D'Shar are riding towards my town fielding a total of 1600+ strong! I tried to defend the town with another lord who happens to be in my town(he only have 30 soldiers).

But when we get into the fight, only a total of 6 of us spawn vs the enemy with more than a 100! Madness! Even our reinforcement comes in waves of 6! It's impossible! No matter how high tier my units are they can't survive being hit from all directions.

So please help me, I do not want to lose my first ever town in warband(I only got the game recently and this is my first town). Is it a bug that my forces spawn with only 6 soldiers vs their 100+ or is it meant to be this way because of our number difference? Battle size is set at 150.

I have tried to find ways to prevent the siege itself like trying to exploit the AI by looting a village to see if they would rush to the village's aid but they have done sieging it after I travel half of Pendor across to their desert.

So great Kings, Captains and Lords of Pendor, what would you suggest that I do to defend Laria?

Click to expand...

If you have any skill points available, dump everything into tactics... if not, try to hit the arena and do melee fights, should be able to get a few levels if you really bring the hurt in it... Intellect gives skill points so every level grab intellect

Thank you so much Talinoth and Arctic_Howler.

I managed to lure a Jatu force of 500+ to the D'Shar army. Unfortunately they did not run away as they were already waiting outside Laria instead they fought them with their combined force of 1600. I then de-garrisoned all of my cavalry units and went to help out the Jatu. Surprisingly it went pretty well, every battle our numbers drop by around 50 while theirs around 100 and eventually we were left with 100+ against their 700+ but I decided to retreat and go back to Laria to let my soldiers recover leaving the Jatu to fend for themselves. I even level up and got 2 points in tactics making it 4 in total during the process.

And finally they siege Laria and it was a 100+ vs 600+ battle. This time my forces spawn around 30 and theirs around 80. It didn't go well during the first try as I died early despite taking down 35 of them personally and I screw up my hold position order. On the second try I set the damage to allies to 1/2 and finally we manage to defeat 345 of them and successfully defend Laria! The D'Shar retreated and I then proceed to pick on their lords which have less than 10 units in their party left and I got a total of 300+ renown from the Jatu fight and the siege defend!

Sometimes, it's better to let them just take it. You can take it back without much trouble. Eventually, you their war party will split and everyone will go home.

Alternatively, try raiding a village or sieging one of their castles while they're sieging yours. It often causes them to break off their siege and chase you down. (I don't know if there's a greater chance of that happening if you attack the properties of the marshal, but you can try that too)

If I remember, Laria is not one of the easier towns to defend, not the hardest, but there are towns/castles that are defensive havens where you can easily take down large armies as long as you have 1/3rd their size for battle size/tactics reasons.  Like others have said, sometimes it's hopeless and you'd do better just letting the town fall and then retaking it.  Or you could go on the offensive and siege one of their towns/castles with no intention of actually attacking.  Sometimes the marshall of the other faction is defensive minded and will abandon their siege to defend against your offensive siege.  But you will need at least a credible attacking force to get them to abandon their siege (you can't siege a 400 garrison castle with 100 men and expect that to work).