Even if they put the extra effort into a multiplayer campaign (which would delay release substantially), many systems involving time stops would need to be completely redone for it. The result would be a game which plays completely differently.
Though I still dream of a post release patch allowing drop in control of non pc lords during battles. Like how total war let you open your game to drop in and random players could connect and control the opposing force.
Be cool to get even something small. An update on what they were so proud of before with hair, a lineup of character models by race, even just theory craft like a weapon types comparison.
I get that information comes as it comes, but with the president they set when they started blogging of one every two months or so it's kind of irrespossible if they do mean to just stop outright without notifying their fans of the decision.
There are a lot of very insignificant things (compared to story or actual game mechanics) that they could write about, building hype for their game and pleasing longtime fans. Even rewriting about things that they have already talked about, to follow up with updates.
Undermining would be a very interesting and appreciated feature. It'd have to be something that took days and weeks to complete during the siege rather than an alternate option during battle though. It's not exactly a quick procedure. Perhaps an option on the defensive as well, if you detect that the other guy is digging counter digging isn't always out of the question. If the defender detects and locates offensive tunnels they could hit the attacker pretty hard with only a few men some night, potentially crippling the siege.
This means there would have to be a few predetermined tunnel routes at each keep, rather than allowing a player to choose exactly where to tunnel, but that's fine as long as there are enough choices.
Related Wikipedia demonstrating that several cultures have used these methods since ancient times. In both guerrilla rebellion type warfare and proper warfare.
Catering to a ten year old computer would be the rough equivalent of designing a new game to run on ps2, ps3 AND ps4. Doable? Probably. Worth doing? Not a chance.
Just for comparison >.>
It's time to upgrade, just like the rest of gamers, everywhere.
Would actually be cool to have an option to duel the commander, or a chosen champion, to decide a battle, or possibly even war. Whether or not a lord or nation actually does what they promise if they loose might depend on honor?
I have some vaigue recollection of some ancient armies occasionally doing something like this to settle disputes and save lives. Even if the looser breaks their promise you're still gonna get a morale boost for watching your guy cut down theirs.
Oh, and capturing a king should allow you to force peace, as should capturing a sufficient number of lords. Not a particularly long lasting peace. But as long as you've got hostages (lords shouldn't be released during peace time in this case, hostages should be included in negociations along with bribes for peace) they're less likely to break the peace if they don't think they can rescue them fairly quickly.
well, a weak general would most likely fail to win battles and as a result you most likely dies when you can follow a great general that you have better chances to survive and have the money for the stuff you want to do.
the best troops would want to follow a strong general that they can win many battles with and earn lots of gold and honor, while going with a weak general would be money but only taking out bandits or smaller battles that you dont rly get that much honor out of (compared with huge battles that takes place).
But then, a sickly old man can still be a master tactician and strategist. I'd follow him a lot quicker than the most recent tournament champion who's never led five guys, let alone five hundred or thousand. A great strong man is not necessarily a great leader of men. Renown is a better value for this, if such a change were to be made. But, as posters have said, money rules all. Peasants were dumber than sacks of potatoes (and superstitious to boot), and generally half starved (with families to feed to boot).
All actions would reduce said stamina system, btw. Drawing a bow is hard work. Drawing a longbow is something... Most posters here actually might not be able to do. Marching is basically the only thing that wouldn't cost fatigue, but the low limit on its impact on fighting efficiency keeps it from being too obnoxious. Scale this with difficulty, so hardcore players get a greater effect for themselves, but also enemies.
Combined with only recovering said stat while off the field it would give attackers an interesting advantage over defenders in a long siege, being better able to cycle units. Perhaps you could even boost overland speed temporarily at the cost of your infantry entering battle fatigued?
Imo stamina should be used. Sort of. Not in an "oh, I attacked five times, now I can't attack again" kind of way though.
Each character and NPC starts a battle fresh. They have a fairly decently-sized stamina bar which does not recover during a battle while they are active. Units who retreat do slowly recover, and may return as reinforcements later (for sieges and the like). As the bar depletes all of your actions become very marginally slower, but not a great deal. When the bar empties you suffer maybe a 20% reduction in all speeds, and are winded. Recover NPCs as above, by retreating them. Possibly make it so that they player can retreat and just watch the battle, then elect to return when theyve gained some stamina. Perhaps while they are not on the field they get a more detailed command screen?
Also, possibly road building as a village improvement option. More prosperous villages provide better roads to their castle or town. Could even be an automatic improvement. Then same for towns, but providing roads to other towns. It'd give a good reason to help keep villages prosperous, even to an infactioned player, in the area that they keep their base.
Siege equipment shouldn't be manable by the player. It should aim and fire on command, but not be possible to man. And, for balance, should likely be one shot. You get to punch a hole in a wall roughly of your choosing, and kill a lot of guys, but not use them to win without firing an arrow. Same ti the defender, build them as castle improvements to deal one mass casualty at the start of each fight. It'd prevent players from ever being able to take a castle with a minamilist, elite, force. They'd need, at least, some meat shields. I mean, give me fifty top-tier vaegyr archers and some patience and I can conquer all of Nordland without loosing a man (floris-expanded troops example, possibly native too).
And sieges. Seriously. Movable ladders can't be too much more difficult to implement than siege towers, with their own animation set. Putting ladder bearers into a custom division with custom orders can't be much harder, an invisible line that triggers the put up ladder animation is minutes of work per castle. This feature not existing on release will fill me with sadness. Even if they move via the force. Though forcing a few men to actually carry them would be nice. My assumption when we see characters actually climbing them means that they are no longer terrain, but are now an interactable object.
Horses could do to have a turbo bar for charging. Err... Stamina. Was thinking about racing games.
Be cool if we had volley commands added to our commands list. Just a couple, like:
1. Fire at 45' (max range)
2. Fire at 30'
3. Fire at 15'
To allow you to deal casualties at a better range even with lower quality archers (they'd fire +/- a few degrees based on their skill) based on your own skill. Possibly the ability to assign volley fire command to a specific npc? Officer npcs with leadership stats that made decisions for you and controlled a division would be really awesome. Especially if you could give them more advanced orders (before combat). Those would be things like 'defend division A', or 'attack enemy archers'. You'd still be able to take direct control of them, and give it back to the officer at any time through your F-# commands menu. Neither of these would be too terribly hard to implement. Enemy/ally lords already have AI to draw upon, just weight it based on their leadership skill and your specific order, and volley firing is just fire at your current facing at specific angle.
Also, they've got a special animation for climbing soldiers. Not sure how difficult it would be to add some 'handles' to the sides of siege towers and just give soldiers a special animation for grabbing them when they get close. Pretty minor change, but apparently a pretty major immersion change. The siege towers don't even really need special landing pads, those wooden decks aren't really going to do that much damage to stone anyways, just make it so that the soldiers enter a special division and can be commanded, then just when they take the tower close enough to the wall it drops wherever it happens to end up. That'd be a lot more complex, because they'd have to take the siege towers off of tracks, but should still be doable. Putting up ladders after that would be fairly easy. Make them like siege towers, requiring soldiers to push them and getting set up on the wall, just with different animations. It'd basically be the same code, with different animations attached.
Iono. None of this is probably as simple as I think, I've only ever done low level development. But it's not necessarily as hard as a lot of people think it could be either. Just some thoughts on additions that would add immersion, and how seems logical yet simple to implement them.
Game NEEDS more advanced pre-battle screen. Yes, screens with buttons are irritating and immersion breaking. But they can also be necessary. Unless the F-# command gets waaay more advanced, you need the ability to set up advanced formations before battle. You need the ability to split your divisions into smaller formations (and a functionality to keep them split, during the battle) based on your current needs. "Oh, they have lots of cavalry, I'm going to need pikes everywhere" versus "Oh, they don't have any cavalry, I'm going to put my pikes behind two ranks of regular melee troops, so they hit on the charge but don't all end up dead in the battle". The soldiers wouldn't even spawn there. They'd spawn and then run to where you told them to go. They'd spawn more intelligently, with all the troops in the same formation spawning in the same files and adjacent ranks. That way a player using very advanced orders isn't going to finish them all before the cavalry of a players simple charge order hit. You'd actually gain strategy, order cavalry to charge, fight for a small amount of time, then retreat. Disrupting enemy preparations and allowing you to gain ground on them.
Again, just thoughts. But I'd find such a game to be very appealing. Also, IMO, villages shouldn't be factional based on who owns the associated castle. I'm sure that if a lord rolled in, offered them protection and reduced taxes, and they hated their lord enough, they'd be completely on board. Granted, the previous lord isn't going to be happy with the new one about this. Feifless lords would get something to do, and perhaps if killing bandits near a village gave them reputation with it, they'd get useful too.
Also, if ambushes are truly being added, you need to have marching orders for your army. A simple screen that you basically just specify what divisions or types of troops march where. So when you get ambushed you get no pre-battle plan. Simply where your troops were when you got there. These marching orders would also possibly be used to determine where your troops spawn at the start of a battle? Be a heck of a lot better than a huge square of dudes.
Also, for the people saying that single player doesn't matter. I'd bet that a good two thirds of their buyers will not touch multiplayer for more than an hour. It's not always that appealing. Some times actual content and complex, long-term, objectives can be funner. Quality of your game shouldn't be based on the quality of your matchmaking system, IMO games like that often have the worst quality communities on the internet. That's worded poorly, but should get the point across.
Also, with the argument about modding. There are some mods which basically every player agrees are necessary. Said mods will be implemented as the new vanilla at least, if not improved upon. Or taleworlds will have failed terribly. They shouldn't need listing.
Sneaking. Clearly required on the campaign map, it should also be somehow made possible on the combat map. Even just the addition of small bushes and vision obstructions with crouching soldiers so as to prevent players from sighting soldiers in specific areas, to allow traps and the like to be used. Similarly, soldiers and formations should not turn automatically to face the enemy. Orders should be added to force the player to control this. How do my men know where the soldiers on the other side of that hill are moving? As long as even a single man has a direct line of sight a command to face the enemy formation should be available, and they should announce it somehow. Need a separate command to rotation your entire army with respect to their current orientation to each other, multiple divisions the same, and single divisions on their center axis.
Need player defined formations. Simply a menu that lets you draw up where ranks and files go (and in what order, if enough troops are not present) so that players can create custom formations. Allow specific unit types to be associated with specific positions. Like putting archer-skirmishers in front of straight archers, or pikes in every second or third rank behind melee troops.
The ability to lay traps, creating a largish region (based on a skill use and time taken) in which every lord other than the layer (and possibly lords he has somehow warned of the danger) have a small chance every small amount of time to have a soldier hit a trap and become wounded (or, depending on the nature of the trap, loose his horse). The traps would deteriorate after time (wildlife), and there would be chances for lords to spot the traps based on their own skill and receive a warning. Not know the actual boundaries, just know that they're in a trapped area. Come on subterfuge and sabotage!
Also, ladders and towers in the same siege are not a new thing. I have no idea where, but I have at least one distinct memory of a siege in warband where a very narrow ladder spawned next to where the tower landed. Also, not sure if this was floris mod, but I've seen destructible gates that you could cut down. So clearly battering rams are a thing which could be implemented. Heck, even without one some wooden doors might be possible to take down with axes and blunt weapons.
On another thing, if adding occupiable positions to the siege towers became a thing, perhaps they could be added to the walls? Giving each arrow slit a number of archers (probably two) that can 'attach' to it, and use it more intelligently. It isn't a smarter AI, but it'd be an improvement. If you use restricted positions like that then the new animations are easier to create and implement. Also, one shot siege equipment should be possible. Boiling oil over the gate to deal serious damage to units attempting to ram the gate, for example. These would need to be constructed in advance of the battle (though possibly could be made during the siege, if you happen to have the time before they decide to attack). Similarly, the attacker would get options to prepare such things. If siege equipment is added it needs to have a very long re-attack time though, or it's going to be game breaking. Guaranteed. Don't care how realistic it may be, the ability to kill a score of enemy troops from beyond arrow range will be game breaking. Heck, having archers is already game breaking in a siege =D.
Lot of words, I'm very tired and slightly medicated. Sorry. TLDR: List of ideas.
Or streamline it further. Perhaps a portion of the defending players units are blocked within certain areas? With certain requirements to trigger their spawns. Say, if the defenders have more than a certain number then some spawn in the courtyard to sally out and meet the attackers. Similarly, once you capture the walls the inner gate opens up and they have another 10% of their troops spawning in the streets? Then again another 5% holed up in the keep. All loaded on one map, no screens in between, and you get all of your survivors to lead into the next battle. It'd make a siege a lot more real feeling.
Perhaps even give the defender the ability to choose what potion of their troops spawn in which of the four zones. Some more cowardly lords might hide out in their keep with half their force, while their braver counterparts others might meet you in the field with everything. It'd make choosing what lords you ask for reinforcement before a siege more of an involved decision too, since they'd all be putting their troops different places based on their preferences. You'd want a lord or two to make up a vanguard and give you time to position the rest of your defenders, some on the walls, some in the city, and one or two to hold the keep.
Unless the AI leanrs how to target enemies wielding weapons that cannot block before those that chamber block before shields. If it figures that out then GG dual weilders in anything but small encounters and duels.
Agreeing with some previous comments you should have some kind of commanders table that you start battles at, give initial troop placements and division breakdowns and possibly simple orders from, and then that you can continue to sit at and trumpet orders out to your divisions mid battle. Would totally add to the immersion, and create the ability to roleplay the brilliant strategist, instead of just the fearless commander. Possibly the ability to give divisions to companions, and give them general orders. Things like, hold point A or defend division B. They'd follow more precisely and make better choices based on tactics skill. It'd make huge battles properly epic. One further advancement would be to be able to decide what divisions come as reinforcements in what order.
Exactly. Nothing wrong with dual wielding, but that ranged units are going to ruin your day. And if the ai improves any, they'll stop emptying their quivers into shields and start shooting for two handers and berserkers. History has demonstrated that dual weilding is effective if used skillfully, same as any other martial form. Even in sport fencing today it is an option.
If you have the skill two weapons beat one weapon and empty hand. Shields have no actual part in the discussion other than the fact that you can block or deflect q blow much more easily (not necessarily effectively) with one. In both cases a sufficiently powerful strike will either break your arm through your shield, or knock your weapon out of its way. A shield requires a more powerful strike to do, but is also heavier to move into a position to block a quick strike with. Each has an advantage and a disadvantage, and historically both have been viable.
Also, a hard limit for maximum party size seems... Weak. I think army size should be uncapped, however heavily effected by morale. First, new units worn even join if morale is bad. Second, units defect at low morale, travel slower, and are weaker in combat.
On the alternate side, you get compounding morale penalties for army size. To provide a maximum army size that fluctuates more, and has 'tiers' (max size before defection, max size at 100% combat strength, max size at 100% movement speed, etc). You win a lot of battles, you can recruit a bunch of guys, but if you stop winning or start loosing they become disillusioned and leave, as an example. You'd get morale bonuses for things like being a lord, owning feifs and other things that currently provide a hard increase to troop quantity.
If you used renown as a modifier to morale benefits and disadvantages it could be even better, with hihly renowned players getting more out of high morale (even more soldiers), but getting hit harder by bad morale (more desertions).
I don't know how well I've explained myself here, but hopefully to par.
Not long ago I have learned that all the sound files are pre-loaded into the game, so they fill your memory even if not needed. I would like you to invest more time in optimizing the game. Let us have more load screens, and get a smoother gameplay in exchange.
If you're saying that you'd want players to have to sit through loading screens while playing multiplayer, I have to go with Meevar, pre-loading less is a terrible idea. It would only serve to slow down the pace of the game. In some situations active loading (resoures load during gameplay as you need them, such as when traveling long distances and needing completely different cultural sounds) becomes viable to save on resources, but in your immediate area NOTHING should stop the flow of the game and force loading. Especially, as you say, when 200 or more players are on the same ground, performing actions.
Quickly guys! If the pattern holds, only three more pages of posts until they release a new blog post!
Oh, and supply caravans. During a siege you should be able to send a group of men to buy (or otherwise obtain) food. Because I don't think my inventory can even hold 30 days of food to outlast a city during a siege when I have 200+ men. There are lots of things like this players should be able to use their soldiers for, by sending a few at a time away.
Query: What does the green exclamation point and watched above me mean?
Another thought, since we're going for realism. Abolish levels. Entirely. Not skill levels, mind, character levels.
RPG elements are cool, but can be out of place. I gained a level by clubbing peasants to death with a quarterstaff. How did I get better at trading during this experience? Most every skill should be trained by simple use, rather than leveling. Even skills like tactics can be done this way (award experience after battle based on initial disadvantage, casualties, kills, and prisoners). It would make the player character more... Legitimate. If you're worried about a PC becoming too powerful when they've maxed every skill implement a system like the developers of Cataclysm DDA have, Focus. The better your morale the more focus you gain over time, low morale looses focus over time. Every time a skill should level up check focus, if you have less focus than the new skill level the upgrade does not happen until focus improves. When a skill levels up you loose focus equal to the new skill level. That would slow down character progression towards the higher levels, and if you made the focus stat more difficult to obtain than simply 'be happy for x number of days' then only a sufficiently old character could max every skill.
Perhaps base it on renown?
And on the subject of renown. Renowned slavers existed. Renowned merchants existed. Many people were well known back in the day for things other than leadership. The game should track what you bought an individual trade good for, how long you've had it, and what you sell it for (as secret variables), and award some form of merchant renown. The same for slaving, the higher tier a unit you sell should get you some form of slaving renown. Perhaps slaving renown would come into effect when parties like patrols and villagers see you, to determine whether or not they run even if you are not at war with their faction, from simple fear. Similarly, if you have a lot of renown as a trader, perhaps caravans that spot you signal you or even spend an hour moving towards you in an attempt to trade? There are other things as well that one might become known for, but off the top of my head and fitting the setting, the main ones I come up with are Trade, Battle, and Slaving.
And on the subject of slaving. Prisoners in a garrison should be usable to speed construction in your feifs. Send them out with soldiers (as escorts, say one soldier can handle 5 slaves?), if they make it to the destination they speed construction, if they make it home they go back to jail. Or perhaps doing this frees the prisoner, calling it their sentence completed. It goes without saying you could attack prisoner convoys and recruit them to your cause should you spot an enemy attempting to send one somewhere. This might reduce your honor if you choose to not release them after, and improve it if you elect to free them for their labor?
And on the subject of honor. Two dimensions to a scale are limiting. Possibly consider adding a second dimension. Think like dungeons and dragons. I can be lawful evil, creating order and rules which allow me to treat people horribly (think like Hitler). I could also be Chaotic good, disobeying the law but doing acts of kindness wherever I can (Robin Hood). Essentially, honor might be your good/evil scale, and perhaps obedience would be your lawful/chaotic? A player known to not follow the rules might find it harder to become a sworn man, and would hardly ever be awarded a high value fief. But he might also find some benefits. Perhaps bandits are easier to recruit, or deal with? And enemy lords are more likely to go off into the corner to plot with such a person? I dunno. Not a very useful stat for the type of game, but it would help to represent more archetypes of characters. I mean, both the examples above would have neutral honor, because they do something to balance out their evil and their good, but clearly one should have a high negative and the other a very high positive number there.
Just more thoughts. Sorry about the length. Again.
Is there a proper thread for suggestions? I didn't find one. That said, I'm lazy and didn't look too hard.
Edit: And with the whole argument about where various groups originated. It's fair to say that two cultures with a shared origin are related, however not necessarily culturally similar. As an example, Darwin's finches. They all originated from the same species, however are all very different, having evolved based on differing needs. An easy example, the Japanese. Perhaps in ways culturally similar to the Vietnamese, and of similar origin. One developed in a jungle, facing it's unique challenges, the other on an island and dealing with those associated challenges. Having different available resources, needs, dangers has made them distinct and unique. This does not mean that they are not similar, but they are different. Same goes for Nordic/Scandinavian roots. Similar, but different. Basing the similar origin comment on someone else saying that they are. The point stands even if they are not of similar origin, just change it to use any two cultures with a similar root.
Just a list of the skills from Warband, and how I might implement them to avoid a character level system (retain skill levels, but gain them in a different way). Spoilered for length.
Ironflesh: If I didn't scrap it entirely and use an endurance stat (which would also cover reducing penalties caused by armor weight and fatigue), take a hit and gain skill XP. Bigger hit causes much more experience. Think twice the damage giving a square of the experience.
Power Strike: Land a blow with a weapon, or if including an actual power attack system, land a 'charged' attack. Only while on foot, would implement a complement to horse archery that covered mounted fighting, because it's a very different talent. And likely would separate cutting, piercing, and bashing weapons into their own categories.
Power Throw: Same as power strike, but for thrown weapons.
Power Draw: Same again, but for bows.
Weapon Master: Would remove, as no levels = no weapon points. And I don't see it as necessary, if you base skill growth on use nothing should stop you but the cap.
Shield: Successfully blocking an attack with a shield. And would introduce a complement skill for deflecting attacks, with the same growth method.
Athletics: Probably remove and base movement speed on a combination of speed and strength, reduced by armor weight and mitigated by endurance.
Riding: Give horses a full on set of stats to determine what they can carry and the like, and separate them from armor. Riding skill built by riding (doy), perhaps makes it less likely that a horse will throw you off when it takes a hit, and increases a discipline stat held by each horse that basically makes horses you use lots less likely to try to throw you off or make their own decisions. Said discipline stat would passively increase, based on your riding skill, as you use the horse. Either give this a low cap and make horses die in combat, or a high cap and make them not. Or, to make your horse more precious, a high cap and they can die permanently in battle, as soldiers. Perhaps an army should have a horse pool almost as a resource, which is depleted as your riders are dismounted and needs to be replenished by captured horses and towns? Allow the player to pull horses from this pool to replace their own and make permadeath a thing for player horses? Larger horse pool means you go through wheat faster, and they start starving if you run out. Allows you to reduce the increased cost of mounted units, as they aren't assumed to provide the mount, but make maintaining them more difficult.
Horse Archery: Same as archery, but from horseback. As above, add a horse fighting or similar skill for melee.
Looting: Any time you obtain something without paying for it the skill gets some experience.
Trainer: Every time you train soldiers (daily training) you get some experience, more experience for larger armies. Promotions give a small boost to it, and training peasants or promoting is required to take it to level 1 before it will start working at all.
Tracking: Make tracks interact-able, with a chance to glean more information. Every time you attempt you get experience, with a bonus every time you actually get information, and a larger bonus based on the value or amount of information.
Tactics: Covered previously in post. Base experience on... Tactics... Or the closest way you can gauge them, battle advantage, casualties, kills, and time.
Path-Finding: As you move around the map you get better at it? I'd honestly flat out remove this, and base your speed entirely on your army size and composition, and cargo. Include units like wagons which can turn a number of regular soldiers to cavalry for this calculation, allow horses in reserve to carry a single man at increased speed as well, regardless of whether or not he's cavalry. Wagons would also offset some cargo weight speed reductions.
Spotting: Give the player a chance to spot enemies at different ranges based on the skill, rather than a flat vision boost, and a minimum range to automatically spot per level of skill. Every time they spot something beyond the minimum range they get a little better, based on how much farther out they spotted it at. This would also play into ambushes. Possibly roll spotting against ambushing skill (which would be added), with penalties based on distance, and re-roll it at specific distance intervals?
Inventory Management: Why? Remove, base maximum inventory based on the number of wagons or other cargo carrying things you have in your army. A note, wagons would go faster than footmen but slower than cavalry, for the purpose of group speed calculations.
Wound Treatment: On the map you get the option to spend time attempting to heal yourself and your heroes faster, time spent and extra HP healed translates to experience.
Surgery: After battle you get the OPTION to spend time attempting to bring soldiers back from the brink of death, giving a small % chance to recover a killed soldier per unit of time spent trying to recover them. Each success gives an experience boost, higher level reduces time and increases success rate.
First Aid: Probably merge it with wound treatment, but retain (heavily nerfed) it's functionality.
Engineer: Apply it to all siege equipment, each project completed gives experience, and each hour spent participating in the construction of a fief improvement also gives some experience.
Persuasion: Create more opportunities to use the skill, and each successful use gives some experience. Envoys would gain experience from use as well, with larger gains for successes. Make a player train the diplomat as a diplomat, rather than having him become one after a time spent fighting.
Prisoner Management: Successfully taking prisoners gives you experience here.
Leadership: Gain experience passively based on group morale.
Trade: Every transaction gives experience here, based on how much money you made and how quickly (goes with the above suggestion to include hidden stats tracking what you bought each individual good for, and how long you've had it for).
Raidable iron mines to severely hamper a city's troop production would be a cool (and fairly game changing, if you made it so promotions could only happen in towns with a quantity of supplies) addition to the game, and something new to burn down without loosing honor like you do for villages.
And a mercenary faction, which could be hired to do just about anything (for enough gold), to give the player pause every single time he sees their banner on the map. Possibly joinable? Similar to signing on with a faction as a mercenary, except you get entirely random targets (paid by various lords, instead of working for a single faction). Possibly the ability to approach a battle in progress and accept bids from the two fighting lords for your assistance? Lords who would be able to beat you and the other army together (or feel that they could) would be smart enough to not pay.
And to throw a wrench in EVERYONES plans, foreign armies, showing up and just raiding a pillaging until they take enough casualty to need to leave. It'd give a player who owns everything a significant end game threat to deal with. Make them massive, but spread out a little so they can be dealt with in parts. Have them move in, take a town, raid around until they need to leave (time passage, or troop depletion, or driven out of the town), and leave their base for the bandits (unfactioned). It'd definitely keep the map more dynamic.
Yay for rapid fire ideas. Because the more people share, the more likely the devs are going to see something they like, or a suggested solution to a problem they didn't know they had or were having trouble dealing with.