Blead said:
The villages offer recruits, but I find them lacking.
In Perisno, at the start of the game it's better to recruit a few expensive mercs such as Viragos or Virago Heroines (even if hiring a couple of them means spending your entire budget) than a ton of village recruits.
Mercs in Perisno are not overpriced crap like in most mods where their wages are 2x-2.5x of their actual worth, and a couple of virago heroines can handle a party of snowalkers or even sandwalkers without much difficulties.
Village recruits are mostly for mid-game - cost-effective, numerous, great for garrisons and for the main part of your army.
Blead said:
I do not know which parties to aim for first, most of them are very strong.
Snowalkers, looters => sandwalkers, low-tier deserters (there are 2 troop trees in the mod where you can find info on all soldiers) => escaped prisoners, volheere => saccar raiders, mid-tier deserters, amazons, desouk slavers => outlawed criminals, eagle knights, demon worshippers => Mosoru, Wolf Knights, Foreign Invaders => any large parties (armies of eagle knights and demon worshippers, holy crusaders etc.).
Plus, in most mods, including Perisno, a couched lance strike at fast speed can one-hit almost anyone even at the start of the game. In addition to this, in Perisno x-bows have armor piercing effect, so even with a starting crossbow you can deal some damage even to high-tier knights.
And, personally, my favorite strategy at the start of the game is not trading, freelancing or farming crap parties, but jumping straight into action. Joining (as a merc) any faction that is at war, assisting their lords in battles, using my lance or crossbow to hit single targets from safe distance. And unlike in case of enlisting, I get to pick battles I want to participate in, and in between battles I can do guildmasters' or lords' quests, visit towns, sell prisoners and loot, recruit companions. That allows me to have diverse, interesting and pretty safe gameplay, gradually raise relationships with future lords of my kingdom, gradually build up my army from the pool of rescued prisoners.
Blead said:
I do not know what kind of companions I need to go for.
The main thread has a link to my "party planner":
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1nCjVvas9XPRvYTxtrYw4ru66ozmssl6H/edit
which includes characteristics of all companions.
Blead said:
I am having issues with finding a good faction to start with.
Pick the one that suits your tastes and preferences in troops and design/atmosphere.
Troops of some factions are better than those of others but they're also much harder to train and less cost-effective. And lords of "weaker" factions field much more numerous armies so they can still hold the ground against "stronger" factions.
Zann hit the western, north-western and northern coasts hard, but they're only good in autocalc. Be there when they attack and by joining sieges you'll be able to save most of the fiefs.