Any updates since 2012?

[original]

Hey all,

I bought the game when it was first released, because I liked what I saw in the first Mount & Blade. Mounted combat gives you such a rush.

I last posted in 29 May 2012, and I left the game because I was disappointed that I couldn't play the benevolent lord that nurtures his village to prosperity. I studied the hardship index formula in detail by looking in the script files, I wanted to understand why despite protecting my castle, doing quests, the prosperity was still low.
I even checked why cattle was always decreasing in villages, and I discovered why. It was because sheep overtook the grazing fields. Yes I know you cannot buy sheep, but in the script files, sheep do exist and they competed with cows for the grazing field. Unfortunately, the formula favours sheep and cows always lose out to them.
But the developer at that time didn't want to tweak any of these because he was either cautious about changing the hardship index values (probably worried that a small change would cause even more problems) or was busy doing other things.

So I want to know whether there has been any official updates since then, whether there had been any attempts to balance the economy or fix some of these problems?

 

[estevesbk]

Have you tried Diplomacy at the time? I believe if you set a tax rate for a village to "very low", at least an Average prosperity you will get from that.

Problem is, one successful raid and it goes back to "very poor".

Actually I think you don't even need to tweak the taxes. Probably if the village stays from some time without being raided, its prosperity will increase although I cannot confirm you that.

What I do for economy is to build Enterprises on every town and garrison my fiefs with a number of low-tier troops, usually 400 nord footmen + 100 rhodok crossbowmen

Other than that, I give every lord that I have 1 castle OR 1 village and I only accept goodnatured, upstanding and martial lords. They are the best and their number enough. I believe by doing that and keeping the rest of the towns and villages it will soon hit the tax inefficiency cap and you will start earning money.


Edit 1: I like to roleplay that by only giving villages to goodnatured and upstanding lords, I am being benevolent enough. These are honorable lords so the peasants will be well treated. I leave the castles to martial lords, which are my "generals". But they probably would also deserve a village, just don't like to risk the well being of my peasants

And when I am at war, I usually don't call for a campaign, I face the enemy and conquer fiefs alone unless it requires siege towers. That way most of the times my lords patrol and protect the villages. Few of my peasants know what is being raided since they were... "liberated" by me.


Edit 2: Also on Diplomacy you can make a patrol that will protect the peasants at least from bandits and ensure that they will sell their goods at the nearest town. This should help them and the village prosperity.