eh.........villagers get a bad rap

[reallybigjohnson]

this whole time i was thinking that villagers and farmers basically sucked.  and then i stumbled across 10 villagers travelling along with 30 vaegir prisoners including a few top level guys. 

why do they get their asses kicked by small bands of robbers then?

 

[McBeverage]

More than likely the farmers were attacked by a Vaegirs war party/deserter party, and were aided by a bunch of soldiers who use blunt weapons.  Thus the blunt weapons knocked out the Vaegirs, and the farmers got to keep the  Vaegirs soldiers as pets/prisoners.

 

[reallybigjohnson]

that would be a first.  usually i see the lords ride right by them when they are attacked and i end up going to help them.

 

[Puritan]

this whole time i was thinking that villagers and farmers basically sucked.  and then i stumbled across 10 villagers travelling along with 30 vaegir prisoners including a few top level guys. 

why do they get their asses kicked by small bands of robbers then?

I've seen those partys a few times and helped create a few of my own.

They were being hit by vaegirs, someone helped them, and that's their share of the prisoners. Must have been a big party.

 

[Garluch]

Obviously the peasants were luring patrolling troops into their villages under the guise of pampering them with food, women, or other desirables only to gang up on them so they can eat them later.

With all of these invisible bandits stealing all of their cattle they have to do something, right?

 

[supraliminal]

I have no idea what specifically created the super farmer party you refer to.  I do know, however, that if you intervene on a fight, and hire no helpers from the defeated bandits' prisoners, they combine into one stack.  Hypothetically, for example:  You come across a sea raider group with 8 farmer prisoners attacking a (X) sized farmer group.  But... you don't care to hire the freed prisoners once you stomp the sea raiders, so you close the prisoner screen after the battle.  The farmer group will absorb all the prisoners you freed but didn't employ.  I'd assume the same is true for AI lords (who actually DO intervene pretty regularly from what I have stopped to observe, if not busy doing something else).  I've made super stacks of 40ish farmers (usually only farmers of course) this way myself.

So... what probably happened is a hugely hugely rare hire-spurn-so-make-super-farmer-stack type of occurrence that started much like the above.  That's what I would bet on, anyway.

Although... now that I think about it (some beers blocking teh intellect!)... you are talking about prisoners, not a farmer group traveling with 30 vaegirs actually as a member of the traveling farmer group.  I'd assume it is nevertheless rather similar (and similarly very rare!), but still.... probably just a very odd result of AI behavior/farmer help.

 

[Puritan]

It actually would be nice if you could assign escorts to farmers, or at least caravans.

 

[reallybigjohnson]

it must be rare cause although i dont usually check out the stats of villagers its the first time ive seen that big of a prisoner party.

 

[CorSelinke]

this whole time i was thinking that villagers and farmers basically sucked.  and then i stumbled across 10 villagers travelling along with 30 vaegir prisoners including a few top level guys. 

why do they get their asses kicked by small bands of robbers then?

Lol that's AWESOME!

 

[iffy]

Obviously the peasants were luring patrolling troops into their villages under the guise of pampering them with food, women, or other desirables only to gang up on them so they can eat them later.

With all of these invisible bandits stealing all of their cattle they have to do something, right?

LMAO!!  So great!