So I've been playing Warband, and then Floris, hoping the mod would fix what's frustrating me. It doesn't. Every game I've played ends exactly the same way.
The game is fun and enjoyable right up until mid-game, when I've got an army of hardened, veteran warriors, picked a side, and gone on the attack. For a while it's fun and challenging until I smash all the high-level units in the field and start taking over the territory of whomever my nation is at war with. I'll take a city or two, and the king always takes this as a signal that he needs to declare another war. I rush to the new front, smash the big 300-man army, lick my wounds and smash the handful of 150-man armies, then take another city or two. This is apparently the signal that the king should start yet another war. He won't give me any more of the cities or castles I take, and he won't give them to anyone with a real army. As near as I can tell, all the king does is declare wars and hold feasts.
So I'll be rushing from city to city, swatting at these swarms of 50-man ****-tier armies which are flitting around like fruit flies, and no matter which city or castle I rescue, the fruit flies gather everywhere I'm not. No one except me seems to have any interest in defending territory. My side's armies are all clustered in a big pile, sieging another castle they can't or won't defend, or gathered at another fscking feast. Meanwhile, I'm bleeding red ink everywhere because the king has declared war on the whole planet and all my businesses are sequestered.
I'll be desperately trying to hold off 15 or 20 little armies of peasants buzzing around my holdings, then I'll be ordered by the marshall to cross the fscking continent so I can stand still for two weeks to siege a useless, strategically valueless castle in the middle of nowhere. At that point I usually throw my mouse across the room, yell in frustration at my keyboard, and delete all my savegames.
Is there any purpose to the game in single-player? The AI seems to be designed to deliberately nerf itself by over-extending and never defending itself. I can understand why they'd want to make a game which self-balances so one side doesn't just sweep the map, but it makes me feel frustrated and powerless. I can conquer any city or castle on the map, but what's the point? Am I playing this wrong? If I'm going to be at war with the whole planet anyway, I guess I could strike out on my own and become my own king, but I don't see this being any less frustrating.
Any advice?
The game is fun and enjoyable right up until mid-game, when I've got an army of hardened, veteran warriors, picked a side, and gone on the attack. For a while it's fun and challenging until I smash all the high-level units in the field and start taking over the territory of whomever my nation is at war with. I'll take a city or two, and the king always takes this as a signal that he needs to declare another war. I rush to the new front, smash the big 300-man army, lick my wounds and smash the handful of 150-man armies, then take another city or two. This is apparently the signal that the king should start yet another war. He won't give me any more of the cities or castles I take, and he won't give them to anyone with a real army. As near as I can tell, all the king does is declare wars and hold feasts.
So I'll be rushing from city to city, swatting at these swarms of 50-man ****-tier armies which are flitting around like fruit flies, and no matter which city or castle I rescue, the fruit flies gather everywhere I'm not. No one except me seems to have any interest in defending territory. My side's armies are all clustered in a big pile, sieging another castle they can't or won't defend, or gathered at another fscking feast. Meanwhile, I'm bleeding red ink everywhere because the king has declared war on the whole planet and all my businesses are sequestered.
I'll be desperately trying to hold off 15 or 20 little armies of peasants buzzing around my holdings, then I'll be ordered by the marshall to cross the fscking continent so I can stand still for two weeks to siege a useless, strategically valueless castle in the middle of nowhere. At that point I usually throw my mouse across the room, yell in frustration at my keyboard, and delete all my savegames.
Is there any purpose to the game in single-player? The AI seems to be designed to deliberately nerf itself by over-extending and never defending itself. I can understand why they'd want to make a game which self-balances so one side doesn't just sweep the map, but it makes me feel frustrated and powerless. I can conquer any city or castle on the map, but what's the point? Am I playing this wrong? If I'm going to be at war with the whole planet anyway, I guess I could strike out on my own and become my own king, but I don't see this being any less frustrating.
Any advice?
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