Giving Away Castles and Villages

[YFLeo]

I finished the game in 2.5, and now I'm trying it again under 3.1.  Some crucial details of Pendor are difficult to test.

1.  Do the size and quality of a lord's army depend whether he holds any fiefs?  And if so, is the army size and quality based on the actual income of the fiefs, rather than something simpler such as the number of fiefs?

If it's based on income, that would mean that a lord with one castle will generally have an inferior army to that of a lord with one village, because villages produce so much more income than castles.  It would also mean that giving a lord an improved village will give him a bigger long-term boost than giving him an unimproved village.

2.  Do lords still improve their own castles and villages?  If so, does the building speed depend on the town steward's abilities?  In other words, is it generally a good idea to train up stewards before giving away towns and castles, to speed their future development?

 

[Fawzia dokhtar-i-Sanjar]

You should absolutely train stewards before giving away a castle, and the elder in the village before giving away a village.
At the very least, that means if you build improvements/make repairs, if someone in your party (or you) has strong engineering skills, the steward will acquire them, likewise with trade skills, for better prosperity.

Other than some of the lords having "special" house troops, it is the same as Vanilla M&B, except that some castles or towns might have a Knighthood Order in them.

 

[manekemaan]

You should absolutely train stewards before giving away a castle, and the elder in the village before giving away a village.
At the very least, that means if you build improvements/make repairs, if someone in your party (or you) has strong engineering skills, the steward will acquire them, likewise with trade skills, for better prosperity.

Other than some of the lords having "special" house troops, it is the same as Vanilla M&B, except that some castles or towns might have a Knighthood Order in them.

so this means that lords build improvements themselves as wel? So if I train some steward to high lvl engineering, the vasal who owns it after me will build more improvements in the town/village/castle?

 

[Fawzia dokhtar-i-Sanjar]

Since he asked about improving the lord's finances and troops, I suggested (or thought I did) that he do some improvements after training the village elder or steward, so the lord he gave it to would get improved troops and revenue from his holdings.  I generally hold on to castles, towns, villages long enough to make at least some basic improvements/repairs, build a training field if necessary, then give them away to loyal lords myself, but not everybody does that, I'm sure.  What I meant by "it is like M&B Vanilla" is that the lords don't make improvements to their holdings, so if Player doesn't make them, they don't get done.  It is worth the investment, in my opinion, to have more prosperous lords with better troops loyal to you.

 

[Footy]

Oh that is some good information. Maybe i should give Gazin to a loyal lord, since it got.... alot of improvements But sounds like i will do a little tour to all of the villages uner my control, every now and then ^_^