Haven't played for quite quite a while but I started a new campaign a few days ago, deciding this time to take a non-cav route and rely instead on Vaegir archers as the mainstay of my army. Anyway after the usual few weeks of plodding around killing bandits and winning tournaments I had a small band of sharpshooters and was at a decent level of combat ability. I soon got invited to the Vaegirs and accepted.
Anyway the Vaegirs had been at war with the Nords when I joined them, our lords were surprisingly organised and were advancing on Wercheg and Sargoth in force. In fact we took Wercheg with relative ease, followed closely by Tehlrog castle. It looked like the Nord lands (which extended as far as Uxkhal, splitting the Swadian territory in half) would soon be crushed under the boots of the Vaegir as Sargoth looked about to fall. At that point the plan fell apart.
Over a few days the khergits, followed by the Sarranids then the Swadians all declared war on us. This was pretty hard for a while with all of them except the Swadians repeatedly launching large campaigns but we held our ground. However the Nords soon got sick of the fighting and made peace with us, which allowed me to invest in recruiting and training up as many huscarls as I could.
From that point the war was surprisingly positive for us, despite the numerical disadvantage we started pushing outwards from Reyvadin towards Narra, I gained Dramug Castle myself and was rewarded it, and we managed to eventually take Narra as well as a few other castles along the way. At this point the Nords 40 days of peace gave up and they went to war again mere days after. My huscarls (of which I had nearly 50, plus 50 more in various stages between recruit and veteran) became useless. I was immediately involved in some pretty 'slaughtery' battles which saw my huscarl + sharpshooter combo basically annihilate the entire Nord army. But the result of this was that the Nords went from +3 relation to -97 over only 2 days. As such my wonderful huscarls started leaving and I had to put them in the Dramug garrison to hang on to them.
With the Nords now attacking and a critical part of my army rendered unusable in any sort of protracted campaign I watched unable to stop as most of our gains in land towards Narra were retaken. After a few weeks of this I decided enough was enough and this ganging up (4 on 1) against us was too much. I sneaked into Dhirim and was fortunate to get a quest for peace (exactly what I wanted) between the Swadians and the Vaegirs. For convincing the two lords to bring peace I would be rewarded 12,000 denars (which I could really use since I had been investing heavily in Dye Works) Convincing the Vaegir lord to support peace was simple if expensive. The Swadian one however was lord Haringoth who hung out for most of the time at Haringoth castle. So, knowing I would be going up against what might be a strong Swadian lord I gathered every competent infantryman, all my sharpshooters and all the spare cav I had in my garrison and set out with 110 (65 archers of which 50 were sharpshooters, 30 infantry of various mercenary types and 15 cav most of whom were slave drivers) men for a mission deep behind enemy lines.
I found Haringoth returning with a second lord at the bridge near his castle, between them they had about 250 men and of that around 70 were men at arms or knights. However his own homeland betrayed him as the terrain leant excellently to my archers with his forces having to cross a river then run up a hill to get to me. It was honestly an awesome sight seeing volley after volley of arrows smash through his lines and the few cav that managed to get up out of the ditch were dispatched by my infantry who were set just behind my line of archers.
Total victory cost me a mere 15 men which mostly came from the cav I had with me. The quest completed and peace imminent I set out back to Dhirim to claim my reward...
...Actually it was even more imminent than I expected, pretty much seconds after I had won the battle and set out, the Swadians, Sarranids and Khergits all suddenly (and pretty much simultaneously) made peace with us. The quest was cancelled and my reward lost
. Haringoth must have been some sort of mastermind controlling all three kingdoms or something 
. Still I got more than I wanted originally.
Now I need to deal with the Nords so I can get my huscarls back. Then make sure everyone else pays... in blood.
-------------------------
Have to say, I went the archer route for my own character this time and its extremely devastating, I have a 7 in Ironskin, powerstrike and powerdraw along with a 5 in cav archery. Its an extremely flexible and powerful combination and is much stronger than the melee route I usually take. You have to invest more points of course though... But killing the damned khergit cav-archers has never been easier.
I am glad that its easier to invest and get money from the cities, it makes the game a lot more fun than when I last played and had to spend every free second trading like crazy or beating up sea raiders to stay in the black.
Sharpshooters are really effective up to the point you actually have to fight in melee. They cant really even take on mid tier infantry on their own without a numerical advantage. As a top tier unit I kind of expected them to be half decent in melee as well. They also strangely seem to only have 1 quiver of arrows, as they only have one melee weapon they must have a free slot, why not use it. As such they tend to run out of ammo really fast, I have to keep telling them to hold fire except when the enemy are at optimum range.
Huscarls totally kick ass, they seem to be good in every situation against every enemy, its a good thing the AI never seems to have any of them. Huscarls = Spartans?
Anyway the Vaegirs had been at war with the Nords when I joined them, our lords were surprisingly organised and were advancing on Wercheg and Sargoth in force. In fact we took Wercheg with relative ease, followed closely by Tehlrog castle. It looked like the Nord lands (which extended as far as Uxkhal, splitting the Swadian territory in half) would soon be crushed under the boots of the Vaegir as Sargoth looked about to fall. At that point the plan fell apart.
Over a few days the khergits, followed by the Sarranids then the Swadians all declared war on us. This was pretty hard for a while with all of them except the Swadians repeatedly launching large campaigns but we held our ground. However the Nords soon got sick of the fighting and made peace with us, which allowed me to invest in recruiting and training up as many huscarls as I could.
From that point the war was surprisingly positive for us, despite the numerical disadvantage we started pushing outwards from Reyvadin towards Narra, I gained Dramug Castle myself and was rewarded it, and we managed to eventually take Narra as well as a few other castles along the way. At this point the Nords 40 days of peace gave up and they went to war again mere days after. My huscarls (of which I had nearly 50, plus 50 more in various stages between recruit and veteran) became useless. I was immediately involved in some pretty 'slaughtery' battles which saw my huscarl + sharpshooter combo basically annihilate the entire Nord army. But the result of this was that the Nords went from +3 relation to -97 over only 2 days. As such my wonderful huscarls started leaving and I had to put them in the Dramug garrison to hang on to them.
With the Nords now attacking and a critical part of my army rendered unusable in any sort of protracted campaign I watched unable to stop as most of our gains in land towards Narra were retaken. After a few weeks of this I decided enough was enough and this ganging up (4 on 1) against us was too much. I sneaked into Dhirim and was fortunate to get a quest for peace (exactly what I wanted) between the Swadians and the Vaegirs. For convincing the two lords to bring peace I would be rewarded 12,000 denars (which I could really use since I had been investing heavily in Dye Works) Convincing the Vaegir lord to support peace was simple if expensive. The Swadian one however was lord Haringoth who hung out for most of the time at Haringoth castle. So, knowing I would be going up against what might be a strong Swadian lord I gathered every competent infantryman, all my sharpshooters and all the spare cav I had in my garrison and set out with 110 (65 archers of which 50 were sharpshooters, 30 infantry of various mercenary types and 15 cav most of whom were slave drivers) men for a mission deep behind enemy lines.
I found Haringoth returning with a second lord at the bridge near his castle, between them they had about 250 men and of that around 70 were men at arms or knights. However his own homeland betrayed him as the terrain leant excellently to my archers with his forces having to cross a river then run up a hill to get to me. It was honestly an awesome sight seeing volley after volley of arrows smash through his lines and the few cav that managed to get up out of the ditch were dispatched by my infantry who were set just behind my line of archers.
Total victory cost me a mere 15 men which mostly came from the cav I had with me. The quest completed and peace imminent I set out back to Dhirim to claim my reward...
...Actually it was even more imminent than I expected, pretty much seconds after I had won the battle and set out, the Swadians, Sarranids and Khergits all suddenly (and pretty much simultaneously) made peace with us. The quest was cancelled and my reward lost
. Haringoth must have been some sort of mastermind controlling all three kingdoms or something . Still I got more than I wanted originally. Now I need to deal with the Nords so I can get my huscarls back. Then make sure everyone else pays... in blood.
-------------------------
Have to say, I went the archer route for my own character this time and its extremely devastating, I have a 7 in Ironskin, powerstrike and powerdraw along with a 5 in cav archery. Its an extremely flexible and powerful combination and is much stronger than the melee route I usually take. You have to invest more points of course though... But killing the damned khergit cav-archers has never been easier.
I am glad that its easier to invest and get money from the cities, it makes the game a lot more fun than when I last played and had to spend every free second trading like crazy or beating up sea raiders to stay in the black.
Sharpshooters are really effective up to the point you actually have to fight in melee. They cant really even take on mid tier infantry on their own without a numerical advantage. As a top tier unit I kind of expected them to be half decent in melee as well. They also strangely seem to only have 1 quiver of arrows, as they only have one melee weapon they must have a free slot, why not use it
. As such they tend to run out of ammo really fast, I have to keep telling them to hold fire except when the enemy are at optimum range. Huscarls totally kick ass, they seem to be good in every situation against every enemy, its a good thing the AI never seems to have any of them
. Huscarls = Spartans? 
