how can I stop my parties morale from going down

[thelastpatriot]

I dont know if this is a native or sod thing but No matter how many battles I win or what I do my parties morale goes down. I always keep my party well fed and I usually dont fight any battles that I cant win. if i raise my parties morale to 99 it eventually goes down and if i want to keep men from deserting I usually haft to pay a boatload of money. How do I stop this because this really draining my coffers.

 

[LibSpit]

The 'boatload' of money is how.

After a certain size, it is very difficult to have stable morale, something like 100+ soldiers or there abouts (it has been a while).

This fits quite well in historical terms, as soldiers didn't follow leaders (or at least not extended campaigns) out of loyalty or for their wages, it was more the possibility of loot! So the commander that can keep his army well stocked in loot will keep his army in the field. Hence the boat loads of money.

One way to deal with this in peace time or not when actively engaging in a fullscale assault is to garrison your men in a nearby town/castle, the way I usually do it is to keep about 90-100 low level troops in my party, so that they gain training experience, and then if I know I am going to attack a major army or town, I dump the recruits and load up with my max number of my best troops, take the objective, and dump them off again until they are needed for the next objective. This way my morale drops more slowly, or at least drops less of the time, because my negatives for party size are low or non-existent. Therefore inorder to keep my morale at a decent level I do not have to pay for a boost as often as if I constantly have my max army allowance, also by only 'holding' my low level troops, if some do desert it is no great loss, compared to losing elite heavy cavalry.

 

[Cider]

A good way is to set up a castle that is completely reserved for your favorite troops to be garrisoned in (preferably have the local village stop sending reinforcements to it), it's better if you keep it near your capital and if you think war is coming your way then stay near your capital. I also recommend giving a lot of priority to building a barracks, practice range and stables to it so your troops in the castle will start getting upgrades while you're off bandit killing or escort cattle to a village.

 

[Digital Terror]

Having the attached village(s) stop sending reinforcements is not necessary, as they will automatically do so once the town/castle has a threshold # of troops garrisoned.

For a town, I believe that is 300.  Fewer for a castle, not sure what the # is though.

If you're storing your favorite troops in the town or castle, chances are you will have FAR more troops than the threshold amount garrisoned there during peacetime.

 

[BetaRP]

Apart from what everyone said above, go to any town's tavern and talk to the Tavern Keeper, choose the option: "Buy the best ale for my men...." something like that. It will cause your party to stay in the town for a few hours WHEN you LEAVE the town depending on your party's first aid skill, you'll have to wait till your men are sober.
It resets your party morale to 100. You can do it every few days I believe.

 

[Cider]

You can do it everyday just like buying drinks for everyone in town, honestly I think you should be able to do both but for balance reasons I can understand.

 

[SilverBrone]

I'm like a faction's mercenary, I only come out of my castle if I'm needed to join a campaign, if not I just stay in there, dumping all my soldiers in the garrison.