So I gave up on starting my own kingdom since all I was doing was running back and forth paying enemies not to siege my few castles, plus concern over save files not being compatible with any new patches, and went to support Rhagaea on a new game.
I had a good start. By slaughtering countless recruits with a core of palatine guards and using speed bumps (infantry) to help the pew fest, I got renown very quickly and next thing I know I was able to marry her daughter Ira and was given a lot of fiefs. Not sure how many, since some were given to me without me noticing (I never bothered voting) and retaken by the enemy immediately.
But as our empire expanded, so did the difficulty in logistics. We were usually at war with 3 or 4 factions at any time, so while I would go off to siege some castle or town (and fight Garios's army three times along the way) I would end up losing a town or two. So I'd turn around, resiege the 45 defenders and recap. But somewhere along the line it felt pointless. When attacked by extremely superior numbers, I would just line my archers up on a hill with infantry in front of them, then go play on my phone. All I was doing was running back and forth on the map destroying vast numbers of recruits and capturing extremely slippery lords who never learned from their mistakes.
My poor character was having an existential crisis. I had gained fame and fortune, but it all seemed meaningless. War was futile, and ambition was pointless. I was ready to give it all away and join a monastery, but monasteries haven't been implemented. So I took a break.
After a few weeks, I booted her up. I immediately engaged a numerically superior army and arranged my men in very favourable terrain. Imagine my surprise when I glanced up from my 9gag memes on my phone to see that my men had been routed. I reloaded my save game several times and saw defeat each time. I finally had to accept that this time it wasn't just mowing down guys in T-shirts, and for the first time ever I avoided the battle.
Suddenly the game became challenging. I focused on defending my one remaining city and castle, using most of my influence urging lords who hated me to sign up in my army to help defend and stripping my garrisons of men for field battles since there was no time to recruit. The Asserai and Khuzait captured large swathes of our lands, but I was able to hold on to my fiefs. Then, finally, peace was declared.
Now I've had peace before, and it usually lasts about 3 hours. I started recruiting, saving my game constantly in case I wandered too far from my lands and had to be there to prevent an attack. But the peace lasted. For two years!
I enjoyed my peace time. I refilled my garrisons, trained my men on the countless looters to a decent level, did any quest I could for my peoples, and rooted out any bandit lairs in my vicinity, plus participated in a lot of tournaments. It was very stress relieving.
After that, the wars came and went. Sometimes we'd make some gains, other times we struggled to hold what we had. But at least we weren't fighting everyone at once, and we still had moments of peace to consolidate what we had.
Eventually we conquered the factions one by one. I kept playing, since I wanted to see what my children would do. The oldest was 15, and I was curious when she would leave the nursery. So I chased looters and crept into bandit lairs, then suddenly there was a revolt! A defiant clan rejoined the defunct Asserai faction, and suddenly two cities and a castle in the desert were ready to take on the empire. Armies were assembled and the rebellion was crushed, but I had to admire their moxy. Plus it made the game just that much more interesting.
I guess this is just a very long way to say I am very happy with the improvements Taleworlds has made already. I never really gave up hope, since this has obviously been a passion project for Armagan since the start, but I did have my worries. I am sure once they take care of the myriad of bug fixes they will focus even more on content.
And maybe, just maybe, they'll make multiplayer fun.
I had a good start. By slaughtering countless recruits with a core of palatine guards and using speed bumps (infantry) to help the pew fest, I got renown very quickly and next thing I know I was able to marry her daughter Ira and was given a lot of fiefs. Not sure how many, since some were given to me without me noticing (I never bothered voting) and retaken by the enemy immediately.
But as our empire expanded, so did the difficulty in logistics. We were usually at war with 3 or 4 factions at any time, so while I would go off to siege some castle or town (and fight Garios's army three times along the way) I would end up losing a town or two. So I'd turn around, resiege the 45 defenders and recap. But somewhere along the line it felt pointless. When attacked by extremely superior numbers, I would just line my archers up on a hill with infantry in front of them, then go play on my phone. All I was doing was running back and forth on the map destroying vast numbers of recruits and capturing extremely slippery lords who never learned from their mistakes.
My poor character was having an existential crisis. I had gained fame and fortune, but it all seemed meaningless. War was futile, and ambition was pointless. I was ready to give it all away and join a monastery, but monasteries haven't been implemented. So I took a break.
After a few weeks, I booted her up. I immediately engaged a numerically superior army and arranged my men in very favourable terrain. Imagine my surprise when I glanced up from my 9gag memes on my phone to see that my men had been routed. I reloaded my save game several times and saw defeat each time. I finally had to accept that this time it wasn't just mowing down guys in T-shirts, and for the first time ever I avoided the battle.
Suddenly the game became challenging. I focused on defending my one remaining city and castle, using most of my influence urging lords who hated me to sign up in my army to help defend and stripping my garrisons of men for field battles since there was no time to recruit. The Asserai and Khuzait captured large swathes of our lands, but I was able to hold on to my fiefs. Then, finally, peace was declared.
Now I've had peace before, and it usually lasts about 3 hours. I started recruiting, saving my game constantly in case I wandered too far from my lands and had to be there to prevent an attack. But the peace lasted. For two years!
I enjoyed my peace time. I refilled my garrisons, trained my men on the countless looters to a decent level, did any quest I could for my peoples, and rooted out any bandit lairs in my vicinity, plus participated in a lot of tournaments. It was very stress relieving.
After that, the wars came and went. Sometimes we'd make some gains, other times we struggled to hold what we had. But at least we weren't fighting everyone at once, and we still had moments of peace to consolidate what we had.
Eventually we conquered the factions one by one. I kept playing, since I wanted to see what my children would do. The oldest was 15, and I was curious when she would leave the nursery. So I chased looters and crept into bandit lairs, then suddenly there was a revolt! A defiant clan rejoined the defunct Asserai faction, and suddenly two cities and a castle in the desert were ready to take on the empire. Armies were assembled and the rebellion was crushed, but I had to admire their moxy. Plus it made the game just that much more interesting.
I guess this is just a very long way to say I am very happy with the improvements Taleworlds has made already. I never really gave up hope, since this has obviously been a passion project for Armagan since the start, but I did have my worries. I am sure once they take care of the myriad of bug fixes they will focus even more on content.
And maybe, just maybe, they'll make multiplayer fun.
