Keeping up appearances... I mean morale?

[Cornelius Constantine]

Or should I say: my party's to big for my boots....?

I'm doing quite nicely, being a Lord of Nords. Got me a couple of towns, castles, villages and quite a bit of renown. So I can lead a party of about 150-160 men (well, not just men, but that should be bad, now would it?).

So, when I had about 50 or 100 men, all was well. I ran around, was victorious in  battles, conquered some stuff and everyone was happy: morale was in the high nineties.

So, I'm still running around, winning battles, taking towns and castles, got 5 varieties of food, and tons of it, and my men start deserting me. Even my truest companions aren't happy about the general state of affairs.

I guessed I needed to check my morale: low thirties... YIKE!

What did I do wrong? Am I running a too large a party with my current leadership and charisma, and should I bring down the size of my party, or did I miss something?

Also, a second question. Somehow I got myself bethroted to a nice lady, and her brother keeps sending me messages to come to Khudan. So I move across half the map (usually, for some reason,  I find myself between Dhirim and Praven) only to hear that sonofa... (wait, that's my wife to be's mother too...) tell me that we have to wait because the realm is still on campaign. He's pulled that trick on me a couple of times already, and I'm quite annoyed. Is there anyway around it (and no, she won't elope with me, but sseing that would put her brother off, I don't like that idea)?

 

[tzlop]

I would assume since your kingodm is fairly large, other kingdom is fighting against yours and any feasts end instantly when the marshall calls for a campaign thus when you try to get to Khudan the marshall probably called for a campaign while they were waiting for you thus resulting in cancelling the feast.

What you can do is just patrol around Khudan and its nearby and wait for your wife to be's brother to call for feast again.

As for the morale, what is your charisma and leadership?  As far as I know even with cheat and editing (63 charisma + 15 leadership) the maximum morale boost you get from it is 180 + 50(base moral) so under most situation keeping around 100 is enough but going to 150-60 should be avoided under unless in need like during siege or large battles.

I do however wish for a mod that changes the amount of party you can keep based on the number of fiefs you have just like the lords, that would be awsome.

 

[Lord Brutus]

If you check your Party Morale Report, it will tell you exactly what's dragging your morale down and 160 men in your army will drop your party morale by 159 points.

 

[Cornelius Constantine]

That's what I was afraid of...

I would assume since your kingodm is fairly large, other kingdom is fighting against yours and any feasts end instantly when the marshall calls for a campaign thus when you try to get to Khudan the marshall probably called for a campaign while they were waiting for you thus resulting in cancelling the feast.

Well, the feast ain't cancelled, the party (with no visitors) should be going on, there's a tournament, and it's been a month since the marshall called the campaign.

What you can do is just patrol around Khudan and its nearby and wait for your wife to be's brother to call for feast again.

Might give that a try.

As for the morale, what is your charisma and leadership?  As far as I know even with cheat and editing (63 charisma + 15 leadership) the maximum morale boost you get from it is 180 + 50(base moral) so under most situation keeping around 100 is enough but going to 150-60 should be avoided under unless in need like during siege or large battles.

Charisma is about 12, LD about five, so yeah, that could just be it. I'll drop some men in one of my towns then, keeping just the elite.

I do however wish for a mod that changes the amount of party you can keep based on the number of fiefs you have just like the lords, that would be awsome.

Indeed. I'm a bit jealous on King Ragnar and his happy few of 500.

 

[annallia]

Keep more than 5 varieties of food... just carry less of it.

I stay away from the perishables myself but I always keep grain, fish, bread, dried meat, apples (I think its fruit but it looks like a basket of apples to me) honey, butter (when I can find it) grapes, olives, cheese, and sausage.

Just remember it doesn't really matter how much food you have, its how many different kinds. When my party is small and I am not relying on food to keep everyone happy I tend to go with about 2 of each tops, later game when I am roaming around with parties of 150 or so I keep 3 of each in nice neat rows to make it easy to restock.


This of course limits my free space as I have 10 rows being taken up by food alone and another 3-4 rows by horses and equipment which leaves me very little room for loot/trade items but by that stage of the game I am not depending on those things for income.

 

[Cornelius Constantine]

You're right, and that is what I did. Although running out of food has its downside, so that's what I meant to say: my troops didn't go hungry.

 

[Cornelius Constantine]

Follow up: keeping an eye on morale, I saw that "Recent Events" can have a huge impact. I suddenly had a modifier of -41, but had no idea where it came from.

So, what are those "recent events"?

 

[annallia]

Recent events are battles and such. Go out and win a few and you will see that -41 go away.

Things like loosing a fight or leaving some men behind to escape will lower your recent events and give you a hefty negative like that. I am not sure but I think winning a fight but just barely (like say 3/4 of your troops get slaughtered) will have minimal positive bonus if any at all. Alternatively wiping the floor with another party will give you a healthy boost.

 

[Cornelius Constantine]

Well, that's the point. Couldn't really think of anything negative happening to me. 

So, let me rephrase that: which events can have such an impact?

 

[Mods]

Putting 30 men (for example) in a castle will give -30 'recent events', the reverse applies too
also when you had the -30 'no food' penalty and you just got some food it will be converted in -30 'recent events'

Basically 'recent events' stops morale from instantly changing, it will slowly go back up if it was low and go down if it was positive

Only winning/losing battles against though odds will instantly boost/reduce morale by giving positive/negative 'recent events' score

I think to avoid confusion 'recent events' should have been split in 'recent battles' and 'recent change' or something

 

[Cornelius Constantine]

Putting 30 men (for example) in a castle will give -30 'recent events', the reverse applies too
also when you had the -30 'no food' penalty and you just got some food it will be converted in -30 'recent events'

That's it! I put a third of my army in a garrisson to decrease it (the army, not the garrisson), so I wouldn't get the huge morale penalty, and then I still get it. 

Kind of makes sense, though...