Mid(?) game advice seeking

[CKtheFat]

I've been playing M&B:W for several days now, 149 days ingame.  I have sworn allegiance to the Nord king Ragnar and have a relation status of 13 with him, with an even higher relation status of 35 with Jarl Knuder.  I'm playing as a female peasant origins.

I do have one village, but... well, it gets raided all the time.  We Nords have conquered about the top 1/3 of the map, but my enemies always seem to find it necessary to target my little village of Odasan way up north (even if it's just a lone Boyar trying to loot the village all by himself, since the Vaegirs have lost all their territories and do nothing but roam and loot.)  I think I've collected taxes from it once in the past several months.

Renown=430
Honor=10
Part size limit = 97

My army consists mostly of high-level Nords, mercenaries, and some Vaegirs thrown in the mix.  The upkeep costs 2,529 a week, which is more than double what my village (in theory) produces for me.

I'm kind of wondering what to do next in the game.  I want to bring my army large enough so that I can conquer castles on my own, without asking the marshall to attack it first and let me join in the action.  However, castles typically have a garrison of about 150-300 men, and I'm not sure how I'll be able to raise an army to match and defeat that.  I've slowly been leveling my character and her companions in a variety of battles with other lords from warring factions, but now there's truce and not much to kill other than bandits.  Also, no good village plunder income.

Does anyone have a suggestion on what to do?  Work on building relations with the Jarls?  Build up relations with the Nord king so he may actually grant me more than a tiny, raid-infested village?  I'm a bit at a loss here on what to focus on next; it just feels like I'm doing something wrong (or neglecting to do something more experienced players take for granted.)

Thanks

 

[bob1]

Hello CktheFat
    I use to be in the same boat as you.  King Harlaus gave me Ehlerdah, which was raided almost as soon as it was restored from the previous raid on it.  The lords of enemy factions go about raiding the villages of other lords whom they want to provoke and anger, so if you are in every battle defeating lords, they will target your village.  I have enemy lords who are "friendly" and "gracious" towards me (55+ relation) who attack my village constantly because I repeatedly introduce them to my sword.  Anyways...  I used to have to fight sea raiders constantly just to keep a balance of 3,000 daenars, so that when payday came I would have about 1,000 daenars left, despite having a village.  I had a brewery too, but that brought in about 200-300 daenars a week, so I was still running a very tight budget.  My big break came when Swadia took Shariz from the Sarranids, the Sarranids promptly took it back, because of it's small garrison, and then I followed right after that and took Shariz.  I requested King Harlaus to give me Shariz, and he complied.  I immediately ran out and recruited all of the villagers I could get my hands on and shoved them in the garrison.  I still get about 7,000 daenars a week from Shariz, which helped propel me towards a nice healthy budget of 200,000 daenars.  I used this same tactic for Weyyah castle, sieging it immediately after the enemy faction takes it back. With the large sums of money coming your way, you'll be able to invest in expensive, but more lucrative businesses in the towns. 


As a side note, I find I can take a Khergit or Vaegir (especially Vaegir) castle by myself if it has about 150-160 men when I have about 100 well trained (read: knights, sargents, and sharphsooters) men. 

Hope this helps!    In sum: resiege a castle immediately after it has been taken, and you will only have to go up against 60 or less men of mid grade quality.

 

[CKtheFat]

Good idea and tactics.  Problem is, as the Nords we haven't ever lost a castle or city to an attacker after we captured it, and we're at peace now for the time being.

 

[Lord Tristan]

Then wait, do some trading, maybe drop the units you don't need, and save up a little money. When war comes, wait till your faction sieges a castle, then swoop in. And repair relationship with the king and other lords for the time being.

 

[annallia]

As an alternate tactic you can do what I often do fairly early game or whenever I am trying to claim my first castle/town.

First of all drop any cavalry units you have, mercs as well since they are expensive. Now since you are at peace spam tournaments, do trade routes and equip your companions with blunt weapons and hunt down sea raiders/bandits for ransom. When in battle do not let your squishy troops participate, set your companions to their own group and send them in first then send in your other troops to mop up if need be. 

Keep doing that until you have a nice little pile of money (20-30k minimum) and make sure you have a companion with decent surgery skill.

Now then, replace those cavalry and merc troops you had with faction troops. Next time you go to war pick a castle that you want, towns are more tempting but tend to have larger garrisons. First assault do the whole lining up at the walls with your infantry in front and your archers behind and let them plink away for a bit... some would say until your archers run out but I like to just do it until I think they are about to get reinforcements then send your infantry in on a charge.

Chances are, depending on your settings, that your infantry will be defeated, and that is ok. Once that is done retreat, go back and train up some more troops while you heal, sit in the nearest castle/town for a few days till they can get to be tier 2-3 infantry and head right back to that same castle and assault again using same method as before.

Assuming that the lord of that castle hasn't come back to sit inside or that the marshal army doesn't show up to break your siege this should work, it costs quite a bit sure, but it does work.


As a side note, some castles/towns the missile units will sit in the spawn area when reinforcements are called rather than charging up the walls, it might be helpful to move your archers to the walls once you get a foothold if for no other reason than to help protect your infantry.

 

[Jock]

Drop all your mercenaries and other faction troops. Mercenaries cause they have an expensive upkeep and other faction troops since they get a moral penalty when fighting their own faction. Then go to other faction villages and force peasants to give you supplies. I know they wont give you as much as when looting, but try to force villages that are deep in other faction territory, since there's a higher chance that they will give you more expensive supplies there, cause usually the borderland villages are looted or very poor.
Other option is to spam tournaments, really easy money, if you can win them.

Once the peace is over and you've trained yourself a good army of Huscarls and Archers, head to the weakest castle (every faction has a weak castle with less than 100 garrison). When you see your own faction assaulting some castle and it seems that they're going to lose, rather wait till your faction troops fall back and then charge the walls all on your own with your own army, since it increases the chance that you'll get the castle.

 

[zedestroyer]

Like many things, you should plan and execute your strategy from the moment you start a new game.

Even the character creation is essential for a successful strategy. For me investing in a strong fighter is the best way to start the game, a strong fighter will allow you to win your first fights and to win tournaments and you will be able to get more experience and evolve your character faster, if you fight with your own men and don't stay back. Leadership skills will be more useful after the middle of the game and at that point you will have a powerful character capable of gaining many experience points in each battle, by killing many enemy troops, that can level up faster than a character that was focused in non-fighting related skills. Fighting your own battles is a good way to get stronger and stronger.

Then you have tournaments, they are the way to go in the beginning of the game, since if you bet in yourself and win, you can win a few thousands denars, not to mention some experience and renown. Since feast are normally held at the same time as tournaments, you can enter them if you win the tournaments, this will allow you to meet the ladies that you can later marriage and dedicate the tournament to any lady you would like to marry in the future, if not, you can dedicate it to a already married lady, so that you can improve the relation it her and allow you to ask her to help you improve the relation with another noble.

Another advantage of the tournaments is that you will have to travel, so you should try to pass by as many towns you can to look for companions in the taverns, I would advise having the following heroes in your party, before starting to build a large army:
- Borcha - he can help you spot and track down your enemies and he will enable your party to move faster, because of his skills: tracking, spotting and pathfinding
- Jeremus - he reduces the amount of troops killed in battle and helps your troops and heroes healing faster, since he is good at: wound treatment, surgery and first aid
- Lezalit: he can train your raw recruits, enabling them level up to more decent troops, since he has 4 in trainer skill
- Artimenner: he has 4 in engineer, so he reduces costs and construction time for your village/town improvements and reduces the time needed to build siege equipment, this reduces the probability of an enemy lord attacking you while sieging a town/castle
- Firentis: he is important since Jeremus like him and don't like Artimenner, so adding Firentis to your party helps maintaining Jeremus satisfied (Artimenner likes Lezalit)

You should also try to train a few man to help you and to be the core around your future army will grow, but keep your party small. Try to take looters, deserters and other bandits in your way from one tournament to another. Doing some quests for the nobles of the faction you want to join is also important in this stage, especially  if you do quests for the king.

After getting a good amount of money and equipment, you should start to recruit more men and then try to talk to the nobles, to be a mercenary (that way you get a small steady income). In this stage, just recruit and train new recruits to expand your army and attack start attacking enemy armies, to get more experience.

You can become vassal after you have  decent army, with high tier troops,  capable of taking a town. Just talk to the king to become vassal and then attack ... the Khergit are a good target, in my current game I took Halmar with an army of less than 60 troops, they had a garrison of 300 troops, just use strong melee troops to kill their horseless horse-archers. Artimenner would be important to reduce the time you spent building siege equipment and Jeremus will reduce the amount of troops killed o your side. If you have a good relation with the king and a high renown, he will probably grant you the city, after that you will have a steady income and you can garrison your troops to reduce their wages.

 

[Sven-Mjolnir]

First of all raise some money and start small enterprises on every city you can, start winning tournaments, seriously just go to every city ask the master of the arena where are tournaments being held and win them all, you can get a lot of money with tournaments specially if someone makes a feast on his city, you win the tournament then wait for some hours and another one starts, this can last for several days and make you rich

 

[Sreaction]

Sounds like you need economic advice.

I have my own kingdom so money isn't a problem, but I remember when I was a vassal I hit a wall and could barely pay my troops. I spent most my time trying to drum up gold to pay their wages.  The post above is an excellent way to make gold. In the current game I have 9 dye-works scattered around the map netting around 4500 gold a week.They are the most expensive business, but pay themselves off eventually. You can start out small with a brewery or something. Once you have enough businesses the weekly expenses become manageable. Also, bump up your prisoner management skill so you can capitalize on ransoming prisoners.

  I have a trade route to make money: Curaw, buy iron if its less than 100 gold---Revacheg: sell iron (usually for a good price), buy silk if its ~ 300. Wercheg: sell silk buy salt, (never pay more than 100 gold for it), fish and fruit. Fish and fruit is usually cheap there so stock up and head back to Curaw to sell the salt. I try to get ~250 to 300 for salt. Along the way capture Sea Raiders and Taiga Bandits and ransom them. Ladies and gentlemen the Curaw trade route. I haven't charted how much you can make on a good run, but the principal is simple:buy low sell high.

If you want to capture castles on your own there is a well known (i think?) strategy. I make two of my companions into what I call medic units (specializing in Surgery, First Aid, and Wound Treatment). Two, so if one goes down there is a back up. Bolster up her (I use Ymira) surgery skill so when you take a castle your men are wounded and not dead! Ive been taking castles and cities with minimal casualties, but at this point Ymira's surgery skill is 7. I create a Medic unit under "class troop"  then order them to follow me during a siege. I move to cover and have them hold the position. This guarantees they will survive the battle and I am able to benefit from the Surgery bonus.

 

[annallia]

If they get knocked out in the battle you still keep that surgery bonus, the only time you would lose it is if you had to say retreat and then went back in to fight with them below (I think it is 30%?) HP.. or whatever number it is where their name turns red on your party screen. You won't get any of their bonuses until they are somewhat healed again.

Also depending on what version you are playing the Curaw trade route could be useless. On the newest version for instance it is more or less dead, you can still make a profit however it is only worth buying iron in Curaw if you are passing nearby anyway as you only make a tiny profit from it.

That said I agree with the prisoners bit, it is best if you can find small groups of Sea Raiders or Tundra bandits while there is a ransom broker nearby but if all else fails there is always the slave trader in Tihr though he only gives you 50 denar per prisoner.

I usually will make companion cavalry, Matheld and Lezalit along with whomever else I have serving as my super troops, I will outfit them with horses, heavy armor, and some form of blunt weapon then set them to their own group and use them to handle small bands of raiders.

 

[Sreaction]

I'm playing 1.143 and it the trade route makes me plenty of money. I don't know what newer version your talking about.

As far as protecting Medic units, its good practice to keep them healthy. No use in subjecting them to combat then being wounded and unavailable for the next round.

Also the "stickied" single player manual says, "but remember your doctor needs to be alive at the end of the battle or you risk losing that bonus. " Seems to me like casualties go up when my main surgery unit goes down.

 

[Chaingun]

Trade in latest version still nets you significant money, but it requires a bit of research to find the profitable goods now. I.e. it's simply more difficult (not that it's very difficult in absolute terms, mind you).

 

[Cao_Monk]

ramun the slave trader gives 50 no matter the prisoner and looters normally sell for ~34 so it could be worth holding onto the looters until you get to him