Noob Question: How to Loot Villages?

[Bullethead]

I'm new to both M&B in general and RoY in particular, so maybe I'm missing something obvious here.....

How do I loot a village in RoY?

I'm trying to do the traditional Viking thing of landing near some coastal village, sacking it, and running away.  This is all freebooting on my own time, because I can't get any lord to give me jobs other than carrying letters, collecting taxes, etc.  However, when I and my dastardly crew arrive at a potential victim and I say "Take Hostile Action", the only option I have is "Force peasants to give you provisions".  Where's the fun in that?  What's the point of being a Viking if you can't plunder and burn a peaceful village every few days? 

Meanwhile, I see other villages going up in flames all over the map.  Did my guys forget to bring their matches or what?

Do you have to have a merc commission or something to get the "Loot village" option?  I've looted many villages in Native, but I only started doing that after I'd signed on as a merc company, so I don't know if it's possible in Native without that.  The manual doesn't say that's a requirement.

The problem is, I can't get a merc commission in RoY.  I've carried so many letters, captured so many runaway serfs, and collected so many taxes that I'm now blood brothers with all the nobles I want to work for.  And these are guys who REALLY need my services, what with their faction at war with 3 or 4 others and getting their asses kicked.  But they just keep asking me to do mundane tasks while their country collapses around them.  And the ruler won't have me as a vassal, until I've fought some of the enemy.

Thus, since I can't get hired directly, I was hoping to improve my chances by at least attacking some of their enemies on my own.  But all I can do is raid caravans, I can't burn villages 

 

[Aetheus]

The Lords don't really care if you're a kiss up - they only hire capable people to be mercenaries.

Some tips:
* get more renown
* get a larger party - a 5 man group isn't worth much as a mercenary army.
* OR you could just start attacking caravans until your relation to a faction goes negative, and then start your own faction by capturing a    castle/town.

To be honest, though, I've never actually needed to raid villages for cash, so I wouldn't know if any of the above steps are relevant. Just basing off Native.

 

[Ruthven]

You need to be at war with a faction to loot it's villages.

 

[Bullethead]

You need to be at war with a faction to loot it's villages.

I'm at war with the world and every living soul in it    There's no central power able to stay my hand, or even any central power at all.  Wars are just personal arguments between kings that I might or might not want to join in with.

To me, it would be rather more realistic for a Viking to be able to attack anybody he wanted to at any time.  If that doesn't suit a given king, then the king can outlaw the Viking and try to kill him, but that really doesn't seem to have deterred many of them .

 

[Aetheus]

I'm sure it wouldn't be difficult to set the relation level needed to do hostile actions towards a faction to 0, so that players can automatically start looting/pillaging the moment they start the game.