After playing for a while now, I'm starting to sense a nasty pattern with sieges. Out of all the sieges I've been in, I have seen only one town with 300 defenders, and every other time its only been around 100-150. This is usually because that is how many defenders spawn in a town after its been taken, and then it gets tossed around by both warring factions until peace is declared. I also think that this might be another cause of the "snowball effect", as a large army will take a city, then the opposing faction's armies will go to reclaim that town, while the original army goes on to take another town. In my playthroughs, two towns will get taken from a faction, then the two factions will fight over those same two towns until peace is declared.
I think there are multiple solutions, including less aggressive armies, lords being more defensive of their fiefs, or raising the amount of defenders given to a fief when its taken. With the change of giant armies instead of one marshall, increasing the flat amount of soldiers given to a fief when taken wouldn't be too overwhelming, as taking towns should require an army anyways. Armies being less aggressive in general isn't my favorite idea, i think a better fix would be to have some parties in the army defend the recently taken town, helping stop the tug of war and also stopping large armies from plowing through a faction. The final solve is something i feel needs to be implemented whatever the solution is, and that is having lords defend their lands. I don't think I've ever seen a lord defend their castle/town while its being sieged, and that really would make a difference, both by bolstering defender numbers and by having better troops on the field. In Warband, lords would patrol their lands, and when they saw you, might run into their castles, here it seems they just flee without direction. Additionally, lords seemed to spend a lot of time in their castles and towns when not called out to help the marshall, but i rarely find any lords in their fiefs unless they were recently defeated or in peacetime.
Personally, i think the easiest solution would be to automatically have more defenders in a town or castle when it has recently been taken, as this would not only stop the endless tug of war of towns and castles between factions, but would also deter small armies from attacking towns and instead make them attack castles, and cause a dent in large armies' numbers preventing them from taking multiple towns before disbanding. A rough estimate would be changing the current number (~125 towns, ~50 castles) to maybe ~300 for towns, and ~150 for castles.
I think there are multiple solutions, including less aggressive armies, lords being more defensive of their fiefs, or raising the amount of defenders given to a fief when its taken. With the change of giant armies instead of one marshall, increasing the flat amount of soldiers given to a fief when taken wouldn't be too overwhelming, as taking towns should require an army anyways. Armies being less aggressive in general isn't my favorite idea, i think a better fix would be to have some parties in the army defend the recently taken town, helping stop the tug of war and also stopping large armies from plowing through a faction. The final solve is something i feel needs to be implemented whatever the solution is, and that is having lords defend their lands. I don't think I've ever seen a lord defend their castle/town while its being sieged, and that really would make a difference, both by bolstering defender numbers and by having better troops on the field. In Warband, lords would patrol their lands, and when they saw you, might run into their castles, here it seems they just flee without direction. Additionally, lords seemed to spend a lot of time in their castles and towns when not called out to help the marshall, but i rarely find any lords in their fiefs unless they were recently defeated or in peacetime.
Personally, i think the easiest solution would be to automatically have more defenders in a town or castle when it has recently been taken, as this would not only stop the endless tug of war of towns and castles between factions, but would also deter small armies from attacking towns and instead make them attack castles, and cause a dent in large armies' numbers preventing them from taking multiple towns before disbanding. A rough estimate would be changing the current number (~125 towns, ~50 castles) to maybe ~300 for towns, and ~150 for castles.
