Recruiting efficiently

[w00d]

Hi all.

Other than the diplomacy mod, is there a way to recruit efficiently. I am in the mid game of my campaign after some false starts but the problem is this,playing as a Vassal for the Nords i am on the last Swadian city, which is bugged btw ( its called Praven or something, all the castle is floating inside the hill or something ). You don't even need a ladder, u just walk thru the walls but anyway i digress . The computer, in less than a day can refill its troops from 200 to 1200 within a day, maybe 2. Having endured a few sieges on my city of Uxhaul (?) i beat them back, slaughter a couple of hundred of them ( go Great Long Heavy AXe of overhead choppage ) , and literally btw the time i travel around , recruit some Nords / Rhodoks and maybe some Khergits , they will have gotten 5 times the number and fully trained Swadian knights to my tier 2-3 troops.

which leads to another round of bloodshed on the wall , me down to my minimal men again and them retreating back to their lone city. Where they regenerate within a day and i end up with a smaller garrison over time. Getting quite tedious tbh.

In between the Rhodoks now decide to declare war and guess whose City is first in line ( and now its even worst as i have to travel BACK to Nord land to get recruits ( equally annoyingly i lose access to the mass xbow of cheese Rhodoks/ Swadians which are fantastic in siege fights )

So, other than the Diplomacy mod, is there another way to recruit faster?

 

[TigerLord]

I play Diplomacy, so I'm not sure what's different in native, but the only I've found to quickly recruit troops is first of all have high path-finding and horses in inventory to make traveling faster, than travel village to village according to the troops I'm looking for (Swadian villages for later Knights, Rhodok for their sharpshooters, Nord for Huscarls, etc...) and then put as many points in Trainer on all my companions and myself (it stacks).

This allows me to bring vanilla recruits to tier 2 in a day, tier 3 in 2-3 days... then it becomes a lot slower, so you need to engage in fights. A good way is to follow your King/Vassal/Marshall until they enter a huge battle which you know they'll win, and hold your troops back. Once it's over, you'll share the experience.

Hunting Sea Raiders or other bandits also provides good experience.

 

[Caba`drin]

The higher your relations with the villages, the more recruits you'll get at a go. Have it quite high (40s-50s+) and you should be getting 10+ recruits each time you go, and there's a chance they'll be from a higher tier. But you may already know that. Other than that, you are stuck going from village to village, and thus at a disadvantage, unlike being able to send out a recruiter like in Diplomacy.

 

[w00d]

Sigh ok, i guess i will need to pray i get some time to raise more rep with the villages i can visit b4 the next round of whack a mole begins at the Uxkhal.

note to devs, please implement some of the Diplomacy stuff into the next patch k thx xxx.

 

[TigerLord]

If you're a user of the "Plunder and Raze" strategy to raise a lot of dinars, it'll come back and bite you in the ass later. I always plunder the same villages to avoid ruining my rep with villages for later.

 

[w00d]

nah never plunder and raze, mainly because i got some prissy boys as companions who whinge and whine about my  travels. Marnid ..sigh...

cmon, a little pillaging never really hurt anyone too much ( mainly cos they are dead )

 

[Meestor Pickle]

My Praven was screwy too, I just walk up to the wall (going up the hill) and jump the battlements, friendly bots barely knew what to do though. Haven't found a way to fix this either 

 

[LeviL]

My Praven was screwy too, I just walk up to the wall (going up the hill) and jump the battlements, friendly bots barely knew what to do though. Haven't found a way to fix this either 

Just tell them to follow your lead across the hill, they'll eventually figure it out if you manage to put them on the walls.

Anyway, I'd also like to see that map actually fixed.

 

[iffy]

The computer, in less than a day can refill its troops from 200 to 1200 within a day, maybe 2.

Are you playing native? I've never seen a city or castle with more than about 450 guys.  I've also never seen a city/castle re-build more than a spattering of knights in a few days.  Are you exaggerating?

 

[morphwan]

about the buggy praven I have had that to when playing diplomacy. It happens when the dev's patches give the cities their own distinctive styles, like they did a few patchs back with first the Rhodoks and then the Swadians. Best way to fix it is to completely delete your diplomacy file then use the latest installer to load a clean new version. otherwise, well I used to be able to literally walk under the walls of Veluca, and Jekala and Praven both had a moutain, in the middle of the towns!!!!!!!! does make for interesting siege warfare though?

 

[Rogue Zombie]

The computer, in less than a day can refill its troops from 200 to 1200 within a day, maybe 2.

Are you playing native? I've never seen a city or castle with more than about 450 guys.  I've also never seen a city/castle re-build more than a spattering of knights in a few days.  Are you exaggerating?

So what happened is I had beat the Rhodooks down to just one castle. I had several of their lords languishing away in prison.  Swadia started to give me some trouble so Ileft the Rhodooks alone, they weren't bothering me.

After dealing with Swadia for a bit, I got a message saying ARMIES were spotted near Veluca.  I went there and the Rhodook has lain seige to Veluca with almost 1300 troops (no exaggeration).  I could not defend Veluca, so I waited till they defeated the town, then I met them on the open plains with my 120 knights and heroes.  After killing all of them, I threw some MORE lords into my prison.

LESS than one week later, maybe only days later, another army with several Rhodook leaders came out with over 900 troops, again heading for Veluca.  I caught them on the plains and defeated them.

I then went to their last castl ewhich siad it had over 350 troops defending it.  I liad seige and I got attacked immediatedly by an army of 420.  At first I thought they were trying to break out of the seige, but I realized it was just another 3 lords wandering around.


Anyway, yeah, playing on all native but MAN does that computer cheat.

 

[Rogue Zombie]

Woops, I replied to the wrong thread.  Sigh, I'm an idiot.

 

[w00d]

The computer, in less than a day can refill its troops from 200 to 1200 within a day, maybe 2.

Are you playing native? I've never seen a city or castle with more than about 450 guys.  I've also never seen a city/castle re-build more than a spattering of knights in a few days.  Are you exaggerating?

nope, that is what happens when u beat them to just 1 city / town / fief left. King has about 200 odd, Marshall the same number, add in half a dozen to a dozen lords with 30-100 men each and boom, 1200-1500 guys to hack to death.

like i said, its frustrating to kill so many and by the time i run around the country side manually recruiting folk , they return, fully regenerated. No idea where their income is from.

trying to take the last Castle, Praven , is not so easy either, 1200 + troops not counting the garrison of 200-300 with 120-150 of your own . I tried to convince the marshall to assault them but while he is willing , the other laggard Jarls are a bunch of slackers..

 

[Velax]

Woops, I replied to the wrong thread.  Sigh, I'm an idiot.

You know you can edit and, more importantly, delete posts, right?

 

[alcibiades]

If you're a user of the "Plunder and Raze" strategy to raise a lot of dinars, it'll come back and bite you in the ass later. I always plunder the same villages to avoid ruining my rep with villages for later.

Just make the rounds in Khergit land, since their troops are useless compared to all others.  You'll be doing Calradia a favor by burning their flea infested homes.

 

[iffy]

So what happened is I had beat the Rhodooks down to just one castle.

I understand now.  I thought you meant the castle itself (without lords) had that many.  I know what you mean about the last castle/city.  It's a PAIN!