Saving Ravenstern

[Mephansteras]

Hi all, I'd like a bit of advice.

Recently started playing this mod and I've been enjoying it. A bit harder than vanilla, but I'm doing all right overall. My current kingdom of residence, however, is not doing so hot. I'm wondering if I can save them.

I'm in what I think is early mid-game. Got offered vassalage by the king of Ravenstern a little while ago after being a mercenary for them for a long time. I've got a good set of companions in decent gear, have myself set up as a pretty decent Knight, and have a force of about 100 that is mostly cavalry and cav-archers with some infantry that I'm training up.  Current wealth is about 20k and I have enough businesses scattered around that I can pay my weekly wages reasonably well with a little bit of combat looting and doing bounties for the Dragon Knights.

When I joined them Ravenstern was going pretty strong. They'd captured a few castles down on the Sarleon/Fierdsvain coast area and hadn't done any of the City trading that most of the other factions have been doing. Some time in there Wolfbode the Slayer spawned. He'd smack people around occasionally, but mostly hung out in the mountains and didn't do too much.

About 2 months ago or so in-game, another Mystmountain army showed up. Not long after a Vanskerry army showed up and marched its way up the coast to Ravenstern. So there are now 3 armies camped out in our area, all with about 500-700 troops. Wolfbode moved his army down to the bridge near Ravenstern city and has been camping it, attacking whatever tries to move between the eastern and western areas. Consequence of all of that is that the lords are getting piecemeal chewed up. Then both Sarleon and Fierdsvain declared war. With the lords unable to move safely around, Ravenstern has been unable to mount any sort of decent attack force. They've already lost 3 castles in the East and lose pretty much every fight they get into. I expect peace will be declared before they lose too much more this time around, since the other factions have started taking advantage of the situation to strike while Sarleon and Fierdsvain are busy, but we might lose Senderfall before that happens. And it'll all likely go downhill next time war breaks out.

So...suggestions? My force is ok, but there is no chance it'd be able to take on one of those huge armies and win. I've got a few proper Knights in my group, but it's mostly mid-level troops. I've considered just suiciding against one of them a bit to wear them down, but they seem to rebuild their forces fairly quickly. I'm not sure I'd be able to do damage fast enough to accomplish much, and I'd hate to lose all my companions. No to mention the cost of replacing any of my good equipment if it gets lost.

 

[kelospario]

Lure the mistmountain into the vanskerry and make them fight each other, lure wolflblode deep into jatu territory and make him fight kjuda/zulkar or more than one jatu army. Join one of the side to recruit prisoners.

 

[xzavian]

If you have good relationships with some lords you could ask them to follow you. A few lords and the King with you and Wolfbode should be easy to kill.

 

[Mephansteras]

Well, no one likes me enough to follow me but I've managed to make some progress. Kited the Vanskerry into the invading Sarleon army, which took care of them. Also dragged a whole bunch of lords leaving a feast into killing off one of the Mystmountain armies. Sadly, my army got crunched in the first wave and it ended up being a multi-part affair, so I didn't get anything out of it. But they did die. A bit later I managed to lure Mr. Slayer next to the king and a bunch of other lords near Ravensten and we managed to beat him. Well, my troops did anyway. I got cornered by a bunch of his elite dudes and cut down much earlier than I'd have liked, but we won. Sadly, he managed to escape. So we'll see him again someday, I'm sure.

We now have yet another Mystmountain army running around, a Jaku army, and some...purple guys. Some sort of invading landing party. Can't remember their names off the top of my head.

Anyway, we're making some progress at least. Hopefully enough that when war breaks out again we'll be able to take back some of the lost land. Sarleon managed to grab most of the eastern lands except Sendorfall itself, so we have a lot of fighting to do.

Thanks for the advice!

 

[thermocline]

What's your long-term goal for the game? Play as a Ravenstern vassal, or eventually become an independent king?

If the latter, the only purpose for being a vassal is getting married and getting a couple of walled fiefs to use as the base of your future kingdom. Stockpile recruits, raise village relations, found and train your CKO, etc.

 

[Mephansteras]

Eh, have fun and explore the mod, mostly. I rarely stay interested in a game of M&B long enough to really do much of the end-end game stuff. But we'll see.

For now I'm just enjoying the challenge of trying to keep Ravenstern from getting crunched.

 

[Ian Jones]

                               
                              From my observations, the unique spawns(Wolfbode,etc) can a help protect the core Ravenstern fiefs.The Jatus and Mystmountain clans covering the bridge ingress near Poinsbruk and Wolfbode and other Mystmountain clan spawns on the other bridge,so it works for and against the Ravensterns.You can always kite them away so other Lords can go wherever.
                            For extra fun,let the unique spawn build a massive prisoner train of over 1000 then take them out along with other Lords and watch as they leave the battle with a 300 plus to 1000 plus army to battle other factions.I kited the 3 Seers and Eyegrim into Konigur Valdis,helped defeat them,now Valdis is cruising around with a 1100 plus army steamrolling over the Sarleons.

 

[azxcvbnm321]

Like the last post said, those Mystmountain armies help protect Ravenstern more than they do harm I think.  Ravenstern has the advantage of being pretty isolated and far away so that enemy armies must travel a long way.  Once an enemy army defeats a Mystmountain one, the majority of that army usually just goes home, either because of high troop losses or too much time away from their fiefs.  It'll have to be a very cohesive faction to be able to do any real damage to Ravenstern. 

Another huge benefit is that Wolfbode sometimes launches surprise attacks on Ravenstern Towns.  His troops are horrible at sieges and all you have to do is show up and you'll win, with a chance at capturing Wolfbode.