Slowing down the pace of the game?

[ssssnake]

I have a problem with the pace of POP.

The game tends to go too quickly. 

With all the propensity for war, the factions tend to take each other out too quickly. 

By the time I'm ready to start my own kingdom, one of the factions (usually the Dshar or Sarleon) is generally eliminated or almost gone, and the Emire and/or Fierdsan is a giant blob of green or yellow on the map. 

Once I start my own kingdom, I've found that the only way to really survive a war is to take castles/cities from the enemy.  So, I pretty much take over the map as quickly as possible. 

This doesn't leave much time to do other stuff I want to do, like build my own custom knighthood order, become an order Grandmaster, collect qualis gems, etc. 

I wish there was a way to tone down the inclination of nations to go to war. 

Even having excellent relations with another faction doesn't seem to matter much.  (I've got 60+ relation with the Fierdsan and 80+ right to rule, and they still attack me.) 

Would be nice to slow down the pace a bit instead of the constant maelstrom that is Pendor now. 

 

[iskar]

Become a vassal of a faction right away. Lots of interesting battles, since lords are more fun to fight than bandit rabble, lots of renown, xp, loot and prisoner stacks to be freed.
You can quite easily take lots of fiefs for yourself and make sure your faction does not loose the war. Joining the generally loosing side solves the problem of your faction potentially dominating everything in turn. Being a vassal also gives you lots of time to do knighthood order quests and do whatever you want to do for your fiefs, as the marshal will not always call for you on campaigns.
In particular linking the "more challenging task" quest from the order with the defense of the kingdom against enemy parties is quite rewarding and does not even cost you lives of your own men.

 

[Umezawa]

Once I start my own kingdom, I've found that the only way to really survive a war is to take castles/cities from the enemy.  So, I pretty much take over the map as quickly as possible. 

In my opinion this is the biggest problem. After just starting your own kingdom you will generally be unable to defend your holdings against huge mobs on campaign, maybe with the exception of your main base that you've heavily fortified. The easiest way to deal with the mobs is to dodge them and run around conquering various holdings while they take a single one. However doing that will quickly lead to everyone declaring war on you to "curb the other realms power" and you're left with few viable options other than taking over the whole map as quickly as possible while holding all the enemy lords captive.

 

[ssssnake]

I'm in a game now, where I'm cheating to make this "kinder gentler" Pendor a reality.

I just save early and often, and whenever anyone declares war on anyone else, I just go back to my save game, and run it again and generally, they don't declare war a second time through.  If they do, then I let it happen, as I figure they must really want to fight, and the game needs some conflict. 

It's interesting to be in a game where war is not all that common.  You would think that by not fighting each other, the kingdoms would have time to hunt down marauding armies, but they don't.

Because they aren't on constant campaign, the lords tend not to form big armies capable of fighting invading armies, so the marauders go unchecked.  There's a dozen or so armies running around.  I think at one point there were 4 Mystmountain armies, plus Wolfbode.  Right now, there are 11 total, ravaging the land. 

I've had to fight the Sarleon, the D'Shar, and the Fierdsan, but at this point, I am not at war and I'm happily doing quests and managing my small kingdom. 

I also make a point not to take any faction's very last stronghold.  I could have taken out the Sarleon completely, but figure the game is more interesting with them.  (The Dshar got eliminated by the Empire, but I guess that's ok too.) 

Really enjoying the slower pace. 

 

[AnddyiRaynor]

Huh you have your own kingdom which you've carved out of Sarleon but you use save scumming so that the other kingdoms don't declare war on eachother or you? That makes no sense to me. The ai doesn't really see the spawned npcs that aren't part of kingdoms as a threat so they don't form a group to hunt them down. Sure they may run into them but it's because they don't see them as a threat that you can get a huge deathball lead by wolfbode or one of the others if they are lucky.

As for the first posters question, the answer is simple the ai run a script that looks for the weakest cities and I'm guessing you have the least amount of troops in your cities so they come and attack it and declare war on you.

 

[IlluminaZer0]

If you want to maintain the balance of power in PoP, being a Mercenary and always working for the weakest kingdoms is the best way to balance out the factions until you are strong enough to consider starting your own kingdom.

Being a Mercenary for a losing kingdom is also the best way to ensure constant battles for quick renown.  Especially if a favorable defensive siege pops up.

If you want to have a strong holdings before declaring your kingdom, rebelling as a vassal is ideal as you keep both your lands and your garrisons.

Addendum: If you don't want to be perpetually at war you need to minimize the amount of contested land you own while also maintaining a strong army. You can also motivate war between other kingodms (and thus get them off your back) by manipulating enemy factions into conquering contested territories.

I am presently playing a slow game as well, in many ways treating PoP as a Sim RPing game. Factions teaming up on you is just a good opportunity to build relations with their honorable lords.  Also feels less exploitable, as I find playing defensively oddly more difficult at times than simply blitzing castles/towns, especially those with ladders...

There is little more gratifying than taking on a Marshall + forces head on and WINNING. Especially on the field, and initiating combat yourself. I find it a bit too easy to exploit the AI with aggressive guerrilla warfare style tactics.

 

[Cornelius Sula]

If you dont want war with all factions at once, first have high right to rule. Second start your kingdom in such position that you have only one kingdom to fight for teritory, example start from Chez and youll fight only Empire. Third if you dont want blitz conquest but really to enjoy nice slow kingdom building, whenever some faction declares war on you, and you dont want everlasting war, take their marshal as prisoner to prevent 2000+ armies fights and burn as much and as fast as you can vilages. This makes faction to reconsider their war effort.