Start of game

[chargers1783]

Is the start supposed to be hard? Whenever I start out I get taken prisoner within 3 days.

 

[Riddermark]

Of course it is. Otherwise the game will be over when you reach level 15 (what happens in native).

Now when you start - do the merchant quest then pick some men, companions are a must - healer, tracker, trainer. And very carefully pick who you engage.

 

[chargers1783]

I find it hard to even get to the villages, as soon as I leave a city there's a mercenary war band waiting to dine on my flesh. If I look away for a second I have been attacked. I know I'm griefing but it kind of kills the mod for me. There are usually no companions to be found where I start either. I guess I must be patient.

 

[Riddermark]

Some people would suggest you hire mercenaries from the taverns right away. You have a gold bar in your inventory you can sell right away. I never used that approach though but then again I never have mercenaries with me.

You probably picked a risky town to start in. What you can do is wait in it until the bandits move away, then zoom and carefully roam around. Yeah u have to pay attention at least at the start. Another good option is to stick by some random lord that is moving around - the warbands tend to run from those.

My way of playing this is the same - go from town to town to collect companions (and village to village for troops, though the more troops the slower you are so that's a bit tricky too), then go into Vaegir lands and train on some tundra bandits as they are the easiest to kill.

It is a painful process but hey, that's why you have quick-save 

edit: there's probably a much better way, im a bit of a masochist but the payoff is much greater when you finally kick their ass.

 

[chargers1783]

I shall try this method. Thank you for the help.

 

[Riddermark]

I shall try this method. Thank you for the help.

You're welcome. Also try to win as many tournaments as possible (ask the ring leader when there will be any and where).

 

[Ballacraine]

Melee fights are a good way to build up experience & earn a little cash too.

Balla. 

 

[Riddermark]

Melee fights are a good way to build up experience & earn a little cash too.

Balla. 

a little cash..  I'd say it's useless cash. I think that this needs to get some revision in the newer editions. You win a tournament and get 20k while winning the arena yields what? 500 ? Maybe bumping it a little would make them worthwhile.

 

[Ballacraine]

Yes, I think it is more use in the building up of experience.

Balla. 

 

[chargers1783]

I don't think the amount won should be increased. Then you can just sit there if your patient enough and build a small fortune.

 

[ThunderClaw]

Soul and I have talked about the relative uselessness of certain things in the game and neither of us are terribly happy with it.  Melee fights were definitely one of the things that were mentioned.  We definitely agree with you guys that they need to be changed somehow.

 

[soulmata]

One thing I intend to do is move bandit and merc war band spawns further away from cities. It makes sense to have them near roads, but so close to cities makes less sense, as well as sometimes making them nearly impossible to see (when they are on the city texture, for instance).

That will probably happen in .604b.

 

[Pellagus]

Soul and I have talked about the relative uselessness of certain things in the game and neither of us are terribly happy with it.  Melee fights were definitely one of the things that were mentioned.  We definitely agree with you guys that they need to be changed somehow.

Just out of interest, does anyone use the arenas for training? I used it once or twice when I was trapped by bandits early on. It might be a useful way of training your garrison? For a fee, naturally.

Is the start supposed to be hard? Whenever I start out I get taken prisoner within 3 days.

Yep, but not impossible. You should be easily able to outrun any mercs or bandits on your starting horse, so you can trade or visit towns to enter tournaments. Your map speed will decrease if you hire recruits, and will continue to decrease as your party gets bigger.

One thing I intend to do is move bandit and merc war band spawns further away from cities. It makes sense to have them near roads, but so close to cities makes less sense, as well as sometimes making them nearly impossible to see (when they are on the city texture, for instance).

That will probably happen in .604b.

How about timing spawns to coincide with in game days, so maybe merc war parties don't arrive until day 20 (for example)? That should give players more time to build experience. I'm certain this was implemented in pre Warband versions.



'quote' is not 'edit' oh god please forgive me -ThunderClaw

 

[ThunderClaw]

Just out of interest, does anyone use the arenas for training? I used it once or twice when I was trapped by bandits early on. It might be a useful way of training your garrison? For a fee, naturally.

I've experimented with it as a way to level up companions by letting them wail on other people/me, but the non-lethal XP penalty of the arena means that you're pretty much wasting your time.  The scrimmage option is sort of useful for allowing you to see how new troop types will perform on the battlefield; the Training Ground will spawn them shirtless and with a stick, so you don't get a good idea of how they'll spawn in a real fight.  But you're correct in that currently it's more of a curiosity than anything useful, which isn't ideal as I see it.

 

[soulmata]

I'd like to see training grounds replaced with Mercenary Camps, and have paid 'trainers' there, which let you trade cold hard cash and time for XP added to you or your companions. I.E. you can pay 10,000 denars and leave a companion for 24 hours to have him given 10,000XP, as a shortcut to coddling low-level companions when you are already level 20+.

The same could apply to the player; rather than scrape your way through absurdly dull arena fights or training sessions for a minuscule amount of XP, you could trade a day of game-time and some huge chunk of change to get XP instead.

 

[Ballacraine]

More options is always good.

Especially useful ones like that.

Balla. 

 

[chargers1783]

I don't know if there is somebody to train your garrison in castles and towns up, but if there isn't it would be a nice addition, he could also run around and get recruits. Or in the next update just implement all of the DIplomacy mod. I don't know exactly what's in this mod I have yet to get past month 1.

 

[Vazzaroth]

Instead of starting a new thread, I have to say here: I also think starting is too hard, nigh impossible. At least in the Nord lands. I was almost always being chased by 2-5 groups of 25-35 Merc troops in Full chain or plate mail and a few mounted sergeants. This is against my hoard of rabble with a few green soldiers in it. Outrunning is basically impossible with anything more than 10 men, and you need at LEAST 20 just to take on the easiest of bandits when you do actually find bandits (Instead of inexplicably hostile mercs). I did have success hanging around with the Vaegirs and killing tundra guys, but I still lost half my army and usually took a serious, stat affecting injury in the process of killing some guys for their +14 chestpiece leather rags...

I understand there's probably a way to play that works, but isn't it sort of counter-intuitive for a sandbox game to have 1 or even 2 ways that you have to play because everything else is just certain death? Shouldn't every starting area be viable? 

As far as fixes, making the Mercs ignore low value targets (like my peasant army) or less agro in general would probably work. Maybe it's just an issue with the area around Sargoth too because the density of 30ish merc bands is just ludacris (Like I said, 2-5 following me at almost any time), or just slow them down so you can engage them on your terms more often once you've built up.

I know the mod is in a state of flux, so I'm keeping my eye on it, but until them I'm going to re-install Floris, which I generally enjoyed before my HD wipe. I'll come back when the itemization is done, that sounds very interesting. Good Luck.

 

[Thurak]

After I played this mod for some time now I have mount & blade "on rest" until the next version of this awesome mod (!) comes out.

I love the idea to move the spawning points of rebels/bandits away from the cities. That sounds logic. Low effort, much gain, I think.


About the start: As you said you have problems as soon as you can't outrun the enemies. So the don't let your party grow too fast. I, too, started in Nord territory, so I know exactly what you mean. Just evade the larger groups, the war mercenaries are the hardest, so always avoid them at first, and train your small group against looters and bandits. Search for a pathfinding companion and start yourself with pathfinding 2 (that gives you a permanent +1 bonus for your group and you start with effective pathfinding 3).
IIRC, I took 10 guys near the town and then moved to the sea-rider area northeast of the Nord territory. When I was out of sight of war merc band I took additional recruits from the villages there. and took on seariders. If you are any sort of mounted guy those battles should be winnable (with losses, of course, but hey, you are low-level) and you get money from the gear.
Train your first 20 guys in a group of ~20 people. When they are trained to a decent level jump to max as fast as possible. Don't have an army of anything between 20 and 40 in the early stages of the game. With <20 you can outrun the enemies, with >40 you should be able to beat them.

 

[ThunderClaw]

I understand there's probably a way to play that works, but isn't it sort of counter-intuitive for a sandbox game to have 1 or even 2 ways that you have to play because everything else is just certain death? Shouldn't every starting area be viable? 

We agree, and that's one of the focuses of the unit revamp, which includes the bandits and mercenaries.  Merc war bands are going to be much more motley, as are bandit groups. I have no doubt that in practice you'll have one or two areas that are harder than others, but our hope is that getting started in the steppes or the coasts will no longer be insanity.

The sort of situation you're talking about also artificially increases the worth of Pathfinding, which I don't feel is ideal either.  Don't get me wrong, pathfinding is an amazing skill and I basically never have it anything but maxed.  But it's a problem to make it a survival requirement.