Starvation: An Exploration

[Satur9]

I'm currently just finishing a "kill every named NPC" run as Nosferatu Zodd. There are 4 separate women in their 20s who will not leave cities under any circumstances, and they're keeping all the children in their family from being "lost". I was considering going all Pennywise and resting for 20 years until all the children grew up, but that seems a little ridiculous. Even if I wanted to establish a kingdom to raise larger armies (which I don't) I cannot do so without capturing a castle, which brings me back to the same issue.

Siege:
Currently I'm exploring starvation as a siege mechanic. I'm using the main game branch and it is unmodded. I haven't had much success so far, but I'm sure there is a light at the end of the tunnel. As an example:

• Just my personal party of 150
• I destroy the outlying towns (not necessary but just in case)
• I besiege a castle with 300 militia and 100 garrison
• Their castle started with 200 "Food Stocks" (this is the key metric for starvation)
  • Do not judge the amount of food the castle has using the grain symbol at the top of the siege menu, it is glitched currently. Hover over the center of the castle to view the "Food Stocks" value. It should be something like Food Stocks 400(-30)
• Every day that passes their Food Stocks will deplete by the listed value (30 in this example)
• After the Food Stocks reach 0(-30) every day that passes 1-2 members of the garrison will starve
• Once the garrison is down to 5-10 members, the depletion of the food stocks decreases to such a small value that it takes a week for each garrison member to starve
• Once the garrison is empty, the process repeats for the Militia (I have no idea why they are consecutive and not concurrent)

This is obviously not great because I would have to wait several years in-game for the castle to be weak enough to attack with a single party. I understand that the castles can have granary upgrades and that they feasibly could produce *some* food, but that is still a little ridiculous.

I did see an army of 800+ units besieging a city (Rovalt) and while the defenders of the city were starving they were losing (-8 ) militia and (-3) garrison troops per day. Does the size of the besieging force and/or the base number of defenders affect the starvation efficacy that much? I'm currently doing testing to find out if there's some workaround.

Armies:
Just as an interesting side note. Once I had eliminated all of the NPCs in the game except for the Battanians, there were no longer any enemy armies to pit them against, so I had to get creative when I encountered a superior force. One thing I noticed was how easy it was (especially at -100 Relation) to kite the armies in a circle until they starved themselves down to a manageable size. It was usually most effective immediately after they finished a siege, because their food stocks were low. As they got more and more desperate you would have to remain closer and closer to successfully bait them. Eventually when they had lost a good chunk of troops and morale drooped they would stop chasing you altogether, but if you performed the kiting far from one of their settlements, they would usually starve down to ~100 units and you could pounce right before they reached a village. Food for thought, just in case you're planning to chop everyone's heads off at some point...

 

[Timmortal]

I'm currently just finishing a "kill every named NPC" run as Nosferatu Zodd. There are 4 separate women in their 20s who will not leave cities under any circumstances, and they're keeping all the children in their family from being "lost". I was considering going all Pennywise and resting for 20 years until all the children grew up, but that seems a little ridiculous. Even if I wanted to establish a kingdom to raise larger armies (which I don't) I cannot do so without capturing a castle, which brings me back to the same issue.

Siege:
Currently I'm exploring starvation as a siege mechanic. I'm using the main game branch and it is unmodded. I haven't had much success so far, but I'm sure there is a light at the end of the tunnel. As an example:

• Just my personal party of 150
• I destroy the outlying towns (not necessary but just in case)
• I besiege a castle with 300 militia and 100 garrison
• Their castle started with 200 "Food Stocks" (this is the key metric for starvation)
  • Do not judge the amount of food the castle has using the grain symbol at the top of the siege menu, it is glitched currently. Hover over the center of the castle to view the "Food Stocks" value. It should be something like Food Stocks 400(-30)
• Every day that passes their Food Stocks will deplete by the listed value (30 in this example)
• After the Food Stocks reach 0(-30) every day that passes 1-2 members of the garrison will starve
• Once the garrison is down to 5-10 members, the depletion of the food stocks decreases to such a small value that it takes a week for each garrison member to starve
• Once the garrison is empty, the process repeats for the Militia (I have no idea why they are consecutive and not concurrent)

This is obviously not great because I would have to wait several years in-game for the castle to be weak enough to attack with a single party. I understand that the castles can have granary upgrades and that they feasibly could produce *some* food, but that is still a little ridiculous.

I did see an army of 800+ units besieging a city (Rovalt) and while the defenders of the city were starving they were losing (- militia and (-3) garrison troops per day. Does the size of the besieging force and/or the base number of defenders affect the starvation efficacy that much? I'm currently doing testing to find out if there's some workaround.

Armies:
Just as an interesting side note. Once I had eliminated all of the NPCs in the game except for the Battanians, there were no longer any enemy armies to pit them against, so I had to get creative when I encountered a superior force. One thing I noticed was how easy it was (especially at -100 Relation) to kite the armies in a circle until they starved themselves down to a manageable size. It was usually most effective immediately after they finished a siege, because their food stocks were low. As they got more and more desperate you would have to remain closer and closer to successfully bait them. Eventually when they had lost a good chunk of troops and morale drooped they would stop chasing you altogether, but if you performed the kiting far from one of their settlements, they would usually starve down to ~100 units and you could pounce right before they reached a village. Food for thought, just in case you're planning to chop everyone's heads off at some point...

Its when you really go out into unintended terretory like this, that you will encounter issues, game is not balanced for it, and i dont think they should waste time on it, though i do think theres some things they can do to make starvation work better. As to sieging a castly with only one army, i would make sense that food could be smuggled in, as a roleplaying element, im pretty sure its not a game mechanic though. I salute your for your determination though, and hope they add assassination plots to the game somehow, though preferable not just someone you pay to do it, but either yourself or a companion and men you send, (that you risk loosing) working similarly to the free prisoner quest, from Warband.

 

[Satur9]

Agreed on the assassination. That would definitely solve my little conundrum. I realize I'm out in the boonies as far as game mechanics go, but that's where I have the most fun so I'm going to keep making characters that break things. The devs definitely shouldn't waste time on this specifically, but there does need to be a bit of a starvation re-balance. Unless they come out and say they want starvation to be this way so it doesn't get exploited and they don't particularly care if it's accurate.

 

[Timmortal]

Agreed on the assassination. That would definitely solve my little conundrum. I realize I'm out in the boonies as far as game mechanics go, but that's where I have the most fun so I'm going to keep making characters that break things. The devs definitely shouldn't waste time on this specifically, but there does need to be a bit of a starvation re-balance. Unless they come out and say they want starvation to be this way so it doesn't get exploited and they don't particularly care if it's accurate.

oh i fully applaud what you are doing and some people do enjoy taking things appart (or breaking them) Also while some of the things you discover is never meant to be experienced or to be fixed, you might come across issues while you are doing it, that can help the dev team or spark ideas in others. People like the SpiffingBrit has helped devs fix issues in game by trying to find exploits, its stuff like that, that prevent them from being in the game and thats nice, cause i hate knowing about an exploit and having to steer away from it. I my self found an exploit quest, that let you get max relation with a village notable, by taking a quest with hunting laborers for the other notable in the village and then keep going into conversations with the other one, giving you a relation boost for telling him you would share the money. Taleworlds fixed it and now i can do the quest without feeling guilty I do think assassination should be in the game, as its the only way to get rid of some Lords/Ladies. I do not think killing children will ever enter the game though, it would make Bannerlord loose its content raiting, but if they add assassinantion, modders would easily be able to make it a thing.

 

[Apocal]

Once the garrison is empty, the process repeats for the Militia (I have no idea why they are consecutive and not concurrent)

They should be concurrent. They are in my most recent attempts (1.5.1) at starving out settlements:

 

[black_bulldog]

Agreed on the assassination. That would definitely solve my little conundrum. I realize I'm out in the boonies as far as game mechanics go, but that's where I have the most fun so I'm going to keep making characters that break things. The devs definitely shouldn't waste time on this specifically, but there does need to be a bit of a starvation re-balance. Unless they come out and say they want starvation to be this way so it doesn't get exploited and they don't particularly care if it's accurate.

I think it's good to push the boundaries of a game like this. It brings out some very interesting dynamics and tests things the devs would never think to test.

 

[Ananda_The_Destroyer]

There's something wrong with the food/starvation for enemy garrisons under siege in 1.5.2, don't know about other recent versions. I reported it because in this .sav it seems not troops will go away even they're way past out of food.
https://forums.taleworlds.com/index...-troops-with-food-plus-1-more-concern.431406/

I think they should start getting KOs when out of food just like field party

kite the armies in a circle until they starved themselves down to a manageable size.

My favorite is to starve a neutral army and get them caught by bandits and load up on free troops. I got really mad one day because mesui brought an army in my town and bought all the food. So I fallowed her and bought all the food everywhere she tried to go until she starved!

Anyways you don't need an army/kingdom to take any fief, no matter how big 150 is more then enough.
you can even

Spoiler: get gud

use f7 to retreat you enter war band in the siege which will make the infantry open the gate and come out to get you, you can kill them all and retreat if you need ammo refills, you can do this and spine out all the ranged too after the infantry is dead

 

[Satur9]

ahhhh, man. I was looking for a retreat exploit. Thanks

EDIT: Hmm f7 is "Transfer" for me. No retreat option.

 

[Satur9]

Another trick I really enjoyed was baiting two armies to fight, if the friendly army wins go talk to all their leaders after the battle and "buy" their prisoner lords for 1 Denar.

My head cannon is that the friendly lords know I'm going to just chop their heads off, and while their morals wouldn't normally allow murder, they're more than willing to "sell" prisoners to a murderer in a legitimate transaction. Like when you "sell" a relative a used vehicle for $1.

 

[Ananda_The_Destroyer]

ahhhh, man. I was looking for a retreat exploit. Thanks

EDIT: Hmm f7 is "Transfer" for me. No retreat option.

Yeah it's f1 option then f7 is retreat

Spoiler

you might have to press 0 first to select everyone