I've played mount and blade for over a hundred hours. For a guy who has only finished two Single Player games in 18 years, from the 386 to quad core cpus, this means a lot - as i cant stand SP games, and strictly play MP games like quake/cs/etc in leagues/tournaments.
At some point through it i decided this game was so singular that I bought it - though i kept playing my pirated copy out of laziness. Later when warband came out i bought that too but never installed until many months after. I just thought they earned more than 15$ from me.
I've been to these forums years before.
I have played PoP, Bryten, Vanilla, Floris, you name it.
...but in all these years, and in all these visits, i never once made an account on TW.com.
I finally registered to thank you othr.
This is without a doubt the pinnacle of M&B. I've been playing computer games for longer than im comfortable revealing, but i can tell you that the best thing Valve did was make an engine for someone to make Counter Strike on. Excuse this obvious hyperbole but I feel the same about 1257AD.
It's not the map.
It's not the history.
It's not the textures.
It's the numbers.
Games live or die by gameplay mechanics.
Always have, always will.