I have always liked a hardcore challenge (used to be hooked on Diablo ii hardcore), I wanted to try this. My choice of character was a hunter, because in my previous games I mostly played melee characters and knights. My character plan was individualism, no companions, but high level troops, little charisma and leadership. I hope to build party size by renown gained from fighting with odds. The high path-finding is a key to my choice.
Settings are full with normal combat speed, 100 battle size (slow pc), realistic savings.
I didn’t plan to document the progress until I have enjoyed it so much and reached far! So no screen shots yet, they will come later! The dates stated are more or less correct, because I write the down to keep tabs on wages, and to know when to sack mercenaries. So this is the story of my huntress, from day 0.
Elena Morpheus – The Great Ranger
Elena had been raised in the small village of Pagundur in the Kingdom of Rhodoks. The villagers lived simply by farming and hunting; it was a quiet but beautiful place. Until one fateful day when mountain and forest bandits came during night, razed the village to the ground and slaughtered all the villagers. Luckily for Elena, her had been away from the village hunting that night. By the time she got back home, all that were left was the smoking ruins of village huts and the stench of burning corpses. It was through the shock and despair of this fateful day, that Elena decided to leave Pagundur and seek revenge for her village. She had scores to settle with the bandits, scores to settle with the King of Rhodoks – as it was he who was supposed to be protecting her people. Gathering whatever provisions she could find, she lead her hunting party of five out of Pagundur into the wilderness, searching for those responsible…
Day 1-9: Looters and more looters
Having recruited a dozen Rhodok recruits, Elena and her party pursued a few parties of looters and disposed of them with little problems. Realising life is tough in these parts and combat shows no mercy, Elena was cunning and cautious, only sought to fight battles she can win. With her masterful path-finding skills, she was able to easily out manoeuvre larger hostile bands of enemies. As some recruits were killed in fighting, she recruited more to keep her numbers consistent. By the end of the week, through her experiences she gained more intelligence and learnt to loot more efficiently. Her usage of the bow improving, and her band of followers also became stronger.
Day 10-28: Forest bandits near Praven
As her Rhodok infantry troops grew in strength, they were able to hold a firm battle line against the forest bandits while Elena shoots from range. Over the days, these hunts became more successful, with victory almost assured always. However, the leading bandit headhunter did give Elena some problems on a number of occasions, and knocking her unconscious a few times. She grew in fortunes, fame and confidence. With her band of forty loyal followers, eventually she decided to leave the forests around Praven to search for other bandits.
Day 29: Almost captured by the fallen ones
Having just left for the mountains near Vyincourd castle, she came across several infamous fallen ones. In her high spirits, she thought her party of goliath and infantry will be able to defeat these fallen ones. She could not have been more wrong! The battle came to a worst start when Elena herself was almost mortally struck by a throwing stake. In the melee that followed, her party quickly fell a part without inflicting enough damage to the fallen ones. Wanting to avoid capture, she order the last survivors to retreat. It was lucky that their retreat was swift, and the fallen ones could not catch them.
Day 29-58: More recruits and bandits
The battle with the fallen ones has taught Elena to be more disciplined and careful about whom she fights. Disheartened but determined, she raised another party of competent Rhodok infantry. Within weeks, her party had recovered and more. Due to her ability to loot well, she became very wealthy and was able to buy some new personal equipments and pay better wages to her followers. In addition, she travelled more extensively around the Kingdoms, defeated numerous bandits, bear clan raiding parties and deserters. As her party grew larger and more experienced, the soldiers demanded more wages and upgrades to their equipment. Elena knew sooner enough she has to find a home for these troops, so she started to wonder where they may go.
Day 59-84: Getting ready for a warElena had thought about offering her services to the King of Swadia, but she fear he would not grant her land large enough for her ambitions. Thus, instead she decided boldly to take a settlement by herself, then perhaps take up vassalage to a Kindom for protection. Out of all the possible targets for her assault, she finally settled on the lands of the King of Rhodok – Jelkala. For it was this King who let down her village, and it would only be fitting for her to dispose his rule of Jelkala and take it over. From a tactical point of view, the walls of Jelkala are not very tall, so she would only need to contruct ladders to assault which is much faster. After taking Jelkala Elena would swear allegiance to the King of Swadia for protection. And given the proximity of Jelkala to Swadia, the Swadians should be able to quickly come to her aid if Jelkala were to be attacked later.
Having set her plans, she began to increase her army and saved more denars to aid the coming campaign against the King of Rhodok. She lead her army against harder foes in order to gain the experience needed to prepare for the campaign. These foes included the infamous Bear Clan whose light armour makes easy targets for Elena. She also had her revenge on the fallen ones when she defeated a couple of fallen parties. Her army rotated around Swadia looking for bandits of all kind. During these days of action, Elena developed the strength necessary to wear plate armour and became an excellent two-handed sword fighter. Finally equipped with a great sword, full plate armour and a great helm, she was ready. As for her army, she was ready to enlist an additional elite group of forty veteran goliaths to aid her war effort. These warriors are heavily armoured and armed with long pole-arms which will be very effective when sieging Jelkala.
Day 85-86: War!
All was ready, and Elena had saved over two hundred thousand denars to pay for wages, so at the beginning of this week, she upgraded her forty odd goliaths with much experience to veteran status and marched on Jelkala. To declare war, she first raided a Rhodok Caravan, then headed towards Jelkala. Elena commanded an army of ninety odd men consisting of around fifty veteran goliaths, eleven veteran Rhodok knights, and forty odd goliaths and Rhodok infantry, she has thus far enough resources to field this army for four weeks. Unexpectedly, not only King of Rhodok was present at Jelkala but also the armies of two other lords.
Together with the defenders of Jelkala that’s just over one thousand men. Elena was expecting around five hundred. There was only one way, that is to divide their forces. Elena’s army was small in size, but by no means easy to defeat – something the Rhodok lords failed to realise. Elena just camped outside Jelkala, within hours, the armies of the King of Rhodok and his two lords attacked Elena’s camp. So began the first epic battle, one hundred vs five hundred.
Day 86: Battle of Sarimish Hills
Despite the huge tactical disadvantage, Elena was confident to inflicting heavy casualty to the enemy. Due to her excellent path-finding skills, she knew she could always retreat should the battle goes badly. The battle begins, Elena ordered the eight veteran goliaths with her to retreat to a hilltop near their starting position and waited for the hording enemy. As the undisciplined enemy knights charged in without infantry support, they were cut down all too easily. However, soon enough the mass of the enemy army traversed through the hills and arrived at the foot of the hill by Elena’s men. Many of them had been shoot down by Elena on their way, but many still had arrived at the foot of the hill. This was it, glory or defeat, Elena told the men if they can hold the enemy here, victory will be theirs, and perhaps the greatest victory of all! Finally Elena ordered the charge down the hill. The eight veteran goliaths courageously buried themselves into the enemy masses. As the enemy fought the goliaths in a their numbers, they made easy targets for Elena to shoot from the hill top. By now, Elena was an exceptional sharpshooter, and extremely fast. With each short, one enemy perished, and with her heavy armour, she was able to stand the shots coming from the enemy. Occasionally, when a few enemy gets to melee range of Elena, they would be mercilessly cut down by her great sword. The enemy were amazed at how long the goliaths held their grounds, and by the time they had knocked down a few, more of my reinforcements arrived. At the same time, the enemy were being shot execution style by Elena! Soon enough, the tide turned, and the enemy quickly crumbled, and routed. After defeating the first wave of a hundred odd enemies, which included the King of Rhodok, Elena’s men had to fight a couple of more waves of enemies, each wave easier. By the day’s end, victory was at hand, and the bloody hills of Sarimash was painted red with blood. Amazinly only seven of Elena’s goliath perished, though many were wounded. In addition, a huge amount of loot was collected. Elena took her army to Praven to heal up the wounded and recruited some mercenaries, and after a day, she returned with her army to Jelkala, with almost five hundred defenders inside the city, she laid siege to Jelkala.
Day 87-88: Siege of Jelkala
Once again, the defenders – blinded by their numerical superiority, sallied out to meet Elena’s forces. During the first sally attack, due to the huge number of enemies, Elena was forced to retreat but only after killed many enemies. She laid siege again immediately, dealt with another sally attack in the same way. It was during the third siege sally attack during that night, when Elena’s men held their ground and slaughtered the sally attack force. Elena waited with her army until the next morning, then launched the final assault to the town itself. At the start of the battle, Elena ordered her men to stand their ground, so she could shoot down some defenders and reload arrows. The foolish defenders tried to shoot down Elena’s men, and stuck their heads out of the battlements, only to be shot down by Elena in rapid fashion. After many defenders fell, the assault order was given, and the veteran goliaths advanced onto the ladders in their glorious armour. Elena, after restocking some arrows, followed the men up the rampart. While the goliaths tried to cut a path through to the courtyard, Elena stood back on the rampart and executed many enemies stuck on the rampart. Eventually, the enemies fell back to the courtyard and the goliaths in pursuit, while Elena stood on the rampart taking free shots at the enemies coming onto the courtyard. Soon enough, it turned into a slaughter, the defenders had little chance, as their best troops perished, the recruits were forced to fight with certainty of death. Finally by noon Elena’s forces dealt with the last defenders, and proclaimed Jelkala for their own! Upon defeat, hundreds of enemies were captured but released by Elena (she doesn’t take prisoners), but she hired many released prisoners from many Kingdoms – norse huscals, vaegir footmen etc. Elena went inside the castle, looked around her new home, it was a sweet feeling. Finally, she has taken revenge on all those who had destroyed her village. Her mission had been complete, and she wonders what she should do next.
Day 89-91: Two more castles to take
Soon after taking Jelkala, Elena realised the two Rhodok castles near Jelkala will be a threat in the future and right now is lightly defended. With her veteran army she will be able to take them easily, moreover, she doesn’t think she could maintain this army for too long as it is very expensive. So she decided to take the castles of Almerra and Senuzgda as well. In this decision she was spot on, indeed the two castles with their a hundred odd defenders each were very easy to take, within two days, both fell. Fearing reprimands, Elena quickly sought out the King of Swadia and pledged to him her allegiance. The Swadians will be happy enough knowing the Kingdom of Swadia is expanding and having gained such a competent commander. Moreover, due to the peace diplomatic relation between Swadia and Rhodok, the kingdom of Rhodok agreed to not attacking Elena! However, protection does not come without a price, as Swadia was fighting a fierce wall with both the Nords and the Khergits. Thus ends another chapter in the adventures of Elena Morpheus of Pagundur, with her lands secure, she wondered what she would do next.
More to come….
Currently she is on 140 days played, I will post more details later. Below are my current stats etc.
Stats page
Equipment page
