what party build do you use?

[space pope]

how do you guys format your party? do you go all cav/foot/marksman or do you keep a fair spread?

at first, i didn't know the tree sets, so i just upgraded randomly. now, i'm split between 1/2 hvy. infantry and 1/2 hvy. horse. i had some archers, but they were pretty useless. they hardly ever hit a target, and i would rather have another infantry unit who might actually kill someone.

i also focused on hired blades/blade sister for awhile, but they're really hard to replace, so now i just stick with vaegir/swadians.

there's also the river pirate comedy option, but they seem pretty worthless.

 

[Rorthic]

currently all my army is swaeden knights and sharpshooters, but i perfer to have all mounted units. i like to watch them all charge into battle.

 

[Tzarius]

I like the party map speed advantage Knights bring, but being melee units they tend to die a lot. I've found the most effective way is to go militia -> skirmishers -> crossbowmen -> sharpshooters. (missing a step?)
Only takes four or five slots, and you can constantly replenish lost troops. Then, I tell the group to hold at a strategic position while I herd the enemies into a convenient spot where they can be cut down. Also doesn't hurt to pump the crossbow stats on Marnid & Borcha, and buy them each a Sniper Crossbow. (they seem to ignore orders if you give them horses).

This is after the .623 patch as well, now that they have learned to put away the (cross)bow when enemies come within melee range. It's good to watch them swarm one or two stragglers that got away from the pack.

 

[DoomedOne]

Right now I have

7 knights
5 sharp shooters
3 seargents
1 sword sister

hard to walk away from those kergit battles with a full army.

 

[BlindArcher]

Right now I'm trying to have a party full of knights and hired blades. It'd be cool to charge into the enemy with all my guys but my knights are walking around for some reason.

 

[Worm]

Random Peasants, coming to the realization that reering the troops is a huge pain in the ass. So I don't know what I'm doing. Maybe the a troop of archers to back me up in all my glory.

 

[The Pope]

I like having a horde of crossbowmen at the moment. My strategy is to get them to follow me up a hill, then order them to hold position while I go and fight up close. They can do a lot of damage and with a nice fast horse I have little trouble surviving.

 

[Skree]

Sword sisters all the way

I got lucky, a bunch of 9 dark knights had more than 30 refugees as prisoners...

 

[Tiedye]

Yeah, the trick is keeping those peasant women alive, though. I about half of them tend to die before becoming sword sisters.

But dark knights do seem to like keeping 30 or so peasant women as prisoners. Very strange...

 

[jimbobsween]

I currently have all Hired Blades, but I'm starting to wonder what the best units are. I used to have Vaegir Knights+Gaurd+Marksmen, but I realized that was too hard to replenish. Then I switched to Vaegir Knights+Gaurd, but something was lacking. I had a party full of Knights when I saw that Hired Blades had better armor and horses, so thats why I now have them.

I just want something that doesn't die all the time.

 

[Plagued]

Right now I split my forces between Swadian Knights and Sergeants. This allows me to bring in peasants and militia in large numbers to replenish their losses in short order.

 

[Mechstra]

As a Swadian warband leader, I have a force comprised of mixed crossbowmen and infantry, of various stages - mainly crossbowmen, with 20 sharpshooters forming the backbone of my force. I'm building up the infantry side, though, and we can generally handle absolutely anything that's thrown at us.

 

[[bulletproof]]

This is how I party.

 

[space pope]

do hired blades really have better equipment? it's hard for me to tell. plus, they're only available at zendar or liberated peons. if you go with a faction and let the reserves stock pile, you can pick up 10 or 15 tier 2 militia at one city, which is a lot easier to replinsh a party stack.

 

[jimbobsween]

Yeah Hired Blades seem to have better equipment, plus they seem to be about 10 above every weapon over nights, and they are more diverse in thier skills and stats.

 

[Ferox]

originally i did vaegir armies, then swadian... I find I am liking the hired blades and other "unconventional" units like the sword sisters. IMO they DO seem to last long.

 

[Orange]

I like to move fast, so I've been going for Vaegir knights. I keep my speed about 7 leauges with a gang of 40, kick the ass of anything I like, and run away from the stuff I dont.

 

[nightrunn3r]

I used to like to use half Vaegir Marksmen and half Vaegir Knights, but the Marksmen never hit anything with their bows. When we would start, they would whip out their bows. They would start walking forward and backward (with the enemy in plain sight), and after about 20 seconds start shooting. They would each get one shot off (invariably missing) and then take out their melee weapons. And get horribly slaughtered. I got rid of them and now have all Knights.

Just for kicks, I created a new character and cheated him up to lvl 35 with a party of close to 60 Vaegir Marksmen. I put the battle size about 3/4s of the way (my computer gets laggy if i put it all the way up ). I then ran into a Swadian patrol, mostly Men at Arms with a sprinkling of Crossbowmen. The Men at Arms charged from nearly the whole map away, giving my mass of archers plenty of time to pincusion them. By the time the Swadians reached us, I counted a total of 4 arrows stuck in them. This from like 9 or 10 archers, and in like 3 or 4 volleys.

 

[JohnathanStrange]

Sword sisters all the way

I got lucky, a bunch of 9 dark knights had more than 30 refugees as prisoners...

I agree although at first it was for the novelty value - we've all seen knights - but now I really do appreciate their high stats and weapons. I'm also starting to see how being on foot keeps them from running too far out and getting into trouble. The only thing is they're harder to replace as you can't recruit just anywhere.

 

[nightrunn3r]

actually, I find it easier to get sword sisters. The raiders from the "kill the raiders" quest usually have about 30 or so peasent women, so I just take them if i'm low on units.