Mount and Blade Post V1

[Chardok]

So - since I cannot read the entire thread and there are a million zillion mods apparently - what are the absolute must-haves to make the game enjoyable and not at all lame?

[PeZook]

Damn!

My hard drive died on me...so I decided to try a mod. I'd really like one which allows you to start your own kingdom, works with 1.010 and doesn't make every lame enemy party dangerous like Native Expansion.

Any suggestions?

[Tolya]

Go play The Settlers

[weemadando]

I've just been cheating like a mother-fucker through Native Expansion to get an idea of the factions unit trees etc.

Mang - Skarls are fucking awesome. The enemy gets into range and suddenly it's a never-ending stream of "X killed by Skarl" cluttering up my screen.

Vikings + Longbows = everyone dead before they can reach you.

[Tolya]

With around 60-70 Paladins (top Swadian faction unit) you are practically invincible. Full plate armor, around level 36. combat skills around 7-8, wicked amounts of strength. Those guys are more like Space Marines than humans.

I only recruit archers and infantry to station them at my castle.

[PeZook]

I tried Native Expansion yesterday - it's only difficult until you get a couple knights (took me about an hour to get five Lady Knights). Leveling is ridiculously fast, cavalry is hugelu overpowered, and money is practically laying on the street. Five hours in, heavy charger, lordly plate mail, fifty top-tier units, wads of cash.

[weemadando]

I picked up a Champion Charger - it does some STUUUUPIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIID amount of Charge Damage so I find myself lining up the enemy archer mob and riding down there line KO'ing at least 9 out of every 10 I clip. It's the best way to end a battle ASAP.

[PeZook]

The guy who made that mod must've been high: I just bought a "Masterful Longsword" which has a reach of 120...like a spear.

Yeah, 'coz quality of a sword makes it reach further

[Commander 598]

I was playing Native Expansion the other day when I decided to sell the prisoners I had acrued into slavery... I got so much money that my cash was actually going into and out of the negatives. I think I ended up with around 2xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx in the end. I'm guessing it's a bug, but I'm not complaining.

[Artemas]

Are you guys playing the patched or unpatched Native expansion?

The unpatched is .430 and has hilariously unbalanced mounted combat, where a warhorse CAN fuck 3/4s of the enemy army. By itself.

Patched i think is .54x and is waaaayyy better balanced. The spear bracing mechanic often unhorses anyone charging at them, and definately prevents mounted combat from being the be all and end all.

[weemadando]

I'm playing on patched and have lost numerous horses to braced spears.

Question - how do I couch a lance for a charge?

[Artemas]

drive your horse fast enough and the lance will couch by itself. You dont need to push any buttons.

[weemadando]

Ahah, so then I just aim the tip. Nice. That's where I'd been going wrong.

[Enigma]

Anyone notice the bug in which when you defeat your opponent their hair turns blond?

[PeZook]

Are you guys playing the patched or unpatched Native expansion?

The unpatched is .430 and has hilariously unbalanced mounted combat, where a warhorse CAN fuck 3/4s of the enemy army. By itself.

Patched i think is .54x and is waaaayyy better balanced. The spear bracing mechanic often unhorses anyone charging at them, and definately prevents mounted combat from being the be all and end all.

All you have to do to make the AI not use the spear bracing mechanic is flank them. They're just incapable of reacting to that, and using horse archery against enemy armies is just cruel

In my current (patched) NE game, I have more than 40 knights of various kinds in my army, and ran over plenty of spearmen heavy groups of enemies by simply moving to flank and then plowing through the formation. In fact, the only problem is enemy cavalry. It's most hilarious with Nords, where I can just lazily steamroll over any warparty because Nord warhorses are mutants that can't go fast enough for a couced lance attack

Seriously, some of the ideas for NE are just plain crazy. How can you call a horse a charger if it can't go any faster than a 200 denar farmhorse? And why the hell can't nords just buy proper horses from anybody else? It makes no friggin' sense. Their heavy cavalry is hilariously impotent because of their crippled mounts.

How do fiefs work, BTW? I get one village from my lord upon swearing fealty...then what? Anything I capture by myself is mine, or does it work differently?

[Enigma]

I'm also using NE and I noticed that one of my companions is called Melissa and she's some warrior. The problem is that it is a burly blond haired dude. May be a glitch or the modder intended to have transsexual companions?

[Artemas]

In the unpatched version, Melissa was, for me, a 55 year old, grey-bearded man. Patched, and now she is a she.

Also, on fiefs:

You can collect taxes from villages and castles every so often. You can also build improvements to upgrade bits like prosperity (taxes), loyalty (higher loyalty allows you to recruit more and better troops there), and a bunch of other stuff.

If you are a vassal, and you capture something, you can request it be given to you. Unless, you renown is high (500) or all the other lords already have one, then it will usually not be given to you. You can however, renounce your oath and start your own faction. In which case you keep whatever you just captured, as well as any non-village fiefs.

[PeZook]

Hmm...so I rampaged through Nord lands, burning down villages and wiping out warparties (see mutant horses: I can fight Nord warparties three times my size and win with neglible casualties). I have six lords as prisoners, including the High Jarl (King). I decided to besiege a city, and it didn't really work (too few men), but during the siege, I refused to let one of the lords go (because he'd ride to the rescue and annoy me). The game said I lost honor.

What does this mean? Are lords gonna consider me a big meanie?

[Vympel]

I managed to hire Katrin, Lezalit and Artimenner, using the interaction graph to make sure noone who hated someone else didn't have someone else they liked to cancel it out. Unfortunately, Lezalit still left. Carrying that beautiful equipment I gave him too, the theiving cunt (Cuir Boulli, Iron Greaves, Great Helmet, Spirited Hunter, nice weapon and shield). Artimenner will of course leave shortly I imagine, for the second time.

[D.Turtle]

I turned off the damn people hating each other and leaving shit

Oh, someone asked about what mods to use. I'll just quote Executor32 from page 2:

Zablorg, the Calradia 16th Century mod is pretty decent. It's basically the vanilla game with flintlock pistols and new gun-using units. Native Expansion is a must-download, as it takes the vanilla game and makes it what it should have been. Britain 1297 is another must-have, with a new world map of the British Isles, period factions and items, and an emphasis on archery. Another good one would have been Onin no Ran, which has a medieval Japanese setting, but the last version was made for .903. They're working on updating it for the current version, though.

I also suggest Zaro's Graphics Enhancement 2.5, punkt's Campaign Map Textures, and M&B Panoramic 2.0, for maximum pretties. There's also a mod that converts the shaders from Shader Model 2.0 to 3.0, so if you have a native 3.0 card it can result in increased performance.

Things I learned playing this game:
1) It is fucking addicting.
2) Heavy Charger + enemy (non-spear) infantry = fun times + easy XP
3) Horse + Bow + enemy without ranged weapons or cavalry (sea raiders, hungry bandits and the like) = easy XP
4) Lady Knights murder everything.
5) Best way to start: Recruit lots of peasants/etc from villages and then kill sea raiders around the city of Tihr - lots of XP, easy kills, starting equipment, and you can sell prisoners for even more money (Yes, you get more money from selling them to the Ransom Brokers that randomly appear in cities, but in Tihr you can always sell prisoners - good for the beginning).
6) Once you have lots of lady knights, the game is too easy. Seriously, I killed an entire faction on my own.
7) Fuck enemy Snipers during sieges - they HURT.
Do not take any party skills with your main character - thats what your party members are for! (Looting is something you need, the relevant part is a leader/personal skill). One thing: If your party member with all those medical skills gets knocked out, it sucks.
9) Those two level 30 guys (ok, one guy, one gal) you can hire are ridiculously powerful.
10) Almost forgot: Once you have a few levels, winning a tournament is a nice way to get lots of money (about 30k).

Oh yes, this is all with the Native Enhancement mod.

[weemadando]

Something I learnt from power-leveling (read: pressing Ctrl-X a LOT) to check out the high level games so I know how character builds should work:

CHA + Leadership is the only way forward. If you can't bring 130+ guys to the table, don't bother showing up to mid game onwards.

[Tolya]

Hmm...so I rampaged through Nord lands, burning down villages and wiping out warparties (see mutant horses: I can fight Nord warparties three times my size and win with neglible casualties). I have six lords as prisoners, including the High Jarl (King). I decided to besiege a city, and it didn't really work (too few men), but during the siege, I refused to let one of the lords go (because he'd ride to the rescue and annoy me). The game said I lost honor.

What does this mean? Are lords gonna consider me a big meanie?

I don't see Honour influencing ANYTHING really.

[Vympel]

CHA + Leadership is the only way forward. If you can't bring 130+ guys to the table, don't bother showing up to mid game onwards.

Are you referring to the vanilla game? I've wiped out armies of 350 - 400 enemy with my army of less than 100 guys. I can actually pack over 130+ (since I have 12 CHA and 4 Leadership and a shit-ton of renown) but it's not necessary, and you get a morale penalty, which is what I think made Lezalit leave.

[Stark]

It's scary reading all this crap with people actually being new to the game. It's even worse reading the 'pro tips' to 'success' when the game is so broken and easy to start with. This thread just blows my mind.

More advice like 'get heaps of massively overpowered high-end cavalry', please. Do you guys at least turn off the auto-block?

[weemadando]

CHA + Leadership is the only way forward. If you can't bring 130+ guys to the table, don't bother showing up to mid game onwards.

Are you referring to the vanilla game? I've wiped out armies of 350 - 400 enemy with my army of less than 100 guys. I can actually pack over 130+ (since I have 12 CHA and 4 Leadership and a shit-ton of renown) but it's not necessary, and you get a morale penalty, which is what I think made Lezalit leave.

I'm playing Native Expansion w/the battle sizer scaled up to 250 or so- it's still relatively simple to floor-mop w/ a higher level character, but goddamn do you ever need more backup when you start getting into real fights (like 6+ armies of 200 at once). Just the depth in your roster to take the multiple stages of combat is essential.