Is there a mod that removes kingdomless lords?

Question

After you take over every castle and town of a kingdom, often their lords (consisting of a party of 1) end up running around raiding all your villages by themselves. This is annoying because they are super fast since they're by them selves and hard to catch.

Is there a mod that can either wipe out all lords of a kingdom once they lose their last piece of land or make it so you need a minimum number of men before you can raid a village?

Asked by yx.

Answer

Kingdomless lords running around is no longer an issue as of the latest patch. The lords of landless kingdoms will not defect at a much greater rate.

Answered by yx.

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Does leader skills of companions help anything?

Question

Or does it only make sense to add skill points to those skills on my own dude?

Clarification: When I say 'leader skills' I mean the skills marked with (Leader skill), not the Leadership skill (although that one is a leader skill too).

Asked by Svish

Answer

From the Mount and Blade wikia:

Leader skill

Like a party skill, a leader skill grants an ability to a party. However, only the party-leader's level in the skill is used.

I can confirm this, as several of my party members have 2+ points in Prisoner Management, while I only have 2 points in it myself. I can still only hold 10 prisoners.

If you're wanting your other heroes to be more beneficial to your overall party, you'd be best giving them party skills instead. If you want them to be of more use on their own (as a vassal for your kingdom), give them Leader skills, as they will then be the leaders of their own armies.

Answered by Fluttershy

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Can I declare War without losing Honor?

Question

The question basically says it all.

I am the female ruler of my own Faction, the Kingdom of Metal. I begin my Wars by speaking to another Jarl or Count whatever and demand them to surrender, leading into a fight.

That results in a decleration of War and I loose Honor, even if the opposite Faction is much larger than me.

Is there any "good" or "political correct" way to declare a War?

Asked by scorcher24

Answer

You can talk to your minister to send an envoy, who's gonna declare a political war on your enemy.

From the inofficial wiki

"By talking to this minister you can conduct many different affairs of state. Diplomats can be dispatched to the other factions, performing such actions as declaring war..."

Answered by Timothy Roy

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What does being a Marshal entail?

Question

Recently, I've managed to make a bit of a name for myself in Mount & Blade: Warband.

The only problem is, I don't fully understand the responsibilities that come with this new title. Does this mean people will listen to me if I say "Go here." or "Take this castle."?

What happens when I become a Marshal?

Asked by Fluttershy

Answer

As per the Mount and Blade Wikia, it means that you can boss people within your faction around with regard to military actions (bolding is mine):

Being the marshall gives you the power to give orders and organize military campaigns. You will also have full authority over your allies in battle, so you may instruct their troops just as you would your own.

To give orders to your fellow lords (including the monarch), just speak with them and select "I have a new task for you." A list of orders will then be shown.

If you wish to head a military campaign, talk to any vassal and tell them "I want to start a new campaign. Let us assemble the army here." This will send out a message to all the vassals with instruction to meet you at that location.

To cancel orders, tell the lord "I won't need you for some time. You are free to do as you like."

...

It is important to note that vassals will not always obey you. When given a direct order, if they are preoccupied with something else already (like heading to their castle), they may tell you they are too busy.

If they are not busy, they must listen to you, but may only do so for a limited length of time. This means that if you instruct a fellow lord to follow you and then besiege a castle, he may wander off before you even finish constructing the siege equipment. All lords, even ones that like you, will also be tempted to chase passing caravans or enemy farmers as well.

If you are not playing with realistic saving, you should save before starting the siege so that if all your allies run off, you can restore and try again. It is advisable to tell all your comrades to follow you again just before starting the siege, this will decrease the likelihood of them losing interest before the actual battle begins.

Calling together a military campaign can be even more frustrating, as it can take a long time for everyone to come together and the lords may ignore your summons completely too. It may be faster to just manually give three or four lords direct orders to follow you rather than attempt starting a campaign.

There's also a greater risk of controversy (a new feature to warband) when you mess up:

As Marshall: Any loss, such as having a village raided, caravan destroyed, peasants attacked, a lord losing a battle, a castle captured, or town captured will add to controversy in often large measures. If you face war on multiple fronts or have a large kingdom to defend, you can expect to reach near 100 controversy very quickly. The only solution is to give up being marshall in that case.

Answered by skovacs1

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How do I get a castle?

Question

In Mount & Blade: Warband, I swore allegiance to the Kingdom of Swardia. As such, I'm currently a Vassal under King Harlaus.

The king, being the generous sort, awarded me a small fiefdom consisting of one village. However, I feel I need a castle in which to store prisoners and plan my next course of action. Particularly one close to said village.

How can I acquire a castle?

Asked by Fluttershy

Answer

The best way of getting a castle or town is to just capturing one by yourself. Keep an eye out along the borders where towns and castles frequently change hands. Those places usually have a rather weak garrison so you should be able to take it without too much trouble. When you capture a town or castle, you can make the request to your king that you want to keep it. Unless you've just recently been rewarded a fief, the King will almost always grant you the town/castle you've just captured. Don't count on the king giving you one otherwise unless your reputation with him and the other lords are all super high and you manage to convince them to support your cause.

If the castle near your village is already owned by a lord (almost 100% of the time it is), then you are out of luck, you can't get that one unless an enemy faction captures it and you retake it.

Answered by yx.

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How do you win against the superiority of NPC Lords?

Question

I am playing a female character and have fought a long time with the Kingdom of the Nords against Swadia, which resulted in them having only a few castles left.

Now I am trying to help the female Claimant on the Throne. I have captured 1 Castle of Swadia, which has a good position since a lot of Nord Castles are between it and the remains of the Kingdom of Swadia.

Capturing the remaining Castles seems to be very difficult, since my army's max size can be around 90, but all swadian Lords have around 200-400 Men in their Armies. And Swadia has still many lords, I think it is around 7 or 8. And they often group up on me, which makes me fight more than 600 men with my 70-90 men, depending on the current state.

Restricting the Number of men in battle at once is not an option since you still have to fight the rest in a second battle and if you loose some in the first battle, the second one can still go ill.

What is the best late game strategy to win against these lords and/or capturing their castles?

Asked by scorcher24

Answer

You may have decided to support the claimant a bit early. There's really not much you can do when all you have are 90 units with 1 lord vs 600 and 9 lords unless your party's stats (like surgery/first aid) are super high already.

Here are some tips that may help you out:

1. A max army size of 90 means that you don't have enough Renown and Leadership. A good army size to have when declaring for a claimant is at minimum of 150. Next time you should try to boost your renown (by taking fewer units into battle against a higher number of enemies). Having a renown of 1500 to 2000 is probably a minimum before striking out on your own. Also, put more points into leadership/charisma.

2. Try to build up relationships with the lords of the faction your claimant is from (capturing and releasing them repeatedly will gain you relationships fairly quickly as well as improving your honor). If you do that, you can visit their lords while they are in their castles and persuade them to join your cause. This will increase your holdings and lords without having to fight them. Since you'll always be the marshall of your faction, you can then ask your lords to join you in battle.

3. Use only high tier units and play to their strengths. For the Nords, their best units is huscarls, but they aren't mounted so suffer when fighting in the open. Your best bet is to fight in moutnaineous terrain and tell all your units to hold out on top of a hill. This will drastically slow any mounted units heading at you, giving your huscarls plenty of time to throw their axes for tons of damage.

4. Try to wait until there's a war between Swadia and someone else, when their leaders are distracted, go in and take their territory. Also, wait until you see Swadia conquer a city, this is the best time to go and take that city from them as it won't be heavily defended.

5. There are also some really cheap tricks you can do to take a castle without any losses, but that requires you to get some rhodok sharpshooters first. Just tell them to use their melee weapons and defend at the start of a castle battle. They'll be nearly invincible when hiding behind their board shields. Then wait until the enemy runs out of missiles, then tell them to open fire. After your guys run out of missiles, retreat, and repeat.

Answered by yx.

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How do I swing a polearm while on horseback?

Question

Most polearms come with a swing and thrust damage number, but while on horseback, the default attack seems to be only thrust. How do I swing a polearm while on horseback?

Answer

It seems that most polearms in the game do not support a swing attack while mounted. The only such pole arms that allow for 2 handed swings are the the hafted blades and their variants. These are the same weapons that the khergit lancers sometimes use, which is how I noticed their uniqueness.

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