Mount and Blade

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darkmaster
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Post by darkmaster »

Battles against larger forces are actually really hard if you're army is too lopsided, it's not impossible to take on a thousand guys with your dinky little army but it's nearly so if all you have is heavy cavs or infantry. What you really want is like 20-25 Swadian Knights and then the rest of your army to be split between Huscarls and Sharpshooters, you still run a good chance of losing, but with Huscarls to absorb damage, sharpshooters providing basically artillery support and a small force of heavy cavalry to smash into the enemy's flank you at least stand a chance, and of course if your team has someone with high tactics it helps too.
Kaelik wrote:
darkmaster wrote:Tgdmb.moe, like the gaming den, but we all yell at eachother about wich lucky star character is the cutest.
Fuck you Haruhi is clearly the best moe anime, and we will argue about how Haruhi and Nagato are OP and um... that girl with blond hair? is for shitters.

If you like Lucky Star then I will explain in great detail why Lucky Star is the a shitty shitty anime for shitty shitty people, and how the characters have no interesting abilities at all, and everything is poorly designed especially the skill challenges.
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Kaelik
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Post by Kaelik »

@DSM

I don't really do wars for one side or another so much. Basically I just run around collecting 10 of the best gear in the game and leveling up my huscarls and and party members and self. Then, when I have someone with a 10 in all the important stats (Engineering, Pathfinding, Surgery, Tactics, me with Leadership, and then Combat stats as high as you can), and a full complement of Huscarls, and renown and honor out the ass, then, and only then do I begin plan conquer the world.

Plan goes like this: Star with Nordes, because they have the Norde villages. Join them against the Veigars, because they are always fighting those guys. Win enough renown that in addition to your one starting village for joining you get a castle, but make sure you release all the Veigars you capture, because you give no fucks about more armies or whether the Nordes win or not. Put all your Huscarls in the castle and go around recruiting more men, give no shits about the nordes winning. In some senses it is better if they lose. Just get a whole new army, and the train them up. Deposit Huscarls in castle. Do this as many times as you can before your finances start to take too big a hit (this can be never if you had a huge nestegg from your adventuring days as a Mercenary for some faction who cares).

Then, once you have a giant super garrisoned castle, you just tell the Norde king to fuck himself. If you did it right, he'd probably busy losing to the Veigars, so you just carve him out from the South taking everything and leaving almost no Garrisons because the Nordes are like one giant line. Once you have everything up to the border, then you leave larger garrisons. Once you have defeated Nordes, immediately move to the nearest big ass Veigar city and declare war and instantly capture that. Keep moving all your troops forward constantly as you conquer and leaving token garrisons, they will fill up the garrisons on their own. Then start on the fucking purple fucks, because that is next in the line of defended territory. Eventually you need to keep some peace for a bit to get more huscarls and consolidate them in positions. Do that whenever.

That seems to be the ideal path to Kingship.
darkmaster wrote:Stop being an idiot Kaelik, if you're going after cities and castles then you're not by your villages, if you're not by your villages then the lords are pillaging them so when you go back to your territory to recruit more soldiers it aint even hard to run the fuckers down and stomp them and I mean it when I say they will literally start back toward your villages the moment you're out of their sight, every, fucking, time.

That you apparently attack into only the most heavily defended castles in no way effects how stupid that tactic is.
Once again, if you are by them, they don't go for your villages, so when you march up to the city and conquer it your villages are behind you, and they are in some city or castle in front of you, and you just march in a straight fucking line to the next castle and assault it immediately.

But how you can call a strategy that loses 10 men to take one of the 3 cities the faction has and all the goddam castles and cities without getting villages pillaged bad I have no idea. Since you can easily win these battles, it seems pretty dam silly to calling winning easy battles to conquer the world a bad strategy.
DSMatticus wrote:Kaelik gonna kaelik. Whatcha gonna do?
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AndreiChekov
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Post by AndreiChekov »

When you besiege a city, you only fight 300 guys. Then, if they still have more guys, you fight a handful inside the walls, and then if they still have more, inside the keep.

I have reliably conquered castles and cities with the sharpshooter technique. If you go for a one unit does everything tactic, cavalry is the best, because you just smash everyone in the field, and then attack their weakened castles.

Also, when you are in a field battle, you fight 300 at a time, and then the battle is over, and you go for the next round.

Kaelik, you forgot to mention the swadian side, and the fact that every faction declares war on you when you make your own faction. Which means that the swadians are attacking you from behind as you are marching on the veigars. Unless, there is something that the mod changes, in which case, you should mention that.
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Kaelik
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Post by Kaelik »

AndreiChekov wrote:Unless, there is something that the mod changes, in which case, you should mention that.
The Mod changes literally everything. Like the map, the factions, the items, the everything. Adds some skills too.

I was talking about the standard game. If you do your adventuring until you have a fuckton of renown and everyone loving you (and by that I mean, just the swabians and/or kergit) then you can very quickly make peace with several people when you start your faction. Although personally, I like to be a mercenary for the Rhokodokos and Swarian factions during my training montage to get them both well ground into the Swabian/Kergit, which means that even though both parties declare war on you, neither one actually does anything because the one side is too far away, and the other is busy losing a war badly.
DSMatticus wrote:Kaelik gonna kaelik. Whatcha gonna do?
The U.S. isn't a democracy and if you think it is, you are a rube.

That's libertarians for you - anarchists who want police protection from their slaves.
Blicero
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Post by Blicero »

I've pretty much only played the Floris mod, but that has been a really neat experience. I'm desperately waiting for someone to make a game whose scope scales up from Mount & Blade to Crusader Kings II, but I realize how stupidly ambitious that would be.
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darkmaster
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Post by darkmaster »

Well, Mount and Blade 2 is coming out... at some undefined point in the future. So, keep your fingers crossed.
Kaelik wrote:
darkmaster wrote:Tgdmb.moe, like the gaming den, but we all yell at eachother about wich lucky star character is the cutest.
Fuck you Haruhi is clearly the best moe anime, and we will argue about how Haruhi and Nagato are OP and um... that girl with blond hair? is for shitters.

If you like Lucky Star then I will explain in great detail why Lucky Star is the a shitty shitty anime for shitty shitty people, and how the characters have no interesting abilities at all, and everything is poorly designed especially the skill challenges.
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Post by Korwin »

Mount and Blade is on -75% on steam now.
There is also M&B Warband and M&B With Fire and Sword. (also -75%).

Whats the difference between M&B and Warbandf?
Red_Rob wrote: I mean, I'm pretty sure the Mayans had a prophecy about what would happen if Frank and PL ever agreed on something. PL will argue with Frank that the sky is blue or grass is green, so when they both separately piss on your idea that is definitely something to think about.
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Chamomile
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Post by Chamomile »

The difference is that Warband is superior. Seriously, it has an extra faction, some new mechanics, and a couple of old things that were pointlessly difficult have been streamlined. Mount and Blade still badly needs more streamlining, but Warband is a step in the right direction, and is about as close to objectively superior as you can get when talking about inherently subjective experiences.
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Post by Laertes »

So I just bought Warbands and spent six hours playing it. It's going to take up a lot of my post-work time this week. I blame... <rolls D6> Chamomile.
darkmaster
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Post by darkmaster »

It's a super fun game though, so you're in for a ride, just remember, before you revolt and start conquring, people won't accept your rule if you don't have a high reputation, low controversy, and high right to rule. Otherwise everyone will dog pile on you.
Kaelik wrote:
darkmaster wrote:Tgdmb.moe, like the gaming den, but we all yell at eachother about wich lucky star character is the cutest.
Fuck you Haruhi is clearly the best moe anime, and we will argue about how Haruhi and Nagato are OP and um... that girl with blond hair? is for shitters.

If you like Lucky Star then I will explain in great detail why Lucky Star is the a shitty shitty anime for shitty shitty people, and how the characters have no interesting abilities at all, and everything is poorly designed especially the skill challenges.
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Whipstitch
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Post by Whipstitch »

I always have a tough time choosing between the Nords or Rhodoks when it comes time to do serious business. As has been established Huscarls rock your face but in terms of sheer annoyance I think I hate fighting against sharpshooters even worse. Fucking siege crossbows.


Lately I've taken to using a heavy great long axe and it makes me weep for the way the AI robs the bardiche wielding Vaegir Guard of their siege defense potential. My dude has "only" 4 power attack but with 57 base damage that's more than enough to stand to the left of the siege ladder and cheerfully murder King Graveth and his conga line of Counts and Sergeants with one sharp tap to the dome each while humming along to Holy Diver. Unfortunately, the whole concept of "cover" seems to be lost on my compatriots.
Last edited by Whipstitch on Mon Aug 11, 2014 12:55 am, edited 2 times in total.
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Dezzy
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Post by Dezzy »

Warband has long been one of my favourite games. Just got round to playing With Fire and Sword and felt that guns really ruined it though. The reliably unfair occurence of his getting killed in a single shot from distance really puts a downer on things.
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Judging__Eagle
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Post by Judging__Eagle »

I'm sort of really sad that no one here talked about Mount and Blade's best features:

+Actual demonstration/simulation of Mounted Combat.

I'm fucking, sorry, but this cannot be ever stressed enough.

"Mounted combat" is like... the holy fucking grail of fantasy combat games; and almost all fail to promise, let along deliver.

Being able to replay every medieval battle scene involving mounted characters (i.e. almost every character that matters) is simply the most refreshing thing after thousands of hours of infantry-only combat.

+Archery feeling like the real thing; also cannot be stressed enough. After you've got 3-4 points in Mounted Archery, it's about as smooth as you might be able to get in real life if you practice any form of non-throwing target practice.

+Good simulation of the historic "Parthian Shot"

That is to say, the reverse archery attack that stonewalled the Roman legions; established the Mongol Khanates; and was still being used 1,000 years later; later evolving into Pisoleers/Dragoons.

+Not impossible to win Sieges

Mercenary swordsmen, and Hired Blades make this possible. Both are able to be recruited in all taverns on the map's cities. A force of about 50-150 is able to take on almost all the sieges I've ever fought.

I prefer to reserve my Swadian knights, and Norse Huskarls for guard duty. They're not expendable enough; and they're

+Decent simulation of melee combat

Direction-based attack combat isn't new in video games; however it's not common. Even simple methods are pretty enjoyable.

+Secret Hardcore Mode

Being a female character is harder than being a male one; because of the setting being a medieval era-based game involving European expys.

Playing an all female army is super hardcore mode. However results in some fairly well geared mounted crowsbow equipped "Sword Sisters" with a sword and sheild. Making them good on the ground/sieges, fast on the world map, and allow for mounted archery overpowerness.

+Mounted Archery Armies

One of my more favorite parts of the game isn't that I can have mounted archery that isn't terrible; but that I can have an army of mounted archers, who also have lances; barded warhorses and heavy armour.

Now, they're not the heaviest armour troops; but being able to keep repositioning, flanking the bulk or cutting off the enemies rear with your entire field force in a couple of minutes; rain arrows; and repeat until your arrows are done; and you repeat until you've ground down the enemy; making units who've exhaused their arrows leave the field, so you can spawn units that are waiting in reserve.

+You can recruit enemy prisoners into your own army

Say hello to paying less often to recruiting and training of elite units. You'll focuse on the elites and let the junk troops go free because of one of the games problems, you can't have many troops under your Leadership, or Prisoner Capacity, scores.

+Different ways of gaining XP

You can also "train" your units yourself; or if you have a Companion with the skill. At maxed ranks, the "training" skill takes away the risks that are involved in raising troops to the level you want them.

+Open world game play

Being a merchant, business owner, cattle rancher, and slaver are nice alternates to simply being "a mercenary captain". Better still; if you can pick ideal businesses for the city your in you could end up making more money from your businesses than from your land holdings (something very similar to how feudal economies tend to end up historically, and highlights the rising mercantile class of the high middle ages and Renaissance).

Annoying parts

-Limit on total units on a battlefield as a product of character rendering limitations in the graphics engine.

Yes, you can have 1,500 troops on the march with your vassals and their armies following your own army. However you certainly well can't field them all at once because the game's render engine doesn't have effective enough Level of Detail coding for units; although it does have an alright amount for environments.

-Archery doesn't reflect ancient, internationally practiced archery techniques known to historians and archery experts today

Books from the time of the Islamic Persian Empire describe "three shots before the first lands" as being a minimum entry level requirement to join the mounted archery military units; and "11 before the first lands" is described as a heroic maximum. I can't think of a single game that has ever demonstrated this.

-Mouse controlled combat is limited

I've only got three swing directions with most weapons; and four if I have something that I can stab with. This makes picking my angles of attack a piece of shit.

At the very least should "low" strikes to the legs be permitted. At the very most; three high/downward strikes (instead of just the single downward strike); the two side strikes; the forward thrust; two low/upward strikes.

-Can't wield Sinister

All the characters are right-handed; and you can't play ambidextrously, wield two weapons, or left-handed.

-Sometimes the equipment cycling is wonky/annoying

I've played sieges and campaigns against every faction, fought bandits by their caves, and even won few tournaments; but the shield/weapon, weapon, shield, bow/quiver, cycling via the mousewheel has had me having to cycle again. Spinning up makes the wielding go in a certain set of choices; and spinning down brings up the shield. However cycling up and down to switch your Bastard Sword or Morningstar from 1H to 2H sometimes gives results you don't want.

-Skills are weak/taxes, others critical

Some skills can be a gateway to taking down enemies with minimal losses (Mounted Archery); others are suvival tax (Ironflesh).

-Companion/Vassal skill choices are critical for the end-game

If your Companions destined for vassalhood don't have maxed out Leadership; they won't be able to lead as large armies to augment your own maxed/capped Leadership skill. The downside of getting "Leadership 10" on a Companion is that they can't begin augmenting your armies with extra units until you've made them into a vassal. Worse, you may never see a return on the investment if you can't get to the end game.

Also, making Companions have certain skills will give them better killing power and survivability. Having almost all Companions specialized in Horse Archery makes them useful all the way through the game, not being in melee on its own adds to a units survivability. However having a few of the non-nobles spec'd for the last two Siege battles is also important.

=========

Overall its got definitive faults; but it brings so many new fundamental gameplay experiences that just aren't in any games within this style of game that it shouldn't be passed up.

With all of the mods out there, and a producer support modding forum; the life cycle of the engine is greatly expanded.
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ckafrica
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Post by ckafrica »

A fun trick I discovered during a siege was jumping off the wall and moving behind the enemy forces fighting yours and pummeling them with a maul. Got so many captures that way.
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Josh_Kablack
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Post by Josh_Kablack »

Apparently the base game is FREE on GoG for the next 36 hours in an attempt to get you to shell out $10 for the rest of the series.

Overall well worth free.

But since this is the Den, let me talk about some really embarrassing basic design failures:
  • Has a "hardcore" mode where you cannot quit without saving. Also has rendering glitches where tournaments and sieges cannot be concluded due to a character falling into a wall. Yeah, that's better than save-scumming in a solo game, right hardcore fans?
  • Cannot save in a battle. Also, large battles default to many waves and can take up to 30+ minutes of realtime. Have fun repeating battles because you had ctrl-alt-delete, end task to deal with the wife and kids.
  • Limited save slots. Seriously, what the fuck? In this age of terrabyte drives this is inexcusable
  • Cannot use keystrokes to window out of fullscreen mode, and leaving taskbar overtop of screen means that you will click on your spreadsheet or email instead of the enemy you were aiming for.
  • Combat sorely needs a "get the fuck out my way" command, or at least an AI where your allies are not quite so eager rush in front of you while you have a bow drawn and vision scoped in.
In short, the game places demands on it's players' time management more appropriate to the SNES than a PC.
Last edited by Josh_Kablack on Tue Dec 30, 2014 7:19 am, edited 1 time in total.
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