Mount&Blade Hysteria

[Mighty Midget]

Ok, since it seems there are a few here on AB who are talking about/playing this game, I decided to open up a topic for us to collect all your ideas, hints, tips or general opinions on this game.

To me, it now seems they kinda rushed it a bit, forgetting to create a world where anything interesting happens.

The battles are awesome but alas, they are over in a couple of minutes, if that long. I do miss the pre-battle stage, with deployment, planning and all that, I also miss the prolonged battles where the forces retreat for the nightfall and wait for the dawn to keep going, the size of the battle isn't only a matter of how many units you can shove into the battlefield but also it's duration and, as I said, the tactical element is absent unless I'm missing something here.

One thing I wonder about is this:
Early in the game, the recruits level up fairly quickly. Take them to the training field and they level up after a couple of sparring rounds. Later, however, they need perhaps as many as 10 rounds before leveling up. What's up with that?

Currently trying to build an army of:
20 Nord infantry (army backbone), possibly supplemented with Rhodok spearmen, but not sure at all about their actual usefulness against cavalry.
10 Swadian Knights
10 Rhodok xbow men and 10 Veagris Archers

Trouble is, now it takes several battles for even the recruits to level up. Any idea how this XP works?

[The Fifth Horseman]

I'd guess that the experience requirement for each subsequent level is increased compared to the requirement for the prior one. It's commonplace in all games where characters/units/whatever gain experience points.

[red_avatar]

I honestly don't get the attention this game received. Yes, the combat is great (although, it's still repetitive after a while) but the rest of the game is meh. The map is bland and boring, there's very little going on in the world, there's no story to at least give you an incentive to play, going from town to town gets dull after a while, trading takes too long to be worth the effort, you can only carry 30 arrows into battle which sucks since being an archer is the coolest thing, etc.

It just lacks anything to push you onwards. The game is actually the most fun at the start of the game, when you can focus on fighting instead of the boring army management. Well, I guess I can't complain for $8 but I was hoping for more strategy and tactics.

[Eagle of Fire]

You guys pretty much sum up what I think too. The game is great until you get around level 10. Then the game become way too easy.

The only way to get around it is to increase the difficulty. But since you are now an armored tank, it simply keep the difficulty roughly at the same level. Even sieges are too easy now.

[Mighty Midget]

5th: Not sure if we understand each other here. In this game, each individual soldier keeps track of his own XP, and I would have thought the thresholds for each level would be the same for each say, Swadian recruit. Currently I have a Nord who refuses to become a veteran even though he has been in every fight from the beginning, recieving his share of the training and so on. I've had 5 Nords from the same "recruit class" leveling all the way up to becoming Supermen but this one chap is still not leveling up.

To the rest of you: Unfortunately, I share your view on how this game is meh beyond the fighting scenes. It seems this title will depend 100% on mods coming from fans to become something even remotely interesting. Too bad, really.

[The Fifth Horseman]

5th: Not sure if we understand each other here. In this game, each individual soldier keeps track of his own XP, and I would have thought the thresholds for each level would be the same for each say, Swadian recruit. Currently I have a Nord who refuses to become a veteran even though he has been in every fight from the beginning, recieving his share of the training and so on. I've had 5 Nords from the same "recruit class" leveling all the way up to becoming Supermen but this one chap is still not leveling up.
There may be a random factor somewhere in there, or there's a cap on how many soldiers can reach a given rank.
Not sure if it rings any bells, but the X-Com trilogy had a similar thing - you had to have a certain number of soldiers to get Sergeants, certain number of Sergeants to get Captains and then a number of Captains to get a Commander.

[Mighty Midget]

I don't know, but you might be right. For all I know, the game has a cap on the total level count, which would be retarded. Of course, they could have implemented that to avoid throwing the game off balance, but it's already off balance. Two words: Mounted archers.

I'm thinking about doing an experiment: I'm getting a hero trainer, then wait and see if all recruits level up at the same time, if I stay away from fighting. It will take a good while, but at least I'll get to see if there is such a cap.

[Doubler]

Well, it's just how much emphasis you put on the negative as opposed to the positive. The criticisms here are valid, but the game offers a lot too.

Also remember that as far as ARPG's go, M&B is almost completely unique in setting and orientation. Part of the popularity might simply come from the fact that people were starving for something like it.

[Mighty Midget]

It's unique alright, and after reading the responses the game got, it seems that people were indeed starved. I'm not saying the game is terrible, it isn't, rather that the vanilla version is dull and off balance:

I faced an army of 69 men, some 20 cavalry and the rest were infantry and archers. I had 20 Nords, from veterans to 4-5 huscarls and I lost one veteran while wiping out the enemy army. It was cool but ridiculous.

[Eagle of Fire]

If you have a lot of recruits and place them at the bottom of your list, they won't participate in the battle unless you need reinforcement and you actually need them. It is normal that most of your units leveled fast at the beginning of the game if you used all of them in every battle. I think units only level if they actually kill a unit, otherwise they get no or very little XP. And of course they get XP when you train them with the trainer skill too. That's how I level my troops anyways.

Also, there is some troops which are insanely powerfull against others. Like Rhodok infantry against Khergit troops for example. Or knights in sieges are also insalely powerfull (versus other units) because they are so armored they can shrug off a lot of arrows before dying.

Also, nudging the difficulty a notch will help you have a bigger challenge. There is several options to tweek in the option menu. One of them is the amount of damage dealt in the game. The default is ridiculously low... If you try a "realist" setting then you'll see that you won't be able to solo a 80 man army like I used to do when I began playing.

[Doubler]

Just be glad the dark knights are no longer in the game. They meant long and frustrating battles as you tried and tried to singlehandedly kill dozens of the bastards without taking hits yourself because sending in your troops simply meant having all of them slaughtered within minutes. :braindead:

By the way, M&B has always reminded me quite a bit of Pirates! Am I the only one seeing similarities? :unsure:

[TheChosen]

By the way, M&B has always reminded me quite a bit of Pirates! Am I the only one seeing similarities? :unsure:

Nope. I had the same thought when reading Red's post.

[angry axe]

was meant to get this game today but couldn't =p, this is the best guide i have found so far http://chapterhouse2.nhvt.net/users/momaw/mbmanual/ ( I also thought of similarities between this game and pirates! when i saw the travel map on wikipedia)

[ianfreddie07]

That manual is way outdated. That's for version 0.804 (newest is 1.011)

BTW, I do hope they fix the not-so-good elements of Mount&Blade in their expansion. They're gonna add multiplayer, and I hope it won't be bugged. But I can imagine the fun of a team siege in LAN, or something like that. :D

P.S. The hysteria started with me, Fubb and Eagle of Fire :clap:

[Eagle of Fire]

This game was worth my money. Not by much, but it was worth it.

Thing is, I purchased it in beta stage, so I didn't pay full price. I'd never pay full price for a game like this... :max:

[angry axe]

this is my first day of playing it and ive already committed various acts of blasphemy :rant: . just like the graphics, the ai intelligence is like that of Rome:total war, of which the ai consistently refuses to follow orders e.g "we were told to flank those guys in the phalanx but wouldn't it be better if we ran infront of it" or in m&b;s case "hey ive got an idea why don't we run in front of the guys with the long spears" or "hey lets all gang up on those few weak units over there and leave the player to hold off all those guys coming from behind" also, I hope they could smarten up in multiplayer otherwise in my anger i may be none too pleasant to the guy facing me just like that dude from the video "crazy German kid" P.S sorry for lack of spaces (having trouble creating them for some reason)

[Mighty Midget]

Ok, I am reading all these forums and I still wonder: How the heck am I supposed to keep track on how well the different lords/kings like/hate me? All I get is a notification that disappears and is nowhere to be found later... I am trying to work up a reputation as one the king would gladly give castles and towns but I have no idea how much of a chance I've got in getting one.

In short: Where the heck do I find their disposition towards me? I can't fully believe it matters one bit if you can't read it anywhere :doh2:

[Doubler]

When you talk to a lord, you can get an exact figure by mousing over his 'portrait'.
Otherwise you can review your friends and enemies (based on disposition) in your character report :)

[gregor]

to be honest, having played the old version, i expected a lot more from 1.0 version (and onwards).

let's leave the balancing issues of different factions and the enemies aside.
the thing that is totally missing is the story. even if it's open ended it still sucks that there is none. and in the end all you vget is a "congratulations" screen?!?! with the movie on the start i though there will be a realy story behind it all. i mean having played the lord of the rings mod (where they seem to take a lot of things out form) i was bitterly dissapointed.

battles are OK. and i didnt' really have problems with formation except in fighting Khergits. they just ride arround like crazy and are all too efficient against swadian or vaegir knights since they just try to follow them on their much slower horses while the pump arrows into them.

then it's the morale factor. you dont' fight a few days and everyone suddenly wants to leave you. also it is your fault if oyu loose alot of men (duh it's their fault if they don't know how to fight).

as for XP points. nords are slow to level up. so are the vaegir (in their knight/guard line). the fastes ones to upgrade are rhodocks. what you do is get heroes into the company and pump them with training skill points - these accumulate through party. so soon you will have an army that will change from crapy recruits into sargents withing a couple of days.

i like how they made these uniforms (and shield with your ensignia) but it suck because your soldiers are still withough uniform so it's hard to see if you are an archer.

ah yes one of you mentioned you can't take more than 30 arrows. yes you can you can actually take exactly 102 of them or 68 (if you carry a shiled or a weapon). and it's quite easy now since you can take more arrows form fallen archer like opponents anyway.

oh and no rhodocs spear are not effective against cavrly like the pikeman of umbar were (in LOTR mod). their spears are too short.

all in all for me the game is a dissapointment. let's call it a time waster (a battle or two every now and then) and nothing more. especially later when battle become really boring. BTW have you noticed how defeated lord get their army back fast?! luckily with a couple of edits to the ini files you can get more ouf the game (like change the chance of capturing a lord...)

[Eagle of Fire]

Rhodoks are not effective against cavalry because they can stop them. They are effective especially against Khergits because Khergits are weakly armored units who all carry ranged weapons.

Station the Rhodoks spearmen on the top of a hill mixed in with a few ranged units and let them be. The sergents will block most of the ranged attacks with their shields, the ranged units will soften the riders up and once the Khergits don't have any ranged items left they'll charge and break up on the Rodoks.

Edit: And BTW: knights are no good in small numbers. They are great against a number of lowly levelled ennemy units, but against Khergits... Make the knights dismount and join the foot troops instead. They are so armored they'll stand for a long while with them.

[Mighty Midget]

Ok, I finally got a castle with a village. I now have two villages and the castle and the game does change a bit of character now that I need to administer them. Leaving a garrison to defend the castle weighted up against how many units I can afford and how many I need for my army, it adds a little bit to the game. Just to be on the sour side :p : It is a bit retarded there is no stable in the castle where I can keep my warhorses while I wait for my char and heros to get the skill needed to ride them.

I found having a castle is a good wau of building up an army of elite troops. As soon as my units max out on their tech level, I place them in the garrison while I take the other untis to battle and training. By keeping a small army, my level 21 char and 6 heros add a couple of thousands XP to the recruits, enough to get them to tech level 3 or thereabout where they stand a good chance in battle.

I am however a bit concerned about the Nord huscarls' effectiveness. The Vaegirs attacked the castle with a 500 men strong army, and I had 140 men defending, 30+ were huscarls who went in first to defend. They massacred the much larger army like I couldn't believe it.

[Eagle of Fire]

There is no such things as an ultimate unit in this game. Every unit have a counter. It is normal to see a butcher if you happened to field units which are inherently strong against the others.

Also, sieges and defenses are not played exactly the same. You must adapt your planning a lot to do well in them versus normal battles in open fields.

I suggest that you raise the AI level in the options. You sound like you need it.

[Doubler]

The units aren't exactly balanced, though. Most players agree that Swadian Knights and Nord Huscarls are simply the best units in the game. The knights are strong in almost every situation, and the Huscarls beat anything if they can get to it.

Of course it's the player that tips the scales, though :)

[Eagle of Fire]

Well, I certainly don't remember having any real difficulty against any units. Yeah, the knights are really well armored, but they lack good speed. Just outmaneuveur them, you've won.

Sure, the Huscals are great... I didn't fight with or against them much, but aren't they completely owned by ranged weapons?

Etc.

[Doubler]

The huscarl shields, sheer power and (iirc) quick movement make them excellent against enemy archers. They have trouble with mounted units on flat terrain in general, but keeping them together usually works just fine.

Thing is, as a general rule the player always wins. The AI by itself makes a marginal difference. That's what I meant when I said the player tips the balance :)
The measure of a unit is therefore not so much determined by how tough they are to fight against, but how useful they are to fight with. That's where Swadian Knights and Huscarls win out by a pretty big margin.

[angry axe]

i dont see the point of castles they might as well be make-shift forts you cant even sell anything!

[Mighty Midget]

What I do when my huscarls face enemy cavalery is: I order them to halt (preferably on a slope if possible, the steeper the better), close together. Others say I should spread them but I found that by having all the huscarls hugging each other the wall becomes much more difficult to breach. The Swadian knights are the toughest but if I succeed in trapping them with my infantry they're pretty much done for.

Also, it's important to remember the difference between how successful the player is against the enemy and how successful your army is. In one battle that I ultimately lost, I won one skirmish all alone against 5-6 Vaegir cavalery units and 15-20 infantry/archers. All by outmanouvering their cavalery, getting them to crash into trees or each other. A lone Swadian knight wouldn't be able to do much damage at all against that force.

EDIT: I really, reeeaaaally would like to see the AI for the cavalery done better. Ordering your cavalery to charge should mean they ride through the enemy ranks, off to a good distance before turning and charging again. Now they don't. They ride up to the infantry and stay there for melee fights which is very, very poor thinking.

[_r.u.s.s.]

HAW dO I plAy IN XP??????? I DAWNLADED dOsBAX And UNzIpAD DiS GAEM oN MY cOmpUTER. WAT iAM DOEING wRAnG?!!??

[AlumiuN]

HAW dO I plAy IN XP??????? I DAWNLADED dOsBAX And UNzIpAD DiS GAEM oN MY cOmpUTER. WAT iAM DOEING wRAnG?!!??

Lol. :hysterical:

[Mighty Midget]

angry axe: Castles are good for four things: You get some tax from them, you can keep prisoners there (with a prison tower you can further reduce the risk of them escaping) and you can keep those expensive units as garrison which cut their wages in half (I think) and with each castle there is a village for you to develope and demand more tax. Since you are upgrading the villages (you want to do this) they slowly become wealthier. My first village started as poorer than poor and is now average, whatever that's worth for a medieval village :p

And _r.u.s.s.: Which version of DOSBox are you using? Since this won't work on any DOSBox for Windows, you must use DOSBox for Linux, obviously.

[Eagle of Fire]

I never understood why Knights were rated so high anyways...

If you can't kill them, kill their horse. Then kill them with ranged weapons, or use the bonus from thrust to kill them.

Or do what kill any unit in the game: couched lance damage.

[Mighty Midget]

Knights out in the open against archers/xbow men are superior, against a moving mass of infantry, less effective. On slopes: They are dead. Any cavalry should stay well clear of anything that will slow them down. Of course, that is what saves the archers, if they can be on a steep slope, they are pretty safe against knights.

Couched lance means one hit one kill, problem is to hit though. Weapon of choise: Axe while riding. A long and heavy two-handed or a fast, lighter one-handed. With bonus against shields and a 200% speed bonus, there just isn't much that will stop it from cutting through pretty much anything and it's easier to land a hit than with a lance. With a Hunter horse, I found this to be, for me anyway, the most lethal combo.

[angry axe]

lol killed 135 men just by riding in a circle (all infantries were within the circle) and taking their cavalry out was easy but for the infantry i had to do it one by one (did you know soldiers can go unconscious without being hit?)

[ianfreddie07]

You're forgetting Bastard Swords MM. Probably the most versatile weapon in the game.

Couched lance damage isn't hard to do. However don't use it against spear cavalry as their spears will touch you first.

[Mighty Midget]

did you know soldiers can go unconscious without being hit?

Yep :D Had I dunno how many men falling off the seige tower/ladders or off the battlement, knocking themselves out.

You're forgetting Bastard Swords MM. Probably the most versatile weapon in the game.


Haven't found any :embarassed: and I refuse to buy what others will hand over for free.

[_r.u.s.s.]

HAW dO I plAy IN XP??????? I DAWNLADED dOsBAX And UNzIpAD DiS GAEM oN MY cOmpUTER. WAT iAM DOEING wRAnG?!!??

Which version of DOSBox are you using? Since this won't work on any DOSBox for Windows, you must use DOSBox for Linux, obviously.

TrAyED DosBAX FuR LInAX BUt iT gaEV ME a WeIRD FiLES aND NOE EXE fIeL!!!!!!

[Mighty Midget]

TrAyED DosBAX FuR LInAX BUt iT gaEV ME a WeIRD FiLES aND NOE EXE fIeL!!!!!!

Hmmm weird.... Have you tried unzipped you trousers and mounted a horse? If so, go straight to the asylum. You will not collect $1000 even if you pass Start.

[_r.u.s.s.]

U sUCK!!!!! i Go aWAY tO LisTAN tO GanGSTAR RAp anD PLAi 50 CENT gaEM!!! stOOpiD weBSiTE!!!!!!!

[Mighty Midget]

In this episode of Mount&Blade Hysteria, you have seen the performances of _r.u.s.s. as the N00b, AlumiuN as the Laughing Passer-by and Mighty Midget as the Tech Wizard. Stay tune for another episode coming sooner than you'd expect.

[ianfreddie07]

I think a Mount&Blade RP would be a nice idea. :D

Lord Ian: Yay! I'm now a vassal of Kingdom of Swadia!
Lord Tomekk: Hah. But I got your precious king right here. :perv:
Lord Ian: :notrust:
Lord Midget: My axe will tear you all and I will spread the plague :p

[angry axe]

I sieged the fortress(or whatever its called its better than castle) with 400 soldiers and i only had one tiny ladder, the only reason i won was because i had a load of arrows. Also, don't you wish you could be knocked unconscious with your men dead and still escape? well you cant but luckily the AI can BTW the guy who went unconscious randomly wasn't in siege

[Mighty Midget]

For storming the castles/fortresses, I found the Nords (again) to be superior. I left home with 60 huscarls and 20 knights, captured 3 castles and came home with 20 huscarls + a few rescued Nords.
I am thinking about having peasant shock troops sent in first just to soften their defence, before having the heavy infantry sent in later, to minimize the loss of them huscarls, but then again, I was having more than 100 of them and I couldn't afford them all :D Good riddance!

My renown just passed 1000, and I'm a close mate with the king. I'll see now if he'll let me have 2 castles, or even a town. I believe renown, as well as estate, decides if the king will let you keep the castles or if he'll hand them over to someone else. The latter brings me to this point:

By captureing castles and leave them undefended if the king won't give it to you, chances are the castle will be re-captured pretty soon by the enemy, which in turn means there will be more conquests and more XP (one battle alone just gave my men more than 22,000 XP), as will as a higher renown, which finally means a greater chance you are given the castle.


EDIT: Anyone knows how to export/import characters? Anyone knows why I would want to do that? Is it possible to start a new game with a lvl 25 char?

[angry axe]

to import/export go character, then go to statistics

[Mighty Midget]

Yeah, what I didn't know was that the new character has to have the exact same name. After I did that right, I got it working.

[Eagle of Fire]

And what is the advantages/interest of doing so?

[Mighty Midget]

Well, from what I have read so far, it's something you want to do when upgrading M&B to a new version. Not entirely sure about this, it's just what I read.

Another thing is, it makes it possible to start a new game with your level 27 character, with the same stats and the same amount of money "he" had when you exported him.

Finally, it's possible to edit the character for cheating, giving him all the money you want, editing all the stats, skills and proficiencies to wwhatever level you like.

[Eagle of Fire]

Hummm... That's what I thought. Nothing interesting in the least

[Mighty Midget]

Well, from what I have read so far, it's something you want to do when upgrading M&B to a new version. Not entirely sure about this, it's just what I read.


Hummm... That's what I thought. Nothing interesting in the least

Did you read the entire post? ;)

[Eagle of Fire]

I did. I have nothing so change to what I said.

The whole fun of the game is when you are struggling. When you have an established army you are already unstoppable. Starting at level 1 and knowing what to do, you are already unstopable! There is no point in transfering a character who could solo an entire king army by himself by the very start. And as for cheating... :bleh: