The Rise and Rise of Galadriel: Part 4
After nearly 1.5 years since the last post, I picked this game again (as contemplated recently). I had to relearn a few things e.g. tactics during battle, the use of the siege crossbow, sieging 'shoot-and-run' tactic etc but fortunately it didn't take long.
This was the situation about 2 weeks ago:
So Swadia is no more. I captured their last town Praven and initially awarded to myself, in line with my plan of owning towns. However, after their demise. Grainwad defected to my kingdom and I gave him Praven. I had tried for ages to get him over but to no avail. It seems that lords with upstanding personality generally stick with their original liege until the end.
Grainwad is quite special. He is one of the few lords whose personality doesn't get randomised for each new game. He is the only lord with reknown value of over 1000. Impressive, eh? Hence, he's the only vassal whom I bestowed a town, castle and a village. Gharmall, another upstanding lord, has a town too but no castle. Otherwise, all other lords (updated as at 2 weeks ago) have only castles and villages.
The fight for Praven wasn't easy. After capturing it, I had to defend it against a horde of Swadian lords, including their infamous King Harlaus. Taking them on the field was an epic failure because their sheer number of troop with significant number of Swadian cavalry. After trying a few times, I asked Ban help but he too had difficulty beating them on the field.
My vassals were just too scared to approach in silo. I can't remember what my marshall was doing but I highly suspect he was still gathering an army. So it was left to me to defend Praven. In the end, I decided to defend it within the town to partially negate the power of their mounted troops. Swadian Knights are still decent melee units but not as fearsome as when they're on their horses.
After some painstaking sniping and chopping (I use crossbow and axe + shield), miraculously I managed to beat them off and that was the straw that break their back. Swadia was gone shortly after.
Incidentally, a tactic that was suggested by Ban for the defense of Terrama Castle (much later) against the overwhelming number of Sarranid army (something like 250 vs 1000) was to get my troops down off the ledge and below it within the castle just when the enemies about to get onto the ledge. I stationed my Rhodok crossbowmen below facing the flight of stairs which the enemies took to get down while my infantry units were stationed at the base of the stairs.
There was peace after Swadia was gone. I took the opportunity to hold a feast and improve my relationship with my vassals. Meanwhile, there were plenty of surprises: Nord weakend considerably before bouncing back; Khergit weakened; Vaegir miraculously reinvigorated and took more land. There was some tug-o-war between Sarranid and Khergit but as at 2 weeks ago, it was pretty much status quo for Sarranid.
Sometime during my feast, I was notified of a certain incident near the Nord border which gave me the justification (casus belli) to declare war on them. If I didn't, I would 'lose face' with some of my vassals (think they're all martial type lords). So when I ended the feast, I declared war on Nord.
My immediate priority was to go around the field and defeat Nord lords individually before they could amass an army. I was depending on my marshall to gather forces to capture some Nord holdings. I was mildly successful in my objective but my marshall prioritised repulsing raids done by the Nord lords. I changed marshall and finally Gutlan lead a campaign, which I joined, and captured Kelredan castle but boy it was painful. We outnumbered the defenders by a lot and yet lost a lot. I blamed the poor AI.
Then disaster struck: Vaegir and Sarranid declared war on me. Only Khergit held peace. So I was at war on 3 front. Grrr. I was busy helping defending castles because my marshall was too slow. There was one funny incident: a group of Vaegirl lords were sieging when I approached. Due to their numbers, I had planned to defend within the castle. However, they started to scatter despite outnumbering me lol. So, after some manoeuvring, I managed to defeat them one-by-one (or at most two).
After breaking their armies by defending castles, I went on the offensive, capturing some Nord castles since I wanted to curb their power. I vaguely remember my marshall not conquering anything but at least he did lead people to repulse enemies.
So 2 weeks ago, the 3 largest kingdoms were Kelethin (my kingdom), Nord and Vaegir. Oh yes, Khergit had fallen by so much. We'll see how this will pan out.
This was the situation about 2 weeks ago:
So Swadia is no more. I captured their last town Praven and initially awarded to myself, in line with my plan of owning towns. However, after their demise. Grainwad defected to my kingdom and I gave him Praven. I had tried for ages to get him over but to no avail. It seems that lords with upstanding personality generally stick with their original liege until the end.
Grainwad is quite special. He is one of the few lords whose personality doesn't get randomised for each new game. He is the only lord with reknown value of over 1000. Impressive, eh? Hence, he's the only vassal whom I bestowed a town, castle and a village. Gharmall, another upstanding lord, has a town too but no castle. Otherwise, all other lords (updated as at 2 weeks ago) have only castles and villages.
The fight for Praven wasn't easy. After capturing it, I had to defend it against a horde of Swadian lords, including their infamous King Harlaus. Taking them on the field was an epic failure because their sheer number of troop with significant number of Swadian cavalry. After trying a few times, I asked Ban help but he too had difficulty beating them on the field.
My vassals were just too scared to approach in silo. I can't remember what my marshall was doing but I highly suspect he was still gathering an army. So it was left to me to defend Praven. In the end, I decided to defend it within the town to partially negate the power of their mounted troops. Swadian Knights are still decent melee units but not as fearsome as when they're on their horses.
After some painstaking sniping and chopping (I use crossbow and axe + shield), miraculously I managed to beat them off and that was the straw that break their back. Swadia was gone shortly after.
Incidentally, a tactic that was suggested by Ban for the defense of Terrama Castle (much later) against the overwhelming number of Sarranid army (something like 250 vs 1000) was to get my troops down off the ledge and below it within the castle just when the enemies about to get onto the ledge. I stationed my Rhodok crossbowmen below facing the flight of stairs which the enemies took to get down while my infantry units were stationed at the base of the stairs.
There was peace after Swadia was gone. I took the opportunity to hold a feast and improve my relationship with my vassals. Meanwhile, there were plenty of surprises: Nord weakend considerably before bouncing back; Khergit weakened; Vaegir miraculously reinvigorated and took more land. There was some tug-o-war between Sarranid and Khergit but as at 2 weeks ago, it was pretty much status quo for Sarranid.
Sometime during my feast, I was notified of a certain incident near the Nord border which gave me the justification (casus belli) to declare war on them. If I didn't, I would 'lose face' with some of my vassals (think they're all martial type lords). So when I ended the feast, I declared war on Nord.
My immediate priority was to go around the field and defeat Nord lords individually before they could amass an army. I was depending on my marshall to gather forces to capture some Nord holdings. I was mildly successful in my objective but my marshall prioritised repulsing raids done by the Nord lords. I changed marshall and finally Gutlan lead a campaign, which I joined, and captured Kelredan castle but boy it was painful. We outnumbered the defenders by a lot and yet lost a lot. I blamed the poor AI.
Then disaster struck: Vaegir and Sarranid declared war on me. Only Khergit held peace. So I was at war on 3 front. Grrr. I was busy helping defending castles because my marshall was too slow. There was one funny incident: a group of Vaegirl lords were sieging when I approached. Due to their numbers, I had planned to defend within the castle. However, they started to scatter despite outnumbering me lol. So, after some manoeuvring, I managed to defeat them one-by-one (or at most two).
After breaking their armies by defending castles, I went on the offensive, capturing some Nord castles since I wanted to curb their power. I vaguely remember my marshall not conquering anything but at least he did lead people to repulse enemies.
So 2 weeks ago, the 3 largest kingdoms were Kelethin (my kingdom), Nord and Vaegir. Oh yes, Khergit had fallen by so much. We'll see how this will pan out.
Comments