Getting first settlement

[Tendeza]

I'm trying to get my first settlement, but everytime I lay siege, the faction sends an army of 500+ soldiers to my location since my speed of building siege-camp/equipment isn't that fast. That's also the reason why I can't finish any equipment.

Any tips? Which faction is the weakest or which settlement is the easiest to capture or maybe a different strat? I've heard about going into a faction's service, and once they give you some settlements, leave the faction to keep the cities, does that work?

[Doranos]

If you go in a faction and then leave, you can keep the cities, yes... and get at War with your former faction...

Also, I would say that it's more situationnal to get a castle... I got mine from a faction that was almost dead and had barely the men power just to fight aginst my own army.

[omns9491]

On a new playthrough I got one from the Northern empire while they were fighting the Kuzaiths. It had a small garrison because they had barely gotten it from the Kuzaiths. I had a 90 man army and yes they send 1k army but I destroyed them. Then they sent a second wave of 800 man I destroyed it as well. The third wave I asked for peace and they accepted it at almost no cost.

[TCPippin]

Join an already established kingdom. Fight their wars, get experience, fame and influence; eventually you'll be awarded a fief of your own. To found a kingdom, you'll need to get your Clan to lvl 3 anyways, and fighting for someone else is a great way to earn renown.
Then you can leave the kingdom, keeping your lands (not by talking to your liege, use the red button in the kingdom interface). Before you do it, make sure you're close enough to a weak member of your soon-to-be-ex-kingdom so you could barter for peace (or close to an NPC that lets you found your own kingdom, that will make war flag go down as well).
Also, make sure you've saved up about half a million before founding a kingdom. You're going to need the cash in case someone randomly declares a war on you (that happens, but it'll cost pitiful 50-60k to end it). You'll also need cash and charm to get some noble families to join you. It's easier to recruit those that have no lands, but even they might ask for 15-50k bribe.

Best scenario, imo, is to get at least 1 town (better 2 or 3) to your name before you go solo. Once you found your kingdom, run around for some time until you get 50 influence; use it to pass the "council of commons" law (at least I think that's how it's named - you need the one that gives you +1 influence daily for each notable in your towns). Use the newfound avalance of influence to pass every law you like - and since you have no vassals, you don't need to bother with their opinions.
Once you're happy with your legal system - start recruiting people, both lords and mercenary companies - mercs aren't reliable, but they're cheap and readily avaliable for new kingdoms.

[Natius]

Originally posted by Tendeza:

Any tips? Which faction is the weakest or which settlement is the easiest to capture or maybe a different strat? I've heard about going into a faction's service, and once they give you some settlements, leave the faction to keep the cities, does that work?

Weakest Settlement is settlement after siege battles, easy fight they only have 50 garison
newly capture by other faction and make peace with them after that,grofit

[sammwich]

Originally posted by Natius:

Originally posted by Tendeza:

Any tips? Which faction is the weakest or which settlement is the easiest to capture or maybe a different strat? I've heard about going into a faction's service, and once they give you some settlements, leave the faction to keep the cities, does that work?

Weakest Settlement is settlement after siege battles, easy fight they only have 50 garison
newly capture by other faction and make peace with them after that,grofit

That's how I did. Aserai took a city well beyond outside their borders, so I waited a day and took it for myself. Their army disbanded the day after that and now they have another hostile kingdom between me and them to deal with.

[Natius]

Originally posted by sammwich:

Originally posted by Natius:

Weakest Settlement is settlement after siege battles, easy fight they only have 50 garison
newly capture by other faction and make peace with them after that,grofit

That's how I did. Aserai took a city well beyond outside their borders, so I waited a day and took it for myself. Their army disbanded the day after that and now they have another hostile kingdom between me and them to deal with.

This is why i like AI, i just pay 1k denar to make peace with them after i take 1 newly capture settlement
But beware! influence become negative

[Tendeza]

Originally posted by TCPippin:

Join an already established kingdom. Fight their wars, get experience, fame and influence; eventually you'll be awarded a fief of your own. To found a kingdom, you'll need to get your Clan to lvl 3 anyways, and fighting for someone else is a great way to earn renown.
Then you can leave the kingdom, keeping your lands (not by talking to your liege, use the red button in the kingdom interface). Before you do it, make sure you're close enough to a weak member of your soon-to-be-ex-kingdom so you could barter for peace (or close to an NPC that lets you found your own kingdom, that will make war flag go down as well).
Also, make sure you've saved up about half a million before founding a kingdom. You're going to need the cash in case someone randomly declares a war on you (that happens, but it'll cost pitiful 50-60k to end it). You'll also need cash and charm to get some noble families to join you. It's easier to recruit those that have no lands, but even they might ask for 15-50k bribe.

Best scenario, imo, is to get at least 1 town (better 2 or 3) to your name before you go solo. Once you found your kingdom, run around for some time until you get 50 influence; use it to pass the "council of commons" law (at least I think that's how it's named - you need the one that gives you +1 influence daily for each notable in your towns). Use the newfound avalance of influence to pass every law you like - and since you have no vassals, you don't need to bother with their opinions.
Once you're happy with your legal system - start recruiting people, both lords and mercenary companies - mercs aren't reliable, but they're cheap and readily avaliable for new kingdoms.

Oh damn that's really detailed, thank you

[killmekillyou]

My strategy was to invest in Charm early on (best is in character creation, but there are ways if you are already playing as well).

During the campaign itself I was releasing every defeated lord which currently is the most secure way to build up relationship (unless you are using mods).

Once I decided to build my own kingdom I went around the whole map and using my Charm skills, convinced enough lords to join my kingdom (make sure to first pass all the kingdom policy that gives you influence before there is anyone to oppose you). You will also need at least 200-300k saved up because you need to buy some lords.

Once I got myself a big enough army I chose the kingdom that is least powerful or had the most enemy currently and just fought them for more castles while at same time tried to convince even more vassals to join me. And if someone tried to take a castle I just call all my lords to me and defend it. In my free time I went around and fought all the armies I could and captured all the lords I could so that the enemy could never muster a large enough army to siege.

Currently, I control around 80% of the map, the rest 20% divided between the two remaining empires.

[Seijana]

My fellow horse lords and ladies just went and gave me a castle in an election...

[TCPippin]

Originally posted by killmekillyou:

My strategy was to invest in Charm early on (best is in character creation, but there are ways if you are already playing as well).

The best way to raise Charm is to talk to every lord you meet and gift them 1 denar through barter interface. I had 2 pips in this skill, and for 10-50 it gave me 2 skill points per barter, then, for 50-90, 1 skill per barter.
Afterwards, it's about 2 barters for 1 skill, but once I got to 125, I already got my kingdom. So now I use my endless influence to improve relations with vassals (50 for 1 or 2 relations with a familiy) which also gives Charm XP.

To make sure your nobles don't become too powerful (and to avoid paying mercs), you can pass some laws with a daily drain on influence. So when you use Promote on a family, it's a win-win-win: you get Charm XP, you improve relations with them, but they still remain powerless. Ideally, it's best to get them to the point when they adore you (50+) before giving them a town, because then they'll have enough influence to actually have a say. So it's best if they become yes-men beforehand.
Unfortunately, you can't keep every town for yourself - not only because of the interface issues; It's also necessary to have some influential vassals, because they form armies that can somewhat competently defend your lands, and, most importantly, lay sieges (I hate laying sieges myself, because it leads to a relation drop with the owner)

[Caramel Aztec]

I target settlements that were recently (re)captured. A little time consuming and requires a little luck, but works for me so far. I personally try to side with the vlandians as much as I can (not that diplomacy matters much right now), so when I see them massing a big army, I'll follow them through their seige. If I feel brave enough and have decent troops, I will keep some of the smaller individual parties off their back to make sure their siege doesn't break. I'll then try to stay in the general area until I see the original kingdom take it back. I'll wait a little for the army to bug out, then attack. As far as them bringing an army to counter me, thats where the luck comes in. I'll break my siege and have them chase me around and pray they run into an enemy army.

This has worked better for me for castles. I don't know if this is intended in game, but I feel like kingdoms don't care as much for castles, and are less likely to send a huge army. Like I said though, not sure if that's more luck, or just coincidence.

[BeefStew]

Originally posted by omns9491:

On a new playthrough I got one from the Northern empire while they were fighting the Kuzaiths. It had a small garrison because they had barely gotten it from the Kuzaiths. I had a 90 man army and yes they send 1k army but I destroyed them. Then they sent a second wave of 800 man I destroyed it as well. The third wave I asked for peace and they accepted it at almost no cost.

90 vs 1000? C'mon man, Raise that difficulty. Playing on very easy can't be satisfying.

[TCPippin]

Originally posted by StewVader:

90 vs 1000? C'mon man, Raise that difficulty. Playing on very easy can't be satisfying.

Theoretically it's possible. I play on "realistic" everything (except I opted for "no death for heroes", which I regret now), and I crushed 100+ army on my own. They didn't have many archers, so I would go into battle, order my own troops to flee, then circle around enemy lines, firing one arrow after the other, and after I'd get a few kills, I would ride away, return to world map, save (you can do it in "attack/send troops/retreat" menu) and come back for another round.

Using this method, I think I could kill a thousand troops as well, even though it would take a few hours. And with loads of horse archers, you can speed up the process considerably (just pay attention to their ammo, so they won't start charging into enemy lines).

[omns9491]

Originally posted by StewVader:

Originally posted by omns9491:

On a new playthrough I got one from the Northern empire while they were fighting the Kuzaiths. It had a small garrison because they had barely gotten it from the Kuzaiths. I had a 90 man army and yes they send 1k army but I destroyed them. Then they sent a second wave of 800 man I destroyed it as well. The third wave I asked for peace and they accepted it at almost no cost.

90 vs 1000? C'mon man, Raise that difficulty. Playing on very easy can't be satisfying.

Have you heard of the Kuzaiths horse archers? I play everything on realistic .

[omns9491]

Originally posted by TCPippin:

Originally posted by StewVader:

90 vs 1000? C'mon man, Raise that difficulty. Playing on very easy can't be satisfying.

Theoretically it's possible. I play on "realistic" everything (except I opted for "no death for heroes", which I regret now), and I crushed 100+ army on my own. They didn't have many archers, so I would go into battle, order my own troops to flee, then circle around enemy lines, firing one arrow after the other, and after I'd get a few kills, I would ride away, return to world map, save (you can do it in "attack/send troops/retreat" menu) and come back for another round.

Using this method, I think I could kill a thousand troops as well, even though it would take a few hours. And with loads of horse archers, you can speed up the process considerably (just pay attention to their ammo, so they won't start charging into enemy lines).

Exactly. Horse archers are very overpower. Just run around the enemy shooting at them. When you run out of ammo just leave the battlefield and come back to finish the job. If they have cavalry then sit at the edge of the map battlefield and kill them then exit the battlefield and do it again.