A Guide of Ice and Fire: Game of Thrones Mod (Outdated v1.2)

A guide to get you started and on your way to ruling the Iron Throne in the Song of Ice and Fire and Game of Thrones inspired mod: A Clash of Kings (ACoK version 1.2).

Getting Started

Download the mod here.

Character Creation

There are a lot of choices in character creation and luckily you're not picking the options blind in this particular mod. Every option has an effect and you will be shown just exactly what skills you take with you.

There are a few notable points to be made about what you can get in character creation:

• 6 Leadership
  
• 6 Power Draw
  
• Decent Combat Stats (Iron Flesh, Power Strike, Weapon Master, Shield)
  
• Lackluster Party Stats (Trainer, Pathfinding, Wound Treatment, etc.)
  
• Starting Items (Furs, a Sword, etc)

The most important things listed are the Leadership and Power Draw. While Leadership is essential, I highly recommend getting more than 6 and thus, ignoring Leadership during character creation since you are going to level it up past 6 regardless. The points would be much better spent in getting your combat stats up such as Iron Flesh, Power Strike, or Power Draw as all commanders start off solo and it is from these humble beginnings that you must build your character.

Starting Out

All characters start out in the Stormlands. Like the vanilla Mount and Blade, there's a fight followed by a visit to an npc's house. I recommend ignoring this fellow and getting out the area as soon as you can.

The Stormlands is a poor region of Westeros. It is a very wooded area, hard to navigate, and the battles often take place on hilly regions in this area of the world map. I do not recommend it for starting out.

In the beginning, the War of the Five Kings has just begun. The Riverlands and the North have declared themselves independent with Robb Stark as their new king. The Baratheon brothers have made their claims to the throne as well. Soon, the Tyrells of the Reach will ally themselves with Renly while the Greyjoys declare their independence and take things the way an Ironborn should. Their war is limited to the Northern reaches of Westeros but the rest of the seven kingdoms, save the Dornish and the Vale, will be at war.

From this point in time, you should make a name for yourself in an army. Fighting on your own is not terribly effective early on. Your weapons and experience are simply not good enough to fight without help. To gain valuable experience and possibly some gear, joining an army is your best bet. The Westerlands (Lannisters) is fighting a war on multiple fronts. They will most likely lose dearly in the beginning and their soldiers are not terribly well equipped. Their troop tree is probably one of the worst later on, but early on you can side with a Westerlands lord for a time to get some decent starting gear. Eventually, that lord is bound to fight someone as long as you sign up with a lesser lord with a relatively small army. He will lose and you will die.

This sounds a lot worse than it is. When you enlist in an army, you gain some gear. You cannot keep this gear without deserting (a very bad thing) or getting captured when your liege lord loses in battle. At some point, you will be released from captivity, but the gear you got in the beginning will be yours.

A Capable Freerider

How the army system works

When you enlist in an army, you enlist as the lowliest of recruits. Each faction will remember your rank across any lord and participating in battles will increase your rank within the faction. Ask your liege lord for a promotion every so often and you will get upgraded gear. Be warned: he will expect the old gear back so dont go selling it.

Where to next?

Once you fight in many battles and gain enough levels and experience and gear from fighting for armies, you may decide to venture out on your own. In this stage, bandits will be your source of money and experience. Bandits, unless they are deserters, almost always consist of some sort of cavalry. This can be difficult to deal with when you start recruiting for an army.

If you dont feel like starting your own company of men, the Clash of King mod offers several quests you can do, trading is always an option, tournaments can be attended, and Essos can be explored if you want a change of pace. It is worth noting that Essos is the only place you can get throwing weapons, but most of the other gear available there is not up to par with Westeros.

Army Composition

A lot of the unit types are very similar across Westeros. Essos is different and have their own unit types, but nearly all of them fall behind the Westeros equivalents. The only exception are the mid-tier infantry. Some mid-tier Essos infantry posess throwing weapons, which makes them marginally more effective than their Westeros counterparts. Other than that, they remain underequipped and weak.

There are four types of archers in the Clash of Kings mod:

• Fast Firing Bow
  
• Slow Firing Bow (Longbowmen)
  
• Crossbowmen
  
• Mounted Archer

The best bow archers are from the Vale. These archers are well armored with good melee stats. They suffer from a lack of shield as most other archers do, but their biggest factor in a melee are their hard hitting maces. These typically hit much harder than swords and Vale archers can quickly bring down even the strongest knights.


Longbowmen are generally one of the most useless units in the game. They fire slow, they don't do much damage (compared to crossbows), they are generally underequipped as well as slow. I do not recommend using Longbowmen.

Crossbowmen are where the ranged units become much more interesting. The Riverlands and the Reach have the best crossbowmen. Riverland crossbowmen wear plate armor, essentially making them as tanky as a knight. They, however, do not fight in melee with a shield. Reach crossbowmen are geared as most higher-tier infantry are geared but have the added bonus of fighting with a shield. This makes reach crossbowmen a formidable force in and of themselves. They require no other supporting units to function well and an army composed entirely of reach crossbowmen is a flexible army indeed if you are willing to micromanage them through the improved order system available in the mod.

Mounted archers are basically mid-tier infantry with bows on horseback. It sounds decent at first, but they do not perform terribly well, especially since mounted units cost much more than footsoldiers. A standing force of shield-ready archers is much more desirable.

Infantry also come in various forms:

• Light Infantry
  
• Heavy Infantry
  
• Shock Infantry
  
• Spearmen

Light Infantry are typically the lower-tier infantry groups in Westeros. In Essos, however, light infantry are the only infantry units, with few exceptions. The skirmishers available in Essos are unique though, in that they posess thrown weapons. A volley of throwing spears after a heavy bombardment from archers or crossbowmen is sometimes all that is necessary. Light infantry is useful, but the Westerland's and Essos' light infantry are very lackluster in a head-on melee.

Heavy infantry fight with shields and a good amount of armor. There are a couple of good types of heavy infantry. The Dornish and the Vale posess the best Heavy Infantry. The highest tier ones, when not upgraded into knights, are just as well equpped as knights are, but fight on foot. What I have found to be good heavy infantry are Veteran Ironborn Retainers. The Ironborn do not posess any mounted units at all. To make up for this, an Ironborn "knight" is really just a very well equipped foot soldier. These have better stats than other infantry groups but are not as heavily armored as knights are. A big downside is that they cost 700 silver to recruit, per unit. However, an Ironborn retainer can hold its own as good as any other high-tier infantry right from the get go, so it can be well worth the price. It is important to note that when Veteran Ironborn Retainers are upgraded, they lose their shields. The shields make them look badass, but they are not as heavily armored as the Dornish or Vale.

Shock Infantry differ from Heavy Infantry. They are extremely vulnerable to ranged units and even some melee units (especially other Shock Infantry). The Westerosi Shock Infantry include Elite Sisterman Retainer and Elite Ironborn Retainers. Both function very well at defending or assaulting a castle. Often, they kill lesser infantry in a single blow and deal massive amounts of damage to anyone else. The Bravosi also have Shock Infantry as their standard infantry units. These are not quite as effective as Sisterton or Ironborn Retainers, but they can be acquired in larger numbers, this however requires journeying to Essos which might not make it viable.

Spearmen are often the upper-tier infantry units much to the dismay of anyone wanting to create a good standing army. Spear units are typically weaker in a melee than their sword or axe bearing counterparts. While they are generally well equipped, and can stop a cavalry charge quite well, other infantry types can perform better, and are much better in sieges as well. An inbetween answer are Reach or Riverland Glaivemen. These soldiers posess a weapon that can function as a spear or a great two handed cleaver. This means that they perform well in sieges as well as out in the open against cavalry, but are weak to archers. Glaives, on the downside, cannot be used with shields, shortening the life span of the units to sustained arrow fire.

cavalryalry are the masters of the open field. They only come in three varieties and this linearly follows their upgrade path.

• Light cavalry (Mounted Skirmishers from Essos)
  
• Medium cavalry (Mounted mercenaries or Man-at-Arms)
  
• Heavy cavalry (Knights and Cataphracts)

Light cavalry are exclusive to Essos and bandits. They are typically equipped exactly like a skirmisher or low tier infantry and function the same way, except on horseback. They cannot break a defensive line of good soldiers, but can cause a decent amount of havoc among archers.

The mid-tier cavalry are excellent at engaging infantry. Charging with their Heavy Destriers, they can inflict massive damage on a charge. While they are not extremely well armored like their heavier counterparts, they function nearly the same offensively. Their lances are a powerful weapon and keeping your cavalry moving and using lances exclusively is a good tactic. Once their powerful charge is over, mid-tier cavalry will typically lose to infantry when outnumbered or tightly grouped. It is best to keep your cavalry in a line to combat an enemy defensive line, or if they are grouped, in a wedge or some other clumped formation, but if the enemy is grouped up, it is even better to wait until they are engaged against other infantry and to use your cavalry to attack from the rear.

Heavy cavalry are composed of Knights and Cataphracts. Both have exactly the same stats but Westerosi cavalry are better equipped early on and when they were infantry. The best cavalry all function basically the same and are all similarly equipped. Any Heavy Knight or Cataphract is worth just as much as another. However, before they reach this stage, Northern and Essos cavalry are particularly weak (and in some cases, are mounted archers) and the first stage of Westerlands cavalry is a bit underequipped as well. If you can train your men safely, however, any Knights that suit you is a formidable fighting force, even as infantry. For Knights that function well as infantry, the Vale win in this regard and if you've noticed, the Vale has some of the strongest units in all of Westeros and attacking the Vale at any point will be a long and arduous task.

Training Your Army

Where to go

If you have no problem fighting calvalry, then the wildlings north of Winterfell are the most bountiful bandit source. They can be a little spread out at times, but every so often there will be a king beyond the wall (who are actually south of the wall but that's not a big deal). The wildlings are a bit stronger than other bandits but roughly half of their forces are mounted, making their attacks come in two waves. This can be useful if you fight them with a smaller force, as you wont have to engage the full number of wildlings at any given time.

If you cannot fight calvalry, then gain some companions (preferably lowborn companions) to level up. Rank up their intelligence and Trainer stats and with enough of them, they can turn a band of recruits into a mid-tier fighting force literally overnight. Since these companions cannot die, you are free to fight bandits and let them die all you like. So long as you yourself are good enough to defeat the bandits, you will do fine.

Companions

There are much more companions in ACoK than in the vanilla Mount and Blade. Gathering these companions can make a good addition to your army. You can equip your men with the best gear from either Westeros or Essos and have a unique group of fighting Knights who also carry throwing weapons, or some other combination of your choosing.


Some companions can only be bought with a very large number of silvers. Others come freely, or are acquired through quests. Be on the lookout, as some are only available while walking around. Some mercenaries are also only available while walking around places. You should definitely do this, because every location in ACoK was made by some hard working individuals, and some are very beautiful depictions of scenes from the Song of Ice and Fire / Game of Thrones universe.

Factions

Once youve acquired a decent fighting force (roughly 120-200 men, a high renown is required), you should think about aligning yourself with a faction or going about on your own. Each individual faction can be fought for and all the factions in the Westerlands will eventually go to war except the Three Sisters, the Dornish, and the Vale. Aligning yourself with the reigning king means siding with the Westerlands. You can also pledge loyalty to the king by talking to Cersei in the Red Keep in King's Landing.

Starting your own faction requires a few things.

• Highborn Companions
  
• A whole lot of money (around a hundred thousand silvers to start)
  
• Territory

Highborn companions are important. Each companion that is highborn can be made into a lord. You will need the large number of troops that lords provide in order to assault castles. I recommend taking over the Three Sisters to start. You need castles and towns and villages to give to your lords before they will fight for you. The Three Sisters are not allied to anyone else, and nobody will care if you take the Three Sisters for yourself. This can allow you to recruit a few lords into your service. The Sisters is also in a perfect position to assault the Vale via the sea.

The Vale, however, have some of the most ridiculous to assault castles. On the open field, commanding your soldiers well can lead to victories over the Vale losing only 1 man to their every 10 (but probably less). However, in a siege, the Vale can easily take out 10 of your men for every kill your troops get. Vale castles are designed to be impenetrable. There is a reason why in the lore, nobody has ever successfully taken the Vale.


You can work around this, however. Siege castles with several hundred soldiers from your lords and yourself but do not ever enter the fighting. The auto resolving fights never take into account the ridiculously good design of the Vale castles. Every castle and town you get will allow you to recruit more lords into your service. In total you can have nine highborn lords from companions[acok.wikia.com] in your service. Do not allow lowborn companions to become lords, or all the other highborn lords will hate you for it. This may not seem important early on, but much later on you will simply not have enough lowborn companions to make into lords to have an adequate enough force to fight a dying faction. A faction with one castle remaining, very late into the game, can have thousands upon thousands of soldiers. You will need dozens of lords to contest these castles and having lowborn lords will deter other lords from joining you.

Conquering Westeros and Essos

Conquering Westeros is hard. The hardest places to conquer are easily the Vale and the North. While the Vale have the most well-designed castles, the North's advantage over invaders is its sheer size and distance between holdfasts. The most vulnerable regions are the Westerlands, the Three Sisters, and the Riverlands.

It is important that you use strategy to your advantage. Once the War of the Five Kings is in full swing and all the major players are at war, it is not in your advantage to remove any of the warring kingdoms. A kingdom at war is a weak and vulnerable kingdom. For most, the war concentrates on the Westerlands. In Westeros, the Westerlands should be one of your last targets for conquest. The North, The Riverlands, and all of the Westerland's enemies should be your starting goals. Take them on one at a time, preferably after the war has managed to go on for some time as it would have certainly resulted in many Westerland and other defeats.

Fighting multiple wars is a disadvantage that the various claimants have, but it is not one that you need to have. I highly recommend starting your conquest in the Three Sisters. Once you have the Sisters, you can field a decent army to combat one of the Seven Kingdoms. Stannis' portion of the Stormlands is a decent place to start but I do not recommend the Vale, the Iron Islands, or the Reach. The North is achievable, but it would take a long time. It is a very realistic conquest because none of the Nothern armies can respond to a siege in any reasonable amount of time, but this will leave the Iron Islands without an enemy to fight. The Iron Islands is a very hard region of Westeros to take because you may find yourself on the highly convoluted sea battles. I recommend a large force of archers to fight the sea battles, but good infantry are required to break the castles and this can lead to some resource problems because of the very specific routes that need to be taken before the Iron Islands can even be visited.

The Vale cannot be assaulted in normal methods. You must take the Vale through the auto resolve functionality of having your troops fight without you. The Reach have some of the best equipped soldiers in all of Westeros. While not as heavily equipped as the Vale, the Reach Crossbowmen are essentially mid-tier infantry with crossbows. The fact that they have a shield makes them a very strong force. The Dornish should also be avoided at first because they are not at war with any other faction. This makes the Dornish much more powerful than the weakened kingdoms participating in the war.

Claiming the Iron Throne or the Free Cities

Once you conquer the North and the middle kingdoms (except the Westerlands), you should have recruited enough lords to assault the Westerlands and King's Landing (if you or someone else haven't taken it already). After the Westerlands, you now have options. The Vale and the Iron Islands will be difficult, especially if you plan on doing the fighting yourself. These must be conquered with superior numbers. Even early on, the Iron Islands can field a couple thousand men in their kingdom. The fact that they are densely packed means you need to be ready as soon as you attack them.

The Vale, as I have explained many times previously due to prior experiences in trying to assault them (I lost 200 Riverlands Sergeants and Reach Crossbowmen assaulting a castle with just 120 men in it), do not ever assault the castles yourself. Auto resolve these fights and you will lose a lot less men. Even someone with a lot of experience fighting near-impossible odds like myself could not easily take on even one Vale castle when I outnumbered them 2 to 1.

The Dornish should not be as difficult as either the Iron Islands or the Vale, but, like any other faction, when they have one or a few stronghold(s) remaining, make sure you have enough men to take them on.

With Westeros conquered, you will find Essos much easier. While you may find yourself in similar situations in the ones the Iron Islands presents, soldiers from Essos are much weaker than the soldiers from Westeros. The biggest problem you will have will be actually bringing your amies there.

If you wish to start your game conquering Essos, I recommend an army of Braavosi two handed infantry to take castles with. While they are vulnerable to archers, once you close the distance, no other infantry from Essos should be able to take them on.

Quick Tips (TL;DR)

• Fight in a lord's army to get yourself started.
  
  
• You need 14 strength for plate armor and at least 2 riding for a Destrier. Foraging is a new skill but is very, very effective at higher levels at feeding your armies. This is a party skill so you don't have to take it yourself.
  
  
• Any knight is as good as any other knight, but the Vale have a better infantry tree before reaching knighthood.
  
  
• The highest tier Reach Crossbowmen are among the strongest and most versatile of all the archers. They fight well in melee.
  
  
• The Vale, the Dornish, and to a lesser extent, Veteran Ironborn Retainers, possess powerful infantry capabilities.
  
  
• Fight wildlings in the North to train your armies and companions.
  
  
• Take The Three Sisters located just north of the Vale and south of White Harbor when starting your kingdom. They have no allies and are fairly weak.
  
  
• An army from Westeros can have an easier time taking Essos than Westeros.
  
  
• Keep an eye out for companions and level them up in Trainer. Give your highborn companions Leadership so that they can field you larger armies.
  
  
• Start with the Riverlands, then the Stormlands, the Reach, and the Westerlands. From here, take the Vale and the Dornish in any order. Take the Iron Islands and then the North afterwards. If you care about Essos, start with The Three Sisters regardless. Then take Braavos and work your way down. Cataphracts and Braavosi two-handers are what you want to take Essos.

Good Luck

And if you have any questions, feel free to ask them in the comments.

[JackBadWolf]

I realized that creating a character from North receives a negative on agility and throw. Is true?

[Axle]

No, leaving and joining factions resets most of your reputations.

[Gnomer]

Do you regain the reputation lost with the other factions after leaving the army? By all means like getting captured

[Ugnip55]

How do I ask my lord for a promotion?

[Jah The Prophet]

Oh well, thanks for your help.

[Axle]

Lords and companions cannot die. There are other mods with that possibility but I can't remember if Floris has it.

[Jah The Prophet]

Quick question is it possible to kill the hound? i really want his armor!

[Axle]

Sorry, not aware of any troops using poleaxes. It seems like it should exist though, it could have been overlooked.

[apocal43]

Do you know where I can find a balanced poleaxe? I haven't even seen the basic one, let alone the balanced version. Just to be clear, I mean the the polearm with a straight-edged axehead on one side, a small hammer on the back and a big spike on top.

[Axle]

You may hire once every 24 in game hours. I have not played version 3.0 but I would assume it would be the same. Though, the unit may not even be available anymore.