***Possible spoiler***Mount&Blade WARBAND

[WARLORD HECTOR]

Hi Friends;

It's a long time I' have not written.

But I have started to play Mount&Blade Warband which is really a fantastic game in his own.

Players that liked Diablo and Total War series, will find this game amazing.

Trough it's not a real RPG for my taste, it bears the same specs like playing Diablo, but like total war series you play it both on a strategic map and real terrain. The most boosting is that there are no combos or surely striking in the real battle. You control your Chr. and can command your (if you have a) company. Over 150 (or more if you can) men at a time, Charging to your opponent on a horse or on your feet.

There is also a chance to play MP modes and make some battle tournaments at the communities.

Buy it...

It will make it worth.

[Loki[D.d.G]]

Agreed. The game has far more depth than many more of its polished counterparts. Ridiculously addictive to boot.

[Curry]

I agree, Mount & Blade is a fun game and lasts long. It's a sandbox fighting game though, so don't expect any RPG experience.

[Garriath]

Oh, it's no hardcore RPG experience, for sure, but you can easily choose to play a loyal knight, an unscrupulous mercenary, a Machiavellian vassal who instigates a civil war, or a handful of other character types. The game keeps track of your relations with other lords (ie, whether or not you assisted them in battle, whether or not you've defeated or lost to one of their nemeses, et.), with towns (whether or not you looted them, protected them from bandits, etc.), and factions, as well as a "honor" system where sparing prisoners and refusing underhanded missions will gain you esteem from like-minded lords, and contempt from others.

For a sandbox game, I thought its roleplaying qualities were extremely well executed.

And that's saying nothing about the combat. I think it's pretty amazing just how addictive and satisfying the fighting is; I remember I bought it at the same time as Fable, and was astonished at how better-constructed M&B's fighting was, despite clearly having been produced at a tiny fraction of Fable's cost.

If people are thinking of buying this game, though, I'd encourage them to consider buying vanilla M&B, not the warband stand-alone. For those unaware of the difference, Warband contains everything vanilla M&B contains, plus shiner graphics, a new faction, and some interesting new features (most prominently multiplayer.) However, vanilla M&B has a *much* more established modding community that blows Warband's out of the water. I'd particularly recommend:

[url="http://forums.taleworlds.com/index.php/board,161.0.html"]Rus: XIII Century -[/url] Sets M&B in northeastern Europe during the Teutonic Crusades. Absolutely stunning execution. Excellent new textures for just about everything, and many very well-done new weapons and armors. Battlefield mechanics are redone very nicely, and a whole slew of excellent new features are added (riders taking damage if their horses are killed from under them, horses need fodder, units of different cultures don't get along, etc.) Also adds a few new things to the graphics department, adding bloom to vanilla M&B (which makes it only a little less attractive than WB, if you ask me) and dynamic weather on the campaign map (so you can see it rain around Warsaw or snow around Novgorod...). In a lot of ways, I think this mod takes everything that Mount and Blade did well, and makes it very much better.

[url="http://forums.taleworlds.com/index.php/board,150.0.html"]1866 Western Mod -[/url] This one raised my eyebrows when I first saw it, but I honestly think that its general level of quality is as good as any fan-made mod I've ever seen for a game. As the title suggests, it transports M&B to the Wild West, on the US-Mexican border. Characters are free to join either country's armies, side with the Apaches or Comanches, or join one of over half a dozen bandit or lawmen factions. Guns are flawlessly integrated, and feel completely natural to the setting. The new graphics, music, and gameplay synchs flawlessly. Also very highly recommended, particularly if one ever gets sick of vanilla M&B play.

[Scottg]

Yes, it very much allows you to "role-play" your character.

It even has a "role-play" leveling system, but that system is unfortunately NOT integrated into your role-playing. (..i.e. no "alignment" based level-up selections.)


Oddly, I don't think the combat system is as good as everyone seems to claim.

3rd Person perspective is excellent. 1st person is mediocre at best.

The horse-based combat is fantastic.
The opponent AI is generally excellent.

But your own character's (non-horse based) attack movement lacks a bit, and particularly when you consider the effect (or near non-effect) of skill-points.

Honestly, I haven't noticed any appreciable difference between 50 skill points in Polearms and 300.

Personal artillery (archery) is weak. Morrowind was over-all a fair bit better in this regard (particularly with respect to 1st person perspective and damage vs. distance vs. "pull" or "force").

Basically I think that personal combat in Morrowind was better from a 1st person perspective, and perhaps surprisingly - Dungeon Lords CE is better from a 3rd person perspective. (..though none of this is with regard to horse-based combat for which M&B is pretty much singular.)



I also think that the end-result of party formation and control is lacking. You just can't seem to get enough control of who actually goes into battle, when they go into battle, etc.. Terrain advantages/disadvantage also seem something of an "afterthought". The developers could have "borrowed" more from the Total War franchise here.

Siege war-fare is also very weak..


Additionally personal exploits beyond combat at are largely missing in action.

I would have *loved* some thieving activities (a'la Thief I & II), and frankly the basic architecture/places/people are already there for this, but the mechanism to achieve this is not (..i.e. no lock-picking, no hiding/sneaking, no pick-pocketing, no wall-climbing or grappling hooks, and no black-jack.)



It's still a lot of fun, particularly for the "death-race" like action of a couched-lance attack from horse-back.. you can literally be entertained for hours at a time just doing that, and of course there is quite a bit more than that as well.

[Stworca]

I agree, Mount & Blade is a fun game and lasts long. It's a sandbox fighting game though, so don't expect any RPG experience.

This is both the strongest and the weakest point of M&B. Sandbox fighting games are fun, but tend to get boring realy fast.

M&B is not a game for everyone, but those who will like it, will soon grow to love it