Quick Look: Mount & Blade: Warband

wow... this totally drove me to try out the demo and it was amazing just by playing the tutorial~

" It continues to drive me nuts when the GB staff refers to Empire: Total War as just Empire. "

Good quick look guys!

TNT Mount and Blade

So Mike is . . . an intern?

I can appreciate this but it's too much for me.

I get the appeal but this game needs lots and lots of polish.

This looks really fun... but I don't have the cash for it yet. 
 
I'll probably wait till it goes on sale on Steam.

" I can appreciate this but it's too much for me. "

Cool quicklook guys. Love seeing these PC games getting some lovin

This game looks so hardcore, I love it.

man fuck this game! FUCK IT TO HELL!!!

raise your uh tributes

Stop saying it's like Demon's Souls.  DS has rock solid controls and physics, M&B is janky as hell in that way.  DS is all about the combat depth & level design, M&B is about armies, horse battles, and the freedom of battling where you want.

" @Psych0Penguin said:

" How the fuck is that horse still moving. 3 arrows sticking out of your leg must hurt like a bitch! "

You'll notice that there is a separate health bar for your horse than from your character. Once your horse dies, you have to huff it on foot until you buy a new one. Horses come in various types, from speedy to decked out in armor. Say what you want about the graphics, it's a fairly deep, but still accessible game. "

man I could listen to dave talk about this game all day

 
this is all pve advice: 
 
first things first. STOP using that polearm. it is horrible. you can kill 10x as many mobs in the same amount of time if you'd actually spend your time swinging a real melee weapon rather than riding around trying to gain speed, just to miss... crossbows are horrible too for same reason, way too much downtime. regular bows are far superior. swords with long reach are good.
 
you gotta level up intelligence, put skills in proper management, and recruit the proper companion/heroes and level their strengths too. (there is a very particular, cookie cutter build if you look for it). because 50% of the companions available do not get along with each other, so you have to figure who likes who and recruit them. use wiki to find a chart of who likes who. basically there are 2 possible groups of companions. each companion should cover an attribute that you are missing. collectively, you and them should cover them all....   
 
also, the basic troops (farmers, etc) very in strengths. again, wiki for a good understanding. you'll want a mix of troops. basically the 1 best type of unit from each "faction". many ways to recruit them, either convert  prisoners, free prisoners, recruit friends, etc.
 
build a large military and enough renown, then you will get recruited by a king to go to war with him and take villages, castles, and towns. the king will grant you a small village, and every time you defeat a new territory, you can ask your king if you can have it, but he will likely treat you like crap and give it to another captain instead.  
 
also, your territories can be upgraded. making it more profitable, defensible, etc. 
 
so once you get strong enough, you tell the king to f off and start your own kingdom. after that he will label you a huge threat and bring his entire army upon you the very next day, so you have to get strong before making that move and hopefully you have a nice keep upgraded to defend against his armies. after you crush him repeatedly you can go on the offensive and start taking over the entire map, but it takes a long time. 
 
also, big note: the original game has many mods that extend the replay value. the new xpac hasn't been out long enough to port over those mods yet but time will be good on that end.

TNT!

" Stop saying it's like Demon's Souls.  DS has rock solid controls and physics, M&B is janky as hell in that way.  DS is all about the combat depth & level design, M&B is about armies, horse battles, and the freedom of battling where you want. "

" @Diamond said:

" Stop saying it's like Demon's Souls.  DS has rock solid controls and physics, M&B is janky as hell in that way.  DS is all about the combat depth & level design, M&B is about armies, horse battles, and the freedom of battling where you want. "

yeah saying this is like DS is pretty insulting "

ur right this is better than demon souls

This game is oddly... compelling....

die by the sword name drop! fuck yeah!

" ur right this is better than demon souls "

I love Mount&Blade, it's a pretty addicting game if you don't mind the graphics.

Thanks for reminding me of this awesome game.

" @Diamond said:

" Stop saying it's like Demon's Souls.  DS has rock solid controls and physics, M&B is janky as hell in that way.  DS is all about the combat depth & level design, M&B is about armies, horse battles, and the freedom of battling where you want. "

yeah saying this is like DS is pretty insulting "

Oh god I played M&B for like 8-9 days straight when I was sick. I captured a huge amount of villages, until, suddenly, I got steam-rolled by an enemy king. I lost about 8 hours of progress, got really pissed, and stopped playing.

They were obviously talking about the pacing of the combat. I can totally see where he's coming from with that comparison, what with everything taking ages to do, slow movement and slow attacks forcing you to be extremely tactical when battling. More so than, say, people who claim Lead and Gold is "like Team Fortress 2". That, I don't understand... "

 "function keys" 
 
You can pick classes of troops, like infantry, mounted or archers, with the number keys, then assign them tactics with the F# keys, like defending a position, following you, charging, mounting/dismounting or retreating. For instance, you can send your mounted units out first while you tell your archers to follow you to a flanking position, then tell your mounted troops to retreat toward your archers while you send your infantry to mop up their ranged troops. Stuff like that. 
 
That's before you get into mods that have already been released:  http://forums.taleworlds.com/index.php/board,165.0.html?PHPSESSID=vgbccbqtb2klfjpbtvqo3gqn94 
 
"Is there friendly fire?" 
 
In single player, archers and slingers can friendly fire but melee attacks don't damage allies. 
 
"... unless you level up as a doctor ..." 
 
This is where your hero characters come in. Their skills can handle those sorts of things as they level up if you want to purely focus on individual combat or leading a massive army.  Party skills can influence things like world map movement speed, tracking parties and "tactical" advantages that can influence how much damage you do during a fight and how well automated battles turn out.
 
"The towns are fairly barren." 
 
That's because you're in a fort there, not a town.  The larger cities have some bustle but suffer from Daggerfall-itis - everyone is extremely generic.
 
"It looks like you're just a roving band of bandits..."; Empire references; "It looks like a game made 15 years ago..."

30 minutes of quick look and not one mention of Sid Meier's Pirates!, especially the older Amiga/DOS versions (26 years old) and Pirates! Gold (6 years old). (Props to Food for being the only person saying this.) You move around on your own, plunder parties or cities independently or join a faction, earn territory, curry favor with factions/generals/villages/cities through quests, try to keep your morale up and food stocked or your army deserts, there's hand-drawn still artwork throughout, skills influence but don't completely determine your gameplay style, you can get married, when you retire it tells you what happened afterward, etc. 
 
It's practically the same game, just based on land instead of sea and with 3D 3rd-person physics/timing battles instead of ship-to-ship with a 2D fencing minigame. But the whole overworld game wrapped around the battles is nearly identical in mechanics.
 
"I believe you can get siege weaponry... can you siege a castle or keep?" 
 
When you attack cities and forts, you have to build siege engines/ladders in order to get over the walls. It's a generic camp-out process and the time it takes depends on your Engineering skill. You can also lay siege to a fort or city and try to starve them out, though they usually stock about 1-3 months' worth of food. It's tough to pull off without allies, though.
  
"I need to get villagers all the time to keep my army up" 
 
You can make enough money from raiding caravans or winning tournaments (Defender of the Crown style!) to hire mercenaries in cities, though they also come with higher maintenance costs. If you defeat a party or fort/city that's taken prisoners, you can hire them directly into your army as well.
 
"What happens if you die during this part?" 
 
You don't die in most failures; most times you get captured and released missing some money or gear, or dragged away by your allies to fight again. The hardcore modes can kill you.
 
"Can you throw your spear?"
 
No. You can equip javelins that you can throw, but they're useless in melee.    

"

Dave! Fuck yeah!

"

The lance in the back was hilarious.  This Mountain Blade game seems pretty interesting.

You can never truly kill Dave. He'll just keep getting back up.

" @Zatoichi_Sanjuro said:

"

Dave! Fuck yeah!

"

hahaha lmao  "

This actually looks like it could be fun. Am I the only one thinking that?

Aha was very much looking forward to this quicklook, this might be the first PC game i buy on Amazon.

They don't know how to do the couched lance...

Mount & Blade has the best combat around. Next steps, add Euphoria to it and make the multiplayer persistent (a la Chromehounds)

A Hot-Crossed Buns reference is why I love the Giant Bomb.

Man, I can't wait to play this :D

" "Can you throw your spear?" No. You can equip javelins that you can throw, but they're useless in melee.     "

I bought the original during a Steam sale and never played it (it looked kinda terrible but for like $3 who cares?). I'm definitely installing it now. Then I'll have to wait until Warblade goes on sale...

This game looks nuts. I approve.

Looks kinda fun.