Great if YOU can do it, just this information doesn´t help me, perhaps you can give some hint how!?

If the 4 are pressing in I don´t have any possibilty to strike because they hit me everytime I ready my weapon, so there is no chance to hit. Only once I managed it the be faster in the backwards move then they pressing forward, having a two handed sword and reach I could smash them.

The reach of the longsword is really great, it allowed me to cut passing horses and man at arms even while being on foot. Also the cutting while mounted is easier.

Boom and zoom as I visualise it: take a turn giving you some distance to your enemy, advance, giving you the correct position for "aiming", cut/stab and bail out again.
Just as a ground attack aircraft would do. Advance to the target, drop your load and fly to it again from adifferent angle, though it takes longer it allows for more safety.

Felix The way I beat 4-8 at the same time on foot is to keep backing away and side stepping...a two handed weapon like a spear is very helpfull. If you keep backing up AND side steping it forces them into single file to chase you or a two front at worst. Like you i am a horse guy and had to learn this the hard way when my horse was killed and dumped me into the middle of an infantry formation. If you want to use your character on a mod you can export the character then make a character with the same name on the mod and then import the character.
P.S. for me nothing beats a couched lance on horse back...once you get teh hang of aiming and wheeling it great..no blocking it and I can kill horse and rider in a single shot!

Sorry, Felix I did not mean to sound arogant. This is just the way it is.
However to meet the enemy one or two at the time is the only way in my experience. Then you can beat the group of 4-5 river pirates, for example.
You need to find the way how to fight them two at the most. As said above to line them up, is one of the ways. I'll still haver to try this tonight. But if you are lucky they will advance to you in a somewhat looser formation so if you can take them down before the others come along you will for sure be the hero. ;)))
Anyhow what I notice is that even when they take you down you dont loose your equipment or money, so what to hack if you get your b*** kicked. ;)))))

If you want to fight on foot, you need to have a pretty hefty Athletics score, to outpace the foes, and a relatively light armour so that you are not encumbered to much.

Weapon wise, a lance or spear is a must. Just ride into things, and they die.
A good horse does WONDERS for you lancing efficiency.

Range weapon wise, the crossbow is your friend. It is wastly more accurate than any of the other weapons; the RoF is lower, but it is plenty worth it. The Light crossbow can be used from horseback, which is quite helpful.
Another good thing about the crossbow is that you will never have to buy skillpoints for it.
Simply equip your crossbow (a sniper if you can afford it) and attack a group of river pirates or sea raiders (or other group with no cavalry), and set yourself up on a hill. Start shooting at the foe as they approach. You won't hit much, but when you do, each long range hit will earn you a hefty skill bonus.
My current character has a crossbow skill of about 200 without ever using a skill point; He simply picked up a crossbow and started shooting stuff.

I have to admit I got tired of my low-level M&B characters getting beaten all the time so I downloaded the M&B battle-sizer mod which controls the number of enemies on the battle-field. Having them come on 2 and 3 at a time is rather artificial, but it's better than endless failure.

I'm quite looking forwards to the "Live by the Sword" mod being finished as it has some pretty realistic looking armour and weapons.

Well I just got on a lvl 6 and bought the game. Actually it is indeed great fun.
I'm now using one hand sword on a horse and can bwat up to 10ish river pirates.
Raiders are tougher and are coming in greater numbers but I can beat some of them too.
I charge them in hussar fashion by holding my sword arm back and just cut them when I pass by.
They can be killed with one blow. I think I'll be doing this for some time as I put aside Dark Messiah for this.
Great ide this game. Thanks to one who added this. ;)))

Another thing is recruite a load of peasant sword fodder and keep throwing them at prisoner trains and and pirates with knight or man-at-arms or archer prisoners and them recruite them...beats the hell out of trying to go it alone. Sea pirates I think give the best loot/difficulty ratio; no heavy knights on horse or crossbowmen..(they can really chew you up)

Henchmen is a must if you plan to take on anything but river pirates.
Liberating them from enemies is the best way to get them: Typically, look for a river pirate or other weak group that has some usefull prisoners, beat them, and recruit the prisoners to your band.

In this way you can amass a very powerful force quite quickly.
On the standard map, especially vaegir troops can be captured this way, since they are closer to zendar and "prime raider territory"

Another good trick is to get involved in battles where you can aid the winning side.

I figured out how to perform sweeping blows with the great sword, which is an instant kill against not too heavily armoured enemies. But the couched lance thing still puzzles me, the forum says I have to go full speed, pull back the lance and charge upon someone without releasing it, it didn´t work yet, also the stab is another matter too, I am yet only into sweeping blows :(.

sigh

Accutualy Felix, do not touch the attack button when chargeing with the lance. It will couch on its own, all you need to do is line up the point at the enemy. Another thing that i forgot to mention( and that Elling did) is look for battles already in progress. these might or might not yeild prisoners for you to recruit but they will help you get gear and money; just makesure that the odds are in your favor :lol:

If I just hold the lance he keeps it point up. Will he lower it himself in the charge? Do I need the weapon called "lance" or will it work with a spear and alike?
You mean to make the couched lance attack I just have the weapon activated without doing anything just riding? Not like all other weapons where make them ready by pushing the attack button, sounds curious.

Once you reach a certain speed, you will automatically lower the lance.
You can do this with all polearms, but lances and spears are the best.

Once the lance is down, you need to hit people with the tip, by manouvering the horse. this might take a few tries, but when you hit, you will deal huge amounts of damage.

A classic trick for the less squeamish is to buy a jousting lance, hunt down river pirates, and sell them as slaves for 20 gold a piece.

Gosh, sometimes one is really slow-witted. Just tried it in a quick fight against mountain bandits with a cracked great lance. In the initial charge it is wuite easy, they came directly storming upon me, me being the first in our charge, that gave me two instant kills :D

After that I probably will stey with the great sword in the semi wooden environment.

There´s still so much to try, bought me a light crossbow, although I am no master crossbowman yet, it sometimes gives one shot kills, which is really impressive. Tomorrow I will try to find some steppe raiders or river pirates to charge down in shallow terrraing :evil:

Well, I've discovered a lance as well.
It is just great. I can take gangs of 20 all on my own. But a god horse is essential.
So I charge them and just keep circling at ful speed and pick them off one by one. My pole arm level shoots one up with each kill. However I think it is also essential not to get your horse killed too many times as they loose the speed and then you can forget about it. So when I see I'm gonne loose I just dismount and try to kill as much as I can on foot and possibly take one of loose horses walking around. If they kill me I just get back to them as soon as I get free and do the same until I get them all. In short: I love this game.
One thing I don't quite understand is a message: "Horse charged by ..... points" Does that mean that my horse damaged the enemy or that the enemy damaged my horse? Anybody knows?

It means that your horse damaged the enemy. The higher the horse's Charge rating, the more damage it does in this fashion.
So yes, given enough time you can knock people out just by riding into them.

Unfortunately it doesn't seem to be compatible with a MAC. :cry:

Ah, yes, I know. It is one of the great sorrows of my life.
I only get to play it at work... Still well past level 20 though.. :P