[Michael Curl]

Jason Henry wrote: "Talking about mercenaries, basically the premise is you are a hired arm with no true allegiance earning coin from battle, acquiring better equipment for your character and improving their skills in combat. This is from what I understand, what the hundred year war evolved into because the death of so many nobles, both sides had to start hiring mercenaries to keep their campaigns going."

Well, many mercenaries were nobles. Its fine for game purposes but most mercenary captains that I have heard of were usually nobles, generally 3rd sons or princes from small kingdoms like Montiferro (I"m probably spelling that wrong). It wasn't dead mercenaries as much as it was the increased size of armies, the superior skill of hired troops as opposed to feudal levys, and the restrictions imposed on warfare by feudal contracts. Mercenaries were more dependable, competent, and would stay in the field indefinitely as long as they were paid.

I have heard that most feudal terms of service were only for about 45 days a year or so, thus it was very difficult to actually keep a campaign going and frequently (William the Conquerer did this) you would have to hire your feudal troops to serve longer ("My 45 days is up, I don't owe you anymore so unless I'm getting paid for this I"m going home") thus the line between mercenary and feudal knight was extremely blurry.

[Chad Arnow]

[Chad Arnow]

[Simon G.]

[Jason Henry]

Well the two choice are:

-Terminator visual indicators hovering over peoples heads indicating friend or foe with freedom of heraldry/colors.

-Team based colors, no terminator indicators, loss of background color heraldry customization, but retains freedom of coat of arms.

I personally thing the latter is the lesser of the two evils, for the simple fact, while you do lose some historical accuracy you retain the key component this is all shooting for immersion.

Not having the indicators also makes it harder to distinguish friend from foe something I imagine not easy in medieval warfare, increasing the drama of the situation with friendly fire.

Note: The reason the first way doesn't work with the indicators turned off is because the game is going to have custom heraldry per player, making is impossible to tell friend from foe unless you someone knew every person in the battle and had their heraldry memorized.

[Colt Reeves]

I can see where trying to do it for real could be a problem.

"Ok guys, for the woodland battle there are going to be two hundred different coat of arms present. Under each of these lords will be twenty to fifty different guys all wearing the same coat of arms, but with variations you'd expect from each of them getting their own gear from different sources.

You know what to do, change up the color tone and stuff so it looks like this guy had his done professional and this poor guy had his mother make his.

Oh yeah, remember to make some guys without an coat of arms too, say another sixty or so variations there.

And can you have that by Tuesday?"

[Christopher VaughnStrever]

I was wondering what systems this game was being developed for? Only the Computer? or is the PS3 a possibility? I sure do hope so....

I don't know if this is in the plans, though I could see a huge curve for online play regarding this title; such as building your characters suit of Arms, being able to then take on additional soldiers (A bit of a clan setup at this point) And having wars between clans. At stakes for such small skirmishes would come rewards of more funds/food/anything that profits the characters growth. Developing Alliances with other clans so that full Alliances can create an actual full war scenario. This aspect could become quite enveloping seeing as some would betray an alliance to benefit their alternative goal. Clans would separate upon job class, clans would need to create alliance due to the fact the a properly evenly supported job class across the board would be needed to deal with different scenarios. Man this sounds cool.... thought I would throw it out there.

Oh and its needed by Monday Colt. J/K I liked your post.

[Jason Henry]

[J. E. Hyväri]

First of all, I would like to commend you on the willingnes to build a game that is based on history and historical combat. An exellent choise. It may represent some problems, but sometimes compromises have to be made.

I have trained both historical swordmanship of Italian and German lonsword and also participated in re-enactment type of fighting for some ten years now. My assesment would be, that while I do agree with people here about the fact that swords and other sharp weapons were mainly used against openings of the opponents armour (even maille) or padded panzer there are also attacks against armoured bodyparts like gauntlets, not so much to cause physical trauma, but rather to give an opening in the defence of the enemy. However there is no need for all the multiple techniques in the codexes and mastertechniques of Lichtenauer tradition nor those of Fiore dei Liberi. They are the masterworks of experts of their own time. In my opinion most warriors would have been skilled in a number of attacks and defences, but the masters, whose works we today have left, wrote about all the possible techniques to win the average swordsmen. (Average here meaning everything better than lacking in skill and worse than an expert.)

I am by no means wery knowledged about the 100-years war, but in many European medieval conflicts the common soldiery might adopt a combat recognition symbol just prior to battle. Sometimes this would be just sraws somewhere visble in their gear or a rag or band of cloth of certain colour. Also the accidental attacks on allies are not unknown during medieval warfare due to misinterpreting heraldry. Infact there are even battles where the outcome was seriously affected by this. Coloured surcoats is a problem, since most soldiers of the mid 14th century did not use heraldry or even surcoats.

I must admit that to my humble taste the Mount and Blade is a game realistic enough. The one thing that annoys me in it, is that the lances do not brake on impact.

[Jason Henry]

Progress is going well, but we need more manpower, if there are any programmers interested in joining we could use you. If interested send me a PM.

[Jason Henry]

I wanted to keep you guys in the loop, so here's a quick update.

The planned system we have for sword is a customization system where you choose the Oakeshott's typology of the blade and handle (consisting of the cross-guard, grip, and pommel). The handle and blade combination determines the center of balance, how many hands it supports, weight, and aesthetic preference. So you can mix and match different blades and handles to suit your own play-style.

Is there a good typology system for others weapons (maces, axes, polearms, etc.) that fit the 14th century? I've seen typology for viking era spears and axes, but not later examples.

[Quinn W.]

That's great you hope to make the different sword types have different stats. I'm thinking back on most (if not all) auto racing games where adding things like spoilers and hood scoops were entirely aesthetic additions, when in fact on real race cars those are added for a reason.
Obviously there won't be as big of a difference between different kinds of swords as, say, a sword versus a mace, but for those who really want to fine tune their warrior, more options is always good.

[Jason Henry]

Indeed, customization is a big deal for us and we want players to feel like their character is unique.

[Kalle Kylmänen]

Just some nonsignificant ramblings from a dilettante, but anyway:

How about using battlecries to help identification? I don't have any sources to cite, but I hear that at least the Swedish army in the 30 years war kept shouting some motto in the thick of the fighting to help the distinction between friend and foe. Such a simple practice could very well be as old as organized warfare itself. But again, I am no expert in this field, especially in this company.

With most players being limited to only two speakers, the accurate direction of the sound probably wouldn't be perceivable, and suffice as a identification by itself. But Instead the player could shout a battlecry that would result in a visual signal on the players character for the duration of the shout. The problem I see in this would be some loss in immersion, if for example a players livery would change colour for a moment. Though some might thing identification (beyond livery badges) is not period
I think the option can be left to the gamers, wether they want to choose the names over the players, team colors on livery or something else. These can be then forced by the servers, and likeminded players eill find each other and enjoy the game their way. Or you will come up with some other, ingenious solution .

[Jason Henry]

Interesting concept on the shouting mechanic. We'll definitely let server admins set the server rules the way they want for a certain play-style.

Our "active parry" mechanic will feature historical counterattacks, by using an attack to defend as well as attack at the same time. Static parries were an undesirable way to defend yourself if you had the choice because it didn't stop the opponent from attacking directly after that parry.

Wrestling mechanic will most likely be not included for the simple fact that it wouldn't be fun from both players perspective especially the person locked into the grapple move. There will be a weapon push, pommel strike, shield bash if you wish to attack differently. A cinematic death system (featuring grapple kills/armor) is a possibility depending on how much time the animators have before release.

Thanks for the support!

Here's a random pic:

[Sam Gordon Campbell]

I'm looking forward to its release.
Maybe, since we've been so helpful, we could get a discount when it comes out?

[Scott Hrouda]