Mount and Blade Guide: Recruiting and Commanding an Army

Written by:  • Edited by: Michael Hartman
Updated Oct 2, 2009

This is a guide on how to recruit an army in Mount and Blade from basic soldiers to hero characters. It also explains how to train your troops up and what commands are available to you on the battlefield to get the best from your forces in combat.

Mount and Blade Guide

This article is part of a series on Mount and Blade. To start at the beginning of the guide, check out the Guide to Mount and Blade. The rest of the series can be found at the end of this article.

Recruiting Heroes

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There are various hero characters that you can recruit spread across Calradia. These characters have personalities, back stories and they can be upgraded and equipped in the same way that you are. You’ll find them lurking in taverns and while some will join up for free, others will want a payment of some kind. You should be careful about which characters you recruit because it is easy to upset the balance of your party and personality clashes will lead to moaning and arguments in your party and have a negative effect on morale.

It is always a good idea to recruit a few heroes. These characters are the same as you in that they cannot be killed on the field of battle, only knocked unconscious, and they have the potential to be tougher than basic soldiers and to serve your cause in other ways.

Recruiting an Army

You can recruit men for a small fee by entering any village and selecting the Recruit Volunteers option. Each man you recruit from a village will be an untrained raw recruit, they will cost you 10 gold each and they will be poorly equipped and fairly useless in battle.

You can also recruit trained troops from taverns in towns. You’ll often find small parties of trained mercenaries willing to join your cause but they will generally demand a substantial fee for their services.

Training your Army

You can train up your men via the trainer skill . When one of your soldiers can be upgraded you will receive a message notifying you and you can upgrade them on the party screen. You don’t even need to train your men yourself as you could find a hero character with some training capability and hire him, or develop one of your hero characters to have more training skill. Your troops will of course also improve by getting real battle experience, if they survive!

Commanding your Army

Your troops are not always the brightest bunch in the world and they have a fairly direct approach to combat on the battlefield so there are some useful keyboard commands you can employ to get the best out of them.

Firstly the numbers allow you to select various groups within your army or your whole army quickly.

  1. Entire Army – selects the whole army
  2. Infantry – any troops on foot who don’t have a bow or crossbow
  3. Archers – selects any troops with bows or crossbows
  4. Cavalry – selects all mounted troops
  5. Invert – if you selected archers and then hit 5 it would select everyone else except your archers

When it comes to issuing actual orders the F keys are the place to go. Here is a list.

  • F1 – Hold – orders your troops to hold your current position
  • F2 – Follow – orders your troops to follow you
  • F3 – Charge – orders your troops to attack
  • F4 – Mount/Dismount – orders your troops to dismount or if pressed again to mount any spare horses nearby
  • F5 – Hold Fire/Fire at Will – orders your troops to hold their fire or if pressed again to fire at will
  • F6 – Advance Ten Paces – orders your troops to advance ten paces
  • F7 – Fall Back Ten Paces – orders your troops to fall back ten paces
  • F8 – Stand Closer – orders your troops to bunch up together
  • F9 – Spread Out – orders your troops to move apart
  • F11 – Blunt Weapons – orders your troops to use blunt weapons only (useful if you want to capture rather than kill enemies)

Comments

Showing all 22 comments
 
anonymous Jun 12, 2011 3:08 PM
counts
does anyone know how to get counts in your kingdom with m&b warband
IsuckatXbows Mar 27, 2011 5:11 AM
...
No, you can't be a king in Mount & Blade, only in Mount & Blade Warband and in With Fire & Sword.
The Bailer Oct 6, 2010 9:01 PM
Morale
Is there an easy way to get Higher morale? cuz my troops keep bailing on me! plz tell me if there is an easy way to get the morale to increase.
Joneseh Sep 27, 2010 5:12 AM
Taking all kingdoms... are u king?
So one day when i was bored i cheated... yep i cheated and just went haywire and killed them all in every castle BUT i got bored and stopped after i had about 10 to go.

My question is:
1)If you have no lord what happens? do u become king?
2) If u have a lord/king can u become king later?

Finally...
3) can u even become king at all?

And correct me if i am wrong but in Lords and realms mod i get english archers... are they the best archers?? the sure kick everyone else...
ryan Jul 30, 2010 9:47 AM
defending a castle
as many people will know a castle is a death wish. With the infin enemy army and that your castle is in enemy land i get my max troops and bring them to my castle and go to local towns and recriut low grade men take them to the castle and drop them when i have a good amount of men (200)=(300) or more i put them in my party and i stay in the castle for a while (note i get as many heros as can be and put points in to trainer) so i get more xp each day keep the recruits coming you never know when the enemy comes with more then one lord if you keep beating them the king might get in on it and where the king comes so does the nation
dj Jun 15, 2010 3:11 AM
best cheat
here is the best cheat in the game

in the character screen click on statistics and choose export character

in the mount and blade game folder open charexport folder

open the file of your character and set the skills as you want

in the game iport your character using statistics

your character will now have skills you choose edited in charexport folder.

:-)
:-)
:-)
:-)
:-)
garyMc Mar 30, 2010 11:20 AM
RE: Mount and Blade Guide: Recruiting and Commanding an Army
There is a mod called Mount & Blade Battle Sizer. With this mod you can have up to 1000 people in the battles ;D
Simon Hill Mar 28, 2010 7:16 AM
RE: Mount and Blade Guide: Recruiting and Commanding an Army
You can only have a limited number of men on the battlefield at once, if either army is bigger then the extra troops will spawn in after the first batch are dead.
enis Mar 27, 2010 5:25 PM
mount blade
hay i have a level 62 and have 400 men but when i got to battle it looks like im using 100 how do i use my full army
Nick Acker Feb 5, 2010 12:04 PM
How to be your own king?
Im a experienced Mount and Blade player. I have a level 34 charecter and own 1/4 of the map. It is a pain to be a rebel because you have to pay men to keep your cities and castles defended. I dont really enjoy playing that account because all I do is run from town to town collecting taxes. Btw in all my towns and castles I have fully upgraded units. (Knights, marksmen, and the rest) I was just curios if theirs a mod that will let me become my own king so I wont have to worry about running around protecting my land. please let me know, my email is wolverine1121@hotmail.com
DJ Jan 25, 2010 7:38 AM
best weapon
which is the best weapon for
throwing,
two handed,
blunt weapon

where are they found?
Simon Hill Jan 20, 2010 12:24 PM
RE: Mount and Blade Guide: Recruiting and Commanding an Army
Each faction has a troop type they are best for:
Vaegirs are the best archers
Rhodoks are the best crossbowmen
Nords for infantry
Swadians for heavy cavalry
Khergits for light cavalry

I think archers are best.
DanteMNE Jan 20, 2010 11:57 AM
Army
In what kingdom i can find best archers?
In what kingdom i can find best crossbowbans?
Who is better archers or crossbowmans?
In what kingdom i can find best soldiers on horses?
Bear Jan 15, 2010 7:42 AM
Rainbowevil and Kemal
Yes you can - to both questions.

Download the Native expansion from the M&Brepositoy, brilliant mod. Gives you loads of new features, larger army sizes and allows you to rule your own faction
RainbowEvil Dec 15, 2009 5:10 PM
Army size
Has anyone been able to create an army of NPC size?? I think it's ridiculous that the rules that apply to the player don't apply to NPC lords and kings eg the number of prisoners an NPC can have is unlimited and the one that annoys me the most: they don't have an effective limit on number of troops (ie no morale system so no people leaving). Apart from that though, great game and a mod allowing you to be a king with proper subjects would be AWESOME!
Cem Dec 1, 2009 8:14 AM
Peace
If you have any castles or towns ( any land that belongs to you )
You will be seen as a ' REBEL ' so no king will make peace with you on your demand...

They may send you a peace aggrement after sometime, but its them who will decide when to make peace or war.

P.S = If you are not an owner of any land, you can pay a lord of that faction to use his Diplomatic power to zero your relationship...

ANY QUESTIONS?
kemal Nov 10, 2009 4:07 PM
RE: Mount and Blade Guide: Recruiting and Commanding an Army
i just want a mod that i can play the game with conquring the all castle and cities but with my heroes.i mean i want my heroes make an army for him with my permission and make wars for my faction.is it possible?
hoof Oct 19, 2009 10:04 AM
Adi
Adi first of all this isn't a faction, it's a type of gameplay you can download other modules from mount and blade website created by other players
Micahel Oct 16, 2009 4:35 AM
Best footman units
Knock out a Hugh army of looters then try to get them in your party then let them rtain by staying in a castle w8 untill it says they can be upgraded, then you will get some slayers BEST FOOTUNITS IN THE GAME
Adi Aug 28, 2009 3:26 AM
how can i choose another faction.
i can play only with native now. i bought the game yesterday and i want to play with others then the native
guest Aug 3, 2009 6:31 PM
answer
Approach a lord of said faction, "I wish to ask you something", and select "I wish to make peace with [nation]" Then prepare to whip out your cash. The worse the relationship the more money you must pay.
dev Aug 1, 2009 7:08 AM
how to place a peace with kingdom of swadia
how to place a peace with kingdom fo swadia
 
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