Earlier Days mod for Mount & Blade

Earlier Days has a strong historical basis but is not a historical mod and has no intention of becoming one. This gives me a good basis to build from while allowing for creativity.

Each game faction approximates one or more real world cultures. Swadia equals the crusading orders of the era particularly the Teutonic Order. Vaegirs primarily the Kievan Rus with some Novogrod, Polish and Lithuanian influence. Khergits the Mongols and to a lesser extent the Kipchaks and Pechenegs. Nords the early medieval Danes. Rhodoks are a mix of the Old Prussians, Finno-Ugarian peoples and other northern Baltic tribes.

Most obvious changes to gameplay at this time are the modification of the recruitment system and importance placed on your relation with your holdings. Recruits now come from one of three social classes. Social classes are lower, middle and upper. The higher the social class the better their level, equipment and skills are. Your relations score with your holdings directly impact your tax income and the quality of recruits you receive.

v0.006

Added James' Chekan Axe. First item specifically made for this mod.

Added the Highlander/Mirathei/NCrawler formation script for AI infantry only.

Added two new improvements to villages. Irrigation improves the villages production of raw goods like apples, chicken, etc... Industry improves production of finished goods like butter, dried meat, etc... These improvements are built in levels up to a max of 4.

School improvement renamed to "Influence the clergy". Yes the name is a bit clunky. Now adds +1 to relation every 2 weeks. Can also now be built in castles and towns that you own.

Added second castle improvement, "Clear land". Another leveled improvement, max lvl 4, that boosts your rent income.

Completing an improvement adds +6 to your relation with that center.

Build times reduced slightly.

Taxes are now a percentage of the gross equal to your relation. i.e. if your relationship with a village is 5 you'll only receive 5% of the taxes generated that week. A message showing the exact numbers is recorded in the game log.

You can now recruit faction troops from castles and towns you own.

Modified recruitment, again.

Overhauled the reinforcement templates. Kingdom armies, caravans, towns and castles should now get a better force mix.

Tweaked the villagers "fight or flee response". You might find them a little more willing to put up resistance.

Mercenary Light Horse have had their armor reduced.

Party size of bandits and caravans adjusted. Feedback would be appreciated.

Other small fixes and tweaks.

v0.005b patch

Recruitment system tweaked.
AI armies number of upper class troops increased slightly.
Native AI tactics tweaked and two new tactics added.
The 3 almost black spears have been made lighter and alpha improved.
Shields guaranteed for Khergit lancers.
Few other minor fixes.

For the .005 release.

Including some items that were graciously donated by some very talented people here.

James - Light Bearded, Bearded, Dane and Mammen axes. Boar Spear, falchion and saex. Chekan axe and almond shield.
James and Mirathei -Gjermundbu, Vendel and Valsgarde helmets.
Pope - Flanged Mace and "Dagger in Fist" warhammer.
Raptor - 3 maces, spiked club, mallet and 4 spears.
Raz - Club, War Club, Yataghan, "Sugarloaf" Great Helm, 2 turkic domed helmets(metropolian and ghulam2). OK the Sugarloaf is a few decades outside the timeframe I've set but it just looks too good to pass up.
Stoned Dude and Talon - Battle Axe, War Axe, Great Axe from the Standard Weapons Uprgrade Project.
Talon - Replacement Knife and Khyber(Butcher) Knife also from SWUP.

Amarillo was kind enough to map a texture sheet of just round shields so now I can fit 15 shield faces on a single texture sheet. This means I can do a lot of round shields without bloating the filesize.

Fixed error in Swadian recruitment.
Fixed several item errors.
Fixed a few other asst'd errors and typos.
Mercenaries tweaked. Guard and knight are level 20. All others are level 15.
Working towards a better balance of AI Lord party troops. Parties had too many lower class troops before.
Bandits tweaked and leaders with some tactics skill added.
Village defenders increased in number and slightly improved to "village levy and skirmisher" troops.
Farmer parties also made village_levy and skirmisher troops.

Character generation overhauled. Nothing earthshattering just makes some minor attribute,skill and profeiceny tweaks to better tailor your character to your liking.
-You now choose which kingdom you were born in, preferred weapon and non-combat skill.
-You gain a small party of troops of the same social status and culture as what you picked. i.e. a Swadian noble will start with 4 Swadian Knights. A middle class Nord would get 3 Nord Militia, etc...
-Have the option of recruiting a small party of 5 lower class recruits of your culture at game start.
-Still start with cash instead of equipment.

Tweaked the map. Bumped the hills and added quite a few scattered trees in Rhodok country and elsewhere.

Outlaws, except Sea Raiders, morphed into tribals. Represents the elements of the original population that refuse to be assimilated.

Changed outlaw party text to red.

Few economy tweaks. As I expected the impact is marginal.
-Caravans should yield less loot.
-Reduced the maximum amount of good villages can produce. Which in turn should reduce tax incomes in villages and cities and possibly loot from raids.
-Rents paid are now a percentage equal to player relation. This is very minor part of the players tax income. The big hit will be on castles since you can't currently raise relations. Should reduce your tax income from castles to ~25 denars, sorry.

Renamed all the AI lords with real names from as close as I could get to the mid 13th century.
Swadia - German, Vaegir - pre-christian and christian Russian, Khergit - Mongolian, Nord - Old Danish and Rhodok - Lithuanian

Added thrown spear "Angon". I'm assuming angon is a recognizable term?
Angon ammo set at 2.
Javelin ammo reduced to 3 and will only be used by AI foot troops.
Throwing Axe ammo reduced to 3 also.
Besides being more realistic numbers it will hopefully get the AI infantry into melee a little quicker.

Removed spears being shown on the back when carried and the javelin bag.

Removed Zendar and manhunters.
River Pirates renamed to "outlaws".

Initial spawn point moved to near Bulugha Castle so you have 4 cities fairly close.

Re-enabled Armagan & co. variable ransom price script with a slight tweak.
A lower class recruit should yield 2 denars, typical bandit 10 denars and the top of the upper class tree 52 denars.