Warband Episode 001 AAR For Empress

Welcome to the first AAR that should be complementing the release of the first content-filled episode of my Empress achievement run.

To watch the Video, it will be live on My Youtube.

For now, let us set off on our Adventure!

Welcome to Calradia, a country of many petty kings ruling divided lands.

The Owners of the lands are colour-coded as such:

Khergit Khanate: Light Purple, controlling the steeps.

Kingdom of Nords: Light Blue, controlling the northern coast.

Kingdom of Rhodoks: Green, controlling the Mountains in the west.
Kingdom of Swadia: Orange, controlling most of the centre of the map.
Kingdom of Vaegirs: White/Grey, controlling the Tundra.
Sarranid Sultanate: Yellow, controlling the desert.

The aim of the achievement run is to turn every province  Red, the rebel player colour.

Meet Hydrona, the Hero of this game.

Her job is hard. She needs to get strong, well known and acquire lands in her name. No so easy for a lass in these trying times, but not impossible. It may just require some hard work here and there.

 

Her starting stats are very basic, but are enough to work with. Just to make sure that this achievement is that little bit harder, Here is the difficulty.

The Battle size will be raised later, as it become more important.

Onto gameplay. Hydrona accepts the basic starting quest line from the city of Reyvadin, in the Kingdom of Vaegris. Gathering a few men, she kicks some information out of a bandit about the location of a merchants' brother, the quest objective. She travels over to the bandit hideout, just outside of the village of Ulburban.

Marching in with a handful of the most experienced peasants in the warband, the assault begins.

 

Unfortunately, the most experienced peasants are farmhands who are unsure what end of the sword to hold, Hydrona is forced to bury the first friendly casualty. One down, millions more where you came from.

The fight finished up quickly after the death, with Hydrona rescuing the brother of the merchant. Heading home, the reward is well received and the merchant offers a new task, help to clear the bandits out of the city.

Accepting, the fight is fast, victory coming swiftly from the hilt of a crossbow. Hydrona took a few solid hits from a few bandits that managed to close the range. So what does an injured but high on success maiden do less then an hour after ridding a town of bandits? Enter a tournament of cause!

The less we talk about that tournament, the better.

After being humiliated by the Boyer Marmun within the opening melee, Hydrona leaves town to find some men to join her ranks. Heading over to Curaw, she stocks up for the army's appetite, then marches to Slezkh for more peasants. Spotting what appears to be a small band of looters near Slezkh Castle, Hydrona marches head-first into them on the bridge.

Well, those certainly are not looters

Heavily armed and armoured, Sea Raiders are no joke, especially at level 1 with a warband made of recruits and maybe a troop or two stronger.

After failing to run, Hydrona is taken prisoner and dragged around until she masterfully escapes, however she is short some of her very valuable bread.

She runs to the closest city, Khudan and recruits some mercs, giving her some peace of mind. Needing more protection though, she travels to the nearby town of Tismirr, levies some peasants and marches to Curaw, thankfully without incident.

Walking her horse into the city, she talks with the guild master of the town, pleading for some work to build back up her meagre savings.

 

Looters about town. This can either go well, or you can find yourselfself running in circles for weeks on end. Well, a job is a job. Hydrona accepts. Leaving town, crossing the bridge, she encounters the first band of looters.

The fighting goes better then expected, with Hydrona learning a thing or two from the battle. She feels a little more knowledgeable about the world.

Searching around the river nets two more bands of looters. Hydrona cleans them up and moves back to Curaw, collects some pay, and prays that she can find the two other bands before it is too late.

Thankfully, after searching for only an hour in the day, she finds the last two looter bands, cleans them up and returns to hand in the quest.

Great! A huge handful of gold and level 3!

And that does it for the first part of Hydrona's adventure. I hope you will join me for the next instalment, hopefully next week! Have a Happy new year!

-Hydronum