Mount & Blade: Warband Claimant's Throne Guide

Claimants

To each faction, there's a single claimant, every single one of them believes, that they are the rightful rulers of the beforementioned factions. They roam the world in search of aid for their cause, thus they can be found in all Keeps, expect within the walls of these, which belong to the King, that they want to usurp.

As I've mentioned - there's a claimant for each faction, here's a short list of them:

Arwa the Pearled One - Sarranid Sultanate

Dustum Khan - Khegrit Khanate

Lady Isola of Suno - Kingdom of Swadia

Lethwin Far-Seeker - Kingdom of Nords

Lord Kastor of Veluca - Kingdom of Rhodoks

Prince Valdym the Bas[t]ard - Kingdom of Vaegirs

The Fire Rises

For a claimant to consider your humble services, you need at least 200 renown.

Once you become that famous, you may set out to find your future King, and then offer him your aid.

When you've done so, the claimant will ask you to swear an oath, as with all oaths there's a trick to this one too, it turns out that you, must break up the rest of your oaths (oh no!).

Naturally, your commitment to the noble cause (known as self-interest in disguise) will justify this bold act, so your ex-superior won't mind.

By pledging your services to the claimant you will immediately change your colour to red and automatically start a war, with the King, whom you intend to dethronise.

Now, here's some reasonable advice:

For starters, don't mess with a faction, that's currently doing brilliantly by all means. What I mean is that when you want to usurp a King, who has no enemies, plenty of allies, whose trade flourishes within and outside his borders like a spring flower and all of his Vassals have no reason (due to the beforementioned facts) to betray him - you will not have much of a chance to suceed.

Secondly, if you're aiming for a long-term game, including the trial of conquering the entire world, make sure you want this rebellion to suceed, perhaphs, in the so called long-term, It'd be better to leave things as they are? But if you want to pull off a rebellion just for fun, then don't mind this scrawny piece of advice : D

Not only you need renown, but also some private resources, if you're to fight an ENTIRE kingdom!

First of all, have a good, versatile army, that you're capable of controlling flawlessly.

Make sure that you, are capable of expanding it's size, training it and sustaining it for a long time.

This one's a no-brainer, your hero must be well leveled. In my opinion a decent leveled hero, shall be at least lvl 20.

But what's hero worth without plenty of henchmen to make up for his weaknesses, a strong fellowship is a must!

Have some passive income aswell, make sure you certainly won't lose in the process of swearing an oath or during a prolonged rebellion.

Slow And Steady Wins The Race

Unfortunately, a Rebellion can't be won with a straigth-forward approach.

This isn't your regular type of war, where the first to smack the enemy here and there wins.

Now, rushing things, especially battles is the best way to ensure inevitable victory failure. Before engaging in any combat, make sure that you can either win this one with minimal losses or it's simply worth your resources. Have in mind, that pretty much for the most of the Rebellion your enemy will have more resources to spare, so a battle, where you lose some, you win some in most of the cases will be a bigger lose for you.

So take your time, don't lose hope and just practice, because the guide is but an addition and it's definitely not a substitute for good ol' practice.

In the beginning play in a passive-agressive manner. Allow the enemies to either chase you hoplessly or engage them in favorable conditions.

If you're given with the opportunity of capturing a castle without suffering a great number of loses, go for it. Once the castle is yours, simply pledge it to the Claimant, this is a good maneuver for two reasons. 1 - The claimant will fill up the castle with a little bit of troops and 2 - The more territory your claimant has, the easier it will be to convince the enemy's vassals to change sides.

If you happen to lose this structure, simply run away and try to take over another castle.

The hit-and-run strategy is the best approach early on, the point is to slowly wear off the adversary's troops and steadily talk the Vassals into joining your cause.

Once you've built some sort of foundation within the enemy's borders, capture a castle for yourself and fill it up with troops to the top. It'd be good if your base's location was of high strategical importance.

Political Warfare

Despite what it seems, the guerilla warfare's really easy to pull-off once you've become accustomed to it.

Technically speaking, during the rebellion you have only a single, actual enemy - The King.

The usurpation will be impossible to perform if most of the enemy's vassals are not on your side.

This is why your contacts, with his Lords are of utmost importance.

Even if it's still a war, and ransacking a village seems like the most brilliant guile of them all, in the long term it will be of no use, what's more it may actually be your doom.

Bottom line: You must keep your contacts with the Lords in a positive light.

As a matter of a fact, the Lords can be persuaded to aid us in our quest.

But were you in their shoes, you wouldn't be so willing to aid a bastard, who has ransacked all of your villages. Would you?

So, I advise you to avoid battles with the Lords as often as possible and just forget about their villages, pretend they do not even exist.

Let us move on to the more technical part, the Art of Persuasion:

Whenever you attempt to enlist a Lord, they will ask a simple, yet most sensible question - Why should they join you?

While trying to fool them with riches, lands and virgins, keep in mind, that after a while they will realize (due to their supernatural telepathic abilities) that you're simply promising everyone what they want to hear. And oh boi, they'll be like: "Are you promising everyone what they want to hear?". So pick a single reason, which you'll utilise in most of the conversations and stick to it. Basically, avoid lying as much as possible. Even though it may work in the beginning, it's just fools gold.

If you engage the enemy King and turn out to be successful, make sure to capture him at all costs, once you've done so, lock him up in tallest tower, of the biggest castle, on the top of the highest hill. This will hinder his Vassal's loyalty by a lot, which will make convicing them far easier.

But keep in mind, that the very act of keeping such an important persona locked up for a longer time, will affect your honour, which may have an effect (a negative one I shall add) upon further

negotiations.

Lordish Way Of Thinking

This may surprise you: The Lords do not refuse to join your for no reason.

But how may you, figure out this cryptic reason?

Well in most of the cases, some common sense and the ability of putting yourself in their shoes is enough.

The ultimate truth is, that they are naturally loyal and disloyal Lords, upon whose shoulders rests your fate. But, if you're capable of figuring out their needs, your chances of convicing them will raise greatly!

Let's have a look at a few exemplary answers:

"I will find myself in a sea of enememies". This one's quite obvious, if they decide to join you, their lands will be surrounded by enemies and more than likely quickly captured by their ex-allies.

Alternatively, it may mean that the Lord has bad contacts with the people (I mean the rest of the Lords) that are currently on your side.

"I think I would be in a better position with my own Liege, than yours". This one's a no-brainer aswell - he either is extremely loyal to his allies and king, or he dislikes your king and your Lords.

The best, long-term strategy of convicing is: "Because X is the rightful heir to the throne". This is the best reponse, since as I've mentioned, once you've tried far too many arguments the Lords will treat you with: Do you perhaps tell everyone what they like to hear?

Here's a more or less accurate system of defining the answers value:

If the Lord talks in a negative manner of you - Very Bad

If the Lord disagrees without any negative comments - Bad

If the Lord agrees without any additions - Good

If the Lord answers with something negative about his presnet King - Very Good

There's also a fifth type of an answer, which is somewhat between negative and neutral.

If he responds with a "How do I know your claim is solid?", it simply means that you haven't changed his viewpoint in any meaningful way.

If they do not respond positively three times, simply tell them to take their time.

Once some time passes, retry.

Also have in mind, that three negative or positive answers do not ensure the outcome.

Like I said, they are some loyal Lords, which will not be subdued even after they've responed positively, and they are Lords, who will change sides even if they've answered only in a neative way. To simplify: it's pretty much random.

+ I've noted that Lords, who have changed their Liege recently, may be less willing to seek new options, than the old dogs.

The Lord's loyalty can be checked, all you have to do is simply send a spy (one of your companions) and once he comes back, simply check your journal for notes, reducing your fellowship's size temporarily for intel is a good, if not a necessary investition.

Source: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=474270279

Claimant's Throne Guide

Claimants

The Fire Rises

Slow And Steady Wins The Race

Political Warfare

Lordish Way Of Thinking

More Mount & Blade: Warband guilds