IILordsof the Realm

CreditsGAME DESIGNER David Lester

with Chris BeatriceSimon BradburyEric Ouellette

PRODUCER Eric Ouellette

PROGRAMMING Simon Bradbury

CREATIVE DIRECTOR Chris Beatrice

ARTISTS Adam CarriuoloHeidi MannMike MaloneScot ForbesDennis Rose

WRITER Todd Capute

MUSIC & SOUND EFFECTS Keith Zizza

AUDIO VIDEO ENGINEER Steve Serafino

QUALITY ASSURANCE

MANAGER Steve Grammont

LEAD TESTER Doug Gonya

QUALITY ASSURANCE Joe McGuireKen ParkerJon PayneEdward Pugsley

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GAME MAPS Doug GonyaEdward PugsleyKen Parker

BATTLE MAPS Edward PugsleyJon Payne

VOICE ACTORS George PielPaul HechtFelix Van DykeJo HadenRichard CooperJulian Halloway

Special thanks to Ken Ford and Steve Serafino.

LORDS OF THE REALM II uses Smacker VideoTechnology. Copyright © 1994 by Invisible, Inc. d.b.a.RAD Software.

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Table of ContentsPart 1: Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .8

Installation and Loading . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .8Getting Started . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .10Game Overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .12Game Time and Interface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .15

Part2: The Realm . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .18The Main Map . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .19The Control Panel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .21The Overview Map . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .22The Menu Bar . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .23

Part 3: County Management . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .24Your People . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .25

Happiness . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .25Population Growth . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .29

Food . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .31Labor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .34

The Labor Allocation Slider Bar . . . . . . .34The Advanced Labor Panel . . . . . . . . . . .37

Agriculture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .39Field Usage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .39Cattle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .42Grain . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .44Industry . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .46Wood Cutting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .47Stone Quarrying . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .47Iron Mining . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .47Blacksmith (weapon making) . . . . . . . . .48 .

Castle Building . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .50Getting Materials . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .50Choosing a Castle Design . . . . . . . . . . . .51Assigning Castle Builders . . . . . . . . . . . .53Altering a Castle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .53The Garrison . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .54Repairing a Castle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .55

Managing Multiple Counties . . . . . . . . . . . . .56The Economy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .58

The Treasury . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .58Merchants . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .59Taxes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .614

Part 4: Armies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .64Creating an Army . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .65

Drafting Citizens . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .65Arming your Soldiers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .67Army Wages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .68Hiring Mercenaries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .69Troop Types . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .70

Armies in the Realm . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .73Moving Armies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .74Combining Armies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .74Splitting an Army . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .75Disbanding an Army . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .75Pillaging . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .75Capturing Counties . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .76Foraging . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .77

Part 5: Battles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .78 Taking Command . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .79

Ordering Units . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .80Unit Size . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .81Battlefield Controls . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .82Peasant Revolts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .85

Part 6: Sieges . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .86Laying Siege . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .87Siege Weapons . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .90Moats . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .92Defending a Castle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .94

Part 7: Diplomacy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .96The Players . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .97Messages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .107Alliances . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .104

Part 8: Advanced Play . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .106Advanced Farming . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .106Exploration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .108Custom Games . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .109Multiplayer Games . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .110

Part 9: Appendix . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .114Strategy Hints and Tips . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .114Customer Service . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .120Technical Tips . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .123Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .132

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There will be Dark Days Ahead...

The year is 1268, and the throne of England sits empty.The lands of England and Wales are ruled by powerfulfeudal nobles who do as they please and answer to noauthority. They wage constant war with their privatearmies and cruelly oppress the lesser folk of the land. Thepeople cry out for a single leader who can unite the landsunder one great and powerful kingdom.

You are that leader. You and you alone have the strengthand the wisdom to build an empire and rule it withhonor and skill. But the road to the throne will be abloody one.

Even as your struggle begins, your enemies are raisingarmies, building massive castles, and swearing alliancesagainst you. A dark and terrible war is ahead.

Can you turn a remote hamlet of fields and forests into athriving community? Can you keep your people healthyand safe? Can you turn a ragged band of peasants into amighty army?

DO YOU HAVE WHAT IT TAKES

TO BE KING?

Only time will tell...

IntroductionWelcome to the Middle Ages! Part I of this manual isdesigned to help the first-time user get started play-ing and enjoying LORDS OF THE REALM II.

Installation and LoadingWindows 95 InstallationStep 1: Place the game CD in your CD-ROM drive.

If the Windows 95 AutoPlay feature is enabled, awindow will appear automatically on your screen.Select �Install LORDS OF THE REALM II� to begin theinstallation. Follow the onscreen instruction to com-plete the installation.

Step 2: If your AutoPlay feature is not enabled, openthe �My Computer� folder on your desktop, andselect the the drive letter that corresponds to yourCD-ROM drive. From the window that appears,double click on the Setup icon. Follow the onscreeninstructions to complete the installation.

The install program will give you several options. Forbest performance, we recommend that you use themedium or maximum installations.

To load the game any time after you have installed it,insert the CD into your CD-ROM drive. If yourAutoPlay feature is enabled, the game will beginautomatically; if not, click on your Start button andselect LORDS II.

You must have the game disc in your CD-ROM drivein order to play.

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Part 1

MS-DOS InstallationThis game cannot be installed and run from Windows3.1. If you have Windows 3.1, you must exit to DOSin order to install and play this game.

Step 1: Exit to the MS-DOS prompt in order toinstall the game. The MS-DOS prompt should looksomething like this C:> or this C:\> ( the letter maybe different if you are using a different drive).

You must exit completely out of any other programsyou may have running, such as Windows or Dosshell.

Step 2: Insert the CD into your CD-ROM drive.

Step 3: Access your CD-ROM drive by typing in theletter designation of the drive, followed by a colon,and then pressing the <Enter> key. If your CD-ROM drive is your �D� drive, for example, type:

D:

and then press <Enter>. At the drive prompt, type

INSTALL

and then press <Enter>. Follow the onscreeninstructions.

By default, the installation program will create adirectory on your hard drive called LORDS2, andplace all necessary game files in that directory.

To load the game after you have installed it, access thedirectory that holds the game files by typing:

CD\LORDS2

and then pressing the <Enter> key. (If you haveinstalled the game to a different directory, access thatone instead.)

To run the game, type:

LORDS 2

and press <Enter>. 9

Getting StartedLORDS OF THE REALM II has an intuitive interfacedesigned to allow you to begin playing quickly andeasily. After you install and load the game, we recom-mend that you consult the LORDS II Getting Startedcard. This will familiarize you with some of thegame�s basic concepts, and allow you to begin man-aging your first county.

Do not expect to master the game right away. Useyour first few games to experiment with different set-tings and strategies, and consult this manual or thegame�s on-line help when you have specific ques-tions.

The game includes several instruction screens thatwill appear automatically and will help you with thegame�s objectives and controls.

When this manual or the on-line instructions tell youto �click on� something, click on it with the leftmouse button unless specifically instructed to use theright mouse button.

In general, left-clicking on an item performs anaction or calls up a panel in which you can perform anaction. Right-clicking on an item either calls up apanel that gives general information about the item,or exits a panel or screen without taking any action.

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HelpIf you have any questions, or if you come acrosssomething you do not understand, help is available inseveral forms.

As you play, instructions will appear automatically onyour screen. (You may turn these off by clicking onTip Screens under the Game Help menu).

There are also Tool Tips which explain many of thegame�s buttons and icons. These Tool Tips appear onthe screen when you hold your mouse pointer over abutton or feature for a moment. (You may turn theballoon help off by clicking on Tool Tips under theGame Help menu).

For more detailed information, consult either thismanual, or the on-line help. Online help is availableunder the Help menu.

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Game Overview The game opens in the year 1268. The King has diedwithout an heir, leaving the throne empty. You areone of several nobles vying for the right to wear thecrown.

Your goal is to eliminate all challengers to the throneso that your rule is uncontested. You begin the gamewith a single county. With its meager resources, youmust build a large following, a successful economyand, ultimately, a powerful army.

First, you must make your county thrive. Increaseyour population by making your people happy.Manage your labor force to produce as much as youcan while providing food for a growing population.

When the time is right, you may build castles todefend your realm and raise armies to march forthand bring other lands under your rule. Your fightingforce must be large and well-equipped�it will do bat-tle on open ground and in bloody castle sieges.

Look after your counties, build castles, raise andcommand powerful armies�these are your tasks. Ifyou can carry them out with skill and ambition youwill overpower your adversaries, and county aftercounty will fall into your hands.

Only then will the glorious crown rest where itbelongs�upon your head!

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Setting Up a GameOnce you load the game, the introduction will begin.In the future, you may skip this sequence by clickingyour mouse.

When the introduction finishes, you will be prompt-ed to choose a single player or a multiple player game(for 2 to 5 people). Click on the appropriate buttonto continue.

If you choose Single Player, a second panel willappear:

� Select Play Now!! to begin a game straightaway with the default game settings.

� Select Load a Game to continue a previouslysaved single-player game. A list of saved gameswill appear. Choose one and continue.

� Select Custom Game to set up a custom game.There are many variations to choose from (seeCustom Games, page 109 for more details).

� Select Back to Start to begin again.

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Whenever you begin a game you will be prompted toenter your name and choose a shield that will be your coatof arms. The shield�s color will serve as your identifyingcolor throughout the game. Enter your name in the box,and click on a shield to select it.

Single Player GamesWhen you play a single playergame, you will compete against asmany as four computer-con-trolled players: the Bishop, theBaron, the Knight, and theCountess. (For profiles on thesecharacters, see the Diplomacy sec-tion of this manual, beginning onpage 96).

Multiple Player GamesWhen you click on theMultiple players button,a Connection Methodwindow will appear.This window lets youchoose a modem or net-work connection to link2 to 5 human players.

Consult the Multiplayer Games section of this manu-al, page 110 for more information.

When you play a multiplayer game with fewer than 4human players, you may decide how many computercontrolled nobles (if any) you will also competeagainst.

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Game Time and Interface Game TimeLORDS OF THE REALM II is both a turn-based and areal time game.

All county management aspects of the game takeplace in a turn-based environment. Each turn repre-sents a season of the year, and as the game progress-es, so will the years. All players will take their turnssimultaneously.

As soon as any battle commences, however, theaction begins to take place in real time. During a bat-tle, you may issue orders while the fight rages, or youmay pause and resume the action as you wish. Botharmies will be able to move and attack at any timewhile the battle is on (see Battles, page 78).

During each seasonal turn, you will tend to the essen-tials of building and managing your realm. There arefive main types of action you may take during anyturn:

1) Manage your counties: This means making sureyour people are well fed and happy, dividing laborbetween food production and industry, monitoringyour treasury funds, buying and selling goods at avisiting merchant�s wagon, sending suppliesbetween your counties, and checking on theprogress of any castles you may be building.

2) Create and dispatch armies: This means draftingpeasants from your population, supplying themwith whatever weapons you have purchased or pro-duced, and sending them off to conquer the coun-ties of your opponents. You may also hire merce-nary armies whenever they are available, providedyou can afford them.

3) Build castles: You should build some kind of acastle as soon as you have enough stone and wood,and enough peasant workers to complete the task 15

in a reasonable amount of time. The number ofturns it takes to build a castle depends on the com-plexity and size of the design you have chosen, thenumber of castle builders you have assigned, andthe availability of materials.

4) Engage in ground battles or sieges: During anyturn, your troops may engage in a battle or castlesiege. More than one battle may be fought in anysingle turn.

An army can either fight a traditional battle onopen ground, or, in an effort to capture a castle, itcan lay siege. During a siege, the attacking armysurrounds an enemy castle and spends several sea-sons constructing siege weapons such as batteringrams and catapults. When the weapons are ready,the battle begins.

5) Engage in Diplomacy: Your relationships withthe other would-be kings will develop as the gameprogresses. You may exchange messages, establishalliances, or foster hostile rivalries with your oppo-nents.

6) End your turn: When your tasks are complete,click on the End Turn button. When all players haveended their turns, merchants, supply wagons, andrebels will move around the map, the screen willdarken momentarily, and the next turn will begin.When the map reveals a new season and the wordsEnd Turn reappear on the button, you may beginyour next turn.

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InterfaceYou may perform most of the game�s functions byclicking on icons, buttons, text, or arrows.

In general, left-clicking on icons on the main mapperforms a function, while right-clicking calls upinformation. You may right-click on features in anycounty to view some general information aboutthem.

The control panel at the right of the game screen con-tains many buttons and other features that allow youto manage your counties or view information.

Up and down arrows, where they appear, will allowyou to set numerical values. Slider bars allow you toallocate people between two types of activity.

Much of the gameplay in LORDS II occurs as youinteract with figures and features on a map. On themain map, the terrain displayed is a partial view of alarger landscape. To move your view, you may scrollusing your mouse pointer.

Scroll around a map by placing your mouse pointerjust over any edge of your computer screen. You mayscroll in any direction: north, south, east, west, ordiagonal in any direction, until you reach the edge ofthe game area.

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The Realm When the game begins, your screen will display aview of the realm and many of its features. The coun-try is divided up into independent counties. At thestart of the game each player controls a single coun-ty. County borders are marked by stone walls.Mountains, woods, and roads also appear on the mainmap.

At the start of the game, there are two types of coun-ties: those controlled by nobles, and those that areindependent. Counties controlled by nobles appearin the noble�s color on the mini map in the upperright corner of the screen. In a multiplayer game, anoble may represent either a human or a computerplayer.

The social center of each county is its county town.The county town will begin as a small settlement witha colored flag indicating its noble (if it has one). Asits population grows, the town will fill up with build-ings. You will be able to get some sense of a county�sprogress by looking at its county town.

As a population grows, villages will also appear out-side of the county town.

Each county also has several other features. Right-clicking on the features on the map will display infor-mation about them.

Every county will have a blacksmith shop, severalfields, and usually one or more industrial sites likelumber mills, quarries, or iron mines. In customgames, you will be able to set many of the conditionsof the starting counties.

Your county and its resources will be the foundationupon which you will build your kingdom.

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Part 2

The Main MapThe main map is where most of the game action takesplace. It shows a zoomed-in view of the realm thatdisplays the essential details of each county: towns,castles, industries, forests, mountains, fields, roads,borders. The main map shows only a portion of theentire realm. To move your view, scroll around byplacing your mouse pointer just over any edge ofyour computer screen.

Your main map view will always determine the select-ed county. The control panel will always displayinformation and control settings relevant to the

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field

mountains

county town road county border

industry(iron mine)

industry(lumber mill)

industry(blacksmith shop)

selected county. If you adjust the labor allocation slid-er bar, for example, you are managing labor for theselected county only.

The selected county is always the county in the cen-ter of your main map view. It is indicated on the minimap by a white highlight around its border. Watch thecounty selection change as you scroll around therealm.

The main map also shows merchant wagons andcounty-to-county transport wagons, as well as thearmies of the various players.

The control panel to the right of the main map iswhere you oversee and manage your counties andaccess other game screens. For more information onthe panel, see County Management (page 24).

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The selected county will always be highlighted on the mini map.

control panel

The Control PanelThe control panel allows you to view reports and takeactions in order to rule your lands.

The mini map in the upper corner shows the entirerealm. Each county a player controls is filled in withthe player�s game color. When you click on a countyin the mini map, the main map will center on thatcounty.

The currently selected county�the one in the centerof the main map�is indicated with a white border onthe mini map.

The buttons to the right of the mini map display var-ious color coded overlays (idle workers, rations, andhappiness) for each county your control. The bottombutton displays the overview map.

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mini map

selected county

county�spopulation

idle serfs overlay

ration overlay

happiness overlay

view overview map

county�s happiness(scale from 1 to 100)

health indicator

county�s ration

county�stax rate

labor allocationslider bar

cattle productionicon

view treasury

current herd size

send supplies

create army end turn

build castle

view diplomacy panel

change in cattleherd next season

addition to lumbersupply next season

The Overview MapThe overview map is a full-screen view of the entirerealm. To view the overview map, click on the buttonwith the magnifying glass to the right of the minimap.

The overview map shows the locations of all mer-chants, armies, supply wagons, castles, and revoltingpeasants. You may access it to watch enemy troopmovements, find merchants, or locate mercenaries.

Click on a county on the overview map to display itsinformation on the control panel.

To return to the main map from the overview map,click on the overview map on the county you wish toview; or select the county you wish you view on themini map and click on the magnifying glass button.

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Click on themagnifyingglass to viewthe overviewmap.

Overview Map

The Menu BarIn addition to your pull-down menus (File, Options,Help), the menu bar will always display the year andseason, and the amount of money in your treasury.The unit of currency is the Crown.

At the beginning of every turn, a row of shields willappear along the menu bar. Each shield represents aplayer in the game (either human or computer-con-trolled). As each player ends his or her turn the cor-responding shield will disappear from the menu bar.

This feature comes in handy during multi-playermodem or network games, as it allows everyone tosee who has finished and who hasn�t.

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Each turn, the shields will disappear as thecorresponding players finish their turns.

Current year and season

Gold crowns inyour treasury

County Management

Much of your time and effort will be devoted to man-aging your lands on the county level. You�ll find thateach county has its own unique resources, features,and problems. If you can master county manage-ment, you will be well on your way to claiming thethrone.

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Part 3

Your PeopleEach county has its own population, made up ofpeasants. (The terms �peasants,� �people,� and�serfs� are used interchangeably in the game andmanual.) Your population consists of everyone who isnot serving in the military.

If you control more than one county, you controlmore than one population, and each requires individ-ual attention.

To manage successfully any population, you mustkeep its people happy. This usually means keepingthem healthy, which means feeding them well. All ofthis requires you to manage with skill the county�slabor pool in order to produce food and industrialgoods.

At the start of the game, a good strategy is to strivefor rapid population growth. Later on, a skilled rulermust learn to manipulate various factors in order tokeep a county�s population at just the right size.

HappinessA high happiness rating is a sign of a healthy popula-tion. A low happiness rating can lead to rioting, and,if left unaddressed, can even get you thrown out of acounty!

The factors that can influence a county�s happinessare taxes, health, military conscription, rations, andevents.

� Taxes are an essential part of government, and youwill need tax money to buy the things you need.Your people can live with a reasonable tax rate, butwill become angry if taxes are too high (see Taxes,page 61). You may have to experiment for sometime before you can find a happy medium.

� Health is expressed as one of five levels: perfect,good, average, sick, and diseased. To see a selected 25

county�s health rating, click on the Rations displayon the control panel to display the Rations panel.A county�s health is also shown on the health indi-cator on the control panel. The colored portion ofthe indicator will be high when health is good, andlow when it is poor.

Health is determined by factors both within andbeyond your control. Do your best to provideNormal rations of food (or more). Half andQuarter rations are likely to cause health to deteri-orate. Plague, an unfortunate random occurrence,kills people and damages the county�s health rat-ing. You have no ability to prevent plague.

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Happiness Report

health indicator

happiness rating

� Conscription, like taxation, is necessary for thewell-being of a county. People will accept someconscription, but will not stand for a leader whodrafts too many of its young men into the military.The more men you conscript, the lower your hap-piness will drop.

If Happiness drops to zero, you may not conscriptany more men. Like taxes, you will have to experi-ment with any given county to determine its toler-ance for conscription.

� Rations will also affect happiness. In addition todetermining health (which will influence happi-ness), rations will affect happiness in their ownright. Low rations will reduce happiness while highrations will improve it. The rations panel will tellyou the anticipated effect of the ration you set.

� Events can also influence happiness. The Eventscategory on the happiness report refers to countytakeovers, which cause severe reductions in happi-ness, and revolts, which will damage happiness aslong as they remain in a county.

To keep your population happy, feed it well and treatit fairly. Your county�s happiness rating, indicated bya number between 0 and 100, is located on the con-trol panel next to the red heart symbol. For a reporton your county�s happiness, click directly on the hap-piness rating display on the control panel.

The Happiness Report charts the selected county�shappiness rating by season. It also lists each factorthat raises or lowers happiness, and the effect eachfactor has had upon the rating since the previous sea-son. If your happiness rating drops, this report willhelp you determine the cause.

You can increase happiness by:

� Providing normal, double or triple rations. Themore food you give your people, the happier theyget. (For information on rations and how theyaffect happiness see Food below.)

� Buying ale. As a special gift to your peasants, youmay purchase ale from any travelling merchant. 27

Keeping yourpeople happywill lead to pop-ulation growth.Happiness ismeasured on arating scale thatranges from 0 to100.

TIP

Ale�s only role is to boost a county�s happiness.Since you cannot produce ale yourself, it is a spe-cial treat for any population, although its effectsare temporary. Buying ale for your people can be anice gesture, and they will appreciate it!

� Keeping taxes low.

� Taking care not to draft too many peasants intomilitary service.

If your population has a high level of happiness, yourpopulation will grow. Conversely, if your populationis unhappy, it is likely to shrink (see PopulationGrowth, below).

An extremely unhappy population may revolt.Revolting peasants roam the countryside and canseriously disrupt a county.

If you let a county�s happiness rating fall too low fortoo long, your peasants will revolt (you will get plen-ty of warning beforehand!). A revolt will remove thecounty from your control, and produce a roving bandof brigands, who will wander the realm looking forfood. A band of revolting brigands will appear on themain map as a figure holding a torch.

Brigands will spread their dissent: happiness will dropin whatever counties they move into.

You may gain back a county that has revolted byrecapturing its county town.

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Population GrowthThe key to a thriving kingdom is a large citizenry. Youshould strive for large populations in the countiesyou control. A large population means more taxincome, greater armies, and a healthy industrial out-put. It also means greater responsibility: the larger apopulation, the more food it demands from you.

A population�s size fluctuates from season to season.Population growth will come in the form of birthsand immigration.

� Births: Births will most likely occur each season.Sometimes a county may experience a spontaneousbaby boom. Human passions being what they are,such occurrences are unpredictable and beyondyour control.

� Immigration: If your people are happy and healthy,word will get around and others will settle in yourlands. Immigrants will move from counties whosehappiness is low to counties where it is high. Thelarger the difference in happiness between neigh-boring counties, the more people will move to thehappier county. Keeping your population happyusually means that immigrants will come. A coun-ty�s location will also affect immigration. A cen-trally located county that borders many others islikely to attract more immigrants than a remoteand isolated county.

� Demobilization: Whenever you disband an army,its soldiers will return home to their county of ori-gin. Their weapons will return to your treasury.

The following factors will cause a county�s popula-tion to shrink:

� Deaths: Death is a natural and unavoidable occur-rence. Deaths will most likely occur each season.You may attempt to minimize deaths by keepinghealth high (i.e. providing normal or high rations).Sometimes factors beyond your control, such asplague, will cause a rash of deaths.

� Emigration: If a population is unhappy, people will 29

population icon

move out of a county to happier lands. If you settaxes too high, if you draft too many into the army,or if your rations are poor, emigration may soar.

� Conscription: Conscription influences populationboth directly and indirectly. Indirectly, a high con-scription rate can make people unhappy, whichmay cause them to emigrate. But conscription alsohas a more direct effect on a county�s population.Once someone is conscripted, he becomes a sol-dier, and is no longer part of the population.

To monitor your fluctuating population, click direct-ly on the population display on your control panel.The Population Report will appear, displaying a graphthat chronicles the seasonal changes in the selectedcounty�s population since the start of the game.

In the beginning of the game, you will want yourpopulation to grow as fast as possible. The bigger acounty�s population, the more workers it will have tobuild weapons and castles, which later on give you adecided edge in battles and sieges. 30

Population Report

FoodYou must do your best to provide enough food foreach of your county populations. You should oftencheck the rations panel for each county you control,and make adjustments if necessary. Your people mayeat dairy produce, beef, or grain.

Feast or Famine?Food management is done primarily through therations panel. Click directly on the ration display onthe Control Panel to access the rations panel. Hereyou may set the amount of the county�s ration toNone, Quarter, Half, Normal, Double, or Triple.

The Achieved listing shows the actual ration level thecounty�s people are receiving. The Achieved rationwill be lower than the Wanted ration if the countydoes not have enough food to supply the ration sizeyou have set.

The slider bar can also influence your achieved ration.If you have no grain, for example, and your bar is allthe way to the grain side, then your achieved rationwill be lower than it could be.

The heart symbols show the effect upon the county�shappiness that the ration level will have over the nextseason. A ration of Normal or above will improvehappiness while half or quarter rations will decreasehappiness. Likewise, average or better health willcause happiness to rise, while sickness and diseasewill cause happiness to fall.

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Food types

dairy

beef

grain

Milk, Beef, or Bread?If a county has cows, then its people will live, at leastpartially, on dairy produce. People will automaticallyeat dairy as it is produced.

Dairy produce cannot be sold or transported, and anyextra dairy will spoil and cannot be saved for futureseasons.

On the Rations Panel, the number beneath the cheesesymbol shows the number of people that can survivesolely on the county�s dairy. As long as this is higherthan your population, you need not worry about thecontent of the county�s diet.

As soon as dairy can no longer support an entire pop-ulation, you will need to supplement its diet with beefand/or grain. This is done through the slider bar onthe Rations Panel. The slider bar balances your pop-ulation�s diet�aside from dairy�between grain andbeef.

At the bottom of the Rations panel, a simple chartlists grain, cattle and dairy produce. The first row32

If dairy does notfeed the entirecounty, slide thefork betweengrain and beef todetermine itsdiet.

people fed bygrain

people fed bydairy

people fed bybeef

cows eatensacks of graineaten

The Ration Panel

shows how many people will be fed by each food itemunder the current settings. The second row showshow many sacks of grain, or how many cows, will beeaten during that season under the current settings.(There is no listing for Eaten under Dairy, because itsconsumption is automatic and it cannot be stored).

Moving the slider bar can affect this chart. Sliding thefigure towards the grain sack, for example, will causemore sacks of grain to be eaten. Sliding the figuretoward the cow will cause more cows to be slaugh-tered for beef.

Notice how the amounts of cattle, grain and dairyproduce eaten and the number of people they feed areaffected by setting the ration and moving the slider.

Transporting FoodGrain and Cattle can be transported from county tocounty. If one county under your rule has an abun-dance of food, while another is going hungry, youmay send a loaded transport wagon to share thewealth.

To send food between counties, select the SendSupplies button on your control panel (see page 57for more details).

33

send suppliesbutton

LaborHistory�s greatest kingdoms were built upon thesweat and toil of the common laborer. A large,healthy, and well-managed work force is vital tosecuring and expanding your realm.

There are two main categories of non-military laborto which you can assign your peasants: agricultureand industry.

Agriculture consists of grain farming, cattle raising,and field reclamation.

Industry consists of woodcutting, stone quarrying,iron mining, weapon making (the blacksmith) andcastle building (and repair).

The Labor Allocation Slider BarThe slider bar on the control panel allows you todivide your workers between agriculture and indus-try. When the figure is directly in the center of the

34

agriculture

# of cows inselected county

# of grain sacksin selected

county

When a production symbol has a blue outline, itstask has too many laborers assigned to it. When asymbol has a red outline, it has too few laborers.

cow productionnext season

industry

lumberproductionnext season

iron productionnext season

bowproductionnext season

sliding figure

bar, the labor force is divided exactly evenly. Click onthe figure and drag it to the right to assign moreworkers to industry, and to the left to assign moreworkers to agriculture.

When you allocate laborers with the slider bar, theirdivision between tasks is automatic. New workerswill be divided equally between operational tasks thatneed them, and tasks that do not need workers willnot receive them.

Remember: workers will only go to operational tasks.Right-click on an industry to check its status; left-click on an industry to change its status.

35

Click directly on aninoperational ironmine to activate it.

If your county does not have an operational ironmine, for example, peasants assigned to industry willnot work on iron mining. If you have no grain toplant, peasants assigned to agriculture do not work ongrain farming.

Imagine, for example, that the only operationalindustrial sites a county has are a lumber mill and aniron mine. This county�s slider bar is set with the fig-ure right in the center, so that half the workers areassigned to industry and half are assigned to agricul-ture. The half that are assigned to industry will bedivided equally among the operational lumber milland iron mine, so that each will employ a quarter ofthe overall workforce.

The county�s blacksmith will get no workers if it isnot operational.

The Colors on the Control PanelWhen a blue outline appears around the figure on theslider bar, this indicates that you have idle workerssomewhere in your labor pool. If you have a largenumber of workers assigned to agriculture, for exam-ple, and only a few fields are active, there will not beenough work for everyone to do. Your extra workerswill sit idle.

When you have idle workers, try adjusting the sliderbar to make the blue outline disappear. If the blueoutline remains, you should consider activating moreindustries or starting new cattle or grain fields. If youhave idle peasants, you might as well put them towork!

The production symbols below the slider bar will beoutlined in red if there is insufficient labor allocatedto the corresponding task. If your cattle productionsymbol has a red outline, for example, allocate moreworkers to cattle farming.

If a production symbol is outlined in blue, on theother hand, this means that too many workers areassigned to the corresponding task. If a county�sblacksmith symbol has a blue outline, this means thatthere are more workers at the blacksmith than need-ed. The extras are idle. When a red outline appearsaround a production symbol, allocate the extra work-ers to another task.

36

The blue outline indicates idle laborers somewherein the selected county.

The Advanced Labor PanelWhen you adjust labor with the slider bar, the work-ers will take it upon themselves to split up into eachoperational task.

You may accept the default labor allocation, or youmay wish to take a more hands-on managementapproach, and change it. If you have a castle underconstruction, for example, and you want to finish itquickly, you may take workers from wood cuttingand send them to the construction site to hasten thecastle project.

To do so, click directly on a county�s county-town.This accesses the county�s labor panel. You neverhave to use this panel, but it is available to playerswho want a real hands-on management experience.

Each section of the labor panel represents a task. Thefigures within the task areas represent peasants atwork.

37

cattlefarming

idlepeasants

castlebuilding

grainfarming

stonequarrying

field reclamation

weaponmaking

woodcutting

Advanced Labor Management

To shift workers from project to project, simply holdyour mouse button down and drag a rectangularframe around one or more workers. When yourelease the mouse button, the figures will stand atattention. Click on the area to which you would likethem to move.

You may use the labor panel to shift workers fromone agricultural pursuit to another, from one indus-try to another, or between agriculture and industry.When you move laborers from agriculture to indus-try (or vice versa), notice that the slider bar adjustsitself accordingly.

If you have too many peasants assigned to a task, theextra ones will become idle. Idle peasants will appearas sitting and resting figures, either in the over-staffed task area or in the Idle Townsfolk area in thecenter of the labor panel.

Double-clicking on the center of the labor panelautomatically allocates idle peasants to areas that areunderstaffed, and brings any extra idle peasants intothe center where you can keep track of them.

If any task does not have enough workers to meet itsminimum labor needs, dark shadowy figures willappear in the task area on the labor panel. If possible,allocate workers to the understaffed task so that theshadows disappear.

38

Double click onthe center of theAdvanced LaborPanel. Thisautomaticallyallocates idlepeasants tounderstaffedtasks, and bringsany extras intothe middle.

TIP

AgricultureIn LORDS II there are two types of agriculture: grainand cattle. You may buy grain and cattle from travel-ling merchants (see Merchants, page 59).

When you have cows or grain you may either raisethem or feed them directly to your people. Increasingyour agricultural output will allow you to feed agrowing population. You may also sell extra grain andcows to merchants, which can be profitable.

Allocating agricultural labor is discussed in the Laborsection of this manual (see page 34). Feeding yourpeople is discussed on page 31.

Field UsageGrain and cattle are raised on a county�s fields. Fieldsvary in number from county to county and can beallocated to different uses. Any field can be assignedto any use, as long as it is not barren or damaged.

39

To assign a use to a field, click directly on the field. Thisbrings up the field usage panel. The symbol at the top ofthe panel indicates the current status or usage of theselected field. The buttons along the bottom show allpossible field uses. Click on a button to assign a newusage.

currentfield use

assign fieldto grain

assign fieldto cattle

Right click to exit without making a change. Be care-ful not to change accidentally an active grain field. Ifyou do, your crops will be destroyed!

A field�s use, or status, may be any one of the follow-ing:

� Fallow: A fallow field is one that is fertile and canbe allocated to grain or cattle farming. (With theAdvanced Farming option activated, fallow fieldsare necessary to maintain fertility, see page 106).

� Barren: A barren field is infertile and unsuitable foruse. You will not be able to raise or plant anythingon a barren field until you reclaim it and make itfallow. Field reclamation is hard work, and requiresmany peasants over several seasons.

� Grain: Grain fields look different from season toseason as grain is sown, grown and harvested. Youwill have no active grain fields at the beginning of agame. You must buy grain from a merchant, thenallocate fallow fields to grain growing.

� Cattle: A cattle field is a grassy meadow with cattlegrazing on it. The appearance of cows on a fieldindicates that the field is currently assigned to cat-tle use. If a county has no cows, a field assigned tocattle will appear empty, but it will accommodatecows as soon as they are purchased or arrive bytransport. The number of cows on a field reflectsthe field�s crowding condition (see Cattle, page42).

� Parched or Flooded: Occasionally, a drought or aflood will damage a usable field. Such events areunfortunate and expensive, but unavoidable. Youcannot reclaim a weather-damaged field immedi-ately, but after a single season its status will changeto barren and you may set peasants to work toreclaim it.

40

Reclaiming Barren FieldsBarren fields are reclaimed over several seasons. Toreclaim a barren field, click on the field, and thenselect the farmer symbol from the panel that appears.In order to reclaim a field, you must have at least onepeasant assigned to field reclamation.

For each field undergoing reclamation, a hoeing fig-ure will appear on your control panel. Click on thefigure to see a report on the field reclamation project.

To speed the project up, assign more peasants toreclamation duty (although you will never be able toreclaim more than a quarter of a field in a single sea-son). You will be able to watch as the field isreclaimed gradually with the passing seasons.

41

Click on any field for a complete report on its statusand productivity.

CattleYou will begin each game with some cattle, which youwill see grazing in your county fields on the mainmap.

A cow figure on the main map does not represent asingle cow, or even a specific number of cows. Rather,it indicates that the field has been assigned to cattlefarming. As long as a county has at least one cow inits possession, a cow figure will appear in each fieldthat is assigned to cattle farming. If the county has nocows, a field assigned to cattle farming will appearempty.

In addition, the number of cow figures in each fieldshows the overall herd crowding conditions in thatcounty. One cow figure represents low crowding,two figures represent some crowding, and three rep-resent overcrowding. Overcrowding can harm theproductivity of your herd�your cows need space tograze. Whenever you have overcrowding, allocate anew fallow field to cattle farming if you can.

42

low herd crowding

medium herd crowding

high herd crowding

A county may do four things with its cows: it canraise them in its fields, eating the dairy products theyproduce each season; it can slaughter and eat them; itcan transport them to other counties; or it can sellthem to travelling merchants.

In order to raise cattle, a county must have at leastone field assigned to cattle farming, some peopleworking on cattle farming, and some cows.

Bovine Nutrition: Dairy and BeefCattle provide two sources of food: dairy productsand beef.

Dairy produce is a valuable food source. As long as acounty has cows, they will produce cheese, milk, andother dairy products which will automatically feedsome, or all, of your people. Your population willonly need to eat beef or grain after the season�s dairyproduce has been consumed. If your dairy output canfeed your entire population, you need not worryabout food allocation at all, because no grain or beefwill be eaten (see Milk, Beef, or Bead, page 32).

If you provide enough workers to tend to your cattleand do not slaughter and eat too much of your herd,it will increase in size. The more cows you have, themore dairy produce you will get.

But don�t forget: as your herds grow, you may needmore laborers and additional cattle fields to accom-modate them.

Whenever a county receives cattle or grain, remember toallocate a field or fields for grazing or planting. Be sureto remember this when you transport food from countyto county!

43

GrainAt the start of the game, your county will not haveany grain. If you choose to buy grain, you may eitherplant it or feed it directly to your peasants.

In order to grow grain, you must first buy it from amerchant. After buying the grain, allocate at least onefield to grain growing and save enough to plant in thewinter. Then assign workers to grain farming.

Up to 5 sacks of grain can be planted in one field,provided you have enough laborers. The more grainfields you plant, the more workers you�ll need to allo-cate to grain farming.

To raise grain:

� Buy grain from a merchant.

� In winter, assign one or more fields to grain(one field plants five sacks of grain).

� Make sure you have laborers assigned to grainfarming.

Grain will always be planted during the periodbetween the winter and spring turns, and it willalways be harvested in the period between the fall andwinter turns.

For each sack of grain you plant, you will harvestmany more sacks, provided you have adequate fieldsand labor. Grain can be an efficient food source and avaluable commodity.

When the Advanced Farming option is turned on,grain will have different labor demands in differentseasons (see Advanced Farming, page 106).

44

The fall is when your workersharvest the year�s grain. Makesure you have enough grain work-ers to reap the maximum amount

of grain. The grain you reap will become available toyou after you end your fall turn. The following winteryou should see the year�s work yield a nice return.

Winter is when you need todecide how many fields you wantto assign to grain for the comingyear. Base this decision on how

many sacks of grain you have (up to five are plantedper field), and how many grain laborers you have.Grain is sown during the period between the winterand spring turns. Think of this period as both the endof winter and the start of spring.

The Grain Planting CycleAs long as you have done all of the above, grain willbe planted at the beginning of the following spring.You will see your active grain fields change in appear-ance as the planting cycle progresses.

45

In spring you will see that yourfields have been sown. The grainis just beginning to appear.

In summer the grain continues togrow into full stalks.

Winter

Spring

Summer

Fall

IndustryThe term �Industry� refers to:

Wood CuttingStone QuarryingIron Mining Blacksmith (weapon making)Castle Building

A county may not have the resources required for allindustrial pursuits, though. A county with no quarry,for example, may not produce stone.

You may activate or deactivate each industry in acounty by clicking on it. When you do so, a panel willappear, informing you whether you have switched theindustry on or off.

When you adjust labor with the slider bar, those youassign to industry will be automatically dividedbetween the industries you have activated in thecounty.

When an industry is active (or operational), its sitewill animate and a symbol representing it will appearbelow the slider bar on your control panel. When anindustry is producing, a number will appear alongwith the icon, showing the production that will occurover the following season. Click on any productionsymbol to access additional information about itsindustry.

Wood, stone, iron, and weapons may be used in anycounty regardless of where they have been producedor purchased. You will never have to transport theseitems between counties.

46

Wood CuttingWood cutting takes place at a county�s lumber mill.When a lumber mill is operational and has workersassigned to it, it will produce lumber.

When a selected county has an active lumber mill, alumber symbol will appear on the control panel. Thenumber alongside it indicates the amount of woodthat will be produced over the next season under thecurrent labor setting.

To see how much wood you have at any time, click onthe treasury button. To make any kind of weapon, orbuild any style of castle, you will need some quantityof wood.

Stone QuarryingStone can be produced in counties that have opera-tional, staffed quarries. When a selected county hasan operational and productive quarry, the stone sym-bol on the control panel shows the number of tonnesof stone that will be produced over the next season.

The only use for stone (besides selling it to mer-chants) is in castle building. All castle designs requiresome quantity of stone.

To see how much stone you have at any time, click onthe treasury button.

Iron MiningIron can be produced in any county that has an ironmine. When a selected county has an operational andproductive mine, the iron symbol in the control panelwill show the number of tonnes of iron that will beproduced next season under the current labor setting.

Iron is used by the blacksmith to produce weapons.All weapons, except the bow, require some quantityof iron. 47

lumber mill

quarry

iron mine

Blacksmith (Weapon Making)

Every county on the map will have a blacksmith shopwhere weapons may be produced. An operational,staffed blacksmith will produce the weapon of yourchoice. Each county may only produce one type ofweapon at a time.

The output of the blacksmith shop will depend uponthe number of laborers working there and the mate-rials (wood and iron) available to them.

When a blacksmith shop is operational and staffed,the symbol that appears on the control panel showsthe weapon being produced, as well as how many willbe produced over the next season under the currentlabor setting.

To go the blacksmith shop, click directly on theweapon symbol on the control panel (or click on theblacksmith on the advanced labor panel).

blacksmith

48 materials needed toproduce 1 weapon.

weapons producednext season

weapon beingproduced

In the blacksmith shop, you will see a number ofweapons hanging on or leaning against the walls. Thecurrently produced weapon lies on the table in theforeground.

To change the weapon being produced, find theweapon on the wall and click on it. The new weaponwill appear on the table in the foreground.

The panel at the bottom of the screen tells you howmany blacksmiths are working and how many of theselected weapon they will produce next season.

There is also a small box showing how much woodand/or iron is required to produce a single one of theselected weapon. You will only be able to produce asmany weapons as you have materials for.

Once you have the required materials to make theweapon, you must make sure you have laborersemployed at the blacksmith.

As long as your blacksmith shop has the requiredmaterials and sufficient laborers, it will produce theselected weapon each season.

You may choose a weapon for which you do not havethe required amounts of wood and/or iron. Yourworkers will begin producing it as soon as you collectthese materials.

Castle BuildingCastle building (and alteration) works much likeweapon production: you must select a project, obtainthe required materials, and assign a construction staff.

For more detailed information about castles, readon...

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castle underconstruction

In an age of violent conquest, nothing can ensure acounty�s protection like a strong and imposing castle.

As Edward I learned, a castle provides not only apowerful stronghold against armed enemies, it alsostands as a symbol of a leader�s authority and might.

Each county may have only one castle at a time, butthere are several types of castles, ranging from a mod-est Wooden Palisade to an opulent and forebodingRoyal Castle.

To build a castle you must decide on a design, acquirethe needed materials, and then assign laborers to thetask. It may take many seasons to complete a castle.

Getting MaterialsCastles are built from wood and stone. You can buythese materials from a merchant, or you may producethem yourself (if your county has the resources). Ifyou control more than one county, the materials theyproduce will be shared. (For information about woodand stone production, see Industry, page 46.)

When you choose a castle design (see below), youwill see how many units of stone and wood the designdemands.

You may begin the construction before you have allthe required wood and stone. As you collect thesematerials, they will automatically be sent to the castlesite until the required amounts have been used.(Wood will be shared with blacksmiths if you are alsoproducing weapons.) 50

Castle Building

Build a modestcastle as soon asyou have therequired materi-als and labor.Then upgradewhen yourwealth increases.

TIP

Choosing a Castle DesignWhen you�re ready to build a new castle in a county,make sure the county is selected, click on the BuildCastle button on your control panel.

Note: If the selected county already has a castle, youmay only alter the existing castle�you may not build asecond one.

This brings you to the castle design screen. Picturedat the bottom of the screen, from the simplest at leftto the most complex at right, are the five castledesigns in the game:

� Wooden Palisade� Motte and Bailey� Norman Keep� Stone Castle� Royal Castle

51Wooden Palisade

Motte and Bailey

build castlebutton

Norman Keep

Stone Castle

Royal Castle

Choose the design you want by clicking on one ofthe castles pictured. One good strategy is to startwith a simple design and improve upon it as resourcesbecome available. If you put off building a castle untilyou have enough workers and materials for a complexdesign, your county will be without a castle for years,and thus vulnerable to attack.

The scroll at the top right names the castle design youhave selected. It also shows how many units of stoneand/or wood are needed to build it.

Beneath the materials listing is an entry describinghow long it will take to build the selected design. Ifyou have any laborers assigned to castle building, thisdisplay will show you how long it will take that num-ber of laborers to complete the construction. If youhave no laborers assigned to castle building, this dis-play shows the completion time based on a minimumrecommended number of workers.

Once you have chosen a design, click on the thumbsup gauntlet to begin the project and return to themain map. There you will see the castle under con-struction in your county.

While construction is going on, the control panel willdisplay a castle symbol. The accompanying numberindicates how many seasons remain until the castle iscomplete under the current labor setting.

Right-click on the castle itself for a report on howmany builders are at work, how many seasons theproject has to go, and how many tonnes of wood andstone (if any) the builders still need.

To speed the construction of a castle, allocate moreworkers to the construction project.

At the beginning of your turn following completionof the castle, you will receive a message that a castlehas been built in your county.

52

While a castle isunder construc-tion, a symbol willappear on yourcontrol paneltelling you howmany seasons theproject will take.

Assigning Castle BuildersAs soon as you approve a castle design, a portion ofthe peasants assigned to industry will automaticallybegin working on castle building. If you have too fewbuilders to complete the castle within a reasonableamount of time, you may take some peasants awayfrom other industries and assign them to castle build-ing (see page 37).

Remember to maintain a balance in your labor force.Don�t, for instance, assign all your woodcutters tocastle building if you still need wood to build the cas-tle.

Once the castle is complete, the castle builders willautomatically be distributed among the county�sother operational industries; or, if all the other indus-tries are fully staffed, they will become idle towns-folk.

Altering a CastleYou may alter a castle in any county by upgrading ordowngrading it. To alter the castle of a selected coun-ty, click on the Build Castle button on your controlpanel to access the castle design screen. Select a newcastle design.

Upgrading a castle will require labor, materials andtime. Downgrading a castle will also require labor andtime. Depending on the previous castle design, adowngrade may free up some materials, or it mayrequire other additional materials. Going from aNorman Keep, for example, to a Motte and Bailey, willrequire wood, but will yield extra stone when theproject is finished.

53

The GarrisonA garrison is an army that resides in and defends acastle. A new castle will automatically include a garri-son. Its size will vary according to the size of the cas-tle, its soldiers are subtracted from the county popu-lation, and its weapon costs are covered by the cost ofthe castle.

Archers are good at defending castle walls, but youmay want to supplement the automatic garrison withsome hand-to-hand units like pikemen and swords-men. In case of a breach, you will need someone totake on the invaders at close range.

The capacity of each castle varies with its size: aWooden Palisade can hold far fewer men, for example,than a Royal Castle. Right-click on a completed castleto display its troop capacity.

54

To garrison a castle, march an army right into the cas-tle. While a castle is garrisoned, a flag of the player�scolor will fly over it. To review the garrison, right-click directly on the castle.

You are not required to garrison the castle with thelargest army it can hold. If one of your opponents ispreparing to lay siege, however, you might want to fillit to capacity.

The best type of soldiers to place in a castle arearchers and crossbowmen. Shooting arrows fromhigh atop castle walls, these units are very effectiveagainst attackers.

Repairing a CastleCastles will commonly need repair after a siege. Afteryou win a castle by siege, it will be yours to repair.Remember this as you crash through walls and gates!

If you fail to repair a castle, its damage will remainand may allow the castle to be easily breached in thenext siege.

Right click on a castle to see its information panel. Ifthe castle needs repair, this panel will tell you whatmaterials are required, and will estimate how long itwill take a crew to complete the job.

As soon as you have the required materials and haveallocated laborer, the repairs will begin. To repair acastle, allocate laborers to castle building just as youwould for a new castle project.

While a castle repair is underway, a castle symbol willappear on your control panel accompanied by thenumber of seasons it will take the current crew to fin-ish the repair. The more workers you assign to thejob, the faster it will be completed.

Note: Castle repairs will not happen in stages. Onlywhen the repair is 100 percent finished will you seeany improvement.

55

Managing MultipleCountiesYour goal in LORDS OF THE REALM II is to conquerall of your opponents so that your rule is uncontest-ed. To do this, you must capture multiple countiesand bring them under your rule.

Each new county will present a new challenge to youradministrative skills. The more counties you conquer,the more counties you must manage. Some of yourcounties may thrive, while others may founder.

Recently conquered populations will often requirespecial attention. After all, you have just seized theircounty by defeating their soldiers on the battlefield.They can be forgiven for mistrusting you. Your chal-lenge is to convince them that your conquest is fortheir own good!

The overview map at the top of the control panelallows you to move easily from one to another. Thecounties you control will be shown in your color.

Your counties share a common supply of gold, wood,iron, stone and weapons. Once any quantity of theseitems is produced or acquired by one county, it isautomatically accessible to all others in your realm.Click on the Treasury button to check your stores ofall these items.

Food, on the other hand, is always grown, produced,or purchased in a specific county. You may send grainor cattle from one county to another with the SendSupplies button. Otherwise, food will always remainin the county of its purchase or production.

The counties you control must be contiguous, i.e.they must all be contained within a common border.If your realm is split into two non-connected bodies,you will immediately lose the weaker one! In thegame�s advanced stages, this becomes a key strategicelement. If you can divide an opponent�s realm byseizing a single county, you will deal a serious blow.56

The mini mapcomes in handywhen you havemultiple coun-ties. Click on itto jump fromcounty to countyand use theoverlays tomonitor variousconditions inyour realm.

TIP

Transporting GoodsThe only goods you may transport from one countyto another are grain and cows. To transport goodsfrom one county to another, click on the SendSupplies button at the bottom of the control panel.The transport panel will appear.

The origin of the shipment will always be the countythat is selected at the time you open the transportpanel. The transport panel displays a small map of thekingdom, with the county of origin highlighted.

Select the county to receive the goods by clicking onit on the small kingdom map. You may only sendgoods to counties you control. The receiving coun-ty�s name will appear on the transport panel.

Use the right and left arrows to set the quantity ofgrain and/or cows you would like to send. (Dairyproducts cannot be transported due to their tenden-cy to spoil.) To dispatch the shipment, click on thethumbs up gauntlet.

The shipment will take a few seasons, depending onthe distance it must travel, to reach its destination.

Consider your transport�s path and the locations ofenemy armies. Supply carts can be destroyed!

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send suppliesbutton

Use the arrowsto move goodsfrom one coun-ty to another.

The EconomyYour ultimate goal�to eliminate all rival claimants tothe throne�can only be accomplished with large,powerful armies. To support such armies, you willneed to cultivate a strong economy based on trade,taxes, agriculture, and industry.

The TreasuryThe treasury lists the TOTAL amount of gold, iron,stone, wood and weaponry for ALL of your counties.To view the treasury, click on the Treasury button onthe control panel. No matter how many counties youcontrol, they all share one treasury and all the itemsin it. When one of your counties produces or buysstone, for example, the stone immediately becomesavailable to all the other counties in your realm.

58

Be sure to keep a close eye on how much gold yourtreasury contains. You must spend within yourmeans. Consult the treasury before beginning a cas-tle construction to see how much wood and stoneyou have, or before raising an army to see what typesof weaponry you have.

The treasury panel also includes the button thataccesses the Best Noble report.

treasurybutton

MerchantsTrade may be conducted only when a merchant ispresent in a county. Merchant wagons are always vis-ible on the main map. Merchants will generally travelfrom county to county on a set course. The frequen-cy of their visits can vary from county to county � acentrally located county may host a visiting merchantalmost every season, while a remote county willreceive infrequent visits. As the seasons progress, youwill get to know the routes of the various merchants,and this will help you plan ahead.

When a county does not have enough food, resourcesor weapons, you may buy these items from a mer-chant. You may also sell these items to a merchant ifyou have extra, or need to raise money.

To go to the marketplace, click on a merchant wagonin any county you control.

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merchantwagon

cows ale grain wood pikes

iron

stone

maces swords bows crossbows knight�s mail

When you rest the mouse pointer on the items in themarketplace screen, a small scroll will appear, namingthe item and showing two numbers (such as 30/60).

The left number is the selling price, in crowns, of theitem, or the amount you will get if you sell a unit ofthat item to the merchant.

The right number is the buying price � the amountyou will pay for each unit of the item that you buyfrom the merchant. Most merchants are tough busi-nessmen, and you�ll notice a large difference betweenbuying and selling prices!

To buy or sell an item, click on it on the marketplacescreen. A panel will appear, with up and down arrowsthat allow you to buy and sell goods. The right set ofarrows sets the maximum possible purchase or sale,while the left set allows you to change the quantityone unit at a time.

The panel also tells you the unit price of the selecteditem, how many crowns your treasury has, and yourgain or loss as a result of the transaction.

Click on the up arrow to buy, or click on the downarrow to sell.

Select the thumbs up gauntlet to complete the trans-action. Select the thumbs down gauntlet (or rightclick) to exit the panel without making a transaction.

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Use the uparrow to buy,and the downarrow to sell.

TaxesTaxes are a dual edged sword for any ruler. On onehand, they fill your coffers with much-needed gold tofund castle construction, army building, and otheressentials. On the other hand, if you raise taxes toohigh your people will object. Their happiness ratingwill drop, and they may ultimately overthrow yourrule (see Happiness, page 25).

The tax rate of the selected county is displayed on thecontrol panel beneath the population tally. Eachcounty can have a different tax rate but all taxes gointo your single central treasury.

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Click on the taxrate to accessthe tax panel.

A county�s tax rate is expressed as a percentage ofeach person�s income that is handed over to your gov-ernment each season. The size of a population, com-bined with the tax rate, determines your seasonal taxrevenues.

To adjust a county�s tax rate, click directly on the taxrate display on the control panel. The tax panel willappear. Click on the up or down arrows to raise orlower the tax rate. Notice how happiness goes up astaxes go down (and vice versa). The number next tothe words �People Pay� is the number of crowns thatyou will collect from that county in the next season,based on the rate that is currently set.

Note that taxes are collected at the end of the season,prior to any population changes that will appear whenthe next season begins. So, the People Pay number willbe accurate.

There will be some communication between all ofyour counties, so if you set taxes outrageously high inone county, this will damage the happiness ratings of

Word getsaround: If youset the tax rateoutrageouslyhigh in onecounty, happi-ness will drop inALL of yourcounties!

TIP

all your other counties. The tax panel for each coun-ty will display the effect of that counties tax rate (ifany) on all your other counties.

The condition of a county should help you determineits tax rate. If your population is very unhappy, youmay want to avoid taxing it at all. Revolts can be cost-ly! If your population is happy, perhaps you canafford to set very high taxes, as long as you don�t dotoo much damage to its state of general merriment.

When a county�s happiness rating hits zero, you cannot increase its tax rate at all.

Castles and Tax RevenuesWhether or not a county has a castle�and the size ofthe castle if it does have one�will also affect yourtax revenues. Castles attract wealth, so a county witha castle will have greater wealth than one withoutone. Therefore when you build a new castle in a coun-ty, your tax revenues will increase, even if the tax rateyou set remains the same.

Likewise, improving an existing castle will furtherboost your tax revenues, while downgrading a castlewill cause tax revenues to fall.

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Winning the GameTo win the game, you must completely eliminateevery other noble who is vying for the crown. Thisincludes both human and computer controllednobles. Victory in LORDS II requires complete anni-hilation of all who challenge your rule. As long as anycompetitor still has a single county or army in pos-session, your victory is incomplete.

You may check your status relative to the other play-ers in several categories by consulting the Best Noblereport. This report compares each player�s statuswith regard to: number of counties, number of cas-tles, number of troops, number of gold crowns, hap-piest people, number of people, and an overall rating,greatest noble, which takes all these factors into con-sideration.

Access the Best Noble report through the treasurypanel.

63Best Noble Report

ArmiesNo ruler can wear the crown without first building,organizing, and commanding powerful armies.

You may create many armies in the course of a game.Each army is composed of various types of soldiers,armed with weapons you buy or produce, and eachmay travel independently of one another, to fight andconquer as you command.

There are two main classes of soldiery in LORDS II:citizen solders and mercenaries. Mercenaries are sol-diers for hire, who travel the land and fight forwhomever will pay them. They tend to be skilled pro-fessionals but they are costly to hire and maintain.You may find yourself unable to afford them untilafter you have ruled for several years.

A citizen army, on the other hand, comes from theranks of the people themselves. The cheapest kind ofsoldier is the simple peasant soldier, armed only withwhatever �weapon� he can find on the farm. Or youmay arm your citizen soldiers with swords, pikes, andother weapons which will improve their performanceconsiderably.

You raise a citizen army through conscription(forcible service). Conscripting peasants can reducehappiness: your people realize it is necessary, but theywill become angry if you conscript too many.

Mercenaries will come to your county occasionally tooffer their services, and you may hire them when youcan afford them.

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Part 4

Creating an ArmyDrafting CitizensTo create an army, click on the Create an Army but-ton on the control panel. The armory will appear. Thepanel in the middle of the armory contains a slider barwhich you may use to choose the number of citizensyou want to draft into your next army.

The slider bar shifts your population between civilianservice and conscription into the army you are aboutto raise.

Once part of an army, citizens cease to be countedamong your population. Only those not conscriptedwill be available for the non-military work pool ofagricultural and industrial labor.

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Create an Armybutton

slider bar conscription into next army effect on happiness

available weapons

The slider bar is your way of determining what pro-portion of the population you will conscript (thenumbers on either side of the bar will equal your cur-rent population). Slide the figure toward the soldierto raise conscription; slide it toward the farmer tolower it.

Just moving the bar does not actually conscript any-one, it just sets the percentage of people you will con-script. Once you have determined the size of thearmy you want to conscript, click on Continue.

The conscription panel also displays:

� The change in happiness resulting from the con-scription level you set. The higher the percentage,the lower your happiness will fall. You may notconscript a number that will cause happiness todrop below zero�beyond a certain point, peas-ants will simply refuse to take up arms!

� The number of mercenaries (if any) in the county,and the hiring price they demand. If you do nothave sufficient gold in your treasury to hire them,the panel will tell you so.

� The number of each type of weapon currently inyour armory. If you have 20 swords, the army maynot include more than 20 swordsmen.

Clicking on the Continue button confirms the size ofthe army you are raising. You may then determine themakeup of the army by arming your soldiers.

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Arming Your SoldiersAfter you have determined the portion of your pop-ulation to conscript, you may arm your soldiers withswords, pikes, and other weapons.

An army must have at least 50 soldiers in it. It mayinclude a mix of several types of soldier: peasant sol-diers, macemen, pikemen, archers, crossbowmen,swordsmen, and knights. To raise non-peasant sol-diers, your armory must contain weapons.

The figures at the bottom of the screen (and theweapons visible in the armory) show the types of sol-diers you may raise. The weapons you possess hangon the armory wall. If swords are visible, you mayraise swordsmen; if pikes are visible, you may raisepikemen, and so on. The number next to each figureshows the number of that type of soldier currently inthe army.

67units you may raise, and number currently in army

raise swordsmen

To arm your soldiers, click on the figures at the bot-tom of the screen (or click directly on the weapons inthe armory). A panel will appear, telling you the num-ber of the selected soldier currently in the army, andthe maximum number you may raise. Use the up anddown arrows to set the desired number, and thenclick on the corner arrow to close the panel. Thenumber you have set will appear next to the corre-sponding figure at the bottom of the armory screen.

When you approve of the army composition shownat the bottom of the armory screen, click on theCreate button to create the army.

If you are unsatisfied with the size or composition ofyour army and wish to start over, click on the Changebutton to return to the conscription slider bar.

If you change your mind and decide not to create anarmy at all, click on the Cancel button (or right click)to return to the main map.

Army WagesYour citizens soldiers demand wages. If you do notpay your army wages, your soldiers will desert andyou will lose them. You may consult your Treasury atany time to see the total army wages you must payeach season.

To see the wages of any specific army, right click onthat army on the main map.

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Hiring MercenariesMercenaries are �soldiers of fortune� who travel fromcounty to county offering their services to any lordwho will pay their wages.

Mercenaries are skilled warriors and as such they canbe expensive. They come with their own weapons,though, and hiring them will not reduce a county�shappiness or population like conscription does.

When you see a mercenary icon on top of one of yourcounty towns on the main map, a mercenary army ispresent in your county.

When there is a mercenary army in your county youmay find out more about it by going to the armory.The panel in the middle of the screen displays thenumber and type of the mercenaries, what it will costto hire them, and their seasonal wages.

If you have enough crowns to hire the mercenaries,the panel will ask you whether or not you wish to hirethem. If you click on Yes, the mercenaries will beadded to the corresponding unit type in the stonepanel at the bottom of the screen. Their wages will bededucted automatically from your treasury, and willcontinue to be deducted for every season you employthem.

You may not combine two armies that both containmercenaries. Most mercenary clans have foughtagainst each other in the past, and as a result they donot get along!

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Peasant SoldiersPeasant soldiers are the most basic, most ill-equippedtroop type in an army, but they can be useful.Peasants soldiers carry only their own pitchforks asweapons, so they cost no crowns to raise and arm.

Peasants can move at medium speed around the bat-tlefield, and they have a minimal ability to attack anddefend. They wear no armor, so they are more vul-nerable to ranged attacks by bow and crossbow thanunits wearing armor.

MacemenMacemen carry large and heavy warclubs with spikedheads. Macemen wear light armor and can movequickly across the battlefield (second only to knightsin speed). Cheaper and faster than swordsmen, mace-men are good attackers but weak defenders and arevulnerable to ranged attacks. Mace productionrequires both iron and wood.

Macemen are ideal for chasing down archers andcrossbowmen. They are also very effective againstpeasants.

PikemenBecause of their heavy and cumbersome weapons,pikemen move very slowly on the field. Their lightmail protects them somewhat from ranged attacks.Their hand-to-hand attack value is less than that ofmacemen, swordsmen, and knights, but their hand-to-hand defense value is relatively high. Pikes are lessexpensive than crossbows, swords, and knight�sequipment, but a bit more expensive than maces. Pikeproduction requires iron and wood.

Pikemen are best used to defend archers and cross-bowmen. 70

ArchersArchers and crossbowmen arethe only units capable ofranged attacks. Archers wearno armor and are moderatelyfast on the field. They are notwell suited to hand-to-handcombat, as their real value is inthe ranged attack. Archers havea greater range than crossbow-men, and they can fire morerapidly. Each shot from anarcher�s longbow, however, is not as powerful as onefrom a crossbow. Bow production requires no iron,but quite a bit of wood.

Archers are not well suited for attacking units thatwear armor. They are very effective against peasants,macemen, and archers. Against swordsmen andknights, archers are nearly useless.

CrossbowmenUnlike archers, crossbowmen wear light armor. As aresult they will better withstand ranged attacks.Crossbowmen are poor hand-to-hand combatantsbut they have better close range defensive ability thanarchers. Shots from a crossbow will do more damagethan those from a longbow, but crossbowmen take alonger time to reload, so their rate of fire is lower.Crossbows are among the more expensive weaponsto purchase or produce. Crossbow productionrequires both wood and iron.

Crossbows are very effective against units wearingarmor. (Against peasants or macemen, archers are abetter value.) Crossbowmen can also be very effec-tive against siege weapons.

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SwordsmenSwordsmen wear full chain mail and helmets, andthey carry swords and shields. These are your elitefighters, chosen from among your strongest citizens.They move reasonably well and are deadly hand-to-hand fighters. Their armor and weapons make themgood at both attacking and defending at close range,and they stand up pretty well to archer attacks. Swordproduction requires much iron and some wood.

KnightsKnights are the most powerful and most expensiveclose-range fighters. They wear heavy plate mail andcarry swords and shields, but because they aremounted they are by far the fastest troops on thefield. Their hand-to-hand attack and defense abilitiesare the highest of any troops, and they withstandarcher attacks better than anyone. A knight�s onlyweakness is his vulnerability to crossbow attacks.

To outfit knights requires large quantities of iron andsmall quantities of wood.

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Armies in the RealmAfter you create an army in the armory, you willreturn to the main map, where your new army standsawaiting orders. An army is represented by one ormore figures carrying a flag of its player�s color. Anarmy�s size is reflected by the number of figures thatrepresent it on the main map. A one-figure army issmall, a two-figure army is medium sized, and athree-figure army is large.

Army Information To get information about any army on the main map,right click on it. A panel will display informationabout that army.

The three buttons at the bottom of the panel allowyou to move, disband or split the army. Clicking themove button closes the panel and readies the army formovement on the main map.

When you right-click on another player�s army, asmall parchment panel displays very general informa-tion about that army.

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small army

medium army

move army disband army split army

large army

Moving ArmiesTo move an army, you may use the move button asdescribed above, or you may left-click directly on thearmy on the main map. The mouse pointer willchange shape. As you move the pointer in the direc-tion you want the army to travel, a path will progressin that direction, beginning from where the army cur-rently stands. Click on a destination to move thearmy.

Each army has a certain number of movement pointseach turn, which represents the distance the army isable to travel during one season.

The number inside each ball shows the number ofmovement points it costs to move across the terrainyour mouse pointer indicates. You�ll notice that trav-el across roads uses far fewer points than travel acrossgrass or fields. Armies may move across many typesof terrain, but they are fastest on roads.

Splitting armies and fighting battles also use move-ment points.

Combining ArmiesTo combine two of your armies, move one army ontop of another. The first army will march over andcombine with the second.

Whenever you want to add forces to an army, this isthe way to do it. If, for example, you purchase 50pikes and would like to give them to an existing army,simply create a new army of 50 pikemen and combineit with the existing army.

You may not combine two armies if they both con-tain mercenaries.

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Splitting an ArmyIf you want to split one army into two smaller ones,right-click on the army to bring up the army infor-mation panel, then click on the Split Army button atthe bottom of the panel. A new panel appears thatgives a breakdown of units that comprise the army.

Use the left and right arrows to divide men betweenthe existing army and the new one. When you are sat-isfied with the division, click on the thumbs upgauntlet and the two new armies will appear on themain map. If you decide you don�t want to split thearmy, click on the thumbs down gauntlet and thearmy will remain as it was. Remember: an army musthave at least 50 soldiers in it.

Disbanding an ArmyTo disband an army, right-click on it to bring up thearmy information panel, then click on the DisbandArmy button at the bottom of the panel. You will beprompted to confirm your command.

The soldiers of a disbanded army will return to theircounty of origin and become a part of the populationagain. Their weapons will return to your treasury.

PillagingDestroying your opponents� resources can be aneffective, if barbaric, tactic. You may wage economicwarfare by destroying any opponent�s active fields orindustrial sites. To do so, simply march an army overthe site you�d like to pillage.

When you attack a grain or cattle field, your soldiersrender the field barren and destroy all its contents.When you attack any industrial site, it must shutdown for several seasons for repairs. You may alsoattack a county�s villages and slaughter its people,which reduces the county�s population. 75

Capturing CountiesTo conquer any neutral county (even one with a cas-tle), you must send an army to capture its county-town. (Neutral counties appear green on theoverview map).

To conquer a county with a garrisoned castle (whichwill always be controlled by a noble), you must cap-ture its castle.

To conquer a noble controlled county with no castle,you must capture its county town. Human playersmust defend their county towns by placing armiesnearby.

When you set the path of your army to end on anenemy town or castle, the graphic representing thearmy�s last move will appear different.

Counties without castles tend to be much easier toconquer than counties with castles.

The only way to capture a completed, garrisoned cas-tle is by laying siege. During a siege, your army sur-rounds the defender�s castle and builds special siegeweapons. As soon as these siege weapons are com-pleted, the battle will begin.

If your forces defeat the castle defenders and capturethe castle, it and its county will be yours �anotherjewel in your royal collection.

See Sieges on page 86 for more information.

When a neutral county has a castle, you will not needto siege the castle to capture the town. Neutral coun-ties with castles will always be counties that haverevolted and kicked their ruling noble out. In thesecounties, the castle has been abandoned.

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Army ForagingBy default, the Army Foraging option (under theOptions/Advanced menu) is set to No. As long as for-aging is off, you will never have to worry about feed-ing your armies; they will take care of themselves.Any and all food management you do will be for yourcivilian population.

For a more challenging game experience, switch ArmyForaging to Yes. See Army Foraging in the AdvancedGame Options section of this manual, page 106.

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BattlesThe path to the throne will almost certainly be abloody one. Those who would dare to deny yourright to rule must face your wrath on the battlefield.

Open ground (non-siege) combat begins immediate-ly when:

� One army attacks another or the paths of twoopposing armies cross.

� An army attacks the county town of a neutral orcomputer controlled county.

(When an army attacks a castle, combat occurs onlyafter a siege, see page 86).

Before combat begins, a panel will inform you of theimpending bloodbath, display the comparative troopnumbers of both forces, and ask you if you wouldlike to take the field.

If you choose not to take the field, the battle will becalculated automatically. You may want to do this if,after viewing the size and makeup of each army, youbelieve either winning or losing is a foregone conclu-sion.

You never have to the take the field if you don�t wantto, but when you decline you waive the opportunityto use your tactical wizardry to your advantage. Withsome practice, you may be able to defeat forces muchlarger than your own!

To take command of the battle, click on the thumbsup gauntlet and the engagement will begin.

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Part 5

Taking CommandWhen the battle begins, you will see a top-down viewof the battlefield. Your main screen view shows a por-tion of the field. Consult the overview map in theupper right corner for a bird�s eye view of the entirefield. You may scroll your main view around just asyou do on the main map screen. You may also jumpto a new location by clicking on the overview mapwhile no units are selected.

The main screen will show the various terrain featuresof the battlefield: rocks, rivers, bridges, forests, etc.The troops of both sides will also be visible: attackingarmy at the south (bottom) end, and defending armyat the north (top).

Each soldier figure wears the color of its kingdom(the soldiers of neutral counties wear brown). Eachfigure represents a unit of a certain type.

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overview mapbattlefield

fighting units selected unit stats soldiers in armies

To Select a Single UnitTo select a single unit, click directly on it. When aunit is selected, a status bar will appear next to its fig-ure on the battlefield, and a symbol will appear in thecontrol panel.

To Select a Group of UnitsTo select a group of units, click and drag a rectanglearound the units you would like to select. A statusbar will appear next to each selected unit, and an iconfor each selected unit will appear in the control panel.

To Deselect a Single UnitTo deselect a single unit, click on the unit�s icon onthe control panel (or select another unit).

To Deselect a Multiple UnitsTo deselect multiple units, right click on any emptyspace on the battlefield (or select something else).

To Move a Selected Unit or UnitsTo move a selected unit (or units), click on a destina-tion on the battlefield, or on the overview map. Allselected men will move to the indicated spot.

To Order an AttackTo order a selected unit (or units) to attack, placeyour mouse pointer over an enemy unit so that itsappearance changes, and click. Archers and cross-bowmen will be able to fire from a distance, all otherunits are hand-to-hand units which must attack atpoint blank range.80

Unit Sizes Each soldier figure on the battlefield represents aunit. Unit size will vary from battle to battle, depend-ing on the overall size of the forces involved. In onebattle, a unit may be four men, in another it may be16 men.

The status bar that accompanies each selected unitshows the number of men that unit currently has, rel-ative to the battle�s unit size. The icon that appears inthe control panel for each selected unit shows theactual number of soldiers in that unit.

For example: picture two selected archer units, onewith a fully green status bar, and one with a halfred/half green status bar. The icons in the controlpanel indicate that the fully green unit contains eightarchers, while the half red unit contains four archers.

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unit of 16 swordsmen unit of 4 swordsmen

You now know that, in that particular battle, a unitconsists of eight men. When you select an enemyunit, you can guess how many men it contains bylooking at the status bar: if it is fully green, it proba-bly contains eight men; if it shows a bit of red, it maycontain six or seven men.

By looking at the number of figures on the field, andthe status bars of each unit figure, you can get a pret-ty good idea of the relative sizes of the opposingforces.

The precise size of each army is shown above theappropriate shield at the bottom of the control panel.

You may, for example, see that the number of figureson each side is about the same. But if all of your fig-ures have a status bar that is half red, and the enemy�sare all fully green, you will know that are outnum-bered two to one (or thereabouts).

When a unit�s status bar is completely red, it containsno men, and is wiped out.

Battlefield Controls*Pause: Starts and pauses the battle. When a battlebegins, it will be paused. To begin the battle, click onthe hourglass button. You may pause the battle at anytime by clicking this button again. You may selectunits, but not move them, when the battle is paused.

*Retreat: Click on this button to order all your mento retreat from the field. When you do so, your armywill not escape without casualties but it will escapecomplete annihilation. You may want to give thisorder if you are far outnumbered�at least part ofyour army will survive to fight another day!

*Lower Castle Drawbridge: This command will onlywork when you are defending a castle with a draw-bridge during a siege battle. Lowering the drawbridgewill allow your men to exit and enter the castle, but itwill also allow the enemy to get in if your leave theentrance undefended.82

*Mop-up: This button gives a general orderto your army to attack and engage the near-est enemy. You may want to issue this com-

mand after you have positioned your troops effec-tively for an all out attack, or when the battle is near-ly decided and you wish to end it quickly and easily.

*Autocalculate: Calculates the battle auto-matically. Choose this option if you do notwish to command the battle.

Advanced CommandsAdvanced players may use the keyboard to issueadvanced commands to troops. You may, for example,assign multiple units to groups that will answer com-mands together. To create a command group, selectall the units you would like to group together, andhold down the control key while pressing any numberkey from 1 to 9. Hitting that number key by itself atany time during the remainder of the battle will selectthat group of units. You may then command all unitsat once.

You may also order multiple units into formation.Press the H key to order the selected units into a hor-izontal line. Press the V key to order selected unitsinto a vertical line.

83

Combat

Before you begin a battle, survey your army anddevise a strategy. Consider the size of your army, itscomposition, the battlefield terrain, and other fea-tures such as rivers or bridges.

Once a unit is engaged, it will remain so until it anni-hilates the opposing unit, it is annihilated itself, oryou command it to disengage.

Figures will fall dead on the battlefield as units arekilled off. The number of remaining soldiers for eacharmy appears on the control panel. Watch the num-bers fall to evaluate the battle in progress.

An army wins a battle when one of two things hap-pens:

1. It kills all the soldiers in the other army.

2. The other army retreats.

When a battle ends, a panel will show the new unitbreakdown of each army. Even victories can be cost-ly if a large portion of your army is killed. Click onthe exit arrow at the bottom right of the panel (orright click) to return to the main map. If the losingarmy was destroyed in the battle, only the winner willremain on the map.

If the battle has won a new county for the victor, aflag with the winner�s color will appear over thenewly won county town.

84

Peasant RevoltsIn addition to battling with rival armies, your troopsmay at times be called upon to put down peasantuprisings.

When any county�s happiness rating drops below 25and stays there for more than four seasons, its popu-lation will revolt. The ruling noble will be stripped ofpower and a band of brigands will set out in search offood.

Peasant revolts will appear on the main map as torch-carrying figures. They will reduce the happiness ofany county they wander into.

To put down a revolt, send one of your armies toattack the band of rebels just as you would attackanother army. The battle will play out as usual.

You should do your best to ensure that your countiesdo not revolt. Are your people getting enough food?Are they healthy? Have you set taxes or conscriptiontoo high?

85

SiegesA siege is a prolonged confrontation in which aninvading army surrounds an enemy castle and spendsseveral seasons building siege weapons. Capturing acastle by siege is the only way to win a county thathas a garrisoned castle.

Historically, Medieval armies besieging a castle had tocontend with moats, 10-foot-thick stone walls,arrows, boiling oil, and other dangerous objects beinghurled at them by the castle defenders above. You willface these same obstacles as you command sieges.

Once the siege battle begins, it will proceed just as anormal battle; you will issue orders in the same fash-ion. During a siege battle, however, you will have spe-cialized weapons (catapults, battering rams, and siegetowers) at your disposal.

To win a siege, you must do one of two things:

� Kill all the soldiers defending the castle,

�or�

� Break into the castle and capture its flag. A castle�sflag will be clearly visible in the castle, in the colorof the defender�s kingdom. If one of your menreaches it, the castle is yours.

86

Part 6

Laying SiegeThe height and protection of a castle give its defend-ers a great advantage over an attacking army. Theadvantage becomes greater the larger and more com-plex the castle is. Taking an enemy castle requiresplanning, manpower and perseverance.

To begin a siege, select an army and move it to thecastle you desire. With the army selected, place themouse pointer directly over the castle, so that themovement indicator turns gold, and click.

Preparing a SiegeWhen you begin a siege, a panel will allow you to pre-pare the siege by choosing the type and number ofsiege weapons (catapults, battering rams and siegetowers) you want to build.

87

Click on the up and down arrows to the left of eachsiege weapon to select how many to build. The paneltells you how many seasons it will take to prepare forthe siege�in other words, how long it will take yourarmy to build the siege weapons. The bigger yourarmy, the less time it will take to build each weapon.

When you are satisfied with your selection of siegeweapons, click the Proceed button.

While your siege weapons are being built, a symbolwill appear over the besieged castle showing the num-ber of remaining seasons of siege preparation. Clickon the besieging army to monitor its progress.

When the siege battle is about to begin, a panel willinform you that the siege battle is about to begin. Thepanel lists the breakdown of units for each army andasks you if you�d like to take the field. If you choosenot to, the computer will immediately calculate theresults of the siege battle.

The Siege ScreenIf you choose to take the field, the battlefield screenwill appear, with the castle dominating the landscape.The siege weapons you have built will be present.

Your army, complete with siege weapons, awaits

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orders outside the entrance of the castle�or on theopposite side of the moat if there is one. The garrisondefending the castle is stationed inside. Survey thepositions of both your army and the castle�s defend-ers before the siege begins so you can devise yourattack strategy.

Winning a SiegeOffensively, there are two ways to win a siege.

One is by killing all the castle defenders. Archers, fir-ing from outside the castle, will help you accomplishthis, but you will most often have to send soldiersinto the castle to fight hand-to-hand.

The other way is by capturing the castle�s flag. To dothis, you must break into the castle in some way andat least one soldier must reach the flag, which will beclearly visible in the main screen view. The area sur-rounding the enemy�s flag will often be guarded heav-ily.

There are several ways to get into a castle: you can

� Use a siege tower to climb over the wall.

� Punch holes in the wall with a catapult.

� Destroy a gate with a battering ram.

� Have your soldiers hack the gate to pieces. (Thiswill not work on Drawbridges).

ONLY castle walls�not towers�may be knockeddown or climbed.

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There are twoways to capturea castle: kill allits defenders, orcapture thedefender�s flag.

TIP

Siege WeaponsSiege weapons are catapults, battering rams, and siegetowers. When the siege battle begins, your siegeweapons will be on the field along with the rest ofyour troops. Siege weapons do require soldiers toman them. These soldiers will be represented in thecontrol panel when you select a weapon, but will notbe visible on the field. When you give an order to asiege weapon, you are effectively ordering its crew.

While any siege weapon is within range of enemyarchers or crossbowmen, it is vulnerable to attack.Siege weapons are especially vulnerable to crossbowfire. Close range units can also be used to attack anddestroy siege weapons.

Once the entire crew manning the weapon is killed,the weapon is destroyed and will disappear from thefield.

CatapultsA catapult can knock down a castle wall from a dis-tance, including from across a moat. To use a catapult,maneuver it to face the wall you want to attack. Withthe catapult selected, move your mouse pointer overthe target spot on the wall and click. The catapult willfire repeatedly until the wall is breached. Once thishappens, you may march your soldiers right throughthe hole in the wall.

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Battering RamsA battering ram can knock down a castle gate. A bat-tering ram must be moved right against its target towork. To use a battering ram, move it against the gateyou would like to attack so that its ram faces the gate.The battering ram will pound on the gate until it isbreached. Your men will then be able to marchthrough the opening and into the castle.

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Siege TowersA siege tower allows your soldiers to climb up andover a castle wall. To use a siege tower, move it rightagainst the target wall. When the siege tower is inplace, it will open up automatically, signalling that it isaccessible. You may then march your troops over thetower and into the castle.

Walls, Towers, and GatesWalls and towers will provide protection for a castle�sgarrison. Archers and crossbowmen may be posi-tioned along the top of a wall or atop a tower in orderto target attackers below.

Neither archers nor crossbowmen will be capable offiring over a wall or tower from the ground level. Thismeans that those inside a castle must be on top of awall or tower to fire at those outside, and those out-side may only hit troops that are on top of a wall ortower.

Troops atop walls or towers will be somewhat pro-tected from missile troops firing from below and willendure fewer casualties than they would if they wereon the same level.

The various siege weapons must target areas of a cas-tle with care: battering rams may only attack castlegates; catapults can only break through walls; andsiege towers will only work on walls.

Once inside a castle, the only way to move from wallsto higher towers is via stairways. Send your troopsthrough the stairways to move from level to level.

Defending troops may move in and out of gates atwill. Attackers must destroy a gate to go through it.

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Archers and cross-bowmen firingfrom atop walls ortowers will besomewhat protect-ed from those firingfrom below.

Before ordering units to begin filling in the moat,choose the section you would like to fill. It might bethe narrowest section of moat, or it might be the sec-tion adjacent to the area you�d like to attack.

To order units to fill in a section of moat, select theunits, and then click on the area of water you want tofill in. The selected units will march to the edge of thewater with shovels and begin digging.

Your diggers will be open to attack while they areworking. You may find it best to use peasants for thistask, since you will eventually want to send yourskilled fighters into the castle.

One solid strategy is to fire a catapult over a moat tobreach a wall, and then send your troops over themoat and through the breach.

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Order troops to fillin sections of moatby selecting themand clicking on thearea you want tofill.

MoatsA castle with a moat presents a special challenge. Asthe attacker, you must fill in part of the moat inorder to enable your men to attack and enter the cas-tle.

Any unit is capable of moat filling, with the excep-tion of knights.

Defending a CastleIf you are defending against a castle siege, your goalis obvious: hold the castle at all costs. The first step isto create a large and powerful garrison, complete witharchers and crossbowmen to pick off attackers beforethey can reach you. As defender, the advantage isyours and you must exploit it to its fullest!

Remember: if the attacker gets to your flag, the cas-tle is lost�guard it well!

Boiling OilAlong with missile troops, another effective weaponfor castle defense is boiling oil. Each castle will beautomatically supplied with one or more cauldrons ofboiling oil. Boiling oil is very effective when dumpedon troops and siege weapons who get too close toyour castle walls.

Move and dump your cauldrons just as you moveattack with your troops. The effects of a boiling oilattack can be spectacular and deadly.

Defending the FlagRemember: a castle siege can be a game of capture theflag. If an attacker reaches your flag, the castle is lost.You must make sure your flag is well defended on allsides. Keep a close eye on your flag and don�t let youropponent sneak up on your from behind.

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After a successfulsiege defense,remember torepair your cas-tle. This will fixany damage thecastle has sus-tained and itwill replace yourcauldrons ofboiling oil.

TIP

The DrawbridgeCastles that have moats will also have drawbridges,which you may open by using the lower castle draw-bridge button. You may want to lower the drawbridgein order to send hand-to-hand combat troops out ofyour castle to destroy siege weapons. Once you opena drawbridge, your troops may move in and out ofthe castle�but so can the enemy. Make sure yourdrawbridge is well guarded while it is open.

The OutcomeIf you have won the siege, the contested county isnow yours and you�ll see a flag bearing your gamecolors flying atop the castle when you return to themain screen.

If the castle is damaged, set about repairing it as soonas you have the materials and builders. (See Repairinga Castle.) Damage will carry over from siege to siegeunless you repair it.

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DiplomacyEven in the 13th century, government was as muchabout political backscratching�not to mention backstabbing�than the ability to lead. The balance ofpower is often a delicate matter that rests precarious-ly upon loyalties, betrayals, favors, and deceits.

You are but one of many seeking the throne. Howyou interact with the others is entirely up to you.Will you make alliances and remain loyal to yourfriends? Will you lie and doublecross, bringing ruinto those hapless souls who trusted you? Or will yoube a lone wolf, shunning diplomacy altogether? Thechoice is yours.

As you play, you will get to know your opponentswell. Study their words and actions�history�s greatleaders often display an uncanny ability to read theminds of their enemies.

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Part 7

The KnightWhat he lacks in maturity, patience, and tact, theKnight makes up for in daring. He is zealous andcocksure, he and loves nothing more than to show offhis prowess on the battlefield.

The Knight favors lightning strikes and invasions,often taking weaker opponents by complete surpriseearly on. He has been known to work his peasantryto the point of cruelty in order to produce and sup-port his ruffian armies.

The Knight is a would-be warrior king, but he is nostatesman. His road to the throne lies on the battle-field, not in the negotiating chambers.

His demeanor is rough, power-hungry, and base�buthis sword is always polished.

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The CountessHer trail is strewn with the ruined souls of all whohave underestimated her. The Countess is a master ofdiplomacy, but her lust for power will always win outover honesty or loyalty. She will treat her friends withgrace and respect�until she no longer has use forthem.

Highly intelligent, eloquent, and well-schooled, theCountess has no doubt that she is destined to rule all,and she has yet to meet an adversary she could notruin with ease.

Beware of the Countess. Her mien is regal and hercountenance is fair, but her tactics are cruel and herterrible resolve will not be denied.

Ally yourself with her at your own risk.

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The BishopDo not expect the Bishop to bow easily�he has Godon his side. Cloistered in his clerical fortress, he andhis Council of Elders plot endlessly to further thecause of the Church�not to mention their ownwealth, power, and prestige.

The Bishop wields enormous influence with his infi-nitely loyal following, but he tends to hide behind thealtar as soon as trouble breaks.

The Bishop will be bold, pompous, and mockingwhen he is on top, but cowardly and grovelling whenhe is cornered.

Don�t be fooled by his pious prattle. His Grace cov-ets but one sacrament�the crown.

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The BaronThe Baron is the elder statesman of the group. Hisyears of experience have taught him that order arisesfrom cold calculation rather than passion or empathy.

The Baron believes he is the only soul who possessesthe maturity and discipline to be King. He will takeno pleasure in crushing his opponents�no, he�ll do itsimply because it is necessary to secure his ascensionto the throne.

His rule is solid and practical, but his detachmentmakes him unyielding and severe. He has a strongsense of dignity and deals swiftly with those whowould challenge it.

His realm is ruled by a hard and oppressive brand ofjustice. His people are obedient, but they live in fear.

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MessagesYour relationships with the other players will developthrough an ongoing exchange of messages.

To send a message, click on the Diplomacy button onthe control panel. The diplomacy panel will appear.

Sending MessagesEach turn you may send one message to each of theother players. To send a message, click on the portraitof the intended recipient. A highlight will frame theselected player and the message options on the rightwill display all your message options for that player.

Select the type of message you would like to send. Apanel will appear, containing a suggested message ofthat type. You may keep the default message, or youmay type in your own message. Click on the thumbs

101relationship status bar send message

up gauntlet to dispatch the message. It will arrive atits destination, and you should receive a responseshortly thereafter.

In multiplayer games, human players receive mes-sages instantly.

Sending GiftsYou may send a monetary gift to another player byselecting Dispatch Gift from the message panel. A giftcan boost your standing in the eyes of its recipient.When you select this option from the message panel,a second panel will appear. Use the up and downarrows to set the amount of your gift. Then click onthe thumbs up gauntlet to dispatch the gift.

Compliments and InsultsCompliments provide a free way to gain favor withselected opponents. You may want to send compli-ments to players who are especially powerful, whopose a danger to you, or whose services might bevaluable later on.

Be careful not to compliment too frequently, though.Excess in this area can be a transparent attempt tomanipulate. Your opponents (for the most part)arenot stupid. Too many kind words can work againstyou in the long run.

An insult is likely to hurt your relationship with therecipient. Sending insults is a good way to let anenemy know exactly how you feel.

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Friend or Foe?The message panel displays a picture of each oppo-nent remaining in the game. The colored bar next toeach portrait shows the current state of your rela-tionship with that player. A higher bar reflects afriendlier relationship; a lower bar reflects a morehostile relationship. The color of the bar will alsoreflect the nature of the relationship (red=hostile,blue=indifferent, green=friendly).

If you anger an opponent badly enough, he or she willbecome an enemy. A symbol will appear next to eachopponent you have so offended. Once an opponentreaches enemy status, he or she will remain so for therest of the game. Enemy status represents an irrepara-ble breach between two players.

The higher an opponent�s opinion of you, the lesslikely he or she is to attack you, or to refuse analliance should you request one. As favor drops, anopponent is more likely to attack or to refuse afriendly overture.

To improve your relationships, you may send compli-ments and gifts.

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To aid your quest for the crown, you may choose toform alliances with your opponents. You may initiatean alliance with another player by choosing Offer anAlliance from the message panel. The player may ormay not accept your offer. Likewise, another playermay offer you an alliance. Accept or reject it as youwill, but choose your friends wisely! Make and breakalliances to your advantage, and remember: in the endthere is only one winner.

An alliance gives you options you do not have whenyou go it alone. When you select an ally on the mes-sage panel, additional message options will appear.

You may :

Terminate your alliance: Once an alliance benefitsyou no more, you should terminate it. Terminating an104

You will have additional message optionswhen communicating with allies.

alliance indicator

Alliances

alliance is the honorable way to say farewell.

Ask ally for help: If one of your counties is underattack, you may ask an ally to send troops to your aid.This request come in especially handy if you are thetarget of a siege.

Ask ally to attack: You may also ask an ally to attackanother county. When you select this option, a smallmap will appear, allowing you to choose your target.

You always have the option to doublecross yourallies, but this is not a wise course of action. Whenyou attack an ally without terminating your alliance,all other players will be hesitant to trust you in thefuture. All will be more willing to attack you and lesswilling to form alliances with you.

A safer route is to simply terminate an alliance youno longer need, and then launch your attack.

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Advanced PlayBy default, LORDS OF THE REALM II is designed foreasy play. There are, however, several advancedoptions that experienced players may try when theyfeel they are ready for a special challenge.

Advanced Farming When Advanced Farming is activated, you will have topay more attention to your grain fields (if you haveany).

Labor: The number of laborers required to get themost out of your grain farming will fluctuate fromseason to season, according to the grain plantingcycle. Each grain field will require relatively fewworkers during the spring and summer. During thefall you will need a great many grain workers to tendto the harvest, and during the winter you will needquite a few to get the fields ready for next season�splanting.

Weather: Advanced Farming also introduces weatheras an influence upon your grain fields. Each season�sweather has the potential to affect your grain output.Many seasons will be cloudy and mild, having nogreat effect on your output. But droughts can severe-ly undercut your efforts, and can reduce your grainproductivity. Sunny seasons, on the other hand, canimprove your harvest.

While Advanced Farming is active, a weather report isavailable each season on the Advanced Labor panel(accessed by clicking on your county towns).

Fertility: Fertility also becomes a factor underAdvanced Farming. In order to keep your fields fer-tile, you will need to leave a portion of them fallow atall times. While Advanced Farming is on, you shouldtry to keep at least a third of your fields fallow. The106

Part 8

more fallow fields you have, the more fertile youractive fields are likely to be. You do not have toengage actively in any sort of �crop rotation��justmake sure a portion of your fields remain fallow.

A fertility report beneath the weather report on theAdvanced Labor panel will keep you abreast of eachcounty�s fertility. When fertility is high, grain outputwill be high. When fertility is poor, grain output willsuffer.

Army ForagingUnder the default play settings you will never have toworry about feeding armies. Once you draft a peasanthe will no longer eat, as far as you are concerned.Your ration management applies exclusively to yourcivilian population.

With Army Foraging switched on, this is no longer thecase. Each army must now survive on the food avail-able in the county it occupies. Armies will automati-cally consume food in the county they are in, andthey will eat before the county�s population. So, if youmarch an army through a county with meager foodsupplies, its population may suffer.

As long as any army is in a county you control, youwill need to provide rations for it. This is done, asusual, through the rations panel.

While Army Foraging is active, the ration panel willkeep you informed of how many soldiers are foragingin each county.

In addition to feeding your own soldiers, thisadvanced option requires you to feed the soldiers ofany other player, friend or foe, as long as they are ina county you control.

If the troops are friendly, you must feed them as acourtesy. If they are hostile, they will raid your coun-ty�s stores and help themselves to your food.

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ExplorationExploration offers a more realistic game experienceby obscuring your vision of the kingdom map.During the Middle Ages, leaders seldom knew forcertain what their adversaries were doing, or evenwhat the landscape outside their homeland lookedlike.

While Exploration is turned on, your vision of thekingdom map will be limited to what you haveexplored. When the game begins, you will only beable to see the single county you control. The rest ofthe map will be blacked out.

To expand your vision, you must explore the land. Asyour armies travel, the areas around them will berevealed to you gradually. Only when you haveexplored the entire region will you see all the landsyou seek to rule.

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Custom GamesYou may customize any single player or multiplayergame. To do so, select Custom Game from the start-up screen before you begin.

The custom game panel will allow you to set theoptions that you can normally set: difficulty,advanced farming, army foraging, and exploration.But here you have many more options.

If you would like to begin combat right away, all play-ers can start with a castle, weapons, and an army.

You may decide how many nobles will vie for thecrown, and you may set the amount of gold (crowns)each players starts with.

There are a number of maps�both real and fictional�to choose from. Each offers a unique strategicchallenge.

Advanced Farming, see page 106.

Exploration, see page 108.

Nobles allows you to determine how many nobles willcompete for the throne. In multiplayer games, allpositions not filled by human players will be filled bycomputer controlled nobles.

Army Foraging, see page 107.

The Difficulty setting will determining how challeng-ing the game will be.

Army size determines how large an army (if any) allthe players will begin with.

Starting castle determines how large a castle (if any)each player begins with.

County Status refers to how strong or weak each play-er�s starting county will be. It takes into account thepopulation, number of fields, number of cows, happi-ness, and health that each player will begin the gamewith.

Time Limit is designed primarily for multiplayer 109

games. It sets a maximum time limit that each turncan last. If each player does not end his or her turnbefore the time allotment has passed, the turn willend automatically. During games with time limits, thetimer will be visible onscreen at all times.

The Fight option allows you to set the game to auto-matically calculate each battle fought against a non-human opponent. This feature is designed for multi-player games. If Humans is set, every battle that isfought against a non-human opponent will immedi-ately be calculated automatically. Only battles againstother human players will be fought manually. WhenAll is set, every battle will be fought manually.

Multiplayer GamesLORDS OF THE REALM II can be played by as many as5 people connected by IPX compatible network, orby 2 people connected by modem or null modemcable. Multiplayer games are only supported by theWindows 95 version of LORDS II.

To begin a multiplayer game, select Multiple Playerduring the game startup. Several options will appear.

IPX Network ConnectionUp to 5 players can play over an IPX compatible net-work. A single CD can support up to three networkplayers.

To start a network game, click on the IPX Connectionbutton on the multiplayer panel.

A panel will allow you to either Create a Game orConnect to a Game, or Cancel to exit the setup.

One player must create a game for others to join. Ifyou would like to create the game, choose thisoption, enter your name and shield, and selectContinue. You will enter the custom game screen. Seepage 109 for details on custom game options.110

When you choose to connect to a game, a list of allcurrent network games will appear. Select one to join.

The player creating the game must set all customgame options, and click on the Start button when allplayers are ready.

The custom game screen allows all players to com-municate by sending messages to the others who havejoined. Type your message in the black text box, andpress enter to send it. This option allows you to dis-cuss the custom options as you prepare for a game.

As the creator of a game, you may load a previouslysaved network game by clicking on Load and select-ing a game from the list that appears.

Modem ConnectionA modem game connects two computers through amodem and phone line. To establish a modem con-nection, one player must create a game for the otherto connect to.

The host player should:

1) Select Multiple Players from the setup screen,select Modem Connection for DirectPlay, and thenselect Create a Game from the setup screen.

2) After you name the game, the modem selectionpanel will appear. Make sure that all modem settingsare correct. The program should choose the correctmodem settings automatically, but you should makesure that the modem speed setting (on the Configurepanel) is set properly for your modem.

3) Click on the Answer button and wait for the otherplayer to initiate the connection.

The other player should then initiate the modem con-nection:

1) Choosing Modem Connection and then Connect toGame.

2) Type the host player�s modem phone number inthe panel that appears. 111

3) Click on Connect to make the connection. Oncethe connection is made, both players will see the cus-tom game screen.

The host player should choose the game settings andclick on the Start button to begin the game.

Serial Connection Select this option to play a two-player game connect-ed by a null modem cable.

The host player should:

1) Select Multiple Players from the setup screen,select Serial Connection for DirectPlay, and thenselect Create a Game from the setup screen.

2) After naming the game, the setup panel will appear.

Port: Set the Com Port number through which youare connecting the null modem cable.

Baud Rate: We recommend that you set the highestBaud Rate setting.

Stop Bits: Set Stop Bits to 1.

Parity: Set Parity to No Parity.

Flow Control: Set Flow Control to RTS/DTR.

When these settings are correct, click on OK to pro-ceed. After you enter your name and select yourshield, you will enter the custom game screen.

The player initiating the connection should:

1) Select Multiple Players from the setup screen,select Serial Connection for DirectPlay, and selectConnect to a Game.

2) Select the game name from the panel that appears,and click on OK to proceed.

The host player must set up the game and click onStart to begin the game.

(Please consult the README file on your game CD formore information about multiplayer games.)112

MenusFileNew Game: Click on this to begin a new game.

Load: Click on this to load a saved game. In the panelthat appears, click on the saved game you wish toload, then click on the thumbs up gauntlet to begin.

Save: Click on this to save a game. A panel with a textbox. Type a name in the box. To overwrite a previ-ously saved game, select its name from the list so thatthe name appears in the box. Click on the thumbs upgauntlet to overwrite the old saved game with thenew one.

Quit: Select this option to exit the game.

OptionsAdvanced: See page 106 for a description ofAdvanced Farming. See page 107 for a description ofArmy Foraging. See page 110 for a description of FightHumans Only?. See page 108 for a description ofExploration.

Sound: This option allows you to turn the music andsound effects sound on or off.

Display: The Animations option allows you to con-trol the animated portions of the game. Turning theanimations off may help the game run faster on slow-er computers. Turning the Full Screen option onensures that the game window takes up your entirescreen, regardless of the resolution you have set.(Turning Full Screen on can improve performance.)

Game Speed: Clicking on this calls up a parchmentpanel in which you can adjust the game speed.

Scroll Speed: Clicking on this calls up a parchmentpanel in which you can adjust map scrolling speed.

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AppendixStrategy Hints and Tips1) Dairy: It is possible for a county to survive entire-ly on dairy produce. However, preventing your pop-ulation growth from outstripping your food supplycan be difficult. Maximum herd growth is necessary,but requires nearly all of your workforce. A compro-mise is the best solution here: limit your herd growthto about 5 cows per season so that a good portion ofyour workers can work on industry. The only prob-lem remaining is to restrict your population growth(see Overpopulation below).

2) Grain: It is also possible for a county to surviveentirely on grain, but this can be risky. Randomevents, weather, and pillaging can destroy your crops.Since you can only plant grain once per year, it can bedifficult to recover from such a loss.

It is a good idea to plant at least one more field thanyou expect to be able to harvest. While this requiresmore labor to maintain, it reduces the risk of havingto cut your rations for a year due to a bad harvest.

3) Mixed economy: Combining cattle and grainfarming is the safest way to feed your populace. Thechances of having both your cattle and graindestroyed by random events and weather is slim. In acombined economy, eating your cows can be veryefficient. Since only a portion of your fields will bededicated to cattle, your dairy production will berestricted.

The trick here is to restrict the size of your herd sothat there is no overcrowding. With no overcrowd-ing, cow births will be maximized. Adjust your rationslider so that, each turn, your people eat exactly asmany cows as are born. This way, your herd sizeremains constant and your people are fed largely bybeef and dairy. Grain can supplement this and canalso be stockpiled.114

Part 9

4) Reclaiming Fields: Field reclamation is extremelyimportant. Regardless of how you manage your econ-omy, reclaiming fields should always be a top priori-ty. Power is based on population size. Population sizedepends on food production, which depends onusable fields. Reclaim fields as quickly as possible!

5) Overpopulation: Whenever there is a shortage offood you must make an important decision in theaffected county. A slight shortage is easily overcomeby reducing rations for one turn. A more severeshortage can require a sustained reduction in rations,which can reduce health. Population control can pre-vent such problems.

To control population growth, raise taxes. This willreduce happiness and drive excess people to neigh-boring counties (as well as raising a good amount ofcash). Raising an army will also curb a population.

Reducing your population will allow rations to returnto normal. If all else fails, have an army slaughter oneof your own villages (if you can bring yourself to doit). Better to cut a population yourself than to havelow rations and bad health drive a population torevolt.

6) Happiness: Happiness is the single most impor-tant rating in the game. Everything affects happiness.Happiness determines population growth (throughbirth and immigration) and allows you to collecttaxes and create armies. If happiness drops too lowfor too long, counties are lost.

Keep happiness up by keeping your people healthy,minimizing taxes, and conscripting no more than acounty�s happiness will allow. Raising small armiesfrequently and then combining them will have asmaller impact on happiness and population size thanraising large armies.

7) Specialize: Once you control multiple counties,have each one specialize in producing a single item.This can be quite efficient and can simplify countymanagement. Any resources not produced can bepurchased. 115

8) Advanced farming: When advanced farming ison, grain labor demands will fluctuate between sea-sons. Since the autumn grain harvest will require themost workers, base the number of fields planted onthe number of workers available in autumn.Remember: field reclamation will slow down eachautumn, so plan carefully. The introduction of weath-er makes a mixed economy even more beneficial, asweather can devastate grain or cattle production.

Try to maintain constant proportions of your popu-lation on each resource. If all workers are reassignedto farming for the autumn harvest, efficiency is lost.

9) Divide & Conquer: Counties must be contigu-ous to be retained. Take full advantage of this. Aquick way to cut an opponent down to size is to cap-ture a county in the center of his domain and split hisrealm in two. The smaller half turns neutral. Ofcourse, your enemies can do the same to you!

10) Army Foraging: When playing with army forag-ing on, your strategy must either be more offensiveor more defensive than when it is off. With an offen-sive strategy, the goal is to raise large armies andinvade enemy counties right away. Even if no battlesare fought, your armies will ruin counties just by eat-ing everything in sight. With a defensive strategy,focus on castle construction and keep friendly armieson garrison duty where they eat from the castle�sstore rather than from the county. Either way, be verycareful to minimize the soldiers eating in your owncounties.

11) Split and Pillage: When enemy forces are toostrong to be confronted, it is often possible to cap-ture counties by pillaging all usable land and thenwaiting for a peasant uprising. When this happens,your opponent loses control of the county, half thepopulation becomes brigands, and the remaining halfare easily destroyed. The most effective way to pillageis to split an army into many small armies (10 or so).This makes it very difficult for the defending playerto kill all of your armies before they can destroy hisfields. This strategy works, but keep in mind: thecounty will be unusable for some time.116

12) Obstruction tactics: When being invaded,remember that all attacks require movement points.Block roads with very small armies to buy time. Ifyou can�t do any damage in combat, order a retreat. Ifany soldiers survive they can block the road again onthe following turn.

13) Off-road movement: Numerous mountain pass-es and forest trails allow armies to move betweencounties that are not connected by roads. Take advan-tage of these. They enhance your strategic opportu-nities and allow you to catch opponents off guard.

14) Ranged Weapons: Use archers and crossbow-men effectively. Harass enemy units until they can nolonger tolerate the attrition and are forced to attackor retreat. Set up a line of hand-to-hand units block-ing a narrow chokepoint and place archers behindthem. If your enemy has archers as well, keep peas-ants between your archers and theirs. Their arrowswill hit your peasants while yours hit their archers.

15) Close Combat: In hand-to-hand combat, alwaystry to have multiple units attacking a lone defender.Units can defend themselves against one attacker butdo very poorly when surrounded. If you have onlyhand-to-hand units, take out enemy archers first.

16) Sieges: Get to know the strengths and weakness-es of each castle. Use catapults to isolate towers bydestroying the walls on either side. The defender willoften be forced to abandon the tower. Once a sectionof the wall is undefended, peasants can fill in a moatwithout being harassed. Ranged weapons are veryimportant in sieges. Always place hand-to-hand unitsin front of your archers to prevent casualties fromenemy fire.

When garrisoning a castle remember to include a siz-able contingent of crossbowmen. A good garrisonwill consist of mostly archers with the rest of thearmy divided between crossbowmen (for killingknights and destroying siege weapons) and hand-to-hand units (for defending against breaches).

117

Game Maps1) England: Balanced for 2-5 players, this is thestandard game map. All starting counties have aboutthe same number of fields. Two counties have theadvantage of having islands that can�t be pillaged.The best counties to hold here are on the western sideof the country because limited access makes themmore defensible.

2) Scotland: This is a small map for up to 5 players.With only 10 counties, some of which have very lim-ited resources, life here is appropriately nasty, brutishand short. Strategically, this map is a figure 8 eventhough cross-country movement is necessary to cutacross the center. The key counties to hold are theones in the center of the map which divide the coun-try in half.

3) Ireland: Balanced for a 4 player game, a fifth play-er will have to fight for space. Each starting county isadjacent to two neutral counties. However, all of theneutral counties can be easily reached from at leasttwo starting counties. The fifth player starts in themiddle and must fight his way out. Try to gain con-trol of the neutral counties on either side of yourstarting location and avoid early wars.

4) France: Smaller than modern day France, thenorthern and eastern parts of the country were con-trolled by the Holy Roman Empire. Designed as a 5player map, each player has access to two neutralcounties which will provide all resources and act as abase from which to seek the throne. Starting in theRoyal Demesne is most challenging because it is sur-rounded by enemies. However, it also has the bestaccess to neutral counties.

5) Germany: This is the Holy Roman Empire andincludes territory in modern France, Italy, Austria,etc. The inner ring of counties contains all of theimportant crossroads and enables access to the outercounties, like spokes on a wheel. The outer countiescontain the best resources but have the least access toother counties and see very few merchants.118

6) Italy: As a peninsula, this country imposes a lin-ear strategy: fight from one end to the other. If youare unfortunate enough to start in the center, headeither north or south while maintaining friendly rela-tions with the players facing your other border.Avoid fighting on both fronts simultaneously.

7) Europe: Best for 2-5 players, this map will alwaysprovide an interesting game. Many of the neutralcounties here can only be reached by passing throughenemy territory. Defend your home county well andgain control of any neutral counties in your rearareas. France and Germany, in the center of the map,will be hard pressed to avoid an early demise.

8) Crusades: Many counties divide this crescentshaped map in half. You will be fighting from one endto the other. Regardless of where you start, secure thecounties in either Greece or Africa first and then turnback and fight for the center. Don�t allow playerswith a single front to remain at peace for too long.

9) Africa: This is an outstanding map for any num-ber of players. French North Africa is by far the moststrategically important county because it containsfour other counties within it. However, it is also oneof the most difficult to hold on to, especially witharmy foraging on. It has few fields which are incon-veniently spread out and easily pillaged. Once yougain control of this county, make an effort to build astrong castle and, with foraging on, immediately startshipping food in. If an opponent controls it, makeevery effort to either capture it or make it revolt: hisremaining counties will be non-contiguous and willturn neutral.

10) India: This is an interesting medium sized mapfor up to 5 players. The northern counties have anabundance of fields but no resources. The countiesabove them have resources but few fields. The centrallocations are well placed to start in but are inconve-nient to capture. To conquer the western side of themap, you must capture a county accessed from theeast and vice versa. Starting in the south is probablysafest. 119

11) China: Using the province borders of theNorthern Sung dynasty and a road network based onthe main trade routes of the period, this map is his-torically accurate. Each starting area has access to atleast two neutral counties which provide the neces-sary resources to form a solid base. Pay attention tothe strategic possibilities of off-road movement.Unlike other maps, there are no rear areas that can beeasily defended. Every county can be invaded from atleast two others. Ching His-Tung county, the capital,is similar to the Royal Demesne on the France map:it is centrally located and surrounded by enemies butalso has the best access to neutral counties.

12) Jigsaw: This fictional map is exceptionally wellbalanced for 2 or 4 players. Adding a 5th will make itvery bloody (and challenging for the 5th player).Each player can control three counties as a base andthen fight for control of the center. Once you ownthe center, defend it well and then expand into anoth-er quadrant. If an enemy controls the center, makesure he doesn�t hold it for long.

13) Rose: This small fictional map for 2-5 playersworks best with 5. Each player has only his homecounty and access to the central county. However,since the home counties are adjacent to one anotherit is not necessary to hold the central county toincrease the size of your domain. With such a smallmap, plan a quick conquest rather than a long cam-paign. Starting with strong castles will lengthen thegame somewhat.

14) Bullseye: Two concentric rings of counties withthree concentric rings of roads makes this an enter-taining geometric map. Evenly balanced for 2 or 4players, with the 5th player appearing in the middle,this map always provides a lively, entertaining game.Control of the central county will allow conquest ofterritories on opposite sides of the map. It will alsoallow conquest of counties that divide an opponent�sterritory in half.

15) Crossroads: Another evenly balanced 2 or 4player map with the 5th player in the center. Here,control of the center is essential because it separates120

each of the other counties. If you can�t control thecenter, try pillaging your opponents. Eliminatingother players by making their counties revolt isalmost as good as conquering the county.

16) Rorschak: Spend a few moments studying thismap before playing it. The northwest and southeastare easiest to hold but are difficult to expand from.The northeastern counties are interconnected andwill probably form the largest initial kingdom. Thesouthwestern counties are actually the strategic cen-ter of the map and the most dangerous area to startin.

17) Centreville: This is a medium sized fictionalmap with seven counties forming an arc around a cen-tral county. In a 4 or 5 player game, there will be ascramble for neutral counties, as there aren�t enoughto go around. The central county is, of course, themost important and with five players someone willhave the difficult task of defending it.

18) Quaintville: Very small 2-4 player map. Thecenter is not nearly as important here as on othermaps of this type. All counties are adjacent to allother counties so it is impossible to divide a kingdomin two. Also, since the center is so inaccessible, it isfaster to move around it than through it.

19) Pretzelland: Specifically designed for 5 players,each player will have two natural enemies. However,with nearly all counties contiguous, it is possible tofight anyone and still be able to retain most capturedcounties. Note that some counties are adjacent eventhough it is not possible to move between them.

20) New England: Massachusetts is the key to vic-tory on this map. Without it you won�t be able tocontrol more than half of the map. This small mapwill be quick and bloody with any number of players.

21) Equalizer: This is a perfectly balanced 2 or 4player map. All players have equal resources andaccess to all other players. Be careful to defendagainst all opponents: diagonally opposed countiesare not contiguous but a surprise attack can cost youyour home base even if the conqueror can�t retain his 121

prize.

22) Rubix World: Also perfectly balanced for 2 or 4players, this is a medium sized map which will takeslightly longer to play. Note that counties which arediagonally adjacent are not contiguous. There arelimited resources here: if you can�t capture countiescontaining iron and stone you will have to purchasethem.

23) Pentagon: This is a perfectly balanced �donutshaped� 5 player map. Each county is contiguousonly with its nearest neighbors. Try to form analliance with a player on the opposite side of the mapand get him to attack the county adjacent to both ofyou. You can join in this attack when your other bor-der is at peace (let your ally do the fighting while youretain the county). If at war with your other neigh-bor, you will be able to concentrate on him as long asyour ally can protect your rear.

24) YinYang: Balanced for 2, 3 or 5 players, thismedium sized map does not have enough neutralcounties for everyone. There are plenty of resourcesfor weapons, but stone is in short supply.

122

Designer�s NotesLORDS OF THE REALM 1 is probably my favorite of allthe games I�ve designed, and it also happened to bethe most commercially and critically successful titleprior to our acquisition by Sierra. But there is noquestion that it left plenty of room for improve-ment�especially given the relentless march forwardof technology. LORDS 2 takes full advantage of theCD ROM�s storage, requires a lot more RAM, andreally wants a lot more processing power.

LORDS 1 was really a flawed gem, in my mind; thegame offered a unique mix of strategic decisions andsomehow achieved that all-too rare quality that per-suades players to continue for that �one more turn�no matter what time of day or night it is. The flawslay heavily with the interface, especially by today�sstandards, and the game�s learning curve. Also flawedwas the game�s �sagging middle�, a trait common toall too many �empire building� strategy games, butworsened by a need for lots of micro-management ofcounties in LORDS 1. Combat, too, was flawed�although LORDS 1 featured real-time battles, theywere not as much fun as they could have been, and weopted for a turn-based siege model rather than a real-time one.

With LORDS 2, I have tried hard to address theseissues and in addition take the gameplay a little far-ther. Above all, though, I have tried to reduce thelearning curve of the game dramatically, and to radi-cally restructure the interface, in order that manymore people will be able to get into the somewhatunique blend of fun this time. In addition, as a gameso close to my heart, I have tried to create by far thebest-looking and sounding strategy game ever�nosmall feat, these days, I know. As I write, users on-line and press alike are playing around with a demo orbeta version of the game, and the feedback we�rereceiving suggests that the goals look to have beenachieved�though there is still plenty of work still tobe done improving the AI and interface still further. 123

The journey from concept to where we are today hasbeen tougher than I had expected. And as a result, Ihave relied more on other people for help with thedesign than ever before�Eric, Chris and Simon,thank you; I couldn�t have done it without you.

The biggest �issue� arose once we had first got com-bat up and running. The truth is that it was a wholelot more fun than we had hoped, even in its thenflawed state. Combined with the real-time siegeengine, it seemed clear that a far wider audience eventhan we had first envisioned would derive huge plea-sure from the game�which sent us back to the draw-ing board, attacking that thorny learning curve oncemore.

This resulted in our �hiding� grain farming, and theaddition of the slider bar which most gamers will nowuse to allocate their serfs to tasks. Initially, I wasagainst the idea�I couldn�t see that a strategy gamerwould want to give up the detailed control that theoriginal labor panel offered. Of course, now that it�sin the game and working well, I find I hardly everresort to the labor panel! The subject of unbelievablehours of internal debate, I hope that you appreciatethe ease with which you can now manage a largequantity of counties.

Possibly the most emotive issue were the sheep.�Where are they?� LORDS 1 users will cry. �Gone� isthe simple reply. The reality is that sheep added littleto gameplay; they did not represent, in our minds,sufficient additional strategic choice to warrant thesignificant additional complexity needed to therationing panel. So, with many a tear, we axed themfrom the game (so to speak�).

I could go on for hour after boring hour about themany other debates raging here along our journey,but I need to move back to the product itself, toensure that you will enjoy it as much as I, and myteam, hope.

David LesterImpressions/Sierra

October 4, 1996124

Customer ServiceSierra On-Line is dedicated to helping our customerswith each and every question or problem. Because wewill go to any lengths to guarantee complete satisfac-tion with all Sierra products, our customers knowthat when they buy our games, they buy the supportof the whole company.

Technical SupportSystem configuration or installation problems maycause any one of a number of different error condi-tions. Refer to the README file in the game direc-tory, as well as the Technical Tips section of thismanual for information on technical problems andpossible solutions.

Direct your inquiries to the Technical SupportDepartment if your question is about hardware andsoftware compatibility specific to Sierra games (i.e.,sound card configuration and memory management).

Automated Technical Support Line (US):

(206) 644-4343Technical Support - United StatesSierra On-Line Main: (206) 644-4343Technical Support Fax: (206) 644-7697P.O. Box 85006 8:15 a.m. - 4:45 p.m. PST,Bellevue, WA Monday-Friday98015-8506

Technical Support - United KingdomSierra On-Line Limited 2 Beacontree Plaza Gillette WayReading, BerkshireRG2 0BS United Kingdom

Phone: (0118) 920-9111 125

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The Sierra No-Risk GuaranteeThe Promise: We want you to be happy with everySierra product you purchase from us. Period. If forany reason you're unhappy with the product, return itwithin 30 days for an exchange or a full refund...EVEN IF YOU BOUGHT IT AT A RETAILSTORE. (Hardware ordered direct must be returnedwithin ten days.)

One Condition: We�d like you to tell us why youdon�t like the game. Your comments will help uscontinue to get better. Send it back to us and wepromise you complete satisfaction. (If you bought itat a retail outlet, please send your original salesreceipt.)

126

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Disk/Documentation replacement:Sierra On-Line FulfillmentPO Box 485Coarsegold, CA 93614

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127

TECHNICAL TIPSWe have found that many of the common problemsour customers experience with their machines havesimple answers. If you are experiencing one of theproblems listed below, please try the solution(s) pro-vided before searching elsewhere for answers.

WINDOWS 95 TIPS

Why doesn�t my sound work?

Sound hardware, usually a card of some kind, isrequired for sound to work in the game. If you hearsounds in other places in Windows 95, but not in thegame, it is possible that there is a conflict ofresources, where some other program that is runningis controlling the card. Make sure the game is theonly program running (hold down the <Ctrl> andthe <Esc> keys, or check the Windows 95 task barto see the currently running programs). Make sureyour sound drivers are properly installed. If you havean older configuration, contact the manufacturer ofyour card for the latest sound drivers.

General problems

Make sure the game is the only program running(hold down the <Ctrl> and the <Esc> keys, orcheck the Windows 95 task bar to get a list of cur-rently running programs) as things like screen saversand runtime virus checkers can sometimes causeproblems with other programs running at the sametime.

This game is designed to run on a machine that has atleast 8 megabytes of system RAM installed.

Graphics seem to be in wrong color

This game was designed to run in 256 color mode.Please make sure that your display is set to this num-ber of colors. In Windows 95 please do the following:128

Close any running applications, and left click on theIcon that says, �My Computer�, (unless you haverenamed it, it which case click on this icon instead.)Then click on the Control Panel folder, followed bythe small picture of the monitor marked �Display.�Select the tab marked Settings, and move the sliderbar under Color Palette to 256.

Animations are not running smoothly

If the game animations appear slow or �choppy,�there are two things that can improve this:

� Make sure that the Full Screen option under theDisplay menu is turned ON, so that the game win-dow fills the entire screen.

� Install the game using the Maximum install (if youhaven�t done so already). This copies the animationfiles to your hard drive, which will improve perfor-mance.

WINDOWS NTNote: This game uses Microsoft�s DirectX 3 for mul-tiplayer gameplay. As of the release of LORDS OF THE

REALM II, Windows NT version 4.0 does not supportDirectX 3.

Consult your Windows NT documentation for infor-mation concerning possible updates that will allowDirectX 3 to run under Windows NT.

DOS TIPS1. Why does it say �NOT ENOUGH MEMORY�when I type in the game command?

This game is a protected mode program which maybe incompatible with some of the other programsthat load into your machine when it boots up, includ-ing memory managers. 129

There are two ways to deal with this:

1) Press down and hold the <F5> key as soon as yousee the words �Starting MS-DOS� when starting orrestarting your machine. This will bypass your con-figuration files, so that you won�t be loading in thethings that you don�t need. If you use this approach,you will need to manually load your mouse driverand, if necessary, your VESA driver (see below);manual loading is usually a simple matter of findingthe device driver(s) and typing their name(s).

2) If you are comfortable with editing your configu-ration files, edit your config.sys file to create a bootconfiguration that disables references to all memorymanagers, such as HIMEM.SYS, EMM386.EXE,QEMM, 386Max, etc. as well as disk cacheing pro-grams such as SMARTDRV.EXE or Opticache andanything else you don�t explicitly need to run thegame. Edit your AUTOEXEC.BAT to create a con-figuration path that removes references to diskcaches and all other TSRs beside your mouse driverand, if necessary, your VESA driver.

2. What is a VESA driver?

To access the extended VGA mode used by the game,you may need to load a VESA graphics driver toenhance the functionality of your video card.Consult the manual of your video card to find outwhether or not you need to run such a driver, whatthe name of the driver is and the location of it onyour hard disk or on a floppy.

3. How do I set up my sound card?

Setting sound card parameters:

LORDS II includes an auto detection program thatshould set up your sound system upon installation. Ifyou encounter problems with this auto detection,consult the following section.

To use a sound card with a program, it is sometimes130

necessary to set a number of parameters using thesetup utility in the game directory.

The significant values are the I/O Address, theInterrupt Request Channel (IRQ) and the DirectMemory Access (DMA) values of the relevant soundcard. Boot from your hard drive (ie. without a spe-cial boot disk) and type �SET<enter>� and look fora line that begins with �BLASTER=� followed by asequence of letter/number combinations including:Annn, In, Dn (where n represents a numerical digit);Annn is the address, In is the IRQ and Dn is theDMA value.

The setup program allows for specification of thetype of sound card as well as the Address, IRQ andDMA values of the installed card; If any of these areincorrectly set, sound will not work with the pro-gram.

If no BLASTER variable is found from SET, consulteither the sound card manual or the technician whoinstalled the device to obtain the Address, IRQ andDMA values.

Sound card emulation:

If you are using a card that is not listed as an optionin the setup program, it probably emulates somethingelse. It is usually a good idea to use the oldest versionof whatever card your system is emulating (ie. chooseSoundBlaster over SoundBlaster pro), as the oldercards are usually better documented so that emula-tion of those works better.

4. Why is my CD-ROM game running so slowly?

CD-ROM drives are much slower than hard drives.When running a program from a CD-ROM, if youdon�t run a disk caching utility, the program willprobably run slowly.

The problem with this for protected mode programsis that disk cache programs take up much neededRAM. Unless you have 8 or more megabytes of sys- 131

tem RAM, you will probably run into memory prob-lems when running a protected mode program with adisk cache.

MSCDEX (C:\DOS\MSCDEX.EXE) is a programthat comes with DOS and is packaged with someCD-interface or drive hardware. Along with a prop-erly loaded CD-ROM device driver, it lets DOS seethe CD as a disk drive; without MSCDEX, you can-not access a CD-ROM drive through DOS orWindows.

5. Memory managers

Memory Managers like HIMEM.SYS,EMM386.EXE, QEMM, and 386Max are not neededby this program. They may cause conflicts with theProtected Mode Runtime program. If you experienceany problems running this program, we ask that youdisable any Memory Managers and then try loadingthe game again.

132

IndexAAdvanced battle commands, 83Advanced Farming, 106Advanced labor panel, 37Advanced options, 106Agriculture, 39Ale, 27, 59Alliances, 104Archers, 54, 71Armies, 64

combining, 74creating, 65disbanding, 75foraging, 77, 107information, 73moving, 74splitting, 75wages, 68

BBarren fields, 41Baron, the, 100Battering rams, 91Battles, 78

commanding, 80Beef, 43Births, 29Bishop, the, 99Blacksmith, 48Boiling oil, 94

CCapturing counties, 76Castle building, 49-53Castles

altering, 53repairing, 55taxes and, 62 133

Catapults, 90Cattle, 40, 42Compliments, 102Conscription, 27, 30Conscription, 65Control panel, 21, 34Countess, the, 98County towns, 18, 76Cows, 32Crossbowmen, 54, 71Custom games, 109Customer service, 125

DDairy, 32, 43Deaths, 29Demobilization 29Designer�s notes, 123Diplomacy, 96Drawbridges, 82, 95

EEmigration, 29Events, 27Exploration, 108

FFertility, 106Field usage, 39Food, 31

GGame time, 15Garrison, 54Gifts, 102Grain, 40, 44

HHappiness, 25, 66Health, 25Health Indicator, 26

IIdle peasants, 38Immigration, 29Industry, 46Installation, 8Insults, 102Interface, 17Iron mining, 47

KKeyboard commands, 83Knight, the, 97Knights, 72

LLabor, 34Labor Allocation slider bar, 34

MMacemen, 70Main map, 19Maps, 118Menu bar, 23, 113Mercenaries, 66, 69Merchants, 59Messages, 101Moats, 93Mop up command, 83Multiplayer games, 110

OOrdering troops, 80Overview map, 22

PPause, 82Peasant soldiers, 70Pikemen, 70Pillaging, 75

Population growth, 29

RRations, 27, 31Retreat, 82Revolts, 62, 85

SSetup, 13Siege towers, 91Siege weapons, 90Sieges, 86

the flag, 94winning, 89

Stone quarrying, 47Strategy hints, 114Swordsmen, 72

TTaxes, 25, 61Technical support, 125Technical tips, 128Time Limits, 109Transporting food, 33, 57Treasury, 58Turns, 15

UUnits, 70

sizes 81selecting and moving, 80

WWeapons

making, 48Weather, 106Wood cutting, 47

135

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This software is protected under federal copyright law. It is illegal to make or distributecopies of this software except to make a backup copy for archival purposes only.

Duplication of this software for any other reason including for sale, loan, rental or gift isa federal crime. Penalties include fines as high as $50,000 and jail terms of up to five

years. Sierra On-Line, Inc. supports the industry's effort to fight the illegal copying ofpersonal computer software. Report copyright violations to:

SPA, 1730 M Street N.W. Suite 700, Washington, D.C. 20036 (202) 452-1600This manual, and the software described in this manual, are copyrighted. All rights arereserved. No part of this manual or the described software may be copied, reproduced,translated or reduced to any electronic medium or machine-readable form without the

prior written consent of Sierra On-Line, Inc. © 1995 Sierra On-Line, Inc. and/or desig-nate trademarks of, or licensed to Sierra On-Line, Inc. All rights reserved. Bellevue, WA

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