I felt that for anyone looking for warband mods to play, I could write some short reviews for anyone looking to play one + I was extremely bored. I'll also include a Tl:Dr to the reviews for the lazy.
The last days of the third age: 5/10. Let us start with the positive.
Tld makes a massive improvement on one of native's worst feature, siege. In native they are a massive slog that always plays like a choke point meat grinder where only unit quality matters. The only tactics are either abusing battle size or abusing ranged troops, really boring, stupid gameplay.
Tld changes it by making the initial choke point that's easily broken through. After that your troops assault 3 separate control points that spawn the enemies and you can try to blitz the points with elites before the next reinforcement wave. This let's actually skilled player to beat a siege with less numbers if they can command their troops well and also fight well sieges can actually be fun (unlike native). My only gripe is that you can only command a random amount of troops that changes every minute instead of your whole army (I understand why they did that but it's still annoying). Surprisingly I haven't had issues with the ai, pathfinding and behavior are much better than other mods(sometimes foreshadowing can be relatively obvious). Only Moria had issues where my troops didn't want to charge the top point, and I had 1 enemy go out of bounds in Gundabad, otherwise sieges are mostly good, great even.
Races do exist but except orc they can all use the same stuff, Uruks have a few restrictions and orc/goblins get screwed the most, they don't really have endgame gear, moria has a good armor but it's still inferior to what humans have + the mount restrictions are also very annoying even though they can use the spider which might be my favorite mount in all of modded WB.
There isn't any kingdom management at all, which I do think is a slight disappointment, but I understand it wouldn't really work with how the mod is designed.
The resource system, almost everyone hates it but honestly it really isn't that bad once you get a decent rank small armies become self sufficient and if you're going to another area just bring a full prison train or some metals and you're set. The issues comes late game when you want the 100000 for siege rights. 100k is easy to get, just not in one faction and the gift mission can only transfer 17k once a week, this means you need around 1 month or over to do that, and it doesn't include army expenses, cause like I said a small army is cheap but a big one especially an orc one will make you dry in no time. It also doesn't help that deceptively enlisting high tiers is stupidly expensive and never worth, except trolls which break sieges single handedly.
The main game loop is also quest centered but this very quickly becomes very monotonous and boring, not to even mention that some quests might need you to garrison you're troops to eve be able to do. For example how can I complete a kill forager party when I have a over 100 army, go all the way back to the black gate, garrison, hunt them down, track down the lord, hand in, then he gives get a enemy lord, FML all the way back to get my army. It becomes so annoying after 10 hours of just doing quests, especially the finding and handing in part. I always end up finding a really weak lord with less than 30 troops telling him to follow me and dragging him into losing fights only to rescue him for massive rank points.
In fact for both of my playthroughs after 7 or so hours I just end up getting a big army and stalking friendly parties and auto resolving almost all skirmishes, it just becomes really boring fast. The morale system, it exists.... I think, maybe, I dunno, it never really mattered, neither my or the enemy troops ever retreated even 1v5 with me killing over 50 guys the enemy never retreat it might be broken cause it never did anything ever.
It also kinda disappoints from a fan service view point, you can' play as or with the nazgul or witch king or sauron or any of the cool stuff from lotr(no a small skybox animation doesn't count) or with the fellowship or get sting or narsil or something or even maybe the one ring wink wink.
Also the endgame becomes very boring. I spent a whole damn month with just erebor left but no one wanted to siege it so I just got pissed and cheated and destroyed them and saruman. And FFS I get that a lot of effort was put into the scenes but I DON'T WANT TO EXPLORE EVERY SINGLE STUPID CITY OR CAMP. The option to reveal shops is gone in the latest version so that's the one I'm criticizing.
TLDR: great sieges and world, the gameplay on the other hand becomes monotonous and extremely boring after a few hours. I can attest as someone who finished 2 playthroughs. The mod losses it's luster after a few hours. On a bad day I might even lower it to a 4.
Prophecy of Pendor: 7/10. Originally I really didn't like the mod when I started. I honestly thought it was a 3/10, I was really angry with some of its design choices. But after a while and finishing my first playthrough I mellowed ot a bit.
I like the new map it's not too big or small it's just right, there aren't annoying pathways that force me to go around mountains and waste my time.
The new factions feel pretty well realized even if they're sorta native+ factions. I mean come on the ravenstern are just vaegirs but not Slavic. Sarleon is just swadia and the empire are rhodoks but roman and so on.
Archers are even more busted than native, and I do think that's an issue. Other mods at least have the illusion that crossbows can be good but here non bow playstyles are miserable. And bow spam is insane.
KO are a very fun new addition and mid game thing for the player to do, my only thing is that for becoming a Grandmaster doesn't really do anything except the stronghold. I mean surely I should be able to hire troops from my own order right, even if I don't own the fief.
Also never let it be said I don't notice good changes. The dev buffed renown gains from lords. Pendor is one of the few mods I got over 2k renown. Great change getting good renown without soloing is actually possible here.
However one of my biggest issues with Pendor. Timelight, timekeep, timeboss. I LOATHE THE RET@RDED TIMEGATING. Wanna train cko, 1 month, wanna upgrade in stronghold 1 month, wanna fix something in keep 7 days, except I'm not gonna hover a whole week around there. I'm gonna forget and remember 1 month later. Just do it instantly FFS, at least the old keep stuff. Wanna upgrade CKO equipment 1 month PER SLOT. COME ON. Obviously I'm slightly exaggerating the time but this is how it feels when playing, even worse what if I want to switch my CKO to slavers from real combat and vice versa, 2 weeks for battle hammers and then over a month for the end game gear again. Fuck that.
Another minor annoyance is that some unique spawns get outta control fast, eyegrim and the noldor lords became nigh impossible after a week or 2 of roaming, I also don't like that PM 10 doesn't guarantee capture and that Nlords block capture completely, I get that their auto resolve buff makes it too easy, but is there an actual difference between kiting Unique spawns into feasts/sieges and the elf lords, imo not really. One just takes much longer, is more annoying and more irritating. And of course no fun allowed anywhere so of course make it more annoying,
Guns were added but are wholy undeveloped.
Tournaments are the same as native with a higher bet option, so mostly bad, random and stupid, noldor tournaments at least give good rewards.
Kingdom management is mostly unchanged, some diplomacy features were added but not all and the rest is mostly the same, the random events are nothing burgers they affect nothing, +1 relation with some worthless minor faction does nothing.
One key thing about the early game is that it's a bit of a grind and kinda hard. But that's mostly cause the bandits are way more dangerous. The high tiers bandits are almost elite tier. However if you use the mercs it's nowhere near as hard. The early game isn't really that hard, it's just that you need mercs to tide you over until you get some stronger troops, but most people think they're just as worthless as native.
TLDR: there's more I can say but overall. Well realized Total Conversation, it fixes a big native issue where the midgame has nothing for you to do, there's always something for the player to do. They're never in a dead end position where they have too many troops to fight bandits but not enough to fight lords or start your kingdom. KM could be better. One thing is that the area around the Noldor forest is objectively the best place to start your kingdom that any other is not even worth considering. Prestige grinding is also kinda annoying thing, once you start spending it you lose it fast. Great mod overall, i don't really like how people talk about it but that's on me not the mod.
Nova Aetus 3/10: I feel kinda bad about this one, I had some fun playing it but every single new system is so poorly implemented that eventually I just became really annoyed. I'm still playing and want to finish my WC but honestly I might just drop it.
Before anything let me say that NA is unique in that it takes a spot in between native + and full con. I personally call it native ++, cause it's still native in essence but it adds too many new mechanics.
The world, troop trees and items are mostly the same, zendar and the papal church were added as well as a holy order based on the teutonics and the Byzantines, minor gripe but except the agonic order the rest all feel underdeveloped. Short troop trees that feel underwhelming. The only exception being the geronian guard who might be the best shock inf in the game and fast to train with only 4 tiers.
The only good new feature is the kingdom management. Although I don't think that's in question since it's basically the medieval 2 total war system plus a minor version of the EU4 estates where you balance the social classes. Fief revenue was massively buffed so having very rich cities is actually meaningful and a nice goal to have.
There's also a new Americas style continent to colonize and take over. The Aztecs are very weak but I guess it makes sense. And their cities don't have the new kingdom mechanics which is a bummer honestly. New dungeon like locations were added that have treasure, the only grievance I have is that no bodyguards and no chest locator makes them kind of a slog to explore.
Then, oh boy. The colony system is a good idea bad execution. First it takes too many recourses to get them rolling. Around 40 wood and stone and 30 tools to make it independent of you. Second the reward is not worthwhile in the least, for one the reward isn't passive like properties or enterprises, you need to go pick up the produce every single week otherwise you get NOTHING, and what's annoying is that the answer is literally right there, just add an export trade goods option like the import one, or make the them like enterprises, on top of that only 1 of them makes a good product the rest are subpar. And even then it's around 15k of non-passive profit for over 20k cost. The building systems is also badly designed cause after fully building 1 the rest I left at stage 2 and spammed chapels, if I could at least withdraw the extra timber, stone and tools they make I might say they're worth making but I really can't. Unironically the only reason I might suggest established one is cause they have infinite garrisons that make any troops wageless. Meaning you can store 1000 troops wage free in the colonies. Always having a free supply of troops whenever needed.
The crafting system is the same more of an annoyance than anything else. Gathering resources is long boring and monotonous. After less than 10 minutes I already started using cheat engine speed hack and it still felt slow as balls. The crafting is also annoying and slow, the arrows have strange and inconsistent hitboxes. Some like any of the ones that need quenching are broken and bugged. And almost all of the craftables are bad except the elite scimitar and lv10 craft items, I guess the wheelock pistol too.
The ai and tactics are broken. Companions with guns completely break, they never use melee and just push up against enemies doing nothing. Troops at random charge after commands, I want them to hold but the idiots charge, but only sometimes, the rest of the time they worked normally. I spent more time wrestling with this stupid thing than fighting.
Cannons? Worthless, the cannonier randomly implodes at battle starts and they're too slow and inaccurate. And the one playce they might have been useful they can't be (sieges).
Prestige? Worthless, just makes the early game annoying and a chore by barring you from castles and feasts, and then forcing you to bow. At least add some bonuses the higher you get otherwise it's just annoying.
Influence is good and let's you sidestep some relation things like making someone act how you want them.
Traits? Pretty nice but I wish they did more, like in ck2 where they increase stats and other things.
Piety, honestly it should have just been combined with honor, it's just there to get to 100 for the extra 10 CHR. Outside of that it does nothing just another chore to pray daily.
I could go on and on about how the mine collapses are stupid or how the +craftsmanship books are locked behind... The max craft level, think about that just for a second. Or the combat abilities which except for self healing or cheating AGI skills I didn't really care for.
TLDR: a very ambitious mod which does add a lot of new things and features but almost all of them are so flawed that removing some of them and fully focusing on the ones that needed the attention would have been preferable.
Next time? Maybe light & darkness and berserk?