History YMMV / MountAndBlade

** Castle Grunwalder, where in addition to there being a substantial run to the castle from your starting position, the single ladder given to you is covered by at least three angles of fire from the walls. It doesn't help that initial controllers of it are the aforementioned Rhodoks.

** The game is actually a very, ''very'' popular under-the-radar classic, far more than most people would realise. When the long-awaited ''VideoGame/MountAndBladeIIBannerlord'' finally emerged into early access release on UsefulNotes/{{Steam}}, it instantly shot right up to near the top of the list of the most-played games on the platform, behind only perpetual list residents ''[[VideoGame/CounterStrike Counter-Strike Global Offensive]], VideoGame/Dota2'' and ''VideoGame/PlayerUnknownsBattlegrounds,'' revealing the long-delayed game to be anticipated beyond what almost anyone could imagine.

*** Butterlord [[note]]A portmanteau of "Butter" and "Bannerlord"[[/note]]

** BANNERLORD WHEN?[[labelnote:Explanation]]Screamed by the community due Bannerlord's long development schedule. Again, not nearly as applicable now since the Early Access Announcement.[[/labelnote]]

** Ïf you ever get faced in a tournament against a single opponent in a jousting match (i.e. both of you wield lances) you might want to open a beer for the occasion, as you are going to spend minutes circling around each other trying to get a decent angle to charge. Your best hope in this situation is to try to get your rival to crash into a wall...

** Sea Raiders can make your early game a living hell if you start off in Nord territory. They come with better armor and weapons than the other faction-specific mobs, making them more difficult than regular bandits. And unlike bandits and deserters, who will leave you alone if you pay their fee, there is no option to avoid a Sea Raider fight outside of abandoning some troops or surrendering.

** Also, arguably, deliberately invoked; the game was built ground-up to not just support, but encourage modding. As a result, there have been a lot of mods made for this game, ranging from all sorts of historical settings like Rome, Japan, Dark Ages Britain (Brytenwalda, which the devs later helped make the Viking Conquest official DLC), and more. There are also tons of mods transporting the game into fictional settings, from ''Literature/ASongOfIceAndFire'' (or, as you might know it, ''Series/GameOfThrones''), to ''Literature/TheLordOfTheRings'' to ''TabletopGame/{{Warhammer}}'' and even into ''Film/StarWars''. In short, if it's a popular enough setting, there's a decent chance someone has made a mod turning M&B into it.

** "All I want is a release date so I can sleep at night." [[note]]The developer blogs for Bannerlord are filled with this exact comment due to the refusal of Taleworlds to provide even a token possible release date for the game.
** BANNERLORD WHEN?[[note]]Screamed by the community due Bannerlord's long development schedule.[[/note]]

** "All I want is a release date so I can sleep at night." The developer blogs for Bannerlord are filled with this exact comment due to the refusal of Taleworlds to provide even a token possible release date for the game.

* SpiritualLicensee: Because of the gritty third-or-first-person ground-level view of medieval battles and skirmishes, the absence of magic, monsters or other overt fantasy elements, and the {{Fantasy Counterpart Culture}}s, ''Mount & Blade''/''Warband'' can feel like a licensed game for HistoricalFiction novels - especially action-packed works by Creator/BernardCornwell and other authors. Playing as the Vaegirs, Rhodoks and Swadians with their knights, archers and crossbowmen can feel like Cornwell's ''Literature/TheGrailQuest'', about UsefulNotes/TheHundredYearsWar. Playing as the [[DarkAgeEurope slightly retro]] Nords can remind one of Cornwell's ''Literature/TheSaxonStories'' about the Dark Ages English and Vikings/Danes. Playing as the Khergits can evoke Conn iggulden's ''Literature/{{Conqueror}}'' series about the rise of the Mongols as a world power. The lead developer actually {{Squee}}d when presented with one of the Grail Quest books by an interviewer, and acknowledged Cornwell as an influence.

* CrowningMusicOfAwesome: [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F4YynloCjdM&feature=related The main theme.]]

** Nordic Huscarls. 20 or more in a tight formation easily become unstoppable. Storming/defending a castle, holding against cavalry in the open plains. Odds that were once reason to run and hide are now reason to sit down and dare the enemy to bring a friend. They were absolutely ''insane'' in the original release, leading to them being nerfed- now they're "only" the best melee infantry in the game.

** Nordic Huscarls. 20 or more in a tight formation easily become unstoppable. Storming/defending a castle, holding against cavalry in the open plains. Odds that were once reason to run and hide are now reason to sit down and dare the enemy to bring friend.

%% ZeroContextExample entries are not allowed on wiki pages. All such entries have been commented out. Add context to the entries before uncommenting them.

* TierInducedScrappy: Nobody likes the Khergits because they're so utterly useless in sieges.

** Partly the power of cavalry in ''Mount & Blade'' is just that cavalry soldiers, other than Khergit skirmishers and horsemen, manhunters, and caravan guards, are generally ultimate or penultimate soldiers in the progression, while foot soldiers are a broader mix ranging from raw recruits to top-of-the-tree units.[[note]]Comparing a mixed infantry army of fresh recruits, low-level troops, intermediate troops, veterans, and ultimates (say, a mix of Swadian recruits, Swadian militia, Swadian footmen, Swadian infantry, and Swadian sergeants) to a mounted army (which consists exclusively of Sarranid horsemen and Sarranid mamlukes), the more elite force is more powerful. A fairer comparison would be an army of Swadian infantry and sergeants to an army of Sarranid horsemen and mamlukes. (Cavalry is still quite powerful, of course, but some of its apparent power is just the fact that cavalry tend to be high level troops.) I'd say this is also {{Justified}}, considering that much of the power of Medieval men-at-arms in comparison to the poorly trained levies and militias who were often the only other soldiers on the field was in their training and equipment (besides horses), not just the intrinsic power of cavalry. (Many men-at-arms fought on foot much of the time, since high quality "true" infantry was often absent. Militaries that adopted a flexible doctrine about whether to fight mounted or dismounted often gained an advantage over more dogmatically horse-bound foes (until their foes learned, that is), such as initially the Scots over the English, then later the English over the French.)[[/note]]

* BrokenBase: Before ''VideoGame/MountAndBlade'' was picked up by a publisher, they were operating on a buy now get a fleshed out version later without added cost deal. Similar to Minecraft and Terraria. However, once a publisher picked up the game, the promised improvements were never made to the original Mount and Blade. The improvements were to include better combat, multiplayer, and improvements to sieges and management. Instead they were made into addons that had to be purchased. A segment of the original fandom who had pre-purchased the game then were less then pleased. There were vows to never buy or instead pirate the sequels as they felt they were cheated by the deal. As the game and sequels became cheaper, members of the fandom who felt this way changed their minds and just purchased the now notably cheaper sequels.

* FridgeBrilliance: For most of the original game's development, Marnid and Borcha were the only companion [=NPCs=]. '''M'''arnid and '''B'''orcha, '''M'''ount & '''B'''lade.

* CurbStompBattle: Player can easily pull this off during normal gameplay but the tutorial/introduction quest is a prime example of this trope. In this quest you are tasked with training 10 peasants to recapture merchants wife/brother from robbers... "Problem" is that this quest is not timed and player can easily amass huge army and get high end gear before finishing the quest which results in robbers getting completely roflstomped. Oh, and a second part of this quest pits PC and several high end faction troops ( that serve as city guards with every faction ) against few unarmoured looters..

%%** [[GameMod "Where's the 'rape' button?"]]

* EnsembleDarkhorse: Bunduk seems to have a lot of fans.

** As of the 1.153 patch for Mount and Blade Warband, daily waves of indicted Lords. At around 300-600 days, Kings from all factions will constantly indict their Vassals for treason at the drop of a hat each day. This causes wide swathes of their territory to remain unclaimed, which means smaller armies to fight in the endless wars. Even if they start granting territory to one, it is no guarantee that they will remain at all. A player is often the sole vassal who actually sticks around for more than a week, meaning they are the only one who can actually fight enemies off. If this goes on enough, some lords may even [[LostForever permanently leave Calradia]].