As you build up your resources and make a name for yourself in Manor Lands, not everyone wants you to have it good. There’s a good chance bandits can appear in your growing region, and you need to protect yourself from them.
Bandits are aggressive units that periodically raid you throughout your Manor Lords campaign. When they raid your village, they take a small amount of resources you have stockpiled up, making it more challenging to maintain a happy life with your villagers. Thankfully, there are some ways you can protect yourself from these bandits, making it more difficult for them to take what’s rightfully yours.
How to defend against Bandits in Manor Lords
When protecting your village from Bandits in Manor Lords, it all comes down to having a sizeable militia and keeping their morale high. You can create a militia by going to the Army tab at the bottom of your screen and equipping your villagers with the correct equipment. You won’t be able to make every type of army, depending on the particular military items you’ve crafted in your town or traded with other regions.
An established militia in Manor Lords can help protect against bandits stealing from your resources, and they deter any bandit forces that might attack you. Thankfully, there’s typically a notification if an attack is about to happen, giving you plenty of time to focus on increasing your forces and preparing your villagers accordingly.
If you want to gather resources for your militia, install an Armorer’s Workshop and a Blacksmith’s Workshop to your level two Burgage plots. These add armaments to your village’s supply, which is what you need to create military units. The Armorer’s Workshop gives you Helmets, Mail Armor, and Plate Armor, while the Blacksmiths’ Workshop allows you to craft Spears and Sidearms. If you want to add archers to your ranks, this requires a Fletcher’s Workshop, where you can craft Warbows. If you’re desperate, hiring Mercenary Companies is also an option if you cannot afford to create militia units in Manor Lords. However, mercenaries are expensive.
There are several requirements a level one Burgage needs to meet to become a level two Burgage. You need to give them water access through a well, add a Church to your village, and have enough supplies to expand your fuel, food, and clothing reserves to have multiple stalls at your Marketplace. So long as you meet these requirements in Manor Lords, level two Burgages are available to unlock, which is the only way to access these more advanced arsenal options for your militia.
You want to monitor your village’s approval rating, too. If you don’t have a high approval rating, the militia is less keen to protect this location in Manor Lords. Some of the best ways to increase your village’s approval rating is by adding various food to the Marketplace, giving them a large selection of fuel, and having multiple sources of clothing options, which means establishing a Tannery and a Weaver shop, with Wool, Yarn, and Flax to turn into Linen.
After you have one or two army slots for your region, your village should be protected from attacking bandits. I recommend going out of your way to attack any bandit camps that pop up in Manor Lords, preventing them from becoming a problem as you progress through the area and add regions to your control.
