How to Create an Army in Knights of Honor 2: Sovereign (Quick Guide)

When you first play Knights of Honor 2, you lose quite quickly. Here, the management system works a little differently than in similar games. So let’s talk about an essential thing: how to create an army.

How to Hire a Marshal

First of all, pause the game using the “P” hotkey or the corresponding icon in the lower left corner of the screen. This will take you time to figure out what to do in any situation; remember that.

So, in order to create an army in Knights of Honor 2, you need a marshal that will lead it.

1. Click on the empty noble slot at the top of the screen. Then select the “Hire Marshal” option. The first marshal costs 200 gold, but each subsequent one will cost more.
   
2. In the next window, select one of your cities in which your marshal will appear.
   
   That’s a very important step, because if you start, for example, with Kyiv, you have two pieces of territory that are located quite far from each other. And if you choose the wrong city, you will have to take your marshal throughout foreign lands, which will be bad for politics if you don’t have a non-agression pact with these kingdoms.
3. When the marshal appears, you can select him with a mouse click and order him to enter the city.
   

How to Recruit an Army

1. Select the city, then select an empty garrison squad slot in the city panel. You will see a window with the available types of troops.
   
2. The simplest peasant troops can be hired from the beginning. The rest of the troops will be available later. If you want to find out the requirements for hiring a particular unit, hover over it and press RMB (right mouse button) to pin the window.
   
   Inside the window, you may see additional requirements as a link. If you hover over it, you will see the next window with the requirements and will be able to pin it with RMB and so on.
3. To hire squads, you need to have a population in the city. The population is displayed right on the map and in the city interface.
   
   To increase the population, build Housings. Click on an empty building slot on the city panel and select “Housings” from the proposed options.
   
4. While your marshal is in a city, you can transfer squads between him and the city garrison. Just select a squad and drag it with the mouse.
   

How to Increase Army Manpower

Manpower is the number of units in an army. In Knights of Honor 2, manpower plays an important role and often determines the outcome of the battle.

1. Visit any of your cities and click on the marshal equipment slot.
   
2. Here, you can buy additional troops up to 4 times. Each one will increase the manpower of the army by 15%, but also increase its upkeep costs. This especially applies to food. Besides, each subsequent “Additional Troop” will cost more than the previous one.
   
3. In the beginning, only two slots are available for each marshal. To get an extra two slots, the royal family of your kingdom must have the “Logistics” tradition.
   
   In addition, a marshal of your army must have the “Logistics” skill upgraded to level 3.
   

How to Increase the Power of Your Army

When squads take part in combat, they gain experience and increase their rank. The rank displays as stars on the squad icon and is specified in its description. There are 4 ranks in the game now, from “Novice” (0 stars) to “Legendary” (3 stars).

As you can see in the picture above, the manpower of the squad doesn’t change from rank to rank, but its characteristics become significantly stronger. So it will be wise to replenish troops after battles in a city by clicking on the corresponding icon instead of losing them and then buying new ones.

You can also increase the power of your army by setting corresponding traditions for the royal family.

How to Learn Marshal Skills

Each marshal can acquire skills that will increase his effectiveness in battle. Select a marshal and click on the plus icon on his panel. Then select a skill from those randomly suggested.

To learn a skill, you need a certain number of books.

A university and a church can increase the production of books in a city.

You can also hire a cleric and assign him to govern a city. This will increase book production in the settlement.

Besides, from time to time a cleric will make pilgrimages. This will give you more books in the future.

If you have questions, ask them in the comments below. Thanks for reading 👀!