Mount & Blade 2's naval expansion will have complex sailing with wind, currents, and respect for a boat's draft

This year will see the release of the first major expansion for Mount & Blade 2: Bannerlord, following three years of updates since its 2022 release. Previously delayed from summer to fall, the War Sails expansion will take your medieval fantasy adventures and conquest to the high seas, adding ownership of ships and naval combat to the detailed land battles.

War Sails will also add the Nord civilization and expand the map of Calradia to include their icy northern and eastern homelands. The Nords, in Mount & Blade's world, being famous seagoing raiders and traders like our own world's vikings.

Taleworlds has now given a real look into the features we can expect in the expansion, and it's a hell of a lot more detailed than I'd have expected, especially when it comes to the particulars of life on the waves. The seas will have currents, wind directions, and storms to inconvenience or speed your voyages on the waves—that'll include not just the currents of the bays, but sailing on some of the newly-widened and now navigable rivers. Which will have its own knock-on effects modifying the map and its placement of bridges and such.

"Certain rivers have been widened to support inland navigation, allowing ships to reach far beyond the open sea, while bridges have been reconsidered to maintain vital overland routes," said Taleworlds. "Several towns have also been relocated closer to water, weaving them into the expanding maritime trade network. For settlements now hugging rivers and coasts, danger sails closer—rival ports are now just a voyage away."

Purchasing boats will be as simple as buying them from a port, though in true medieval fashion warships will cost you a ton of money—one screenshot shows a two-masted, two-oar-banked Dromon at just over 60,000 denars. That's quite literally years of daily pay for a top-tier troop type. But you'll want them, because with boats come blockades, meaning it'll be hard to siege a coastal settlement without a proper navy to keep enemy supplies and reinforcements out.

To be honest it's a lot more detailed simulation than I would have expected from the expansion, which could have been as simple as making naval combat and siege blockades before calling it done. Few games care much about the knock-on effects of prevailing ocean currents or skirting the edge of a storm system to get somewhere faster, but if any kind of game should care it's surely Mount & Blade.

You can read more about the upcoming War Sails expansion in a development diary on Steam, which is also where you can find the page for War Sails.