Children are a feature in Mount&Blade: Bannerlord.
Children are considered minors from birth until the age of 18, and as minors they are not available to interact with, only present in the Clan section and the Encyclopedia. They are added to the Player's Clan, and are eligible to succeed the player character should he/she die or retire at the Retreat. When children come of age, they are eligible for marriage like adults are, and will follow the same rules as regular noble characters. Female characters that are married will be transferred to the husband's clan, unless that female character is a faction leader. Male characters that marry will remain in his clan unless he marries a female faction leader, at which point he will transfer to the clan of his wife.
Traits and appearance[]
- The physical appearance of the child is determined by mixing the physical features (facekeys) of the parents.
- The child's Personality Traits are likely to be the same as the parent of the child's corresponding gender, however they may take on different traits as well.
- Children born from parents of different cultures are more likely to adopt their mother's Culture, even if the mother has joined her husband's clan or faction.
- The equipment a child will be given upon coming of age is dependent on their personal Culture, and not the Culture of the faction of which the child is a member.
- The convention of naming the child is based upon choosing a name from either of the parents' cultures; a child can for example be of a Sturgian culture and be given a Battanian name.
Pregnancy[]
Whenever a married couple spends time together waiting inside a fief, there is a chance that the mother may become pregnant. In Bannerlord, only married couples are eligible to have children; it is impossible to have children out of wedlock. It appears that whether the female character will become pregnant or not is determined at a fixed time of day, around the time of the day similar to when wages are paid.
The probability of pregnancy is dependent on the age of the mother, as well as how many children the mother has had previously. A female character may have children from the age of 18 up until the age of 45, at which point it becomes impossible. The amount of children a female character has had previously substantially impacts the likelihood of the becoming pregnant, and the after usually 4 children further pregnancies become significantly more rare.
The level 25 perk Virile of the Charm skill will increase the likelihood of the character having children by 30%. This perk will not stack, it is only required for either the aspiring mother or father to have the perk.
The exact formula of pregnancy chance for the main character or main character's wife is the following:
pregnancy_chance = (1.2-(womans_age-18)*0.04)/((number_of_kids+1)*(number_of_kids+1))*0.12*[1.3 if virile]*100%
A 18 year old 'virile' lady with 0 kids has 18,7% daily chance to get pregnant. With 1 kid, it turns into 4,6%; with 2 kids it turns into 2%; 3 kids - 1%; 4 kids - 0,7%. Similarly, with other things held constant, every 5 years that passed since the age of 18 further reduce the chance to get pregnant by roughly 1/6 of its value.
Education[]
At several stages of children's age you can choose how to "guide" their upbringing which will affect their Attributes and Skill Focus points.
Bonuses granted on the 3rd (random) page of each stage can be rerolled if you have a save file from the day before the child's birthday, before the game gave you the Education notification/event.
| Age | Choice | Total |
|---|---|---|
| 2 years | Page 1. Choose 1 out of 3 highest Attributes of the child's father to give the child +1 to this Attribute *in case of multiple equal Attributes, their order in the game matters, i.e. if father's Attributes are 4/4/3/4/4/4, then you will only be able to choose between Vigor, Control and Cunning |
+4 AP |
| Page 2. Choose 1 out of 3 highest Attributes of the child's mother to give the child +1 to this Attribute | ||
| Page 3. (Random) The game randomly chooses 2 additional Attributes neither of which was picked above. | ||
| 5 years | Page 1. Choose one of the following options:
|
+2 AP +2 FP +5 SP |
Page 2. Choose one of the following options:
| ||
| Page 3. (Random) The game adds +1 to a random Attribute (including the one chosen on page 1). | ||
| 8 years | Page 1. Choose one of the following options:
|
+1 AP +2 FP +10 SP |
Page 2. Choose one of the following skills based on what you chose on page 1 and get +1 Focus Point and +5 Skill Points to this skill:
| ||
| Page 3. (Random) The game randomly gives you +1 Focus Point and +5 Skill Points to 1 out of the 5 remaining skills from the same set of skills you chose above. | ||
| 11 years | Page 1. Choose one of the following options:
|
+1 AP +2 FP +10 SP |
Page 2. Choose one of the following skills and get +1 Focus Point and +5 Skill Points:
| ||
| Page 3. (Random) The game randomly adds +1 Focus Point and +5 Skill Points to one of the following skills: Riding / Athletics / Smithing / Scouting / Charm / Medicine. | ||
| 14 years | Page 1. Choose one of the following options:
|
+1 AP +4 FP +20 SP |
Page 2. Choose one of the following options:
| ||
Page 3. (Random) The game randomly adds +1 FP and +5 SP to one of the following pairs of skills:
| ||
| 16 years | Page 1. Choose one of the following options:
|
+1 AP +3 FP +15 SP |
Page 2. Choose one of the following options based on what you chose on page 1 and get +1 Focus Point and +5 Skill Points to this skill:
| ||
| Page 3. (Random) The game randomly gives you +1 Focus Point and +5 Skill Points to 1 out of the 6 skills from the same set of skills you chose above. |
Coming of Age[]
When children reach 18 years, they're automatically assigned a certain level (that seems to depend on time passed since the start of the game, usually it's 15++ or even 20++) and are given a large amount of extra Attribute Points and Focus Points to be distributed (base number + level bonuses).
At level 1, your children have a total base amount of 25 Attribute Points (6 + 10 distributed during Education + 9 more you can distribute yourself) and 18 Focus Points (13 distributed during Education + 5). That is more than the main character has (18 and 12 respectively for Story Mode) and way more than any of wanderers or lords have (15 and 5 respectively).