I have created a character but I have no idea where I should spawn.
Also, much like Mount & Blade, I will probably feel terrible plundering villages. Which sucks, because I apparently got a bonus plundering trait. Ripip.
I can offer you two options. One is as the Bloodheir of the Roarin Blood, which could be pretty powerful but comes with a bunch of RP baggage you might not want. That's already posted in Ykaemen.
The other is as a lord in the Spearbreakers/Lokumokab, which I haven't posted yet but I can do so soonish, and you'll get as many estates as you can take if you're willing to do a bit of running around.
Also, looting is used for tax collection, so it's not a bust.
E: Crikey, didn't realise I was going to need to fight my way into this settlement. Unless Forsaken or maybe Aerotonus can set up an offer, I might not be able to offer you the Spearbreakers position immediately. It's a pretty good one though (probably better than the other), so I'm entirely willing to hold it open for another character of yours.
So I signed up as the MacGroove family recently (two or so months ago) and let me give you some advice. Basically, do your schtick and pull risks, raid your neighbors, loot their temples, plunder their wives and force yourself upon their homes (wait, this doesn't seem right). In other words, have fun and don't be afraid to lose shit. It happens, and there is plenty of shit around, so you can replace yours easily. However, the most fun I have is picking isolated villages and kidnapping thralls from there to my villages. This way two settlements with 200/300 citizens became 750/800 powerful villages in no time at all. Good shit.
That's... one way of playing. If you don't mind any major realm you're in or near branding you and your family a robber. I've successfully pulled a character from five low-end medium infantry and one pathetic estate to the same pathetic estate, almost forty high-end medium infantry, and a bunch of archers and low-middle cavalry in training. Without picking fights, or probably (hopefully) even being noticed. That's not counting Peran, since the West opening up is a total once-off.