![mount and blade fire and sword free a prisoner mount and blade fire and sword free a prisoner](https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/mountandblade/images/f/fe/Escape_male.png)
That was my experience when playing as the Cossacks, and I was only in the first June of the game!!! :D Usually the Enemy Nobles manage to escape, but as long as you have a big enough army to tackle them with, maybe twice the size, there is a better chance of taking the Enemy Noble as prisoner. When I finally defeated the Crimean Army, after losing 2/3rds of my men, my friend ended up with 8 troops, and I got to take the Crimean leader in one fell swoop with 30 or so men remaining. Of course when we fought this Crimean force together, my "Friend" became a prisoner while the rest of his troops were either fighting or had been routed. I was level 7 at the time, and my pop cap. I think what happened when I captured the Noble was get into a fight that one of my "Friends" was in, and my "Friend" was lower on troops than I was. If the Noble you captured is important enough, you may get paid faster and in bigger amounts!
![mount and blade fire and sword free a prisoner mount and blade fire and sword free a prisoner](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/vByXJyhRH9M/maxresdefault.jpg)
I've also heard if you hold onto your Noble prisoner long enough, the Kingdom from which you captured him will offer a larger sum of money, sometimes 20k or more, but that would be after several weeks had passed. Luckily, I held onto my prisoner until a better offer came along two weeks later, which totaled out to be around 12k thaler. I hung onto him for a couple of weeks and the King of the Cossacks, Hetman Bogdan Hmelnitski, tried buying him from me for around 7.5k thaler. When I played as the Cossacks I had captured a Crimean Noble after losing half of my troops in battle. If you have joined up with a kingdom, there are times where the King or a Noble of that faction will want to buy the prisoner from you for a large sum of money, usually between 5000-10000 thaler as far as I've seen. Ratsherr is a Noble of the Swedish Kingdom, he is therefore not for sale to Ransom Brokers.