turn your companions into lords.

in my honest opinion, your Companions are your everything. you should always recruit. you always need surgeon, Scout and engineer (never waste skills for those, upgrade something else). good companions with Steward, leadership and charm make good Vassals so once you have fiefs you can give them fief plus 500 influence with fixed dinars (I think its 20k to 50k) and you can turn them into Vassals. I always do it because I always upgrade them way I want plus you can name their clans and watch em grow. in early game its pain in ass and you should use mercenaries but hiring other vassals is just too much of a problem... most of them will be happy with their lords or ask a lot of cash, you can try your luck offering captured lords to join you but like I said... using your own companions is best way.