It’s not like Sims meets Skyrim.

Controls are fine. People generally pick up on the shortcuts for army commands decently quickly.

Combat, I assume, you mean swordplay and archery and stuff, and not controlling your army. It varies. You can change the difficulty quite drastically, in order to find what fits you.

The pacing of the game is where Mount and Blade shines. Since there’s no real storyline, there’s no preset pace. And I wouldn’t recommend looking at guides, either. A ton of the fun comes from figuring out what you want to do. Trade peacefully and get uber rich? Sure. You can always use your immense wealth to hire every merc you can find and then become a lord or mercenary later, if need be. Want to be an elite fighter with a small retinue of 20-30 and just pillage everything you can find, moving too fast for lords or patrols to catch you? Also fine. Just make sure you have at least one faction you’re neutral/friendly with, so that you can sell loot and buy new equipment.