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bonerstorm said:

Nice necro, bro. Honestly your point is legit, but you open yourself up to criticism when you make that legit point in the context of an old post dealing with outdated mechanics. I'd have suggested writing it up as a new post, but you do you.

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Weird that only you complained about me reviving an old thread.. You do you too, i guess...

AnandaShanti said:

It feels like some people at TW sincerely want the players to just smash troops into each other. I hope they come around to see that this is horrible, lazy gameplay and not what people want to do. Yes, casuals will play on reduced damage and just smash troops onto enemies and clap. But I want to take on a competent AI that can put up a fight and have my troops behave appropriately and fallow orders and win with little/no losses because of how well I micro'd them!

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I think this is starting to come close to another issue: Depth and newbie availability. There is one thing to make a product for people with several hundred hours in the predecessors. But they also need to appeal to new players. And some of those will want the melee fighting experience. The other half will want the rts-style tactics. Some overlap of those two groups, will want a mix. I mean, TW is still a business. They need profits. If the game is too in depth, it scares new players. If it is too slanted into rts or fps play, they lose one group or the other.

But atm, they lose both veterans and new players. There is still too much that is not working. And too much that needs polish. With release this year?

Apocal said:

You absolutely could not counter HAs at the start of EA with shieldwalls. They would eventually complete their circle and eat your shieldwall, ******* first. That's realistic enough but people weren't having fun with it, especially once the recruit armies were fixed and the Khuzaits could circle-**** you to death with 60+ HAs in every party or 150+ with every army. It was especially, egregiously bad because back then HAs had Noble Bows coming out of their earholes so they were bloody murder on your troops even if your shieldwall was facing the right direction.

I don't agree with the nerfs to their behavior -- making them be dumb and dive into melee just to give foot troops something to bite on -- but on release, horse archers were insanely overpowered in the context of BL.

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I did not state that it was "at the start of EA". But at some interval around 1.5.2 to 1.5.5 ish, cant remember. at that interval HA worked, and shieldwalls soaked up alot of arrows. You countered with your own cav to drive them away, and this sort of semi-skirmish dynamic was there. That dynamic is gone. Instead, all HA do, is shoot at approach, yolo into my infantry or run up to my cav and give them a big hug. Then die.

At launch HA were very strong. But never OP. they always had a counter. Cav. And if you play a "infantry only" type thing, you should expect to lose half your army every battle.

And there are many ways to nerf this, without making them bad! Adjust recruitment. Wages, so the AI prefer the melee cav variant for khuzaits. Nerf their damage and possibly amount of arrows. that would be the best one, imo. So 50 HA cant wipe an army of 200. But still be impactful on static infantry.

At this point.. This game is more frustrating than fun.

AnandaShanti said:

Position your HA just like archers DON'T charge them until the enemy begins to rout. If the enemy gets close pull them back or bring them around and behind. HA (even the t2 one) when used like this will obliterate bandits, militia and less powerful lord parties, stronger HA will defeat parties 5x as big with zero losses if you micro them this way.. Put infantry or Cav in SW (yes SW for cav) in front of HA and slightly to one side, as enemy start to get close move them from that side to the other side (I usually go from left to right), still in front of your HA/archers, this makes the approaching enemy start to turn towards them and expose them selves and causes a massive spike in damage, this will often end the attack on the spot and they route.

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The problem here, is that i don`t want my HA to be archers. They should be competent as HA! And the looter melee weapons should be irrelevant when compared to HA, because they should never be able to catch them. HA was good before. OP is BS because they could be countered with shieldwalls or your own cav. But they acted perfectly before. Their behaviour was excactly what i wanted them to be.

Correct me if I am wrong but this is moreso a problem with the looter equipment than the AI of the archers. Looking at their XML files, which do not lie, they can spawn with Wooden Hammers and Spiked Maces, which are respectively tier 1 and tier 3 blunt-weapons. They shouldn't spawn with such weapons that deal 21 to 45 blunt damage. AI is a problem sure, but they honestly shouldn't be giving looters these weapons

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You are (im sure) not wrong. But the looter weaponry is beside the point. If the HA were not caught in melee, they would not lose. I mean, you would not expect an archer to win against a group of looters, because it is a ranged unit. The looters equipment at that point, is almost irrelevant.
You are arguing their damage, when i am talking about tactics.

But speaking to those damage values, they are only part of the problem. Looters lose hard to regular tier 3 or 4 infantry. Sturgia soldier/spearmen come off the worst in that tier. The looters` weapons only barely able to interrupt them. Even with an aketon with 16-18 armor value, i can take like 6-8 hits by looters. Depending on skills at that point. So they are not too strong. Too strong for their tier? Yes, but it makes little difference. Besides, without shields and without javelins they are truly trash. One good shield and you are almost unbeatable. And on realistic you gotta have a shield anyway. If anything their greatest strength is their propensity to gang on one target. But that is returning to the bad AI, not the looters.
What i think should be nerfed, is their weaponspeed. because they are able to spam attacks much faster than most infantry. So while dealing low damage (comparably to armour values), they are just unrelenting. Which is kind of annoying.

I am assuming though, such details as armour values and weapon types, will be addressed before release. the AI behavious however, can not be relegated to "melee range" or "encircling range" nerfs. That ultimately makes a fully functioning troop type close to useless.
Comparatively, i do not need to counter HA in SP campaigns anymore. I can just shieldwall and watch them suicide on my front line. Some will hit my infantry, some will hit my cav on the flanks. And then they kill themselves off. Sad. Especially considering they worked perfectly at EA release.
Considering this is only one of many problems. AI logic as well, being unable to choose correctly between swords or spears in melee. A cav soldier with sword+shield+spear, will often choose spear when on foot. Which makes him useless and he dies. Infantry have much less, close to none of these issues. So it is only lacking in scripts (i am assuming). Another thing is baiting javelins. You can effectively negate javelins by baiting battanians into throwing them waaay too early. This needs some sort of fix. Like, they only throw on massive blobs. Alternatively they throw en masse, so it becomes a volley. For a single target, that is WAY more dangerous. And would be much cooler. Volleys of javs exchanged before the charge. mmmm...

Also, i am quite certain that AI in Warband was more responsive. He was more capable of blocking with a shield at least. On realistic in Warband, if you did not feint, you would have to crush every shield on your opponents before you could net the kill. In Bannerlord they seem to be far less capable of holding their shields up. This is anecdotal, but it is one of many small things that i have noticed in my playtime. This could be because of block direction, for example. But, such issues should be irrelevant for AI. Just give them 1 block direction with shield, and you immediately create far more competent soldiers, and the AI only have to make 1/4 of the calculations it has to do now. The same rules does not have to apply to the AI, if removing those rules, makes him more competent.

Imo, i hope they push back launch.
The issues:
-Sieges are still pretty basic and.. ****. Ladders and towers dont work, mixed groups makes missile units somtimes protect the gate. Frustrating. AI clumps units and pushes 300 men onto walls. = easy kills unnecessarily for enemy. AND suicides from falling. SHOOTING THROUGH FLOORS. TW, pls. Fix it! I cant block a group or unit type from entering battle. Like.. Really? So i have to lose all my 2h palace guards to arrows? Cool. Thanks. Friendly fire from mangonels etc. 4-5 times now, they even destroy my own siege tower! Like, wtf. And kill dozens of my own men.
-custom equip units or color schemes or ANY customization! I want my own bodyguard in purple. And with special hats. Gimme! It does not have to affect stats! Just cosmetic. Gimme!!!
-villages and cities are not finished. I know they are working on this. But release is 2021 and there is so much with the basic mechanics and such that is wonky.
- world is still empty and lategame, looters/bandits overpopulate the map. Where is my patrol option?!!!
-quests are still samey. Even in 1.6.0 "gang leader need recruits" is just rehashed "slave labor" quest. The only quest i REALLY like is the "find spy" one. Great way to show off the cities. Why not look at mods from Warband? Things that would be easy to implement. Hunting. Bandit character that is allied with bandits. More things based in influence. Lords asking for help, directly. Like a summons. Because we are their friend. And on realistic, quests are very, very rare. Makes it hard to gain relation. And not fun hard. Just waiting-hard. Also random events, ambushes, waiting on campaign map.. The drunkard in the tavern! The world is empty. And the game is less than a year from full, 100% release?
- Companions and lords need different priorites in combat. I hate levelling "Osric" to lvl 30 and then some looters stagger his horse and kill him. Death is fine. It is genuinely a good upgrade from Warband. But having 200 in one armed or polearm, should be a really good fighter who can block, run away and keep distance. Companions especially, often fight worse than tier2 troops, no matter their skill. And 2h or polearm is useless because they run up and give the advantage to sword&board. Optionally, only make them able to die to enemy lords. This is a bad option, but an option i would prefer. If not, death is just not fun. Because skill becomes worthless.
- companion quests! Make them personalized. The quests could be generic, but initialized when you have known them for a time. And the option to have feuds to avenge their deaths.
-relation system is ****. It is a great skeleton for more options, however. In Warband, relation affected many things. Who joined you as marshall, who followed your orders or how big their relationship hit was when you defied their wishes somehow. Bring some of that back! At least make us able to give lords individual orders outside of armies!
- Combat is underwhelming. I dont feel a difference between 60 one handed or 200. A looter STILL hits faster than me. Wtf.
-Armor. MAKE ARMOR GREAT AGAIN. The best feeling in Warband was when your took ZERO dmg from low-level arrows, rocks and looter scythes. So far, even at 50+ armor, 20 looters can kill me in 3 seconds.
- missile aiming is wonky. The path of the arrow/bolt changes when you go from 3rd person to 1st and back again. In sieges, the arrow can fly above the reticle. Like.. What? Not working as intended. I can compensate, but like, why have a reticle of it is not where the arrow goes from? So that is my point of reference.

At this point, this is the amputated expansion of Warband. Nothing more. I really hope they push back release. Taleworlds, don`t release this game as a half-assed Warband copy! It has potential and there is greatness in there. You just gotta fix it!

This has really been frustrating me lately.

I want to do a cav heavy character. With only mounted companions, small group of shielded inf and horse archer (HA) and heavy cavalry (HC).
But, at the moment, even looters manage to kill a few HA, because they run inbetween. And with less armor and weaker horses, they get caught and the dirty peasants knock them out. This is frustrating because it is stupid. A Sea Raider with his javs, would kill 1 or 2. I can accept that, because javs are powerful. But the looters?! ANY mounted unit should run circles around them. The individual soldier AI is very simple. I know. But seriously, a mounted combatant should be able to skirt around and make jabs at a group of enemies. The only time they should yeet into the enemy blob, is in a massed initial charge. The point of them having a horse, is excactly this! Mobility!

The other point is that Aserai HA cost me a war horse to upgrade. Now, late game, that is not an issue. With high rougery and lord-enemies, you get war horses out the horse-ass. But as a low-level, aserai merc, it is not viable. Because war horses cost alot and in caravans they are rare. I could use the Khuzait tier 2-3 HA, but they are REALLY weak and hardly get kills on anything, because of poor skills. And i cant have like, 50 of them atm.

HC works fine, but they are prone to choose cqc fighting. They could do with another targeting system, so cav fights dont end in massive melees. I always hoped that Bannerlord cav fights would be like the "battle of the bastards". And sometimes it is! Sometimes, the AI makes all cav just fly around stabbing each other with pointy sticks. And it is GREAT. Hectic and kinda scary, since you get like a second to react or you are dead. But 3/5 times, the AI forgets that a soldier on horse is NOT an infantryman. Especially against infantry.

At this point, Bannerlord is ambitious and has potential. But there is so much lacking, that it wont be at an acceptable standard in 2021. Because release is set this year.
Im not saying "Bannerlord will be bad". Im saying.. They should just postpone and really finish it.

Save file: https://1drv.ms/u/s!AowaCrNGO4Wyxi8hF8dmUS2sJ6Lr?e=g31VTV

I downloaded the update last night, after playing. Opened the game today, most of my newer saves crashed the game.
Idk if it is directly correlated to the update, but that is the only thing i have done between then and now.

I have this crash too. Is there a timeframe for the update? This week, or something?
TW is very good on their patches, so i assume its fast.

So far, 1.5.10 is the most stable version of the game for me. Also the most optimized. My rig is old, but atm i have 60fps smooth with 600 units in battle. It only lowers fps when there is snow or in the middle of 500+ units clashing

Yes, a GPU crash caused by the game. Not sure what that sentence is meant to imply? It`s the games fault.
Once again right now:
2021-04-30_17.39.01_b06c08ba9ae7720047a0b19407e58bc4
This is my dxdiag: https://1drv.ms/t/s!AowaCrNGO4WyxgmS0TSVRJzLNcNL?e=QwztYx

I dont know what more info you need or what i should elaborate on. If you would tell me, i could give you the information you need.
I tried to delete shader and check integrity on steam just now. Same crash. I also tried to set memory as you suggested above. No effect.
When i start the hideout, im running smooth 70fps. And there are some texture glitches, sometimes on the campaign map.
I updated drivers (i know the GPU is old) and it is running perfectly.

I mean, if there was a workaround or something, i would be happy. Because i am loving the game and really having a blast. But this is so annoying and makes early game unplayable. Hideouts are a big part of it.

And again right now, on a new sandbox game.
2021-04-30_00.15.48_b06c08ba9ae7720047a0b19407e58bc4

Here is my most recent save file:

Just reloaded today, after reinstalling graphics drivers and trying that workaround. Same issue.

Crashlog reference:
2021-04-26_15.53.13_b06c08ba9ae7720047a0b19407e58bc4

WNxSpectre said:

My Major was Psychology I am familiar with statistics we encounter them all the time, and the numbers are not working out the way you have detailed them. You would have two bell curve distributions for male and female with an 80% overlap. Which given what I know about human nature makes intuitive sense, we as a species largely overlap in average distribution in most attribute details, cognitive and physical.

It would not surprise me that in the US the numbers would turn out different given the ongoing obesity epidemic inflicting both males and females, that must skew the numbers.

Fun conversation. I couldn't help chiming in on this topic given my university major and interest in human nature.
Respect your good manners, and the respectful way you have conducted yourself in this thread.

Edit:
Have been doing a bit of research into this topic.

As a general rule from what I have found women are roughly 2/3rds as muscularly strong comparative to men. Meaning the overlap of the gender bell curves would be roughly 70%. The initial 20% you mentioned falls close to that range of distribution and the 2/3rds estimate is a good approximation. The largest difference falls in upper body strength..

I think body muscle comparisons are more revealing than strict body mass comparisons, because males and females contain different average fat to muscle ratios and even different ratios of differing types of muscle fibers.

"a woman's body is typically about 30 to 35 percent muscle by weight, while a man's body is about 40 to 50 percent muscle by weight".

The difference in average musculature is more stark when comparing the upper body of each sex, a European study found that "the women were approximately 52 percent and 66 percent as strong as men in the upper and lower body respectively."

This study only had 16 male and 16 female subjects, which is a very small sample to draw broad conclusions from and thus will have had a very large margin of error. I would take these findings with a grain of salt, the precise numbers are worthy of skepticism given the tiny sample size.

It has also been said that the type of muscles differ and that women tend to have more slow twitch muscles.

"Perhaps most notably, women tend to have about 27 to 35 percent more type I muscle fibers than men. More commonly known as slow-twitch muscle fibers, as per the American Council on Exercise, type I fibers are aerobic muscles rich in blood-carrying myoglobin. By the same token, women's muscles have a greater capillary density.

The combo of more slow-twitch fibers and more capillaries makes for an increased ability to deliver more blood to the muscle, while it also increases fatty acid oxidation.

According to ACE, "Because they can provide their own source of energy, slow-twitch fibers can sustain force for an extended period of time, but they are not able to generate a significant amount of force"."

So it seems that women may have on average greater muscle endurance over time, although lower capacity to exert immediate force. This makes some sense to me, given our species history and what I have learnt of early hunter gatherer societies during the vast majority of our history.

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I might read it incorrectly, but im pretty sure it was not a comparison. As i stated.

Besides, modern testing done in different military corps, shows this categorically:

And if it is present in modern units, where technology such as guns equate for the disadvantages during the actual fighting and women STILL come up as scoring lower? Come on, man. If they had swords, it would not be a fight. It would be a slaughter.

If necessary, i can find desert or sea raider hideouts and try those. But im not one to seek out CTDs.

FizCap said:

ez win for me

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No i demand satisfaction. On the battlefields of calradia. Pick your weapon, we fight at high noon.

WNxSpectre said:

Your math here is wrong regarding the distribution.

What it means is that there will be roughly 20% of males with an advantage in strength beyond any female on the opposing force, meaning that 20 males will have strength outside the range of the predicted distribution for the female force.

There will also be roughly 20 females in the female force who will be at a physical disadvantage against any predicted male on the opposing side.

The bulk 80% of individuals both male and female will be within the overlapping zone of the bell curve distribution and will have even distribution of physical prowess with each other.

However, in any statistical distribution there will always be outliers, meaning there's always a chance that there could be women who may be unusually large and that some men may be unusually small. There could be a male who is so small that he is no physical match for any of the women. And equally there is a chance that there could be an outlier female who is so unusually strong that there is no male in the opposing force who is a physical match for her.

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What? No. Its a statistic with an average of all males in the testgroup. The average of men, is 20% larger and stronger than the average of women. Not an average difference. If that makes sense. My english might be faulting me. And regardless 20% is significant. Idk how statistics work, but i would say that if it was only a 10% difference, it would be negligible.
Yes, some men will be weaker and vice versa. But for the sake of this argument, of women in medieval or earlier periods, participating in battle, the weakest of the men would not be present unless it was a last ditch defense. You could argue that probably most of the women would be of peak strength. But so would the men! Average or above.

Btw, i just googled it quickly and it is 12% in the US, regarding body mass.

FizCap said:

It's already known that this game doesn't have historical melee combat or else the game would be boring and slow paced. They are messing with the game's lore, there's no female commanders in warband but 200 years ago society progressed far enough where women are constant commanders? Dudes love defending crap like this because they think it gets them laid.

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Thats about how long your line of thought went, huh? I disagree, so i`m white knighting.
I mean, at least the others in here, have genuinely good arguments and manage to be respectful. Even more respectful than me!
You have a good one. I`m not entertaining angry little boys like you, when you can`t separate person from topic.

FizCap said:

I feel like taleworlds taking the SJW approach and just including women commanders ruins the immersion of actually playing a female. In warband if you played a female you were at a disadvantage yea, but you also had the unique ability to marry any lord and gain power that way. You would usually be the only female leading a war party which would be accurate. It was like a nice little perk of playing a female. In Bannerlord playing a female has no perks and just ruins the game for people who like realism in their games.

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They make a history adjacent game. They are trying to recreate a feudal system, with realistic weapons and armor. And have authentic weapons and make things feel as realistic as possible. HOWEVER. The setting and the factions, cultures (while being clearly copied off of real world counterparts), are fictional and historically, tribal celts are not even early medieval-consistent. So the female leaders are not out of place.

They are out of place if you expect a wholly realistic medieval sim. But then why are you not complaining about the completely inaccurate combat system? If you watch any HEMA video on melee combat with sword and shield, M&B are WAY off. Not to mention inaccurate castles that are as historically inaccurate its borderline comical. These are just some of the inconsistencies.

Its their own fictional sandbox. It has no inconsistencies, because it is fictional. And complaining about female leaders as "historically inconsistent" is cherry picking from all the inconsistencies.

Btw, the feminist response to my comment here, is to claim that it is whataboutism. But it still holds true.

Tryvenyal said:

This statement might be somewhat true if you compare the top X male and female atheths in a single sport but when it comes to avarage citizens, it´s far less. A standing, elite well- drilled band on 500 individuals(In bannerlord: T3 or even T4+) in peace-time might have been hard to qualify for a well-trained woman but in militia, caravanguard, bandit and low-tier regular bands, women with good fitness would certainly fight alongside both weaker and stronger males.

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No, its a statistic on ALL men and women. It comes from the EU, so it might not be representable for Asia or the US. But there will still be a difference in how men and women are built. This is just simple biology! Just look at sheep. There`s not HUGE differences in rams or ewes (female sheep). But the rams have more prominent skulls and nasal ridge, for ramming and fighting. They are also predominantly bigger, by about 15%.And yes, a ram will kill a ewe if they decide to butt heads. About three impacts and she will die. Because he is built bigger.
Now, not all men are larger than women, or stronger than women. But the average man, will be around 20% larger and stronger. Which means out of a hundred men and a hundred women, 99 of the men will be able to defeat 100 of the women. And perhaps 20 of the women are able to defeat one man. With equal training and weapons practice. I dont know about you, but in a mass fight, i would put my money on the all men`s team.

Again, women participating is not dooming the army. But it gives your side a clear disadvantage, as i calculated in my earlier example. Out of a 10K force, 15% women equates a 12% disadvantage in strength and height/weight. Lets say 10% since its a simplified calculation done hastily.
Today this is not as true, because personal strength does not apply directly to wielding a weapon. But the further back in history you go, the more prominent this statistic is.

Also, if you kill 10% of the women of a culture/tribe/city, in war, it becomes MUCH harder for them to regain those lost numbers. Because like in sheep, deer or cattle, one man/bull/ox can impregnate many cows/women/does. This is the inherent biology of it all.

I feel this is the problem with modern society. We want to ignore simple facts and inherent biology. And i even feel like a "bad guy" for arguing this. But it does not make it less true.

Kentucky 『 ＨＥＩＧＵＩ 』 James said:

I think you overestimate how much actual fighting soldiers do, and how much they rely on physical strength. It's tempting to fetishize weapon skill and imagine that an army of HEMA enthusiasts could fight the entire HRE alone, but every source about medieval battles is unanimous in how unintuitive and unpredictable they were, and how easy it was to make an entire army rout. In a chaotic environment like this where 30,000 men might just decide to go home before the battle even starts, or where most casualties are from soldiers being killed while running away, how does a 10-20% difference in physical strength play any perceivable role?

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It`s not that i overestimate it. But any longstanding, effective army have had drills, meticulous training regimens and fitness standards for their soldiers. You are correct that individual soldiers` strength is a negligible factor of a battle. However that was never my point. If the entire army is trained and drilled toward a standard that gives you cohesion, accurate expectations of performance and from that grows individual strength. I mean, if individual strength is not important, how can you know how far you can march and expect efficient performance in battle? Or how much pressure the soldiers/units/formations will handle before exhaustion or mental stress breaks them? These are directly linked to individual fitness and strength.
Besides, if you have an opposing unit or piece of a battle line composed of on average 20% weaker enemies, 20% smaller, with 10-15 kg less weight per body, that is where your Spartans, Romans or Franks would engage their elites, to push through the "weakspot" in the line. This was always my argument. From that break, a victory might be forged. Such things can be negated, but it is a inherent disadvantage to have in your army or battle line.
How much fighting an individual soldier does, wholly depends on the situation. The hussites for example, were often outnumbered heavily which lead to almost each individual having to participate. There are also accounts that describe situations so dire that even the general had to rally or go into the fray for a short period. Alexander the great through most of his campaigns, was heavily outnumbered. So there, every individual will at some point have been involved. This varies alot. But again, there is not doubt that cohesive bodies of men, with training and individual fitness and strength as a result of that training, perform better. "A disorderly mob is no more an army than a heap of building materials is a house"

And while a battle is not a series of duels between two and two opponents, if one side has an advantage in simple strength or height, this can be easily utilized to press a melee advantage. Just because the Romans negated it against larger gauls (debatable anyway), does not make it false.

Exactly, and that is what made them effective, not the individual strength of the soldiers. No historian will ever study the diets or exercise regimes when trying to ascertain why one state annexed another, because when you're talking about gigantic systems like states the things that matter are on a much larger scale. If the Romans could organise their society to supply twice as many soldiers as anyone else, it doesn't really matter how strong they are individually.

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Now you are looping around on your own argument. It was you who dragged diet into this. And now you are claiming diet or rations for armies are not relevant. As a matter of fact, we know alot of what different armies ate while on the move. So i think this is pretty much an incorrect statement. Also we know alot of how the Romans trained (the bronze equipment) and the Spartan "agoge". So historians have ABSOLUTELY studied the diets or exercise regimes of states. "The things that matter" in THIS context, is especially food. The Romans did not conquer the known world on ****ty rations. Alexander did not march to India on lentils and dirty water. And armies who forgot to feed or water their soldiers, perished. Often brutally. When Rome sacked Carthage it was not a great feat of civic administration. When vikings plundered and settled in England, it was not a complex matter. They killed the opposing armies and took what they wanted. The scale WAS huge, but the complicated bit was the battle. Nothing else.

Also, Rome did not supply twice as many soldiers as anyone else, we just agreed earlier that they were outnumbered!

Kentucky 『 ＨＥＩＧＵＩ 』 James said:

Every source I've read says that the Gauls were way taller and more muscular on average than the Romans they fought against. The Mongols, Romans and Japanese were midgets even for their time, but they carved out massive empires while mostly outnumbered.

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So what? Yes, there are equalizers to size and strength. But size and strength is always important. The Romans trained with bronze weaponry so their battlefield equipment would feel lighter. Strength and fitness is all that matters.

Your examples had very niche advantages (extremely effective tactics and drill, completely mounted army), and the last one is in modern times. A firearm is the greatest of equalizers. Besides, i stated that after the 18th century(ish) the need for women to ONLY reproduce has diminished rapidly. Furthermore, as their neighbors learned from their defeats, the romans lost. Because their opponents were physically more imposing. Most famous viking warriors were huge men, known to cleave men in two or dwarf horses. The same goes for alot of famous samurai. Size and strength matters. The more "basic" the fight is, the more important size and strength becomes. Are you kidding me with this bs? And this only holds true up until the 15th/16th century, when firearms take over for melee weapons. But at this point, societies were so ingrained in their misogyny and misconceptions anyway.

Alternatively, do you think that Jessie Eisenberg could beat Schwarzenegger with a sword, if both had experience using it? Or Angelina Jolie? Eisenberg can wield it probably only 30% of the time Arnold has before he gets tired.

Kentucky 『 ＨＥＩＧＵＩ 』 James said:

What's more people are rarely if ever selected for military service by strength or height. The vast majority of people in almost every society are never expected to join an army, let alone fight in battle. It's usually only specific social classes and other arbitrary groupings, meaning the majority of soldiers were of suboptimal peak strength, not that it matters that much in warfare anyway.

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I agree that there were societal structures that dictated wether or not you would have to do some soldiering. But assuming they were suboptimal in health or strength, is wrong. For most of history, the infantry have been from the masses, required to pay for their own equipment. Which assumes some MODEST personal funds. And this means they were able to feed themselves and do a full days work on that diet. Also, our perception of food back then is plain wrong. Medieval peasants ate alot of fish and root veggies, dairy milk or sheeps milk and cheese products. They would have been surprisingly healthy, assuming no plague or other pandemic were ravaging the country. Quality in diet was actually far worse after urbanization because that required alot more transport of perishables, diluting for storage and larger crops. Which means the crops became more homogenous. I.e Bread. This is when deficieny diseases start becoming a societal problem.
Second of all, im not saying that women can`t fight. I am saying that there are logical disadvantages to allowing women on to the battlefield in the past. And without disparaging matriarchies, why did they not survive and prosper, build vast empires or civilizations? Most are anecdotal tribes or offshoots of religious groupings.

Lastly, if the worlds best female MMA fighter or boxer met the best male boxer or MMA fighter, even at the same weight, the man would win 99 out of a 100 matches. Swords, spears, and such melee weaponry are amplifiers of physical strength. Not equalizers. Which means, ANY man will beat a woman if equal training and practice is given.
If you amplify this to a army-wide situation, just holding the battle line with alot of women becomes not impossible, but much harder. Requires more planning, better preparations, other greater advantages and equalizers. Besides, if women were capable, there would be more evidence of women participating as warriors. There are examples of matriarchal societies, and many sources claim women fought among the celts. But there are not dominating matriarchal or egalitarian societes. However, many societies hold womens rights equal to men, but their responsibility is to produce children. And nowhere in the ancient era, migration period, early medieval or medieval period in general, were women a significant minority of a fighting army.

It is not pretty. Thank god it is not this way today. But when survival of your culture,language and people demands children and 30%-40% die before they reach 5 years, it becomes necessary to produce many. It is crude, but simple.