Best army compositions that are fun to play

[Premoderneomarxist]

Wondering what mixes of troops you guys have good experiences with.

Seems like a lot of people stack Khan's Guards and Fians but that seems kinda boring. I want to do some strategical maneuvers in the dark with different troops types but keep it all one faction themed.

It seems like Asera and Empire might be best for this to have like a even split of Infantry, Archers, Cavalry, and Horse Archers?

What about Sturgia but with the Outrider mercenaries that look Sturgian as my horse archers?

 

[Overestimated]

With the empire you have a lot of options because they have so many different types.

I like to build an almost entirely mounted army with them as the horse archers can quickly flank and are decent archers while the cataphracts are super armored and can work like superior infantry when dismounted. It also goes with the lore of them having strong garrisons and being a mostly mobile army. The foot troops I find I end up putting into garrison. I think as long as you have the mounts its always better to upgrade them that way, if you wanted a bunch of legionaries and palatine guards just dismount the bucellari and cataphracts and you essentially have the same thing. I think cataphracts can beat up legionaries dismounted because they have more armor and higher skill, I don't know how the archers compare but they both have comparable skill levels and if you dismount the bucellari they shoot better.

I have also tried a Vaegir playthrough where every companion/family member is basically built like a sturgian version of a fian and I have a good archer captain and try to make the best Sturgian Veteran bowmen possible.

I also tried a Rhodok playthrough using green vlandians, not using the knights but just infantry and crossbowmen with good captains respectively.

Overall with the introduction of captains and banners you can make a lot of units workable that otherwise would not be, the only unit I really had trouble with was I was trying to do a Battanian knight playthrough and just use Battanian horsemen (unofficially the worst troop unit, not counting vlandian pikemen or swordsisters) but the main limitation I ran into was I needed to get the mellaurgy perk (+5 armor) and could not get engineering high enough in the vanilla game soon enough to really use them as well as really high medicine because I was trying to use them like cataphracts along with the 250 riding perk that also adds +5 armor

To be honest if you train medicine skill past 275 you can pretty much use any unit effectively, even sword sisters with about twice the normal hitpoints can be used and the ones that go down are likely to be wounded. Strat game showed you could do it with khuzait recruits and people have taken over calradia with just looters. The famous looton comes to mind, the Bob Ross of all looters, he is what every looter aspires to be and with your leadership you can help these plebs reach their full potential. Loot on looton, loot on

I play without mods because I feel like I cheat too much when I use mods but I have noticed that children get more attribute points so maybe make your first gen some time fast forwarding blacksmith/tactics or something or make them execute a lot of lords to get them mad and so you get executed and then you can play a heir, I think then you could really make a decent build without having to get to level 50 to get enough attribute points

 

[Reiksmarshal]

The most fun I had was playing a Vlandian mercenary company. Mostly all crossbows with some Voulgier and Pikemen support. I called my faction thee Company of the Lion. I would make 2-3 groups, 1st group I would use as a Shield wall (crossbows with pavise) and the Second group I would position them on higher ground so that they can fire over the first group. The 3third group I would put my infantry so I could put them where they are needed. This is a very effective army if you use the terrain well. Depending on the battle location all my crossbows would be firing or only half. Lots of kills with very little loss of troops.

 

[sh1ny4]

Wondering what mixes of troops you guys have good experiences with.

Seems like a lot of people stack Khan's Guards and Fians but that seems kinda boring. I want to do some strategical maneuvers in the dark with different troops types but keep it all one faction themed.

It seems like Asera and Empire might be best for this to have like a even split of Infantry, Archers, Cavalry, and Horse Archers?

What about Sturgia but with the Outrider mercenaries that look Sturgian as my horse archers?

I have been enjoying a three ranks infantry gameplay recently : first rank is shieldwalling, second is made of shock troops that will charge as soon as contact happens, and finally the third rank is a skirmishing infantry. Bear in mind that this is modded though, I don't really know if it can work out in vanilla. Since iirc only battania has skirmishers put a few fians alongside the skirmishers if it doesn't work well ?

 

[Ananda_The_Destroyer]

Khan's guards/HA and heavy cav because they're fast and can be positioned and repositioned without getting stuck in enemies. Just standing guys around until they're close enough to trade off isn't "strategical maneuvers".

 

[Hoady]

It depends where I own towns, because I like to build an army around the free high level recruits added to the garrison. Right now I use a balanced army of approx 25% Imperial Cavalry, 25% Mtd Cav mainly Family Members and Khuzaits, 25% Infantry (Sturgian Heavy Axemen), 25% Foot archers, preferably Vlandian Sharpshooters. This mix handles every battlefield scenario, and is also strong enough to overthrow a rebellion town if the opportunity arises.

 

[Kentucky 『 ＨＥＩＧＵＩ 』 James]

Pure light cavalry, or heavy cav + archers can be fun, especially against infantry spam armies. It's cheesy but it always gives you something to do on the battlefield.