Faction Troop Trees - an analysis as of 1.5

[Anushtegin]

Yes,my mercenaries that spawn in imperial taverns have heavy nord/sturgian infantry called "guards" that are inspired by the varangians.Incidentally since they are nord/sturgian they can branch off and loop back into the Nord tree and become huscarls.
Nothing ruins your day like seing an heavily armored axe wielding nord charging at you while fighting imperials. Expecially when the guy who just axed you is your own creation.
EDIT:also, to clarify, lords will hire only stuff they see as upgrades of the mercenary_1 unit, meaning the watchmen. They don't seem to hire armed traders. The way I make the hire my troops is by making my basic mercenaries "fake" upgrades of the watchmen. I say fake because those upgrades require an un-obtainable custom item. This way the game "sees" all of my troops as part of the possible upgrade pool for the watchmen and since the tavern can spawn the watchmen OR any of the upgrades, my mercs will spawn.
Furthermore, the AI seems to hire from the taverns only after they hire from the notables and given that any of my mercs can spawn they might not be able to afford them. The game auto-calculates the cost of mercs based on their level and their mount. So if the tavern rolls some tier 5 cavalry they may only be able to hire on or 2 troops.

armed traders aren't worth it anyways, because for soem reason the caravan guard line troops don't seem to upgrade to better caravan guards.

 

[lukkyb]

I feel like really good heavy infantry is a booby prize when the fictional Sturgians are not in the position of the historical Norse, protected as they were from the overwhelming power of much stronger sedentary states and nomadic steppe confederations by virtue of being across a sea. Instead, the Sturgians are crammed right up next to them and at risk of invasion right from the start. @Dabos37 has done a lot of good testing on how shieldwalls can help greatly against archers but those were always foot archers. Against horse archers, in Bannerlord, a shieldwall is going to take serious losses without cavalry of its own -- preferably well-armored cavalry. Druzhinniks are that well-armored cavalry.

They did pretty well in Bannerlord to make it so certain factions didn't have gaping holes in their troop tree and it would suck if the Sturgians became the most lop-sided faction (debatable) in Bannerlord just so people could say they have Huscarls again.

not to say that you are wrong i agree but I feel though that even though you could argue Warbands factions were lobsided noone did worse based on there troops alone it was map placement (its why Swadia usually got reket at the start since they are in the middle and Dhirhirm is what everyone borders)

it could be down to autocalc being better in this game meaning high teir troops are represented better and its not just they have 100 they have 200 200 wins i would like to see a test to see if Sturgia did worse the same or better with a Heavy inf noble line

Battaina dont do worse for having a Archer only line (again my point of view someone who has extensivily tested this tell me im wrong here) they do worse though as they have no archers in there main tree which can hinder the player more than the AI

I just feel everyone having a Cav noble line feels kind of samey and kinda wish things could be diffrent but thats just me

 

[HalfMetalJacket]

not to say that you are wrong i agree but I feel though that even though you could argue Warbands factions were lobsided noone did worse based on there troops alone it was map placement (its why Swadia usually got reket at the start since they are in the middle and Dhirhirm is what everyone borders)

it could be down to autocalc being better in this game meaning high teir troops are represented better and its not just they have 100 they have 200 200 wins i would like to see a test to see if Sturgia did worse the same or better with a Heavy inf noble line

Battaina dont do worse for having a Archer only line (again my point of view someone who has extensivily tested this tell me im wrong here) they do worse though as they have no archers in there main tree which can hinder the player more than the AI

I just feel everyone having a Cav noble line feels kind of samey and kinda wish things could be diffrent but thats just me

I feel like Battanian AI armies can do surprisingly well purely because of the amount of cavalry they end up with. The bonus to auto calc is a boon, but I still think its completely contrary to their faction flavour. I'll echo everyone else and say I wish Battania had common archers.

Besides the fact that their other infantry are actually fairly competent, giving Sturgia a heavy infantry noble would take away one of their sources of that bonus.

I disagree with the idea you're implying with troops though. Factions in Bannerlord do not perform worse off because of their troops, but like Warband they perform worse because of their campaign situation. And Sturgia's situation is terrible. Maybe adding the winter penalty will help, maybe not, but as they are they're in dire straits.

 

[Apocal]

it could be down to autocalc being better in this game meaning high teir troops are represented better and its not just they have 100 they have 200 200 wins i would like to see a test to see if Sturgia did worse the same or better with a Heavy inf noble line

Bannerlord's autocalc only cares about three things when it comes to troops: tier, being a named character (50% bonus) and being mounted (20% bonus). Sturgia could only do worse by replacing their current druzhinniks with huscarls.

I just feel everyone having a Cav noble line feels kind of samey and kinda wish things could be diffrent but thats just me

I don't disagree with that. But I'm more concerned that each faction can effectively fight battles without having to resort to autocalc. Ulfhednars suffered from a similar desire for uniqueness over effectiveness before 1.4 and wound up being the absolute worst unit for the shock infantry role as a result.

 

[Olympeus]

I don't disagree about archers (esp fians) overshadowing everything in SP, but the AI doesn't build the sort of monotype armies players tend towards. If the counter to archers was, ex, heavy cavalry; that wouldn't super matter because the player would still pick up 40% archers while the AI runs their usual mishmash of units with 5-10% heavy cav tops - it's not as though you run the risk of hitting an oops all heavy cav AI party, forcing you to build more diverse forces.

I'd like to see that expanded - it could be cool to have AI traits influence their preferred army structure, and at a basic level should be easy to do (just manipulate their promotion odds away from a dice roll based on unit type of promotion targets). But unless taken to the absolute extreme, at which point it becomes self defeating, it wouldn't really do anything to reign in the player from monobuilding.

For sure. The AI will need to field more diverse armies. Whether those armies are a well balanced mix of troops or whether they are a heavy focus on one or two troop types, it will make your encounters more dynamic.

 

[Olympeus]

Infantry without shields can be horrifically good though. For what its worth, they completely tear everything up in melee- so long as you can protect them from the ranged threats.

Please share which infantry you like best. I would LOVE to do an Infantry focused run on my next play through. I've been heavily favoring Imperial Legionary and Sturgian Veteran Warriors because of their ability to soak archer fire for days and then when the enemy closes they launch their pila/javelin and the melee is over before it starts. My Fians have already thinned their lines.

I would prefer some slog fests in melee. What units do you like?

I haven't played around with them lately, but horse archers have always been OP as ****. They're literally as good as an archer, except on horse back. Simply selecting them and going f6 is basically cheating. f1-f3 works too. Dunno if their AI just got ruined though. Probably has.

I believe you, but I won't be using HA in large numbers until I make a Khuzait play through. Maybe they will be smarter about their movements in high quantities. Everyone says they are OP but I have yet to see evidence of that in their Kill/Death ratio in my battles (which I inspect after every fight). If I allow 20 HA free "rein" in a battle they will finish with 3 kills. If I plop 20 foot archers on a hill top and never move them they will finish with 20 or 40 or 60 kills. In sufficiently high quantities I'm sure they can get a higher portion of the kills but I think my foot archers are just to efficient comparatively speaking.

I use horse archers in lower quantities of 10-20. And as bad as their movements are in low quantities I don't see how increasing their numbers is going to help. In low numbers, I see HA get entangled with the advancing enemy spearmen on an open field when given F3 or F4 command. Triple their numbers and I'm afraid they will get tangled up on each other. I think the AI is targeting some softer enemy units behind the spears and they just casually ignore the presence of the spearmen and ride up to them or through them or on top of them. I can't come up with any other explanation.

I've seen the frenetic behavior of foot-archers on the F4 command enough to suspect AI is gets really confused with ranged units and F4.

 

[Dionaea]

the ugly:

• the tier 2 ranged/mounted upgrade is significantly better than the tier 2 foot, who doesn't even get a shield.

Why would you ever choose the non mounted option when playing Khuzait anyway? Play the Hu in the background, ride your horse, lead your horse archers and rain death on the enemy as you circle around them like a great swarm

 

[Anushtegin]

Please share which infantry you like best. I would LOVE to do an Infantry focused run on my next play through. I've been heavily favoring Imperial Legionary and Sturgian Veteran Warriors because of their ability to soak archer fire for days and then when the enemy closes they launch their pila/javelin and the melee is over before it starts. My Fians have already thinned their lines.

I would prefer some slog fests in melee. What units do you like?



I believe you, but I won't be using HA in large numbers until I make a Khuzait play through. Maybe they will be smarter about their movements in high quantities. Everyone says they are OP but I have yet to see evidence of that in their Kill/Death ratio in my battles (which I inspect after every fight). If I allow 20 HA free "rein" in a battle they will finish with 3 kills. If I plop 20 foot archers on a hill top and never move them they will finish with 20 or 40 or 60 kills. In sufficiently high quantities I'm sure they can get a higher portion of the kills but I think my foot archers are just to efficient comparatively speaking.

I use horse archers in lower quantities of 10-20. And as bad as their movements are in low quantities I don't see how increasing their numbers is going to help. In low numbers, I see HA get entangled with the advancing enemy spearmen on an open field when given F3 or F4 command. Triple their numbers and I'm afraid they will get tangled up on each other. I think the AI is targeting some softer enemy units behind the spears and they just casually ignore the presence of the spearmen and ride up to them or through them or on top of them. I can't come up with any other explanation.

I've seen the frenetic behavior of foot-archers on the F4 command enough to suspect AI is gets really confused with ranged units and F4.

this was a battle in 1.4.2 i had. incidentally, i was fightign a battanian army of 1422 with a khuzaite army of 560. the 14 khan's guards in my party alone had 101 kills all by themselves at the loss of only three.

Why would you ever choose the non mounted option when playing Khuzait anyway? Play the Hu in the background, ride your horse, lead your horse archers and rain death on the enemy as you circle around them like a great swarm

exactly, see above. the khuazites should have only horse archers and lancers in the regular troop tree. but that would probably not exactly be balanced.

 

[Olympeus]

this was a battle in 1.4.2 i had. incidentally, i was fightign a battanian army of 1422 with a khuzaite army of 560. the 14 khan's guards in my party alone had 101 kills all by themselves at the loss of only three.



exactly, see above. the khuazites should have only horse archers and lancers in the regular troop tree. but that would probably not exactly be balanced.

Yeah your Khan's guard cleaned up. But Luichan's 14 imperial recruits also had 74 kills in the battles which makes your Khan's guard seem not that impressive by comparison. That or those imperial recruits are some god-tier level 1 troops.

 

[ElCrisp]

Maybe a cool way to add an archer to the batanian main tree would be to have a shielded one. Just a thought for some variety.

Also If you were to change sturgia and give them noble infantry instead. No reason you couldnt at the same time substitute a heavy Cav unit onto their main tree. Which would actually result in them fielding some more cavalry than they do now. I cant say I even remember ever fighting a Druzhinnik from the AI

 

[Dabos37]

Please share which infantry you like best. I would LOVE to do an Infantry focused run on my next play through. I've been heavily favoring Imperial Legionary and Sturgian Veteran Warriors because of their ability to soak archer fire for days and then when the enemy closes they launch their pila/javelin and the melee is over before it starts. My Fians have already thinned their lines.

I would prefer some slog fests in melee. What units do you like?



I believe you, but I won't be using HA in large numbers until I make a Khuzait play through. Maybe they will be smarter about their movements in high quantities. Everyone says they are OP but I have yet to see evidence of that in their Kill/Death ratio in my battles (which I inspect after every fight). If I allow 20 HA free "rein" in a battle they will finish with 3 kills. If I plop 20 foot archers on a hill top and never move them they will finish with 20 or 40 or 60 kills. In sufficiently high quantities I'm sure they can get a higher portion of the kills but I think my foot archers are just to efficient comparatively speaking.

I use horse archers in lower quantities of 10-20. And as bad as their movements are in low quantities I don't see how increasing their numbers is going to help. In low numbers, I see HA get entangled with the advancing enemy spearmen on an open field when given F3 or F4 command. Triple their numbers and I'm afraid they will get tangled up on each other. I think the AI is targeting some softer enemy units behind the spears and they just casually ignore the presence of the spearmen and ride up to them or through them or on top of them. I can't come up with any other explanation.

I've seen the frenetic behavior of foot-archers on the F4 command enough to suspect AI is gets really confused with ranged units and F4.

Melee: Legionaries > Veteran Warriors
Skirmish: Veteran Warriors >>> Legionaries
Overall (in open battlefields): Veteran Warriors >> Legionaries

Legionaries are the stronger units in melee fight but because proyectile weapons work like AK47 in this game, Sturgian Veteran Warriors are killing machines just because they have more javelins. It is pretty disappointing and frustrating how good skirmishes are in this game.

 

[HalfMetalJacket]

Please share which infantry you like best. I would LOVE to do an Infantry focused run on my next play through. I've been heavily favoring Imperial Legionary and Sturgian Veteran Warriors because of their ability to soak archer fire for days and then when the enemy closes they launch their pila/javelin and the melee is over before it starts. My Fians have already thinned their lines.

I would prefer some slog fests in melee. What units do you like?

Do you mean 2hander infantry? If that's what you're asking though, I'd say I like almost all of them, save for ulfhednar. They all have their own strengths and weaknesses, something like...

Polearm troops: in general they will kill cavalry with ease, and just about anyone else too.
Veteran Falxman: lots of handaxes, bad armour
Menavliaton: heavy armour, short polearm (I don't know why, but they seldom seem to use their menavs against infantry so their use could be limited)
Shock Troop: slightly better stats, okay armour
Voulgier: one set of handaxes, okay armour

Two Handed Axes: these guys kill infantry better, and don't need as much space to swing.
Mameluke Palace Guard: HEAVY ARMOUR, awesome axe, throwing axes. These guys will soak up more arrows than most, and absolutely deliver in melee. Still better to hide them behind shields though.
Ulfhednar: Better stats, but I don't feel they matter enough. They've got more armour now, but their heads are too lightly covered. Still not worth it imo.

Legionaries and Veteran Warriors are both the best bets for the lads that will protect your killers.

Melee: Legionaries > Veteran Warriors
Skirmish: Veteran Warriors >>> Legionaries
Overall (in open battlefields): Veteran Warriors >> Legionaries

Legionaries are the stronger units in melee fight but because proyectile weapons work like AK47 in this game, Sturgian Veteran Warriors are killing machines just because they have more javelins. It is pretty disappointing and frustrating how good skirmishes are in this game.

I really feel as though it shouldn't work this way tbh. I feel like Sturgia should have the better infantry in a head to head clash, at least if we go by the Battle of Pendraic stuff. Legionaries should probably act as the more versatile, defensive infantry.

 

[HalfMetalJacket]

Maybe a cool way to add an archer to the batanian main tree would be to have a shielded one. Just a thought for some variety.

Also If you were to change sturgia and give them noble infantry instead. No reason you couldnt at the same time substitute a heavy Cav unit onto their main tree. Which would actually result in them fielding some more cavalry than they do now. I cant say I even remember ever fighting a Druzhinnik from the AI

Eh, I think Sturgia should have shielded heavy archers. That way they are unique, even if they don't do archery as well. Battania should have naked archers with two handers, if we want to accentuate the glass cannon aspect of Battania.

 

[markp27]

Vlandians seems right to me with horsemen. Vlandians are essentially a nation of knights and they would not accept lesser men riding horses until they have proven they truly were worthy of earning the right to wear spurs.

 

[HalfMetalJacket]

Vlandians seems right to me with horsemen. Vlandians are essentially a nation of knights and they would not accept lesser men riding horses until they have proven they truly were worthy of earning the right to wear spurs.

Eh, there are such things as coutilliers and hobilars. Gotta have someone to do all the menial riding.

 

[markp27]

Eh, there are such things as coutilliers and hobilars. Gotta have someone to do all the menial riding.

The peasants can run alongside the knights carrying everything

 

[Apocal]

Yeah your Khan's guard cleaned up. But Luichan's 14 imperial recruits also had 74 kills in the battles which makes your Khan's guard seem not that impressive by comparison. That or those imperial recruits are some god-tier level 1 troops.

If you hold recruits back a little bit from your main infantry line, they'll catch the occasional guy fleeing through your forces and get to rake in free kills during a large battle.

 

[Telyon]

Given the nonstop horde of respawning peasant armies coupled with the limited party sizes, the player is incentivized to maximize efficiency per party slot. Should the player engage in battles instead of auto-resolving them, this translates to choosing units that can inflict maximum casualties while incurring minimal losses. Claim that two-hander units–or any infantry, for that matter–are as effective as much as you want; they still have to be vulnerable in melee to provide value, where they will get stunlocked and die in any outnumbered situation, assuming that they hadn't already died to three arrows. Archers are the only archetype capable of consistently providing value regardless of the state of the battle. With the current states of arrow damage, crossbowmen inefficiency, armor mitigation, AI effectiveness, cavalry effectiveness, ad nauseam, valuing non-archers whatsoever is inane, and discussions revolving around non-archer units are obsolete.

Battanian Fian Champions are the best unit in the game, outclassing even Khan's Guards. Second best are Khuzait Marksmen. Third are Aserai Master Archers. These three units have decent equipment, two quivers, and adequate bow skill. Palantine Guards, while being easy to amass due to being bowmen from T2, have a poor end state with a weak bow and only one quiver. Veteran Bowmen are an actual joke.

If the player were to exclusively auto-resolve, then the best unit would be whatever cheap commoner cavalry can be attained. Ultimately, is this a discussion about the value of faction troops for the player or the AI? The answer will be different. As Bannerlord currently is, only archers matter, and the best faction unit is whichever is the best archer.

 

[HalfMetalJacket]

Given the nonstop horde of respawning peasant armies coupled with the limited party sizes, the player is incentivized to maximize efficiency per party slot. Should the player engage in battles instead of auto-resolving them, this translates to choosing units that can inflict maximum casualties while incurring minimal losses. Claim that two-hander units–or any infantry, for that matter–are as effective as much as you want; they still have to be vulnerable in melee to provide value, where they will get stunlocked and die in any outnumbered situation, assuming that they hadn't already died to three arrows. Archers are the only archetype capable of consistently providing value regardless of the state of the battle. With the current states of arrow damage, crossbowmen inefficiency, armor mitigation, AI effectiveness, cavalry effectiveness, ad nauseam, valuing non-archers whatsoever is inane, and discussions revolving around non-archer units are obsolete.

Battanian Fian Champions are the best unit in the game, outclassing even Khan's Guards. Second best are Khuzait Marksmen. Third are Aserai Master Archers. These three units have decent equipment, two quivers, and adequate bow skill. Palantine Guards, while being easy to amass due to being bowmen from T2, have a poor end state with a weak bow and only one quiver. Veteran Bowmen are an actual joke.

Meh, I gave those suggestions because they asked. Archers are still the best unit in this game, no ****. Anyone that plays this game knows this. I think if horse archers are fixed back to the way they were before though, they'd be the absolute best. I still remember tests where fian champs couldn't do **** to horse archers even with numbers. Its absurd.

Speaking of archers though, you got some facts wrong.

I don't see how Khuzait Marksmen outclass Master Archers at all. Sure, their progression is less borked, and they might be more well armoured, but their bows are the same, their arrows are inferior and so are their skills. Lmao, how is a 160 bow skill for the Master Archer only 'adequate' compared to the Marksman's 130? When you want to mow down footsloggers, the Master Archer has the Marksman beat.

Also check the Palatine guard again. For some reason TW gave them the Steppe War Bow, which is straight up superior to the Steppe Recurve bows that the previous two have. They also have 160 bow skill for some reason, and are the most heavily armoured archer by far. Fian Champions are lighter than them. They still lack quivers sure, but considering their other benefits, I'd say they're pretty much second best to Fian Champions.

Which is absolutely stupid imo. Once again the Empire's roster power creeps the **** out of everything.

The Sturgian Veteran Bowman does suck for sure though, won't pretend otherwise. They should get shields and a bit more armour, at least maybe that way they compensate by doubling as legitimate heavy infantry. But its funny to think that they're the best unit the Sturgians have, at least if we go by the logic of efficiency you posit.

The slow changes seem promising, but TW still has ways to go before archers stop overwhelming everything.

 

[Telyon]

Speaking of archers though, you got some facts wrong.

I don't see how Khuzait Marksmen outclass Master Archers at all. Sure, their progression is less borked, and they might be more well armoured, but their bows are the same, their arrows are inferior and so are their skills. Lmao, how is a 160 bow skill for the Master Archer only 'adequate' compared to the Marksman's 130? When you want to mow down footsloggers, the Master Archer has the Marksman beat.

Admittedly, I had originally wrote that the two shared the second place, but changed it before posting. I prefer to avoid making non-conclusive/indecisive statements like "both have their own advantages!!!!", so I'm more than happy to be wrong here. Adequate bow skill referred to the latter two, as a way to just say "average" since Palantine Guards arbitrarily have 160. As for why I said KM > AMA, I considered the simpler progression path and much better armor to be superior to the bows/arrows, which differ in damage by 1.

Were the Palantine Guards modified very recently? I could've sworn that they were using smaller recurve bows. Either way, they still only have one quiver.