I've played the mod and got quite into it, the entire experience was quite grand, before several substantial bugs and frustrations put me off it for now. Along the way I noticed some oddities that also took away from my game experience. This thread is going to be used to report said oddities, propose suggestions and ask questions all, in no order in particular.
One of my biggest gripes: equipment variety and some odd design choices
I've noticed this as I played; while the equipment used by troops themselves is of stunning quality, the effect of this gets reduced when you notice that the variety in equipment (and facial codes) between soldiers is lacking.
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Far too many soldiers across way too many factions do not have helmets that could help remedy this. Riverlands is a great example.
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Different types of troops still have very much the same-ish looking equipment. The prime examples of this are the Westerlands, the North and the Riverlands. The amazing addition of house troops remedies this somewhat.. but only when they are present.
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A more specific example of this is Westerlands Freeriders. They all come equipped exactly the same, and all have those hideous looking vanilla arming caps/leather caps. I hated that unit because of it.
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Another specific example of this are the wildlings. They look cool, yeah, but they all have that one coat that looks exactly the same, and the same spear and shield all over. They are desperately in need of being and looking less uniform.
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Why do faction knights not have lances? The knights are already not as tanky as they should be in my opinion. Taking the lances away from them makes them less specialized and less awesome still. Less powerful too. Robber Knights have them, but Stormlanders knights for example do not.
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The problem of outriders/freeriders/squires. The aforementioned brings me to another problem. Why is the game dominated by weak light cavalry that do not have a shield? I get that they are supposed to represent light cavalry and they are well represented, but I feel that without heavy, lance equipped knights, they just provide the same, less cooler and weaker versions of knights that would be much more interesting in their stead, if they served as a cheap alternative to them. This is especially true with the Westerlands. Westerlands have freeriders and squires, which I have to confess I think both are far too uniform and as such a little hideous to me, and they serve more or less the same purpose, but this brings me to the next issue.
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Why don't the Westerlands have any knights? They have squires, so why no knights? I hate to say it here, but I miss the contrast of ACOK's pigface bascinet & transitional half-plate equipped knights. They served as a nice contrast to a faction that has its troops equipped in almost entirely the same manner. I don't think it would hurt if you added Westerlands knights of sorts that looked more or less akin to this:
Not a strict representation of what I meant, but it comes quite close.
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I feel that a bit too many troops rely on a sword and shield. Once again I hate to say it, but ACOK handled this well, making more troops into halberdiers, hammermen, glaiviers, macemen. I'm very much glad that you make full use of spearmen, unlike acok. The game should still be dominated by sword & shield/spear & shield type of troop imo, but a few more
specialized troops wouldn't hurt.
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I feel that villagers, townsmen, troops, guild masters, the special npcs and any and all NPCs overall could use a better distribution of clothing and equipment. Walking into the tavern and seeing this odd recruiter or gambler hailing from here and there wearing cool garb would make the venture a little more interesting. Some of the companions could use a little more interesting equipment to start with as well (as opposed to vanilla equipment that for example Podrick starts out with. Anyway, to whichever town I go there's npcs wearing remnants of Brytenwalda's plainest of cloths. Looks out of place and a bit ugly. My point is that, and I can tell by how many items I have encountered in the game, that the mod has so much stunning equipment, it just isn't well distributed or is unused by troops.
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Why do the Riverlands have round shields? I think kite shields would be better, or at least a different model of the round shield. The current one is from vanilla and looks distinctly Norse, making it out of place and rather ugly.
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Taverns. I think vanilla tavern interiors would work better than those from VC that we have in most places. While they look appropriate and excellent in the North, seeing wooden longhalls down South and in the Westerlands just feels weird. Especially the one in King's Landing. So out of place.
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Bows. Its incredibly hard to develop skill with the bow, as your character shoots it like a child with muscle atrophy even when you get a good bow and get power draw to a respectable level. The skill just seldom goes up.
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Projectile speed. I appreciate that the bows are not as accurate as they are in most mods, but the projectile speed still seems strange. Bolts should definitely fly faster and so too should the arrows.
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Last but not least, Renown. Why am I having such a hard time earning renown from battles? I'm glad I start with a substantial renown advantage as a noble, its refreshing, but if I join or even initiate battles where I get reinforcements and WIN. Say a 300 vs 300 battle, of which I compromise about 70 men and myself. We win and I get no renown whatsoever. I can only get it from hunting bandits and winning tournaments, as well as completing quests, or fighting a single lord's party with my own.. Is it because I'm a mercenary? I won't lie, this kind of hinders my will to play, that and bugs. Is the way you earn renown here actually different, or is something wrong?
This compromises most of my gripes with the mod. I adore your mod and think its amazing, but I do think there's room for improvement and even creativity without going outright against the lore.
Anyway, I posted these on your forums too, just in case.
