[In progress] Every Bannerlord High Tier Troop Analyzed

[LyonExodus]

Here is an ongoing Playslist that by the end will cover around 34 units, between T4 and T6.
It will not only talk about equipment & armor but also use hours of testings to give the viewer all he/she needs to know in order to make an informed decision based on their own playstyle,

Playlist Here. Scroll down to go to the unit you are interested.

ASERAI

1) ASERAI VETERAN

2) PALACE GUARD

3) MASTER ARCHER

4) MAMELUKE HEAVY CAVALRY

5) VANGUARD FARIS

EMPIRE

1) LEGIONARY

How NERFED was the Legionary? Bannerlord Infantry Troop Units Guide

This is a 1.8. Bannerlord in Depth Analysis of the Infantry troop knows as Legionary. This video is part of a Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord Playlist where we ...

www.youtube.com

2) ELITE MENAVLIATON

How UNDERRATED is the Menavliaton? Bannerlord Shock Troop Units Guide

This is a 1.8. Bannerlord in Depth Analysis of the Shock troop known as Elite Menavliaton. This video is part of a Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord Playlist wher...

www.youtube.com

3) ELITE CATAPHRACT

Is the Cataphract OVERPOWERED? Bannerlord Cavalry Troop Units Guide

This is a 1.8. Bannerlord in Depth Analysis of the Cavalry troop known as Elite Cataphract. This video is part of a Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord Playlist whe...

www.youtube.com

4) PALATINE GUARD

How BUFFED was the Palatine Guard? Bannerlord Ranged Troop Units Guide

This is a 1.8. Bannerlord in Depth Analysis of the archer troop knows as Palatine Guard. This video is part of a Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord Playlist where ...

www.youtube.com

5) SERGEANT CROSSBOWMAN

Can The Sergeant Crossbowman COMPETE With The Legionary? Bannerlord Range Troop Units Guide

This is a 1.8. Bannerlord in Depth Analysis of the Ranged troop known as Sergeant Crossbowman. This video is part of a Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord Playlist ...

www.youtube.com

6) BUCELLARII

Is the Bucellarii a GOOD GLASS CANNON? Bannerlord Horse Archer Unit Troops Guide

This is a 1.8. Bannerlord in Depth Analysis of the Horse Archer troop known as Bucellarii. This video is part of a Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord Playlist wher...

www.youtube.com

STURGIA

1) AXEMAN

How UNDERRATED is the Heavy Axeman? Bannerlord Infantry Units Guide

This is a 1.8. Bannerlord in Depth Analysis of the Infantry troop knows as heavy Axeman. This video is part of a Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord Playlist where ...

www.youtube.com

2) SPEARMAN

How SPECIAL is the Heavy Spearman? Bannerlord infantry unit Troops guide

This is a 1.8. Bannerlord in Depth Analysis of the Infantry troop knows as Heavy Spearman. This video is part of a Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord Playlist wher...

www.youtube.com

3) VETERAN BOWMAN

How BAD is the Veteran Bowman? Bannerlord Ranged Troop Units Guide

This is a 1.8. Bannerlord in Depth Analysis of the Ranged troop known as Veteran Bowman. This video is part of a Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord Playlist where ...

www.youtube.com

4) DRUZHINNIK CHAMPION

How SPECIAL Is The Druzhinnik Champion? Bannerlord Cavalry units troops Guide

This is a 1.8. Bannerlord in Depth Analysis of the Cavalry troop knows as Druzhinnik Champion. This video is part of a Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord Playlist ...

www.youtube.com

5) HEROIC LINEBREAKER

How GOOD is the Heroic Linebreaker? Bannerlord Shock Troops Units Guide

This is a 1.8. Bannerlord in Depth Analysis of the Shock Troop known as Heroic Linebreaker. This video is part of a Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord Playlist whe...

www.youtube.com

6) HORSE RAIDER

How BAD is the Horse Raider? Bannerlord Cavalry Unit Troops Guide

This is a 1.8. Bannerlord in Depth Analysis of the Cavalry troop knows as Horse Raider. This video is part of a Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord Playlist where w...

www.youtube.com

VLANDIA

1) SERGEANT

How BAD Is The Vlandian Sergeant? Bannerlord Infantry Units Guide

This is a 1.8. Bannerlord in Depth Analysis of the Main Infantryman of Vlandia AKA Vlandian Sergeant. This video is part of a Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord Pl...

www.youtube.com

2) VOULGIER

How BAD Is The Voulgier? Bannerlord Shock Troop Units Guide

This is a 1.8. Bannerlord in Depth Analysis of the Vlandian Voulgier Shock Troop.This video is part of a Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord Playlist where we analy...

www.youtube.com

3) SHARPSHOOTER

How OVERRATED Is The Sharpshooter? Bannerlord Ranged Troop Units Guide

This is a 1.8. Bannerlord in Depth Analysis of the Ranged Unit known as The Vlandian Sharpshooter. This video is part of a Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord Playl...

www.youtube.com

4) VANGUARD

How BAD Is The Vlandian Vanguard? Bannerlord Cavalry Units Guide

This is a 1.8. Bannerlord in Depth Analysis of the Cavalry troop knows as Vanguard. This video is part of a Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord Playlist where we an...

www.youtube.com

5) BANNER KNIGHT

How WEIRD Is The Banner Knight? Bannerlord Cavalry troop Units Guide

This is a 1.8. Bannerlord in Depth Analysis of the Noble Cavalry troop known as Banner Knight. This video is part of a Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord Playlist ...

www.youtube.com

BATTANIA

1) VETERAN FALXMAN

How AWFUL is The Veteran Falxman? Bannerlord Shock Troops Units Guide

This is a 1.8. Bannerlord in Depth Analysis of the Battanian Shock Troop unit known as The Veteran Falxman. This video is part of a Mount & Blade II: Bannerl...

www.youtube.com

2) FALXMAN

How AMAZING is the Tier 4 Falxman? Bannerlord Shock Troops Units Guide

This is a 1.8. Bannerlord in Depth Analysis of the Tier 4 Battanian Shock Troop known as The Falxman. This video is part of a Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord Pl...

www.youtube.com

3) WILDLING

How BAD is The Wildling? Bannerlord Infantry Units Guide

This is a 1.8. Bannerlord in Depth Analysis of the Battanian Main Infantry Unit known as The Wildling. This video is part of a Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord ...

www.youtube.com

4) OATHSWORN

How GOOD is The Oathsworn? Bannerlord Infantry Units Guide

This is a 1.8. Bannerlord in Depth Analysis of the Battanian Main Infantry Unit known as The Oatshworn. This video is part of a Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord ...

www.youtube.com

5) HORSEMAN

How AWFUL is the Battanian Horseman? Bannerlord Cavalry Units Guide

This is a 1.8. Bannerlord in Depth Analysis of the Battanian Cavalry unit known as the Horseman.This video is part of a Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord Playlist...

www.youtube.com

6) MOUNTED SKIRMISHER

How GOOD is the Battanian Mounted Skirmisher? Bannerlord Cavalry Units Guide

This is a 1.8. Bannerlord in Depth Analysis of the Cavalry unit known as the Battanian Mounted Skirmisher. This video is part of a Mount & Blade II: Bannerlo...

www.youtube.com

7) FIAN CHAMPION

How BROKEN is the Battanian Fian Champion? Bannerlord Archer Units Guide

This is a 1.8. Bannerlord in Depth Analysis of the Archer unit known as The Battanian Fian Champion. This video is part of a Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord Pla...

www.youtube.com

​

Hope you find this information useful & if you want to support this on-going project consider subscribing as i am currently attempting to grow this channel in order to bring the most updated stats about units to the community on a daily basis

 

[Ananda_The_Destroyer]

It gets shot with arrows and dies.

 

[five bucks]

Sadly, all troops except Khan's Guards and Fian Champions are largely irrelevant because of three major factors:

* Arrows doing way too much damage to armour

Because armour barely provides any protection from arrows, shieldless infantry are worthless. Shielded units can use their stupidly durable shields to survive attacks from archers when not fighting, but as soon as they get into a fight they have to put down their shields, meaning archers can fill them full of arrows as well. So shield infantry are also almost worthless except as a distraction.

Whether you care about realism or not, two entire troop types being garbage is bad game design, and that is why armor should give more protection from arrows.

* Glaives being way too fast and powerful

This makes Khan's Guard beat all units in the game in melee combat, making all other melee units worthless.

* Melee cavalry being unable to accurately land attacks

This makes all melee cavalry units a waste of money and horses. You could just recruit Khan's Guards instead, who can kill better both in melee and at range.

There is only one reason for other units to exist and that's if you aren't within a couple days' ride of Khuzait or Battanian territory. Which you usually are. Once you get a bunch of Khan's Guards or Fian Champions they take a long time to die due to their ability to slaughter armoured melee units from a distance.

Armour damage against arrows desperately needs to be fixed before we can even start talking about the balance of the rest of the game.

 

[froggyluv]

Ugh. TW if nothing else make levels matter again.. That was a staple of this series since M&B1 -what in the world happened that you lost sight of that? Mounts that cant swing or lance properly? Again -YOU were the Boss in this genre. Shame.

 

[LyonExodus]

@five bucks listen mate.
Even if you are right and some troops are OP in comparison to others why would all of these be meaningless?
Do you ever consider that there are players, a large amount of them out there, who care about playing with everything the game as to offer?

I do not make this videos for people who do not care, and find it meaningless.
I make them for those who want to understand what troops they should seek and which one they shouldn't after deciding they don't want to use the most imbalanced troops in the game.

Another things those videos do, given if they do well, is that it can be a factual representation of troops imbalances so TW can work on them and find which one they want to improve.
I am down to test them every patch to find out what changed because i care about the troops becoming better and more balanced.

We know TW watches videos and streamers and patches their games accordingly to what thy find or do/abuse. So why calling it meaningless?
If TW ends up nerfing some units while buffing others after this videos came out? I have done my part in improving the game and bring awareness not only to the players but to the developers themselves.

Another thing. Each and every video explains the whys of something working or not (the Aserai Veteran video is a good example, just to name one). That information can be picked up and used by players to build better companions depending on their needs and , in case of troops mods, understand which ones are likely to perform well.

I do not find this IRRELEVANT. And it is hard and free work.

 

[Ananda_The_Destroyer]

It just looks like a lot of filler content I guess. The strongest unit is the one you position and support so it can attack with an advantage: This is large technique. The small technique knowledge (troops skill, troops exact weapons, armor) become irrelevant with mastery of the large technique. Also, the whole concept of "what troops is best" implies you have control over what troops you are raising and using, so as is common knowledge just get khan's guards, fians or other assorted ranged troops, it will be much better. If you don't have the ability to choose your troops then all this info is irrelevant, just use whatever you have and focus on placement and timing to give them openings and advantage (Large tech again).

 

[five bucks]

@five bucks listen mate.
Even if you are right and some troops are OP in comparison to others why would all of these be meaningless?

Do you ever consider that there are players, a large amount of them out there, who care about playing with everything the game as to offer?


I make them for those who want to understand what troops they should seek and which one they shouldn't after deciding they don't want to use the most imbalanced troops in the game.

This doesn't make any sense. Either you care about having the strongest troops - and we all already know what the strongest troops are - or you don't care about having the strongest troops and want to use a variety of troops, in which case why would you need an analysis?

Another things those videos do, given if they do well, is that it can be a factual representation of troops imbalances so TW can work on them and find which one they want to improve.

It's like the fire department worrying about the doghouse being on fire before putting out the actual house. The major, overarching problem is that infantry and cavalry are much less powerful than archers and horse archers across the board; this is much bigger than any minor imbalance between types of infantry since all infantry is nearly irrelevant if you want to win anyway.

And if TW was to fix that major problem, that would be a big shakeup to the balance of the game (in a good regard), so your videos would be outdated.

I do not find this IRRELEVANT. And it is hard and free work.

Yes, it is hard work, and it will all be a waste of your time if 1.8.X drops and changes the armor protection formula vs arrows, or makes cavalry actually able to hit infantry.

 

[LyonExodus]

in which case why would you need an analysis?

Have you even watched a single video?

First not everyone knows what the strongest troops are.
Second there are people who plays in different ways
Third There are people who play faction only
Fourth You can't possibly be that close minded
Fifth Bet you didn't know how poor some troops perform in 1.8. that didn't before.
Sixth There is a **** tonne of misinformation out there.
Seventh It teaches the players (new ones) what kind of weapons and armors can work on companions since they do on troops. Likewise it teaches them what troops are likely to work when playing mods that add troops to the game.

It's like the fire department worrying about the doghouse being on fire before putting out the actual house.

That's honestly called safety and architects, engineers, city planners and fire departments actually all care about that kind of stuff since you don't want your stuff to go on fire, and if it does there needs to safety features to fight such fire.

The major, overarching problem is that infantry and cavalry are much less powerful than archers and horse archers across the board; this is much bigger than any minor imbalance between types of infantry since all infantry is nearly irrelevant if you want to win anyway.

You see that's your problem.
You can WIN with any kind of troop, you just need to know HOW to use them.
NOT EVERYONE WANTS TO PLAY WITH THE BROKEN ASS UNITS! some wants to have fun, and yes infantry needs a strong captain build to have a similar feeling to archers and horse archers.

But what's that? having fun not using Khan's? PREPOSTEROUS!

And if TW was to fix that major problem,

Sure, they will in no time. We all know how on top of the balancing issues TW can be. Stuff needs to be right up in their faces and on top of everyone mouth to be worked upon, and generally after months it might.
Knowing you as one of those people who complained for months about armor here, armor there and still does. How can you possibly say that line.

Yes, it is hard work, and it will all be a waste of your time if 1.8.X drops and changes the armor protection formula vs arrows, or makes cavalry actually able to hit infantry.

If it does i'll update the video. simple.
I can't believe there are people who can be this close minded on a single player game. that offers about 34 different troops to use between T5 and T6.

But no, let's all Khan's or Fian it up, because it's known that players prefer winning over HAVING i don't know FUN and VARAITY.
I find it funny cause this imbalances are portrayed in the videos too. like the worst infantry or cavalry gets 0 while the worst archer still gets a 2.
So easy judging a book by it's cover. isn't it.
Watch a few, instead of just judging.

You want to know why nobody goes trough all of this? Because there is no way to cheat the system by using mods that speed the combat up like RTS camera, cause they end up invalidating the results and don't work on 1x speed combat mechanics.
Some tests take up to 7m for just 1 of them, when you have to do 10 on average for units you can quickly realize why nobody ever cares about putting actual time and effort in finding real results.
Just gathering the data took a week of work, making videos takes another 6 hours for each one at least.

Maybe don't call someones else work that ends up informing new and returning players IRRELEVANT just because it's not useful to you or you didn't do it.

I am willing to bet reasonable people would find my take more logical than yours

 

[sh1ny4]

This doesn't make any sense. Either you care about having the strongest troops - and we all already know what the strongest troops are - or you don't care about having the strongest troops and want to use a variety of troops, in which case why would you need an analysis?

What if I want to play a very specific type of unit, only one culture, or a specific strategy in battles ? These videos are very useful to me personaly, much more than someone saying 'go get some khans guard'. Did you know Khans guard are pretty useless when playing shield wall ?
And these are even more important when you consider that playing horse archer or only ranged is the most boring way to play this game.

also thanks @LyonExodus for teaching me why the vet falx sucked

 

[LyonExodus]

Did you know Khans guard are pretty useless when playing shield wall ?

First many thanks for finding the videos useful and proving my point.
But i have to say that as far as i have tested there are only 3 infantry units capable of defeating an equal amount of Khans.
This uses a very specific tactic with an impressive long line and units in loose formation.

the only units capable of achieving such a result where Legionaries, Sturgian Spearman and the Khuzait Darkhan.
That strategy was not discovered by me, just tested. Video here

 

[sh1ny4]

But i have to say that as far as i have tested there are only 3 infantry units capable of defeating an equal amount of Khans.
This uses a very specific tactic with an impressive long line and units in loose formation.

Well what I meant was that they aren't fit to be in a shield wall.
A while back my strategy was to do a shield wall while far from the enemy to have them deplet their arrows and then advance and have my ranged troops farm the enemy without getting shot back, and in that case the Khans would have been pretty bad

 

[LyonExodus]

makes sense. given the right setup and map you can force the Horse Archer to run out of arrows.

Altough be awere becasue even without a bow and arrows the Khan's are still the deadliest cavalry in the game thanks to their good armor and insane weapon.
They are the most broken unit in the game for a reason, thing is. in vanilla the AI will likely never have more than 50 Khan's. so a good enough army will likely do well anyway.

But now we must stop. We can't be seen having fun with other troops. We will end in a sea of trouble if we keep this up.

 

[Ananda_The_Destroyer]

Seventh It teaches the players (new ones) what kind of weapons and armors can work on companions since they do on troops.

ranged weapon, 3 stackes of ammo. If you think sending a clan mate into melee is every a good idea, you have not been paying attention. Maybe a long glaive or romphia is okay though, if you can afford them and they have some polearm skill. For some reason AI seems bad at using them without skill even though you can do it fine as a player.

And these are even more important when you consider that playing horse archer or only ranged is the most boring way to play this game.

Here's a place for your opinions : 🚽

Fifth Bet you didn't know how poor some troops perform in 1.8. that didn't before.

They're all the same with a couple arrows in their head.

 

[BigFat]

I appreciate the effort you put in your videos, but looking at someone analyze the stats of armors and weapons just makes it clear how pointless any of it is. I've done infantry only playthroughs of most factions and honestly the only difference in how they feel to play is if they have a throwing weapon or not and that only matters for the initial exchange usually. A unit having 52 armor helmet or 20 armor helmet just means they go from getting 1-2 shot to 2-3 shot most times. Swing speed feels like the only thing that matters so they can start stunlocking the other unit quicker.

 

[LyonExodus]

A unit having 52 armor helmet or 20 armor helmet just means they go from getting 1-2 shot to 2-3 shot most times. Swing speed feels like the only thing that matters so they can start stunlocking the other unit quicker.

that's a 50% to 75% difference tho. the difference from 1 to at least 2 or 3 is huge.

You can feel the armor being relevant once you pick a unit like a Vlandian Sergeant. 66% good weapons with fast swing but bad body armor and below average head for the class.
that ended up in the unit being far worse than someone who has very good armor but a bad weapon like the Aserai veteran.

before the armor change of 1.8. the Aserai veterans ranked 6th vs low tiers and now they are all the way up to 1st. imagine if they had the same weapon of the Axeman or the Sergeants.
increasing armor effectiveness doesn't end up changing the stats by much, it just makes the unit die slower but the performance is largely going to stay the same, unless a unit as an impressive amount of armor that can be able to carry a bad weapon. So armor is more important than a good sidearm.
But really from 1.7.2 the only unit that has seen a significant improvement in melee are the Aserai Vets everyone else stayed roughly in the same spot with the nerf to maces impacting units who carry them a lot Vs low tiers, unless the weapon skill is insane like the Banner Knights.

High tier performance across units have roughly stayed the same across infantry units. with units bringing maces having the edge and slow swords being the worst.

but looking at someone analyze the stats of armors and weapons just makes it clear how pointless any of it is.

Okay let me pick the worst armored infantry and the most armored infantry stats Vs low tiers (which is what they will fight the most)
The Sergeants have 91 H + B (head + body) and rank last while the Darkahns have 115 H + B and rank first.

First thing to notice is that it's a difference of roughly 26% in favor of the Darkhans so if armor was not important the difference Vs low tiers should be less or around 26%

Sergeants Vs low tiers K/D is 60,18 while the Darkhans have a K/D of 126,08
that's an increase of more than 100% in favor of the darkhan and the Darkhan have honestly a worse weapon than the average weapon of the Sergeants.
With this data here i can't say armor is pointless and the weapons for the Darkhan is honestly worse off than 66% of the Sergeants.

 

[BigFat]

Yes I agree certain ones have advantages and disadvantages but none of them are big enough to really change how the units play. If I think back to any of my infantry only playthroughs, I didn't need to use any different tactics when playing as Vlandia versus playing as anyone else (admittedly Khuzaits were the only ones I didn't play as for this). There was never a point when I had to think "Ok, I know my Sergeants have lower armor than those Sturgian bastards so I need to do X instead of Y" and to tell you the truth, I feel that way about all of the troop trees. The only faction I switch things up for is Khuz and sometimes Aserai if they have a lot of mounted skirmishers. That's what I mean by the stats not really mattering.

 

[LDominating]

that's a 50% to 75% difference tho. the difference from 1 to at least 2 or 3 is huge.

You can feel the armor being relevant once you pick a unit like a Vlandian Sergeant. 66% good weapons with fast swing but bad body armor and below average head for the class.
that ended up in the unit being far worse than someone who has very good armor but a bad weapon like the Aserai veteran.

before the armor change of 1.8. the Aserai veterans ranked 6th vs low tiers and now they are all the way up to 1st. imagine if they had the same weapon of the Axeman or the Sergeants.
increasing armor effectiveness doesn't end up changing the stats by much, it just makes the unit die slower but the performance is largely going to stay the same, unless a unit as an impressive amount of armor that can be able to carry a bad weapon. So armor is more important than a good sidearm.
But really from 1.7.2 the only unit that has seen a significant improvement in melee are the Aserai Vets everyone else stayed roughly in the same spot with the nerf to maces impacting units who carry them a lot Vs low tiers, unless the weapon skill is insane like the Banner Knights.

High tier performance across units have roughly stayed the same across infantry units. with units bringing maces having the edge and slow swords being the worst.

Okay let me pick the worst armored infantry and the most armored infantry stats Vs low tiers (which is what they will fight the most)
The Sergeants have 91 H + B (head + body) and rank last while the Darkahns have 115 H + B and rank first.

First thing to notice is that it's a difference of roughly 26% in favor of the Darkhans so if armor was not important the difference Vs low tiers should be less or around 26%

Sergeants Vs low tiers K/D is 60,18 while the Darkhans have a K/D of 126,08
that's an increase of more than 100% in favor of the darkhan and the Darkhan have honestly a worse weapon than the average weapon of the Sergeants.
With this data here i can't say armor is pointless and the weapons for the Darkhan is honestly worse off than 66% of the Sergeants.

Your analysis are good.
But the whole Archers just beat everything?
It's pretty wrong.

I have faced and fought alongside Sturgians.
In manual battles they'll beat almost everyone just because they're infantry based.
I guarantee you a T3 army of Sturgian Soldiers will beat a 1/2 of their size army of Fians and Khans.
Just because of sheer numbers,reliability and shield formation will render any range useless.
I do not know how my Fians get so many kills against infantry but they do and it's surprising because if the A.I goes shield formation and archers on a hill,I'll have to pull my Fians back.

And to be fair the A.I on Bannerlord difficulty blocks a lot so it's controversial to me when people say armour should be better,because I think of lower tier troops beign squandered to dust.
It's incredibly visible on Sturgian Axeman and Sea Raider Chief when they block.
Not to say 2H in Arenas.
Fighting against Caladog is just..fighting Darth Vader in arena )

But yea some units just need less armour (fians and khans) and other more, Vlandian infantry and cavalry and Sturgian Axemen..

 

[LyonExodus]

the boys who want armor to be more "realistic" can honestly go and download RBM and have their sense of fun.

My only problem with Bannerlord units is that it's very easy for the player to have an army full of T5 and T6 while the AI can master 50 to 100 T5 among 10 lords in the best of armies vanilla has to offer.
If the AI could bring better troops, than faction playstyle, weaknesses and strengths of units will be more important. not that it's useless now. a Battanian army won't be as effective in melee over a Sturgian. and will rely more on throwables over melee.

And for new players i find it's important to be told how certain troops perform, what you should expect from them and why they are good/bad. Which is one of the main reasons i do my best to make those videos as fast and packed with info as they can be. A new player wants to play, not listen to a nerd rumbling for 15 minutes over 1 troop.

if you buff the armor you have to give more shots to skirmishers and archers to compensate to the lack of DMG in the short term. there are bigger issues than armor in this game, like cavalry, ai tactics and quality of AI troops that stunts the long term replayability of the game.
Every enemy feel easy to fight as their tactics are fairly simple and predictable, and the only way to have a challenge is by giving the lords unfair advantages. More XP perks , more HP perks, Better economy perks and so on.

After 1.8. Ai infantry got much better. they now charge using shield wall that has been proven for well over 1 year to be the best charging formation for that unit type.
I can only hope they can improve on that side. then we can really talk about armor calculations. Re-painting the boat won't fix the engine.

But i can't understand people who say that a 100% increase in efficacy Vs low tiers between one unit and another is not important information.

 

[BigFat]

the boys who want armor to be more "realistic" can honestly go and download RBM and have their sense of fun.

Silly argument. Wanting to see T5 units survive more than 3 swings should not be a case for modders to solve and it has nothing to do with armor being "realistic"

My only problem with Bannerlord units is that it's very easy for the player to have an army full of T5 and T6 while the AI can master 50 to 100 T5 among 10 lords in the best of armies vanilla has to offer.
If the AI could bring better troops, than faction playstyle, weaknesses and strengths of units will be more important. not that it's useless now. a Battanian army won't be as effective in melee over a Sturgian. and will rely more on throwables over melee.

I agree to an extent, if AI spent more time during peace recruiting and killing looters to level up their troops after being defeated it would be nice. I don't want to see them just get good troops cheated in though because then it just reminds me of warband defeating lords who roll up with new armies a few days later.

And for new players i find it's important to be told how certain troops perform, what you should expect from them and why they are good/bad. Which is one of the main reasons i do my best to make those videos as fast and packed with info as they can be. A new player wants to play, not listen to a nerd rumbling for 15 minutes over 1 troop.

I get your point but I don't really agree. I think most new players won't be worrying about optimizing troops rather than picking one faction and using what they have and they mostly perform close enough to one another that it doesn't make a huge difference at the start.

if you buff the armor you have to give more shots to skirmishers and archers to compensate to the lack of DMG in the short term. there are bigger issues than armor in this game, like cavalry, ai tactics and quality of AI troops that stunts the long term replayability of the game.
Every enemy feel easy to fight as their tactics are fairly simple and predictable, and the only way to have a challenge is by giving the lords unfair advantages. More XP perks , more HP perks, Better economy perks and so on.

I really don't agree here. 1.8 buffed armor a little and on my Sturgian playthrough it was noticeably better than before. Still not where I'd like to see it but a step in the right direction. Archers being buffed would kind of defeat the purpose, they'd be fine at killing low to mid tier units easily as intended, their skill is doing damage from a safe distance anyway. Skirmishers should just do way more damage to shields, though shields are too strong in general.

After 1.8. Ai infantry got much better. they now charge using shield wall that has been proven for well over 1 year to be the best charging formation for that unit type.
I can only hope they can improve on that side. then we can really talk about armor calculations. Re-painting the boat won't fix the engine.

Was this a 1.8 change? AI really only has 1 offensive tactic and they've always advanced in shield wall, at least as far as I can remember. The only difference in 1.8 is the slight increase to armor values makes infantry survive the approach a bit better. I'd love to see AI improvement but realistically full release is coming some time and you're much more likely to see armor altered than full on AI overhall.

But i can't understand people who say that a 100% increase in efficacy Vs low tiers between one unit and another is not important information.

Because a units capability to F1 F3 is not super important to me nor is it something new players should pick up as a bad habit in my opinion

 

[five bucks]

I appreciate the effort you put in your videos, but looking at someone analyze the stats of armors and weapons just makes it clear how pointless any of it is. I've done infantry only playthroughs of most factions and honestly the only difference in how they feel to play is if they have a throwing weapon or not and that only matters for the initial exchange usually. A unit having 52 armor helmet or 20 armor helmet just means they go from getting 1-2 shot to 2-3 shot most times. Swing speed feels like the only thing that matters so they can start stunlocking the other unit quicker.

+1

Yes I agree certain ones have advantages and disadvantages but none of them are big enough to really change how the units play. If I think back to any of my infantry only playthroughs, I didn't need to use any different tactics when playing as Vlandia versus playing as anyone else (admittedly Khuzaits were the only ones I didn't play as for this). There was never a point when I had to think "Ok, I know my Sergeants have lower armor than those Sturgian bastards so I need to do X instead of Y" and to tell you the truth, I feel that way about all of the troop trees. The only faction I switch things up for is Khuz and sometimes Aserai if they have a lot of mounted skirmishers. That's what I mean by the stats not really mattering.

+2

the boys who want armor to be more "realistic" can honestly go and download RBM and have their sense of fun.

The boy who is wrong and doesn't want armour to be balanced is outnumbered by about 100:1 by the people who do want armour to be balanced. Arrows being as overpowered as they are makes infantry and melee cavalry comparatively garbage. Our sense of fun comes from the game being balanced and being able to use different troops viably.

you buff the armor you have to give more shots to archers to compensate to the lack of DMG in the short term.

No you don't lmao, because they are overpowered. You don't have to buff them at all because they are already by far the best troop types, they really just need a nerf, with the optional change of all around weaker shields also but that's optional.

there are bigger issues than armor in this game, like cavalry, ai tactics and quality of AI troops that stunts the long term replayability of the game.

What stunts the long term replayability is that non ranged units are garbage and I know if I use anything but a party of all Fian or all Khan's Guard I'm gimping myself.

Every enemy feel easy to fight as their tactics are fairly simple and predictable, and the only way to have a challenge is by giving the lords unfair advantages. More XP perks , more HP perks, Better economy perks and so on.

After 1.8. Ai infantry got much better. they now charge using shield wall that has been proven for well over 1 year to be the best charging formation for that unit type. Ican only hope they can improve on that side. then we can really talk about armor calculations. Re-painting the boat won't fix the engine.

Better analogy: you are talking about how the engine could be working better while everyone else on the boat is more concerned with the fact there's a hole in the bottom.

There is no point about talking about anything AI tactics related when archers can do the same damage *or better* ****from a distance**** than melee troops can do. It makes infantry permanently useless for anything but a shield-dropping distraction in small amounts.

Until armour damage from arrows is fixed, there will continue being only two cost effective strategies: "massed horse archers preferably Khan's Guard" or "massed archers on a hill with 10% token distraction infantry".