Vland troops are extremely good.

[Marlax]

You may know vland has very good heavy cav but they also seem to have some of the best units all around i have seen.
the recruit has spears. they use them to great affect a spear wall lvl 1 stops cav and shreads infantry. then level 2 with swords better after the first spear wall has weakened the enemies. lvl 3 they have shields that cover their entire body. so if you place a shield wall in front of your units before the battle start there is no way arrows are killing them.

then you have good cav units and crossbows that have more damage and range than most units. the slower fire rate doesnt matter so much if the enemy is shooting your shield wall. so its really just units being shot by high damage bolts then they hit a pike wall. shreaded, then they hit a wall of formed up sword infantry with more spears if cav are around. then they shield wall but this is all while a cav charge can wreck your side even at level 1.

the shields are the main thing here the units are weak but they are smaller than most and the shields lvl 3 cover every inch of their body making them immune to arrows. then the spears make them immune to cav. and then their cav wreck infantry so do the crossbows.

the khans might be the one that can fight them but thats if the heavy cav dont get ahold of those riding bowmen.

 

[Eternal]

Alright man

 

[7heTexanRebel]

Wait until you get some fian champions.

 

[Puerkl8r]

Have you even fought Battania? The Empire?

Battanian archers are just as good in melee as range, and the empire units have more armor than any other units with spears and large shields, and better heavy cav than Vlandia to boot.

There are factions that are a lot more powerful than Vlandia.

 

[Ananda_The_Destroyer]

The cross bows are good but I haven't used all the different ranged units enough to say whats better. The real test will be if they out shoot bow archers and if their armor/shield lets them survive melee. I don't like that the recruits have spears, they get killed by looters more often then recruits with swords.

the khans might be the one that can fight them but thats if the heavy cav dont get ahold of those riding bowmen.
Cav gets wrecked by horse archers because Cav ai is derpy. Maybe if you make like 100 heavy Cav it would be different but the amount AI usually has isn't very good. Of course Khans don't have that many horse archers at once usually, but if they do uh oh. Probably better to let AI deal with it then a live fight.

 

[Tuco]

One problem I have with today's Bannerlord is that most of the troops in the different factions are fairly similar. There are some differences in that Khuzait has more horse archers, Vlandia has more crossbowmen/lancers, Sturgia has more footmen+shields etc. This effect is exacerbated by the fact that 50%+ of armies are typically of tier1/2 units that are almost identical to each other. As a player you can ruck up 100+ Fian Champions and have a very different army composition than if you had 100+ Vanguard Faris, but the Aserai and Battania armies are still pretty similar.

In my opinion the game would be more interesting if they got rid of a lot of the generic units.

Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord Troops & Trading

Troops Made by Bjarke,Last Updated 15th of April 2020,Skills,Armor Values Unit Name,Starting Unit,Nationality,Role,One Handed,Two Handed,Polearm,Bow,Crossbow,Throwing,Riding,Athletics,Tier,Level,Wage,Head,Body Arboreal,Sprout,Vlandia,Ranged,200,60,60,200,130,60,0,140,5,26,12,0,47 Aserai Archer,A...

docs.google.com

 

[eddiemccandless]

One problem I have with today's Bannerlord is that most of the troops in the different factions are fairly similar. There are some differences in that Khuzait has more horse archers, Vlandia has more crossbowmen/lancers, Sturgia has more footmen+shields etc. This effect is exacerbated by the fact that 50%+ of armies are typically of tier1/2 units that are almost identical to each other. As a player you can ruck up 100+ Fian Champions and have a very different army composition than if you had 100+ Vanguard Faris, but the Aserai and Battania armies are still pretty similar.

In my opinion the game would be more interesting if they got rid of a lot of the generic units.

Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord Troops & Trading

Troops Made by Bjarke,Last Updated 15th of April 2020,Skills,Armor Values Unit Name,Starting Unit,Nationality,Role,One Handed,Two Handed,Polearm,Bow,Crossbow,Throwing,Riding,Athletics,Tier,Level,Wage,Head,Body Arboreal,Sprout,Vlandia,Ranged,200,60,60,200,130,60,0,140,5,26,12,0,47 Aserai Archer,A...

docs.google.com

Τhis is a good point, I have also observed the same. I think it would help if they had certain lords have household troops, which for right now could be something as simple as certain Vlandian Lords having a set number of crossbowmen, while others get a higher percentage of cavarly etc.. Similarly to what Prophesy of Pendor did in Warband. Some lords could even have troops from minor factions.

 

[HelveticGenetikk]

Have you even fought Battania? The Empire?

Battanian archers are just as good in melee as range, and the empire units have more armor than any other units with spears and large shields, and better heavy cav than Vlandia to boot.

There are factions that are a lot more powerful than Vlandia.

That is absolutely true, even if you you are superior in number you have kinda no chance. especially the other lords have armies with about 90% vlandian recruits...

 

[Boozbaz]

I've been playing on hardest settings and struggling to build up a strong vlandian army. They just keep dying. :/ I'll have to figure out how to use these guys better

 

[bearmans]

I actually thought they were one of the weaker factions after 100 hours playtime. Possibly the weakest, although Battania may be worse.

Mind you I am <not> talking about knights or fians here. Those are obviously both amazing. But their T2/T3 troops perform way worse than most other factions, except maybe Aserai mameluke infantry, which seem to be the worst infantry unit in the game (made up for somewhat by the fact that they eventually can become the absurdly strong heavy mameluke cavalry, though).

Part of this is because crossbows just seem to be straight up worse than bows overall right now.

 

[Tuco]

Part of this is because crossbows just seem to be straight up worse than bows overall right now.

Crossbows serve their purpose of being accurate, low rate of fire ranged weapons. The reason they're generally worse is because most fights are blob vs blob, and accuracy matters less than rate of fire.

 

[Nokturnel]

Crossbows serve their purpose of being accurate, low rate of fire ranged weapons. The reason they're generally worse is because most fights are blob vs blob, and accuracy matters less than rate of fire.

^ Yep.

Another fix that might help Vlad xbows is making it so shields always block attacks whether they're equipped or not. The huge shields their Crossbow users have would be pretty effective at protecting them if even when they had them on their back it protected them. (Currently it only protects them while they have it equipped, can shoot/hack right through it when it's on their back)

Far as army balance, Vlad isn't terrible, but it's not as OP as Fians and it lacks OP horse archers. Think Sturgia even with it's stats fixed is still the worst army. They're supposed to be "The Good Infantry" army I believe, but Infantry AI is pretty bad ATM and Archers are way more powerful than most infantry units. Their archers aren't any better than any other faction and Fian's are just plain way better, while Sturgia also lacks horse archers.

 

[Osium]

The top tier sturgian infantry is probably the best infantry in the game, but everything below top tier is pretty much objectively the worst in class.

Not to mention their sort of defining unit the top tier berserker, is completely unarmored. It's a cool trope for TV that has no basis in reality, but in terms of actual combat performance, not having armor kind of makes them suck

 

[Boozbaz]

Do the crossbows do blunt damage? If they do, they can be helpful for knocking out enemies and turning them into prisoners. I think Vlads also have tier 5 blunt melee user too. Good for roleplaying mercenaries that take live prisoners back for sale. Also good for capturing and forcing certain bandit type enemies into joining your army. If I recall correctly I did this to amass an army of sea raiders in Warband.

 

[GrasSclammPferd]

Battanian archers are just as good in melee as range, and the empire units have more armor than any other units with spears and large shields, and better heavy cav than Vlandia to boot.

It's a lucky day if I see the AI bring more than 8 Fians in a 70 stack

 

[Bob Gnarly]

Do the crossbows do blunt damage? If they do, they can be helpful for knocking out enemies and turning them into prisoners. I think Vlads also have tier 5 blunt melee user too. Good for roleplaying mercenaries that take live prisoners back for sale. Also good for capturing and forcing certain bandit type enemies into joining your army. If I recall correctly I did this to amass an army of sea raiders in Warband.

I assumed the advantage of crossbows is that they pierce heavy armor like in Warband? I haven't tested it yet.

 

[Pejot]

I find Vlandian xbows really good against shielded infantry. In fight with empire my 20 crossbowman kill legionaries like flies. Crossbow destroys shields much faster than bow (I checked both options against shielded troops). They are harder to lvl cause of weak T1 and T2 but are quite decent from T3 up. Cavalry is strong as long as You don't use it in frontal charges and keep ordering them instead of letting them attack on their own. Their only weakness are horse archers. I watched Khuzait horse archers taking banner knight after banner knight on plain terrain without the latter ever catching them. T3+ inf is decent against ranged fire but they die fast in melee (not sure what's causing this maybe gear is worse?) against most other factions. They also die fast against throwing weapons so Battania skirmisher can wreck Vlandian inf.

 

[Razdv]

AI is very weak if it is under command of any lord or companion. In last my 600 vs 1200 battle I completely destroyed enemy army, lost only 30 men, but when I ordered everyone to charge (anout 100 enemies left alive) I was fallen due to random couched strike from some vlandian knight (about 20 of them still left on the battlefield) and my troops started to act weird and stupid. My archers started to do weird maneuveres restoring and rotating their formation around for no reason (f1-f4 behavior i think), my infantry went shieldwall and started rotating too, my 60 cavalry went back to "protect" (from who!?) right or left flank (I don't remember) as described in combat log string. And enemy 20 knights started to shred my men. My army lost 30 more men 570 vs 20 knights. If my men were ordered just to f1-f3 and break formations and act fire at will as I told them they won't lost any unit I'm pretty sure, may be just 1-3.

 

[Gambles]

AI is very weak if it is under command of any lord or companion. In last my 600 vs 1200 battle I completely destroyed enemy army, lost only 30 men, but when I ordered everyone to charge (anout 100 enemies left alive) I was fallen due to random couched strike from some vlandian knight (about 20 of them still left on the battlefield) and my troops started to act weird and stupid. My archers started to do weird maneuveres restoring and rotating their formation around for no reason (f1-f4 behavior i think), my infantry went shieldwall and started rotating too, my 60 cavalry went back to "protect" (from who!?) right or left flank (I don't remember) as described in combat log string. And enemy 20 knights started to shred my men. My army lost 30 more men 570 vs 20 knights. If my men were ordered just to f1-f3 and break formations and act fire at will as I told them they won't lost any unit I'm pretty sure, may be just 1-3.

If you're playing on easy / very easy YOUR AI is also on very easy, so if you die they will do really, really dumb things cause the computer is set to do that. The difference between how the ai uses your army and theirs is no different, it's the exact same.

 

[Razdv]

If you're playing on easy / very easy YOUR AI is also on very easy, so if you die they will do really, really dumb things cause the computer is set to do that. The difference between how the ai uses your army and theirs is no different, it's the exact same.

I'm playing realistic and challenging and no save/load abusing. Game is too easy for me in current state actually. I need to restrict myself to have some challenge.