Darkhans exist and for awhile were hands down the best infantry in the game. They certainly aren't the worst now.
Balance was indeed poor in the past and is still poor, and subject to change like everything else. The point is more that if/when TW eventually succeeds in balancing the game, then Khuzait lacking melee infantry choices relative to other factions will determine what is considered their weakness.
There's another very clear reference in game - the Wolfskins. Battanian culture, Battanian equipment, referred to by some Battanian wanderers. Their troop line represents the single non-noble line allowed to a minor faction, for the only minor Battanian faction: the devs chose archers.
Minor factions aren't a reference to what the main faction is meant to be like. Vlandia has Brotherhood of the Woods- which is bow focused, despite Vlandia only having crossbows in their regular army with zero bows- and Company of the Golden Boar- which are crossbow infantry. If you went by these two for your idea of Vlandia, you would think they had no cavalry at all and were an entirely ranged army.
Also, go read the description for the Wolfskins, it says that they are mainly comprised of
the sons of the wealthy. In other words, they're Highborn Youth on gap year, and that's why they use bows just like the Battanian noble line, because it's a thing Battanian nobility does. Wolfskins are consistent with the way Battania already is.
Veteran Falxmen already wear some heavy armour now, so your idea still isn't all that unique in function. Are you sure we're talking about the Veteran Falxmen? You know? The guys with the rhomphaia and not the falx? Because those guys will absolutely do job better than anything you can come up with.
Oathsworn and Wildlings could be differentiated, but your way about it makes no sense. Sword and board only units would suck from being so hyper limited, all infantry in BL make use of some extra capabilities beyond just one note roles. And pikes don't make any sense at all for a skirmishing light infantry type of unit. I would settle with just giving Oathsworn a throwing spear in place of their javelins, and Wildlings a second stack of javelins in place of their spear. That way you have two truly unique troops.
I base it on the notion that we have been informed about Battania's descriptions as an archer faction, but also that there needs to be an archer faction. Archers in good quantity need to exist for Battania to actually let shock troops do anything. If they have no means to nullify enemy fire, you just end up with an army of pin cushions.
I also base this on the fact that just giving them common archers would not make them any less unique in the least bit, especially if you take away something else.
So yeah, I guess its subjective, but it certainly doesn't come out of nowhere. And A LOT of people want it. In the same vein as your logic, nothing about the entries say Battania can't have common archers, and I believe common archers don't make a faction less unique.
I think you can give all factions a good variety of troops, and still give them enough distinct characteristics to be unique and interesting. Lets say we take Imperial Archers vs a theoretical Battanian archer. Imperial archers can have the advantage in armour, which lets them kill other archers in ranged shootouts as well as making them more resilient in melee combat. Battanian archers meanwhile can be near naked and armed with longbows+two handers. They will move faster than any archer and potentially out skirmish anyone given enough finesse, but perform extremely poorly if damage comes to them in any way.
In regards to your troop tree thing, I did not come to your conclusions. The Khuzaits are a terrible example because their cavalry units in their troop tree let them dominate and snowball on the map. Its unique, sure. But completely imbalanced.
Vlandia is just weird and needs some tuning. I think they could use a bit more cavalry, and zero pikemen. Pikemen suck, and I don't think TW will ever make them good.
Battania is easy to make unique even then. Take away their melee cavalry and done. You have a unique foot focused troop tree. Adding common archers doesn't detract from that at all. We don't need to deny them their archers.
I like your ideas for the Oathsworn and Wildling, and we both agree Battania should lose their melee cavalry, which is good. As for the Vet. Falxman, its armor could go down a grade. It could be the glass cannon, while the 2h axeman unit could be the tankier but less powerful option. Having two types of shock infantry would cement Battania as the shock infantry specialist faction, something Bannerlord lacks, which feeds into my next point.
We both agree Bannerlord needs a unique ranged infantry faction. But there are better candidates for that than Battania. Aserai already have the Master Archer, and its real-life inspiration, the Sassanian Empire,
considered archers to be the elite of their infantry, placing high cultural value on skill with the bow and javelins. I think that with slight changes, Aserai can be Bannerlord's ranged infantry faction. Another good candidate is the Empire, who already has a regular archer *and* a crossbowman at T5!
It's also worth thinking about representation of different weapons in the game's armies. Bow users are extremely common, but javelins and two-handed weapons are much less common. So, giving Battania a new two-handed weapon user would make the game more varied; giving them a new bow user would make the game less varied.
Let me just compare our positions quickly.
* You think that Battania should be the game's ranged infantry faction. Your reasoning is that
this dev blog says they are masters of the longbow (which Fians being elite bow users satisfies anyway). You also say an unspecified number of other people want it.
* I think that Battania should be the game's shock infantry faction. My reasoning is that when you pick a culture, the game tells you that "Battania's fierce warriors use great axes and two-handed swords with deadly efficiency", and does not mention bows at all, but right now Battania doesn't have any great axes! Also, that
their real-life inspirations the Celts were overall
not known for their use of the bow and used it
less than other cultures, other than a small subset of the Welsh who were elite archers, therefore elite Fians being the only Battanian archers represents real life very well, and giving them regular archers would not. Next, to give javelins and two-handed weapons more representation in the game, which they currently lack. Finally, that to give Battania a regular ranged infantry unit like
every other faction in the game has, would be to undeniably make them less unique
because you are making them objectively more similar to the other factions.
Your three other points - shock troops being too weak without archers in large quantities to back them up, Khuzaits being overpowered, pikemen sucking- can all be answered in one. All these things happen because the game is currently poorly balanced. This (hopefully) isn't a permanent situation, so it shouldn't be a reason for including or not including certain troop types. Ideally, by the end of development, all troop types should be much better balanced. Therefore, how powerful certain types of troop are now should be irrelevant. The only question should be making the faction troop trees provide player choice, feel different to each other, and make them similar to their real-life inspirations.
In fact, Khuzaits snowball much less than they used to, so that isn't really an argument at all anymore against making factions unique.
So, it's not a case of "denying" Battania regular archers. They never needed them in the first place. There's no good reasons for doing it, and plenty of reasons not to.