Bannerlord not only butchered the combat system with changes to collision, formations and damage but also ruined the battle AI. The amount of times I have watched formations under AI control sit 30 feet from the enemies archers and get sniped to death because they constantly raise/lower their shields and refuse to charge is insane. The amount of times I have seen infantry run at an enemy formation, nearly clash with them then slowly start walking backwards to form up with their fresh reinforcements or totally turn around to reform is also absurd. At least in Warband the AI could properly deploy their skirmisher line THEN charge, for whatever reason the AI here seems to be completely unable to do so.
The awful friendly battle AI means you can never fight underneath someone else's command without fear of significant losses due to unit mismanagement, and you can NEVER go down in battle because the AI is completely incapable of playing the game. I have had several battles where I am absolutely beating the breaks off of the enemy but end up losing horribly when I went down. Your only way to play is to sit back and play relatively conservatively (unless your a horse archer) or install a mod like "RTS Camera" to allow you to continue controlling your units or at the very least do all the work yourself via killing the enemy.
The awful friendly battle AI means you can never fight underneath someone else's command without fear of significant losses due to unit mismanagement, and you can NEVER go down in battle because the AI is completely incapable of playing the game. I have had several battles where I am absolutely beating the breaks off of the enemy but end up losing horribly when I went down. Your only way to play is to sit back and play relatively conservatively (unless your a horse archer) or install a mod like "RTS Camera" to allow you to continue controlling your units or at the very least do all the work yourself via killing the enemy.