3:30 The scatter formation isn't bugged, it is meant for sieges. Tell your archers to scatter on the battlements an they'll go find proper cover and angles to fire from.
I thought it was bugged too.. Having a command that's completely useless in most battles confusing players isn't a good design choice! Should only show up in sieges, or be renamed to "battlements" or something.
I was testing similar things some time ago with legionaries and menavliatons and my conclusions were that that peppering menavliatons throughout your lines makes your lines a bit more harder to handle for the enemy cavalry. Menavliatons also work good in a loose archer formation when defending against cavalry. Just assign combined infantry/archer group with polearm preference with 10-20% infantry and they'll mix in randomly with your archers.
That's a great point! I used to love putting my companions with the archers and a nasty looking polearm, but they did away with that option lol hopefully the next patch makes it a bit easier to put units where we want them.
Yeah Sturgia probably has probably the weakest troop tree right now, but Vlandian is a close second to last. Their bannerknights are squishy (thanks to the very low leg armor + king of low arm armor), the sergeants are the second weakest shield infantry, their crossbowmen have very very limited amunitions, their vanguard aren't really good and are redundant with their noble line (good for AI that just massive recruit without looking especially for noble units, so they can have more cav than usual). In the end their only "dominating" units are the voulgiers who are probably one of the deadliests shock infantry + one of the best at dealing with cavalry. So kind of a pretty weak roster overall, especially compared to Empire or Battania.
Funny enough in the last version sturgian axeman usually have more kills than an imperial legio. So it's mostly archers and spearman being completely useless. And complete lack of horse archers i guess.
@@Strat-Guides I myself have run with lots of QoL mods and I took some inspiration from a mod that gave all T5/T6 troops a focused stat at 160, so they'd all have their own strengths, and Sturgia was still feeble. I spent a lot of time playing with various combinations and I really don't get 'why' some troops perform so much better. It's not entirely up to their skill numbers. Their weapons play a much more significant role, but again, it's really, really hard to narrow down the exact 'why' of it. Bear in mind I was running with very high stats and all the good perks. Vlandian Pikemen just suck. To be honest, I don't get much use out of Voulgiers -- I'd rather take Aserai Palace Guard, Legionaries or Menavlions. And I was using a mod that helps Polearms/Spears not get stuck all the time. Sturgians don't match up to anyone. They have heavier armor and that's about it. Imperial Legionaries will scythe through any army configuration in the game. Especially when backed up by Elite Menavlions, who are also mighty on their own. Consider that's a Sturgian Heroic Linebreaker (pretty sure it's not a Battanian unit) and he is terrible. Meanwhile, the Aserai have the Palace Guard who fulfills a similar role, and he's using the best axe in the game. Maybe if Skirmishing is ever refined to such a point that it becomes a legit, meaningful battle strategy Sturgia would be good? But I've sure as hell never seen Skirmishing be pulled off satisfactorily in any game, even the Total War series.
Huh. I've never even considered using Skein formation, and I was surprised at how much more effective the Advance command was for the initial Cav charge.
I'm going to be trying out a bunch of different combinations for unit vs unit battles to see which formation is good for which matchup. I did some prelim testing already and I have some interesting results so far! I don't want to give away too much, but one that really surprised me was that square formation in head to head matchup (same unit count and same quantity of units) they traded just about even most of the time. I thought square was good at surviving but not so good at dishing back damage but it seems that's not the case at all! I'll have to test it more to confirm but I thought it was cool. Yeah advance command is soooo good for cavalry and even infantry a lot of the times. It's so easy to units to get ahead by themselves and get crushed.
reading through these comments, i am reminded of the 'floris' mod and the tactics sub-mod in it, where you could instruct troops on what weapons to use. you could specifically say "use blunt weapons" or "use shields", having some way of ordering a change in preference like that could be useful for pikes/spears in switching from anti-cav to melee after the initial impact
That would be incredibly useful. Not just for cavalry, but I suspect other situations too like really dense fighting would benefit from using javelins as melee (to avoid hitting neighbors with swing attacks).
You can also look for the weapon that was drawn first. This changes depending on the type of opponent. Unfortunately also with each unit at a different time. that's why the Vlandian Sergeant can't compete against Cavalry at the moment - they switch to the spear too late! I noticed that the Khuzait Darkhan is the only unit in the shield wall that raises their spear over their head to thrust.
That's a great point, there is always a lag for the AI to process what to do. I notice they do that with throwing weapons too. They will cycle between their melee weapon and pulling out the throwing axe or javelin and half the time not have time to use either effectively lol. Interesting, I'll make a note of that for when we get to the Khuzait unit testing! Thank you for letting me know!
And there goes my idea of using Macedonian tactics I have the feeling though that horses are far too eager to charge into pointy sticks. The main benefit of a pike square is that it can basically stop a cavalry unit from ever connecting because the mounts would shy away from moving themselves onto the defender's weapons
Yeah they need a much longer pike :( That's a good point, although Bannerlord is notorious for horses smashing into trees, rocks, running off cliffs, etc. so I'm not sure they could program them to avoid pikes who's brace state changes through the battle. It would be good though!
The absolute best terrain for archers is if you can achieve an Amphitheatre effect, where your archers are positioned on an incline and their targets are approaching them from the leveled-off area not sharing the incline with your archers, or your archers are on the leveled-off area and the enemy are coming down the incline. Or two inclines are facing each other creating a small valley between them. This opens up the most area for your archers to get clear lines of fire on their targets so you can get a whole formation volleying. Not always achievable but always worth exploiting when you come across terrain that plays along with you this well.
That's a good point, it would present the largest area to shoot at rather than a cross section of the formation or a front/side face. I had not considered that!
Hi Strat! Just wanted to thank you for your incredible work. I liked, subscribed, and have just joined - the first time I have ever joined any RU-vid content. Bannerlord is certainly, if not THE most incredible game I have ever played, in the top 3 lifetime for me. Funny, first time I played it, my reaction was "meh" - and after just a few hours in game, I put it away, for months. Reasons? I think because I encountered some of the unfinished parts, the parts that need polishing, a few bugs etc., and most importantly encountered what were for me a lot of non-intuitive functions, things like undecipherable perk descriptions, etc. It was like being a person going from looking at a fishing pond, seeing the ocean for the first time, and thinking it was just a bigger pond lol, not perceiving the depth under the surface. Yes, there is still a lot to fix - but - it's an unfinished work of absolute genius imho. A couple months ago, I picked it back up again randomly out of my Steam cellar, and by chance came across your RU-vid. Your guides, particularly the Quick Guides, Perk Guides, etc. have *clarified* and *transformed* the game for me. I consider your guides to be *indispensable* to my understanding and enjoyment of the game. I think Taleworlds could be missing out on sales of the game because there is so much depth there that is not clearly explained by them to users such as myself. I think they should purchase your videos from you to help them showcase the game, and hire you to help them polish and perfect it! Thank you again for your work to bring this to us!!!!
Wow, thank you so much for the support! It's always great to hear the hard work is helping others out :D I know exactly what you mean, when I picked up Bannerlord I was in an EU4 phase, so I played it for a week or so and then went back to staring at maps lol. It always irked me when I picked perks and planned things out, only to find they weren't even working. I agree with you, it's not the first to do a lot of what they do, but it's the first where they combine all of these elements into a single game AND add enough depth where it's still fun starting up a new campaign after a few thousand hours! It's funny you mention it, because I've asked if they wanted to collaborate on a beginner's guide before they hit full release. I didn't ask for anything other than promoting the video when it's done - no sponsorship contract, no free stuff, literally just push the video to new people who buy the game. They said "We don't have anyone able to facilitate that at the moment." which is corporate for "$%@# off" lol! Oh well, I tried :) Anyhow I'll keep up the hard work and pushing guides out until everything is covered!
I think that for the Vlandian Pikes, you should go by the rule "Less Is More". They seem like a super-specialized unit so you really only want them capitalizing on it 100% of the time. I'd suggest just keeping a small number of them in your army. Just enough to make a single-row line formation wide enough to cover your other troops. If they can land substantial damage on the charge defense, they're a profitable addition to the army and their further use as sub-optimal sword infantry is just icing on the cake. If they die from the charge or shortly after, it's better that they die than your more valuable troops. If they can't do substantial damage on the initial charge defense then they're just sub-optimal sword infantry and you might as well not have them. So it's better to have less of them than you need.
Good point, I think "sprinkling" a few of them into formations can help against cavalry charges. Maybe they would make good guards for archers? I think the issue with the test I ran is that the AI doesn't have 500 cavalry. That many cav seem to push through any formation just due to the sheer number of horses. When I get to the cavalry testing, I may back that number down to a more realistic number like 100 - 200 or so.
They sound like they'd be good archer guards. I imagine they're cheaper than cav so it'd be less of a loss having them sit around on babysitting duties than cav. Yeah that's always the issue with dry tests. Things don't always line up 'live' cases. That's why I prefer studying and experimenting while on campaign, but even still there's plenty of issues with that. Your control over the scenario is very limited, it can take a LOT of time to reach satisfactory conclusions, and sometimes the conditions you're trying to test are just far too rare or expensive in one way or another. I tried experimenting with War Dogs in Rome2 Total War because of how odd a unit they are. In dry tests they were fantastic, but it was just a nightmare trying to get any useful data from live experimentation.
@@FiltyIncognito Yeah that's exactly why I wanted to start like this, in a controlled environment. We will slowly add more and more to the mixed testing and eventually get to the full scale battles :D Lol the war dogs! I remember trying to make them work too :)
Yeah, that's Khalid ibn Al Waleed! I've only recently discovered his story in the last year or so and I'm fascinated by him. Given that he was such a dominant commander and tactician, I figured he should have some of the spotlight :D
@@Strat-Guides I am very proud because some of the history of Islam has reached you and another fact that he was never defeated in his life, even when he clashed with the Prophet Muhammad, may God bless him and grant him peace in the Battle of Uhud, and 72 Muslims were martyred, and the non-Muslim Arab alliance lost only 23 and This is due to the intelligence and cunning of Khaled Ibn Walid and the disobedience of some Muslim soldiers to Muhammad after he became muslim he swear to spened his entire life in the server of islamic message . he entred many battles ageinst the romans and sassanids the two powerfull faction and deafeat them in too many battles and named "سيف الله مسلول" or in english sword of allah the drawn he want to die in battle but he die with justinian plague and some books say about him There is not a single inch in his body that does not contain a hit, a stab, or arrwo wounds...
I think 'Scatter' formation only works on maps with 'objects' that archers go to, like manlets and firing positions. Archers on siege maps default to 'scatter' formation and you have to remove them from it to position them anywhere other than along the wall or behind the barriers.
Okay got it, that makes a lot of sense. I know i've used it before, but didn't realize that's what it was for. Thank you! I'll be sure to include this when we get to the siege combat episodes.
one thing to add: hold fire on inf helps a lot vers cav charges. and realy 2 handed agenst cav is quite strong, I tryed 500 batania volunteers vers 500 bannerknights and volenteers in square won. thx fore the nice worke!
I've had some success manually moving cav through enemy formations, not giving any charge/advance commands. Example; Enemy line formation in front of me and my cav, I move command my horses say, 50 yards behind the enemy line. The horses will move towards the enemy, when they get close enough they will prepare an attack, proceed to attack, move past and group up behind. Then i can do it again, but this time moving them back towards me. Through the enemy line again. It has been quite effective. They dont seem to do as much damage as a charge command, but get stuck way less, and so i can get in a lot more charges before having them all die on me.
That's a good point, I forgot to test that! When I get into the unit vs unit testing, I'll be sure to check which gives the best results before making any conclusions. Thank you for letting me know, very helpful!
Paused at 13:36 to suggest (to anyone that cares, lol) separating archers into 2 groups, in loose formation, stacked on the hill. The 3 lines of each group should fire, doubling the force multiplier.
Your vids keep getting better! I'd love to see some breakdowns on small unit composition -- early game build-up and late-game hunter/killer parties. How can we get the best map speed? What's effective against various bandit types? Who should I take into a base assault? How far away do I have to draw an enemy before the 2,000-strong death stack can't reinforce them?
That's a great idea! I think once I get a little further into it, I can maybe do a video specifically for small unit tactics. These are all good questions. I'll do my best to address them in the coming guides :D
3:22 just saw this "column" while playing on PS4. Since it wasn't me who gave the order (I was playing as just another mercenary on the field), I started to wonder how to achieve this "insane X formation" and how effective it would be on the battle. Turns out it's just Mount and Blade being Mount and Blade
The issue with pikes is that cavalry are beasts in this game compared to real horses. Square formations were effective against cavalry because horses have self preservation, and can’t tank several shots to the body. If they see a line of soldiers facing them down with spears they straight up wouldn’t charge into them head on. Not only do bannerlord horses not care, so the pikemen couch one horse, then the ones behind go through. The pikemen really need to allow the guys in back to attack too
Informative vid as always Strat! I'm floored about square formation & pikes, I'm glad I never went down that path even though I wanted to try a pike block... btw If you havent tested macro-managing cav while you advance the rest of your troops, it can be very effective. First, have them formed either in line or skein on the flank(s), then command your melee cav to move to a position through the enemy line (like 30-50m on the other side) and will temporarily open infantry to missile fire, assist your footmen pitted in combat, or completely wreck archers. Once they are past, either move through their line again or draw them back towards your flank and move through again from the front. If it were viewed from above, it would result in a figure 8 like movement that occasionally retraces given the situation and terrain
Thank you for watching! Yeah I was pretty disappointed by that test. I thought for sure it would at least keep the Cavalry out if nothing else but it was the worst one lol That's a great point, I have not used it as you described but I have sent my cavalry to mop up the enemy cav since they just sit there on both sides of the enemy army lol easy pickings. I'll be sure to test using this method as well, thank you for the heads up!!
@@Strat-Guides Agreed, cav vs cav is usually 1st priority. And I'd say this method works similar to an improved charge command, in that if cav gets stuck or stopped, they'll go directly to the point instead of drawing swords and attempting a melee, so it can help with losses, with management being the drawback
Im your host, Strat, and I appreciate your time... meh meh meh mih mah.. no bra. We appreciate your time. Hours of learning, compiled and sorted.. fkn gg. And the amount of guides and guides and guides. Lol sub'd
crossbows also works in the same fashion like bowmen, better to have them scattered than in a line as crossbows have more range but needs to fire in a more straight forward way.
Yeah! I was hoping someone who can read Arabic would notice :) He was one of the greatest in regards to battlefield tactics so it only made sense to have him open the series for us hehe. Thank you for watching!
15:06 🙈 "to few has come, we can not defeat the armies of Vlandian Pikemen" "no we can not.. but we will meet them in battle none the less" I laughed so much, bittersweet memories 😅😂
What I really wanted fallback for infantry to do is to have their shield forward while backing up. I don't want them to turn their back ever. This would be amazing for pincer movements.
Excellent research as always! Now here's a edge-case question: What determines the AI used for units? Is it the "troop category" (ie. what the icon shows in your troop list)? This seems like the most obvious way that it would be coded - but that presents another problem. What happens when for example a mounted melee unit dismount? Does that change the class to "melee infantry" all of a sudden? If so, then the "type" of a troop and it's AI might actually be decided by it's equipment (ie. is it mounted, yes/no and does it have a ranged weapon yes/no). Does an "archer" without any ammo left act like "melee infantry"? These are the weird things I can't help myself from questioning :P In the base game units usually fit an archetype, but especially if you use a custom troops mod (really fun for us control freaks) these questions suddenly become very relevant. What class would a shield infantry unit that rides a horse for map-travel mobility but dismounts at the start of combat be? Questions questions... I have half a mind to see if it possible to dig into some of the code for this and see how perks for example really distinguishes between troop types - as the wording is often a little vague and ambigous.
Well you stumped me as I didn't test any of those scenarios :P I do plan on running some tests with dismounted cavalry for a variety of reasons, so I'll be sure make a note of it :) It's an interesting question because when I start using mods this will be relevant! I would like to use the mods that allow you to customize troop stats, equipment, etc.
@@Strat-Guides There is already a quite good one with "custom troop". Very customizable and lots of options that let you integrate it into your game in a way that feels fair to you personal taste. The extra recommended mods even let you make your kingdom culture custom, and slowly convert settlements into your culture. Everything is highly adjustable and you can tell there has a lot of effort into providing options that feel balanced. Highly recommended to check out. Also probably a good angle for a playthrough series later down the road :)
Yeah a problem I see in bannerlord is that a horse doesnt trip on the dead horse infront of them or at the very least rear like if hitting a tree. The real threat to horses is their own weight not only impaling into pikes, but breaking legs on anything heavy enough to not yield (like the body of a dead horse). In real life having a horse charge over the mound of flesh that is a dead horse is a tall order. But in bannerlord dead bodies lose all their colliders. Another issue is the way the infantry staggers. They instantly lose the brace the second something pushes them. So being slightly push by the mass of horses collapses the entire brace because the infantry along the cav push each other out of place. Could also help if spear actually worked better in melee. The whole spacing thing just makes them useless against a horse that will push into them almost instantly and out of the sweatspot.
That's a very interesting point that I have never considered! I guess it's not surprising as I have no experience in riding a horse IRL lol Yeah I really hope they add something that keeps pikemen a bit more grounded. The square formation was a perfect example as the whole mass was moved back several meters within a few seconds. I'm pretty sure people would just fall over at that point haha.
alright i didnt know what delegate command meant i will try around what i like to use it for if its not horribly stupid i might exchange my F1 F3 on main force clash for it, at least a part of my army, maybe the archers like, infantry charges archers do their thing and cavalry follows me, will see if it has a place in my playstyle most in this video only reassured my expectations and what ive learned from your other videos the thing at the end about "so much for fancy formations" i believe that battle morale has alot of impact if a big chunk of a formation gets slaughtered that formation quickly loses morale multiple small formations have members fleeing more easily and boiii in the end using the terrain is way too valuable for my liking yesterday i was in a battle and was able to start on a hill behind a river they had no chance to get close to my archers, their cavalry was slugging sadly i was outnumbered by something like 10 to 1 so i was only fighting this one for fun and science
Currently the pikemen are using an abnormally short pike which I think was supposed to give them a chance in melee a while back. Would love to see what happens when they are better equipped.
Not only that but also the way horses work in the game and the AI hyper-aggressive nature means that pike blocks are much less likely to work. Horses can just keep advancing and pushing infantry out of the way even after getting stopped. Also, horses don't get hurt from running into each other, nor does the rider runs the chance of getting unhorsed. Which makes those kinds of reckless charges impossible to stop. But then again it also balances out the fact that infantry can just stand there and tank a cavalry charge without wavering.
Very good point about the weapon length as I think it really holds them back from being effective. Also a good point about cavalry in the game. I remember hearing over and over from documentaries that most horses would not charge into a wall of pikes so it offered not only a deadly threat, but a significant deterrent for most horses without even touching them.
@@penoiseinnadota7353 I've only run into 2 or 3 that I can remember and they were not very persistent lol A little bit of self deprecating humor and they were back to normal people a few comments later :P
So in theory, charging cavalry into melee troops with F3 works well, but perhaps using advance is better when you want your cav to kill archers? Since they stay in combat for longer
Cavalry are pretty strong in the last couple of patches and should do well in most situation if you have enough of them. I think against archers it's best to keep them in melee mode with something - infantry or maybe a small group of cav set to advance - and allow the rest to keep cycle charging for big damage.
@@Strat-Guides Tried it yesterday and it seems to work well, but it's microintensive to make sure that they stay on the archers instead of the meleetroops that are typically close by
Yeah for sure! This was just the intro to the series and is the baseline for everything that is to come afterwards :) I just needed to at least start here since I know a lot of people don't know the basics and wanted to get people comfortable with each command/formation and what they do. We are going to test all kinds of crazy ideas!
So this is why horse archer seem so easy. Does the AI in this game actually use charge command on their horse archers? My usual formation is an infantry unit on a shield wall, archer unit a few distance on the back and another infantry unit to protect archers from rear charge, then a cavalry unit to flank. The enemy horse archers seem to get massacred when they circle my formation and charges straight into the 2nd infantry line and getting peppered with arrows. When they are engaged my cavalry from the back charges them and deletes almost the entire squad of HA. Also I never knew infantry units can fire their javelins all at once on loose formation. I always use my 2nd squad of infantry to flank the enemy formation and throw their weapons. It kills efficiently but I wish they could fire more efficiently. Idk why I never thought of using loose formation on infantry units lol. Thanks again for the very detailed video. Knowing how the mechanics work really help creating new battle field tactics specially with the clunky ai behaviour.
Yeah the AI mostly uses charge commands. They seem to charge in and if it's safe they stay in charge. If they run into much resistance, they use retreat/fall back. That's exactly it, they can only circle the "closest" formation but the problem is as they move, the closest will change rapidly and the AI goes into the toilet, then feeds the horses into a shield wall lol. I wasn't aware of the foot javelins either! I'm for sure going to use that in my next play through :D Our javelins will blot out the sun!
please do an episode on AI behavior. When do they advance? When do they hold ground? How to bait archers and clav out from the shield wall to pick apart before digesting the shield wall. Corner camping horse archers and counter rotation charging against horse archers etc.
We will be going into all of that soon! :D Nice bike btw! I had an R6 as my main vehicle for about 5 years and I do miss it (although my wife would kill me if I got another one haha).
I don't know if my favorite part is the Cavalry getting killed by everything or the spear men getting killed by the cavalry. A lot of good troop abuse here!
4:06 I never bothered to check, but does the delegate command order change any in-battle captain perks, or is it static after choosing the captains/commanders in the initial battle set up?
That's a great question, because often times they will rearrange their unit groups once the you do that. I'm not sure! My guess is the perks would still work, but I'm not positive.
Hey man! Love your videos. I’m having issue with my cavalry on battlefield. When I give orders they don’t listen and just scatters everywhere throughout the map. I’m leading the unit. I had my companion leading unit and I thought it was her leadership/tactics. But next battle after I switch to my character who has better ratings in those perks but same results.
Ok so just did some testing and even in custom battle it does same thing. It seems every soldier type is affected and it’s when I choose column formation. They scatter throughout map and don’t respond to my commands after lol
No problem! I have not, but I did recently download it. I will definitely start using mods in the near future, probably once I finish off a few more guides :)
Yeah for sure, it's on my list to tackle this month! I'm really hoping I can get around to it. I was supposed to have it done last month but I had a ton of extra stuff pile on my desk so it didn't work out :(
Yeah for sure! We will be testing all sorts of combinations and also varying the troop count to see where the balancing point is (Like aybe we need 100 pikeman for every 30 imperial elite cataphracts).
yea spear weapons are the worst (unless you got one that allows to swing like the swordstaff, glaive or warrazor) a good formation that i like to use is instead of having one giga line of archers/crossbowman, i make 2 lines (in loose formation) and place them both in diagonal lines on both flank of my shieldwall (kinda like a V shape but with the shieldwall in the middle) with no more then 3 rows of archers so they can all shoot and thanks to the shape of the formation they double has backup for when the enemy infantry wraps around the shieldwall.
@@Strat-Guides no issues there because i order the cav to go past both the enemy shieldwall and archer line (in a skein formation) for good enough distance so that after both shieldwall have engaged each other i send them in. Basically i time it so that when the AI sends it cavalry in i send mine at the same time but from their back so that they hit the archer line first. After that i just sit back and do the cycle charging (if i have nothing to level up)
Would love to see you have some 1v1's against people as a commander. Like they do in Total war. Not even sure if there is a way to do this. Maybe through the multiplayer version?
I think it's possible with the RTS mod! You can have both sides form up, hold fire and have the ai commander move to the middle. Although I'm not sure if you can select them by themselves... Might have to manually move them out? It would be a really cool feature if they added it as I know this was very common practice for a long time!
3:40 Scatter formation seems to me to be just Line formation with less restraints, try getting as many different soldiers/units and charging that 1000 man formation at enemies with Line formation and with Scatter formation and you'll see the most noticeable difference.
So a couple people brought to my attention that scatter only works with archers and on siege maps with things to hide behind. Apparently it makes them seek cover (which is silly because they just stand there a shoot without ducking behind to avoid being shot lol).
@@Strat-Guides I found the greatest difference between Scatter and other formations(Line specifically since it's the closest resembling one) with mixed unit armies and especially when charging over large distances. Ranged units will often fire at the maximum weapon range possible so bow/crossbow shots are like indirect fire from above and can bypass shield wall sometimes as it hits nearly directly from above. I've recently started using the Realistic Battle mod and whatever it does to unit AI makes the Scatter formation even more distinct as units without ranged weapons will sprint at max speed towards enemies ignoring allies or formation setting/layout. TW either needs to add an in-game encyclopedia/guide or rework their formation mechanics. Shield wall for example can totally be a simple setting like Hold-Fire / Fire-At-Will or Mount / Dismount.
Where is the "face enemy" on the new one's though? Am I blind? Also.. Sometimes they space out in 4 lines and sometimes in 2.. when using different formations. Can't wrap my head around what makes the difference.
That's the tricky part with switching between Default and Legacy :( If you're using default view, you can find the face this direction button in two ways: pressing F7 or pressing F3 + F1. Also, activating it once will switch the button from face this direction to face enemy (basically toggling between the two each time you press it). If you're using legacy, then it can only be found using F2 to open the next menu, then F1 for face this direction and F2 for face enemy. I hope that answered it, but if not let me know!
Good idea lol it's a bit of a mess at the moment. The biggest issue is that I think they will be changing it with the next patch, so I would have to redo the video soon when they release the fix. They are supposed to be adding more options for separating troops out. Hopefully that's the next patch and I can do a video on it!
Yikes TW really did pikemens dirty. So how do you get your all archers to shoot? Seemed like no matter the formation you couldn't get all of them to fire. Should you split em into several groups?
I think once they fix the system for separating units out, it will be okay. But having just pikeman, or having pikeman mixed in with other units just doesn't work well. Great question about the archers! I'll be covering it when we do the unit vs unit testing, but the easiest way is to spread them out into a single rank for line formation or 3 ranks deep for loose formation. If you have time to micro, then you can make multiple groups, but be sure to give them space in between each line as they won't shoot unless they have enough room.
Yeah sadly spear brace isn't worth the trouble at the moment. If they could program in a proper phalanx formation it would be really good. Also a proper pike square has other infantry mixed in with it to help defend against anyone who gets past the pikes.
I think the brace mechanic is really good as I've had a lot of success with it on my main character, but for the AI it's pretty rough lol. Good point, I usually use square for my regular shield wall infantry and it seems to do quite well.
@@Strat-Guides imo the amount of preparation you need to make it work, plus the fact you really need other infantry to baby sit pikeman makes them not worth it. Until they do something to prop them up a bit, voulgiers are a better choice for anti cav as they perform much better against infantry as well.
Reasons pikes worked in real life: 1. Horses have survival instincts 2. Horses can't run through or push other horses to the side without (most likely) unhorsing the rider 3. More than 2 ranks of pikes presented in front of the formation 4. Longer pikes (much longer) Reasons pikes don't work in-game: 1. Ai horses don't have survival instincts 2. Weak physics - Ai horses can push other ai horses to the side 3. Only first two ranks present pikes 4. Pikes are too short (way too short) Likely verdict: 1. Ai pike formations will probably never work unless physics engine is adjusted for cavalry 2. Formations adjusted to allow more than two ranks to brace pikes 3. Pikes are increased by .50% or 100%.
I'm sorry if I don't follow the chronology, but in ALL troop tactic videos advance was by far the worst option to pick every single time. How come now it's good for bow cavalry?
@Strat Gaming, great vid as always. I've noticed that the advance command for infantry moving on missile units will allow them to better use their shields while doing so. Did you notice this at all?
I had not noticed that, i'll be sure to point that out when we get to the different unit vs unit part! Thank you for pointing this out :D I think the advance command it very underrated as it's quite important to keep units together. The easiest way to lose a battle is have small chunks of units fighting instead of everyone at once.
@@Strat-Guides agreed sir. MP Captain mode taught me the beauty of advance. Not only a great way to keep infantry focused on attacking units versus chasing single’s troops. But also a skirmish-lite command for missle units.
So, I still could be wrong. But in regard to using shield infantry against range infantry. While under fire Charge lowers their shields to the side but comes with a speed boost versus Advance. Which while moving slower allows better use of shields to soak up incoming missiles than charge seems to.
@@Strat-Guides all good, I meant in line formation. This is just from playing Captain MP and trying to find the best way to engage units while preventing players from cheesing your entire unit away. I am however interested to see if shield charge performs in MP. Given the current meta steers almost completely away from shield in that mode. I've found cycling between the two depending on what fight as well when and where in the fight I find myself.
Do you know if I am a mounted captain leading foottroops, do they still get my perks for foottroops or do I need to be on foot to provide these perks, too? And do I need to be near my formation I start with to provide the perks or just need to assign me to them in the formation phase and can do then whatever I want?
Yeah the perks will still work! It gives you the red warning text when you do that, but you can just ignore it. Sometimes having a companion on horse to lead a group on foot will cause issues with the formations though so be sure to dismount them if that's the case. You don't need to be near them, just be alive lol once you go down the perks stop.
Thanks, that really helps! I usually just end up leaving my army doing horse archery with my current character and was always confused by the red warning.
Could you do a series on viable siege options ? Both offense and defense ?I find I take a lot of casualties that could be avoided if my troops would just do what I see needs to be done but don't know how to macro heh .
Yeah for sure! Once we get through a few more field battle guides we will be covering sieges for a couple videos - maybe one for defense and one for offense.
I did a 1.9 tactics video retesting everything and pikemen are a bit better but still terrible at close quarters melee. Shock troops are actually better now, destroying all infantry and cavalry.
I know what you mean lol it's really finicky to adjust, but if you click and hold, then drag the mouse outward you will see the little flags on the floor indicating how big or small you want the formation to be.
Interesting, I was able to get it to work prebattle, but the staging area can be quite small so a large circle formation won't work. Maybe that's the issue??
Hm... I don't think you can do that actually. You can split them up into different groups, but I don't think Banners of flags on the battlefield are in the game yet. There are mods for that though! Check Nexus mods.
I'm not sure I understand your question, so please feel free to correct me so I can fix my answer lol but you can assign someone to lead a group within an army and they become a captain. If you look at that companion's perks, it will tell you what captain benefits they have for the troops under their lead.
No it will only take them to the edge of the map and get stuck. For default layouts, F1 + F7 is the retreat command. Actually I forgot to cover that! woops. I mean, there is no retreat... Don't be a coward! ;)
Hm... I'm using the RBM version of the RTS camera and it just worked without any extra work. I'm not very experienced with mods, but I'll be happy to help you get it working if I can!
It gives control over that unit to the AI, so they will attack, retreat, flank, etc. without you having to command them. It's not very good most of the time, but can be okay for cav in the early stages of a battle
You have to select the unit, click on the ground where you want the formation to start, hold and drag to where you want the formation to end and that will allow you to change the size. If you want it long and skinny, click and drag a long way. Short and square, drag it only a little ways
I usually use the charge command for them to circle, advance typically engages and then tries to retreat to maintain distance. Advance should never be used in direct conflict though (I've yet to see a single instance of it being good out of thousands of trials now lol)
This was the first video of a series on tactics and I thought it was fitting to have one of the world's most brilliant tacticians be on the thumbnail :)
Lol yeah pretty much - I have an African Grey parrot with me in my office. I only had enough time to do the recording once before the kids woke up (which is 10x worse lol). In a couple months I'll be moving and will have a dedicated studio set up for recording/streaming which will be away from the kids and the bird, so this shouldn't be an issue for much longer. Sorry about that!
@@sethmiller2532 I know this is a year late, and probably a really obvious answer. But consoles support keyboard and mouse (I don’t know if bannerlord console does though)
@@samolson9640 The problem with this is that, when using console, the keyboard and mouse option is very clunky and pretty much defeats the purpose of using a controller. I do appreciate the suggestion, though. I just can't (reasonably) follow it because my console is in an entertainment center, rather than at a desk, so there's no real place to have a keyboard or mouse that wouldn't need to be constantly moved elsewhere when not in use.
Been watching your vids for a few months. Taleworlds should really have you as a community member to upload tutorial videos and guides since you go into far more detail than you would expect. Every view and subscriber you have is well earned Btw, how do you change the depth of skein and circle formation?
Thank you! They might ask me to redact all the references to TW Maths though, which ain't gonna happen :D It's all in good fun, I don't mean anything malicious by it anyhow. They have a solid game here :) I appreciate the kind words! So you can change the size of any formation (other than square, that one is fixed) by selecting the unit, click and hold left mouse on the floor where you want the formation to start, then drag the mouse out depending on how wide or compact you want it to be. This is significantly easier to do on horseback since you get to see better and you can move faster to drag the line out.
Three stand out strats from this video that I can't wait to use. 7:50 - Using the advance command for counter cavalry charges means its less likely that my cav ends up scattered half way across the map in the enemy's shield wall -_- 11:30 - Loose formation on my infantry javelins to straight up delete an enemy's archery line or cavalry charge, also possibly building a throwables commander to strip enemy shields with javs. 12:30 - Deploying archers at a maximum of 3 rows deep great guide
Thank you for watching! I'm glad to see the video helped with brainstorming some new ideas :) I tend to get stuck in a pattern of doing the same thing in each battle, so this type of testing is good for me to get outside of my comfort zone as well.
@@Strat-Guides I was goofing around with the custom troop tree mod and gave my infantry 1023 throwing and they were hitting the enemy from the start like they were right in front of them
In each scenario, can you show us what the unit would normally do if we put them on "delegate command", and see what performs better to see if it's worth micro-managing the unit or not? That would help a lot.
That's interesting, I had not considered that! It would also be good to know if they act differently depending on what other units are in our army and again based on the enemy army etc. I'm not sure if they would do the same thing against cav heavy or archer heavy, etc.
@@Strat-Guides Might be a good video idea. Try to use the best micro-managing tactics you can for each unit type, and then do the same test for each unit with "delegate command" and see what performs better.
Just thought I'd toss in that I agree with this - the difference between microing and delegating is important. In the same way we'd want to assess how competent our junior officers would be in an army it's important to understand the strengths and weaknesses of an AI. Getting a sense of the cost-benefit ratio where our attention is the cost and benefit is improved performance vs delegation would give a good sense of which formations offer the best return on our attention investment.
Great video! It confirmed my practice of always using “Advance” for foot and horse archers, as well as my preference for *never* using Vlandian pikemen! When playing as Battania, I tend not to use their cav at all, but it’s good to learn how to use them better.
Nice, gotta love it when that happens :) I had that happen to me this week when I was just thinking I wish I knew more about Cossacks - then bam, 2 new Cossacks videos pop up from my favorite history channels!
First episode is out! There were a few surprises here for me, even after 2500+ hours into the game. The rest of the series will be focused on unit vs unit testing, army composition testing, unique tactics (similar to the column formation for cav archers, but even crazier), siege offense and defense tactics and much more. What are you looking forward to see the most next?
I really enjoy your work. You put alot of quality in your video with actually facts from hours of testing. Ey could it be possible when you have time to add your favo top 10 troops ( I know there are some videos from othe youtubers but personaly if it comes from you with all the details like "why", "how", "when" to get them..etc also if possible more crafting weapon videos I dont know about other people but I had alot of fun testing your crafting guides.. if its possible and you know a place where to find more recepies/ designs ... could you lead me to it? anyway thank you for your time of reading this message and have a wonderful day
@@-x-9909 Thank you so much! I appreciate the support :) So I'm not sure about a top 10 video just yet, but I will be testing each of the units out as well as testing army composition based on cultural units and maybe one near the end for "min/max" army comp using any unit in the game. I think between those videos, we should have all those questions covered. The problem with a lot of the unit testing from other RU-vidrs is they are very limited in scope. It's still helpful to some degree, but testing "in a vacuum" doesn't really make a lot of sense when you wouldn't fight in battle like that. I think it's good to do the individual testing, but then also include how they fit into an army. For example, maybe the crossbow is really good in a 1v1 against the archer, but how do they fare in a 1000 unit mixed army? Maybe one is better for shooting at moving cavalry than the other? There are so many things to test, but it should be good fun at least. I saw your other comment and replied to it regarding the crafting :) I will probably make another video soon about it since everyone loves to watch those type of videos!
@@-x-9909 I also would be very interested to see some sort of tier list or favorite troops individually, or favorite army compositions. And I'm always down to see more fun crafted weapons to try out on the battlefield.
@@Strat-Guides Thank you so much, to be honest I didnt expect a direct answer. Since you content creators are mostly busy so I understand. But you are completely right. So far past days I only have seen your perk and strategic guides but this weekend I am looking forward to see your gaming episodes. Anyway have a lovely day
Only the first and second line of pikes will brace. The third line and each line after that will not brace. Longer spears are best for bracing and to be honest, the Vlandian Pikeman needs a longer spear (there is one in the game), along with a better sword IMO. They could also use an armor upgrade too. Otherwise, Vlandian Voulgiers and especially Battanian Falxman work better. As far as archers, the most effective way to use them is a long thin line (usually single line) in loose formation. Do not face enemy. Mr Chicken did some really extensive testing: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-SHpBGfyp6lo.html For those who use Realistic Battle AI (great mod by the way), everything changes. To be honest, I think Taleworlds needs to change the square formation - all lines of pikes should brace.
Thank you for watching! I really hope they adjust pikes because they need some help big time. I'm going to be doing more unit vs unit testing but for the most part I agree with his results. Yeah I'm really excited to try that mod out! I have it downloaded, but waiting to do testing on it until after we finish this series :D
Got it, I'm making notes of that and will be sure to test it in that setting. We will eventually get to siege warfare testing so this will come in handy. Thank you!
F1 + F4 is invaluable for cavalry, especially melee cavalry when you need them to tie-down/engage other cavalry formations. Discovering that on my own was like breaking the German enigma. Spears/pikes are mostly useless, except on horses. The only real benefit to footman w/ spears is that they stop cavalry, allowing other Melee Infantry to actually take them down. So they are best used when mixed in with other melee troops. Though I'm of the opinion two-handed shock troops are better anti-cavalry overall. Spearmen might be better if unit collision is ever addressed. The way infantry blobs and goes into "bee-hive mode" not only looks bad, but basically reduces the game to overwhelming your enemy with numbers. It's why Sun Tzu's F1 + F3 is almost always effective. It never ceases to amaze me how effective charging footman and archers together is. You'd think keep archers out of melee, would be important. Maybe if armor becomes more substantial there will be some actual need for tactics in this game, but I fear it's too late in development to address that. Only real tactics currently is maximizing the use of your ranged troops.
Very true. I also like to use it when I sneak behind their main lines and pick off archers. They can usually stand and trade with those type of units, assuming it's not fians lol The funny thing is, shields will absorb the charge damage almost 100% of the time and there are some great shield infantry that can take cavalry down so It's hard to justify the pikeman's existence in Bannerlord. Haha Sun Tzu wins again :P It's a great point and is exactly why fighting anything more than 2 people at once is nearly impossible without running away and picking at them. They can have 3 people swinging at you from inside each other practically lol
same i noticed that having medium quality troops in tons beats a small elite army cuz when few tier 3 footmen circle a tier 5 guy yeah he goes down after few hits. I disagree that Spearmen arent usefull. I mean its a infatry unit that has a spear so they can fight in QCC and also stop cav units generaly providing more utility than a simple swordsmen. For me the spearmen unit is that sweet spot cuz they have the shield for range protection , swords/axes for close combat and spears to either brace if that unit can or just poke at cav units and make them stop moving and be ganged up . My use of two handers shock troops is to be a seperate group that i keep behind or on the side of my main line and use them to hit the enemy main line on the flanks cuz that way they have more space to swing those weapons and basicly hit the enemy in the backs and not be blocked by shields. Or use them as bodyguards for archers but idk how a stacked unit of two handers will handle a cav charge cuz most of the troops wont be able to swing unless idk u have them in loose formation.
I'd like to see how thrusting polearm units perform with (if the engine allows for it) the ability to be able to stab through allies. I think what's stopping them being good is the collision detection mechanics and AI not vibing. If spear units could attack two lines deep and pikemen three they would be a lot more versatile in melee with the ability to be able to sustain a line better but be susceptible to flanking. Having tested pikemen before there's something interesting there but it feels like a wasted unit compared to a standard heavy infantry, skirmish or shock troop.
I think they could make it work. I suspect they do that with cavalry archers since each row can fire and their trajectory is pretty much flat. I feel like having a small detachment of pikes would be okay. Maybe 20 - 30 to cover the initial cavalry charge. But then again you can achieve the same outcome with shield infantry and just let them run into the shields lol
Since we are talking about tactics, i want to share some tactics that i use for my favorite faction in Bannerlord! the Vlandia, and for them i use 40 Sharpshooters, 30 Voulgier and 40 Banner Knights. The tactic is to put the Sharpshootera in the front in line formation, the Banner Knight in the middle in skein formation and the Voulgier behind in shieldwall formation (there is a perk in the polearm poll that increases the polearm skill of the troops in 30 in shieldwall formation). After that, just wait your sharpshooters to deal damage to the enemy lines and use the "move to position" command to make your cavalry pass right through the enemy infantry line (if you make that, the cavalry dont get stuck) after they pass, use charge command with the cavalry and the infantry. I put the Banner Knight in front of the infantry bcz the infantry dont have any shield. If you guys likes it, i have made a tactic for every faction and i would like to share if you guys want to!
This is a very solid strategy! I think a lot of people don't realize how dangerous sharpshooters are. I've ran into trouble before even with fians against sharpshooters since they have the range advantage and bolts hit armor very hard. I plan on doing videos of unit testing by the culture, so this would be perfect as they are released!
@@Strat-Guides The Sharpshooters really are a powerfull unit, and in the right circumstances they are even better then the fian. When i play my battania campaign i put the fian in loose formation and as the enemy unit is advancing towards i use the "move to" command to retread the units and keep doing that till all enemy ranged units are dead. After that i charge with the infantry. This works especially well againt vlandian armies, bcz the sharpshooter need to stop to reload! Keep the amazing work that you bring to this community! Wish you all the best!
I'd be interested to see what "jobs" the infantry are all good at. For example I'm aware that Legionaries are the best shielded infantry against other shielded infantry however, are sergeants better at stopping cavalry due to their braceable spear?
That's exactly why I wanted to do this series :) I was asking myself the exact some questions! Rest assured, we will find all of these answers and more.
from my campaign testing where i used vlandian troops vs Vlandia in a civil war, Sarg's are amazing against cav charges, as are oathsworn or any of those end tier shield infantry with braceable spears. counter charging from my experience after the initial cav impact is the best course of action too, naturally that requires a tad amount of micro but it really isn't bad. on the flipside any top tier unit with a one handed mace does well against other top tiers, legionaires and sarg's have a fairly good spawn rate for maces..... and empire sarge crossbows, whom can beat units like oathsworn and aserai veteren infantry while on hold fire.
