This is a detailed, up-to-date and unique faction guide for all players of the newly released Mount And Blade II: Bannerlord. Learn about the concept art and theme music for the major factions, their troop trees and gameplay style, and the overall spirit they embody. In short – find out which Mount And Blade II: Bannerlord faction suits you! (Part 1/2)

Find Part Two here.

Bannerlord’s Surprise Release

With all the depressing and stressful coronavirus news we’ve been enduring over the past few weeks, the unexpected announcement of Mount and Blade II: Bannerlord’s imminent release was a welcome respite. Addressing the virus explicitly in their blog post on March 27th, TaleWorlds delivered the welcomed news that their sequel to Mount and Blade, eight years in the making, would have an early access release just three days later on March 30th. It probably goes without saying that with so many folks self-isolating, quarantining and locking down at home, Bannerlord rapidly turned into Steam’s biggest release of the year so far. Even now, weeks later, the game is still peaking at around 200,000 concurrent players, easily making it into Steam’s top ten played games, and even into the top five. Given the game’s current popularity, you are likely already playing it – or are not far away from getting the game! Our advice is to not miss out on this hot new release and to simply dive in. You won’t be disappointed. Just listen to the theme music for God’s sake!

Faction Guide – Which Faction Should You Play?

With any launch this popular, there will be loads of players asking themselves which of the game’s six major factions is the best fit for them. For this reason you’ll find hundreds if not thousands of guides and posts of advice seeking to answer this question across the internet. Yet with a launch as unexpectedly hurried from announcement to release as this one – a large number of these are unfortunately just recycled lists of attribute bonuses and generic descriptions from the game itself. This guide is different – it will share concept art and theme music for the major factions, summarize their troop trees and describe the gameplay style and spirit that each embodies.

Before starting it’s important to flag one very important thing – regardless of which faction you choose as your character’s origin, you will be able to join any faction in Calradia, equip any faction’s armour and weapons, and will be able to recruit any faction’s troops. That’s why this guide is focused on finding the faction that best captures the feeling you’ll be looking for in the game – what will the backbone of your army look like, what will your local terrain and settlements be and what will you be doing on the battlefield? With that said – let’s dive straight into the alphabetically first of the six major factions – the Aserai of the southern desert.

Aserai – Desert Warriors Of The South

The Aserai (music) inhabit the Nahasa, the Bronze Desert of southern Calradia, traversing its vast sands with cavalry armed with lances or bows and mobile units of light- to medium-armoured archers and infantry. Their regular troops are lightly armed and armoured for the first two tiers before splitting into a few different types. On foot, they have shielded all-round infantry armed with sword and spear, skirmishers eventually training to also use the bow, and heavier Mameluke warriors forgoing shields in favour of wielding progressively larger two-handed axes. While their heavy Mameluke infantry demand respect on the field, their archers will play second fiddle to their mounted alternatives. Their shielded infantry are experts of neither spear nor sword yet are proficient with both. Coupled with their lighter armour than their alternatives among other factions, this means that they are unlikely to sustain the cavalry charges that the spear or pike formations of other factions.

The punch of the Aserai army comes from its horse archers and noble cavalry. Highly mobile Mameluke cavalry provide mobile bow support while their mounted melee cavalry culminate in their Vanguard Faris units armed with lance and shield as well as a pack of javelins. Like the maximally trained two-handed axe wielding infantry (the Mameluke Palace Guard) these troops are more heavily armoured than typical Aserai warriors and will project great force onto the battlefield. Nearby minor factions of Aserai culture include the Jawwal, Beni Zilal and Ghilman, all of which provide cavalry melee and archer options for Aserai warlords recruiting in the deserts of the south.

Mobile Mixed Arms

Should you choose Aserai origin as the backstory for your character you will receive bonuses to forming caravans and trading, benefiting a mercantile play style. However, as mentioned above, picking a different origin than your ultimate home for your character works just as well. For the Aserai two alternatives worth considering are Khuzait, which gives your many horsemen a speed bonus on the map, or Vlandian, which provides an XP bonus to your troops to level them up more rapidly – something that will help you progress more quickly away from the lower tiers’ lightly armoured troops to the at least medium-armoured troops of the higher tiers.

All in all, playing an Aserai commander will challenge you to manage an army heavily relying on mobility and speed. Your infantry will likely be faster than opponents you face, allowing you to deploy and redeploy them on the fly. Using your horse archers to harass and provide cover for such maneuvers and your heavier lanced cavalry to repeatedly charge, retreat, regroup and strike again, you will achieve endless victories for your new home faction in the South. An Aserai commander therefore benefits from high mobility in order to efficiently command their troops across complex battlefields, which makes mounted gameplay all but required. Providing cover together with your horse archers, or forming part of the devastating charges of your lances are both viable and extremely fun options. If this style of gameplay and kind of army sounds appealing, then the Aserai are right for you!

Battania – Stalkers Of The Forests

The Battanians (music) rule the wooded hills of north-western Calradia defending them from all who would dare invade. The Battanians are an exceptional faction in Bannerlord in that their nobles are the only ones to fight exclusively on foot, choosing to focus on archery over horsemanship. This makes their archers essentially the best in all of the game, especially as Battanian nobles’ other penchant is for two-handed swords, meaning they’ll hold their own better than other missile troops in close quarters. Indeed their archers troop tree culminating in the apex Fian Champion are the emblematic unit of Battania and their armies rely heavily on them as their ranged options are paradoxically limited elsewhere.

Indeed their armies field no horse archers or crossbowmen, instead opting for skirmishers who volley javelins before closing to melee with sword and shield. Their other infantry are all melee-focused and consist chiefly of heavy troops carrying two-handed falx swords and shielded spear infantry. Skirmishers, Falxmen and Spearmen alike can best be described as medium-armoured but make up for this with high mobility. The only cavalry available to Battanian warbands are their light horse mounted skirmishers and medium scouts and horsemen. In other words an army of Battanians will rely more heavily on infantry than other more cavalry-heavy factions, perhaps owing to their densely forested homelands. The nearby minor Wolfskin clan, a relic of the wilder side of Battanian culture, offer the potential for recruiting a lightly armoured archer/melee hybrid infantry.

Fielding Fians For Victory

While Battania’s shielded spearmen can form a shieldwall and repel cavalry, their main offensive damage-dealing infantry, the heavy Falxmen, are highly vulnerable to enemy archers given their lack of shield and moderate armour. For this reason Battanian commanders will need to make clever use of their shielded spears as well as their shielded skirmishers to provide cover for their heavy infantry and unleash them when the time is right, keeping them safely behind shieldwalls until then. The light and medium cavalry of Battania should not be relied on to hold their own in glorious charges in the manner of the other factions, but rather should be used to harass enemy archers and light infantry, avoiding being drawn into combat with heavier cavalry or pikes and spears as they will quickly break against such units.

The key to Battanian victory are their brilliant noble archers; the Fians. Even a small unit of these troops are lethal to all enemies, but in particular unshielded troops. Keeping these excellent archers safely on high ground, yet committing them to melee should the opportunity arise, provides the strongest likelihood of success. For this reason, and due to the limited cavaly component of Battanian armies, their commanders will benefit from fighting on foot alongside their Fians. Fighting with bow and arrow from the high ground together with their archers provides the overview of the battlefield and line of sight needed to command the infantry-focused armies of Battania.

Choosing Battanian as the origin culture for your character provides a boost to your speed in forests, which will greatly benefit you fighting near your homelands but will be of less value striking out into less densely forested areas of the map. A Vlandian backstory for your character provides an XP bonus for your troops, which synergises very well with Battanian armies that need to quickly build a core of Fians to carry them to victory. Do you like the sound of commanding your army from forested hills while raining death upon your enemies together with your awesome archers? How does finally skidding down snowy or mossy slopes charging into combat alongside them sound? If it sounds like fun then Battania is definitely the faction for you!

Calradic Empire – Splintered And Surrounded

The Empire (music) covers most of the central area of Calradia but as the game begins it has just fractured into three parts – the Northern, Southern and Western Empires – which together are surrounded on all sides by other factions. However, all three of these nascent Empires field the same Imperial troops – probably the most well-rounded roster of all the factions in the game. Recruits begin, as other factions’, as highly vulnerable essentially unarmoured men with swords, but immediately upon their first promotion begin a path of specialization towards melee or missile combat. Compared to other factions, there is little hybridization or experimentation with troop roles in an Imperial army and consequently their functions and roles are easily understood.

Imperial, alongside Sturgian, recruits destined for a melee infantry role are the only levy in the game who are given a shield on their first promotion. While they will still not command much respect on the battlefield, this does a lot for their survivability and ensures that their early troops are less vulnerable to enemy missiles than other factions’. Imperial melee infantrymen then progress through the tiers before specializing as either Menavliatons, anti-cavalry troops wielding huge two-handed polearms, or Legionaries, highly skilled sword infantry. Both Menavliatons and Legionaries are heavily armoured although only Legionaries bear shields.

In terms of ranged units, Imperial missile units train to serve as either crossbowmen or archers, the latter of which can ultimately be promoted to heavily armoured horse archers. Complementing these horse archers in the mounted component of an Imperial army are its medium and heavy cavalry. Imperial nobles initially serve as recruits on foot but are quickly promoted to serve as medium cavalry before ultimately serving as the heavily armoured Cataphracts and Elite Cataphracts. These ultra-heavy cavalry are excellent shock units capable of charging into essentially any foe, although like any mounted unit should be cautious around spears and pikes. The five nearby minor factions offer various alternatives to infantry, archer and medium cavalry, but these are highly optional given the broad coverage of the Imperial troop variety overall. The notable exception is The Legion of the Betrayed, who afford Imperial commanders locally recruitable troops that can train into their shielded spearmen – an otherwise lacking option.

Methodical Unrelentless Advance

One of the major challenges to an Imperial commander is making the best use out of their Menavliatons. While heavily armoured, these anti-cavalry phalanx troops carry no shield and so are vulnerable to missile fire. For this reason they need to be used with care offensively and positioned behind advancing legionaries. Alternatively, they are highly suited for defensive use providing protection from flanking cavalry for Imperial Archers and Crossbowmen, who will need some form of protection as their melee skills are limited. Imperial horse archers are heavily armoured, which means they will outlast mounted skirmishers of other factions and stand up better than most against their Khuzait counterparts.

Cataphracts are the iconic Imperial unit – a feared unit on any battlefield – they excel at smashing into enemy formations splintering them and breaking their morale. Their heavy armour and barding render them an almost unstoppable force on the field besting essentially every other melee cavalry in the game. Cataphract charges followed up with formations of Legionary infantry will devastate an enemy army. An Imperial commander relying on these expensive but immensely powerful troops should consider mounting up themselves and leading the charge. Alternatively, more defensive or infantry-focused Imperial commanders will find suitable positioning on foot in the shieldwall of their Legionaries, pike readied in the phalanx of the Menavliatons or even positioned among their missile troops commanding from the rear. Given the heavy armour of many of the top tier Imperial troops, your army is likely to be less mobile on the battlefield and so careful positioning and prudent maneuvering will be major tactical focuses. Slow troop speeds and maneuvering mean you’ll need to carefully arrange your army before setting into motion your grinding unstoppable assault.

An Imperial origin story for your character provides bonuses to construction work in towns, repairing walls and building siege engines – these are useful bonuses for all warlords’ broader strategic aims. Useful alternative backstories may be Vlandian, providing the ever-handy XP boost to troops, or Aserai, which will provide bonuses to your caravans and trading – likely needed to help finance the expensive Cataphracts spearheading your army to victory. If a robust army of heavily armoured infantry and cavalry is appealing to you, then one of the Empires is surely a suitable faction for you. You’ll find yourself methodically advancing with ruthless precision, repelling enemy cavalry charges with phalanxes of spear before winning the battle with a triumphant charge of your own super-heavy Cataphracts and Legionaries!

Read about Khuzait, Sturgians and Vlandians in Part Two of our Mount and Blade II: Bannerlord Faction Guide.