Which Weapons Are Best On Companions? NO MODS - Bannerlord Companion Weapons Testing Guide

in this video we're going to look at over 30 tests using companions with different weapon loadouts to see which to use and which to avoid there's a ton to cover here so let's Dive Right In For the first test we equip everyone with a shield and a tier 6 one-handed sword with 86 cut damage one of the best to keep things even we mimic the AI Behavior match their line width and give the charge command we'll be facing off against the best infantry in the game the Imperial legionary who used a one-handed mace the scrum is fairly even at the start with both sides taking losses but our companions pull ahead and keep a sizeable lead to the end we lose only 10 companions in the end killing all 21 enemies next up we replace the one-handed sword with a one-handed ax with 82 cut damage and repeat the battle it's difficult to see what's actually going on since the battle turns into a mosh pit but it's clear the axes are holding it better than the one-handed sword in the end only 7 companions were lost and since we're fighting against heavy armor we swap out for a one-handed mace with 71 blunt damage immediately we see a huge difference it's mostly Green in the kill feed and the enemy gets stomped in under a minute we lose only four companions this time getting even better results and now for the grand disappointment one-handed Spears this one does 37 Pierce damage and has 216 lengths so it's quite good unfortunately we see massive problems our companions cannot land solid hits on the enemy because they are aggressively closing the distance and our pull arms are too long to use at that range even when they do land hits they mostly bounce off like nothing happened we managed a single kill but lose all 21 companions before we move on to two-handed weapons let's do a quick recap of this section clearly pole arms should be avoided at all costs when going up against High skill well-armored opponents on foot any of the other one-handed options can work but the one-handed mace produces the best results let's try the pull arm again but drop the shield and pick up more damage 42 Pierce in this case with 299 length since the enemy was a aggressively pushing last time we give the fallback command in hopes of getting hits while slowly pulling back it works for a couple seconds but then they get overwhelmed we don't even manage a single kill this time for the next test I picked a two-handed sword that has comparable damage to the Falks and only gives up the shield bonus damage which is really a factor for the AI our companions get off to a great start and don't have any issues by passing the enemy Shield they push hard and overwhelm the legionary losing only three by the end now let's try one of my favorite two-handed axes 138 cut damage with 121 length these things are beasts on the field even able to One Tap a legionary right from the start the increased length allows them to manage distance well and the battle ends with only a single companion lost I wasn't able to get my smithing mod working so I found a two-handed build hook that has comparable stats to the top tier crafted two-handed mace this one does 95 blunt damage with 138 length the enemy gets a lucky hit in the opening hits of the battle but it's pretty obvious they are outmatched by our blunt weapons in the end we lose only two companions now for the Big Daddy of them all the two-handed glaive this thing hits for 182 damage and has a length of 206 which is insane the only problem is this glaive can be used with one hand and the AI prioritizes Shields over damage so our companions get slaughtered without a single kill if we remove the shield all hell breaks loose the enemy loses several legionary in the opening Salvo and continue to lose troops at a fast pace in the end only a single companion was lost what a huge difference having a shield can make when it comes to using two-handed weapons there isn't a big difference between any of them with the exception of the two-handed thrust-only pole arms as long as you stay away from that hot garbage you'll be quite happy with your companion's performance personally I'm partial towards the glaive since as we'll see later it's also effective against Cavalry before we move on to the next important section I wanted to run a couple quick tests using javelin's each companion gets a single stack of Jared javelins with five in each plus a couple more from The Perks the first volley is completely blocked by Shields then one legionary goes down and a few others take hits to the legs it doesn't take long for the enemy Shields to get destroyed and the vulnerable legionary get picked off only a handful remain by the time they reach are lines unfortunately javelins and melee modes suffer the same fate as the pull arms from earlier they do very little damage with each strike our numbers Advantage still save us in the end losing only 5 companions but it should have been a Flawless Victory we repeat the test but add the one-handed mace from earlier we see a similar pattern with a handful of legionary getting picked off before the lines meet but this time our companions switch to the one-handed mace and clobber the remaining enemy I paused to see if everyone switched to one-handed mace and sure enough they all did I would also like to point out that Banner Lord has amazing potential for Modern Art we still managed to lose three companions in the end which was a bit disappointing and for the final clip a bit of a meme if you can manage to get several companions up to level 250 throwing this happens it's actually quite disgusting guys moving on to one of the most important parts of the guide countering enemy Cavalry while on foot we'll be using the same weapons for these tests starting with a one-handed thrust only pole arm as the Cavalry line reaches our line a couple horses are stunned but several managed to get a cash glance off dropping three and trampling many others notice the calvary AI doesn't Retreat far enough back and they don't have enough speed to do massive damage like on the first charge but our troops are mostly ineffective against them and our companions are grinded down by the end only four enemy Cavalry are killed we repeat the test with the same Loadout but remove the Shields and allow our companions to spear brace the enemy charge hits hard killing four instantly but we also take out sixth Cavalry in the process on the second charge the enemy doesn't have nearly as much speed and actually performs much better against their spear brace by the end we lose all 21 but take 14 Calvary in the process it's interesting to note that speed is the cavalry's enemy when fighting against a wall of spear-based troops and they perform much better at slower speeds let's try one more test with an actual Pike this time 299 length the first charge hits and our Pikes are aimed way too high to hit the enemy Cavalry and we lose 5 companions without taking a single one out on the second attack the enemy Cavalry are moving so slow that our Pikes don't even bother bracing we give the charge command to see if it helps but it doesn't make much difference we end up killing 8 which isn't bad considering how poorly it started out I included this test to show that long Pikes do have a weakness pills the end of the spears are too high in the air to hit and the AI doesn't adjust them downward for some reason now let's see how well a couple of the two-handed weapons hold up against these Cavalry starting with the two-handed ax we lose five companions on the first charge and don't inflict any casualties in return fortunately the slower subsequent charges work to our benefit and the two-handed axes go to town we still lose a companion here and there when the enemy manages to land a solid hit at high speed but for the most part they wander in get stuck and get chopped in the end we lose 17 troops and kill 21. it's a very close win but compared to the other tests it's a massive Improvement and as I mentioned before we'll test the glaive again against these Mountain troops we managed to kill one on the first charge and lose only three as with the other tests the Cavalry don't gain enough speed to effectively charge and get stuck in our massive glaves and lose quite badly we lose only seven this time a significant improvement from anything else it's pretty obvious that one-handed and two-handed pole arms that only thrust are terrible at countering Cavalry on their own they do have the ability to stun the horse in place but lack the follow-up damage to take out the rider spear bracing is effective against the high speed first charge but useless after that any of the two-handed weapons can bring down Calvary but the longer swingable pole arms should be used over anything else as they have the reach to compete with couch lances Moving On Let's test both range options starting with bow and arrow the noble bow does the most damage so we'll use that yeah our companions begin their draw around 150 meters against Shield troops not many arrows will get past the shields after several volleys they take their first casualty shot through the foot only a handful survived to reach the line but they are quickly dispatched no losses were sustained here now we repeat the test against the best foot archers in the game the fian Champions this archery duel begins around 150 meters although at this distance damage is limited the first fiend Falls around 115 meter distance and at 50 meters only seven are left and get wiped off the map once again no losses and finally we replace the fans with the vladian Sharpshooter crossbow then the crossbows outrange our archers starting around 180 meters however at this distance most shots don't land and the ones that do cause very little damage looking from the crossbows perspective it's painfully clear how outmatched they are they get shot twice for every one volley they get off and sometimes the incoming arrows interrupt their reload meaning some only get one shot shut off for every three or four arrows the crossbows are wiped out before they even reach 130 meters let's repeat the exact same test but equip the bound crossbow the best in the game we see our companions open up around 175 meters but with little effect the shields are very effective against bolts at these distances even at 50 meters not a single legionary has been downed the enemy line reaches our companions in full strength far from ideal let's swap in the fiend Champions and repeat because the fiends like a shield our bolts are landing at the max range the first fan drops around 150 meters only two have gone down by a hundred however by 50 meters only two enemies are left and our companions have run out of bolts and must charge in with their axes and finally crossbow vs crossbow we see a similar result as with the fans although crossbows are much slower to advance and both sides end up collecting Bolts from the floor to continue shooting all Sharpshooters are eliminated by the end without a single loss unfortunately I can't recommend and using crossbows on companions in all three tests Bow outperformed crossbow by a massive margin it's possible that crossbows are more effective from close range but if that's the case it's best to use two stacks of javelins instead time for everyone's favorite Cavalry testing we'll start by fighting against foot troops Cavalry do damage in two ways with their weapon and with their mount in order to establish a baseline of damage we first attack without a weapon the first charge crushes a hole through their line killing two and losing no companions the second charge would lose a single companion but trample 11 to death and by the fourth charge all infantry are dead at a cost of only two companions now let's equip a pullarm that can couch lands the first charge kills six but we also lose one companion halfway through the Third charge all enemy infantry are down at the cost of two companions it's interesting to see very little difference with and without a weapon let's run two more and do the recap testing the two-handed ax first we get only two kills on the first charge with most ax swings missing their Mark by the end it took four charges to kill the enemy at a cost of a single companion the glaive has a bit more length so let's see if that helps we see seven kills on the first charge and it took three charges to kill everyone at a cost of two companions overall the weapon Loadout isn't that important when going up against put troops as all scenarios ended with very few losses and all enemies dead the biggest Advantage is time to kill with couch Lance and glaive ending the fight after three charges instead of four with all the others including unarmed it's more important to have a good mount with high charge damage for the final section let's look at Calvary vs Cavalry we'll start with the couch Lance both groups Collide and two from each side are dead but this time instead of separating they stay clumped up as if they were melee troops the AI seem to be different for Cavalry when fighting against other Cavalry because they didn't do this in any of the other foot troop testing and as you can probably guess our couchlands pull arms do no damage as thrust attack weapons ending in a crushing defeat with only three kills and 100 losses we repeat the test with the same Loadout but add in a one-handed mace this time it's great to see the AI swapping weapons once the groups Collide and get stuck on each other this time only three companions went down and one of those was from the initial couch Lance Clash I already knew that pole arms without couch Lance ability would perform poorly but I tested to see how bad we actually get two kills on the initial charge but it wouldn't get much better from there only 4 kills and a total loss this time and now let's test the two-handed weapons starting with the sword the initial Clash goes really well with no losses and three kills I was a bit confused as to why this Loadout was working so well it seems the enemy Cavalry don't defend well and the swords are just long enough to land hits ending without a single loss hopefully we get the same results with the two-handed ax but not quite we lose two on the initial clash and take only one out however it does turn into a Slaughter shortly after and we lose only the initial two companions in the end the two-headed mace has similar results as the two-handed sword no losses on the initial contact and a complete stomp with no losses in the end and finally the two-handed glaive a quick note make sure you remove the shield from your companions if you plan on using a glaive otherwise you'll get this garbage two kills and 100 losses once we remove the shield the results are completely different no losses on the first Clash and no losses in the end if you plan to equip your mounted companions as anti-cavalry be sure to avoid using Shields and take any of the two-handed weapon options with that said the two-handed glaive or any swingable pull-on for that matter should be the priority since it performs well no matter what situation it's being used in looking at the other tests the Glade performed well on foot mounted versus inventory and even mounted versus mounted so it's a great value if your companion only has two-handed skill then any of the other options will do well I wanted to bring up a quick point about one limitation with the testing done in this video you'll rarely fight against an army or full party of top tier enemy units but these tests only included top tier units it's possible that some weapons perform better against weaker opponents but in my personal opinion it's best to prioritize fighting against the biggest threat which would be the enemy top tier units if you've ever been curious about how much money a small YouTube channel like this one makes click this video right here a huge shout out to the channel members and patreon supporters who make putting bloopers like this in my videos possible who is chickaletta oh my God it's a lot of wheel holes

Channel: Strat Gaming Guides

Views: 287,103

Keywords: Strat Gaming, Mount and Blade 2 Bannerlord

Id: T_PL02Mk5uY

Length: 14min 52sec (892 seconds)

Published: Fri Apr 07 2023