To those who clicked on this, at least most of you, you must be asking yourself “What is a Bannerlord?” and to that I answer with a simple word. “Game”. Now let me explain my rankings. I was going to give a brief overview of each faction before going in but that became longer than intended and so I will just do it when I rank them. Do also keep in mind I mostly do modded playthroughs of Bannerlord. None really impact kingdom interaction other than Diplomacy which almost completely overhauls it. I use their default settings and not much should honestly change.
D:
C:
- Northern Empire - Just gonna be honest, I don’t like them. I cannot recall joining them and they’re in a prime time spot to be gangbanged by the other kingdoms. Even fucking Sturgia can get in on the action. They border, or are like a day’s walk away, from every kingdom outside of the Aserai and Vlandia. Borderline D tier because I just don’t like them, but they never die off even when surrounded, so they get some pity points I guess. Starting to think C is too high for them now but too lazy to back out and redo the list.
B:
-
Vlandia - On paper Vlandia seems like a solid contender, in practice, I got no idea how, they only seem to flop. They have the tools to fucking dominate but never can do it. They border only two Kingdoms and somehow get into more wars than fucking Battania and Sturgia combined. All with foreign enemies too. Outside of the Khuzait and Northern Empire literally everyone is fair game to them. Actually Bizarre. Their war performance is alright but one game I looked away for like a second and they lost 30% of their land to the Western Empire and that alone is worth a B.
-
Sturgia - Now, I like Sturgia. They are the cool viking-like people of the north, tough as shit and balls to the walls fucking awesome. Now with that being said they keep getting their ass kicked in every campaign I’ve been in since I got back into Bannerlord. Must’ve really nerfed them in 1.0.0, or swapped their place with Battania for whatever reason. Cool as fuck culture but they just CANNOT stop getting their asses kicked. I feel like they could really benefit from an environmental/weather update but outside of that, yeah. Pretty badass until they start fighting.
-
Aserai - The Aserai get into wars with the Khuzait, Southern, and Western empires and never get anything done with it. War is just around the corner with these folks. They never lose but they also never win. They literally just have people die and do nothing more about it. They’ll take one castle or two, maybe have a castle or two taken back, but that’s it. They don’t do anything and are just flavor text. Easy B.
A:
-
Khuzait - We’re in the big leagues now. The Khuzait are personally one of my top three if not top two kingdoms, depends however I’m feeling on about the other ones at the moment, but Khuzait is a consistent top tier. They are annoying as absolute fuck to fight against but to be on their side is an actual treat and watching them absolutely dominate games is both hilarious and concerning. If games are left unintended they will probably win 90% of the time. They got a pretty shit economy but that doesn’t matter when you are experts at fucking war.
-
Battania - Already been talking some shit about them. Notorious for getting steamrolled in prior versions of the game now they are proper chads who I’ve seen only take W’s. A pretty alright culture itself but their turnaround from the weakest bitches to being Khuzait Jr’s speaks for itself really. Nothing else to say, they also got the best noble troop don’t @ me but that’s a cultural thing and not a kingdom one, so, /shrug
-
Western Empire - The group of people who think generals should lead a kingdom being lead by a general who does pretty alright. The Kingdom is rather average when it comes to wars. They will get into wars with the Aserai often and sometimes Vlandia + the other Empires but it never feels crazy frequent. All the Empires low key feel the same but I think they’re the coolest of the bunch, that’s all. Speaking of Empires.
A
-
Southern Empire - Need I explain more?
Unironically I’m actually just a huge fan of their placement on the map. It’s the most “center” and while obviously a not so good spot at the same time it makes it feel the most important. Lore wise I think their Empire has the most legitimate claim to the throne. Northern thinks the senate should rule, Western thinks the generals should, and Southern thinks it should be hereditary. Why? Because it has always been. The other factions just want more power now while the Southern Empire wants to maintain it’s status. At least that’s how I see it idk I watched the intro video once and followed the mommy around. Later killed her so I could rule the Kingdom. Fucking blasphemy in Bannerlord to do such a thing. They were the first faction I joined and think are pretty much alright. Imperial Legionaries are fun to spam but again like with Battanian Fian Champions troop lines are not directly tied to kingdoms.
K that’s my list feel free to disagree. Completely biased, 100% so.