Is the Bucellarii a GOOD GLASS CANNON? Bannerlord Horse Archer Unit Troops Guide

This is a 1.8. Bannerlord in Depth Analysis of the Horse Archer troop known as Bucellarii.
This video is part of a Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord Playlist where we analyze each unit not only based on their equipment but also on statistics taken after intensive testings.
The Data will be trimmed down and showcased both throughout the video and at the end to allow the viewer to know as much as possible about the unit in question.
A score will also be provided at the end based on Lyon’s opinion, this score shouldn’t be taken as hard evidence, as different playstyles may impact the way viewers evaluate units.
In this here video we are going to talk about the Imperial Bucellarii.
An often overlooked unit that might end up surprising you for it's sneaky effectiveness
Units Guide Playlist: • How BAD is The Wildlin...
And remember, criticism and constructive feedback are always appreciated.

[@zada0579]

idk why but i swear in the early version of the game 100 of these guys can destroy an army of 400 with light casualties, but now they drop like flies

[@LyonExodus]

it's still an horse archer with 40 shots, so kinda OP by nature. But the Horse Archer AI has been made worse over the development to counter how good they are. No idea why they won't just nerf the other ones instead of making the AI worse. Makes little sense to me.

[@Eddison33]

It was a long time ago, like in a version 1.4.1 or something. They indeed had much better armor. The best armor for non-noble horse archers.

[@HistoricalWeapons]

Historically they had some of the best horses and armor

[@blazezz1101]

Really wish there's a more diverse ranged weapon loadout for T5 archers since there's so much Steppe Recurve Bow. The Bucellarii is certainly underwhelming but not bad at its role. The low horse armor weakness can still be taken care with lots of micro instead of F1 + F3. On the other hand, the Aserai Mameluke Heavy Cavalry is bad especially with patch 1.8 cavalry AI crippling its hybrid melee role.

[@LyonExodus]

more bows would definitely be welcomed, right now ranged troops feel way to similar. apart from the Fians and the Veteran Bowman the rest uses pretty much the same weapons

[@shadowdragon1396]

Yeah, Buc’s aren’t the best horse archers out there, but they are relatively cheap to upgrade. If I remember correctly, you only have to spend a single horse to get them. Can’t recall if it’s a warhorse or regular steed though, I don’t have my computer atm.

[@LyonExodus]

warhorse

[@shadowdragon1396]

@@LyonExodus even so, costing one less horse is a benefit. Not a very significant benefit, but a benefit nonetheless.

[@demoulius1529]

The upgrade to Buc's cost a warhorse. Im playing an empjre playthrough after not playing since like a week before official release. If you get heavy horse instead of equites you only meed the warhorses to upgrade the bucs. Since equites upgrade needs a warhorse you can easily bypass that warhorse requirement. But damn does ir feel bad when you consider how squishy they are😢

[@Eddison33]

I would say they are definitely not worth spending a warhorse on) And I'm definitely a fan of mamlukes. Although they were much sturdier in the earlier versions of the game. One quiver is not a huge problem for a horse archer if a) he's good in melee b) you have some critical number of horse archers to actually matter (50-70) c) you micromanage them to hold fire.

[@PopTartHeaven]

I used to have my armies be all elite cataphracts and bucellarii, but dang the bucs were guaranteed to have heavy casualties every single battle.

[@TheNEOverse]

These guys ought to be the tanky horse archer instead, if only to match with the rest of the Empire's general vibe.

[@Deathelement53]

If you were forced to only bring troops from one culture what culture has the best army?

[@LyonExodus]

Sturgia and Aserai have been my best experiences with strong infantry units fine Cav and weak but effective archers. Khuzaits are undoubtedly the strongest if you want to go Horse archer Heavy. Battania is hard carried by Fians The Empire i am yet to play a campaign with the new Palatines but before their buff it's very weak without Cataphracts. Vlandia has a lot of problems with 1.8. , but before, an army of 400 Sharpshooters was something to behold.

[@chengkuoklee5734]

If exclude elite units, I believe Empire is the most flexible

[@aurex8937]

I tend to use them as very fast archers, as in - take them to the sides and let them simply shoot arrows at enemies like a stationary turret of sorts. They're really awful when the enemy has large numbers of archers or they're forced into melee, they even fail when told to hold fire and harass the enemy rearguard. If they only had a faster, smaller horse and much better AI, now that would be something!

[@MarinoFrana]

For a human player they are kinda OK when you use them to support your infantry as highly mobile archers that skirmish the flanks. What really sucks for them is that AI always yeets the horse archers right into the enemy and they just get destroyed by enemy archers while doing absolutely nothing against the infantry in shield wall. They all just die 5 minutes into the fight while their infantry is still moving into the fight. Shitty AI just uses all the troops in the same way and Bucellarii are worst suited for what AI is doing...

[@orlandoactab3034]

taleoworlds' updates made combat more shit, i dont know any other dev that can do that, kidding aside, no hate to TW, i just really hope we get more major updates even after final release

[@LyonExodus]

i feel you. as someone who has not been enjoying the latest combat changes (mainly the reinforcements) i hope they can find a way to make it work. and hopefully with the release enough of a cash injection is gonna help with productivity.

[@user-cr4cj1fl8z]

So TW fucking up the AI combat and yet you hope they`ll do more updates on the combat ? They will either revert it back or simply continue to criple how units work. Lets not forget they made the pilum not trowable for the empire even tho it still has that tag and the player can trow it but the AI is forbiden. I can list you another 5 units cripled by TW updates so imo they better not touch it anymore and let others fix their mistakes.

[@kintanIchlasul7767]

Agreed

[@orlandoactab3034]

@@user-cr4cj1fl8z it was just a meme before, but after seeing the 1.8 update, i am genuinely scared that the only thing that will pump out content for the game is modders

[@user-cr4cj1fl8z]

Bucelarii are prime example of TW utter lack of actually managing to produce a good troop tree a decade after the game is out and them tinkering with the troop trees all the time. As an empire unit its insane their horses have basicly a peasant tier horse armor , we have 2 helmets one good and the other garbage on a high tier unit. Like how can you give them 47 and then 25 ? Makes no sense , did the dev who did it even looked at the stats or just went on like "yeah they look similar in style so its fine" . They are utter garbage in meele and most of their kit makes no sense Who ever worked on that unit is complete idiot in terms of making troops for the game and im sure that same idiot is responsible for the many more useless or stupid units in other factions. No wonder the players are forced into a meta where we either spam one unit that is proven to outclass the others or we have to mix our army with only the ones that work properly from the other cultures. Like imagine you go pure batanian army. Beside one good unit the rest of the foot soldiers are just canon fodder for the enemy to hold cuz you rely on your archers doing 90% of the fight. I wont even talk about the cav units of batania. Vlandian roster suffers from lower armor value that is even lower than units of batania which makes no sense but its TW logic. With Vlandia you cant really play defensive and must strike hard and fast but your units are equiped with paper armor for the most part and you dont really have the big damage output to balance it so you end up replacing units in mass unless you play with exploits and on easy then it doesnt really matter what units you use.

[@LyonExodus]

if i find the time, people and tools i'll attempt to be that idiot in charge of troops, and create a more balanced meta as far as high tiers are concerned.

[@ChristianAuditore14]

That is what people did, they hired auxiliary.

[@louditalian1962]

I highly disagree. This unit is OP when attached to Legionnaires. Keep the enemy infantry focused on the legions while the horse archers flank them from the rear and just peppers the enemy like hell. You need a quick reaction force to use them as skirmishers and hit and run tactics and they are perfectly suited for it, the lack of armor is irrelevant.

[@LyonExodus]

Like it's said in the video that would require you to "keep them safe" meaning that they can't win by themselevs like other Horse archers. They are a good glass cannon, but the others are as good if not better while not being that weak in melee on when the fight goes south, we die, and the AI takes over. The score is a 2,5 that is still considered an average performer since they are still in an OP class and mounted. But they can't be a 5 becuase of the clear weaknesses in comparison to their competitors. The Mameluke had a worse score than them, just saying... despite having much, much higher armor.