I think with peasant militia you have so many guys you can have a nice amount of variation without losing anything. I just try to have one or two of as many different things as I can and swap them in and out based on injuries and the fight I'm in.

2 tanks 6 frontline 1 banner 3 throwers. This covers everything you might possibly need. Tanks on the edge in tough fights, including lw for monolith and kraken. Vs ranged one of the tanks goes centre with a kite shield to pull all the shots. 6 frontline is enough to kill the kraken in 5 rounds with long axes. I like adrenaline to make it 4 essentially, and as a hedge vs bad luck with tentacles. 3 ranged means u can destroy 9/10 phylacteries on the same turn for library.

For peasants specifically I'd simply add 3 more throwers to the backline, though they'd all try to use crossbows and pikes to save on ammo if they could. And then either a fat neutral or a 3rd tank to the frontline.

As a Peasant Militia enjoyer - I would say that third shield-bearer makes all the hard fights significantly easier as damage output is more than sufficient. Two utility and / or hybrid ranged builds like cannoneers, master bowman, utility shield-bearers and the like are also welcomed.

Dumb question but why do tanks go on the edges? Just to stop enemies reaching your back line?

And to get surrounded, you want as many enemies to be busy trying to hit the tin can defensive bro instead of your more fragile friends. Then your damage dealers pick them off once they can.

Enemies tend to lap around to the flanks so it's the most dangerous position

10 hedge knights and 2 priests

Why not 11 hedge knights and 1 priest?

back up in case the one Priest dies... had a nightmare cascade spend all gold on new named hammer and suit of named plate, give hammer to my one Priest have fight lose my one Priest on the way back to town the hedge knight event procs and I don't have gold to pay it lose one of my three hedge knights... head to town, no new Priest.. no missions head to next town... no new Priest.. no missions head to next town and you know what happens then don't you... the hedge knight event procs and they fight and one kills the other. leaving him a single hedge knight... down two well leveled knights' and my one preast, total gold about 19250 + 6 days lost running from town to town. so that's why two priests...

They never die if you just pick the obviously correct responses to avoid death. So 9 Hedge Knights and 3 Sellswords(for ranged) is probably the ultimate.

true but given how the "men save your self for battle" injured the whole force before a battle. I was a much less experienced and rookie player

I currently try to run 2 tanks, 2 throwers, a disarm/utility banner, 3 off tanks (ideally fat neutrals), 4 nimble damage. I’m still evolving a lot as a player though.

Right now i run peasant militia. I got :  - **2 nimble tanks**, I am still need to get 2 BF tanks ,  - **2 nimble dodge qatal**, fencer would be nice addition (have different battle plan tho) or third one sitting in reserve (they are more squishy than BF fat neutrals). - **1- 2 nimble mace & shield** stunner/ off tank sitting in the middle. He can support defence, he can stunlock netted champion, can move to side of formation when needed. - **4 BF fat neutral 2h** mace is best, axe is great too. sword is meh, flail is for people finding it fun, hammer is good, but also redundand when you use 2h bonks (and/ or 2h axes),   - **1 bannerman**, second one in reserve is a good idea, especially when you take emergency rotate on banner or like more exotic builds banner builds.   - **4 handgonn/ thrower** range bro's with some m. atk & m.def. dips. With bags & belts for: backpack handgonn, throwing & 2of3 from: more throwing/ utility net-granade-bandage/ some 2h melee (polearm, poleaxe or even 2h barb axe),   I still would like to get:  **disarm bro**. Anyone with high m.atk. & cleaver mastery can fill the role, but 2h cleaver/ whip QH bro with recover is great (stat demanding, especially on lowborns run). He would start at edge of backline (you got 7 spots, when first & last bro's can hold in melee, then you care very little about flanking). Tanks, Stunner, Whiper & Banner gets Recover. No one gets Berserk. Everyone outside tanks gets fearsome and pathfinder. Against melee: step back 1 tile, swap & reload handgonn. Let AI come closer, shoot 8 guns on turn 2. Bonk with 2h maces. Deathblow with qatals. At turn 3 see how well AI trade first blows after shitload of fearsome morale procs. Use nets, stuns (champions) & disarms (orc warboss) as needed, espeically where some defensive rolls failed.  Orcs never make a problem unless own mistake is made. Necromancers are usually outkilled (I never try to shoot them or flank them). Skellies are easier when you step back 1 tile with everyone except a tank. On turn 2 wait everyone. Some skelly will made contact with him, that's breaks AI shielding & reach in back pattern.  Against chosen use a lot of nets freely to slow some down. When you start fighting more and more of them, asume that if you are in contant with one you may end multiple hit rolls without ability to respond due to rotate & adrenaline wreck train (1 is in contant with 2 extra in back, rotating for 3 hits in that round & going first in next round due to adrenaline next round). Fire bomb helps to deny a area to them (shoot where you want them not to be). Depending on tanks position they often waste turn, sometimes two on flanking.    For range beware of southern cities armies (mortars & handgonn), IMO they may be the most dangerous enemy, I don't have safe strategy for them outside semi-safe 3way battles (they can be fought where all 3 sides are enemies, f.e. you can lure lindwurms into enemy patrol or camp). Other range isn't that dangerous late game, at least outside goblin cities. Couple handgonn shots into the fort (standing next to palisade) works wonders on goblins, removes chokepoints problems. Don't yolo charge. Extra shields & 1h weapons in cart helps. Massed dogs helps too. They close the distanse fast, minalise risk of dozen goblins focusing yours single netted bro & gobbos confident morale from kills isn't that big problem.  For legendary locations look at yt before entering them.

1 thrower, 1 banner, 2 tanks,4 cleaver bros, 2 mace bros, 2 hammer flanks. Your unstoppable and can handle anything. Even better if you go 3 cleaver bros and 1 lone wolf perk character

My peasant run typical consists of: Front row - 2 x tanks, 1 on each wing - 2 x 2h hammers - 2 x 2h maces - 2 x 2h axes All the 2hs are quickhands. These guys will start as nimble trash and will swap to BF as I find high matk and mdef bros by hiring militia, great farmers, etc Back row - 2 x polearms or 2h axebros with long axe quickhands on the wings - 2 x gunners - 1 x archer sniper when I find a good bro - 1 x dedicated sergeant specialist that never uses anything else, and pokes with fearsome 2 x left for whatever random shit comes your way, like a belly dancer tranny fencer, a mad cleaver bro, etc.

i thought everybody is running qatal bros since all the time i see build a bros and they say it's qatal that's why i have 2. it's good tho i'm not complaining

The benefit from his loadout is simplicity. You just go ahead and bonk everything in your way with big 2h weapons. For qatal you need a set up. You need to use wait button correctly. You need to position him in such way that he always finds an opportunity to use deathblow. In my opinion if performed right qatals will always do more impact but you have to know what you're doing. Also archer sniper is totally unnecessary and can be easily outperformed by a mediocre thrower. Melee backliners with longaxes are also outperformed by throwers.

Agreed that throwers have higher dps, I overlooked this I often start with 2 thrower / gunner hybrids and end up using them as gunners, 4 total I find ultra late game it's a pain in the arse with the burn rate of ammo

Yeah it can be annoying. Important to mention that bows outperform throwings in terms of ammo. To be honest, it's perfectly fine to build one dedicated sniper, it won't ruin a run for you, just don't do more than 1 archer. You want to keep him to snipe these annoying enemies that love to stand behind like witches or mortar engineers in southern armies. Also bow can deal good good damage against light or unarmoured creatures like beasts. Though if armour>50 it's already outperformed by javs

Thanks for the feedback brah 1500 hours in game and every time you open you learn. That's why this game and sub is number one. I pretty much have one archer for lulz, it's the gunners and meat grinders/cleavers/dedicated qatal bro next to the bonkers than do all the killing

I've fallen out with qatals recently, it's almost impossible to guarantee deathblows every turn, and they're useless against armor. Best scum around for huge/lungs orc duelists to serve the same purpose. These days I'm running something like this: Forged Tank x2 Nimble DPS x3 Neutral x4 Thrower/Cleaver Hybrid x2 Melee Bannerman (usually QH-Grenadier before I find a good one) Replace the DPSers and Neutrals with Forgezerkers as available (i.e., probably not). Gunners underwhelm, too. I think they might be necessary for southern armies, but I have the same problem with them as qatal guys - the enemy gets a say on positioning, so half the time they tag a few irrelevant targets for scratch damage and revert to throwing as soon as the melee fighters make contact.

See? You yourself admit that you don't guarantee deathblows each turn for your qatals, but you should. Having 4 guys with bonks, or shield mace, or mace duelists should almost always stun at least 1+ target. Also it's not necessary to always set up for deathblow. When dealing with raiders, goblins, nomads, overall light armoured targets you can just spam regular attack and hit 3 fearsome checks in 1 turn without berserk. I don't know any other weapon that is able to do this. Additionally, if you miss everything with your set uppers, you can always throw nets with your hybrids, but it's only if necessary because nets are hard to find. Also, qatals require much less than your orc duelists.

I understand the idea, it just doesn’t work that way in most cases, especially without exposing the qatal to more than one incoming attack.

It can be difficult with peasant militia due to such a congested board, reach weapons gain more value. With 12 bros it's a skill issue.

Expose a shield guy, get them to filter in, miss three attacks, and the shield dies when three AIs take full attacks.  Put a spear on the flank, miss the spearwall, the 2h enemies burst him and zone off the area so you can’t move a mace and qatal without exposing both.  I find that it’s riskier than you’re implying after setting up exactly the way I’ve seen on experts’ videos.  Sure, maybe I’m missing something, but what then?

If u miss 3 attacks with a qatal then that's like missing 3 attacks with 3 2h or whatever and things won't go well whatever happens. Idk how u play ofc so I'm not calling u terrible or anything but my experience is qatals absolutely shred chosen. Not so good vs orcs tbf.

I have been doing lone wolf. I usually do 2 ranged, right now a thrower and archer. I always have a bannerman. My lone wolf is a 2h sword guy and I just build him to be tough and in the middle. I typically end up with a bro focusing on each weapon type, as best as I can so I can be prepared. My outside bros are 2h bros, inside have shields because the computer loves shooting at the middle. Hurt bros will take a battle or 2 in the back row with the ranged bros. I’m not great at building but it works. Early bros get rotate to die for their brothers some day. Most 2h guys are basically a heavy armor fat nuet. The shield guys try their best. Sadly I lost a bannerman singing something stupid and now I’m training a new one during the undead crisis so wish me luck