The company banner and standard bearer have always bugged me. It’s incredibly useful for most companies, but the standard bearer himself is usually very limited in how he fights.
When you think of a standard bearer, he’s in front of the troops leading the attack, not cowering in the back cheerleading, but that’s almost the only option in Battle Brothers.
Perhaps make the banner an item that can be used as a polearm OR equipped in the off-hand like a buckler, allowing for use of a one-handed weapon? Add a resolve debuff for enemies engaged with the standard bearer?
Basically, the current rear-rank standard bearer would remain unchanged, but a simple adjustment to make it also usable as an off hand item would open up a lot of options without breaking balance, and make it more visually appealing with front line standard leading the fight. Would require some tweaking to get the balance of stats correct, but again, similar to a buckler (decent blocking melee, poor against ranged) is probably a good starting point.
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