The strength of the Peasant Militia comes from their numbers but typically follows standard builds, primarily fatigue-neutral and nimble, to compensate for their below-average endgame stats. This approach, common across all origins, still results in specialized brothers by the end.

For a foundational guide on the Peasant Militia origin, I recommend checking out the excellent guide by Saint Scylla:

https://gtm.steamproxy.vip/id/stscylla/myworkshopfiles/?section=guides&appid=365360


There are no dedicated tanks. The legionary build leverages Bags & Belts, shields, and mass Overwhelm with Relentless, along with a variety of weapons tailored to specific encounters. By equipping brothers with multiple tools for different situations, even average Peasant Militia brothers can become highly effective. This flexible approach allows them to handle all endgame content, counteracting their below-average stats.

A typical Legionary should have:

Hitpoints: 90+
Fatigue: irrelevant
Resolve: 60+
Initiative: 90+ (with Hyena Fur Mantle)
Melee Skill: 80+
Ranged Skill: irrelevant
Melee Defense: 50+ (with shield)
Ranged Defense: irrelevant

Beyond that, priority goes to Melee Skill, Melee Defense, and Resolve/Initiative.

A good brother at max level should look similar to this:
(stats with equipment)


Colossus: Efficient for getting the brother into the 90+ HP range.
Bags & Belts: Allows us to carry our weapon set without adding fatigue.
Pathfinder: Crucial for mobility, fatigue management, terrain control, and enabling Overwhelm setups.
Dodge: With 90+ initiative on average, it adds around 10 defense, which, combined with the shield, makes the Legionary very hard to hit. Relentless and the fatigue-neutral main attack (Decapitate) allow the brother to maintain enough initiative for Dodge to remain effective.
Gifted: More stats are more valuable than an additional perk for this setup.
Relentless: Allows us to tactically delay actions, crucial for setting up Legionary walls, applying Overwhelm to the right targets, selecting Decapitate targets (e.g., undead), and maintaining good initiative.
Cleaver Mastery: The Legionary's main weapon is the cleaver. Mastery enables two-attack bursts with bleed and makes Decapitate fatigue-neutral. It also gives high-precision attacks or disarms at a range of 3 with the whip.
Overwhelm: Since all Legionaries have this perk (either from normal weapons or whips), tough enemies can be disabled through concentrated attacks. With very high defense from Dodge and the shield, even a single Overwhelm (-10% hit chance) often brings enemies down to the minimum 5% hit chance.

Example:
Chosen = 75 - 7.5 (1 Overwhelm) - 55 (effective defense) = 12.5% chance to hit
Chosen = 75 - 15 (2 Overwhelm) - 55 (effective defense) = 5% minimum chance to hit

An initiative of 90+ won’t allow you to Overwhelm fast enemies, but most dangerous enemies are slower than you. Over time, enemies will tire out while you won’t, which means you’ll eventually become faster. Special cases like sword masters can be dealt with using a net.
Underdog: Since Legionaries are frontline units and often get surrounded, this perk is essential for maintaining their high defense even in sub-optimal positions (especially since they lack the Indomitable perk and can be tossed).
Nimble: Given the focus on high initiative and keeping fatigue low, every build includes the Nimble perk. This is crucial for basic survivability in case a brother gets hit despite the high defense.

Initial Armor
The initial armor should be free raider armor: the Nasal Helm and the Leather Lamellar Armor. These will keep the Legionary at 15 fatigue and provide perfect Nimble benefit.

Intermediate Armor
Intermediate armor sacrifices perfect Nimble stats for increased protection, as in real combat, solid base armor is more valuable than theoretical max HP. Armor helps avoid negative status effects like bleeding, poison, and morale failures. We choose armor that maintains decent Nimble stats and offers the best armor-to-fatigue ratio: the Noble Mail and the Barbute Helmet or Sallet Helmet. The Hyena Fur Mantle adds 15 fatigue-free armor and 15 initiative, improving dodge-defense and Overwhelm chances.

Endgame Armor
For endgame armor, we will always keep the Hyena Fur Mantle, but named armor may offer upgrades. As a general rule, we increase helmet and body armor while maintaining approximately 90 initiative and around 55% Nimble effectiveness. The best combination will depend on each brother's HP and initiative stats.
An elite endgame brother might wear armor gear like this:


Equip: Military Cleaver and Shield
Utility: Warhammer, Fighting Axe, Battle Whip, Backup Shield
Neck: Resolve Trinket or Dog
The complete Legionary kit will consist of this gear:

There are only two retinues that are mandatory for the Legion: the blacksmith and the recruiter.

The blacksmith is essential throughout the entire game, as we are equipping expensive armor and shields on (initially) weaker brothers. The build heavily relies on shields, which will be regularly broken by enemies; therefore, these must be repaired by the blacksmith.

The recruiter is crucial in the early game to quickly assess and rotate in brothers that are upgrades over the existing roster. Most lowborn brothers are not very strong, so we need to prioritize quantity to find the standouts.

The remaining choices can be made according to your preference.

The tactical foundation is the legionary frontline shield wall, which boasts very high defense even without active blocking due to the shield being equipped, along with Dodge, Relentless, and applied Overwhelm stacks.

Normally, this comes with the trade-off of very low damage output. However, thanks to weapon selection and using the cleaver as the primary weapon, even these brothers can deal respectable damage in most situations.

The cleaver’s bleed damage is unaffected by double-grip or the fact that it is a one-handed weapon. The special attack "Decapitate" deals high damage based on the enemy’s remaining health, and with cleaver mastery, it becomes fatigue neutral. Therefore, starting with two attacks to apply initial damage and bleed, followed by a Decapitate, will quickly deal with most enemies. Additionally, Decapitate prevents most enemies from being resurrected, making battles against necromancers significantly easier.

The hammer is used to soften heavily armored opponents such as orc warriors and warlords. We won't use Quick Hands, as we want to avoid fatiguing ourselves with a non-mastered weapon. Once the armor is sufficiently weakened for the cleaver to penetrate, we switch back to the cleaver for better fatigue management. In many cases, we may not switch to the hammer at all, even with lots of armor remaining, because applying two stacks of Overwhelm may be more valuable than just one stack and additional armor damage.

The axe is useful for breaking shields of ancient undead once they enter shield wall mode, and it is also effective against Schrats. Needless to say, Schrats fare poorly against brothers equipped with axes, combined with high melee defense and Overwhelm when surrounded.

The whip gives each brother the ability to strike targets three tiles away and apply Overwhelm, along with an emergency disarm option to assist a brother in trouble. It allows for consistent Overwhelm stacks on difficult enemies, to the point that brothers on the verge of death might safely disengage by moving away, since the adjacent enemy’s melee attack will be debuffed to, or near, the minimum 5% chance to hit. The whip is also highly effective against annoying targets like necrosavants that warp to your backline. With the whip, your frontline doesn’t need to chase; they can often damage or disarm enemies from a distance.

The backup shield is essential because almost all enemies capable of breaking shields will attempt to do so, due to your legionaries’ high defense. This is beneficial, as those attacks are wasted, but you must be prepared to replace any broken shields. For this reason, the Sipar shield and Living Tree Shield are excellent choices due to their higher durability.

All fights were done on maximum difficulty.


Wait until enemy is 2 tiles away, then charge and attack 3 times to break the center wall. Switch to axes for remaining enemies that activate shield wall and kill backline.

Ancient Dead Fight [rumble.com]


Use nets on dangerous special enemies, rest should die easily.

Nomads FIght[rumble.com]


Focus on decapitating zombies to reduce numbers and resurrections. Overwhelm dangerous fallen heroes and win the attrition war.

Undead Fight[rumble.com]


Charge as one to not get isolated, keep backline to deal with flanking wolf riders.

Goblin Fight[rumble.com]


Kill berserkers first, then orc young to activate moral failures. Tank warriors with legionaries and Overwhelm, switch to hammer as appropriate. Keep the backline out of range of high health warriors.

Orcs[rumble.com]


Ignore Unholds and pin them down with as few legionaries as possible and focus on reducing barbarian numbers. Tank Chosen with Overwhelm and cycle in new shields as necessary.

Barbarians Fight[rumble.com]


Spread Overwhelm and focus down the Lindwurms one by one.

Lindwurms Fight[rumble.com]


Surround and overwhelm with axes.

Schrats Fight[rumble.com]

The backline should be Battleforged for non-ranged brothers, as these are often strong characters with low melee defense. There should be plenty of spare heavy armor available, as your frontline does not use it. For the backline, high armor serves as a buffer in case they end up in direct melee engagement.

The composition of the backline is up to your preference, but having some ranged capabilities can help force enemies to charge you. I haven’t tested gunners yet, but I suspect they would perform well in this setup. My backline consists of classic high-damage axe wielders, snipers/axe throwers, hybrids, and a utility brother with Rally as a backup:

If you want to try this out, have fun and please leave a comment how it worked out for you!