Every update to the TAOM website.

• Synced 135 equipment XML/XSLT sources from the TAOM_Development_2_0_35 release, including armour, weapons, shields, mounts, harnesses, crafting pieces and weapon descriptions.
• Armoury: 2,904 → 3,023 entries, including 18 new horse/camel harnesses stored with Harad body armour and displayed under a new Mount tab. Harwan and Shaghana equipment replaces the legacy Haradrim pieces; Gondor gains new Lamedon and Ringló Vale pieces.
• Weaponry: 623 → 667 entries — melee 329 → 345, bows/crossbows 38 → 41, ammunition 30 → 31, and shields 226 → 250.
• The weapon parser now reads regular equipment from culture folders as well as the main weapon/shield files. This includes all 41 entries in the new harad/weapons.xml, with shield protection and crafted weapon damage preserved.
• Mount sources: 10 → 22 mounts; harnesses 34 → 68. New entries include spiders, elk and other animal mounts, plus additional elephant and Black Númenórean barding.
• Both equipment parsers share the exclusions for generated ranged_ladder.xml and starter_kit.xml clones. Regular starter_armors.xml entries remain in the catalogue.

Weapons — Gondor / Rhûn / Númenórean Rebalance

• 329 custom melee weapons (was 344); shields 224 → 226.
• Gondor trimmed from 48 to 34 melee weapons: the Lossarnach axe line collapsed from ten variants to two (_1h_axe_light, _2h_axe_light), wm_gondor_sword_a04–a10 removed, wm_gondor_spear replaced by wm_gondor_light_spear, and a Lamedon heavy bastard sword added. Average swing 95 → 91.
• Rhûn grew from 33 to 45: each of the Khamûl, Dragon and Lôke-rim lines gained a second spear and three two-handed swords (sm_*_sword_2h_a/b/c). Average swing 91 → 110 — now the highest of any implemented culture.
• Númenórean (cultureless) two-handers restructured: the 26 numenorean_sword_2h_a–z variants were replaced by a 14-piece set — bastard and greatsword at medium/heavy/elite in a/b, plus two poleaxes.
• Harad lost the two misattributed easterling_spear/easterling_sword items (6 melee, no two-handers).
• Crafting pieces grew 509 KB → 553 KB to back the new blades.

Troops

• 901 unique troops (was 899). Erebor gained two Iron Pass units: ironpass_ram_herder (L16) and ironpass_ram_marshal (L41). No cultures added or removed, no upgrade paths changed.
• Dol Guldur Uruk line pushed up a tier. Eleven dg_uruk_* troops moved +5 levels — Fighter 13 → 16, Skirmisher and Warrior 16 → 21, Swordsman and Bowman 21 → 26, Fell Infantry / Fell Archer / Fell Fang 26 → 31, Black Guard / Black Sharpshooter / Black Slayer 31 → 36. The line now spans T2–T7.
• Gondor Blackroot Vale ranged line renamed in place: Ranger → Shadowbow, Shadowbow → Shadowhunter, Shadowhunter → Vanguard (ids unchanged).
• Skill re-roles on elite ranged and skirmish units. Gondor (12 troops): Throwing +15 to +130, Polearm +15 to +80, Two-Handed +15 to +70, with Bow cut by up to 150 on units moved to melee. Rhûn (4 troops): Throwing +15 to +170, Polearm +15 to +155, Bow cut by up to 215. Mordor (10 troops): Two-Handed +23 to +85, Crossbow/Throwing/Polearm +15 to +45. Isengard and Dale: two troops each +15 across all eight skills.
• Equipment refresh on 153 Gondor troops, 51 Rhûn, 18 Mordor, 13 Dale and 12 Dol Guldur — largely tracking the weapon rebalance above.

Armour — Protection Rebalance

• No items added or removed (2,904), but 2,476 items had stat changes — the largest armour pass since March.
• Buffed: Erebor (body +16 avg, arm +12), Iron Hills (head +16, body +16, arm +13), Gondor (head +12, body +11, arm +7), Arnor (body +9, head +8, arm +7), Rhûn (head +9, body +7, arm +7), Rivendell (body +9, arm +6), Gundabad (head +9), Mirkwood (head +9).
• Trimmed: Dunland (head −10, leg −5), Dale (leg −11), Rohan (leg −9, body −3), Dol Guldur (leg −5, arm −3), Isengard (arm −3, leg −3), Thenn (body −8), Mordor (leg −7). Leg armour came down almost everywhere.
• Net effect: Iron Hills is now the best non-Elven body armour (55.3 avg, just under Rivendell 56.8 and Mirkwood 55.5); Rhûn and Gondor sit level at 43.7 / 43.2; Erebor has the highest head armour of any culture (56.1).
• Two new Gondor shields, sm_gd_shield_b1 and sm_gd_shield_b2. Horses unchanged.

Armoury — New Generated Item Sets (Excluded)

• The mod now ships two generated, non-merchandise files in each culture folder that are not player-facing armour:
  • ranged_ladder.xml — an AI missile-speed ladder of bow/crossbow clones (13 cultures, 15 per culture).
  • starter_kit.xml — stat-floored twins of the player's starting loadout, mixing armour, shields, bows and crafted weapons (14 cultures).
• parse-armory.ts now skips both files and any <Item> without an <Armor> component, so /armoury stays at 2,904 real items. starter_armors.xml (purchasable starter sets) is unaffected and still feeds the Starter tab.

Vanilla References

• vanilla_weapons.xml and vanilla_crafting_pieces.xml refreshed from the current Bannerlord install.

Known Data Issues

• bluecraig_bolgs_ironfang and mistymountainorcs_bolgs_ironfang remain defined twice (in troops_goblin.xml and their own faction files). Counts use unique ids.

New Factions

• Blue Craig (troops_bluecraig.xml, npcs_bluecraig.xml) — 23 goblin troops, levels 11–36, infantry and ranged branches. Previously the faction page borrowed Goblin-town's roster; it now renders its own.
• Lindon (troops_lindon.xml, npcs_lindon.xml) — 30 Falathrim troops, levels 11–51. The deepest tier spread of any roster and the only Elven culture fielding both cavalry and horse archers. Previously borrowed Rivendell's roster.

Troops — New Lines, Mercenaries, and Skill Rebalance

• Roster grew to 899 unique troops across 18 troop-fielding cultures (was 802). 97 added, none removed, no upgrade paths changed.
• Mordor — Black Númenórean line (14 troops): Initiate (L26) → Infantry / Archer / Cavalry (L31) → Veteran Infantry / Archer / Cavalry (L36) → Warden / Knight / Marksman (L41) → Temple Guard / Temple Knight / Temple Shadowbow (L46).
• Gondor — Lossarnach Noble line (5): Noble (L16) → Noble Veteran (L21) → Noble Sergeant (L26) → Noble Warden (L31) → Noble Captain (L36).
• Erebor — Ironpass ram cavalry (4): Ram Rider (L21) → Goatback Charger (L26) → Ram-Breaker (L31) → Ram Vanguard (L36). Erebor's first mounted line.
• Harad — Mûmakil Rider (L51).
• 21 hired mercenary variants (*_merc) across Dol Guldur, Erebor, Goblin-town, Gondor (3), Gundabad (2), Harad, Rivendell (2), Isengard (3), Mirkwood, Misty Mountain Orcs, Mordor (4) and Umbar — recruitable copies of existing troops for the mercenary pool.
• Skill rebalance:
  • Dale: every one of its 35 troops re-statted — Two-Handed +100 avg (+30 to +222), Polearm +50, One-Handed +40, Throwing +31, Crossbow +27. The roster was effectively unfinished before this pass.
  • Mordor (29 troops): Polearm +41, Two-Handed +34, One-Handed +23, Bow +18.
  • Gondor (35 troops): Two-Handed +44; eleven units re-roled from bow to crossbow (Crossbow +56, Bow −50).
  • Rhûn (24 troops): Two-Handed +26; six archers Bow +118.
  • Erebor (8 troops): Polearm +100, Two-Handed +97, One-Handed +82, Athletics +26.
  • Dol Guldur (14 troops): Two-Handed +41, Polearm +28, Athletics +12.
  • Isengard: two troops swapped Bow → Crossbow (−90 / +90).
• Equipment changed on 140 Gondor troops, 28 Rhûn, 21 Dale, 8 Erebor, 3 Gundabad, 3 Mordor, 2 Isengard, 1 Dol Guldur.
• erebor_warriors_boss renamed "[Erebor] Warrior Captain" → "Blacklock Chieftain".
• Dale is now visible. Its 35 troops use Culture.sturgia, which was in HIDDEN_CULTURES and filtered every Dale troop and lord off /troops and /lords.
• Ten culture ids new to the data were added to CULTURE_DISPLAY_NAMES: bluecraig, lindon, and the minor/raider cultures dunland_raiders, erebor_warriors, gondor_soldiers, gundabad_raiders, harad_raiders, mirkwood_stalkers, rhun_raiders, umbar_corsairs. Without entries these rendered as raw ids (Gondor_soldiers).

Armour — Regional Sets, Black Númenórean Kit, Legacy Cleanup

• 2,904 items across 18 culture sets: 276 added, 160 removed, and 1,910 existing items re-statted.
• Mordor — Black Númenórean armour (78 pieces, sm_md_num_* / sk_md_num_*) to equip the new troop line above. 18 legacy pieces removed.
• Gondor — six regional sets (120 pieces): Dol Amroth (33), Linhir (22), Pinnath Gelin (21), Blackroot Vale (20), Lossarnach (18), Lond-Galen (10). 44 older generic pieces removed.
• Erebor: 57 legacy sk_dwarf_* pieces removed (the roster shrank 34% by file size). Rhûn: 16 legacy easterling_* pieces removed, twelve of them helmets.
• Starter kits added — 12 new starter_armors.xml files (six purchasable sets per culture, 78 items) in cultures that previously had none. /armoury gained a Starter tab; these items were otherwise reachable only under "All".
• Stat pass: Iron Hills buffed hard (body +23 avg, leg +22, arm +14, head +14); Mirkwood head +17; Rivendell body +10; Rohan body +8, head +8; Dunland leg +11; Dale +5 to +6 across every slot; Thenn body +23. Mordor trimmed slightly (body −5, arm −5). material_type reassigned on roughly 800 items and weight retuned on most.

Weapons, Shields & Mounts

• 636 weapons/shields/bows: 344 melee, 38 ranged, 30 ammunition, 224 shields.
• Mordor — Black Númenórean weapons (9): bows a/b, lance, one-handed swords a/b/c, two-handed swords a/b/c. Three Rohan spears (wm_rohan_spear_c/d/f) removed.
• Shields: ten added — four Gondor (sm_gd_shield_a1–a4) and six Black Númenórean (infantry and cavalry, medium and heavy); twelve legacy Gondor / Easterling shields and the Rhûn tournament sparring shield removed.
• Mounts doubled, 24 → 44: Mûmakil; two war rams with eight ram bardings (light / medium / heavy / elite, a/b); fell warg, albino / brown / dark wargs and a warg saddle; Rhûn and imperial chariot armour; two Khamûl bardings. These back the new Ironpass, Mûmakil Rider and warg-rider troops.

Lords, Heroes & Clans

• 1,580 lords and heroes, 232 clans. lords.xml grew 2.55 MB → 2.73 MB.
• Newer kingdoms (goblin, mistymountainorcs, bluecraig, lindon, abanissa, shaghana) were missing from KINGDOM_ID_TO_NAME, so their ids leaked raw into the Kingdom column on /lords.

Mod Info

• Per-faction and headline counts on the troop, armour, weapon and overview balancing pages were recomputed from the XML — several had been stale since March (e.g. "545 troops", "2,368 armour items", "300 melee weapons").
• Added cards for Dale, Lindon, Goblins, Misty Mountain Orcs and Blue Craig. Cultural skill modifiers are applied by the mod at runtime and are not present in the culture XML, so those cards carry counts, races, groups and tier ranges but no modifier table.

Known Data Issues

• bluecraig_bolgs_ironfang and mistymountainorcs_bolgs_ironfang are each defined twice — once in troops_goblin.xml and once in their own faction file. The site counts unique ids (899); a raw element count reports 901.

Recorded retroactively on 2026-09-14; this sync (f338c8c) shipped without a changelog entry.

New Factions

• Goblin-town (troops_goblin.xml, 22 troops) and Misty Mountain Orcs (troops_mistymountainorcs.xml, 22 troops) — two new orc cultures, each with infantry and ranged branches.
• Dale (troops_dale.xml, 35 troops, culture id sturgia) — first full roster for Dale, with its own dale armoury folder. Its sturgia id was still in HIDDEN_CULTURES at this point, so the roster did not appear on /troops or /lords until 2026-09-02.
• Kingdom, clan and faction pages wired for Goblins, Misty Mountain Orcs, Blue Craig and Lindon. Blue Craig and Lindon had no rosters yet and temporarily borrowed Goblin-town's and Rivendell's.

Troops

• 802 unique troops (was 707): 98 added, 3 removed.
• Mordor — Morannon line (10): Recruit → Scout / Skirmisher / Fighter → Infantry / Spearman / Archer / Warrior → Heavy Infantry / Heavy Spearman.
• Harad — Elephant Rider.
• Eight minor-culture bandit bosses, one each: gondor_soldiers, erebor_warriors, mirkwood_stalkers, gundabad_raiders, harad_raiders, rhun_raiders, dunland_raiders, umbar_corsairs.
• Removed: Dol Guldur Giant Spider Rider, Isengard Chosen Marksman and Hunter.
• Equipment changed on 13 Rhûn, 9 Gondor and 4 Harad troops. No skill pass.

Armour

• 2,788 items (was 2,544): 246 added, 2 removed, nothing re-statted.
• Dale — full culture set (154 pieces): Lake-town mariner kit (36) plus chest (24), boots (24), helmets (24), gauntlets (24) and shoulders (22).
• Mordor — Morannon set (92 pieces, sk_md_mor_*) to equip the new line.
• Isengard: two Uruk-scout pieces removed.

Weapons, Shields & Mounts

• Dale weapons (17): three war axes, two winged spears, war spear, spears a/b, halberd, sword, longbow and matching pieces. Dale shields (15, wm_dale_shield_*).
• Mounts: war elephant with elephant armour, a Rhûn chariot; the three Dol Guldur spider mount variants consolidated into one.

Recorded retroactively on 2026-09-14; this sync (dc8b431) shipped without a changelog entry.

New Factions

• Âbanissa and Shaghâna — two Harad sub-kingdoms with their own kingdoms, clans, lords and NPCs (npcs_abanissa.xml, npcs_shaghana.xml). They field Harad's troop roster.

Troops — Four Rosters Rebuilt

• 707 unique troops (was 683): 128 added, 104 removed, 50 level changes.
• Erebor rebuilt (−43 / +54): the Iron Hills line reworked (23 → 21 troops), plus a new Erebor Noble line (13), a regular line (8), Oathsworn (3) and the first Ironpass infantry and veterans (3).
• Rhûn rebuilt (−27 / +25): the legacy troops_rhun.xml was removed in favour of troops_rhun_new.xml. New Black Sun line (11, including Chosen Marksman), Darkhûn line (6) and Balcoth horse archers; Easterling Bloodsworn, Pillar, Scout and Dragon Knight removed.
• Mordor (−13 / +20): the Uruk line cut from ten troops to five; Orc line rebuilt (9 — Archer, Fighter, Hunter, Impaler…); six Warg riders.
• Isengard (+13): a new Orc line (Grunt, Brawler, Butcher, Berserker…) alongside the Uruk-hai.
• Dol Guldur rebuilt (−12 / +12): the old dg_uruk_* berserker/howler/butcher line and the archer/warden/initiate/disciple units replaced by Khamûl's line (8), Goblin Harrier / Impaler / Fellbow (3) and a Giant Spider Rider.
• Gondor: five Lossarnach troops removed, three added. Gundabad: four removed, one added.
• Equipment changed on 151 Gondor, 91 Rhûn, 23 Dol Guldur and 17 Gundabad troops.

Armour — Gondor Regional Sets, Orc Kits, Stat Pass

• 2,544 items (was 2,368): 377 added, 201 removed, 2,090 re-statted.
• Gondor (+211 / −194): regional sets for Anórien (49), Lamedon (24), Serelond (22), Osgiliath (16) and Anfalas (13) replaced the legacy Swan Knight (30 pieces), Pelargir Marine helmet, Dol Amroth and Lord Marine sets.
• Mordor (+104): two orc kits, sk_md_orc_* (61) and sk_gn_orc_* (42).
• Rhûn (+22): Lôke-rim set. Dol Guldur (+19) and Isengard (+15): orc kits. Iron Hills (+5). Erebor: six legacy dwarf pieces removed.
• Stat pass: Rhûn trimmed across the board (head −6, body −5, leg −5); Rivendell buffed (arm +16, leg +10, head +9); Erebor head +17; Mordor arm +11, body −7; Iron Hills leg −10; Dunland leg −13.

Weapons, Shields & Mounts

• +31 / −21 weapons. Added: an 18-step Elven arrow quality ladder (wm_elven_arrow_q1–q4, v2–v4), the Gondor Lossarnach axe line (8 — one- and two-handed in black ash, silver and silver-full), two Swan Knight lances, a Gondor bow, a Gondor knight spear and a Pinnath Gelin spear. Removed: all twenty tiered rhun_1h_sword_a* variants and gond_spear2.
• Shields +7 / −2: three Gondor, two Pelargir, a pavise and Boromir's shield added; two legacy Gondor shields removed.
• Mounts +4: three Dol Guldur spider mounts and a Gondor starter cavalry horse.

Troops — Skill Rebalance (All Factions)

Every faction's troop roster received a comprehensive skill rebalance focused on role clarity:

• Infantry: Riding reduced to 0 across all factions; Bow/Crossbow zeroed on melee-focused troops
• Cavalry: Riding values increased at higher tiers (e.g., Rohan elite cavalry Riding 275 → 312)
• Ranged: Throwing redistributed — Dunland and Mordor elite troops buffed (up to 80), Isengard infantry zeroed
• Rohan: Cavalry buffed overall — TwoHanded significantly increased (55 → 160 at Tier 5), Athletics and Bow also raised
• Elven factions (Rivendell, Mirkwood): Skills standardized to round values (300, 320, 325); Crossbow universally zeroed; Rivendell cavalry Riding boosted (45–60 → 300–320)
• Rhun: Infantry/cavalry split sharpened — infantry Riding zeroed (was 28–38), cavalry Riding boosted
• Dol Guldur: Riding added to many units (0 → 10–40), indicating potential mounted capability
• Gundabad: Riding increased across the board (0/5 → 10–20 on infantry)
• General: Moderate reductions in primary combat skills for lower-tier troops (e.g., Gondor recruit Athletics 38 → 35, OneHanded 38 → 30)

New Troop

• Iron Hills Arbalest (Erebor) — New crossbow unit with upgrade path to Iron Hills Veteran Arbalest. Equipped with heavy dwarf crossbow, iron bolts, iron sword, and Iron Hills armor sets.

Lords

• Skills moved to templates: All lord characters now use skill_template references (e.g., SkillSet.spc_phalanx_skills) instead of hardcoded individual skill blocks
• Nazgul individualized with canonical names from Tolkien's extended lore:
  • "Nazgul, the Tainted" → Hoarmurath, the Iceking of Urd
  • "Nazgul, the Shadow of Northmen" → Adunabeth, the Golden King
  • "Nazgul, the Shadow of Umbar" → Dendra-Dwar, the Lord of Hounds
• Vorondir renamed (was Vorondil), age adjusted 78 → 54

Kingdoms

• Mirkwood: Renamed from "Kingdom of Lasgalen" → "Mirkwood Realm"; short name "Lasgalen" → "Mirkwood"
• Lothlorien: Added accent mark (Lothlorien → Lothlórien)
• Banner keys: Multiple kingdoms received custom-designed banner encodings replacing placeholder values
• Diplomacy: Simplified Umbar description; removed a war relationship entry; policy value adjustments

Cultures

• Civilian NPCs reverted to vanilla: All cultures had faction-specific civilian NPC references (villagers, caravan masters, merchants, guards, notables) replaced with vanilla Bannerlord equivalents (e.g., NPCCharacter.*_erebor → NPCCharacter.*_sturgia)
• Party templates: Faction-specific party templates replaced with vanilla equivalents
• Equipment rosters: Custom civilian equipment rosters replaced with vanilla defaults
• Wanderer/notable templates: Custom faction notables replaced with vanilla spc_notable_empire_* equivalents

XSLT Transforms

• New: spheroes.xslt — Adds lore backstory text to dead/historical lords via identity transform pattern
• New: splords.xslt — Extended lord renaming to LOTR equivalents with face/body properties and skill overrides
• Updated: lords.xslt — Refactored to cleaner attribute-preservation pattern; lord skill values updated
• Updated: spclans.xslt — Banner key overrides removed (now managed in XML data directly)
• Updated: spcultures.xslt — Culture NPC reference changes matching the vanilla revert
• Updated: spkingdoms.xslt — Minor kingdom transform adjustments

Files Changed

• 20 modified files, 2 new files (22 total)
• 14 troop XMLs, 1 lords XML, 2 kingdom/culture XMLs, 7 XSLT transforms