Westerners Weak?

[Kaptain O]

Someone mentioned in the thread about Lost that the Westerners are usually considered weak.  Why is that? I haven't played enough to see that come through, is it due to their semi-focus on ranged attacks (with Reloading 2) or do they have weak officers or is it something else?

[Red Terror]

Well individually they are weak (for the most part.)  Plus with the shooting rules they are at a bit of a disadvantage.

Also, they really need to not lose support pieces in order to be effective. 

All that said I actually don't consider them weak. 

[Balgin]

As Red Terror said I don't consider the Westerners weak. They're delicate. Yes, they've got the highest armour values in the game. Unfortunately they have low life (when compared to the non human factions) and a low damage output. Many of the demons and lost are obscene when it comes to womping out the damage. Westerners can do well if you can pull off a lot of synergies and combinations. Unfortunately as they tend to drop like flies it's not easy to maintain such synergies for long.

The demons and the lost are very forgiving factions. You can make mistakes and still play on. The Saracens are a very defensive faction and the westerners are like a house of cards. Take one out and the whole lot can fall apart.

[Liancour]

Grenade are not weak. 
Westerners are subtle to play but they can be very effective in various combination.

[Nayfan]

Grenades seem to be the big hitter for the westerners in my opinion.. such a short range BUT very devastating!
The rest of the army is fairly poor as far as dishing out damage, and yeah they have good armour but it seems like they can just get smashed irregardless 

[B-Loved Wanderer]

Don't forget Sara. She is all sorts of awesome!! Sara, two grenadiers and some other stuff: pyromaniacs wet dream

[Jens]

Even though the melee damage profile isn't as impressive from most models - the missionary makes them quite powerful with the ability to grant an additional hit in melee. Scoring 5 hits is almost impossible against anything with DEF 4+ ... westeners actually have a chance that way.
The fairly cheap blades for hire with their rapid strike attack ability are a pretty powerful support unit too.
Many frontline models have tenacious, terror, eager and reach.. makes them pretty effective to protect the more fragile units. The westeners are rather specialised and have to work together... not that much the buffing part like the saracens, but the attacks have to be co-ordinated.

Besides they work well with many of mercenaries.

[Balgin]

Grenade are not weak. 
Westerners are subtle to play but they can be very effective in various combination.

I tend to avoid using grenades with westerners. Too many squishy guys in the band and too much friendly fire can't be a good thing. That blast template is massive!

[Liancour]

Sending Baptiste in the melee and then launching grenade on it is quite a common tactic (Baptiste is immune to fire).

The swashbuckler is a really good unit, very versatile and a high def.
Dopplesöldners are also very effective unit, their protection is very useful against a lot of damage source.

But sure, there's no "autowin button". You have to think carefully all your move, all your fight, more than the demons, for example. But I really don't think it's a weak army. It's even the most effective against Immortals (because of shooting).