I'd like to start off by saying that I really love this mod, I have played it since before the map was added in and I have been a stalwart fan since then. I love Tolkien and am a massive fan of his world, and I also love the mod for bringing his world to an open world game such as minecraft. I do believe that recently the combat system has fallen off a bit and been pushed to the side in favour of other mechanics of the mod. Though I do understand that, I think maybe this would be a good time to just update the combat system in a small update due to the mod currently being moved to 1.15.
I am going to have two different suggestions in this thread; Changing weapons and armour based off of lore as well as some modifications with the current combat system to make different weapons more useful and fair.
The first suggestion is going to be regarding bows. Bows a while ago made a lot of sense regarding lore and were also pretty balanced, but recently in my opinion have been changed for the worse. Below is a list of bows which I believe should be changed to fit the lore and also the factions more, as well as for balance sometimes.
Gondor Bows = Boost the Range.
Blackroot Vale Bows= Boost the Range.
Ranger Bows= Boost the Damage and Range.
Gundabad Uruk Bows = Boost the Speed.
Gondorian bows should have more range than orc bows in my opinion. In lore Gondorian bows were better than Orc bows and it would make more sense if a Gondorian longbow had more range than an orc bow.
Blackroot Vale bows should get a bit more range as again Gondorian bows were longbows, and thus would have more range than other bows. A Blackroot Vale bow should not have the same range as a rhunic bow would would have most likely been used by horsemen more than anything.
Ranger bows are just terrible right now, and need a big buff as it does not make any sense whatsoever why they suck so much. Rangers main weapon is a bow, and Rangers of the North have been very terrible due to their range being nerfed a while ago to vanilla tier. Making their damage a tiny bit better and giving them the range they had before would allow Rangers to be stronger again and balance out their faction, as right now they are arguably the weakest faction.
Gundabad Uruk Bows should just get a bit more speed as they are meant for the elite Uruks of Gundabad, and it would allow them to compete more against Elven and Dalish archers.
The second part will suggest modifying the combat system.
This mainly deals with just updating some weapons and allowing enchantments on some weapons.
Pikes should be allowed to have reach on them, as they are next to useless currently as a spear does only 1 less damage and has way more speed and only has 13% less reach (Less than half of a block). Allowing pikes to even just get a reach of 225% would make pikes more useful again as you would be able to outreach a spear.
Warhammers should be buffed, as making their damage the same as battleaxes made them useless, as their attack speed is lower than battleaxes. In my opinion, I saw no need to nerf warhammers and thought they were very fine being 1 damage above battleaxes.
Regarding battleaxes, I do not know if it is just me, but Lossarnach battleaxes are extremely underwhelming, being iron tier. I don't know how this hasn't been changed as the lossarnach axemen in my opinion would have better tier axes or the same tier axes as most other factions. I do not understand how Gondor, a faction that was known for their elite armies, would have axemen, which already have crappy armour, have terrible battleaxes. It does not make sense that a much more sophisticated faction thats army is comprised mainly of axemen would have the same tier axe as a faction of the plains that uses spears to hunt food and kill enemies.
"Behind him marched proudly a dusty line of men, well-armed and bearing great battle-axes; grim-faced they were, and shorter and somewhat swarthier than any men that Pippin had yet seen in Gondor." - Return of the King, Minas Tirith
I feel like considering that the most notable thing about them is their axes would have a bit stronger axes.
I would like to disclaim that this might seem very one sided towards buffing good, but in my opinion it is extremely unbalanced towards evil right now. Evil does have the strongest troops and armour and weapons, excluding the bow, but since the change of bow stats a few updates ago, the bows of the free peoples became rather weak, and considering that Eolean modifications are a thing, I do not see why they were nerfed, as that modifier already has made bows a lot less powerful.
Looking forward to hearing back from you all! I hope we share some of the same ideals and hopefully can get this changed in the mod to make it even more amazing!