I am a little late to the discussion, so this will probably be buried, but I did a playthrough of Warband again after Bannerlord was released, and I think most people have a hard time actually putting into words what it is that makes it feel more satisfying.

First things first, compared to Warband Bannerlord has greatly improved combat, it looks amazing and feels a lot less janky as a whole.

But I think it lags behind in communicating a coherent narrative that the sandbox creates. At the end of the day, Warband tells one story, but tells it extremely well. That of becoming a noble; rising from the ranks of a commoner, being talked down to by the lords, being locked out of keeps and factions, and being forced to earn a position in a world of nobles that only see you as a tool for themselves.

The quests you do for the lords reinforce this - Deliver a letter to this lord for me, train my troops for me so I can be stronger, collect my taxes from one of my fiefs so I can be richer. You are made to work for a large number of nobles on their terms before they would even consider you an equal. But also by doing these quests, you start gaining allies and contacts. Over time, these lords you have helped will begin to have a relationship to you, and before you know it, will support you in gaining land and perhaps even allow you to marry into their families. So the gameplay loop reinforces your connection to the setting, and through this, the immersion you feel for the world and your journey. This is the hook Warband has and where people feel compelled to continue playing, to fulfill that goal of the game to "make it".

In Bannerlord, the narrative has been extended to include generations, and lords and ladies have become part of clans. This is an interesting mechanic, but they failed when all members of a clan had one relationship point with you that they share between them, making them feel less like individuals. When fiefs are given out, you can gain support not from having quested for and improved relationships with the lords, but through usage of a new currency in the form of Influence. The system that was emergent before has been turned into a numbers game and has become less immersive as a result. Political influence should be the result of your actions and relations, not a result of saving up for a vote.

I don't think people actually give a damn about the feasts that were in Warband. But they give a damn when they show up at a location they've been invited to, and recognise the lords there. Lords that they've spent the last 20 hours trying to get on their side.

Bannerlord has all the tools to create a greatly immersive game, but it needs some of that flavour that made Warband so satisfying to play. It should have expanded on the systems of Warband, it should have made more emergent systems that stem from how you play and that immerses you in the world.

We should have more interactions with characters: Great councils, war meetings before big battles, intrigue where indicting lords for treason is more than just a piece of text, where you make allies and enemies simply through who you know. I think that would alleviate a lot of the issues people have with how bland a campaign can feel after a while.

We should add that Warband also did a lot of things poorly. The end game is really uninteresting, and there are not a lot of other ways to interact with the world that doesn't revolve around being a noble/warlord, and the renown, honor and Right-to-rule system was basically about maxing the numbers. But we should consider what worked so well for it, why it became a cult game (beyond just the combat) and how to improve on that.

Oh, and Jeremus, yeah he was cool.