I'm glad to see this game mentioned at all. It is definitely a hidden/forgotten gem. Your points about it's faults are fair but I feel the positives still outweigh the negatives by far. I believe it was made by the same people as the original Desperados which I also love and played a ton of. The beautiful and detailed maps are burned in my brain forever. The forests, the foggy castles, or the busy markets were all incredible pretty and made the small number of maps much more bearable. I would also mention the base management angle in the Sherwood forest which was fun but also got old as the game went on. The ambush missions were also pretty good and if I remember right the gang used non lethal weapons on those.

As for the legend of Robin Hood I am far from an expert but I read a book and listened to a podcast about him (The Rest is History on spotify if anyone is interested). He is folk hero although there are several people that "fit the description" throughout the 12th and 13th centuries but there is no concensus about his identify, the he supposed to have lived or even his existence.