Hardest faction

[Parallel Pain]

I still say it depends on playing style. Having trained myself to swarm and swarm and swarm in Vanilla, and having the patience to do so, tactically nomads are a breeze for me. Even VH battle you just lure the general off, swarm him, and swarm everyone else.

Having played through Saka Rauka and most of Saba, I have to say tactically Saba is harder, having weak units (actually due to lack of money in VH campaign I have to resort to using skirmishers to hold the battle line instead of melee infantry)

But strategically, due to lack of fund, Saka Rauka is harder. I had to cover a front line of 4 provinces going north-south-east with two half stacks, leaving an open flank through the mountains, and still did not have any money for rebel-clearing. Even by end-game I only had 3 front-line armies even with a bigger empire, and my Saba right now has 5 (of course I had to save the 500k for the Saka Rauka victory but heck).