One thing I did miss since patching up (or maybe going to VI) was the way mercs behaved. I think it was the vanilla v1 which allowed you to not only merge merc units, but merge them into non-merc units (or putting them on the proper payroll to recognise valiant service, as I liked to think of it ).

One of my favourite changes was the improved re-inforcement deployment, because that finally allowed for multi-stack battles to be properly planned for rather than taking the reinforcements "as they come".