When I died by a single bullet, 30 seconds in to my first battle of the game, I knew something was off.
Would there be vast, complex economies to manage? Would there be more complex relationships with the lords and nobles of the game? Would there be sprawling advances to how one manages their large armies?
To say "no" is being too fair. This .. um.. psuedo-expansion-pack seems to actually be a large step down from it's original.
It does borrow ideas from the large collection of player-created mods that made the original Mount and Blade more streamlined while expanding on what actions are available to you.
Now by default, (as per original Mount and Blade modding) one can visit town elders without having to enter the town and make your way too them, a process that used to be an extreme waste of time. Also, there are many city patrols and various addittional types of peasant and bandits, ensuring that a fight is never too hard to find.
Various additional missions have been added, but are few and far between. You will still get every town asking you to do missions such as "escort cattle", a time consuming and tedious process.
There are a few other gripes, like the overworld map. The first Mount and Blade world, a fictional land, contained a sampling of grass fields, rolling hills, snowy lands, coastal territory, and forests. With Fire and Steel has... grass.
Additional troops, once recruited from every village based on renown and reputation, has been replaced by Mercenary Camps, a small handful of encampments which allow one to purchase a specified number of troops, based on melee, ranged, or cavalry. Sometimes, you will be told that those troops are unavailable. That would have been nice to know ahead of time, in some, I don't know, user interface method?
You are able to purchase additional equipment for your troops, which is easy, and for the most part, a nice addition to the game. But this also lacks customization, forcing you to choose between a only few pieces of equipment at a time.
As with the first, you can befriend and hire several companions, party members with full equipment customization, their own levels and experience-based growth similar to the player. Since the player cannot possibly hope to achieve all the required skills to optimize the army's power by himself, they will be required. However, as with the first, it will not take them very long to start bickering with each other, often in immature ways that will frustrate you early on, and leave you begging for a way to just shut them up.
As is most commonly associated with this expansion pack, guns play a large part, replacing bows and crossbows as the predominant weapons. (Though they are still in the game.) If you are picturing a field of armed infantry firing at each other on a battlefield with matchlock rifles, with clouds of smoke emanating from their gun barrels, you're right!
..However, as you will notice very early on, it does not work in a player-driven RPG. Imagine Cloud from Final Fantasy 7 dying early on, because no matter how gigantic his sword, his enemies have frickin' machine guns. That doesn't sound like much fun, does it?
They went way overboard on the gun realism, here. Guns will now one-or-two shot most targets, making standing still on the battlefield for even a moment an almost guaranteed death, and leaving your horse to attack on foot just as deadly. This actually might not be as bad if the battle didn't end the second you died. Going back to player-made mods again, some allowed you to spectate the battle after being incapacitated.
Using guns yourself is not much more fun. Although you do, in fact, one-shot enemies as well... well, ask yourself why there are no realistic Revolutionary War FPSes. Probably because no one wants to fire one shot before placing another bullet, pouring gun power, pressing it down with the pole, and then you are ready to fire another single shot.
One thing odd about the game is the selective realism... the bows and swords still will often take a number of hits to kill an enemy. This is the good amount of balance that was achieved with the first Mount and Blade.
Instead of being an exciting addition to the series, the guns only bring frustration. An half-FPS half-third person action game should at the very least, not punish a player for wanting to take a leading role in the action. Instead, this game is like playing an RPG of Shogun: Total War 2 as a general unit, where your life is most valuable, and must be protected and placed out of harm's way more than the others.