Fighting Commanders and Equipment.

[Endoperez]

The low-level items shouldn't be very useful, but they should have some use. Of course, the items without any real powers aren't very good (armor piercing isn't enough alone), and some abilities are more powerful than others (SCs have often have higher str than att, so swords are better than axes) even without considering magic. Some items are just hard to use well, because their main use would be as special replacement weapons for normal units (Star of Heroes isn't that good for an SC who should kill critter/turn or could use something that works better against another SC).

Its the second ones I'd like to use more. Star of Heroes is a good example, as is Evening Star, Fire Bola, Flesh Eater, Vine Whip, Rat Tail, Shield of the Accursed (it is easier to just cast Horror Mark against SCs) etc. The chance of losing them is just too big. Maybe, when a commander with bodyguards dies, they should return (most of) his items with his body.
Also, one reason mundane commanders are not used much is the fact that you must choose between buying a mage or a non-magical commander. I'd like to be able to recruit both martial and scholarly commander every turn. This would let me to buy the usual 1st-turn mage, but also get another Spy as Ulm or a Tribal King to levy Slaves as Mictlan. I'm not sure what caste the priests should be in, as some of them lead armies and some of them act as morale raisers, and DomIII having more national priestly spells might change their role a little.

[Wish]

shield of accursed is by far the best shield that isn't unique, primarily because of its stats, not its horror marking. most shield give lousy defence, but that shield gives 7.

For a while I had a pretty good setup to give an assasin or succubus which included no unique items. rod of incineraton, shield of the accursed, boots of stone where the mainstays. the helmet could either be the wraith crown or the elemental helm, the first providing ethereal form and a small set of undead guards, the second would kill weak commanders on its own. (i use amon hotep once unique items are available, nothing like magic resistance and invulnerability, all in one hat. The best thing of being a wish based pretender is that you can steal unique items back from the computer.) the trinkets can beanything really, gauntlets to add more protection, etc. i usually go with a ring of regeneration and an amulet of antimagic. it made an assassin nearly unstoppable on its own.

now for a single leader who is nearly unstoppable there are some neat combinations of items. one of my favorite is fenris' pelt, soulstone of the wolves, lifelong protection, wraithlord crown, any boots (teleportation boots are nice on this one), any weapons, but faithful is nice for added luck, and maybe a shield that plays an active role, like aegis or scutta volturnus, or for the theme of added battlefield creatures: lantern shield. alternatively you can go with some staff that allows for summoning, and seet them to summon more critters into battle. you actually end up with so many wolves and undead and imps that you usually can't even get to the enemy.

[AztraGoth]

I just use the regular weak commanders as "Carriers Of The Holy Wine" just so my troops can party hardy all night long (Love low-magic/abunch of national troops settings)

[NTJedi]

I usually try to have scouts which travel with the armies in stealth mode hold my bags of wine because if the army dies at least you don't lose these items.

[Morkilus]

Ah, the Ninja Lunch Lady tactic. I suppose it was stupid to have my Black Knight lords packing the grub-sword and charging into battle if the grunts would starve after his blaze of glory.