Empire what is a competitive 1600p inf. list

I'll start this off by saying I've got essentially zero experience with Empire outside of designing an army for myself and beginning the construction of it. I've only faced them once and never played them. That said, I can give a few thoughts!

Firstly, I'd drop the Dragonhelm and replace it with the Enchanted Shield and the Dragonbane Gem. Same points cost and you get one higher armor save.

I like the Cannon and the Volley Gun, the Volley Gun is definitely very good and I'd say that those are necessary in a competitive build.

I'm not sure about your big Halberdier block. I know that a lot of people run Halberdiers as their big core infantry block, but I've got a different idea, and it was how I designed my list. Halberdiers hit hardest of the three State Troop options, but they die fastest, meaning they aren't very well suited to be a hard anvil. My list features a unit around 40-strong of Swordsmen and then 2 detachments of 15 Halberdiers at 2500. The Swordsmen are the most survivable State Troop having a 5+ instead of 6+ armor and they've got a parry save. The WS4 will also help against some enemies. The idea is that the Halberdiers will only be engaging the enemy's flanks while the Swordsmen hold the enemy in place. Not sure if it would work that well in practice, but that's how I'm building my Empire army.

Something to consider when you scale up the list, I'd have a Warrior Priest and probably a Captain in every infantry block if you can, Warrior Priest first. The Hatred and the Lizardmen leadership will do wonders for the soldiery. Plus some of the Battle Prayers are crazy good (the reroll to wound one is awesome).

Finally, I've got a list design theory suggestion. I think you need more shooting, by a significant amount. Your list is extremely slow moving and unlike most infantry-based lists you've got no fast elements at all. When I run an infantry list, which I like to do a lot, I've always got a unit of cavalry in there to allow me to take the offense. You've just got 2 M4 infantry blocks and no chaff, your list cannot attack with any reasonable assumption of success. That means you need to have enough shooting to force the enemy to come to you and to destroy the enemy's fast units that will outmaneuver you. I think you've got the beginning of that, but you just need more. A Wood Elf list will be extremely hard for you to face as they'll outshoot you and you'll never catch them. I'd suggest reducing the size of the Halberdiers and Greatswords both and adding in either another Hellblaster or some Handgunners, or both. Also, I'd really suggest using the Detachment system if you do something like that. 3 sets of 10 Handgunners is a very mean regimental group because all 30 get to Stand and Shoot but your enemy will only ever kill 10 in their charge.

Again, please take this with a grain of salt, I've got little experience with Empire so I'm drawing on other armies and stats more than actual combat! Hope this helps!

So copperpotmd can probably share his also limited empire experience with the archer detachment mage bunker, who also looks like your general. If your opponent has anything remotely fast, it could go south fast.

Short version, I wiped out his general in turn two with a couple charges and overruns in a Blood and Glory, winning me the game. He couldn’t possibly have foreseen it tbh.

What I was saying with the 3 sets of Handgunners was a Regimental unit of 10 and two detachments of 10. Sorry for the confusion!

Ah, whoops! There's my inexperience with the Empire book showing.

Then after some modifiers:

Second Draft
The Empire

Battle Wizard Lord: Level 4 Wizard; Lore of Light; Talisman of Preservation 245

Arch Lector: heavy armour; shield; Dragonhelm 118

Captain of the Empire: full plate armour; shield; Battle Standard; Standard of Discipline 108

Battle Wizard: Lore of Light; Dispel Scroll 90

30 Halberdiers: Sergeant; musician; standard bearer 210
• 5 Archers 35
• 5 Archers 35

5 Empire Knights: musician 120

14 Crossbowmen: musician 136

Great Cannon 120

21 Greatswords: Count's Champion; musician; standard bearer 261

Helblaster Volley Gun 120

1 598 points

I think it's a decent list but not sure I would feel the need for 5 magic levels and prayers at 1600 points.

Seems excessive, I would prefer more bodies.

Note that archers make a better Wizard bunker, because of the -1 to Hit and the improved mobility through Free Reform. If you put the Al in the Greatswords, the standard bearer could take the Standard of Discipline, giving the General Ld 10. Stubborn Ld 10 with a re-roll from the BSB is almost unbreakable.
As I indicated before, our characters have a supporting role, for which they need to survive. If they kill something, that is just a bonus. In this respect, the Shrieking Blade is better (and cheaper) than the SoM. Fear is not what it used to be, but still might help your character (and his unit) to survive longer.