Recruitment of locals

[Rex Armeniae]

I just played EB (final version) for RTW, and I like a feature in it, where you can recruit units from the settlement depending on where its located. I.e Im armenia and I have conquered a city in Pontos, Now I can recruit Pontic Light infantry, Pontic skirmish cavalry etc.

And I know about the AOR function in BC, But I haven really got how it works, and what AOR is all about... and what makes it unique and good.

So I was wondering if there is something similiar to the feature in EB in BC. (As AOR, and if it is the same function as the feature in EB)

Thanks :tacticalw
Arsen

[teh.frickin.pope]

Any levy unit will be available to people that own the province, regardless of who owns it. Kypchak in egypt recruit egyptian levies. But that's only if I understand it right, which is a pretty big if.

[Rex Armeniae]

Ah ok, well thats pretty similiar. But I wonder,
Like if (still armenia) I conquer parthia then I can recruit not only levies but i.e Median HA or median Skirmishers, a variety of "levy" units. Will it be like this or will it be like in BC if I conquer Egypt i get a halfgood(or rly bad) levy spearman and a levy archer and thats it, to protect the cities in the far borders of my empire?!


edit:
Found a post by mirage that explains a little better about AOR.

"The basic idea is that every faction will have "home regions" where it an recruit all its faction units. (ie for kingdom of jerusalem it will be the mediteranean coasts + parts of anatolia).

Once a faction goes outside those zones only "levy units" will be recruitable.

So if the Kingdom of Jerusalem conquers Baghdad they will only be able to recruit middles easter levy units from there and THATS IT. This is meant to challenge the player.

So when campaigning afar reinforcements will be late and you will be challenged to preserve as many of your elite units as you can, cuz you won't get to magically make european knights pop up in Baghdad."

[Ahiga]

Like if (still armenia) I conquer parthia then I can recruit not only levies but i.e Median HA or median Skirmishers, a variety of "levy" units. Will it be like this or will it be like in BC if I conquer Egypt i get a halfgood(or rly bad) levy spearman and a levy archer and thats it, to protect the cities in the far borders of my empire?!

Yup. You will only get levies in Egypt if you conquer as Armenia. We want there to be a real slow and methodical nature to conquests, now rushing about without any repercussions. If Armenia expects to conquer egypt and just slap together a levy force to hold it from the locals and focus all their attention on the next big conquest...they should expect to lose it. Same with anyone conquering an area outside of their native AOR.

I briefly put forth an idea of Auxilia to top the levies, which would be better local troops made available at least two tiers after native faction's gain access to it. So that, for instance, in castles tier 3, you could build a unit equivalent to a native faction's tier 1 unit. At tier 4, it'd be tier 1 or 2 equivalent, and at tier 5, it'd be tier 1-3 equivalent.

This would make it so that the invading faction was hindered in a way the native one was not. But this system proved to be needless as we've found mercenaries fulfill the role of military troops for non-native recruitment wonderfully. Hence, for now it's not planned, and I do not believe it will be. :original:

[Rex Armeniae]

That sounds good Thanks for explaining.
But Im also wondering, Levies... is it onl Dismounted units or is there any Levy horsemen? (Could be some light cavalry to hunt down broken units)

[Miraj]

We might just throw in a new "auxilia" building castles and allow you to recruit cheaper variants of local mercs. Although its still under discussion.

But honestly, there will be *plenty* of local mercs that you can recruit in foreign lands that you can complement you forces with. It works to the same effect really.

[Ahiga]

That sounds good Thanks for explaining.
But Im also wondering, Levies... is it onl Dismounted units or is there any Levy horsemen? (Could be some light cavalry to hunt down broken units)

Thus far it's only levys on foot.

There will be enough widespread light cavalry mercenaries that you can recruit them for a limited role of chasing broken units.

[dmesa]

(sorry, my english its still raw)
hi guys!

i think the idea of taking some levies and mercs into my main army its very good, you will have to change your tactics and that will mean a lot of fun, like in RTR, where i fought battles only with my roman general commanding foreign mercs and levies.

it means that you'll never get bored playing with the same units, and that you´ll be more carefull conquering foreign lands, something very real and accurate.

[Sejanus]

What about Janissaries? Shouldn't they be recruitable only in Christian regions?

[John I Tzimisces]

What about Janissaries? Shouldn't they be recruitable only in Christian regions?

Recruitment based on province religion isn't possible(right?), it is however possible to limit janissary (or any other unit) recruitment to a geographically traditionally christian region (aka caucasus, anatolia...pretty much everywhere west of iran and mesopotamia there are significant christian populations to this day, in syria, egypt, the levant...)

[Randarkmaan]

I don't think the Janissaries feature heavily in BC, and if they did, they would not be recruitable only in Christian lands, as their main barracks and training centre (and I think only one, for quite some time) was in Istanbul. Though the recruits themselves were children of rural Balkan Christians. Not to even mention that in BC's timeline, the Ottomans had not yet "invented" the devshirme, they basically just converted Christian prisoners of war and had them trained as infantry (because of the mentality: "Who whould actually want to be an infantryman?").

Also if the Ottomans were only to be able to train Janissaries in christians lands, then the Mamluks would only be trainable in Caucasus, slavic lands and central Asia... similar with Ghulams. But they are trainable in their respective owners' lands as that is where they were trained, though not were they were recruited.

[Miraj]

Yeah, what he ^^ said. The Kypchak slaves that eventually established the Mamluk dynasty were actually all the way from around the Crimean and Caucusus. But the Ayyubids actually bought them at Damascus or Constantinople. Then they were trained and armed in Egypt.

[Bernem]

back to AOR System, if I'm plying Kypchaks and decide to horde at the very beginning of the Game and conquer some Land in Egypt... then it would be a great disadvantage for me if I can only recruit levies in the entire game and so no one would use the hording possibility. is there any solution?

[Ahiga]

Our plans are for nomadic troops (Turkomans, and all Kypchaks except for the Slavs) to be recruitable without an AOR, or with an AOR limited to only places where they could find good pasture.

So the Kypchak's ability to Migrate will be hindered mainly in the lack of your good medium infantry and spearmen. Otherwise, you'll still have your troops.

[Bernem]

yeah remember having read this... this is logical considering that by hording you simulate the migration of a people. But it's a pitty for the slavic troops, so I think I'll wait until the mongols arrive and counter them with a horde of my own

this would make a great AAR

[Rex Armeniae]

Awesome, I think the sound of auxilia is good... but still like you say, I think also that Mercenaries + Levies will be a good enough backbone in a army inb the far borders of an empire (and off coure you'll have to send reinforcement of your elite troops from the kingdom itself).

How do you mean by Hording? Can Kypchaks and turkomans horde as it was in Barbarian invasion? Or is this a new feature you guys implement?

Cheers

[Player44]

The idea of local recruitment is pretty cool, but I got a question. Say you've expanded out of your AoR, and you have a city and a castle. Since they both can only recruit levies, won't castles become useless, as there advantage of better military recruitment is lost, while the cities have there other features? Also, I remember hearing that say if your KoJ and you conquer india, you could recruit indian levies as well as a unique unit, in this case a basic elephant. So if your kingdom of jerusalem and you conquered constantinople, would you be able to recruit some unique byzantine unit?

[Bernem]

Awesome, I think the sound of auxilia is good... but still like you say, I think also that Mercenaries + Levies will be a good enough backbone in a army inb the far borders of an empire (and off coure you'll have to send reinforcement of your elite troops from the kingdom itself).

How do you mean by Hording? Can Kypchaks and turkomans horde as it was in Barbarian invasion? Or is this a new feature you guys implement?

Cheers

When you loose your last settlement your faction becomes a horde, like in BI, some factions can horde several times like the kypchaks, resembling that they were a nomadic people, other factions can only horde once

http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...ighlight=horde

[AlphaDelta]

won't castles become useless, as there advantage of better military recruitment is lost, while the cities have there other features?

Yes this is a problem we face. This is why I originally proposed the idea of a local recruitment building that would let you recreate tier 1 and 2 units from the region.

For example if the KoJ invaded Egypt they would be able to recruit ajnads and nubians etc. The problem is that this creates big, big problems on the custom battle screen where essentially every faction to recreate a huge number of units. They lose their identity.

Truth be told, factions that should be able to expand rapidly, will be able to. Notably factions that can natively recruit turkomans will be able to move right across the map. Factions such as Byz and the Ayyubids get a fairly large recruitment zone to allow them to move and expand. Factions such as Jerusalem and Georgia, whom we wish to prevent from expanding rapidly, will find it tough the further they move.

Also factions that can recruit ghulams, which is most Islamic factions, will have less hinderence in their expansion. Key cities will prove invaluable to the recruitment of upper tier Ghulams.

[Bernem]

The problem is that this creates big, big problems on the custom battle screen where essentially every faction to recreate a huge number of units. They lose their identity.

Well this is a problem that I've seen solved in Pro Deo et Rege. As this mod introduces AOR every faction has a lot of local levies to recruit, but in the Custom battle screen the factions unique units are shown first so the uniqueness of each faction is kept. Unlike in EB, where one can't tell which units are unique and which are mercs...