I played Broken Crescent

[delra]

BC is quite an event in M2TW world, so I've spent some time recently with this mod (and am planning to spend some more until SS6.0). It was great but I am still addicted to SS so while playing BC, I kept thinking which features present there could improve SS. Here go some of those I liked the most:

- Huge (and I mean really huge) mercenary pools around some crucial cities, especially Baghdad. Something like this should be made for Constantinople in SS and some other huge capitals. Both realistic and challenging for potential conquerors.
- Caravan stops and steppe traders buidings increasing trade in steppe and desert cities
- Huge trade bonus for coastal cities due to three levels of "sea trader" building there. For example "Mediterranean trader". +10% trade per each level.
- A very nice idea to make priests be available only on very high mosque/church levels. It slows down religious conversion to far more realistic values and makes warmongering much harder.
- Lower cost of merchants, in BC they pay for themselves even if not working in Dongola
- Slave trade line of buildings allowing muslim to recruit ghulam line of units in their metropolies.
- Bigger horse archer units, RC cut them down too much and it hurts some faction while in BC there's real fun with them.
- Only late bodyguards. Most bodyguards available also as top tier cavalry units with bigger size.
- Mercenaries often start with good experience, silver chevron is not that uncommon for them, it really adds to their battle value.
- Getting more experienced units is easier because most barracks add to experience of units trained there (not only top-tier units and not only +1, +2 experience like it is now in SS) and because smiths improve their experience. Also each faction gets some top-elite gold-chevron units at the beginning to have some fun with. Something like a demo version of your late armies to encourage you to spend longer time in each campaign.
- Great AOR system. Not perfect yet but it adds a lot to the game. We really need one for SS, better sooner than later.

This is my list of ideas for future SS versions. What do you guys think?

[Inhuman One]

There are some good ideas there, I like:

-Recruiting priests on a higher level. We cant execute foreign priests for heresy after all (while I really want to)

-lower cost of merchants. Outside of the desert there should be opportunities for them to earn their pay.

-huge mercenary pools around big cities. This does sound good and I tried to edit such a thing but failed.

-slave trade line of buildings. All muslim factions seem to have slave soldiers of some kind, this will help putting them apart from the free soldiers. Increasing barracks levels should be required to improve the slave trade buildings.

-more experienced units. I cant see why low tier units shouldnt benefit from the increased facilities of better barracks.

I still hate AOR with a passion though. I dont want limitations in recruitment next to settlement and castle levels.

[schulthies]

I agree with you delra, I was thinking the exact same things.

And I know AOR can be a huge pain in the @§§.. but seriously.. I think that level of realism would add huge amounts of fun to the game and increased strategy. You aren't supposed to be able to recruit Longbowmen in Egypt..

However with AOR being implemented we seriously need to have movement points increased..

[hellfire15]

You aren't supposed to be able to recruit Longbowmen in Egypt..

why not? if you teach the people there how to do it?

[schulthies]

I can see where your coming from, but that didn't really happen in history. Most fighting units kept to what they knew. And fought how the people before them fought.

And so yeah you can recruit French archers.. Frankish knights.. Gothic knights in Muslim countries.. just doesn't sound like that would happen to me..

Maybe after auxiliary system similar to what Rome Total Realism Had..

I would be fine with the current system if the further away from you capital the longer it would take to train and recruit new units. Simulating increased adaption/training time or maybe shipping the troops in from the homeland. However I don't think thats even remotely possible..

[Captain Irish]

why not? if you teach the people there how to do it?

You know that longbowmen were basically trained from birth, right? It would take many, many years for an Egyptian who's probably never even seen, let alone held or used, a longbow in his life to become proficient enough to use it effectively in a battle. Especially against a faction that has troops who have mastered it.

[Gatorgolfer]

Janissaries, at least originally, were taken from Christian families when the boys were fairly young. So that's a comparison that is close with the longbow training.

[Captain Irish]

I agree with each point and especially the AoR idea. It is unrealistic to recruit Norse units in Africa, Muslim units from entirely Christian provinces, etc. and elite troops in general should largely be restricted to a faction's "home provinces" or at least regions with the same "culture"

Europa Barborum (RTW mod) really nailed this concept. Instead of building individual structures for missile, infantry and cavalry units, you build one structure that is costly and takes between 4-10 turns to build. It is upgradable depending on how adaptable the province is to your faction. the "home provinces" can build and recruit anything your faction has, while less adaptable provinces have lesser infrastructures available to them.

It may not be everyone's cup of tea but it really adds interesting facets and strategy to the game and makes it more realistic to how it really was in the medieval era. England, for example, couldn't sail to Tunis, take over the castle and within a few years produce a new garrison of a few thousand knights from that settlement and then move on to Algiers with the conquering force. They would have to stay and pacify the population for quite some time while recruiting lesser troops from amongst the willing natives. Other than sailing fresh (and loyal) English troops from home they'd have no other choice.

Nothing grinds my gears like losing a 90%+ Catholic settlement to jihad and having the other faction inform me "BTW, we're training gold chevron jannissary units in your old castle we just captured. The Catholic men that populate the region were all to happy to oblige!"

I don't expect this to be implemented but it's nice wishful thinking!

[Inhuman One]

you know how I see it? when you take over a city, those of your own people come live there, arriving with the trade fleets and such. Soldiers could arrive through this as well.

So if a unit of Longbowmen would be trained in Cairo, I would consider a part of them to have arrived from other provinces, and a part being drawn from the population that becomes more and more english over the years.

If you want AOR, increase the mercenary pools greatly. then you can use the local population where ever you are on the map and dont need to use your own units.

[Captain Irish]

you know how I see it? when you take over a city, those of your own people come live there, arriving with the trade fleets and such. Soldiers could arrive through this as well.

So if a unit of Longbowmen would be trained in Cairo, I would consider a part of them to have arrived from other provinces, and a part being drawn from the population that becomes more and more english over the years.

If you want AOR, increase the mercenary pools greatly. then you can use the local population where ever you are on the map and dont need to use your own units.

Okay, so this scenario would play out as follows given your logic:

ENGLISH PEASANT #1: Hey Wally, life sucks as a Poor English Peasant with no real trade skills, what should be do?

ENGLISH PEASANT #2: Gee Tommy, the king's brother just conquered Cairo. Even though we possess no viable skill, economic, military or otherwise, let's sail across the known world to live in a hostile region with a climate completely unlike our own where almost everyone will hate us. I'm sure we'll find work there and lead happy lives. And failing all else, we can train as longbowmen there, at the Cairo Royal Longbowmen Training Academy! I mean, we've never used one before since we're Poor English Peasants but I'm sure the years of painstaking practice will pay off... assuming we don't die of cholera or plague first. Or get killed by the incredibly hostile Muslim population.

ENGLISH PEASANT #1: Top drawer! Let's book passage on a trade fleet! Because we all know trade fleets depart regularly from York to Cairo, why I bet there's one waiting now. And I'm sure they'll let us sail for free as we could never afford passage on our own!

ENGLISH PEASANT #2: We can't be the only one with this great idea, I'm sure thousands of other likeminded commoners will follow in our footsteps

[Munchies]

How many mercenaries are we talking about hanging around a city/province?
Mercenaries were a pain in the butt, not only to invading armies, but also to the local populous.
A big city with a tight grip on law would not allow countless numbers of mercenaries to roam around the territory... :/
We are talking about mass chaos here.

More mercenaries are good as long as they are not too numerous. They also cost a LOT more to upkeep than regular troops.

[schulthies]

Okay, so this scenario would play out as follows given your logic:

ENGLISH PEASANT #1: Hey Wally, life sucks as a Poor English Peasant with no real trade skills, what should be do?

ENGLISH PEASANT #2: Gee Tommy, the king's brother just conquered Cairo. Even though we possess no viable skill, economic, military or otherwise, let's sail across the known world to live in a hostile region with a climate completely unlike our own where almost everyone will hate us. I'm sure we'll find work there and lead happy lives. And failing all else, we can train as longbowmen there, at the Cairo Royal Longbowmen Training Academy! I mean, we've never used one before since we're Poor English Peasants but I'm sure the years of painstaking practice will pay off... assuming we don't die of cholera or plague first. Or get killed by the incredibly hostile Muslim population.

ENGLISH PEASANT #1: Top drawer! Let's book passage on a trade fleet! Because we all know trade fleets depart regularly from York to Cairo, why I bet there's one waiting now. And I'm sure they'll let us sail for free as we could never afford passage on our own!

ENGLISH PEASANT #2: We can't be the only one with this great idea, I'm sure thousands of other likeminded commoners will follow in our footsteps

Lol so true... this is why We just need to set a more realistic scale of movement if we are going to implement an AOR. So the troops you have trained back in your homelands can get across the world with in a decent amount of time.

@Delra did you think that the movement scale in BC was a lot more what it should be?

[Lamanz]

Okay, so this scenario would play out as follows given your logic:

ENGLISH PEASANT #1: Hey Wally, life sucks as a Poor English Peasant with no real trade skills, what should be do?

ENGLISH PEASANT #2: Gee Tommy, the king's brother just conquered Cairo. Even though we possess no viable skill, economic, military or otherwise, let's sail across the known world to live in a hostile region with a climate completely unlike our own where almost everyone will hate us. I'm sure we'll find work there and lead happy lives. And failing all else, we can train as longbowmen there, at the Cairo Royal Longbowmen Training Academy! I mean, we've never used one before since we're Poor English Peasants but I'm sure the years of painstaking practice will pay off... assuming we don't die of cholera or plague first. Or get killed by the incredibly hostile Muslim population.

ENGLISH PEASANT #1: Top drawer! Let's book passage on a trade fleet! Because we all know trade fleets depart regularly from York to Cairo, why I bet there's one waiting now. And I'm sure they'll let us sail for free as we could never afford passage on our own!

ENGLISH PEASANT #2: We can't be the only one with this great idea, I'm sure thousands of other likeminded commoners will follow in our footsteps

Hahaha...nice

I've got to Rep that

[hylander25k]

seems like all very valid, and constructive additions to SS to me. A poll for most wanted new feature perhaps?

[MiniMe_from_org]

- A very nice idea to make priests be available only on very high mosque/church levels. It slows down religious conversion to far more realistic values and makes warmongering much harder.

So true ..

Europa Barborum (RTW mod) really nailed this concept

Years will pass before we'll see projects of that scale based on MII engine ..

[delra]

I like reduced movement for armies in SS. It causes more field battles and adds additional planning factor.

BC is more like Rome: Total War. There were jokes like calling it Rome: Total Siege. It happens in BC and it is something inferior to what we have in SS (in my opinion, many (most?) would disagree).

Nevertheless, I like a lot that agents are very fast in BC. It really makes diplomacy, spying and trading easier and thus you use it more often than you do in SS.

I don't know if KK is in favour of speeding up agents, but certainly I will speed mine up in SS6.0 when it's published. The first thing I'll do. :-)

[roy34543]

Its not a question of english peasents wanting to move over. If you consider that, it should take you 9 turns to build a longbowmen unit in london.
Its the fact that even with huge unit sizes the armies you use are small, two years is more then enough to move on a boat from london to cairo, and that you specifically requested them means their not technically trained there as such.
Its not really unrealistic considering the scale of the armies. Levying 1000 longowmen in cairo might be ridicolous. moving 60 other from england isnt.
The world is not that big, if you use a boat and go quickly and the paths are good you could proably go nearly anywhere in medieval europe, i do however agree the price should increase slightly as you go further away.

[Inhuman One]

Longbowmen wouldnt be recruited from peasants in england either.

If you want realism, army sizes would need to be greatly reduced since the number of soldiers on the map and the speed at which new armies are created would be far too big.

[schulthies]

I like reduced movement for armies in SS. It causes more field battles and adds additional planning factor.

Your right I had never thought of that. Its nice to see armies coming at you so you can either go out and engage or decide if your going to sit behind your walls.

Agent movements defiantly should be increased.. that is sweet.

And perhaps movement on boats would be the best place to increase general movement amounts. Ships should be able to go from England to Italy in a year, I know that would never be the actual scale.. maybe half of that would be more likely

[wolfslayer]

Longbowmen wouldnt be recruited from peasants in england either.

If you want realism, army sizes would need to be greatly reduced since the number of soldiers on the map and the speed at which new armies are created would be far too big.

Don't forget that unit texture regional variations I inadvertently "discovered" might also has a lot of useful apllications with recruitment scenarios you mention.. These Kievan "Rutherian" archers in their normal uniforms traveled all the way from the Kiev region to near Jerusalem; but only in this region do they appear like this in their "desert" garb; and will always render this way in desert regions. You could even mix in a couple of regional "ethnic" faces into this skin, to reflect local replacements.

(excuse my amateurish skin modding)

These same guys here will automatically appear in long white leggings and covered arms in winter battlemaps.