Unit Recruitment Proposal

[Gromit]

Hello EBII Team

Firstly the obligatory line about how incredible your work was in EB and how superb the previews of EBII have been and how much I’m looking forward to the mod.

Now for the annoying whining/suggestions- In every TW game and pretty much every mod that I know of factions start off with very limited recruitment abilities, for example, in EB the Romani lack access to Pedites Extraordinarii at the beginning of the campaign. There is obviously a desirable gameplay aspect to this, namely that players should have to work to improve their factions economy and expand their cities to build better armies, but from a historical standpoint, which should be the main concern for EBII, such design features become completely ludicrous.

My favorite example probably originates from the Koinon Hellenon faction, where the unit description for classical hoplites references that they fight in the same manner as the troops at Thermopylae, hundreds of years before EB’s start date, yet no starting city of the Koinon can recruit these troops without upgrading their military infrastructure. Makedonia was the birthplace of Alexander's pikemen but cannot recruit elite phalanxes. Elite noble units are generally absent from Barbarian army rosters, yet all the above examples were fielded and recruited by the factions in question at EB's start date.

These omissions make sense only from a gameplay perspective of preventing elite armies from originating too early, but economic incentives should prevent factions from building up massive stacks of nobles and elites in 270 BCE. I strongly believe that EBII should grant factions access to essentially their entire unit roster (barring troops like Thorakitai which emerged after the start date) from the beginning rather than this frustrating ahistorical limiting system which achieves a questionable goal which could be accomplished through superior means.

Thanks for reading

[The Kybrothilian]

Well I for one support this idea. Of course, it needs to be balanced with the recruitment pool sizes. A level 1 MIC should not let you recruit 5 elite units that replenish in 5 turns obviously.

And since it's possible to make capital city to be a requirement for buildings, you can have a separate recruitment building for the elite units that is only buildable in the faction capital. I think this should be implemented too.

[Appius Pulcher]

I agree. As the EB team strives for historical accuracy in all other aspects of the game, this should not be an exception. The start-date is not "the beginning of time". It is just where we drop in to take charge. The game should be in full wing at the time of the start-date. For instance I would also argue that Carthage should have a larger navy to begin with and the economy to support it.

[Dr. Croccer]

It'd make the game too easy and unchallenging. A large part of the fun in my campaigns has been to build up my nation and meeting all the requirements for the reforms. The AI would also most likely just spam elite units regardless of cost or balancing.

[athanaric]

It'd make the game too easy and unchallenging. A large part of the fun in my campaigns has been to build up my nation and meeting all the requirements for the reforms. The AI would also most likely just spam elite units regardless of cost or balancing.

M2TW has better recruitment control mechanisms, so that won't be as much of an issue as it was in EB I. also, there are still many small factions comprised of tribes or "city states" that provide the classical small start and challenging build up (incidentally, those were always my favourite ones in EB I and other games).

[The Kybrothilian]

It'd make the game too easy and unchallenging. A large part of the fun in my campaigns has been to build up my nation and meeting all the requirements for the reforms. The AI would also most likely just spam elite units regardless of cost or balancing.

With the M2TW recruitment system, it's quite possible to have elite units in lvl 1 barracks with 1 unit available every 40 turns or so.

[Dr. Croccer]

With the M2TW recruitment system, it's quite possible to have elite units in lvl 1 barracks with 1 unit available every 40 turns or so.

That would be better. (not 40 turns though, it'd be just as unrealistic to need to wait 10 years to recruit an elite unit)

[The Kybrothilian]

That would be better. (not 40 turns though, it'd be just as unrealistic to need to wait 10 years to recruit an elite unit)

Yeah, well I meant for the lower level barracks the recruitment pool refreshment of elites would be long, but as the barracks improve so do the refreshment rates become quicker.

[Dr. Croccer]

Yeah, well I meant for the lower level barracks the recruitment pool refreshment of elites would be long, but as the barracks improve so do the refreshment rates become quicker.

Ah, that's good.

[zeppelin01]

Hi! I agree that the start date is not the begining of time and there are some ahistorical details, for example i cannot understand why there are no roads in italy/grece/ the silk road, and the Romans by 270 BC had already conquered italy (the pyrric invasion was between 280-270 )..

But on the recruitment subject, i think you forget that many of the most powerful factions were in great decline, would you expect that 50 years after alexander's death, with his kingdom falling apart, you could recruit elite troops?
it is also true that there were many powerful nations like the cartaginians, who by 270 BC had the most powerful navy of the mediterranean and being in their "golden age" should have acces to their best units (the sacred band did apear in the first punic war for instance). Also the celtic tribes were way stronger, it wasn't without reason that romans panicked in front of them..

I might agree that there should be some sort of decayed unit reflecting that the troop did exist a was still there, and with the MICs improvement they tend to recover their lost greatness! But also you should not forget that elite units were rare and expensive. Elephants were used to frighten and as a shock troop, not the backbone of an empire army!

[Gromit]

Hi! I agree that the start date is not the begining of time and there are some ahistorical details, for example i cannot understand why there are no roads in italy/grece/ the silk road, and the Romans by 270 BC had already conquered italy (the pyrric invasion was between 280-270 )..

But on the recruitment subject, i think you forget that many of the most powerful factions were in great decline, would you expect that 50 years after alexander's death, with his kingdom falling apart, you could recruit elite troops?
it is also true that there were many powerful nations like the cartaginians, who by 270 BC had the most powerful navy of the mediterranean and being in their "golden age" should have acces to their best units (the sacred band did apear in the first punic war for instance). Also the celtic tribes were way stronger, it wasn't without reason that romans panicked in front of them..

I might agree that there should be some sort of decayed unit reflecting that the troop did exist a was still there, and with the MICs improvement they tend to recover their lost greatness! But also you should not forget that elite units were rare and expensive. Elephants were used to frighten and as a shock troop, not the backbone of an empire army!

I can't think of any faction that was sufficiently in decline at the start date to put a major damper on recruitment (histrorically Epeiros fell apart almost immediatly but that was mainly the death of Pyrrhos, they probably would have been fine for a bit longer had he lived), sure Makedonia was weaker than it had been but could certainly still field armies of professional pikemen, and the other Hellenistic states like the Ptolemaic and Seleukid Empires were bona fide superpowers. Of course elite units are rare and expensive, which as other people have noted is where the M2TW recruitment pools and EB's traditionally high upkeep costs come in.

[The Kybrothilian]

Hi! I agree that the start date is not the begining of time and there are some ahistorical details, for example i cannot understand why there are no roads in italy/grece/ the silk road, and the Romans by 270 BC had already conquered italy (the pyrric invasion was between 280-270 )..

About this, the EB team made some changes into the political situation of Hellenic world, moving the Epeirote invasion of Macedonia forward in time while moving the Chremonidean league backwards in time. This was done so that you could have both Macedonia and Greek city-states as a faction in the game.

I hope that the Koinon is changed in EB2 given the new scripts, so that you start with 1 city-state while the script will allow you to form an league with other city-states that will hold up depending on if you can keep the others satisfied.

[bobbin]

Hi! I agree that the start date is not the begining of time and there are some ahistorical details, for example i cannot understand why there are no roads in italy/grece/ the silk road, and the Romans by 270 BC had already conquered italy (the pyrric invasion was between 280-270 )..

EB started in 272BC, hence southern Italy was still out of Roman control. The only diversion for history that I'm aware of is that the existence of the Chremonidean Alliance (KH) was pushed back a bit so we could have it in the mod along with Pyrrhos.

[Stath's]

I think that the current system is exactly how the game should be. We can argue about historically accurate, but i believe that this is 100% about the gameplay.

I support the opinion that the player should see the elite units as a great award for his good work so far with the lesser units.

I don't like the idea to be able to recruit your best unit, 1 second after you start the game. Then you would wait about what? Nothing new, nothing extraordinary.

I have seen the system we are talking about in other mods and i did not like it for the above reasons.

As a dedicated fan of EB, i feel obliged to say i 'd like the system to remain as it is. Just my opinion.

[Admiral Piett]

Levy units in EB2 may not be quite as useless as in EB1. I also support the idea of having access to at least a couple of the faction's iconic units. It's kind of stupid to not be able to recruit at least average line pikemen in Hellenistic kingdoms from the start. The Seleukids always end up having to spam Machimoi spearmen and levy pikes to fend off all of their enemies.

Keeping the rebels with strong garrisons and PSFs at choke points using the DOTS system (scripting unmovable armies in PSFs for the AI) would prevent early expansion.

[Dago Red]

I also support the idea of having access to at least a couple of the faction's iconic units. .

Agreed -- a couple.

And there's no need to put top tier elite or any late era units in tier 1 buildings. You simply have them in cities that are already developed.

Multi-turn recruitment combined with prohibitive costs (initial + upkeep) prevents anyone, AI or player, from having too many.

[The Kybrothilian]

Agreed -- a couple.

And there's no need to put top tier elite or any late era units in tier 1 buildings. You simply have them in cities that are already developed.

Multi-turn recruitment combined with prohibitive costs (initial + upkeep) prevents anyone, AI or player, from having too many.

The costs don't seem to inhibit the AI at all. But the recruitment pool refresh times will.

[Dago Red]

The costs don't seem to inhibit the AI at all. But the recruitment pool refresh times will.

I'm not sure what might be done for the AI to consider costs or not, but that factor is needed, at least for the player.

4 factors are needed:
Cost.
Multi-turn recruitment.*
Max available in 1 turn number.
Recruitment pool refresh times (which you mention).

Then you don't mess around with elites in tier 1 buildings (at least not universal buildings like barracks, only in some unique buildings). As has been pointed out, that doesn't work for other reasons.


*Multi-turn recruitment (based on 6 unit categories in degrees of quality/training) helps to prevent unrealistic numbers of professional+ units that appear in armies. It's not a simple measure, some values vary depending on the realistic impact of the kingdom/region from where the unit is raised. For example, levies, the lowest quality troops, have a higher upkeep than some factoring in dual hit to the coffers -- the loss to the economic production they would otherwise be laboring at in the field, farm, or forest and the cost of feeding and keeping them armed at the ready.

Max available refers to how many can be recruited at one time, before pool replenishment is needed. Slow replenishment from the recruitment pool is also a given (10+turns). This is based on a medieval era conceptual system (I wrote for BC) but could basically apply here.


Levy (untrained conscripts): max units available - 5. Minimal initial cost, average (not low) upkeep (high in relation to better troops).

Milita (irregulars): max available - 4. Minimal initial cost, high upkeep Regulars (trained):max available -- 3. Low cost, average upkeep

Professional (highly trained): max available - 2. High cost, extremely low upkeep. 2 turn recruitment each!

Nobles (trained+best equipment): max available -- 1. High cost, average upkeep. 2 or 3 turn recruitment!

Elite (highly trained + best equipment):max available -- 1. Very High cost, high upkeep. 3 turn recruitment!


The only catch is that a player would use levy troops only in emergency or for a temporary campaign and then would have incentive to disband. This does not necessarily work well with the AI.

[AqD]

The only catch is that a player would use levy troops only in emergency or for a temporary campaign and then would have incentive to disband. This does not necessarily work well with the AI.

recruit_priority_offset can be used so that AI tends NOT to recruit levies. But it'd be weird for Roman Republic and Saka tribes considering most of their troops are levies / militia.

From a player's point of view, the initial cost is always ignored unless it's like 10-20 times the upkeep cost. So I'd accept either the system in smaller scale (high upkeep militia <= low upkeep professional), or that recruitment cost is increased to have some significant effect in game.

[Gromit]

Agreed -- a couple.

And there's no need to put top tier elite or any late era units in tier 1 buildings. You simply have them in cities that are already developed.

Multi-turn recruitment combined with prohibitive costs (initial + upkeep) prevents anyone, AI or player, from having too many.

In general I agree with that (especially no late era units). You could achieve the effect I'm after either by granting access to elite/proffesional (essentially beyond basic levy) units in tier 1 MICs or by starting off some/many settlements with higher tier MIC's, I suppose the second one is preferable as there are situations like the conquest of a new colony in an area of different culture where it makes sense to only be able to recruit certain levies.