What does the intergrity penalty for selling captured enemies do in the case of a settlement?

[Aenima]

As the title says, what cons are there for selling back captured enemies with a settlement? Obviously you have the choice to either kill them all (essentially the same diplomatic effects as executing prisoners in R2, nothing else) or take on warriors for a replenishment boost but a stat reduction (speaking of which, how much of a problem is this? Is it permanent or temporary?) and then there's the option to ransom the enemy at a cost of an army/fleet's integrity

But with settlements, there is no integrity - is there no downside to ransoming the enemy?

[RGA]

I don't think there is any option to ransom the enemy in case of settlement battle. Either you kill them all (you suffer diplomatic penalty anyway when you sack or loot their settlement) or you incorporate the prisoner into your army (thus a small boost in replenishment).

Speaking of these effects, I really find them weird. Take on captured warriors was indeed a practice in ancient warfare, but a captured infantryman could not turn instantly into a cavalryman. Stats reduction is hardly noticeable, and you have also have stats reduction from replenishment anyway. And why would an army suffer from integrity penalty when prisoners are ransomed? Soldiers really earn money from this. I would rather see integrity penalty from taking on prisoners, as mixing people who used to want to kill each other wouldn't be a peaceful and easy process.

[Emperor Arcturus Mengsk]

I think it's just forgotten coding and it has no adverse effects as far as I can tell.

I think it's forgotten code because I have also received messages after defending with the same city many times in a row that the garrison army has leveled up in army traditions, which does not exist..

[Bramborough]

I think OP was talking about the opposite case...when a garrison successfully defeats an attacking force (which, I have to admit, is more common in Attila than it was in R2). Then the usual choices of Ransom/Replenish/Execute come into play. And it's a good question, since afaik the garrison doesn't have an Integrity value (at least...not visible).

I do agree it's weird that Ransom negatively affects Integrity, whereas Replenishment doesn't. For the same reasons which RGA mentions. I guess the counter-argument would be that the rank-and-file don't see any of that ransom money, it goes to the bigwigs, while they'd be happy to see ranks refilled.

[Aenima]

Yeah, Bramborough has it right, I just did a bad case of explaining myself properly - I'm talking about playing as the defender, defeating an attacking army and then selling the captured warriors back to the AI. As far as I know settlements don't have integrity of their own, since that's tied to armies, so, other than maybe a P.O hit I can't think of what bad would come of it...which means I've probably wasted thousands of denarii in my campaigns by just killing captured enemies after sucessful siege defences -.-

Also, while we're on the subject of stats being affected by taking on captured warriors, does anyone know to what extent they're affected? And is it permanent? If you were to continuously take on captured warriors with the same army throughout a campaign would their stats eventually be cut down ridiculously or is it just a case of them temporarily taking a drop while the new soldiers are recruited and trained? I assume it's the latter, but don't know for sure.


And Acturus, that's odd, haven't found that bug yet. The only bug I've got RE end fo turn messages is often getting messages twice, ie "enemy general Gundovald killed" - close it - new message pops up, "enemy general Gundovald killed." With every general I kill this always seems to happen, no idea why.

[nameless]

No taking on captured soldiers as your own only reduces their experience.

So that Gold Chevron Cohort you have which suffered heavy casualties may be reduced to silver/bronze when it takes on other soldiers.

At the same time though...taking on captives in garrisons also helps them replenish faster too which is ideal if it's in a heavy war zone and I find the costs not that much, I mean 486 gold isn't a lot.

[Aenima]

No taking on captured soldiers as your own only reduces their experience.

So that Gold Chevron Cohort you have which suffered heavy casualties may be reduced to silver/bronze when it takes on other soldiers.

At the same time though...taking on captives in garrisons also helps them replenish faster too which is ideal if it's in a heavy war zone and I find the costs not that much, I mean 486 gold isn't a lot.

Ahh, I see, didn't realise that it effected XP, I thought it gave their stats a hit. Thanks.

There does not seem to be a downside. Selling prisoners back from a settlement battle without a regular army became a great money source in my recent early WRE campaign. After setting taxes to extreme, rebels popped up everywhere and were easily crushed in the defense battles, leaving 500 gold per battle behind. A little bit tedious, but worth the price with the high taxes.

Yeah, it seems that prisoners after battles tend to run from 300-600 denarii, and with some turns having me fight the better half of a dozen battles that's quite a bit of potential money.

[justfun]

There does not seem to be a downside. Selling prisoners back from a settlement battle without a regular army became a great money source in my recent early WRE campaign. After setting taxes to extreme, rebels popped up everywhere and were easily crushed in the defense battles, leaving 500 gold per battle behind. A little bit tedious, but worth the price with the high taxes.