Modeling feudalism

[officialdeo]

There's a quite opposite point of view: they should cost little (perhaps 0) in recruitment (that simulates the fact that they are already there and they just show up at the call of their liege) and should have a very large upkeep to simulate the constant need to grant them seigneuries.

I'm actually in favour of the second option: you call them in times of a need (like a foreign incursion in yours (and their) land), fight a battle, and then let them go home (disband so that you don't incurr those high costs).

Yeah, I'm also in favour of the second option. This way we can simulate the fact that after every campaign (basically assembling a stack for war game mechanics-wise), the cost of maintaining a standing army would be insurmountably high such that most feudal polities could not afford them. If the feudal units disband like mercenaries after the faction leader's war chest goes below zero, it can also represent them returning to tend their own land. From here we can do testings and model the best boom-bust cycle for the economy, especially AI's.



Obviously, tweaks will have to be made to account for non-feudal factions, but this is a solid point to start from without a total rework.

IMO, this is still within the limitation of the game engine. I strongly disagree with lowering cost, this is exactly why I see some players here maintaining gigantic stacks and snowballing too fast, usually within 300 turns. This may look good on paper especially for the AI, but it will encourage even more hoarding of stacks by the faction leader since it is basically trickle-down economics. The AI prefers growth whenever possible, even when marginal revenue goes negative. Not to mention the knights logically have no incentive to follow such campaign, since we cannot model them procuring and maintaining their own panoply of war from tending their land, or even at least the vassal lords having their own mind and war chest.

[Tripledot]

There's a quite opposite point of view: they should cost little (perhaps 0) in recruitment (that simulates the fact that they are already there and they just show up at the call of their liege) and should have a very large upkeep to simulate the constant need to grant them seigneuries.

I'm actually in favour of the second option: you call them in times of a need (like a foreign incursion in yours (and their) land), fight a battle, and then let them go home (disband so that you don't incurr those high costs).

I think the problem is that wars and recruitment last over the course of several in-game years. Probably the best way to simulate troop levies would be through the mercenary recruit system (since it's basically "instantaneous"), but that runs into the problem of the mercenary pool being held in common, rather than on a per faction basis. Also, I don't think it really makes sense that new seigneuries would have to be constantly granted unless knights die and actually have to be replaced- which a high recruitment cost would simulate*. I think the better way to stop someone from amassing large amounts of knights would be through long replenishment times (something in the range of 10-20 in-game years, basically how much it'd take to raise a family member from birth to coming of age). And as I mentioned before, "raising levies" only to disband them causes the problem of units not gaining any experience. Though one can say to themself "these are the same men", they really aren't, and a major sense of progression is lost. I think of these knights as similar to generals- they spend most of their time sitting around in their settlements rather than actually waging war, basically "on retainer" until real fighting breaks out. I think a better way to simulate the cost of waging war would be through some kind of scripted effect that charges the player (probably only the player to help out the AI) money if they have troops in foreign lands, similar to when generals besiege settlements.

*having a high replenishment cost would also encourage better, more immersive play- if they have an insane upkeep cost, you don't care how many knights die since you'll disband them anyway, while if they have a low upkeep and high replenishment cost (but long replenishment time), you will actually try to conserve your elite troops, since they are not so easily replaced

[Jurand of Cracow]

well, the discussion moved into a broader topic of recruitment. My views are as follows:

The following thoughts came to my mind after having recently played the Broken Crescent with the Buff and Shine submod, and many other mods before. They have little to do with the possible coming version of the SSHIP.
I tried to think what the M2TW engine theoretically enables to provide the best feeling of historicity and the gameplay experience for a medieval mod.

---- THE ELEMENTS --------------------

The recruitment system would consist of 8 parameters:
- factional feudalism/iqta buildings – defining (1) which factional units can be recruited (the more advanced building, the better units); (2) how fast the recruitment pools replenish for various units (slower for the professionals and the feudal units), (3) how big the pools can grow (this might be pretty large number, much more than in the current SSHIP (for example: 5 for a city), perhaps lower for the elites) -- [in (1) the size of the settlement and maximum level of the building are rather disconnected: even smaller settlements can have quite advanced feudal buildings; but (2) and (3) should be related to the size of the settlement: bigger settlement the faster growth and the higher maximum pools],
- barracks and other military training facilities (buildings) – defining how fast the recruitable units can be recruited (ie (4) the number of recruitment slots); perhaps some units might require such facilities, like certain professionals;
- an area of recruitment (AoR) system – defining (5) which units are available in the province for any faction if has the basic feudal building (these may be pretty good units, however, the more advanced factional feudal buildings would provide less and less AoR);
- optionally: (6) population of the provinces – being depleted if recruitment takes place while growing if you disband a full-strength unit (the mechanisms present in the RTW engine, and also recreated in the BC-B&S submod; it may be important for small and slowly-growing provinces),
- (7) governor present in the settlement – as somebody has to organize the creation of the army for the king; in some mods it might require the presence of the very faction ruler;
- (8) money – no unit comes for free; (for the AI behaviour you need the upfront costs (ie recruitment cost), even though in theory it might have been only for upkeep).

--- THE MECHANICS & EXPLANATION ---------------------

A political system set up in a province (technically: a “feudal building”) makes it possible to recruit military units. The first level (“Autonomous administration”) would provide only the AoR troops while the higher levels (ie more advanced political system - specific for each faction) would give faction-specific units. The higher the level of the building, the more advanced factional units it provides, but the less AoR units (the most advanced factional feudal building prevents from recruiting AoR units entirely). At the same time a barracks building is needed to enable recruitment of any unit (technically: it provides recruitment slots). There are other military buildings (stables, ranges etc.) enable more units to be recruited at the same time (additional recruitment slots), while also providing other benefits (eg. experience for the units).

Time has to pass for the recruits to appear in the province: boys must grow up to be able to take up the arms (technically: pools need time to replenish). Only few of them are rich enough to afford betters arms so that they can serve in the higher-tier units (technically: slower pools' replenishment for the elite units). There're always economic limits of how many people the land can support (technically: there're pools maxima) but they can get pretty large (eg. up to 5 units, less for the elites / feudal: there's always a social pyramid and the elites come from the upper parts). In the populous provinces the reserves get bigger (technically: the pools maxima are higher). To be sure, to recruit and to train troops a lot of money is needed and most of the time this is going to be the main factor limiting the recruitment. Also, somebody who organizes the process (a governor) should be present in the settlement at the moment of recruitment (but the regeneration of the pools progresses without a governor). The province should be populated with enough people to fill in the ranks (the number of people is taken away from the population). One cannot recruit all the available units instantly as there're real-life bottlenecks (technically: recruitment slots). The more specialized military buildings (stables, barracks, ranges) are present in the settlement, the faster recruitment may proceed (ie. more units may be recruited at the same time; note that the number of recruitment slots is independent of the political system: one may be able to recruit only the AoR units but many at a time).

--- HOW MOBILIZATION HAPPENS ---------------------

If peace reigns in the kingdom, no recruitment is needed and the pools regenerate. If there's been war recently, many years would have to pass for the pools to achieve the maxima. At the same time, the ruler is filling in his coffer with silver and gold to be able to afford recruitment for a new war. Once a war breaks out, recruitment must take place. If the reserves are large, many units can be recruited - provided money and a general are there. It's not done overnight, there are bottlenecks, like the lack of the facilities. Furthermore, if the war drags one, it might become difficult to find more people to fill in the ranks as the new potential recruits come slowly (pools get empty, regeneration takes place slowly). However, disbandment of a full-strength unit regenerates both the population numbers and the pools of possible recruits.


--- notes on the gameplay ----
* given the SSHIP population numbers, the depletion of a province population after recruitment is actually not as important as in the other mods. It may make a difference only on the fringe, infertile provinces where loss of a few hundreds of men may lead to population problems (this would be quite different for mods with small settlements, like WotN). Therefore this part of the system should be viewed as the least important in the system.
* it should be stressed that with high pools maxima this parameter (maxima) loses it's weight as well. It is, however, central to making the gameplay more reasonable. It should be accompanied by very low replenishment rates. Therefore the player will not be punished for having long periods of peace and build up of the economy (ie. he won't be losing the potential new manpower inflow; what otherwise happens if the maximum pool is reached but he's not recruiting units). On the contrary: the strategy of keeping high money reserves with a small standing army would be rewarded, as in case of an enemy attack it will be easy to mobilize forces: recruit units from the hight recruitment pools. In the current SSHIP setting, you're better off recruiting units as soon as they reach the maxima - as they're usually low for the better units (2 or something). This makes the strategy of a wide-kingdom (more provinces, not bigger provinces) more beneficial than of a tall-kingdom (fewer provinces with better buildings).
* a very big question is to how the AI would react for some changes, eg. for the large recruitment pools.

-------
Another conceptual entry worth reading in relation to this issue is Phases of a strategic operation

[Lifthrasir]

I agree. Further discussion about recruitment should take place in the relevant thread
Thanks for your understanding.

[officialdeo]

well, the discussion moved into a broader topic of recruitment. My views are as follows:

Well, I assumed most people chiming in agree or at least understand the concept you made and partially implemented so that we can discuss this topic from a common ground. Political model, if you will, based on the limitation of the game engine and AI behaviour.

The whole thread is moot without it, guys. Let's keep it relevant.

[Lifthrasir]

Well, I assumed most people chiming in agree or at least understand the concept you made and partially implemented so that we can discuss this topic from a common ground. Political model, if you will, based on the limitation of the game engine and AI behaviour.

The whole thread is moot without it, just FYI.

Only if people make a clear link between their post and the topic of the thread. If not, I'll move/remove their posts.
If not, this will become a mess and absolutly not constructive at all.

[officialdeo]

Only if people make a clear link between their post and the topic of the thread. If not, I'll move/remove their posts.
If not, this will become a mess and absolutly not constructive at all.

Agreed.

Getting back on topic, I thought about this idea after I observed the AI preferring growth even though they cannot calculate optimal marginal revenue. This leads to behaviour like being disincentivised from placing governors inside settlements since it sometimes leads to less income (due to the AI being worse at managing/influencing vassal lords than humans). And they use that little income increase they gain to fuel unsustainable growth in expansion towards new lands, making total revenue eventually falls below total variable cost from increasing garrison upkeep.

[kostic]

*having a high replenishment cost would also encourage better, more immersive play- if they have an insane upkeep cost, you don't care how many knights die since you'll disband them anyway, while if they have a low upkeep and high replenishment cost (but long replenishment time), you will actually try to conserve your elite troops, since they are not so easily replaced

I rather trust the appreciation of the designers of SSHIP. If the 2 nd option suits them better to represent feudalism, we will do with it.
However, the Tripledot argument above seems to me to be very correct.

[Lifthrasir]

^^ Not if we want to keep some reality. As mentioned several times already, these knights were used temporary, not full time. It seems a bit "weird" to me to use feudal units like a professional army about 200 years earlier than it should be

[kostic]

Very just. So the solution is perhaps, as it was written above, to be able to recruit the knights in 1 turn to simulate their allegiance to the king, then to be obliged to dissolve them later because of their very high maintenance cost .
In this case, it would mean that they returned to their occupations in their strongholds, but they could then be recruited again in 1 turn without the player getting the message "more units of this type available at the moment" ...

[Lifthrasir]

I think that it's the right way to explore for some feudal units.
Just out of curiosity, what about adding a script as well, to make them disbanding after a certain amount turns (like for crusades and jihads)? The idea is to make them temporary available even if the player can afford their high upkeep. That would reflect that they have done their time in the ost.
It works as well for Muslims factions. Saladin mentioned some of his army leaving a siege for harvest on their homeland. Where I'm not so sure is for ERE and the Russian factions. Not to mention the pagan one probably using another system
The other unknown factor is how the AI would be able to handle such feature

[officialdeo]

I think that it's the right way to explore for some feudal units.
Just out of curiosity, what about adding a script as well, to make them disbanding after a certain amount turns (like for crusades and jihads)? The idea is to make them temporary available even if the player can afford their high upkeep. That would reflect that they have done their time in the ost.
It works as well for Muslims factions. Saladin mentioned some of his army leaving a siege for harvest on their homeland. Where I'm not so sure is for ERE and the Russian factions. Not to mention the pagan one probably using another system
The other unknown factor is how the AI would be able to handle such feature

This would be great if possible. It would be interesting to test it and model the boom-bust cycle from having such restraint since the AI will inevitably build its army again. The problem with the Roman Empire is its tagmatic, full-time professional soldiers I think. Also, what about joining units recruited at different turns together?

[Dekhatres]

very interesting topic

first i would like to comment on the low replenishment rate system, i've played a LOT with it in many mods, coincidentaly i opted for the 20 turns replenishment for knights and heavy cav in general, around 10-15 for medium quality infantry and cav, 5-10 for militia
also high cost of recruitment while upkeep remained largely the same

the effects are that AI treasury will very fast and easily reach 0 denars and thus cannot spam armies, but it will also seemed bounce back really fast because the upkeep is not high enough to crush his economy to the point where it will be in red for dozens and dozens of turns
as the guy said, it's a very fun system to play with when you know your knights are not easily replaceable, their presence on the battlefield feels truly impactful

so far this has been the most fun system for me, but yea ofc profesional armies are unrealistic and whatever, but idk if they can even be otherwise, i mean the AI aint gona disband his knights unless you script it to happen when AI is not at war or something, but then you might run into problems with AI losing those units when he needs them the most and who knows what other problems

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now regarding this



the De Bello Mundi has this system in v 1.0, they got rid of it in 1.2, the way they did it is throgh kings purse, if your treasury is above 20.000 you get a -700 to kings purse every turn, if it's bellow 20.000 then nothing happens, if it's bellow 0 then you get a +700 every turn till it reaches 0, well i dont remember the exact details but the concept is this
temporary unit use could be achieved like this + a script that disbands units so that AI units are used temporarily aswell

hated this system at first but liked it later, i like this idea that your economy can basically "overheat" and you have to take it easy and let it cool down every now and then
dunno how this could be done for army size, what we want is to make kings purse decrease and go negative when the army is campaigning and when the army is disbanded the kings purse should slowly go back normal

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now my idea for a feudal system, well it's not really my idea to be fair, i would suggest a system like the one in mount and blade warband

every time you reward a vassal (family member) a fief others react negatively or positively, you reward a honorable vassal a fief and the other honorable vassals are either happy about it or indiferent meanwhile greedy or dishonest vassal are unhappy about it and you lose relationship and loyalty with them
we can use honor and dread attributes to represent that

in M&B vassals without fiefs also lose loyalty overtime, but iirc it only happens if you have land that has not been granted and it just sits there, so you dont really have the option to not give a settlement to anyone

what i would really like is for titles to remain after a general has rebeled and has gone to the rebel faction, so if you granted the title of normandy to a general and he rebeled and is now part of rebels faction you still cannot apoint a new governor and there should be huge unrest in Caen until you found and killed that general who holds the title, only after that you can have another guy have the title

other minor features could be the reclutancy of a vassal to support the king in a campaign, a vassal is maybe not rebeling and is relatively loyal but he still doesnt like the king so he doesnt want to provide troops, idk if recruitment pool can be frozen, that would be neat, you cannot recruit from that settlement owned by a disgruntled vassal until you improve your relations with him

gifts, in M&B you can offer gifts to your vassals to improve your relation with them, maybe something could be done aswell through a script that checks your relations with most angry vassals and asks you if you want to send them money or whatever to them to improve your standing

rebelion of entire houses, maybe going a bit too far ? still could be interesting

--------------------------------------------

[Used2BRoz]

A few points.

From testing SS a long time ago I found the main problem with AI economy was that it couldn't handle upkeep.
If it had money it spent it on recruitment without worrying about whether it could afford upkeep next turn.
Hence complicated money scripts.

BUT I'm currently testing out a simple mod I'm doing for vanilla M2TW.
No faction money scripts except for slave faction and yet I'm facing large armies and expansion has slowed right down.
I have scripts to disband crusader / jihadi units after 4 turns
and one to disband general merc units if the treasury goes bust.
The AI seems to cope well with that.

From a feudal perspective one could increase free upkeep in towns / cities for militia units to simulate readily available troops which only cost when deployed in the field.

I also use perm stone forts which allow 2 free upkeep, one can use that to simulate nobility (knights) and retainers who only cost when on campaign.

Longer recruitment times for knightly units helps as does reduced recruitment pools.
I've also substantially increased cost of siege artillery to stop AI spamming it.

In England (which I'm studying atm) the feudal units - both militia and knights / men at arms only served for 40 days a year at which point they could go home.
But the better troops tended then to switch to being contracted and paid a daily wage.
The men who served in militia tended to be the same year on year, with a certain amount of turnover due to age, combat attrition etc.
(After about 1370 English didn't bother with the feudal type recruitment and went for individual contracts. In game terms that's be after the Great Plague.)
Interesting sidebar, after the Plague the value of the warhorses used by knights fell considerably, probably due to English almost always fighting on foot.

Other things you can do are to substantially merchants income
(it's variable but a useful source of extra finance for the AI. Lowering cost of recruiting merchants might help. But need to be careful not to encourage the AI to spam them so don't lower cost too much.)

Recruitable Generals Bodyguards not a good idea - their upkeep is high and the AI will spam them given a chance.
Might need to look at cost of all agents in terms of upkeep ?

[Lifthrasir]

A few points.

From testing SS a long time ago I found the main problem with AI economy was that it couldn't handle upkeep.
If it had money it spent it on recruitment without worrying about whether it could afford upkeep next turn.
Hence complicated money scripts.

BUT I'm currently testing out a simple mod I'm doing for vanilla M2TW.
No faction money scripts except for slave faction and yet I'm facing large armies and expansion has slowed right down.
I have scripts to disband crusader / jihadi units after 4 turns
and one to disband general merc units if the treasury goes bust.
The AI seems to cope well with that.

From a feudal perspective one could increase free upkeep in towns / cities for militia units to simulate readily available troops which only cost when deployed in the field.

That sounds very interesting. However, free upkeep has been removed in SSHIP as giving a huge advantage to the human player on the AI for the reasons you mentioned.
About the 4 turns disband for crusading/jihading armies, I guess that you mean 4 turns after it ends, right?

I also use perm stone forts which allow 2 free upkeep, one can use that to simulate nobility (knights) and retainers who only cost when on campaign.

Longer recruitment times for knightly units helps as does reduced recruitment pools.
I've also substantially increased cost of siege artillery to stop AI spamming it.

In England (which I'm studying atm) the feudal units - both militia and knights / men at arms only served for 40 days a year at which point they could go home.
But the better troops tended then to switch to being contracted and paid a daily wage.
The men who served in militia tended to be the same year on year, with a certain amount of turnover due to age, combat attrition etc.
(After about 1370 English didn't bother with the feudal type recruitment and went for individual contracts. In game terms that's be after the Great Plague.)
Interesting sidebar, after the Plague the value of the warhorses used by knights fell considerably, probably due to English almost always fighting on foot.

I'd love to put the PSF back. But as for the free upkeep, with the AI unable to handle them, they're not implemented in SSHIP (yet ).

Other things you can do are to substantially merchants income
(it's variable but a useful source of extra finance for the AI. Lowering cost of recruiting merchants might help. But need to be careful not to encourage the AI to spam them so don't lower cost too much.)

It's planned to reduce the amount of recruitable merchants, making them quite a lot less available.

Recruitable Generals Bodyguards not a good idea - their upkeep is high and the AI will spam them given a chance.
Might need to look at cost of all agents in terms of upkeep ?

Agree for bodyguards but in that case, we need to find a way to compensate that
Agree as well for agent upkeep, especially for diplomats and princesses. Their upkeep should be higher, especially on foreign land to reflect their travel expenses.
On a side note, diplomats were often used as spies too during that period. By increasing their "view range", that should reflect that somehow

[kostic]

Longer recruitment times for knightly units helps as does reduced recruitment pools.

This contradicts the idea of ​​reflecting their allegiance to the king by recruiting them quickly for little money, but of having to pay very dearly for their upkeep then or of allowing them to return to their fief after a military campaign ...

[Dekhatres]

would a completely spawn based recruitment system work maybe ?

for settlements garrisons they would be handled by a garrison script that spawns the militia and then disbands it after siege is over

for field armies they would be spawned near the current faction capital and they would last a certain amount of time after which they disband and you have to wait for some time

how big the army and how many stacks could be based on current treasury

[Lifthrasir]

^^ This would be too advantageous for big factions imo.

[Dekhatres]

not more than it already is

and even if it was, it wouldnt be a system issue but a tweaking issue, we can tweak it to include more factors that decide how big the assembled (spawned) army will be, number of settlements, number of feudal lords (family members with provincial titles) who have high loyalty etc

it could mean a lot for historicity, no more 10 AI armies of 2-4 units roaming around, no more weird AI army compositions, no more fighting countless little battles with little effect

[Lifthrasir]

And how much this would affect the script? We try to keep it as "light" as possible in order to not increase too much the AI turn duration. The other issue is that we don't have a scripter in the team