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[Ghazkull]

(Warning the following ideas are not completely thought out and balanced...they are jsut ideas)

Idea on Mercenaries

On several occasions i thought: why should a player buy mercenaries? They require continued expenses at a price for which you could raise between one and 2 infantry regiments with the same abilities. Therefore i have the following deal Mercenaries get special traits which can't be bought by normal nobles. THis is a) to show they are professional soldiers and not just some Peasants which god raised last month and put into full plate armor and b) to make Mercs a whole lot more interesting.

What does that mean?

A Mercenary player from example from the Northlands can instead of raising Standard Infantry Regiments, import Northlandish Mercenaries which don't need manpower but instead cost an extra Ducat to be ferried over to Ligoria. But additionally they have still the two Upgrade Slots. Which makes them better than Standard Infantry of the Nobles...and makes the price of Mercenaries (which i have usually seen in YAK I at about 0.5d/y - 1d/y) somewhat reasonable

Standard Infantry Regiment
Costs:
1 Ducat
1 Manpower
1 Ducat/year Maintenance
Traits:
1 Strength
2 Free Slots

Northland Mercenary Regiment
Costs:
2 d
1d/y maintenance

Traits
1 Strength

Northlandish:
starts with Heavy Perk (+1 Strength)

2 Free Slots

The Northlanders here are just an example and can be of course changed...this are of course just ideas to make Mercenaries to MErchant and Noble players more interesting and an actual alternative to normal troops...

[ashton1993]

(Warning the following ideas are not completely thought out and balanced...they are jsut ideas)

Idea on Mercenaries

On several occasions i thought: why should a player buy mercenaries? They require continued expenses at a price for which you could raise between one and 2 infantry regiments with the same abilities. Therefore i have the following deal Mercenaries get special traits which can't be bought by normal nobles. THis is a) to show they are professional soldiers and not just some Peasants which god raised last month and put into full plate armor and b) to make Mercs a whole lot more interesting.

What does that mean?

A Mercenary player from example from the Northlands can instead of raising Standard Infantry Regiments, import Northlandish Mercenaries which don't need manpower but instead cost an extra Ducat to be ferried over to Ligoria. But additionally they have still the two Upgrade Slots. Which makes them better than Standard Infantry of the Nobles...and makes the price of Mercenaries (which i have usually seen in YAK I at about 0.5d/y - 1d/y) somewhat reasonable

Standard Infantry Regiment
Costs:
1 Ducat
1 Manpower
1 Ducat/year Maintenance
Traits:
1 Strength
2 Free Slots

Northland Mercenary Regiment
Costs:
2 d
1d/y maintenance

Traits
1 Strength

Northlandish:
starts with Heavy Perk (+1 Strength)

2 Free Slots

The Northlanders here are just an example and can be of course changed...this are of course just ideas to make Mercenaries to MErchant and Noble players more interesting and an actual alternative to normal troops...

So the only difference between mercenaries and normal soldiers is one costs a ducat extra and starts with the heavy perk (though this doesn't cost upkeep)? How about we either instead of or in addition to this say that a standard regiment can only be upgraded once per battle in which they receive a victory whereas mercenaries can be brought in with whichever upgrades you please (except special cases such as Kain's dogmen and The Nahk's warbears)? That'd be pretty interesting as I recall somebody wanted an experience system earlier on.

[NUKE9.13]

Travel to the Southern City State( the yellow one...) and ask around for contestors to the Queen of Ligoria and maybe a mercenary employment in that City State

Oh noes!

Anyway, these guys, man, what will the deal be? I'm thinking 'defenders of the Storm Coast', which serves as a gathering point for the Storm Coast's armies whenever the orangey empire tries to invade, and as a mercenary hiring ground at all other times. This would go hand in hand with the city's policy of non-involvement, only joining wars when they threaten the independence of the entire Storm Coast.
During peacetime the markets would be full of precious metals and stone from the mountains upriver.

So the only difference between mercenaries and normal soldiers is one costs a ducat extra and starts with the heavy perk (though this doesn't cost upkeep)? How about we either instead of or in addition to this say that a standard regiment can only be upgraded once per battle in which they receive a victory whereas mercenaries can be brought in with whichever upgrades you please (except special cases such as Kain's dogmen and The Nahk's warbears)? That'd be pretty interesting as I recall somebody wanted an experience system earlier on.

Ooh, this looks like a good idea.
How about:
Mercenaries cost 2d to recruit, and can be upgraded whenever you like (manpower being replaced with ducats).
Regular troops can only be upgraded after surviving a battle. You can only upgrade one unit per battle.

[Ghazkull]

Well i thought about it again and i hope now its more fleshed out:

You have your regular Stock Infantry Regiments which you can hire as noble/landowner from the populace. Like before they cost 1 Ducat to raise and 1 Manpower as well as 1 d/y Upkeep. They still have their 2 Slots for upgrades.

But for Experience the following applies:

They start out as  Rank: Green units (-1 on own maneuvers per Green Regiment used in that Tactic, and +1 chance on fleeing on success of enemy Tactic Maneuver)
After 1 Battle survived : Bloodied units (no Bonus, no Mali)
After 3 Battles survived: Battle-hardened (+1 Strength)
After 4 Battles survived: Veterans (+1 Strength, Inspiring Perk (prevents Green regiments from Running and negates Effects on Maneuvers)
After 6 Battles survived: Elite (+1 Strength, Inspiring Perk, Loyality (cannot Flee), Last Stand (Cannot be Captured, instead Roll whether enemy Regiment gets destroyed too), Fear Inspiring (upon contact with enemy Forces below the Rank of Veteran-> Morale Roll)

Morale:
In Crucial Situations you roll for the Morale of Regiments which are involved in these for example:

an enemy achieves a successfull Maneuver (you roll for the Regiments who are influenced by it)
The Personal Guard of your General Falls ( roll for every Regiment in the vicinity)
Veterans and or Elites are killed (roll for surrounding Regiments)
your troops encounter fear inspiring Regiments (Roll for Regiments of Battle-Hardened and below)

it Rains (used as a modifier in this case (at the Battle of Avaricum the Celtic Warriors left their walls because it rained...and thus los tthe city))

Magic,Divine Intervention

use of Blackpoder Weapons

etc.




I hope with this i'm not making battles too complicated (although i fear i already do) but i think we need a Morale System and a Experience System. As far as i have seen we usually have about 100% Kill rate on the losing side...thats not only pretty much but ridiculous. If we take the Battle of Agincourt we have 25000 French soldiers and only 8000 Dead after the Battle, with 2200 Prisoners. That makes still a whopping 15000 deciding to flee the field. I think a Morale and Experience System allows even players with smaller armies and not the Ducats to raise 15 Regiments every season to stand agaisnt larger armies. At least in the first game i found it laughable that at several points some freshly raised green regimetns just took out the Personal guard who survived since the beginning of the Game...

now to my Mercenary Idea:

Northlander Mercenaries:
+1 Strength

This makes them Strength 2 Units (with Heavy and berserker that would bring them up to a whopping Strength 4 in attack)


Weylander Raiders Mercenaries:
+1 Strength
Raiding Specialists ( instead of a +4 undetected raid, on a +3 or +2)

Weylander Berserker Mercenaries:
Loyality/Last Stand
Fear Inspiring

Hatcuri Beast-Cavalry:
Fear Inspiring
Cavalry

Steppe Raiders:
Archers
Cavalry

And this is before they use up their Upgrade Slots, which is maing them quite powerful. However and here lies the interesting point also making them horribly expensive. This allows smaller Trading Kingdoms (which lack the Manpower to raise many troops) instead to raise few but effective Mercs. And traders wouldn't be confined only to trade but could also take part in power struggles and taking care of Competition ( I'm thinking here A Dance with Dragons ,Tyroshi and Slaver Cities). However on the other hand i would also confine the Mercs basically turning them into a guild. You could stay a roving Mercenary captain, raiding manpower as you go but without these special troopers or you could decide to be a Guild Company.

A Guild Company has a fixed base somewhere, which regulates the Size of your Mercenary Army. Following Example:

The Theocracy of Suul decides to buy the Lost Son Company. They Hire the player who is in control of them. He now can establish
similiar to a Trading Guild a Guild House from which to hire his Mercs and sell them out to the THeocracy for money...


i haven't fleshed that part really out but i guess those trader guys who like juggling with numbers know what i mean...

[ashton1993]

I think mercenary captains want to be fighters and tacticians above merchants, just saying but otherwise looks good.

[Taricus]

I kinda think mercenaries getting an extra bonus seems too powerful for me.

However, I'd say two things though.

First, the morale system is good, though blackpowder weapons won't cause fear unless the foe has never seen them before.
Second, The experience system is also good, but the Mali for green troops should be negatable with the disciplined upgrade.

[Yoink]

I'm kinda worried we're over-complicating things with all these excess rules...

Anyway, I should get around to making that epilogue thing. What was the consensus in the end, did Miring end up part of Elbreth or Suul or what?

[Taricus]

Dunno, Trubaldsome lives, but waery and Taric died.

[Yoink]

...What happened to Waery? Old age, or'd he die saving T. from an assassin or something?
I kinda missed something. Obviously.

[Taricus]

Sorta, he died saving you from Taric 

[Yoink]

But Taric was already about to get pincushion'd? A bit weird, but oh well, at least I don't have to work out an epilogue then if it's already done.
Don't think I'll join the new one just yet, doing so much stuff at the moment, my character ideas need revision for the new setting, and said setting doesn't really appeal in the first place. I'll keep checking in, though!

[filiusenox]

Huh...looks like we're gonna be at war soon, one way or the other....

And I guess i'm going to have to flesh out the Northlands pretty soon.

[Taricus]

And we'll have enough troops to fight them off.

Edit: I think we'll need to get the stats for cannons and gunpowder hand weapons done soon...

[filiusenox]

Longbows are better then crossbows look at the battle of (holdon a second)

[Taricus]

Either agincourt or crecy, and there were also other factors in those battles too.