Mercenaries Overhaul

Leoreth has proposed the idea of eliminating the current Mercenaries system and instead replacing it with an early way to hurry units using . I like this idea very much so I've fleshed it out a little bit, as follows:

(1) The ability to hurry units using is to be enabled with the tech Currency. This ability obsoletes with the tech Nationalism, unless you switch to Capitalism. If you're using Capitalism you can hurry units and buildings using just like before.

The reason I feel this ability should be tied to a tech (Currency is the obvious and IMO the only choice), rather than a Civic, is because Mercenaries are historically employed by a variety of civilizations who are running a very diverse array of social and political institutions, most prominently including:

- Ancient Egypt (before and after Hellenization)
- Ancient China (especially during the Tang Empire)
- Greek City States
- Carthaginian Empire
- Late Roman Empire
- Byzantine Empire
- Christian Crusader States
- Medieval German States
- Italian Maritime Republics
- French Republic and Empire

It would be unrealistic to expect all these different civs to switch to a same specific civic just to make use of Mercenaries.

(2) As a balancing act, Currency no longer provides instant +1 Trade Route per city. Instead, this +1 Trade Route is given to the Market building. Numerous other Civ IV mods (such as RFCE) already adopted such a change for balance reasons. This will prevent the Currency tech from being too important.

Next 2 posts will be civ-specific ideas, mostly concerning Carthage. I feel that this new Mercenary mechanism should be designed with a few specific civs in mind (listed above), with Carthage being most important among them.

== Carthage ==

The one civilization that this new change is most concerned with. Mercenaries had been a defining feature of Ancient Carthage and it deserves to be represented fully in this game. Here are some changes to Carthage that I feel are in order:

(1) UU: Numidian Cavalry
Now that BTS style Mercenaries are gone we should definitely bring back the iconic Numidian Cavalry UU. After all, while African Elephant and Asian Elephant are different species, their uses in war had not been as decisively different. Moreover I have some other ideas to make War Elephants in general more unique, which I will mention later. But for now, Numidian Cavalry:
- Base Strength 6 (up from 5)
- Starts with Flanking I (same as in BTS)
- +30% vs. Melee units (down from +50%, this is to give Legions a chance)
- Everything else is unchanged from vanilla BTS.

(2) UP: The Power of Mercenaries
-33% cost and double XP for units hurried with .

Why 33% instead of say 50%? The answer is simple. Pyramids. The -33% hurry cost from Pyramids now represents the mercenary traditions of Ancient Egypt. Should Carthage get hold of the Pyramids too (which is not too hard for the Human player) their UP would become absurdly OP.

Why double XP? 2 reasons. One is to make the Carthaginian UP more interesting and powerful. Two is to replicate (in a way) the famous Charismatic Trait of Hannibal (one of the best leaders in BTS). Now you don't just have quantity. You also have quality.

(3) War Elephants

So how about Hannibals' iconic War Elephants? Do not worry. There are other ways to make War Elephants unique and interesting. What I highly recommend is the Vicinity Bonus ModComp:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=270539
^ The 2nd best ModComp in Civ IV after Influence Driven War (both deserve to be included in DoC) IMO.

What it will allow is that only cities who have Elephant resources within its BFC will be able to construct War Elephants. With this, we can give all War Elephants a +25% vs. Melee units bonus, or Shock Promotion, which is after all completely realistic. The Vicinity Bonus restriction will prevent it from being spamed too much to be overpowered.

Vicinity Bonus also allows for a variety of other features such as buildings which improves the Yield commerce:, , ) of specific resources.

== HRE ==

The HRE is second on this list of relevant civs when it comes to the Mercenary Overhaul because its UU is a mercenary unit. The only other civ in DoC who shares this distinction is the recently added Colombia but they can start with Capitalism. So, for HRE, the change would naturally be concerning its UU. It's actually quite simple, just add one feature:

Landsknecht
-33% Hurry production cost.
This is doable by modifying one line in UnitInfos.xml.

== Italy ==

Italy is third on my priority list because of the famous Italian mercenaries (Condottieri) who inspired Machiavelli to compose his magnum opus The Prince. However, Italy already has an UP and UU which are both quite essential to its UHVs. What to do? We modify the effect of a specific Italian Wonder instead.

Basilica di San Marco (extra effect)
-66% Hurry production cost for Naval units (effect obsoletes with Corporations).

There. Now you can quickly create the largest navy in the Mediterranean like the historic Republic of Venice did, and save your for land units instead.

== Egypt ==

Like has been stated in the above post, the mercenary traditions of ancient Egypt is represented in the effect of Pyramids. This also makes the Pyramids more valuable to players who are aversive to Forced Labor, such as myself.

== Greece/Rome/Byzantium ==

Conquer Egypt and take control of the Pyramids like you're supposed to.

== Greece ==

Actually you don't need the Pyramids because you have Parthenon => Nationhood => Unlimited Draft with Opera House.

BTW I changed Parthenon to obsolete with Feudalism instead of Theology.

Good ideas, as always.

I agree, these all seem like awesome ideas except for bringing back Numidian Cavalry. It just doesn't represent Carthage/Phoenicia very well IMO.

Gah, I don't quite have as much time as I used to, to go on our usual back-and-forth on these ideas, iOnlySignIn, but I'll try to keep this short and sweet.
Gold-rushing mercenaries seems like it'd be defined by the units you yourself can build, with all the limitations that come with it.
If you're say, a civ that's lacking in Horses, how are you supposed to gain cavalry mercenaries for example?
(Please don't say trade for them; the AI forces unfavorable trade deals for military resources)

Part of the big draw with the current mercenary system is that you can draw from a pool of units that you yourself may not have access to.
This is further accentuated by the fact that within the regional merc pools, there are often excellent UUs like Huskarls and Camel Archers that you can hire.
Which I think many players will definitely miss.

How would you address this?

Nice ideas. They should be at very least taken into consideration.

giant49er said:

I agree, these all seem like awesome ideas except for bringing back Numidian Cavalry. It just doesn't represent Carthage/Phoenicia very well IMO.

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Like I said before, not every civ can have an iconic UU such as the Roman Legion.

Numidian Cavalry is certainly a better UU than African War Elephant IMO. Hannibal's War Elephants' purpose was mostly psychological warfare - few (if any - according to most accounts only one) of his elephants survived the crossing of the Alps. His Numidian mercenaries were much more essential to his victories, and their abandonment of his cause was essential for his defeat at Zama IMO.

Tomorrow's Dawn said:

How would you address this?

Click to expand...

2nd UU ModComp.

I'm serious. It's ridiculous how Medieval Europeans are able to hire Numidian Cavalry or Elephant mercenaries. That's not a desirable feature IMO.

2nd UU ModComp deserves to become an official part of DoC after the current Merc system is removed, if only to address the concerns you have raised. This will provide a much more manageable and realistic way to diversify the military of various civilizations without introducing absurdities such as English War Elephant Mercenary Crusaders.

But as you said, the Numidians in Hannibal's army were mercenaries themselves and not Carthaginian. The Numidian cavalry makes more sense as a mercenary horseman that has been hired rather than a full-fledged unique unit. How about a sacred band as the UU? Or if worst comes to worst, the bireme is still there

I'm quite fond of my English War Elephant mercenaries thank you very much.

But in all seriousness, lacking a tech or resource for a critical unit type that you cannot rushbuy is quite a detriment.
Even if they have 2 UUs in the first place.

giant49er said:

But as you said, the Numidians in Hannibal's army were mercenaries themselves and not Carthaginian. The Numidian cavalry makes more sense as a mercenary horseman that has been hired rather than a full-fledged unique unit.

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(1) The military of the Carthaginian Empire relied extremely heavily on mercenaries, like no other civilization before or since. What better way to represent this?

(2) The current Mercenary system is on its way out, which is why this thread is created in the first place, which is also why I think Numidian Cavalry should return as Carthaginian UU.

How about a sacred band as the UU? Or if worst comes to worst, the bireme is still there

Click to expand...

Worst of the worst indeed.

But should Bireme return at least Orang Laut will have some competition for the position of worst UU in the game.

Incidentally, I have an idea to make Orang Laut instantly a more interesting and useful UU:

== Orang Laut ==
Replaces Work Boat
Requires Fishing
Strength of 2
+150% vs. Privateer
Improvements built by this unit receive an extra +1 .

I would rather limit the mercenary pools like the SoI...
certain units can only be hired in certain location, so keeping the mercenary mechanism, but polished it. Then, allow hiring the randomly passing barbarian (abundant in Classical era)... and diversify the randomly passing barbarian, off course.

edit: yes, Orang Laut is useless. It doesn't really play much in Indonesian history anyway besides pirating every ship that passed through Malacca strait to stop by at Palembang and conduct trade.

iOnlySignIn said:

(1) The military of the Carthaginian Empire relied extremely heavily on mercenaries, like no other civilization before or since. What better way to represent this?

(2) The current Mercenary system is on its way out, which is why this thread is created in the first place, which is also why I think Numidian Cavalry should return as Carthaginian UU.



Worst of the worst indeed.

But should Bireme return at least Orang Laut will have some competition for the position of worst UU in the game.

Click to expand...

We can represent their reliance on mercenaries through their UP. Their UU doing the same thing seems like a bit of an overkill. And if your system is implemented, then the most accurate way to represent Numidian Cavalry would be Carthage rush-buying horsemen in their cities. And yes, biremes are terrible, that's why it would be worst coming to worst.

Tomorrow's Dawn said:

Gold-rushing mercenaries seems like it'd be defined by the units you yourself can build, with all the limitations that come with it.
If you're say, a civ that's lacking in Horses, how are you supposed to gain cavalry mercenaries for example?

Click to expand...

Is it possible to tailor the system so you pay more for mercs you can't equip yourself? So if Carthage has no horses, for example, they have to pay twice as much to recruit Numidians to reflect the Numidians supplying their own horses.

Tomorrow's Dawn said:

Part of the big draw with the current mercenary system is that you can draw from a pool of units that you yourself may not have access to.
This is further accentuated by the fact that within the regional merc pools, there are often excellent UUs like Huskarls and Camel Archers that you can hire.
Which I think many players will definitely miss.

Click to expand...

I agree with this, but also see the drawbacks of the current merc system, with unrealistic units popping up all over the place and AI spamming mercs when threatened. Perhaps we could compromise by allowing some regional units, so cities in Scandinavia can build / buy Huskarls and cities in the Magreb can build / buy Camel Archers?

Also, will the bought units have higher maintenance costs, like the current mercs do? I think that would be desirable, to reflect the higher cost of maintaining merc armies.

All of this will be handled by an appropriate civic ...

Leoreth said:

All of this will be handled by an appropriate civic ...

Click to expand...

A civic that everyone is expected to adopt is no civic at all.

Unless you intend to drastically redesign the civics (like extra new categories and such) I don't think there is an appropriate civic for this.

I do intend to.

Tomorrow's Dawn said:

Gold-rushing mercenaries seems like it'd be defined by the units you yourself can build, with all the limitations that come with it.
If you're say, a civ that's lacking in Horses, how are you supposed to gain cavalry mercenaries for example?

Click to expand...

By hiring them with good ol' fashioned money of course!

The Mercenaries are foreign for a reason, they come from a different corner of the world where available resources are different. So of course you can hire them, provided you have the necessary coin.

In reality, many mercenaries actually joined without an upfront payment, only on the promise of booty from pillaging, looting, etc.

I'm not sure how this could best be introduced into DoC.

Mercenaries could turn barbarian if they are not in combat every certain number of turns. They could use the Ravenous Werewolf mechanic from FFH.