So there always is a time where you get a new technology making your old army now inferior. You will want to upgrade your military but the costs are really high.
How about making them re-equip themselves?
Suggestion I: Units can be upgraded in cities.
Instead of spending 1 turn and a lot of money you can garrison a military unit in a city and order the city to upgrade the unit for a fraction (25% seems good) of the actual hammer cost, they keep their promotions and experience.
Ex. I have a Swordsman and want to upgrade it into a Longswordsman. Yet I don't have any wars right now so instead of spending money I can send it to a city 3 turns away that can train a longswordsman in 10 turns. It'll upgrade my swordsman in 3 turns as it only takes 25% of the hammers required to make a longswordsman.
You basically get the choice to upgrade them immediately using gold if you need to but you have an alternative that takes a few turns and costs some hammers instead.
Suggestion II: Units can gain experience in forts.
Getting promotions isn't all that hard, you can build buildings such as barracks to get two early promotions and you can fight wars or barbarians.
But what if you have some units walking around in times of peace with no promotions?
What if you could fortify a unit in a fort and after two turns it'll gain 2xp per turn? Up to a maximum level of three of course so that the unit wont get the high tier upgrades such as Blitz or Logistics without actually fighting some battles.
Citadels should do the same but also for units fortified around the citadel.
Just imagine that these units train within the forts walls (archers shooting at targets, swordsman sparring with each other.
This way you have a nice alternative to getting some early promotions on military units when there is no fighting to be done.
Alternatively:
Garrisoned units can gain experience when station in a city with barracks etc.
Barracks give 15xp, if a unit is garrisoned and has only 5xp it will gain 1xp per turn up till he has 15xp from the barracks.
Armory would increase that by yet another 15xp so that the garrisoned unit will gain 1xp per turn up until 30xp.
How about making them re-equip themselves?
Suggestion I: Units can be upgraded in cities.
Instead of spending 1 turn and a lot of money you can garrison a military unit in a city and order the city to upgrade the unit for a fraction (25% seems good) of the actual hammer cost, they keep their promotions and experience.
Ex. I have a Swordsman and want to upgrade it into a Longswordsman. Yet I don't have any wars right now so instead of spending money I can send it to a city 3 turns away that can train a longswordsman in 10 turns. It'll upgrade my swordsman in 3 turns as it only takes 25% of the hammers required to make a longswordsman.
You basically get the choice to upgrade them immediately using gold if you need to but you have an alternative that takes a few turns and costs some hammers instead.
Suggestion II: Units can gain experience in forts.
Getting promotions isn't all that hard, you can build buildings such as barracks to get two early promotions and you can fight wars or barbarians.
But what if you have some units walking around in times of peace with no promotions?
What if you could fortify a unit in a fort and after two turns it'll gain 2xp per turn? Up to a maximum level of three of course so that the unit wont get the high tier upgrades such as Blitz or Logistics without actually fighting some battles.
Citadels should do the same but also for units fortified around the citadel.
Just imagine that these units train within the forts walls (archers shooting at targets, swordsman sparring with each other.
This way you have a nice alternative to getting some early promotions on military units when there is no fighting to be done.
Alternatively:
Garrisoned units can gain experience when station in a city with barracks etc.
Barracks give 15xp, if a unit is garrisoned and has only 5xp it will gain 1xp per turn up till he has 15xp from the barracks.
Armory would increase that by yet another 15xp so that the garrisoned unit will gain 1xp per turn up until 30xp.
