Warrior Castes

[Chandrasekhar]

I was playing a game of vanilla Civ the other day when a thought occured to me. I was thinking of how armies have traditionally had two types of soldiers: conscripts and professionals.

This is very applicable to FfH. One of the quirks about militaries in this mod is the way that there's less incentive to upgrade your units. You need to spend some precious hammers on a building that gives little benefit aside from letting you upgrade these units, and the upgrades aren't nearly as powerful! Of course, you'll still want to upgrade your elite units, but you still end up having warriors sitting in your cities with two or three axemen patrolling the border.

Here's what I suggest- have there be two different types of military unit. The conscript and the professional. Conscripts don't require buildings, and can be upgraded for just a little bit of gold. Professionals would have a building requirement, and possibly an XP requirement. Also, if it can be done, I'd suggest that these units have a higher upkeep.

What will this do? Well, I think it will encourage more powerful midgame militaries. Also, it might serve to make some units more well-used. Imagine if the maceman was a conscript unit, and the unit you get at Metal Casting was some sort of a professional ("Pikeman" is just too dull, and the need for anti-unit units is gone with the stronger promotions in FfH).

It'd take a bit of work to do, sure. I think it's still worth it.

 

[Mithrus]

Aren't mercenaries basically the same as conscripts? Perhaps there should be a stronger level of mercenaries after a higher tech is obtained?

 

[Chandrasekhar]

No, no; mercenaries are sellswords. Conscripts (at least as far as I know the term) are something along the lines of "Hey, you. Throw away that pitchfork. Now, here's a sword. Welcome to the army." Mostly untrained, mostly undisciplined.

 

[Lloyien]

Mercenaries already increase in strength via the metals promotions (Copper, Iron, Mithril).

However, mercenaries aren't really "conscripts;" they're certainly a quick fix, but they're costly in terms of gold.

Personally, I would suggest an alternative to the conscript/professional system; for instance, conscripts could start as a basic "conscript" unit, like the warrior, which can be upgraded into a second-tier conscript unit type (axemen, archers, spearmen), with the third tier allowing units to continue with the conscript system, or branch out into a professional tier, instead. The difference would be that the professional units would have a modestly higher strength, more general application, and maybe a modest withdrawal percentage. As above, they're more costly to promote and require higher upkeep costs.

However...I'm not sure that idea is entirely feasible, or really necessary. It would be more work than it might be worth, alas.

 

[Sureshot]

and conscripts would be the ones drafted? id say dont let conscripts even be buildable, make them only draftable.
would be nice if nationhood civic granted 1 draft a turn then so it could be done earlier (military state takes too long).

could only make a few conscripts, like a basic warrior type, called militia with 2 strength (lacking the city defense that warriors have, and maybe -25% versus melee), then pikemen would be the next one tho with a new name with like 6 strength, and then arquebusiers would be the final one with their 9 strength (maybe keep them buildable).

 

[Lloyien]

Actually, I quite like that idea, Sureshot. It'd give Nationhood more viability (I hardly ever use it as is), and give large empires a certain edge, especially as a means of population control.

 

[Adrogans]

I like the nationhood idea because as you say inever use it really.

 

[Endovior]

Neat idea. Yeah, the conscript unit would definitely be the draft unit... probably available for normal building from the beginning. The Conscript unit is 25% cheaper then normal units and built with food. 2, 1, and an automatic negative promotion called 'Conscripted'. The 'Conscripted' promotion gives -50% strength when not within cultural borders, and a penalty to resist spells such as Charm and Dominate. (Conscripts can be easily convinced to defend their own homes, but are unwilling and unable to execute an effective offensive. They are also generally more disloyal then professionals, a fact exploitable by skilled mages.) Conscript versions of more advanced units are also available, and weaker conscripts can be upgraded into stronger conscripts.

 

[eerr]

conscript promotion-
-20/30% strength
-20/30% strength outside of friendly cultural or religious borders.
conscripts start at level 0, and starts with -2 xp
after winning a battle against a much more experianced unit, you can take the seasoned promotion (lose conscript promotion, become level one)

level one will be required for a promotion other than conscript

 

[MrUnderhill]

Eh, I'd rather start from the bottom-up than the top-down, as far as promotions go. Buildings already can give promotions, IIRC, but they can't take them away.

If I had my way, all units that would have professional versions would be weakened by 1, then I'd have a "Professional" promotion, given out by the "requirement" buildings we have now, that gives back that , along with (possibly) a small bonus against non-professional units. Heroes and other units that can't be conscripted would have the Professional promotion by default.

Existing conscripts could get Professional somewhere between Combat II and III, so they can keep up with units that have Professional built-in. Civs running Military Discipline would have all applicable units get Professional regardless of buildings. And obviously drafted units would never get Professional (except by normal promoting).

Most of this is using old Civ4 code, so it should be fairly easy to implement.

 

[Sureshot]

the more i think about it the more it seems like the current method of "no promotions or extra xp for conscripts" is the simplest method, which also achieves the main goal that people seem to want (i.e. less able troops, since they have no startup promotions).

i just want atleast a 1-per-turn conscript with nationhood so that conscription actually happens (like i said, waiting for military state takes too long).

also, changing pikemen to a sort of special conscript would be nice (like you get 2 pikemen per draft once you have the tech, or 1 but you dont need any buildings for them).

 

[Nikis-Knight]

That's a good point. Usually you have some xp/promotion granting civics, traits, or buildings; consrcipted/recruited units have a small penalty already by not getting these from the get go. (If you don't have any civics, traits, or buildings that give xp/promotions, all your units could be seen as conscripts anyway.)
I like Sureshots idea because really, any unit that stays in service for more than one or two battles is not really a conscript anymore, but a professional soldier, so giving lasting penalties doesn't make too much sense. (to me, at least)

 

[Sureshot]

i dont find myself ever using conscripts currently tho, since military state comes mid game and is expensive, and each conscript causes 3 unhappiness O_o

 

[Oldfrt]

sure conscription is basically covered in the way that the units that dont require pre-reqs are acquired (ie starting warrier etc)? These are (after a while) effectively cheap/weak units that can be left to garrison cities, patrol borders or to act as cannon fodder? (certainly sounds like conscription to me!).