Make armies cost money

[Leegion]

First I'd like to say that i think that the devs are doing an awesome job on supporting the game in its current state.

One idea to combat late-game runaway economy (and also maybe snowballing depending on how AI economy works) would be to make mustering armies cost money in addition to influence. Perhaps something like 10 gold per soldier per day. That's in addition to paying your own troops salaries.

It would make sense RP-wise too. While its true that you would need influence to get other lords to join you I doubt they'd be willing to (at least fully) bankroll your campaign. Armies need to be provisioned (tents, supply caravans, food, building materials for sieges, materials to repair/replace gear and make projectiles etc) and supporting staff would also need to be hired (cooks, blacksmiths, camp followers, medics, engineers etc)

This would be a huge money sink in the late game, and also would cap (in theory) the amount of time one character can continuously rampage through their enemies kingdoms before needing to disband the army and recover economically.

It is historically true that kings and lords bankrupted themselves and their kingdoms by endlessly campaigning so why not make it a possibility for the player.

 

[Forlorn Hope]

I like the sound of this; it makes sense from both a gameplay and historical viewpoint as you say.

 

[Leader144]

Yes that would make sense. ? +1 that I hope they will implement something like this.

 

[pyerr]

No from me, because it would most likely bankrupt AI vassals when they summon their army.

 

[donpitufo]

you are already paying this whit salaries as you pay your own troops and the other lord pays his troops so no

 

[Leegion]

I would think there's a difference on paying the wages of your household troops (who normally have a nice comfy logistics base in your town or a castle, doing "peacetime" trading with other towns of your faction) vs running with and setting up logistics for a mobile field army, on campaign, in what is most likely enemy territory.

 

[durbal]

No. It won't even make a dent anyway.

 

[Ggoddkkiller]

In history forming large armies wasn't the real struggle rather it was preserving their numbers as weather, infectious diseases, enemy raids, fights within the army, financial problems etc would constantly reduce their strength that you can find dozens of campaigns completely failed because of this!! So i think there should be a severe army attrition with options to lower it like hiring surgeons, buying more food, increasing salaries etc but im not sure AI could handle it..

 

[Leegion]

That's kind of what I'm proposing. Imposing an umbrella logistics cost to running an army. It'd be cool if it was a more fleshed out system with individual areas of expense that would have positive and negative effects on the army. But I'd take even a basic version of it .

Logistics have been a hugely important part of armies and warfare, from the ancient world (e.g. Greeks and Romans), right up to modern times. Why not have it be a factor in the game?

Also, it would be realistic, if not all lords, but the wealthiest could organize and run large scale military campaigns. In lieu of the marshal system that we had in Warband (where you could RP that the costs of the campaigns undertaken by a royally appointed commander, who by the way was the only one who could do this, were covered from the state treasury), this would perhaps limit the amount of armies a faction would field at the same time (most I've seen is 4). Also The AI couldn't use one army to roflstomp 1/3 of another faction in 1 go.

 

[durbal]

Armies already do cost money. They already cost more money the bigger they get because they slow down (more paid per distance and more paid in food per distance). This would add nothing but extra nonsense to account for and balance and with the economy as it is currently it'd have zero effect.

 

[bigbalzzz]

That's kind of what I'm proposing. Imposing an umbrella logistics cost to running an army. It'd be cool if it was a more fleshed out system with individual areas of expense that would have positive and negative effects on the army. But I'd take even a basic version of it .

Logistics have been a hugely important part of armies and warfare, from the ancient world (e.g. Greeks and Romans), right up to modern times. Why not have it be a factor in the game?

Also, it would be realistic, if not all lords, but the wealthiest could organize and run large scale military campaigns. In lieu of the marshal system that we had in Warband (where you could RP that the costs of the campaigns undertaken by a royally appointed commander, who by the way was the only one who could do this, were covered from the state treasury), this would perhaps limit the amount of armies a faction would field at the same time (most I've seen is 4). Also The AI couldn't use one army to roflstomp 1/3 of another faction in 1 go.

doesnt matter
then ai spawns with a decent amount of garrison anyway after being defeated
this will make it so just run without army and who has more lords wins

 

[imgran]

you are already paying this whit salaries as you pay your own troops and the other lord pays his troops so no

If you're taking charge of the campaign and ordering the lord's troops around, paying him for the use of those troops is reasonable.

 

[donpitufo]

If you're taking charge of the campaign and ordering the lord's troops around, paying him for the use of those troops is reasonable.

i dont think so you are a vasall and you are doing this for the king not for yourself so why i would pay more for help the kingdom ? the should be who pays in your logical , sorry for my bad english but i still think its good the way it does right now

 

[hedition]

Yes from me. Armies are the most expensive thing to raise in history. So much so kings hire mercenaries over paying their nobles to fight.

If people wants things to cost less and income to yield more, then sure as long as they don't complain about too much money.

 

[KaelusVonSestiaf]

This is neat, but it can be made even simpler.

Make the leader of an army pay for the salary of all parties in this army, instead of the party leaders, for as long as they're in the army.

This makes it so the money doesn't just vanish into thin air: the army leader is taking care of the expenses of the lords following him in exchange for, well, being followed.
It makes armies led by kings more common, because kings just have more money to spend compared to others.
It also eases the burden of a new player/new character who doesn't have many sources of income, they can avoid the daily wages of his troops by joining someone's army, which can save the player from bankrupcy.
In fact that last bit is also true for pretty much all vassals who are in a bad economic situation: it helps them overcome it by lowering their expenses, at the cost of making them aid the kingdom more actively.

 

[bigbalzzz]

Yes from me. Armies are the most expensive thing to raise in history. So much so kings hire mercenaries over paying their nobles to fight.

If people wants things to cost less and income to yield more, then sure as long as they don't complain about too much money.

the mangools and the muslims and vikings rose armies cheap.......

 

[bigbalzzz]

so if you taking about historically current aseria would ve everyone pay to join your army and those who wont join pay for someone else to join as shariaa law making armies not only free but profitable

 

[Leegion]

Adressing some of the points made in this thread in reverse order:

Mongol armies had little in terms of logistical support, which is why they ran into difficulties facing for example the mameluk sultanate, because the areas in which war was taking place was so arid it was almost impossible to find enough fodder for their horses while keeping the army moving as a cohesive unit. Even in the ideal terrain they basically had to keep moving because they would quickly graze out their surrounding area (and start suffering attrition). Don't know enough about vikings or early islamic armies to comment on those, but i suspect that armies still weren't cheap. Different war taxes exited everywhere in history and for a reason. Also, armies COULD historically be profitable, depending on the spoils of war.

And yes, it would be cool to have different warfare mechanics for each faction (e.g. something like tagmata and themata troop system for the empire) but right now it would also be cool to just have one system to simulate organizing and running a military campaign.

Also, having the party upkeep either partially or wholly subsidised by the army leader is also an interesting idea in terms of economical incentives.

No noble, in the history of the planet, has ever raised an army solely for the glory of their king and country. There's always profit to be had, in new territory gained for oneself (and sometimes indeed, by way of vassalage for ones king) or in spoils of war.

A good example of an army funded and staffed by its various component lords would be the first crusade. Which almost immediately started breaking apart, with its constituent leaders running off to create their own independent duchies, or deciding that they were too good to work together with one another because there really was nothing to give anyone authority to lead over the others apart from personal charisma.

 

[bigbalzzz]

Adressing some of the points made in this thread in reverse order:

Mongol armies had little in terms of logistical support, which is why they ran into difficulties facing for example the mameluk sultanate,

is an arab i will tell you the mangools did beat us with nothing arabs could to stop them mangools started converting to islam and started a civil war so the sultana was saved

 

[bigbalzzz]

Adressing some of the points made in this thread in reverse order:

Mongol armies had little in terms of logistical support, which is why they ran into difficulties facing for example the mameluk sultanate,

vikings started beating everyone until some converted to islam and a civil war started i think its even in most viking books/the vikings show
when the han empire ruled over people the yellow turbans came
in history mostly you will see a group that takes credit for beating a bigger one
when its always people rebelling not staying loyal that kills a huge snowballing group irl
the fix is a feature not yet implemented civil war
civil war is the downfall of every empire the longer you go on war the more likely your people will turn in you is the best way to combat this
not making it more expensive
because the rich will just be rollin