Mounted troop upkeep is too cheap. For example: compare the Khuzait Heavy Horse archer to the Kuzait Marksman. Same skills, same bow, same upkeep, but one of them is mounted. Similar comparisons can be made for most factions. (I know the horses make them more expensive to create, but that does not matter in the long run if I don't let them die.)
To make matters worse, there's a perk for companions that will half the upkeep of mounted troops in a town's garrison. This makes horsemen better as garrison troops. Why would I ever recruit an archer without a horse? Even if I want archers fighting on foot, I can just order them to dismount.
Proposed fixes:
- Horses eat food
- Horses cost money to upkeep
(I know I can just mod the 2nd, but I want the vanilla game to be good and keep running into nonsense like this.)
Eh I think it's balanced for the player since you either have to have horses (I never seem to have enough War Horses for upgrades) or pay a higher cost for recruitment. (The real problem is the A.I. not needing actual horses for upgrade, that's why there's so much Cavalry in the game. But let's not balance Horse Production or anything like that
)
Considering that if the horseman dies you effectively lose the horse also, I think it's fair.
Also you absolutely want Archers in your castle garrison over Cavalry. Cavalry lose their horses in sieges and thereby most of their advantage and just become rather "meh" foot infantry as result. 50% upkeep reduction may be a bit high (pretty sure it's 15%), but like I said it's silly to garrison Cavalry unless you are literally trying to save money or trying to boost Security.
Okay let's assume it's real late game; and you're rocking a 250 Party all Tier 6 Cavalry. That's 4500 denars a day, that isn't exactly cheap. Also unless you are rocking all Khan's Guard you are going to lose units. And that's just your party. Ideally you should have clan members leading parties so you can form your own army legit. And if you're maxing Garrisons too I guarantee you can burn through money. Heck even Khan's Guard die occasionally. I mean sure if you max out Steward/Medicine you can make the game a breeze. If it's true late game you should be using your excess cash to fully kit out your Companions with the best gear and or bribe Nobles to switch factions.
I strongly encourage people who find the game "too easy" to play on Ironman mode. When you have to own your mistakes and actually suffer defeat sometimes and start over the game takes on a whole other meaning. Very easy to trivialize the whole experience when you can just conveniently reload so that you never ever lose your super elite party.
I mean I get it; historically (and even today) horses are very expensive to maintain. But I think there's much more serious balance issues that need attending first. Also troop wages used to be higher and most everyone complained at the time.
Also I don't think money is really supposed to be an issue late game. I mean royals and nobles were usually pretty loaded. Also if you are actually at peace and you can't rely on battle loot anymore I think you'll find maintaining thousands of T5-T6 units is pretty impractical.
IDK in the grand scheme of things raising the upkeep of cavalry by a few denars (maybe like 1 denar per tier) would be warranted. But very few horseman make better foot troops at their respective tiers, real benefit is party speed.
