One click insta-armies seem too simple. I wonder if there will be more to producing a fighting force in CK2. Lord knows it wasn't that easy to get the filthy peasants to fight for you way back then. 
How will armies be handled?
- Thread starter Kiithis
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I would like to see manorism with feudal retainers. You manage your resources which limits your troops and the land can sustain so many. Similar to troop movement in EU III and active demesne limits based on provincial decisions. Also has a muster time limit. E.G you call for your troops they will muster in x days. You summoned a vassel to your court he will arrive in x days. That sort of thing
That sounds like a good idea. You should also have a small contingent of men on hand that you can call up for smaller missions like putting down little rebellions, etc.
you mean an armed retinue. In England during the Stuarts or earlier (post Bosworth Field) they had the King's Gentelman Retinue or Lifeguards.
However during the middle ages they would like just be Men at Arms or Knights. Likely part of the Household. I suppose you could count a character as either having their own household which moved with them or being attached to another's household. When in residence or a region the household could be set to "take up arms" or to "hold court" Meaning that direct military use has to be intended and not spur of the moment.
You understand where I'm going with this. The monarch (and some high-ranking nobles as well) should have something like a personal guard in their retinue. There could be events tied to this, like promoting men from your retinue (which is why many signed up in the first place, at least the nobles among them were younger sons seeking their fortunes) and so forth.
Personally I'm not a huge fan of provincial decisions as those can easily degenerate into micro-management hell. I actually like the 1 click type recruiting although the force size calculation model in ck/dv needs a lot of improvement.
I was thinking along the lines of a POP driven system to simulate limits to the types of troops you can or cannot field - the more upper class or noble POPs a province has the more knights etc the army can have.
These are some good points. I like a single call to arms, but I would also like to be able to have this limited to certain regions, in the case of a large entity like the Byzantine Empire or the HRE. It would also be nice to be able to dismiss everyone with one action as well. (Demobilize all, though that sounds very XX century to me.)
I would assume with the baronies that have been announced that levies will be based around the kind of settlement they come from (@Kiithis, this might work like Victoria II's POPs, in a rough way). So a lot of halberders or pikemen and crossbowmen from an urban canton, while a rural barony even in the same county would send light cavalry and knights, while the count's own demesne would be made of his own retainers, maybe many men at arms and the like. It would also be nice to be able to encourage certain kinds of troops. Having a lot of open country should encourage horsemanship for instance. (I'm thinking of the Ukraine, Iberia, maybe North Africa.) Given that, it would be nice to be able to designate a staging ground or collection point for your levies, maybe the capital of the kingdom or a strategic seaport where the ships are waiting.
A final idea that I would like is to take seasonality into consideration. In rural baronies (that is most of them), most of the fighting men are farmers or in the case of nobles owners of farms. So, it might make sense for men to sign on for the summer months, between planting and harvesting. It makes sense to me, then, that for longer operations (overseas conquests) you will mostly be employing mercenaries and other professionals, as well as any military order knights (e.g., Templars) who might serve in your realm.
I would assume with the baronies that have been announced that levies will be based around the kind of settlement they come from (@Kiithis, this might work like Victoria II's POPs, in a rough way). So a lot of halberders or pikemen and crossbowmen from an urban canton, while a rural barony even in the same county would send light cavalry and knights, while the count's own demesne would be made of his own retainers, maybe many men at arms and the like. It would also be nice to be able to encourage certain kinds of troops. Having a lot of open country should encourage horsemanship for instance. (I'm thinking of the Ukraine, Iberia, maybe North Africa.) Given that, it would be nice to be able to designate a staging ground or collection point for your levies, maybe the capital of the kingdom or a strategic seaport where the ships are waiting.
A final idea that I would like is to take seasonality into consideration. In rural baronies (that is most of them), most of the fighting men are farmers or in the case of nobles owners of farms. So, it might make sense for men to sign on for the summer months, between planting and harvesting. It makes sense to me, then, that for longer operations (overseas conquests) you will mostly be employing mercenaries and other professionals, as well as any military order knights (e.g., Templars) who might serve in your realm.
Some notes:
Terrain (alone) probably shouldn't affect troop type. The reason is that the Ardennes, wooded-hills were renowned for excellent cavalry at the time and very little infantry found employ in that area. I'm pretty sure the same phenomenon existed in other places. The reason for this was that military-cultural issues and fief density were much more important to military composition than terrain. For the Ardennes this was a) strong local nobility and extreme density of fiefs and castles b) very few cities or towns outside the control of the nobility, c) strong church influence (Trier, Prüm, Stavelot-Malmedy, Liège to name just the most important) and d) powerless peasantry. At the battle of Worringen (1288) the count of Luxembourg managed to assemble 600+ knights, squires and mounted sergeants from just three of his counties, while no numbers exist for his infantry contingent of foot sergeants, they cannot have numbered more than a hundred and played no role in the battle. Now had the battle been waged closer to home some militia would also have taken part (Echternach, Luxembourg, Diekirch, Arlon, Bitburg etc.), but still no more than a couple of hundred. Also note that what would be rough terrain in CK need not exclude sufficient open enough terrain for horse breeding. Finally, the role of cavalry was greatly influenced by the chivalric ethos and practice of tournaments (the early bloody battle training as well as the later formalised elite sport)...
So in game terms linking army composition to size to type of fief (barony) makes sense. A noble barony (aka castle) should field a lot of knights and mounted sergeants (light cavalry) as well as some foot sergeants (heavy infantry and crossbowmen), depending on power distribution also peasants (light infantry) and archers. A church barony (aka bishopric) should field few knights and a lot of mounted sergeants and some foot sergeants, again depending on rights of the peasantry also light infantry and archers. A burgher barony (aka city or town) should have very few knights and mounted sergeants (at Worringen Cologne could field some 60 riders) and a lot of militia (medium infantry and crossbowmen) (again at Worringen Cologne fielded some 2-3000 infantry). Obviously some way still has to be found to reflect the role of peasants as a) whether peasants were levied at all depended a lot on the type of campaign (they serve no purpouse in chevauchée, while they are essential in sieges) but also b) on the freedoms of peasantry (as in England for instance, but also some regions in Germany) (serfs would either not be armed at all, or have no training and therefore be useless as a fighting force)...
Final note: I hope the real advantages of cavalry over infantry for most of the medieval period will be respected in CK-II. I know I'll be repeating myself, but it was not without reason that cavalry was considered ten times more effective in battle than infantry. It was only gradually that infantry managed to regain a foothold on medieval battlefields and that largely through training and re-dicovery of battle formations (even then a largely infantry force could not defeat a largely cavalry force in open battle unless a 3:1 numerical superiority existed between infantry and cavalry, rough terrain would also be decisive in those situations). Cavalry also remained an important factor on the battlefield until the Napoleonic age...
Edit: Hit post button too early.
Terrain (alone) probably shouldn't affect troop type. The reason is that the Ardennes, wooded-hills were renowned for excellent cavalry at the time and very little infantry found employ in that area. I'm pretty sure the same phenomenon existed in other places. The reason for this was that military-cultural issues and fief density were much more important to military composition than terrain. For the Ardennes this was a) strong local nobility and extreme density of fiefs and castles b) very few cities or towns outside the control of the nobility, c) strong church influence (Trier, Prüm, Stavelot-Malmedy, Liège to name just the most important) and d) powerless peasantry. At the battle of Worringen (1288) the count of Luxembourg managed to assemble 600+ knights, squires and mounted sergeants from just three of his counties, while no numbers exist for his infantry contingent of foot sergeants, they cannot have numbered more than a hundred and played no role in the battle. Now had the battle been waged closer to home some militia would also have taken part (Echternach, Luxembourg, Diekirch, Arlon, Bitburg etc.), but still no more than a couple of hundred. Also note that what would be rough terrain in CK need not exclude sufficient open enough terrain for horse breeding. Finally, the role of cavalry was greatly influenced by the chivalric ethos and practice of tournaments (the early bloody battle training as well as the later formalised elite sport)...
So in game terms linking army composition to size to type of fief (barony) makes sense. A noble barony (aka castle) should field a lot of knights and mounted sergeants (light cavalry) as well as some foot sergeants (heavy infantry and crossbowmen), depending on power distribution also peasants (light infantry) and archers. A church barony (aka bishopric) should field few knights and a lot of mounted sergeants and some foot sergeants, again depending on rights of the peasantry also light infantry and archers. A burgher barony (aka city or town) should have very few knights and mounted sergeants (at Worringen Cologne could field some 60 riders) and a lot of militia (medium infantry and crossbowmen) (again at Worringen Cologne fielded some 2-3000 infantry). Obviously some way still has to be found to reflect the role of peasants as a) whether peasants were levied at all depended a lot on the type of campaign (they serve no purpouse in chevauchée, while they are essential in sieges) but also b) on the freedoms of peasantry (as in England for instance, but also some regions in Germany) (serfs would either not be armed at all, or have no training and therefore be useless as a fighting force)...
Final note: I hope the real advantages of cavalry over infantry for most of the medieval period will be respected in CK-II. I know I'll be repeating myself, but it was not without reason that cavalry was considered ten times more effective in battle than infantry. It was only gradually that infantry managed to regain a foothold on medieval battlefields and that largely through training and re-dicovery of battle formations (even then a largely infantry force could not defeat a largely cavalry force in open battle unless a 3:1 numerical superiority existed between infantry and cavalry, rough terrain would also be decisive in those situations). Cavalry also remained an important factor on the battlefield until the Napoleonic age...
Edit: Hit post button too early.
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Heavy Cavalry was the "omnipotent" military unit type in the west until Crecy (introduction of the English Longbow) and the advent of the Swiss pike infantry, but both of these happened in the 14th century and did not supplant the cavalry, i.e. they were more or less "localized" for a long time since the nobles made the rules and nobles did not want to abandon the "honorable" profession of a cavalryman and and fight like "peasants" with bows and pikes. It is because of this insistence on knighthood (because noble arrogance and because horses and armor were very expensive = luxurious = status symbols) that western Europe turned a blind eye on military innovation for as long as they could, and why they were so catastrophically beaten by Ottomans in the early phase of ottoman expansion (Nicopolis 1396 for example) since the Ottomans were students of military history and had no problems changing and adopting whereas the western knights clung to the "cavalry charge of nobility"
A long time ago I suggested that the types of recruitment should be a decision type process (like with laws in CK1)
Say you could have 4 types of recruitment.
Levee en masse/feudal system: Just your average call to arms to all vassals. Can be modified when certain technology is unlocked/researched.
Semi-professional: Feudal system supplemented to hirable/standing troops. this means you can actually hire the amount of troop you want and need, and it would resemble EUIII and most paradox games, however you can also call to arms your vassals to supplement your force.
Professional: Fully professional force, regularly paid. Achievable only after certain technology is unlocked. No call to arms from vassals.
Tribal(?): This is more of a maybe. A special type of levee en masse for nomadic cultures, which generates slightly more troops and predominantly cavalry. A special feature about it should be that if it faces another tribal army it absorbs the previous one(just an idea to represent the Golden Horde).
Say you could have 4 types of recruitment.
Levee en masse/feudal system: Just your average call to arms to all vassals. Can be modified when certain technology is unlocked/researched.
Semi-professional: Feudal system supplemented to hirable/standing troops. this means you can actually hire the amount of troop you want and need, and it would resemble EUIII and most paradox games, however you can also call to arms your vassals to supplement your force.
Professional: Fully professional force, regularly paid. Achievable only after certain technology is unlocked. No call to arms from vassals.
Tribal(?): This is more of a maybe. A special type of levee en masse for nomadic cultures, which generates slightly more troops and predominantly cavalry. A special feature about it should be that if it faces another tribal army it absorbs the previous one(just an idea to represent the Golden Horde).
I believe that you should have a professional core to your army (your own retainers and those of your closest vassals + mercenaries). You can then call levies (of militia) in particular regions. Finally, in case of invasion, a full mobilization.
That seems the closest "feel" to me.
Perhaps something that allows for a larger professional core as time/culture advances.