EUIV - Development Diary - 25th of February 2020

[Canute VII]

The swiss didnt use mercenaries, they generally didn't have to and only rented out mercenaries themselves, getting to a point where most nations in Europe rented Swiss Mercenaries. And consequently most majors agreed on Swiss neutrality.

That one is missing from the mechanics so far, I guess....

 

[saltyfish]

So anybody has the idea about when it released?

 

[Poliut]

Will some of the mercenary companies from CK2 make appearances here as well, since (IIRC) some did exist during this timeframe? And if they're vassalized from a converted save will that change things?

 

[master_kong]

Naval Condottieries please.. Also,

Some other examples are we have reworked how supply limit and attrition modifiers interact to be a bit softer on you.

Can you elaborate on that?

 

[Estaloy]

Would some companies have better military technologies(better units) than your country has? For example, in South-East Asia, kingdoms had Portuguese mercenaries that had the particularity to have firearms. Would this be includes?

 

[ywxiao]

This still works but if you have enough to actually fill the combat width it is ignored.

For game play purposes, does this mean the total number of regiments? Or must the combat width be filled?
Example, 40/0/0 won't be stack wiped, but how about 30/0/30?

Also, will mercenary size scale with difficulty? If the VH AI uses up man power, all of a sudden they drop from fielding 4 x 50k armies to fielding armies of 4k, 4k, 15k, 7k?

 

[Bandua_of_Gallaecia]

For the gentleman disagreeing:
"The restricted model of occupation was adopted by the Portuguese in
North Africa as a result of a number of structural deficiencies of the Portuguese
Kingdom. As a matter of fact, very soon the lack of armament and soldiers
made the project of territorial conquest that was initially chosen for Morocco
unfeasible. Therefore, a new political and military strategy was adopted. It
consisted of conquering the most important strongholds along the Northern
coast of Morocco aiming at controlling the navigation of the Gibraltar Strait
more effectively and minimizing the effects of the Muslim navy. The initial
idea of conquering the kingdom of Fez was thus abandoned and replaced
by the attempt to economically stifle the kingdom of Fez by cutting off
access to the sea through the conquest of its main port cities. Indeed, in
Northern Morocco, a restricted model of occupation was chosen where the
Portuguese domination was confined to the area within the forts and to a
small territory around it; the garrisons of these forts were supported by a
naval force that varied from fort to fort, a model that would later be transferred
to the Southern Coast of Morocco and to the shores of the Indian Ocean."

Source:
Athens Journal of History - Volume 3, Issue 4 – Pages 321-336
https://doi.org/10.30958/ajhis.3-4-4 doi=10.30958/ajhis.3-4-4
The Portuguese Art of War in Northern
Morocco during the 15th Century
By Vitor Luís Gaspar Rodrigues

Also i hope to see Portuguese and European Mercenaries in Asia.

"early 1600s, some three thousand Portuguese mercenaries were serving in Bengal, five hundred in Makassar, and fifteen hundred in the Southeast Asian mainland kingdoms. Another contemporary source estimated that as of 1627, there were five thousand European mercenaries in the Mughal army alone and another thousand Portuguese sailors in the Mughal navy."

Also the presence of European mercenaries in Asian armies was not new when the Portuguese reached India. Thousands of men, disillusioned by service in European armies or navies, signed on as mercenaries in various Asian armies. The first Portuguese soldiers to join Indian armies in the early 1500s reported the presence of long-established Italian and French mercenaries. By 1600, Asian armies included Portuguese, English, Dutch, French, Germans, Greeks, Danes, and Swedes.

Why the struggle, why the strain?
Why make trouble? Why make scenes?
Why go against the grain?
Why swim upstream?
It ain't- It ain't- It ain't no use
You're bound- You're bound- You're bound to lose
What's done- What's done- What's done is done
That's the way the river runs
So why get wet? Why break a sweat?
Why waste your precious breath?
Why beat your handsome brow? Nothing changes
Nothing changes
Nothing changes anyhow
The blindest man is him who refuses to see.

 

[TomLore]

How does this make Swiss Mercenaries more historical?

The swiss didnt use mercenaries, they generally didn't have to and only rented out mercenaries themselves, getting to a point where most nations in Europe rented Swiss Mercenaries. And consequently most majors agreed on Swiss neutrality.

Not sure these modifiers properly represent this.

Not that your point isn’t valid but Swiss neutrality is a result of the Congress of Vienna wanting to separate France, Austria, Italy and Germany, and keep key mountain passes neutral. Not because they all wanted Swiss mercenaries.

 

[Ivashanko]

Which is a roundabout way of solving that issue. You don't have Mercs as manpower sink anymore. Great. What do you do with your money in the late game now? Spam buildings that will give a 0.01 monthly return?

The overabundance of money has always been an issue in Paradox games. Its a tough nut to crack, though: make money too hard to obtain and you really hurt beginner players. Make it too easy and money quickly becomes effectively infinite. Of the two, I personally prefer restricting the amount of money, but I acknowledge I am part of a small minority and that Paradox probably has looked into the numbers and come to the conclusion that the economic model is basically fine as is.

 

[Scout1]

All other modifiers should work as expected, mercenary cost reduces the cost of the company, mercenary maintenance reduces the maintenance, discipline makes them stronger.

Does mercenary cost still double dip? I'm not sure how you're changing around mercenaries in the coding, but maintenance cost per month for regiments is calculated as a function of their recruitment cost.

This means that reducing the cost of regiments actually "double dips" - it gives you a discount at the time of purchase, and then it calculates the maintenance cost from that discounted price... resulting in significantly less cost over time.

Previously, all mercenary regiments were slapped with a +400% maintenance modifier which meant that any such reductions to mercenaries were negligible.

It sounds like you're using a new type of unit to represent mercenaries now though, in line with Janissaries/cossacks/streltsy/etc. As opposed to the old special-cased mercenaries. Which means that you're probably rolling that +400% into their base cost... basically instead of receiving a total of ~495% maintenance cost from a default mercenary regiment with a single -5% regiment cost you would be turning it into ~95% (NEW BASE) maintenance cost. This would have a much bigger effect than intended.

I'm not necessarily opposed to that idea, but I think it would create a rather weird 'meta', both for single-player and multiplayer.

 

[JusticeFighter]

Does mercenary cost still double dip? I'm not sure how you're changing around mercenaries in the coding, but maintenance cost per month for regiments is calculated as a function of their recruitment cost.

This means that reducing the cost of regiments actually "double dips" - it gives you a discount at the time of purchase, and then it calculates the maintenance cost from that discounted price... resulting in significantly less cost over time.

Actually a triple dip - Mercenary maintenance is calculated based on regular regiment cost, not mercenary cost.

Previously, all mercenary regiments were slapped with a +400% maintenance modifier which meant that any such reductions to mercenaries were negligible.

That is not true. Though modifiers are additive with themselves, they are usually multiplicative with other modifiers. Having a total of -5% regiment cost will always subtract 5% from mercenary maintenance, as the bonus for being mercenary applies to *mercenary maintenance modifier* and nothing else. Only mercenary maintenance is additive with this +150% (where's 400% from?), all other things are multiplicative.

 

[Oporto]

So anybody has the idea about when it released?

I guess it's just like Half Life 2 Episode 3: the more times somebody asks about it, the Valve just postpones it by one minute per question (kidding).
Anyway, considering the switching to the weekly dev diaries, i predict it to be somewhere in march-april this year.

 

[lolada]

They might want to release it before summer holidays.. so may-june?

 

[I'm gaming]

What about countries which were heavily dependent on regular army like Korea?

You can't merge them no since they need to remain separate, however we have redone how you attach armies as you can see in a previous development diary.

Will you equalize movement speed of armies attached to and attached by other armies?

They do not regen their manpower while hired, it's only recovered when they are dismissed.

If so, why can’t we re-hire then for 20 years? Just letting us to wait until their regen will be enough.

 

[randomgamer71]

A player should not be able to screw over another player by clicking first

Does this mean that the same mercenary band can be hired by more nations at the same time? With the same leader? and its size change based on the development of the nation hiring it? Does the manpower pool is shared between the same band or each have their own?

That would be really roundabout and weird, their troops are only really skilled when being hired out? ".

It is not weirder that the same troops being more or less skilled, depending on who hired them. (Do mercenaries gain bonuses from the idea of the nation hiring them or not?)

 

[PhoenixG]

When the company becomes disbanded, it used to be unavailable to you for 10 years but this has been increased to 20 years

Wouldn't it be better if it scales with how many manpower the company has left? Like at 0 manpower 20 year needed to be available, while if you only used up 50% of the manpower you'll only need to wait 10 years? Can't remember where I read it, but the reason was to give them time to regen their manpower. So it would reasonable that it scales.

 

[randomgamer71]

Wouldn't it be better if it scales with how many manpower the company has left? Like at 0 manpower 20 year needed to be available, while if you only used up 50% of the manpower you'll only need to wait 10 years? Can't remember where I read it, but the reason was to give them time to regen their manpower. So it would reasonable that it scales.

There is no manpower regen. In the 20 years you can't hire them but other nations can. And when they do,they will have full manpower. It is the only way it would make sense, else one could hire all mercenaries available, exhaust them and stop his enemies from using them.

 

[PhoenixG]

There is no manpower regen. In the 20 years you can't hire them but other nations can. And when they do,they will have full manpower. It is the only way it would make sense, else one could hire all mercenaries available, exhaust them and stop his enemies from using them.

That I know. You disband them so they can "regen" the manpower. It would be weird if I hire they lose like 10 men, I disband them due money reasons and I need to wait 20 years for that.

And no, everyone can hire the same company at the same time. That is not what the 20 years cooldown for.

 

[withche.07]

Guess you could add Turcopoles within Knights of Rhodes and Malta
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turcopole

And Başıbozuk within Ottomans
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bashi-bazouk

as mercenaries. just suggestions.

 

[Aquilegia]

Will you give mercenary companies a max size (since at least one companies size scaled with dev)? I'm not sure if a 500 regiment large unsplittable merch army is very realistic or useful...