how generals are assigned to armies

[Ebenweb]

i'm trying to figure out how generals are assigned to armies, specifically:

- which general/leader is automatically assigned to an army when a new one is raised through levies
- how army leaders are chosen when you combine multiple armies together

this last one is especially important, since i have small armies/squads with high martial generals but when i combine them with others, somehow a low-stat general always seems to get elected.

this last also effects the value of hiring ronin. something that seems to be a waste of money if you have a decent number of provinces to levy from already, except that some ronin have very high martial stats and would make excellent generals...

 

[biggoofy]

I'm interested to know this too. It's frustrating coming from EUIII to see a general with 1 martial when I have retainers and courtiers with high values sitting around.

 

[James_Manring]

Ronin have higher morale and benefit from your manufactories. Levies do not. I can hold off armies twice my size with a ronin army of 22,000 men towards the end of the game due to benefits. Eventually I like to build 3 armies of 22000 with about 4000 arquebusiers a piece. This should be enough to take down any clan size 50% or smaller. The cost will be much more than a levy army of equal size, but their power is devastating and they recover from attrition much faster than a levy army would. They can take a maxed out castle with 3,500 guard without a breach in one assault with a good general (stats above 10).

It is a terrible system that chooses the general for you. Often when combining armies I will get an army without a general. Reorganizing the army completely into a new army is the only way to choose the new general, and at that it is only one option. This can end up being terrible if I do not notice there is not a general before a battle. Having no general also means that you lose control of a siege the moment another general shows up. In the same token, what determines if a wife becomes the general of a castle during a siege instead of a male courtier? What determines which wife it is? Some wives have a high enough martial stat to matter which one is chosen.