Mercenaries, WAD?

[Dragonknight2]

Mercenaries are, in the current patch a very good alternative to regular troops for most nations making a decent amount cash, particularly in the mid-late game where everyone has defensive and attrition is quite damaging. However it seems odd to me that a nation can make their entire army out of mercenaries (particularly when army sizes get progressively larger over time). Whilst merc's are nominally limited to 12(14?) without ideas, you can actually recruit that amount, and then wait a few days and recruit more (ad infinitem). The reason I am questioning this (beyond the fact it lets nations totally ignore the MP mechanic, which makes the morale-based battle system atm even more OP) is that Paradox gives out ideas for available mercs (Burg 3rd NI +100%, Admin 5th +50% etc), which would seem to imply that these nations should be able to recruit more mercenaries at once than other countries. ATM all these ideas do is insignificantly improve the ease of mass recruiting mercenaries.

So, is this WAD? If it is, should it be changed to stop all-merc armies (particularly in the mid to late game, where it is fairly OP)?

 

[DDRJake]

If you're against the ropes with your armies wiped and the enemy approaching fast, being able to summon either 12 or 30 troops at the click of a finger (finances willing) is a big difference.

Actually, maybe not so in the late game. I'd need to test it out.

 

[Xara]

The ideas that increase available mercs also increase your forcelimit

 

[DarkThug]

In my experience. Mercenary pool seem to have several capacity.
Without any bonus, you'll have like 12 mercs ready for recruiting.
Then, more mercs will quicky spawn for recruiting up to around 30 units.
After that, it will take very long time for more merc to be available in merc pool.
Over time, You can still hire 100 mercs army without any + available merc bonus at all.
However, your tech progress and your unit need upgrade. Things will become a chore.

I'm not sure if there is a hard cap where merc stop spawning completely as I haven't reach that point yet

 

[unmerged(815621)]

Chances are, if you have the money to field large mercenary armies over the long term, you have a large enough manpower to where attrition does not matter for standing armies.

In the middle game they are most effective against moderate powers such as England and Spain (moderate as compared to France), where you can bleed their manpower over the short term, without going too overboard with the overhead of having mercs. End game it does not matter as a human player or a large power should have near infinite manpower.

 

[The-King]

I agree with the thread OP, It feels like there is too much reliance on mercenaries, and even if your manpower is diminished it doesn't matter at all because mercenaries. I personally prefer not to use mercenaries but I might start testing out how it works playing with lots of mercs.

 

[Cavalry]

maybe player only can rercruit 30-50% their army force limit as merc?
Currently Ryuku can conquer the world with just merc.

 

[hauptman]

Mercs can very well be OP with the ideas, however normally they cost FIVE TIMES AS MUCH and well, 1 stack of 30 mercs or 3 stacks of 50 regular troops is a HUGE difference in both combat power and overall manpower usage. With 150k troops, I may not ever get DoWed upon in the first place. Whereas if I just had 30k, I'd look like easy pickings to most nations.

Mercs are for the very early game when you have a manpower pool of 15k but need 20k troops to beat back austria/poland. You will never win a war without mercs against a major power. Mid-late game. It's the other side. Your regular troops which you can maintain as a deterant, and use for rapid victories when you are the aggressor will save you more money and manpower in the long run.

Personally, instead of taking merc ideas to make them more affordable, you'd be better served by taking combat ideas to save the lives of your regulars. Discipline and morale both go a long way.

 

[Cavalry]

however normally they cost FIVE TIMES AS MUCH and well, 1 stack of 30 mercs or 3 stacks of 50 regular troops is a HUGE difference in both combat power ns.

Of course we all use regular troop first so it is no problem of choice in that case. But after a long war my Russia run out of manpower and the Coalition army of various small countries is still advancing to the Russia capital. If I can use merc then no one can make a serious danger to Russia ever and game become very easy. If I didn't use merc then I will have a more enjoying game to solve the problems.

 

[hauptman]

Of course we all use regular troop first so it is no problem of choice in that case. But after a long war my Russia run out of manpower and the Coalition army of various small countries is still advancing to the Russia capital. If I can use merc then no one can make a serious danger to Russia ever and game become very easy. If I didn't use merc then I will have a more enjoying game to solve the problems.

Everything you can do, the ai can do faster. Half of those coalition hordes are likely mercs. So how does you being able to recruit mercs make it too easy? The ai does it too. It just boils down to who will run out of cash first. You or the hard ai that has a 25% tax bonus.... Probably the ai.

Purely defensive wars are the easiest for any large nation. The larger the better. Castile has it better than even russia in this regard. As you also need a more poweful navy to get to all those islands.

 

[The-King]

It also feels like in single player that AI have infinite troops when in reality they're using all of their money and taking loans, spiraling into inflation just to get more mercs to fight a war they'll lose anyways.

 

[Tankefel]

I find that I often use mercs as a means to mop up rebels that pop up when my main armies are off being glorious in the other end of my empire, and just can't be bothered with sending people back and forth. Just recruit slightly more mercs than rebels, clean 'em up and continue the glorious business.

You might be asking why I don't just keep a bunch of guys around for mop up purposes. Well, you see, this is rather recursive, as I can recruit mercs whenever the need arises...

I also tend to use them for carpet sieging. Just recruit and distribute, and dismiss 'em when the war is over. Let them eat cakes made of attrition. (Especially when conquering far off islands where I can't be bothered to play fetch when the ocean front quiets down.)

With these general statements out of the way, the main benefits of more mercs available at any one time is the reinforcement time. The more you can start recruiting right away, the more you'll have in a little bit. Even more so if you start to recruit another maxed out batch when they respawn, and then another one when - and so on. If you have the time to strategically lay out your recruitment sessions. you're probably in no hurry anyway. But if that Stack of Doom is fast approaching and you need cannon fodder pronto - well, what do you know, more and faster -> better.

Better stop writing here. Getting long winder, after all...

 

[fleetothemoon]

Of course we all use regular troop first so it is no problem of choice in that case. But after a long war my Russia run out of manpower and the Coalition army of various small countries is still advancing to the Russia capital. If I can use merc then no one can make a serious danger to Russia ever and game become very easy. If I didn't use merc then I will have a more enjoying game to solve the problems.

Lol. No one can pose a serious threat to Russia, not because of mercenaries per se, but because you are Russia.

 

[knul]

Historically, nations depended very heavily on mercenaries in this time period. The majority of both the Spanish and the Dutch armies in the Eighty Years War where foreigners. The Thirty Year War saw heavy use of mercenaries.

Especially early on, the standing army was a rarity. Take a look at this: http://celyn.drizzlehosting.com/jherek/16thMilSci.pdf
It gives the examples of standing armies: France 1566 had 16.000 standing soldiers, while in wartime its army would swell to at least 50.000.

At the end of the period, certainly, mercenaries fell out of use and the levee en masse replaced them completely. But certainly in the first half of the game, if history is to be followed, the majority of your European army should be mercenaries.

 

[glaivemaster]

Is the general consensus that mercs are only useful for huge nations (France, Russia and Spain)? Because playing as the Netherlands, trying to use mercenaries to defend myself is pointless, when an army of 3-5 thousand can easily just destroy mercs as soon as they appear.

 

[HansBaer]

Is the general consensus that mercs are only useful for huge nations (France, Russia and Spain)? Because playing as the Netherlands, trying to use mercenaries to defend myself is pointless, when an army of 3-5 thousand can easily just destroy mercs as soon as they appear.

Rather the opposite. I think they are especially useful for small, wealthy nations like the Netherlands, of course you need a "save haven" where you can recruit mercs. If you have already lost and are carpetsieged, they will be no good but what did you expect?

 

[Illanair]

It also feels like in single player that AI have infinite troops when in reality they're using all of their money and taking loans, spiraling into inflation just to get more mercs to fight a war they'll lose anyways.

It beats being annexed - But I agree that they can be a bit suicidal at times.

 

[beckermt]

The ideas that increase available mercs also increase your forcelimit

Wait, really?

 

[beckermt]

A major disadvantage of mercs is that they don't upgrade when you get new techs. Or at least, they didn't last time I played Burgundy.

 

[Illanair]

A major disadvantage of mercs is that they don't upgrade when you get new techs. Or at least, they didn't last time I played Burgundy.

They don't - They're not really intended to be longterm troops either though. They should only be around for long enough for you to recover your manpower. And then you can re-hire them later on as needed.