Ageing in troop units?

[EatYerGreens]

Hi all,

I've only played STW, so forgive my ignorance about this.

I am used to the Daimyo and their heirs ageing throughout the course of a campaign (I'm not the swiftest of campaigners) but the troops are not dealt with in the same way. In the version of STW I have, you cannot demobilize the units you no longer need and some of them may have been kicking around for many years, without ever seeing combat. Particularly the starting units which cannot be upgraded (in this version) and end up being no match for the teched-up units you eventually have to face, making them only of use for garrisons in non-frontline provinces.

So I'm curious about the more advanced versions of the TW series. You can demobilise them or upgrade them but, in the latter case, does the game represent the fact that they could be getting on in years, might march across the battlefield less quickly than their younger peers? (I'm thinking of one of those Kurosawa films, one of which has a little light relief in the form of a pair of peasant soldiers who were late-middle aged, evidently having done the job for years, without ever seeing combat).

Or is it taken as read that they serve for 'n' years and are constantly replaced by fresh blood, as in modern-day armies?


I recall being irritated by the fact that building a swordsmith or armoury in the game did not entitle you to re-equip your entire army. Surely the output of the smith or armoury could be transported across your lands? No, only troops raised in that territory got the benefit. You couldn't even do it by circulating units through the province in question. I guess that problem has now been fixed in that way but there is obviously a certain cost penalty so you end up upgrading a few units well, rather than all of them to a lesser extent?


The demobilisation business interests me, but I'll have to go and buy MTW or RTW to see it for myself. ~;)
My knowledge of history is sketchy, at best, but I had the impression that (in Europe, at least) there were no 'standing armies' in the Medieval era. They were raised whenever needed and disbanded at the end of the warring season, or whenever hostilities finally ceased. Too expensive to have them sitting around for years, just waiting for things to happen.

If this was represented in the game then, when long periods of peace become established (I've seen this mentioned in other peoples' posts), you ought to be able to get by with just tiny garrisons (militia), enough to keep rebellions at bay and high-quality guards look after the royal personage, of course. Then, when your spies alert you to mobilisation going on abroad, you get a chance to rush together a force as best as you can with the funds available and go off for the fight.

This was probably the reason why many conflicts were resolved with just one key battle, with the protagonists' entire armies on the field at the same time, not split into chunks looking after arbitrary 'provinces'.

I've no idea what countries did to protect home turf when they went off to foreign lands for a punch-up but perhaps this is where the business of diplomacy comes in? Even if they are not all overtly allied to you, you still need to be assured that no other country would take advantage of your side 'playing away', so the army would probably not depart home soil until all your various consulates had given the nod?

Anyway, returning to the point, what would you think if the game worked by allowing you to accumulate koku/florins through your economy during times of peace then, when the AI declares war on you, you shift to an interface like the multiplayer screen? You have X amount in the bank, you raise the best army you can, you go into battle and the outcome determines your "empire's" future course.

Even if you did win, you may have nothing left in the bank and, even if you disband your army immediately, it could take years of saving up your annual profits before you're ready for another conflict (but the same goes for your opponent too, I suppose).

I can't say this would make for interesting gameplay but I would see it as a more accurate representation of reality. Long periods of boredom interspersed by short periods of extreme violence. Such is war.

It is possible to sustain a conflict (or peace through a sustained military stand-off) for a period of many years but you'll have to tax your populace heavily in order to do that, with consequent risk of trouble from within the longer it goes on.

Wait a minute, that's the modern world ~:joker:

All historical corrections and your personal opinions (game or real-world related) would be most welcome

:bow:

[Ludens]

I am a bit uncertain what you are talking about. Are asking if aging, general upgrading and demobilizing are present in MTW or are you suggesting that these might be added to newer part of the series?

In the first case, the answer to all your questions is no.
Aging: it doesn't matter how old units are, they stay as effective. Sometimes a general does die of old age (if you have VI installed), but he is replaced by a exact copy of the dead one. However, you can enable the 'green generals'-command line, the copy have slightly worse stats and V&V's.
I don't think it would be a sensible addition the game: one more statistic to keep track of and anyway in reality old soldiers would just be replaced by young ones.

General upgrading is not present either. The only way to upgrade an old unit is to 'rebuild' it (you don't need to pay for it) and then the upgrades are added. It is not even possible to turn feudal (early) knights into gothic (late) ones.
Personally, I hope they will get rid of the upgrade system entirely in RTW, or at least trim it down (max +1 armour/weapon). It just complicates the balance of units. Only honour/valour is really important.

Demobilising isn't implemented either. You can disband units (remove them permanently), and you can recruit militia units (non-profesional soldiers) which have a lower upkeep, but it is not possible to stand your army down.
But I like the idea of standing down armies. It certainly was the medieval principle: a lord had to provide soldiers for forty days a year. If the king wanted them longer, he had to pay for them. I myself would like every province to have his own militia and every castle it's own garrison, that comes into action when the province or castle is threatened. You don't have to look after this militia, your governors will do that for you. The size and strength of the militia would depend on the province, its facilities and its wealth. If a province is repeatedly threathened, you can add your own troops to the province to keep it safe. However, you cannot remove the militia from the province to attack other provinces. This would be much more like the middle ages then MTW is now.

[katank]

I personally think that lack of serious standing armies is simulated by mercs in high conflict areas etc.

I also rely on dominant navy and trade as well as constant upgrading of economic buildings and military facilities.

I keep very little military but only garrisons in rear provinces with cost effective combos of defensive units and missiles in chokepoints and frontlines.

I then raise offensive armies or reinforcements whenever needed and use my navy to shift my units to the frontlines, knowing that my units are the most up to date my empire can bring to bear.

Also costs me less in the long run.

[Sinner]

The armourer/metalsmith system has always bugged me: like EatYerGreens, I thought that it seemed odd that only troops that could be built in the region could be upgraded. Consider the situation where you have a metalsmith and can build feudal men at arms, but you want to upgrade a chivalric man at arms; the current system won't let you, which is really a bit silly considering that both units use swords.

I know it's too late for MTW and almost definitely for RTW too, but perhaps in the rumoured MTW 2.0, they could come up with a more logical system while still keeping game balance. The way I'd prefer is that your units automatically receive the upgrades without having to retrain, with certain limits however: each workshop can still only upgrade one unit per turn, with no limit on what units they can upgrade - even mercenaries or bribed foreign troops (ie. ones you can't normally build) - granting the bonus of that particular workshop; for each upgrade of a unit stationed outside the workshop's region there is chance that the upgrade is downgraded (ie. +4 becomes +3, +2 or even +1), is lost, is reassigned to another unit, or even gets 'stolen' by another faction; the upgrades are either assigned by the player or will be randomly assigned with a preferance to upgrade elite units over professional & professional over militia, although mercs and bribed foreign units will never be randomly selected, they must be manually chosen. Units that are trained or retrained in the same region as the workshop could be handled in one of two ways: they either grab the available upgrade slot, overriding any assignment you might have made; or you get an extra upgrade as a sidebenefit of training/retraining. Personally I'd also like to see upgrading actually cost something to represent the expense of manufacturing, materials and shipping, but that would add an extra layer of complexity.

EDIT:
And while I'm thinking of wish lists...

A method to modernize units other than the royal bodyguards would be good, with each unit having one or more modernisation routes: so feudal men-at-arms could be upgraded to chivalric men-at-arms or feudal knights, peasants to spearmen or pike, spearmen to pike or feudal sergeants, etc. Each upgrade would cost the difference between the two units plus an extra expense and there would be a chance that a point of valour will be lost to represent the initial lack of familiarity with the new equipment. The extra expense would be higher for upgrades from militia to professional and professional to elite with perhaps a further premium placed on upgrades to the top social units like knights. The system could be extended where you could downgrade a unit, perhaps to reduce support costs or because the downgraded unit better fits your latest tactics: chivalric sergeants could be downgraded to pikes or feudal sergeants, mounted sergeants to hobelars or feudal sergeants, etc.

EDIT II - RETURN OF THE EDIT:

A further thought about workshop upgrades going missing or being downgraded, this could be a nice way for the commander of the unit, or even the general of the stack, to perhaps receive a dishonesty vice of some form, although it should only happen for some incidents, not all of them. Perhaps to be really evil, there could be a 'suspected dishonesty' vice to account for the fact that the commander/general might actually be innocent despite circumstantial evidence or slanderous rumours.

[TheDuck]

Right now logistic trains are not modeled in any of the Total War series. They are 'abstracted' via the support cost.

One aspect which could be modeled would be to build an 'upgrade wagon' or some other supply unit that could be used to upgrade units at the front. Since most of the time what you really want to do is upgrade weapons/armor, that abstraction would 'feel right'.

You would have to use 'archer upgrades' on archer units, armor upgrades on armored units, etc. etc.

I'm sure a simple system could be developed that wouldn't overcomplicate things and make it reasonable to upgrade units when tech improvements happened.

[EatYerGreens]

Hi all,

well, now I'm confused ~:dizzy:

I can't remember which threads they were at the moment but I swear I've had replies (about other topics) which mentioned the ability to demobilise units (ie remove from the map) and to upgrade old ones with better weapons or armour, in reference to either STW:MI or MTW, or both. Now you're saying the upgrades can't be done in campaign mode?


With regard to demobilising, in STW, the only way to 'dispose' of low honour, low-tech units is to get them killed - sending YA up against WMs; positioned up-front as cannon fodder; initiating bridge crossings etc. Not always guaranteed to work either - H0 YA units tend to rout before they've even engaged, which is bad when you're against a time-limit. If they exit the map completely before you can rally them, then your better units will have to go into the meat-grinder, or you'll just have to accept the defeat.

A further penalty is that failed territory attacks (deliberate attrition of this kind) simply boost the ranking of the defending general, almost to the point of negating the benefit of your teched-up troops when you finally get to bring them to bear.

I've had this happen to my benefit a few times. The Hojo horde attacks with multiple stacks but some of these are entirely made of low honour Ashigaru and a smattering of archers. First assault gets mashed and the reinforcements trickle in too slowly to make a difference or the time-limit kicks in. The second attack begins by sending in the bashed-up cadre units from the previous attack, instead of starting again with full-sized units. It never tidies up its broken units! After the third or fourth time, I'm beginning to sense that it's deliberately slaughtering off its lowest quality units, so that it can afford to remobilize from its Swordsmith/Armoury provinces. My casualties are manageable, if annoying, in terms of extra expense that I'd wanted to put elsewhere but, all the while, I'm getting the opportunity to tech-up my forces too. So what's the benefit, one wonders? Gets a bit tedious fighting the same battle in the same province in every season though.

Now, if it had sent two stacks to this province and two more to another, instead of all four into one, then I'd be in trouble, logistically. It's fairly easy to set up a chain of fresh troops from a single source (generally all I can afford while the campaign is still in the balance) to one target province but sharing them between the two causes both defence forces to progressively shrink with each lot of casualties. If the path to one is slightly longer, a season or two's delay in being able to resupply it could make all the difference between winning the defence or losing it in the next attack.

[EatYerGreens]

I am a bit uncertain what you are talking about. Are asking if aging, general upgrading and demobilizing are present in MTW or are you suggesting that these might be added to newer part of the series?


Original intention was asking. But, if it's stuff that's not implemented yet, it could be read as a suggestion. That's an irritating response, isn't it? Oops.



In the first case, the answer to all your questions is no.
Aging: it doesn't matter how old units are, they stay as effective. Sometimes a general does die of old age (if you have VI installed), but he is replaced by a exact copy of the dead one. However, you can enable the 'green generals'-command line, the copy have slightly worse stats and V&V's.


Okay, question answered.



I don't think it would be a sensible addition the game: one more statistic to keep track of


Just something that I think every C-in-C should have to face up to. However, you're right in that excessive micro-management wouldn't make for particularly enjoyable gameplay. I brought it up because if units had to be 'retired' at a certain age (could be done for you, automatically if need be) it would give you the opportunity to train up a replacement unit at a higher tech/honour level or make up the numbers with a different troop type altogether. In other words, units dropping out could work in your favour.


and anyway in reality old soldiers would just be replaced by young ones.


Well, in that case, if valour/honour represents battle experience then shouldn't the valour level decline over time as those soldiers grow old and get replaced by younger, inexperienced ones?

Tech level tends to rise and rise with the passage of time but experience needs to be periodically replenished by sending successive generations into battle, so they can learn for themselves. Of course, STW allows you to upgrade your dojos, representing the improvements in training which would, in reality, be the result of experience gained by your most successful units being shared with the rest of your army - but retraining is involved, which should come at a cost. Hence the argument about tech improvements being allowed to spread across your entire army, not just fresh units but not for free, so you should still have the option of not doing it.

I could argue that MTW et al fit in the category of 'God Sims', in that real world empire-builders don't live forever either. No civilisation had a single strategist as their commander for generations, which is basically what you get with this kind of game. As players, we are also aware of the strengths and weaknesses of the various unit types, whereas real generals only got to find this out through, sometimes painful, experience.

We also know about the course of historical events, know why certain commanders made big mistakes which we can correct or avoid. At the time, every army in history always went into battle thinking it was better than the other side and sometimes got their a^^es kicked because they turned out to be wrong. The only chance to replicate such blunders in the game would be for players to be completely ignorant about history, or warfare in general, or both, short of getting it wrong on purpose. ~:shock:


General upgrading is not present either. The only way to upgrade an old unit is to 'rebuild' it (you don't need to pay for it) and then the upgrades are added.


Ah, so it can be done then? That was the impression I got. I was just using the wrong terminology. Rebuild, upgrade, it means much the same to me.


It is not even possible to turn feudal (early) knights into gothic (late) ones.
Personally, I hope they will get rid of the upgrade system entirely in RTW, or at least trim it down (max +1 armour/weapon). It just complicates the balance of units. Only honour/valour is really important.


See above comments about valour. Should it be perpetual? If so, maybe it represents the reputation of a regiment/unit. We can safely assume that all units take on fresh recruits, year by year. The individuals who gained that valour will eventually leave but the reputation of the unit as a whole persists. We can also assume that not all recruits are of the same quality and the best units only accept the top level new recruits. That would be okay.

[EatYerGreens]

Demobilising isn't implemented either. You can disband units (remove them permanently), and you can recruit militia units (non-profesional soldiers) which have a lower upkeep, but it is not possible to stand your army down.
But I like the idea of standing down armies. It certainly was the medieval principle: a lord had to provide soldiers for forty days a year. If the king wanted them longer, he had to pay for them.

Certainly as far as Northern Europe is concerned, that's probably as many days in the year that you could rely on the weather being good enough for marching large numbers of troops across country or engaging in battle without having to fight in a mudbath. So there was a 'fighting season' almost by mutual agreement and, outside of that nobody bothered to mount campaigns.

I've come across one account of Crecy which blamed the stickiness of the local mud, on the day, for the demise of the French knights, who had dismounted and walked to the fight because the ground was too soft for a mounted charge, and not so much down to the longbows, of legend. Their armour was not as heavy as many imagine, in fact it has been shown with replica armour that mobility is very good but the suction effect of thick mud on it prevented them from getting up, if they'd fallen over, tripped or for whatever reason. Many either drowned, face down in the ooze or got dispatched by foot troops using the poleaxe. The longbows undoubtedly played their part but it's now thought that there weren't that many of them there and their contribution wasn't as massive as it was subsequently made out to be.

Punching holes in the heads of immobilized and defenceless opponents isn't a particularly heroic activity and was probably played down by those that took part. The archers got given the credit, the tale became somewhat more heroic and, no doubt, the laws on archery practice could be justified for as long as it took them to be supplanted by firearams.

By all accounts, MTW plays the longbowmen more in line with the legend.

[Ludens]

Just something that I think every C-in-C should have to face up to. However, you're right in that excessive micro-management wouldn't make for particularly enjoyable gameplay. (....) Well, in that case, if valour/honour represents battle experience then shouldn't the valour level decline over time as those soldiers grow old and get replaced by younger, inexperienced ones?
Point taken. But I still maintain that it would be rather difficult to keep track of: imagine hearing just before a large battle that your best unit of warrior monks has just retired. And that wouldn't be realistic either: instead they would slowly lose effectiviness as soldiers become older. Or they should be downgraded to militia units, like the Romans did. And how are you going to do this without springing nasty surprises on the player? I'd hate to be the programmer who would have to find a way to implement it.
In reality, generals had much closer ties with their troops and they would realise that after fifteen years, their super-elite no-dachi probably has lost some of its shine. But we are not as close to the troops so the player wouldn't realise that. And frankly, I don't see me acquiting myself with the record file of every single unit in my army. Too much work, too much detail to take up in a few moments. Face it, we are not as close to the troops as the generals.
To get back to my point: units weren't decommisioned, they were 'refreshed' with new recruits. Perhaps the best way to simulate this would be to have high-honour units gradually lose honour as they grow older. This way the proces won't be as much of a surprise to the player, though he might wonder what happened with that high-honour samurai-unit he had had from the beginning. But that still leaves problems with what the starting honour of the recruits must be: zero, or same as dojo in province, or same as dojo were units comes from? Or would they be trained by their more experienced brothers-in-arms? If so, to what level?


We can also assume that not all recruits are of the same quality and the best units only accept the top level new recruits. That would be okay.
That is also possible, but I do not think talent can make up for experience. Not entirely, anyway.

I share your opinion about God games, but do not think it relevant.


Ah, so it can be done then? That was the impression I got. I was just using the wrong terminology. Rebuild, upgrade, it means much the same to me.
For clarity: if you build a unit in MTW, you are stuck with it. Feudal knighst stay feudal knights and never become gothic ones. But you can add weapon / armour / morale / discipline / valour upgrades to the unit later. This is called upgrading (or retraining, because the unit would also gain new soldiers to replace casualties), and was already present in Mongol Invasion.

There is one exception: the bodyguard units (royal knights / ghulam bodyguards) could be upgraded from their 'early' to their 'high' or 'late' forms: this was done by retraining them.

Your remark about Crecy, except for being horribly irrelevant and off-topic, is also incorrect ~D . At Crecy the French knights stayed mounted. You are probably refering to Agincourt.

[EatYerGreens]

Point taken. But I still maintain that it would be rather difficult to keep track of: imagine hearing just before a large battle that your best unit of warrior monks has just retired. And that wouldn't be realistic either: instead they would slowly lose effectiviness as soldiers become older. Or they should be downgraded to militia units, like the Romans did. And how are you going to do this without springing nasty surprises on the player? I'd hate to be the programmer who would have to find a way to implement it.


In terms of keeping track of, I had in mind something along the lines of the Daimyo/heirs info page (right-click on unit), where you can see their current age. This could get a little tedious but you only really need to 'inspect' the troops you are just about to send into battle, not every single unit on the map.

Better still you could have another icon shown on the unit, depicting the 'age band', young, middle-aged, old, with perhaps a progressive marching speed penalty appropriate to the two oldest age ranges. This will affect your maneuvering on the battlefield. Already in STW, you get speed differentials like this - YA faster than YS, which are faster than Naginata and horse vs foot, so formations can get out of shape as they move about.

Also it could factor into how quickly these troops fatigue, during movement and combat. I think it would be sensible for fighting skill level to be maintained to within 90% of their peak (intellect doesn't decline by much with age) or, to all intents and purposes, not changed at all, but the fatigue factor should kick in that bit sooner.

With an icon display you can assess the condition of an army visually, which is very quick to do. Then you can either organise them so armies are well matched in age, so they move together uniformly and can be assigned to new duties as a block, or you can hedge your bets and make all your armies mixed-age.

For instance, in defensive battles, my forces basically hold a position, fend off attacks and don't move a lot. Slower-moving units would be suited to this. Attacking armies need to march almost the full length of the field to engage and then keep up a sustained fight, so the younger ones would be better suited for that.

I agree it would be annoying for a key unit to disappear completely in the turn before a long-planned attack. However, in STW, it's not unknown for the Daimyo to die of old age or illness, leaving behind an army under a rank 0 general, which can be worse, with the loss of honour bonuses across the board. Not good if the heirs are at the opposite end of the map, looking after another front...



In reality, generals had much closer ties with their troops and they would realise that after fifteen years, their super-elite no-dachi probably has lost some of its shine. But we are not as close to the troops so the player wouldn't realise that. And frankly, I don't see me acquiting myself with the record file of every single unit in my army. Too much work, too much detail to take up in a few moments. Face it, we are not as close to the troops as the generals.


True. But you could always make this a task which you only need to look into once every 15 years or so.


To get back to my point: units weren't decommisioned, they were 'refreshed' with new recruits. Perhaps the best way to simulate this would be to have high-honour units gradually lose honour as they grow older. This way the proces won't be as much of a surprise to the player, though he might wonder what happened with that high-honour samurai-unit he had had from the beginning.


That's more or less what I was suggesting. It might catch some players out and generate queries in forums like this but it'll be their own fault for not RTFM. ~;)


But that still leaves problems with what the starting honour of the recruits must be: zero, or same as dojo in province, or same as dojo were units comes from? Or would they be trained by their more experienced brothers-in-arms? If so, to what level?


I still think that starting level should be in line with the level of dojo where they were trained. Interesting that STW won't let you build the Sword dojo until after you get Legendary Swordsman event but you can enhance the other dojos without having won a single battle. Maybe similar trigger events should be required? (Not that I'd like it to be that way, I'm forever playing catch-up with the AI as it is, without another disbenefit like that).


For clarity: if you build a unit in MTW, you are stuck with it. Feudal knighst stay feudal knights and never become gothic ones. But you can add weapon / armour / morale / discipline / valour upgrades to the unit later. This is called upgrading (or retraining, because the unit would also gain new soldiers to replace casualties), and was already present in Mongol Invasion.


Okay, thanks for the clarification. Is MI still on sale anywhere? Bit late now, I know but worth an ask, all the same.

[EatYerGreens]

Your remark about Crecy, except for being horribly irrelevant and off-topic, is also incorrect ~D . At Crecy the French knights stayed mounted. You are probably refering to Agincourt.

Gah! Well spotted. ~:0 I did say my history knowledge wasn't that great, didn't I? (not in this thread though). Thanks for the correction.

At least you recognised which one I meant, just from the description.

I only raised it by way of making the point about weather. If played out in wargame style, with no account taken of the weather and the ground conditions that resulted from it, the French should have won based on the quality and numbers they sent in, versus the numbers and quality they were up against. Of course, this was precisely the reason why they proceeded to go into battle in the first place - they thought it would be a walkover...

[Ludens]

In terms of keeping track of, I had in mind something along the lines of the Daimyo/heirs info page (right-click on unit), where you can see their current age. This could get a little tedious but you only really need to 'inspect' the troops you are just about to send into battle, not every single unit on the map.
You need to inspect them more often: if I send units to be stationed along the frontlines, I don't want half of them dissappearing because I was on a building spree 35 years ago. Your icon idea is a better option.

But I still think refreshing would be more accurate than decomissioning.

But what are we doing? We are discussing the details of a feature which is not present, and will probably never be present. If it is going to be added, let CA worry about it ~:joker: .


Okay, thanks for the clarification. Is MI still on sale anywhere? Bit late now, I know but worth an ask, all the same.
You can get the Warlord Edition for the same money as MI, and it has also a number of extra's, so I recommand buing that one.


I only raised it by way of making the point about weather. If played out in wargame style, with no account taken of the weather and the ground conditions that resulted from it, the French should have won based on the quality and numbers they sent in, versus the numbers and quality they were up against. Of course, this was precisely the reason why they proceeded to go into battle in the first place - they thought it would be a walkover...
Yes, and...? The relation to our discussion is...?

[EatYerGreens]

You need to inspect them more often: if I send units to be stationed along the frontlines, I don't want half of them dissappearing because I was on a building spree 35 years ago.


Hmm, I hadn't thought of that. Good point. What are the odds of you having an equivalent amount of cash to invest in replacements, 35 years down the line?


Your icon idea is a better option.[/QOUTE]

At the expense of a bit more visual clutter on the unit display, though. You'd also need to have it displayed in the battlefield interface, to be able to take account of this factor.



But I still think refreshing would be more accurate than decomissioning.

But what are we doing? We are discussing the details of a feature which is not present, and will probably never be present. If it is going to be added, let CA worry about it ~:joker: .


True. It was just something I was curious about.


You can get the Warlord Edition for the same money as MI, and it has also a number of extra's, so I recommand buing that one.


I'll look for it next time I'm at the shop, though if RTW is out by the time I get around to it and they are similar in price I'll probably buy RTW instead.



Yes, and...? The relation to our discussion is...?


I only brought that up after the "men available for 40 days per year" thing was mentioned and I'd speculated that this was due to weather considerations. Classic example of weather working against a side which the odds say should have won. Admittedly off topic, so apologies for that.

:bow:

[Ludens]

I only brought that up after the "men available for 40 days per year" thing was mentioned and I'd speculated that this was due to weather considerations. Classic example of weather working against a side which the odds say should have won. Admittedly off topic, so apologies for that.
OT-warning

I wanted to continue discussing your example: there wasn't so much as a fighting season, it just was that the king had a right to summon his feudal levies for forty days a year, any forty days a year. If he needed them longer, he had to pay. And this quite often happened the French kings during the hundred years war (when they were chasing the smaller English armies around until the English found a good hill and let the French storm themselves to death), so it was not really weather-dependent. The idea is just that the feudal lords need those soldiers as well and since they pay for the soldiers, they got more right to it. The king probably didn't need the army for much longer, so it was a sensible arangement. Except when the king did need them longer.

And your example is flawed, because at the time of Agincourt England had replaced this feudal idea with a system of cash-payments. England needed to fight an oversea war, so the forty days limit (and this includes the time needed to get to the assembly point) was a severe problem. So, during the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, instead of sending men you could pay the king a sum of money (originally, you would have to pay a fine if you didn't show up). For this money, the king recruited soldiers and mercenaries, which he paid from his own pocket. This allowed him to keep an army in the field for as long as he wished, or as long as his money lasted. Also, it made his armies loyal to him alone, and not to their feudal lords.