Some suggestions to make the end-game more realistic and more challeng

Some suggestions to make the end-game more realistic and more challenging.

1) Population thinking. Take into account the size of human populations in each province.
(a) The number of available recruits should be limited by the size of the given population. This should prevent quick expansion, also this could limit the overall size of an empire. For example, IMO the English lost the 100 years war mainly because they couldn't field enough troops. The largest English armies barely consisted 10000 soldiers; and before the battle of Patay they hardly could gather 3000 (!) men (no wonder that they were defeated). This means that at that time none of the major nations had a large enough population that could have enabled them to field a large enough army to conquer most of Europe. The trick behind the big empires -like the Roman, Ottoman or Mongol Empire - was that somehow they managed to get the sons of other nations to fight for them. IMHO this should be reflected in MTW.
(b) Farm and export income should also depend on by the size of the given population. No farmers no income.

2) The nationality of the troops should be taken into account. This relates to the first part of the previous section. As the size of an empire increases there is an increasing need to rely on troops recruited from the conquered provinces. However, the loyalty of these troops was often questionable. Usually the solution was to shuffle these troops between the provinces. So, for example in case of the Roman empire German troops served in everywhere from Iberia to Britannica but rarely on the German frontier, Iberian troops served in Pannonica, etc. In the light of this: decrease the loyalty of troops if they are recruited outside of the home provinces of a given faction. This might be even reflected by giving them a valour penalty. Of course, this could vary according to factions and provinces. Irish troops recruited by the English should be disloyal and should start with valour penalty; but perhaps the English can recruit loyal troops in Flanders without any valour penalty. Also the loyalty of the province might be taken into account. The lower the loyalty of the province the higher the disloyalty of the troops should be. Also, these locally raised troops should be more prone to join rebellions. Finally, the player should be able to distinguish these troops from the loyal troops, so name them according to the faction to which the given province originally belongs, i.e. "Irish spearmen" (recruited by English in Ireland), "French man-at-arms" (recruited by English in France), etc.

3) Guerrilla warfare. History is rich with examples when a small force resisted a superior force for a long period, even gaining the upper hand at the end. The very idea behind successful guerrilla warfare is to avoid pitched battle against superior forces. IMHO this is one of the features lacking from MTW. Here the rebels march proudly into battle without any hesitation. This explains the need for super-sized rebel armies, otherwise they don't have a chance against the "imperial" forces. In real life, they would avoid battle and try to harass the line of communications, ambush small detachments, capture or assassin important military leaders, etc. IMHO this should be reflected in MTW and this can be implemented on the strategic level in the same way as religion. So, when the loyalty of a given province drops, then there should be a region of loyalty (let's say between 90-140) when there would be no open rebellion -thus there would be no pitched battles- but there would be a kind of guerrilla warfare, let's call it "rebel activity". This rebel activity could run from 0 to 100; at zero being none-existent; 100 is open rebellion. Several factors could correspond with this activity: (a) garrison troops would die even in the absence of pitched battles (as a result of ambushes, etc.). The higher is the level of the rebel activity and the bigger is the size of the conquered province the more soldiers would die from the garrison. Proportions could be the same to those that determine desertions from crusades (i.e. few noblemen, more professionals, even more "peasants"). (b) Income should dwindle as a result of rebel activity. (c) Rebels should try to assassinate and/or capture generals/governors/heirs, etc. the success of these actions should depend on the level of rebel activity. Captured generals, etc. could be ransomed. A successful assassination should increase the rebel activity further. (d) Of course, when the level of this rebel activity reaches 100 then there should be an open rebellion. Now, this case and only in this case should an AI army pop up, but not the super-sized one, just a moderate, depending on the specialties of the province and on the possible local troops joining the rebellion. A defeat of this rebel army should not signal the end of rebel activities, rather the level should drop somewhere between 50-100 depending on the size of the victorious imperial army, whether the king is present, etc. (e) AI players should try to make advantage out of this situation. As the rebel activity increases they should demand you to leave the province, etc.
To sum: conquering a hostile province is always a game of war of attrition. The success of the conquest depends on whether the given empire can stand this war of attrition or not. IMHO this war of attrition can be implemented in the above way which eliminates the need for unrealistic super armies popping out of nowhere.

Very interesting and solid ideas. I have one more:

ATTRITION: Troops left standing should decay in all areas: equipment wears out, men grow old and die, morale suffers. Basically the idea that an unused blade is a dull blade . . .

Of course, all of this is difficult to implement, so I have no illusions that any of this will be in the next patch ;-)

But good ideas to put out there, nevertheless. . .

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DragonCat
. . . on the prowl!

Three very excellent ideas!

Number one is the alternative to the one unit a year production to limit army sizes. I would prefer greater yearly production but a limit to the amount that can be produced based on population size and time.

Number two is the best idea. I like the idea of labeling troops by their region as well as varying loyalty as foreign troops.

Number three sounds a bit complicated. I like the current system. I would lean towards giving rebels certain advantages. Valor advantages for desperation and motivation. Possibilities of fighting only portions of the loyalists armies because of surprise attacks. Say a 500 man rebel army pops up in Ireland. You send in 1500 men to take care of them. Because they are rebels and choose a battle, perhaps only half or a third or all of your army is available for battle. I would like to see more uncertainty about rebellions.

Great ideas! I can't see it being patched into MTW or even expansion, but I hope this this stuff makes it into the next title of the total war series.

Excellent, Excellent and yours too Dragoncat!! These things s/b in works, or, if not, incorporated immediately into the outline for TW3. Not a chance for the patch, nor the Add-On.