Sugestion about Roman Reforms and Carthage

[Watchman]

'Sides, if mercs are actually more costly than levies or militias is anything but cut and dried. After all, you're just expending cold hard cash (and usually generous looting rights) to hire some foreigner to fight under your banners. That means you're not taking your own people out of productive labour, say farming, and as the French wryly observed in the 1500s, also means your potential enemies have one less man to hire against *you*...

Also, enrolling them as mercenaries was often the most effective way to keep diverse highland tribes and suchlike out of mischief (ie. raiding your stuffs for fun and profit) and make them useful...

[Cyclops]

'Sides, if mercs are actually more costly than levies or militias is anything but cut and dried. After all, you're just expending cold hard cash (and usually generous looting rights) to hire some foreigner to fight under your banners. That means you're not taking your own people out of productive labour, say farming,

Citizen units would agitate to disband whereas mercs serve out a contract. Hard to model that in the engine.

They do cost cash as opposed to classical troops whoe serve at least in part out of citizen/feudal obligation. Of course if the citizen troops are state armed (eg some Macedonian pike units) then there is a cash outlay for equipment.

I like the huge unit size setting because it means manpower matters especially early in the game.

I favour lower costs for citizen units but high upkeep for all units, making the initial purchase cost less of a factor, and making the real question "does my faction have this unit or do i need a merc? " and "can I spare the loyal manpower or do i buy in soldiers and keep the citizens earning?". Of course I lack the skills to mod this and I believ the upkeep cost is hard coded to 1/4 of the purchase cost.

and as the French wryly observed in the 1500s, also means your potential enemies have one less man to hire against *you*...Also, enrolling them as mercenaries was often the most effective way to keep diverse highland tribes and suchlike out of mischief (ie. raiding your stuffs for fun and profit) and make them useful...

On the "hiring rowdies so they are on your side", I sometimes bribe rebels, or at least keep an eye on reb stacks in my empire as a potential force pool. EG inj my current Karthi campaign my allies the Ptolies have sent a friendly halfstack up the Libyan coast. I am tracking them with a FM and an Allied General, and have a diplomat hovering next to a nice mixed Numidian reb stack.

One way to do this might be having mercs on screen as rebs, or to flip that, making the merc pool the reb pool.

The other side is going all in and only allowing players to hire their own citizen/core subjects units in their cities and making them hire their traditional allies and mercs as mercs. Auxilia, Gesaetae etc only available as limited faction specific mercs.