well, i'm afraid this is one that has driven me nuts since the days of shogun. valor is valor. it's not experience. it's not training. it's not confidence. it's valor. the dictionary defines this simply as 'bravery; courage' and it comes from the latin word 'valere' which means 'be strong'. what's wrong here is an assumption that valor increases ability. it doesnt. it's just valor. in the game, that translates to morale or a willingness to hang around a little longer in the face of impending death. there is no reason why a peasant cant have a better valor than a highly trained unit and it's also true that a highly trained unit will tend to have more confidence which does tend to increase his willingness to hang around longer, but what the game does is backwards. if you buy more valor in a multi game, for instance, you are actually buying training and morale, which most closely fits with what i said about a highly trained unit and confidence. what you shld really be buying then, is training, which in turn increases confidence/morale.

what i suggested a long time back was to separate these things out into different categories, as it's quite confusing to new people at times that you think you're buying morale and are really buying training. when i found this out as a newbie, i immediately changed my way of playing. so, it would nice to buy valor (without the training aspect) and or to buy training (and get a little morale bonus in there representing confidence).

and this is what a good leader shld be instilling to his men, confidence. how can you instill training simply by being there on the field? it's just a bit of a silliness. but, it does work in terms of game play as long as you know what's going on.

now, it is also true that in single player (and this may be where the confusion is coming from....mp vs sp) a unit gaining valor is also gaining training and this actually makes sense in this context. the guy has been in battle and survived. he most likely learned something, especially if he was actually engaged and won his battles. his training would indeed to up and so would his morale. so, in this context it makes perfect sense, though i'd tend to change the wording, perhaps, or even still separate them out in the stats, but, it does work. for mp games, however, it does seem backwards.

i've mostly gotten over the whole thing, but i was waiting to see if it would be different in mtw than it was in stw/we/mi and was a bit disappointed when it wasnt.

ah well, c'est la guerre.

K.