The Military Slide (revolution)

[Silver Rusher]

I've noticed discussion about this in other threads, and I think it would be good if we could settle this issue once and for all. The Renaissance housed what was probably the biggest military revolution in history, as it was the time when people stopped using swords as primary weapons, or even using shields at all, and instead used guns and pikes as the main body of the force. Cavalry stayed the same, only armour was almost completely abandoned as things moved into the pike & shot era. Now we must think about how this should be incorporated into the mod, as it is very important that it is. What my personal suggestion is is that in the earlier technology levels infantry and other pre-modern units have good stats, by which I mean the more medieval units, and then in the later tech levels there are no medieval units at all, and instead pikes and gun-units have superior stats so as to stop the player/AI from using earlier units. Another suggestion is that the Marian Reforms are used to do this, although I am unsure of this due to the fact that the Reforms would have to be triggered by a Crusader faction. We would then have to extensively engineer it so that the reforms are delayed for around a century before they kick in themselves. I think either of these would be good options, but only if we can use them well. Anyway, the decision is up to Celtic_Winter so I think we should let him be the main suggestion-taker.

Thanks,
SR

[Uesugi Kenshin]

That sounds good but in custom battles that would not work so well. One idea I have is that we could make medieval units have better defense if they have armour but make them slower and make gunpowder units cheap due to the low level of training required. Pike units of the shot era could also be made somewhat cheaper due to lack of armour, but i do not think that there should be an overall rise in stats because that would be unrealistic and it would be fun to use units from both ages. Gunpowder weaponry did not render medieval tactics and units obsolete overnight so gunpowder age units should not be better in every way.

Summary of Gunpowder age improvements: Faster, cheaper, more powerful ranged weapons, gunpowder ranged units cause fear in medieval age units if feasible.

[Uesugi Kenshin]

That sounds good but in custom battles that would not work so well. One idea I have is that we could make medieval units have better defense if they have armor but make them slower and make gunpowder units cheap due to the low level of training required. Pike units of the shot era could also be made somewhat cheaper due to lack of armor, but i do not think that there should be an overall rise in stats because that would be unrealistic and it would be fun to use units from both ages. Gunpowder age weaponry and tactics did not render medieval tactics and units obsolete overnight so gunpowder age units should not be better in every way.

Summary of Gunpowder age improvements: Faster, cheaper, more powerful ranged weapons, gunpowder ranged units cause fear in medieval age units if feasible.

[Silver Rusher]

Yeah, custom battles aren't good, you are right. And I know raising stats completely wouldn't be good, but what I really mean is that the later units could exploit weaknesses in the earlier units, like good armour piercing (as is historically accurate) to discourage the player from continuing to use earlier units.

Thanks,
SR

[Celtic_Winter]

I've noticed discussion about this in other threads, and I think it would be good if we could settle this issue once and for all. The Renaissance housed what was probably the biggest military revolution in history, as it was the time when people stopped using swords as primary weapons, or even using shields at all, and instead used guns and pikes as the main body of the force. Cavalry stayed the same, only armour was almost completely abandoned as things moved into the pike & shot era. Now we must think about how this should be incorporated into the mod, as it is very important that it is. What my personal suggestion is is that in the earlier technology levels infantry and other pre-modern units have good stats, by which I mean the more medieval units, and then in the later tech levels there are no medieval units at all, and instead pikes and gun-units have superior stats so as to stop the player/AI from using earlier units. Another suggestion is that the Marian Reforms are used to do this, although I am unsure of this due to the fact that the Reforms would have to be triggered by a Crusader faction. We would then have to extensively engineer it so that the reforms are delayed for around a century before they kick in themselves. I think either of these would be good options, but only if we can use them well. Anyway, the decision is up to Celtic_Winter so I think we should let him be the main suggestion-taker.

Thanks,
SR

I think that the Marian reform sounds like the easiest way to do it.
We need to figure out a way to make it so that the early units are not used.
Maybe, make it so that the barracks,stables,etc upgrade to the higher level of the tech tree after sometime. But I don't know much about this since I don't do the programming.

[Uesugi Kenshin]

Yeah adding armor piercing would be good, maybe a unit trait like good versus armoured troops? I think we should stick to real world advantages because the world would not have changed over to gunpowder age weapons and tactics if they were not better or easier. Cheaper units is a must, bows were much harder to use than guns. Riding a horse in full armor must have been harder than riding in cloth uniforms.

[GodsPetMonkey]

I think that the Marian reform sounds like the easiest way to do it.
We need to figure out a way to make it so that the early units are not used.
Maybe, make it so that the barracks,stables,etc upgrade to the higher level of the tech tree after sometime. But I don't know much about this since I don't do the programming.

IMHO the marian reforms arnt a good sole option for this, the change in fighting styles was very gradual, its hard to convince a hole section of society (knights) that the code and ways that they have fought by for 300 years have expired.

Whats more, the changes had as much to do with political realities then military. This is the time where we se absolute monarchs come into the foray, killing the fuedal system. A king who doesnt need his feudal lords anymore just lost the way fuedal armies were raised, whats more, the ruling classes arnt one bmit happy about being taken out of the loop, so you can expect your elite troops not to turn up on the day, so we have armies with more and more lower classes in positions of authority, and occupying positions in elite units.
Personally, I think the death of the medieval way of war had as much to do with the death of the fuedal system then with developments of reliable gunpowder weapons. Peasant armies will be armed with peasant weapons (ie. easily mass produced gear... heavy plate needs to be fitted!), it was just luck that these peasant weapons also killed non peasants rather well.

But I'm getting side tracked. I think the best way to do it is to have it so the later baracks dont allow the training of earlier units, full stop, in a gradual manner, so your early baracks is all medieval soldiers, your next is better medieval soldiers, then your next has early Renaissance units and some of the later fuedal, etc.

Of course, we need some way to prevent feudal units being trained at later dates by just not upgrading the baracks, and here we can use the marian reforms.
I wish we could have many marian reforms in one game! That would be great, but it just isn't meant to be a guess...

At the same time though, I would think it would be good to have different nations at different technological stages. eg. France starting the Renaissance (and building the apropriate units) but England still in the middle ages, not all of europe is created equal, but that is just wishful thinking.


Ultimately, the marian reforms will have to be used as a way to 'herald a new era', ala era changes in MTW, its the true and tried method, but for from optimum.

[Uesugi Kenshin]

I do not think we should make them untrainable unless the computer continues training fuedal era troops, because it would be nice to have the option of trying to fight other factions with gunpowder weapons when you only use fuedal weaponry and not be denied the valor increases sometimes given by barracks.