Limiting Elite Units

[Khan48]

I think it should be left alone how it is. I personally would not want to have realism shoved down my throat. A little self control is all that is needed to maintain realistic armies. It may be a mod of realism but no one will play it if they can't have a little fun. At teh least offer some kind of option to turn it on and off.

[Elthore]

How about exagerating the cost differences. So if hastati cost 100 denari, principes would cost around 1000, with a slightly higher than normal upkeep.This way the game would start off with armies composed almost all out of hastati, then as you got richer you could afford to train more principes. With higher end units getting exponentially more expensive.

the problem in RTWs economy is that large, advanced, and trading countries get too rich. Which is fine actually(on second thought), the cost of everything just doesnt go up at the same level...its like quick inflation i guess.

[Rodion Romanovich]

How about exagerating the cost differences. So if hastati cost 100 denari, principes would cost around 1000, with a slightly higher than normal upkeep.This way the game would start off with armies composed almost all out of hastati, then as you got richer you could afford to train more principes. With higher end units getting exponentially more expensive.

the problem in RTWs economy is that large, advanced, and trading countries get too rich. Which is fine actually(on second thought), the cost of everything just doesnt go up at the same level...its like quick inflation i guess.

I think the example of hastati, principes, triarii is a bad example for limiting of elite units. The romans didn't use hastati just because they were easier to get, but because they had certain strengths the principes lacked. Light, speedy troops that could soften up the enemy. Principes were heavier and triarii had their spears which were effective in flank charges and against cavalry. It's unrealistic to make principes more expensive and require more technology tree levels, they were created at the same time in Rome, and the player should be more or less forced create a mixed army with them because their different strengths should be visible. For example hastati should be faster with high charge but low attack and defense, and principes should be slow, have low charge and high attack and defense, whereas trarii should be slow, have very good attack, medium defense and very good charge plus bonus vs all mounted units, but no pilum so they can't replace principes even though they are powerful infantry. If you want a technology tree with upgrades you could have early hastati/principes/triarii and late hastati/principes/triarii IMO, with simply some upgrades in stats, or, alternatively, so that next building level means the newly created units get 1 or 2 chevrons of experience from start. For romans there's also the problem of forcing/tempting the player to require almost as much auxilia as regular troops. There, special abilities of auxilia in combination with lower training cost might be the solution. In conclusion I'd at least want to point out that principes aren't elite hastati and triarii aren't elite principes. They're as different troops as cavalry and archers.

Regarding elite units, a better example might be spartans vs armored hoplites (using the vanilla R:TW units as an example, because I don't know what units EB will use) or carthage's sacred band vs poeni infantry, or the silver shields of the seleucids vs phalanx pikemen. In those cases, it's really a question of elite units, where they are the same class of units with the same abilities as the units earlier in the technology tree, but with better stats in pretty much all aspects. In those cases, training turns and extreme cost is a solution that I agree is good.