Investigation of unit retraining

[Squid]

I have no objection to there being some small benefit to experience to new recruits when they join a veteran unit. It probably shouldn't be more than one experience point though.

It *is* pretty silly to have retrained units retaining all their experience, if this is indeed what is happening, and furthermore it probably only adds to the already overfast kill rates.

Its not so much that they retain their experience its that is so cheap to do so. If the costs increased exponentially AND had a turn penalty to retrain I think that would keep it more balanced. If each additional level of experience you retrained to cost 10 times more and took an extra year/turn or something it should work since it would be the time and money needed to train new recruits up to the standards of the unit they're joining. If people and AI had to wait 5 years and spend 50,000 to retrain to level 5 it would be done a whole lot less.

[ZZR Puig]

First of all, it's clear that XP don't decrease with retraining, as already has been said. I've tried that on a full fleet with veteran ships when I heard that was possible. Even a 3 gold chevron bireme with 5 or 6 men remaining get full XP. Same results for ground units, although I've never reached 9 XP with them.

It's then clearly a bug, or at least a mistake in the manual. Since it's nonsense that green recruits get 3 gold chevrons I vote for the bug option.

About the strange costs of the retraining I've never experienced that. Many times I don't even check it as I have enough money, but every time I suspected an abnormal cost was due to an upgrade applied to the whole unit and not because of the new recruits.

Perhaps it's a silly hypothesis, but I wonder what happens to the armour and weapon upgrades when retraining in a city that don't have such improvements. Whether they are granted for free like the XP, the new recruitments don't get them or perhaps they are charged to you additionally to the cost of the new soldiers. Perhaps somebody who has made some testing could chech if there seems to be something odd related to the armour or weapons improvements. Never happened to me, so perhaps it don't happens at all or only happens in RTR.

Note: With the game like it is you can use your most depleted units to chase routing enemy units and get insane amounts of XP, then just retrain them to get monstrous armies of ultra elite soldiers. It works but it's not really much realistic.

[gardibolt]

Has it now been confirmed that as of 1.3, the retraining works per the manual, and decreases your XP? That would really discourage retraining, but it certainly seems more reasonable. Otherwise it's too easy to get uber-troops.

[Atilius]

Has it now been confirmed that as of 1.3, the retraining works per the manual, and decreases your XP?

To the contrary, retraining in 1.3 still results in NO reduction in experience.

[gardibolt]

If that's the case, and healing units appears to adversely affect experience gained as others are indicating in another thread, then it's to the player's interest to always retrain troops, and generals should always avoid retinue with the surgery effect, correct? (That would be Chirurgeon, Doctor, Druid, Herbalist, Physician, Priest of Asklepios, Priest of Bendis, Priest of Brigantia, Priest of Imhotep, Priest of Woden and Wise Woman). Seems.....counterintuitive, if not outright bugged.

[Germanvs]

In my experience, retrained units usually keep their experience level, bot not always.
The general's bodyguard usually drops in experience over time (when the losses get replaced automaticly.)

I do not agree with keeping the chirurgeons etc out of your retinue: It's the front soldiers who get the most experience (kills), and thus the healed soldiers are likely to boost the experience of the group, not lower it.

[Atilius]

I've seen units lose experience between the end of the battle and the return to the campaign map, but this seems rare. I can't be certain, but it seems plausible that this is a result of healing.

Still, I don't think it's wise to avoid healing enhancing ancillaries. While the average experience of the unit is lower, you haven't lost anything, and you have men you wouldn't have otherwise. To bring the unit back up to full strength, you end up paying more for the higher experience level than you would if you had more healing. Given the fact that it's unusual for healing to have any effect on overall experience, don't see that it's worth passing up healing when you can get it.

[gardibolt]

But given that retraining is so cheap,and gives you experienced troops, then why bother with healers? There's no additional cost, but they give you green troops. Seems like it should be the other way around.

[LuckyDog Trojan]

My question is not directly related to unit re-training costs - but - it does have to do with costs related to unit upkeep. If this question belongs elsewhere, I apologize.

Having said the above... ...

Following a battle, does a reduced number of soldiers in a unit have any impact on the upkeep cost that is routinely extracted each turn?

For example: I purchase a 40-man Hastati unit that has an upkeep cost of D150 per turn. This unit enters battle and comes away with 20 men left alive. Does this reduced size unit still cost me D150 per turn or is it somehow pro-rated down? (I recognize that if I retrain/restore the unit back to full strength that I can expect a full upkeep cost each turn).

To any and all - your comments & input is appreciated.

[Severous]

^LuckyDog Trojan

Yes. The smaller unit will cost less in wages.

[MajorFreak]

yah know, all of this i've read is just a tad fishy. There are some valid assumptions and rationalizations made...but, seriously, i haven't seen any 'confirmation' about any really in any conclusion. Yes, ships don't lose experience on retraining. EVERYONE knows that. I certainly don't think that translates to using it to confirm land unit retraining....or that crap about rehealing "adversely" affecting anything. As for that comment about "modding" a unit and it "suffered heavy losses" isn't exactly a controlled experiment. Sure, if you said you'd modded it so it suffered casualties without making any kills then i might buy the anecdote.

As it stands i think there's alot more work needing to be done before people start extrapolating on unconfirmed reports. I totally want to prove myself wrong here, but as it stands i have a hypothesis:

• 1) ships are bugged. a severely depleted ship with 3 gold chevrons won't lose chevrons when retrained. This isn't speculation. it's pure cold hard fact i don't think anyone here is debating. it's just silly to assume land units are the same, especially when training a ship from a city with pantheon of mars gives it no base experience boost. I believe this is the exception that proves the rule.
  2) post battle healing will have the computer remembering the recently dead soldiers' prior battle experience and adjusts the final chevron display accordingly for the unit
  3) retraining does not increase in cost for experience, but upgrades
  4) retraining will affect experience average in land units - which is why retraining in cities with mars temples doesn't drain chevrons over time
  5) retraining a low strength unit is more cost effective than retraining many units with less casualties, but it has nothing to do with experience/upgrades - it's just the way the math works (dunno the exact name one would use but obviously it's not a linear line) ...btw, i swear there's a bug in the game where some retraining costs are just silly

now...it's not a theory till i can prove it or not. But it's something i'll take pains to pay attention to from now on...not only pay attention but experiment. But, i swear i'm going to be a bit pissed off if i spend all that time and be right about all my assumptions.


I swear by Brutii. I can have a general with 4 healers (priestess, physician, herbalist and chirugeon lastly - not sure if healing stack tho. that's why i clicked on this thread in hopes of answering)
I swear by Brutii. I can have an awesome temple of Mars and not worry about retraining units that much...at least they won't suffer too much retraining drop in chevrons...

BTW, I agree wholeheartedly with Severous. I swear on my grandfather's grave that i've had repetitive riots in cities with peasants trained from a mars temple where you KNOW they never got any experience or loss thereof in battles, and top that off with a plague or two, and you'll notice. YOU WILL NOTICE. that retraining in a city without a mars temple that those unbloodied peasants will gradually drop in experience. This happened over many games over many years...and that's the one thing i'm without doubt about. I think i have the right to extrapolate that to other memories, less clear, about front line troops being retrained as nearby non-mars cities and discovering after a while that those stacks never really gained MUCH experience as compared to stacks retraining from pantheon of mars cities.

[MajorFreak]

actually, after a bit of testing i started to suspect that only peasants are affected properly...in the resulting state of pissed offedness i decided to jump ship over to EB total mod. byeee. lol