mercenary army

[Watchman]

Hee, that starts sounding very Thirty Years' War...

[Franconicus]

Mercs armies pros:
- You do not have to care about casualities, just abandon them after the battle,
- You can recruit quite a lot
- It does not decrease your population (playing very large recruitments can ruin your best towns)
- If you delete them after the battle you can even increase your pop!
- You do not have to protect all your borders with a steady army. Just buy one when you need it
cons
- It takes a lot of money
- You cannot retrain them

[Al Khalifah]

In my crusaders campaign as Britannia I made extensive use of mercenaries because I find the British armies to be severely lacking many areas and the generally nomadic nature of any faction trying to perform such a scenario. I had to use mercenaries to replace fallen troops because I was only allowed to hold certain settlements. While my ships sailed around Spain I picked up mercenaries from Southern France, Iberia, Numidia and Africa so that by the time my fleet reached Sicily, I had an unstoppable horde of an army with excellent troop variety. In Sicily I was able to recruit hoplites. I decided the destruction of the SPQR faction would help my cause by breaking the Roman factions apart so I captured Rome and gave it to the Greek Cities as a gift, which allowed me to recruit Samnite mercenaries (with the huge cash boost this gave).

I often found myself left with armies that were more mercenary than regular or totally mercenary save for the general. A truly multi-national Britannic Empire it was.

[Mahrabals apprentice]

Using mercenaries alos allows for a 'change of pace'.

PLaying brutii I had armies that were packed with heavy infantry, which is perfect for smacking down barbarians, but not so hot for rfighting scythians and pontus. So i took the crimea and hired all the cavalry mercs i could get, giving me a very differant army to my others. PLus I got a fuzzy feeling in my stomach with all those samatians

And hordes of horse archers are fun in their own unique way (for a rome-aholic)

Mercs can just broaden your options

[bubbanator]

I use merc armies if I want to cripple or destroy a faction, but do not want/need their settlements. I send in one family member that has some potential, take the enemy settlements, exterminate their populations and give them as a gift to an ally (or just let them go rebel)

Al Kalhlifia, I like your stratagy of taking out Rome just so the other Romans kill each other. Taking out the Senate army with all mercs is an impressive feat.

[LestaT]

Prior to RTR I seldom use merc but now I use it extensively as a means to fill up my armies since now have to wait until u get the right building before retraining units.

One full stack army conquering the Dacians is consist of about 4 units of Principees (most depleted/half unit strenght) , 3 Triariss a General (so many stars now) and the rest are all Illyrian skirmishers and one Cretan archer. So much fun to 'bully' those Dacian armies consist of 10 units of onagers and the rest warbands.. Har.. Har. Har...

[Cheater]

Mercs are interesting to use, most of the time, anyway. But being the bastard cheater that I am, I modded the Descr_Mercinaries.txt to have the ability to hire ANY mercenary ANYWHERE on the map! Not only that, I also modded them to have max experiance (3 gold chevrons) and they are locked at 99 units available. Also the actually have a replenishment rate of 30 units per turn.

If any of you are interested in knowing how, just ask and I'll be more than happy to tell!