Info about the Barbarian Recruitment

[The Stranger]

that can be fixed by boosting trade and income by religious buildings. its already more expensive than a man, cuz to hire a normal soldier is like 1 denari a turn. a horse costs 3 per horse, in a unit of 80 men thats 240 denari, that already more than most units cost in vanilla, add armour and weapons you can come to over 1200 denari to recruit a horse unit. in my game cataphracts cost 1272 denari to recruit 250 to maintain, cuz they ask money and not land in return for their service.

[GoreBag]

I think training a man would cost less than giving him a horse.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Well as far as the Saxons, by that system there would be no recruitment cost for some units as they were required, not asked, to fight. Actually the whole thing is very confused and someone else can probably explain it much better but I have a feeling your current system would lead to no cost for the bulk of Barbarian units.

[Ranika]

Gaelic chiefs and kings paid for their soldier's equipment, except for swords and other more expensive or specialized weapons (but they did pay for armor, in most cases; while a lower soldier COULD get chain, a chief wouldn't pay for it, but for elites like Ridire, the king or chief would finance it), 'elites' had to pay for their own specialized training (in most cases), and while horsemen had to qualify in certain training tests (which they had to finance, if the tests would require any equipment, like 'javelin rings'), they had to provide their own horses.

[The Stranger]

thanx, Neongod, youre right. i misposted the prices. it was 1 and 0.5 instead of 10 and 5.

[Randarkmaan]

I think the franks and most other western/central european forces could have recruitment like this:

Peasant Levy:
These were conscripted on order from the king and would supply themselves with what weapons and armour(though this was very rare). These would mostly be armed with bows, axes, spears and sometimes wooden shields as well, in the later game they could come armed with crossbows also since this was a normal hunting weapon, they ofcourse had little training and no discipline. Because these men are the ones to farm the lands and provide income for the province I think that their upkeep should be high so that they cant be kept away from the fields for too long.

Urban Militia:
These where the local protecters of a city or town, these men would have a little training, supply themselves with weapons and armour, and they would get payed.
The richest would come with a sword(only later perhaps?) or an axe, a spear, a shield and a suit of armour, most normally leather armour I think but the richest might have had a suit of chainmail or scale armour, and maybe even a horse!
The ones with a little less money would come with an axe or a spear, propably a shield and maybe a piece of leather armour as well.
The poorest would only come armed with a bow, a dagger and maybe an axe.

Proffesional Soldiers/Men at Arms:
They would usually be mercenaries from region or the surrounding regions and they would be self equipped. They usually demanded a healthy sum of money for their services, but then again they were more reliable than urban militia and also in some case more reliable than the feudal land owning nobility.
They would normally be sergeants or poor landless knights(I dont know if these social ranks existed in this period but they certainly existed by the 11c) they would usually be equipped with good quality equipment and have pretty good training.
As for exactly how they should be equipped here you go:
Infantry soldiers would usually come with a spear, a sword or an axe, a shield and would wear a suit of armour, usually chainmail or scale, but some of the poorer ones wore leather armour.
Cavalry would come with a horse(ofcourse), a lance, a sword, mace or a cavalry axe, carry a shield and wear a suit of chainmail or scale armour, or leather armour in case of some of the poorer ones again

Knights,Nobles or generally troops recieving fiefs as pay:
Knights would be self supplied with weapons and armour, but they usually always carried the same as they wear required to own: a warhorse, a lance, a sword, a piece of armour(chainmail or scale) and a shield. Knights did not receive pay instead they where given fiefs by their landlord and were obliged to give military service to him for something like 40 days a year, the landlord himself was obliged to give military service to the king, this is the feudal system as you propably already know. As knights required fiefs(that is estates and land) instead of money I think the way to recruit them could be a very very high cost and a low upkeep, or maybe just a high cost and an upkeep(lets just say the fiefs count as money), or require the construction of a building that lowers upkeep significantly beacause of the estates that are handed to the knights and make them not cost too much or require too much upkeep. Or maybe some other way

Anyway this is how I feel that recruiting system of the franks and the holy roman empire should look like.

Hope you like it!

[Randarkmaan]

Oh, and since it seems I am not able to edit my post then I will post this here instead:

When it comes to who recruited them as I only said that when I described the peasant levy, so who recruits who is as follows:

Peasant Levy : Conscription, ordered by the king, though to be honest I am not entirely sure on this one

Urban Militia : The towns were responsible for their own militia, but militia sometimes fought in the king's army, though this may be because the lord was obliged to serve the king to repay the fief he had been given.
Oh, and a side note, I am not entirely sure if the militia provided their own equipment, they may have been given equipment by the city/town, but anyway they certainly had to pay for it!

Professional soldiers/Men at Arms : These would just be hired and payed a set rate, so I think that they should have pretty low recruitment cost and a higher than normal upkeep cost, anyway the royal knights which are the bodyguard of the king and the princes should count as professional soldiers since these were all mercenaries.

Knights, Noble units or generally units with a feudal obligation: I think I already described how these are "recruited" but I think either the very high cost and pretty low upkeep or the "construction" of estates is the way to go.

Anyway I think french knights of the mod's timeline were known as Miles until the 11c, and I don't think there was a social rank called Sergeant by the mod's timeline until the late part(11c). But non of this would effect their recruitment method, that I am pretty sure of, but if anyone can prove me wrong on any of this then I won't argue.