Info about the Barbarian Recruitment

[The Stranger]

i've been working on a Recruitment and Maintenance Cost layout. i'm done with the civilised way of recruiting (byzantines) and paying but i dont know how the vikings and franks, etc did it.

did they payed for the warriors equipment or did they payed them themselves.
did they got land in return or moeny. it's very important. were they trained by the goverment or not.


Maintaincost
food = 0.25 per man (pricecan be discussed)
pay = it varies per unit (nobles are mostly pretty expensive)

Recruitment cost
weapons = price varies per unit (high quility weapons are more expensive)
armour = varies per armour type and quality
training = highly trained = 1 per man per turn
trained = 0.5 per man per year
untrained = 0
horses = 3 per horse


if they are recruited by the goverment you have to pay a recruit cost, if not you dont, but that automaticly increases the maintenance cost cuz they'll prolly ask might or land in return for their service.

[Meneldil]

A horse should cost much more than a man. Only the wealthiest people could afford a horse back then (and I'm not speaking about a war horse). I think horses were more expensive than slaves in some regions.

Edit : well, since I'm not part of the team, that's none of my business, I'm merely poiting out facts, but OTOH, having horse units really expensive would probably screw up the AI, who can barely hire anything else than skirmishers in vanilla RTW.

[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.

[Randarkmaan]

Oh, yes and I believe that many Miles(ie. Knights) fought on foot, up until the late 10c or something before that I believe the cavalry was as powerful as it was going to become...

[Randarkmaan]

And seeing as I still can't edit my posts I have to add this in a separate thread as well...

Just got to say that there should be professional crossbowmen in the later part of the game as these became pretty sought after. The french didn't care much for archers and did not include professional archers nor value archers very much at all, though, if you decide to include them, the Normans valued archers alot more and propably even had some mounted archers(though these did not fight as horse archers, more like mobile infantry), and their recruitment method should be pretty similiar to that of the french.

[The Stranger]

thanx. this is helpfull

[Randarkmaan]

And something about the viking way of recruiting.

Peasant Levies:
You could have two types of peasant levies, Karls and Thralls,.Karls were free farmers or fishermen and were required to fight for their king, or jarl they were also the ones to man the longboats. They would arm themselves I believe, and I believe they should have axes, shields and helmets, the ones who posessed armour used armour, though most would have been unarmoured. They should be superior to the peasant levies of other factions though(and better than militiamen as well), with much improved fighting abilities and morale, I think they should be impetuos as well.
Thralls should be similar to other factions' peasant levies and should come armed with a variety of weapons(as with the peasant levies of the franks that I described earlier), but I believe the right way to do it would be to only have two versions one with spears and shields and another with bows.

Landsmenn: These were landowners(they usually owned farms) who were required to fight for their king, they equipped themselves and since they had more money than the karls they had better weapons and they wore armour, they usually also had a horse, though this was only for riding NOT for combat, anyway the norse didn't believe in using cavalry and their horse weren't built for war, they dismounted before battle.
They should carry a sword, a shield and wear armour, they should not be very disciplined(impetuous I would say) and not have that much training, though they should be able to have some sort of shieldwall, but this is pretty obvious as vikings nearly always used the shieldwall.
I dont think they got payed as they required not asked to fight.

Hird: These were the bodygaurd of kings, princes jarls and other important people. They were professional soldiers(so they got payed) and would be armed in similar fashion to the Landsmenn, they would also have horses(again, these were only for riding, NOT combat), and I believe that they were supplied by their lord. They should have good training, but I don't think the vikings were very renowned for discipline. I believe that these should also be able to train, but they should be pretty expensive.

Im not so knowledgable on the viking military as I am when it comes to the european forces, but I don't think it would be much more advanced than this.
Anyway, concerning the Huskarls, I dont actually know where they fit in they were mostly freed thralls but they were professional soldiers, was the Hird made up of Huskarls? Though I believe to have read somewhere that a man in a Hird is called a "Hirdmann", Huskarls were propably like the european men-at-arms, mercenaries from the region. Anyway I want to know this, since I am propably wrong.

And concerning viking use of cavalry, they certainly did NOT use cavalry, except the danes ofcourse who got influenced by frankish warfare which was superior to the viking infantry-warfare, when the vikings fought they always left their horses behind, so I do not think it is right to give them cavalry, though the hird and the landsmenn could have horses that enables them to move longer on the campaign map.

I just realized that I dont only talk about recruitment methods for factions but actually pretty much about the units they should use, hope you don't mind.

[skeletor]

It's very hard to determin exactly what kind of structure their army's had. It was not like the organized and specialized army's further south.

The cuntry was built up by partly independent farms (gaard's) sme big and ritch, some small. Every farm wold have slaves/trells (thrall) freed men and the landlords family. They wold allso have a hird (guard of the landlords and their gaard) The size and gear of this hird wold often be relative to the size and richness of the gaard.

The hird (allso known as Karls/Huskarls (house karls) was usually responsible for defence of the gaard, but in times of crises, the workers on the farm wold allso take to arms with whatever skill they had. (hunters = archers, farmers = spearmen aso.) so called bondis (bonde = farmer)

In times of war and defence of the cuntry, The kings and Jarls wold send out massages to all the gaards. the loyal ones wold then show up with their hird, and sometimes allso regular workers, depending on the time of year(somone had to keap the gaard running) and the magnitude of the threat. All together these men wold form the Norse defencive army.

The viking armys, the ones we usually combine with the norse pople, were actually pirates (in norse viking=pirate) and adventurers seeking loot (some working at farms all year, but joining raids in the middle of the summer when the farms didn't need mutch attention. It was these pople who were responsible for most of the grusome raids in Britain and Europe. They allso raided the Norse cuntry's alot. (In norway there were an alarmsystem along the coast using fire in the same way as seen in LOTR: ROTK to be able to respond to the raids.)

The viking armys were ofcourse used politically by The Norse Kings/Jarls/Landlords in war, as merc's, with the promise of loot. The Kings/Jarls/Landlords wold ofcourse jon the vikings with their own men, to get their part of the loot.

In battle, using cavalery wasn't an option. The commun horses used in Scandinavia, and by Vikings, were small strong horses suited for seatravel, and hard work. As ridinghorses big strong horses were seen as good horses, but these were slow, and not suited for fighting like the frankish and aabic ones. Still, norse armys wold have cavalery scouts that could end up in scirmishes. They allso used horses when chasing routed armymen, so some lowlevel cavalery wold be fine.

Thats why i want to see the army as follows:

Lovest level troops: bondi spearmen and archers and spearthsowers

Viking troops: Spearmen, axemen, and archers, maybe allso spearthrowers. More professional then the bondis, but not too well equiped.

Professional army: Geirrmen (spear) karls, huskarls, heavy axemen, aso.

- Its not too easy with the names, but a Karl working for the Jarl/King wold be mutch bether trained and equiped then a Karl working for a lesser landlord, so we shouldn't have one Karl or Hird unit, but have them in ceveral levels.

The special units is easy (Birkebeiners, Berserkers, Jomsvikings) These were known for their special abilitys and devotion to battle.

-Skel-

[Randarkmaan]

Okay, thanks for clearing that up, I knew there were people who knew more about the viking organization than me...Anyway, Im not entirely sure if the frankish recruitment/unit list that i posted is good for anything else than the late 10-11c as I dont have any books or anything on this subject yet.

[Incongruous]

Remeber for most units there is no training time, and armour cost and stuff will go into the millitary biuldings rather than the training. Look at the minor adjustments thread for the Call-To-Arms thing. Maybe you have already?
The way I see it with the Call-To-Arms idea Western armies are now reliant on the proto-feudal system as is historically accurate, so now we have the idea of unnproffesional armies. Whereby the player can Call-To-Arms an army for hardly any direct cost, but maintaining that army will cost alot of money because of the Feudal system, and the biulding required to gain such unites e.g latter knights are going to need a collection of higher rung biulidings, will cost alot of money.

[Rodion Romanovich]

That's right Bopa, my plan too was to give all militia 0 turns training time and low hiring cost but relatively high maintenance cost, while all professionals would cost much to hire and much to maintain. Especially mounted units will cost much to hire and maintain, due to the horses and so on. However, for cultures where horses played a central role and was as natural as sheep and cattle were to west Europeans - I'm of course talking about the various steppe peoples - the horses shouldn't be a nearly as expansive as for western factions, however they shouldn't be as exaggeratedly cheap as horses are in vanilla R:TW, there either.

[Jarlabanke]

Did the vikings actually have people whose sole purpose was skirmishing with javelins? The sagas gives the impression that their conduct was more like that of the romans, every man has a couple of javelins which are thrown before they engage in close combat. Having separate javeliners might add diversity though.
I'm still wondering what's so special about the Birkebeiners, Heimskringla really doesn't make them look like anything other than a normal vikinga age group/community.

[Rodion Romanovich]

The birkebeiners are good in close combat but also have bows. There are also some lighter version that are excellent archers but less impressive in close combat. The birkebeiners will also have combat in woods and snow, and they'll probably also be quite fast compared to the heavier infantry.

[Jarlabanke]

I meant from a more historical perspective. They don't seem to be anything special juding from the Heimskringla.