2 Points for consideration

[Shigawire]

You would hate me ... But still I have to say that there is one problem - in some areas plunder would be very big - in fact many wars were pure plunder which RTW is not depicting.
Making staying on enemy land very expensive won't be historical - in fact (exept some regions - forests, deserts) staying on enemy teritory should in fact give you money, not take it from you. On the other hand, in your land army needs to be fed and paid by your own men ...

also is there any posibility to give money to army winning a battle if anemy is destoyed or routs? It should be scaled to enemy army size, as it is to reflect capture enemy camp, loot the dead, sell captives.

I would hate you?

I don't see why I would hate someone who reminds me of something so important. Loot! We can't have realistic attrition/logistics without local loot! In fact vanilla does simulate this for the faction being looted. The tile the enemy army sits on starts to look "scorched", and you get "pillage" penalties in your provincial finances.

Something you forget though, is that a lot of this money is basically just going into the hands of the soldiers who pillage. Varying on the abilities of the commander, little of this loot actually goes to the state treasury. But that's what traits and ancillaries can help with.

The mercenary army, of which Xenophon was a guest, also went through Cilicia. Due to Cyrus being unable to control them properly, they looted the country and wreaked a lot of havoc. Only thanks to Cyrus' diplomatic skills, and good reputation, did he save this dire situation. You remember the part where both monarchs gave eachother presents to patch up the relationship..

How much of the money do you think went directly into Cyrus' treasury? The soldiers were the looters. Most likely he ordered them to give it all back for diplomacy's sake. And to preserve his good reputation.

Hannibal Barka's forces moving through aquitania and the alps would scarcely get much of a bonus.. considering he lost 80`000 men on the march. But once on fertile land, with good celtic allies, he started getting reinforcements and supplies.. The local loot soldiers take from the areas they march over is small pickings compared to the enormous costs of bringing about sufficient logistical operations. But local loot may help alleviate these costs somewhat for an able commander. This is micro compared to macro though.

Allowing an army to loot the countryside is one way of preserving "morale" (god knows that definition is "flexible")..

[O'ETAIPOS]

still, while on good looting site they fed "on the enemy" so much less logistics are needed (just send foraging party or two)

I considered post you mention as spoiling idea that everybody cofirms great - so I wrote "You would hate me" :))

[jebes]

I don't neccessarily seem the problem. Raiding cities can give a large amount of money and really damage the enemies economy. How is that so different from foraging?

[Shigawire]

Foraging is a different thing to looting. The Greeks for example, were not very used to this "foraging" business. Polybius noted with curiosity the ferocity with which the Romans would forage food from the countryside whilst campaigning. This impressed Polybius a great deal, who was once an "alphamale" in the greek city of Megalopolis.

If you came across a town, then you would be lucky and get a lot of concentrated loot. Compare it to gold mining/sifting. A large nugget of gold is more valuable than the same volume of gold particles in a river. Even though they are of equal volume, the gold nugget is more concentrated, thus less effort is expended in "collecting" it. Though the golden nugget is more rare to come by..

But if your army is simply moving over terrain, you would be lucky to catch a few scattered huts with sheep-farmers and such. In this sort of terrain, your ability to loot matters very little. Foraging is a skill known to a man who is used to living outdoors. Foraging involves hunting, knowing which berries are non-poisonous, where the food can be found in nature.. that sort of thing..

This would certainly help diminish the logistical costs - hence the "forager" trait mentioned earlier.

[O'ETAIPOS]

For example classical greek warfare was mainly raiding enemy lands and taking or destroying everything, just because without siege artilery and/or enough money to starve city out they were not able to take the city itself.
same thing with different stepe people and in some cases in all wars.
I remind you that Hannibal had problems taking any bigger city so he raided countryside.

oh, 3 minutes late :(
Shigawire, what you say is true in low populated area, but in rich, highly populated people just cant hide in theire cities with everythig they posses - friut trees, growing crops, undefended estates, slaves, animals and many more are what raidin enemy coud take.

[Shigawire]

Yes, but don't overestimate this density. It wasn't as it is today. But I agree that pillaging actual CITIES should reap enormous revenues. But I can't say that I agree with the idea that pillaging the "relatively" empty stretches of land between the cities should reap the same degree of revenue as a city.

This is why I would like to see special tiles with such resources to be pillaged. Oases in deserts to be foraged, to small populated tiles to be pillaged etc.

Don't know if this is doable yet though.

[The_Mark]

We could link some foraging bonuses to tiles.

[LorDBulA]

. But I agree that pillaging actual CITIES should reap enormous revenues.

And it does. When i pillaged Pella few theys ago i go 7K.
For pillaging big cities you can get about 20K. Its hudge money eaven in EB.

[Geoffrey S]

If there were some way to imply a settlement near such tiles, that would be fantastic. It'd give the sense that the cities on the map aren't the only populated areas.

[Shigawire]

And it does. When i pillaged Pella few theys ago i go 7K.
For pillaging big cities you can get about 20K. Its hudge money eaven in EB.

Ok. I haven't tried EB yet.

[aleh]

Well, here're my two cents, hopefully they'll help.

- Looting is a great idea, and it can have a whole new line of traits associated with it as was mentionned. Such as for example as "Soldiers's purses filled from loot"(well shorter...), which would mean they've just looted something and are very happy with their commander. But it could make them less eager to fight when the odds are against them, because they don't want to risk what they just got (or something along those lines). Also, there could be a trait which gives Generals something along the lines of 'good looter', makes his soldiers more loyal, and can increase his personal fortune(more influence I suppose) but it could also give him a couple of negative traits as well such as greedy or some such.

- But there is a huge pretty precedent for supply lines being disrupted, and that at times costed the invaders the war. Though the only example I have it is the Chinese invasion of Korea in the 600s(I think) by the Sui(not sure) dynasty. So perhaps there could be a way to say that if say an enemy force is within X number of tiles(I think) between the province supplying the invaders and the invaders themselves, supply gets harder. Or something like that.

- As well, isn't it logical to assume(might just be me) that there would be a sort of unofficial guerilla caused by an invasion. I'm not talking about like recruitable forces or the like, but like a scripted events. Sorta like some villagers getting together and getting pissed off that their hardwork is being taken by the invaders, so they try ambushing a small party(handful) of the invaders. And the invading army could lose a handful of men(most likely not from the General unit) each turn it spends in enemy territory to that guerrila thingie. If it's possible, it could be tied to the population of the province's capital, the bigger the population of the capital, the bigger the population of the capital, the higher the number of folks who'd be crazy enough to attempt this. If it can be But never more than like ten(or so) a turn.

- Also, is it possible to use the looting concept for the navies? Sorta like to mess with the enemy, a faction resorts to pirate tactics if it's close to enemy shores, I'm talking extremely close. Could subtract some cash from whoever's being pirated<is that even a word>?