Getting armor, weapon and valor upgrades via retraining

**Shahed** · 12-01-2006, 10:51

That's happening to me right now.

I had about 15-16 Turcomen without any armor, on campaign against the Eastern Rebel cities.

While they were on campaign I built a padder (?) and then a blacksmith for light mail armor. Then I bring them back about 15% manpower depletion. I put them in que to retrain at the blacksmith thinking I'd get the armor PLUS manpower upgrade.

Sure enough they were retrained, brought to full strength. but NO armor upgrade at all, not leather or light mail. I paid however, for a full upgrade.

So now I have the Barneys knocking at my Western gates and I'd really like to have this Turcomen army upgraded before the next campaign.

Can anyone help ? Am I following the correct sequence/procedure ? Is this a bug ?

edit: had a look in the manual on pg 30-31 of the mainland europe-english version, according to that all you have to do is build the buildings required and an armorer. The higher the level of the armorer the higher level it can upgrade.

I'd be happy if it upgraded to light mail. That would be enough... lol !

**FrauGloer** · 12-01-2006, 10:59

Yep, has happened to me, too. I had a Master Chapter House of St. John (+2 Exp.) in Jerusalem plus a Master Swordsmith in Nottingham (+1 Exp. for Knights global), but all knights trained in Jerusalem come out at 0. The thing is, when it was still a Major Chapter house, all units came out at 2 Experience. It seem kind of random (bugged?) to me...

**Rothe** · 12-01-2006, 11:04

I think it is just that the city does not have enough of the units for you to recruit, but you certainly can always train up the armor.

The solution is to join units, so that you retrain the manpower depletion by retraining only one seriously undermanned unit instead of multiple ones that lack only 15% men. You can retrain the full units (after joining units to get one full and one depleted one) without spending the recruiting pool in the city/castle. If you try to retrain multiple units with only a few men missing from each, each of them uses up one unit allotment in the recruitment pool and the recharge rate is limited by your buildings.

To effectively join units, do this.

Unit A - at 85% of original strength - valor +2
Unit B - at 85 % original - valor 0

Join the valor 2 unit to the 0 valor unit, to get a depleted unit with at least valor 2 and a full unit.

The way the joining works is that the least experienced men move to the other unit, which might leave you with more valor in the depleted unit than it had before joining.

When you retrain a depleted unit, the new men have the same valor as the average valor is (the one shown in the unit card). This helps you to build experienced armies.

If you can, fill up as many units as you can with your most experienced one without totally using it up, the core of the unit might have 2 more exp than the men you sent out of the unit, and with retraining the unit can "gain" 1-2 valor.

**Shahed** · 12-01-2006, 11:15

That's a very useful post, thanks. Excellent explanation of how to merge units.

Now, that is exactly what I am doing, and have been since I noticed this valor 'upgrade' when I merged two units at random. So now I have already merged units and am putting them through the retraining mainly for the armor upgrade. There are enough units in the unit pool but it's still not working.

So this means the reason is not that there are not enough units in the unit pool. Actually if there are not enough units in the unit pool, you cannot retrain for manpower at all. In my case they are being retrained for manpower but not for armor.

**R'as al Ghul** · 12-01-2006, 11:44

Sinan,

some Ha units have a limit on how much armour they can have.
More would limit their moveability and is not applied.

R'as

**Shahed** · 12-01-2006, 11:50

Originally Posted by R'as al Ghul

Sinan,

some Ha units have a limit on how much armour they can have.
More would limit their moveability and is not applied.

R'as

True. It was silly in MTW, Turcomen going around with plate armor.

Turcomen do get light mail upgrade though.

I love this new armor system. It's excellent and adds a nice and important detail.

**Derfel von Saljeth** · 12-01-2006, 13:52

Originally Posted by Sinan

True. It was silly in MTW, Turcomen going around with plate armor.

Turcomen do get light mail upgrade though.

I love this new armor system. It's excellent and adds a nice and important detail.

I would like a real upgrade statwise. If you give padded armor to a nacked unit, i would like them to have same base armor of other padded armor protected unit . not just 1

**Slaists** · 12-01-2006, 17:09

If the idea that valor (even a couple points) help a lot in correct charges, at least for knights - the valor upgrades become crucial. You can have a 0-valor knight unit, not knowing what it's doing in the battlefield or +2 valor upgraded versions that charge much more consistently. I would go for the latter.

**Shahed** · 12-01-2006, 21:25

Originally Posted by Derfel von Saljeth

I would like a real upgrade statwise. If you give padded armor to a nacked unit, i would like them to have same base armor of other padded armor protected unit . not just 1

That would make sense for units that have 0 armor, to go to, for example 3 when they get padded armor. Thereafter +1 or so. I wonder if the game has levels for this or is it all +1 ?

**Shahed** · 12-01-2006, 11:48

Ok. Got it.

I removed everything from the que. Saved the game, reloaded.

I put in only 3 units (max unit pool). 1 Turkish Archer, 1 Turcoman Horse, 1 Sipahi. The result was: all three came out with manpower retrained, and only the Turkish Archer & the Turcoman Horse cmae out with armor upgrade in addition. That is perfect.

So what was the problem ?

That's the issue I have not been able to identify. I tried the following:

1. Put in ALL the turcomen to retrain, all 8 of them plus all the Sipahi. More units than are available in the unit pool.

Result: It still worked.

2. I put in only those units that are available in the unit pool.

Result: It still worked.

WORKAROUND: reload the game.

I'm almost certain however that the bug does indeed occur when you put in a que of units to retrain, more than are available. It could also be that the bug occurs when there is a combination of factors, armor, manpower retrain plus lack of manpower. Can't be verified until it occurs again. The workaround is easy enough.

Thanks Rothe you pointed me in the right direction.