The ultimate way to implement nomads in MTW VI

[cegorach]

The idea is useful for mods using areas of recruitment or homelands so its use might be limited.


Basically I tried to represent the horde from RTW in the older MTW VI engine.


So we have those zones of recruitment limiting the number of provinces which can rise soldiers, but for mobile societies of nomadic nations it seems somehow unfair.

I decided to replace the zones by more sophisticated design - a certain ( e.g. 5) number of UNIQUE (so only one each) buildings.
Each building can rise soldiers, but the number will still be small enough - because there are only 5 such buildings only 5 provinces can rise units of fleet-hoved nomadic cavalry.
Because there are only 5 such places we can ABANDON the restriction of the areas of recruitment and allow recruitment everywhere !

Now there is another thing to remember - the structures should be cheap and easy to build (for example 250 florines and one turn to erect one) so creating one will never be a problem.

So we have a situation when we have 5 provinces, each with one camp , but later our empire conquers more. New provinces in new areas which in would be away from our area of recruitmen, but now it is no problem - simply destroy whatever camp/-s you need and buid it anywhere you like.

This way your recruitment centers follow your army - exactly as a nomadic nation would do. Because you have a limited number of those you will never create oversized army larger than it would be in reality, but also you would have the soldiers where they are necessary.




There are numerous possibilities to explore:
- 2 level camps with the second level as more permanent settlement which would allow recruiting more advanced soldiers,
- mixed recruitment - some units from the camp, some from the original homeland,
- camps can be limited by a certain resource e.g. called grassland so will be possible to create only in certain provinces where the grasslands were more suitable to the nomadic horde's needs,
and many, many more.


So in general the idea has its obvious advantages:
- allows to create mobile empires, nations on move which will never be too large,
- improves looting income because the omads will not need too many buildings on their own and can burn and destroy everything else (if allowed),
- nomadic faction will be harder to eliminate, because it can always re-build its camps somewhere else, it has no real homeland and doesn't need too much to create an army after all,


Of course nothing is without certain flaws:
- the AI never destroyes what it built so they will not benefit from the idea too much,
- the AI might decide to build ALL camps in one place too... Fortunatelly the risk can be lowered by giving CATHEDRAL_INCOME to every single one and the AI has a hardcoded limit of such buildings possible to rise in one province - this way it will never construct too many in one place.
- the camp still needs a sort of a castle in the same province, but one level fort is enough. I suggest to allow building such structures in one turn's time.
- finally it might be a good idea to rise the number of soldiers in nomadic units because the army might be seen as too small by the human player (when he fights against it) - from my experience I can propose 100 men for each unit of cavalry and no changes for infantry (cavalry should be the main power of the army anyway.


Still I assume some of you can find the idea very interesting and useful.

Here are the screenshots of such sructure from the incoming last release of PMTW mod.






Regards Cegorach

[Martok]

Very cool, cegorach. Just out of curiosity, how have they worked out so far in PMTW? Does the AI handle them okay?

[cegorach]

Pretty well actually, but in PMTW its use is limited - the great migrations were already over and there is no complete nomadic faction.

I have used only one such structure for Crimean Khanate ( Budiak Horde), Russia ( Kalmyk Horde) and I might give it to the Persians, Egypt, Barbary States and Morocco - but I am still not sure, simply it is not realistic to have too many nomadic units at that time of history...


It clearly would be great for MedMod or similar i.e. a homeland mod with nomads among their factions.

[naut]

A very interesting prospect cegorach, emergent gameplay at it's best.