MTW Pocket Mod: Units, Buildings and Unit Stats

[Third spearman from the left]

Some great ideas here so far keep them coming,

Any final decision on the MA for the otto Jan infantry I'm still in favour of getting rid of it and allowing production of the troops in any province that meet the high specs.

[caravel]

Any final decision on the MA for the otto Jan infantry I'm still in favour of getting rid of it and allowing production of the troops in any province that meet the high specs.

Well the way to do that, IMHO, is to remove the necessity for the Grand Mosque altogether. This way the Military Academy would only depend on the citadel and in this way you would be able to construct multiples. This way (assuming the mods above are present) you can separate your MI from you GM and build the MI in Constantinople (and multiples anywhere else of course) and the GM in Arabia to produce the High valour Imams.

Personally if I was to do this, I would also impose the late era restriction and also have the MI require Fortress level.

Not sure about sending the be-kilted bravehearts to northern spain though...

As to the FMAA/CMAA, Spanish javelinmen may be better... but needs more research.

[Kralizec]

I'd change the building requirement for the military academy from Grand Mosque to Fortress. Seems much more sensible.

[caravel]

Well, after adding all of the above changes except some of the most recently mentioned, and starting a new campaign as the Danes, this occured:

https://img301.imageshack.us/my.php?...pikemendq8.jpg

Yes the AI French faction is trying, at the expense of all else, to tech up to the +1 valour pikemen now available in flanders with the level 3 militia building and level 3 spearmaker...

[Kralizec]

That would seem to confirm the issue mentioned in post #42.

A workaround would be to give all bonus provinces border forts, ports and maybe some other buildings on the starting map.

EDIT: another workaround would be to add border forts and ports to the building requirements.
I don't personally like this solution though because
1) it's silly that you should need border forts to build pikemen, etc
2) I prefer not to build border forts. If you have spies or assasins in the province, they'll catch incoming enemy counterparts instead, adding to their valour.

[caravel]

That's what I was thinking, but even then the AI may not develop those provinces further. Now that the French have developed flanders to train those pikemen, will they develop it further? They've teched the spearmaker up to the max, even though that is not the primary prerequisite and, AFAIK, will not give another +1 valour to the unit. If nothing is built in the province for the next few years I could possibly assume that a fortress is being built in order to upgrade to a level 4 militia building (which should give the additional +1 valour), this would indicate that the AI cannot discern which building gives the additional valour.

I have noticed that the valour bonuses in provinces such as Constantinople and Tolouse also affect those provinces in this way. If the province can be teched up fairly fast, i.e. a province that is famous for peasants won't take much teching up, then it appears that the AI can presumably get back to business, but with provinces that give bonuses to high level units, the AI can spend alot of time working towards that particular unit, to the detriment of all else.

On another note, I have thought about modding the HRE/Italian Baronial Estates building to all factions and using it as an additional prerequisite for 'lancers' then modding them as all factions and renaming them to something more realistic (though I've no idea what, as yet).

The Royal Court also needs to be removed from the Orthodox unit roster as it serves no purpose at present. Though I do feel that such buildings could be utilised for the Russian/Novgorod faction as prerquisites for units such as Druzhina and Boyar cavalry.

-Edit: check the post count!

-Edit2:

EDIT: another workaround would be to add border forts and ports to the building requirements.
I don't personally like this solution though because
1) it's silly that you should need border forts to build pikemen, etc
2) I prefer not to build border forts. If you have spies or assasins in the province, they'll catch incoming enemy counterparts instead, adding to their valour.

I agree but it may pay to force the AI to improve at least it's famrland when it improves it's royal courts and horse breeders. The royal court and horse breeder upgrades could also depend on the famrland upgrades. The problem is that some provinces are just not worth farming...

I also avoid border forts, as I prefer to train first my assassins and later my spies in the home provinces counterspying. I'm not so worried about forcing the AI to build border forts, and I'm not sure if the AI actually needs watchtowers at all. I have a feeling that the AI is in perpetual .matteosartori. mode as it regularly deploys emissaries straight off the mark to a faction leader on the other side of the map. Assuming the AI does require watch towers they could be made an additional prerequisite to the keep (possibly with border forts as an additional prerequisite to the Citadel, though that would force border forts, which I wouldn't like personally).

The problem lies in the fact that castle upgrades can be teched up and up with no other buildings required, which is wrong in too many ways. You can potentially build a fort and keep upgrading it until it's a fortress, constructing nothing else whatsoever. Such structures should depend on the farmlands upgrades, among other things, and perhaps making those considerably cheaper is the best option?

[Innocentius]

Regarding the adding and removing of landbridges, is historical accuracy the most important reason for these changes (which would make the landbridge between Sweden/Finland very odd) or is it pure playability?

[caravel]

Regarding the adding and removing of landbridges, is historical accuracy the most important reason for these changes (which would make the landbridge between Sweden/Finland very odd) or is it pure playability?

Well, looking at literally any map, I can see that all my troops would need to do in order to travel from Finland to Sweden would be to walk northwards then bear westwards which would lead them into Sweden. There is no need to cross the Gulf of Bothnia, though the presence of the Aland Islands near the mouth of the gulf (sadly not visible on the MTW map) would make a Landbridge somewhat viable there, but is redundant of course due the land route.

[Innocentius]

The lands you are talking about now were not a part of any kingdom at all untill the 15th or 16th century (they were officially Swedish or Norse already by the 13th century though). Only in the 16th and 17th century were these areas truly incorporated to Sweden.
You can't march an army just through nowhere, they need to eat as well. The minimal population of these lands (Laponia etc.) surely would not have greeted armies from a kingdom due south, which they didn't have much to do with. In medieval times, and of course even later on, armies travelling between Sweden and Finland travelled by sea, docking in Visby, Gotland, and then headed on. Åland was another possible port to stop at on the way. There is a reason as to why Laponia is not included in the map.

[caravel]

I bow to your superior knowledge.

Though there are many sparsely populated, non thoroughly explored and outright dangerous regions on the map, not just in scandinavia. Many of the siberian, german and desert provinces would be dangerous for an army to march across, though a ruler would claim these lands as part of his dominion some of the local folk might think otherwise. In view of this I do think the landbridge is valid, in any case it is just as valid as sending your men via ship from Scotland to Palestine in one year, or sending a crusade, well anywhere which is why I do think it's a valid landbridge.

I was also wondering if you could help me out with some of the Viking units name changes?


Edit: Update: It's now 2am and most of the changes are done The units and their valour bonuses and stat changes are finished, and the buildings are fixed as per the updated summary. The startpos files are mostly done except the late file which I haven't touched yet (apart from to remove inns). Peasants still need to be removed from all files, the sicilian ships still need to be fixed, as does the spearmen/roundshieldspearnmen mix up, the units for georgia and armenia need to be done, the shipping costs need to be sorted out, and the spearmen for the egyptians and almohads need to be added. Other fixes that need sorting are the homelands (i've done some work on this in the past), trade and farming which I still haven't looked at.

[Innocentius]

Though there are many sparsely populated, non thoroughly explored and outright dangerous regions on the map, not just in scandinavia. Many of the siberian, german and desert provinces would be dangerous for an army to march across, though a ruler would claim these lands as part of his dominion some of the local folk might think otherwise. In view of this I do think the landbridge is valid, in any case it is just as valid as sending your men via ship from Scotland to Palestine in one year, or sending a crusade, well anywhere which is why I do think it's a valid landbridge.

Totally agree on that part.

The names of the viking units is a tough one, mainly since there were no viking "units", raids were just composed of men from different social classes. In all honesty, the Viking Carls (or Carl Swordsmen) should be removed as only the very social elite (the cream of the cream) could afford swords, but I guess that'd make the game somewhat out of balance.
The Thrall unit seem fit. The Landsmenn could perhaps be renamed to Drängar (dräng=singular, drängar=plural). In modern Swedish dräng would be the equivalent of farm-hand actually, but they were a form of elite warriors in the army of their (often local) lord or king.
Huscarles is another term that does work, however I think that Tegnar (tegn=singular, tegnar=plural) would be somewhat more appropriate. Tegnar were in many ways the same as vassals to the king, who gained land from him, and this land remained in family of the tegn even after his death.
Huscarl is a term that belongs in the dark ages, the viking adapted the Tegn-system from England, do give the impression of being civilized christians. Tegn itself is in fact only a scandinavian from of the anglo-saxon title "Thegn".

[Martok]

I'm not sure I said anything about training them before era! They're very era restricted. Feudal Knights will no longer be available in High and Late, and Chivalric Knights will only be available in High. Lancers will only be trainable in the Late era. Basically if you have e.g. any battered units of Chivarlic Knights or Feudal Knights left during the Late period you can send them in to be retrained a Lancers. And if you had any Feudal Knights left during the High period you could retrain them into Chivarlic Knights.

Sorry, I should've worded that better. I was actually referring to a comment you'd made earlier in the thread--you had complained how you often couldn't train Feudal Knights until the Early period was almost over, because of all the infrastructure that was required. I was simply commenting that your changes should help remedy that.

-Edit: I was also thinking of reusing the Fedual Knights unit, but reducing it's stats somewhat, and making a new 'mounted militia' cavalry type. I'm not sure of the exact historical accuracy of this, but mounted militias did exist, I just need to find more information on them...

Well wouldn't that be more or less what the Mounted Seargents represent? Seems to me they're pretty much one and the same. I'm not sure either, though.

Summary updated:

Summary

Excellent! Looks good, MC.

One thing that caught my particular attention:

Brothel/Tavern structure needs to be fixed to allow earlier spies.

Are you looking at lowering the fortification requirement for both buildings, or just one of them?

[naut]

Brothel/Tavern structure needs to be fixed to allow earlier spies.

Couldn't agree more. A Keep to get a tavern! GAH!

[caravel]

Totally agree on that part.

The names of the viking units is a tough one, mainly since there were no viking "units", raids were just composed of men from different social classes. In all honesty, the Viking Carls (or Carl Swordsmen) should be removed as only the very social elite (the cream of the cream) could afford swords, but I guess that'd make the game somewhat out of balance.
The Thrall unit seem fit. The Landsmenn could perhaps be renamed to Drängar (dräng=singular, drängar=plural). In modern Swedish dräng would be the equivalent of farm-hand actually, but they were a form of elite warriors in the army of their (often local) lord or king.
Huscarles is another term that does work, however I think that Tegnar (tegn=singular, tegnar=plural) would be somewhat more appropriate. Tegnar were in many ways the same as vassals to the king, who gained land from him, and this land remained in family of the tegn even after his death.
Huscarl is a term that belongs in the dark ages, the viking adapted the Tegn-system from England, do give the impression of being civilized christians. Tegn itself is in fact only a scandinavian from of the anglo-saxon title "Thegn".

Some good ideas in there. I'm quite happy to remove the sword bearing Carls, for that reason alone. The Carl Axemen can be renamed simply "Carls". I have read elsewhere that the Huscarls would have carried swords due to their being an elite. I'm not sure as to the accuracy of this though. I like your ideas of using Tegn/Tegnar and Drang/Drangar instead of Huscarle/Huscarles and Landsmann/Landsmenn respectively for those units to better match the period.

Sorry, I should've worded that better. I was actually referring to a comment you'd made earlier in the thread--you had complained how you often couldn't train Feudal Knights until the Early period was almost over, because of all the infrastructure that was required. I was simply commenting that your changes should help remedy that.

I understand you perfectly now, sorry!

Well wouldn't that be more or less what the Mounted Seargents represent? Seems to me they're pretty much one and the same. I'm not sure either, though.

Probably, though I was thinking that these would be a bit tougher than the Mounted Sergeants, a sort of medium Yeoman Cavalry that depends on the County Militia perhaps.

Are you looking at lowering the fortification requirement for both buildings, or just one of them?

Couldn't agree more. A Keep to get a tavern! GAH!

I'm looking at lowering the requirement for both buildings to the fort, removing the requirement of a tavern to build the first brothel, and then I may try to bring the Cunnny Warren building over from VI. Hopefully it will then work exactly as it does in VI.

-Edit: No sooner said than done. The Taverns, Brothels and their upgrades now depend on the Fort, the Keep, Castle and Citadel. You no longer need the Fortress to build that last type of Brothel/Tavern. They are now both equal in cost, construction time and level. I have also added the "Cunny Warren" as the final upgrade for the Brothel (this was previously absent).

[Innocentius]

Some good ideas in there. I'm quite happy to remove the sword bearing Carls, for that reason alone. The Carl Axemen can be renamed simply "Carls". I have read elsewhere that the Huscarls would have carried swords due to their being an elite. I'm not sure as to the accuracy of this though. I like your ideas of using Tegn/Tegnar and Drang/Drangar instead of Huscarle/Huscarles and Landsmann/Landsmenn respectively for those units to better match the period.

Thinking of it, Huscarles could also be renamed as Hirdmen. A hird was simply a small unit of bodyguards, although these were becoming outdated by the 12th century. In the end, Tegn is perhaps the most accurate term since we're talking about the 11th and 12th century.
And after a second thought, I think that Thralls should simply be renamed Vikings since:
1. Thralls were not intended to fight. They were slaves, often taken as loot on a previous raid.
2. They fit in with the description of the traditional viking: armed with a spear, no armour.

[Kralizec]

One possible reason why Orthodox factions can build the Royal Court is that if they conquer a catholic or muslim province, it doesn't get razed (of course royal estates or baronial courts still would be)

Manco Capac (interesting name btw, could you explain it to me? Is it an actual person): maybe you could have different mounted sergeants for the different eras. The vanilla mounted sergeants would be early only, after that you can retrain them into the high version wich would use the model and skin of Feudal Knights (perhaps with some changes)

[Martok]

Probably, though I was thinking that these would be a bit tougher than the Mounted Sergeants, a sort of medium Yeoman Cavalry that depends on the County Militia perhaps.

Hmm. I see what you're saying now; yeah, that could work. You'd almost have to give it stats similar to that of Feudal Knights, though. Otherwise they wouldn't really be worth training.

-Edit: No sooner said than done. The Taverns, Brothels and their upgrades now depend on the Fort, the Keep, Castle and Citadel. You no longer need the Fortress to build that last type of Brothel/Tavern. They are now both equal in cost, construction time and level. I have also added the "Cunny Warren" as the final upgrade for the Brothel (this was previously absent).

Excellent! So what's left now?

[naut]

Also rename Fyrdmen, Ceorls.

[caravel]

Thinking of it, Huscarles could also be renamed as Hirdmen. A hird was simply a small unit of bodyguards, although these were becoming outdated by the 12th century. In the end, Tegn is perhaps the most accurate term since we're talking about the 11th and 12th century.
And after a second thought, I think that Thralls should simply be renamed Vikings since:
1. Thralls were not intended to fight. They were slaves, often taken as loot on a previous raid.
2. They fit in with the description of the traditional viking: armed with a spear, no armour.

I'm quite happy to make those changes. I always though that "Viking" was just a loose term for the scandinavian raiders that attacked Britain?

One possible reason why Orthodox factions can build the Royal Court is that if they conquer a catholic or muslim province, it doesn't get razed (of course royal estates or baronial courts still would be)

Possibly but yes the later upgrades, that take all the time and money, still get razed when an othodox faction moves in. I suppose the muslim factions have to live with their grand mosque's destruction when the catholics and orthodox invade also.

(interesting name btw, could you explain it to me? Is it an actual person)

The first Inca. I was testing out the new name change feature. I'll probably change back to Caravel so don't get used to this one yet!

Manco Capac: maybe you could have different mounted sergeants for the different eras. The vanilla mounted sergeants would be early only, after that you can retrain them into the high version wich would use the model and skin of Feudal Knights (perhaps with some changes)

That's a good idea, the problem is retraining them into a different unit, which I'll explain below...

Hmm. I see what you're saying now; yeah, that could work. You'd almost have to give it stats similar to that of Feudal Knights, though. Otherwise they wouldn't really be worth training.

Then no one would bother with the Feudal Knights. I was thinking, a bit faster, and with lower defense and armour and not elite? I'll have to see how I can slot them into the unit roster. I haven't even started this unit yet, so there's alot to do.

Excellent! So what's left now?

I've done all of the startpos files now, all of the unit positions are fixed:

• Some ships added for the Moors (formerly the "Almohads") and the English.
  
• The Sicilian barques are replaced with galleys
  
• The round shield/square shield spearmen mix ups are corrected
  
• All peasants removed
  
• Old Feudal and Chivalric Knights removed and replaced with the new ones
  
• Georgia and Lesser Armenia units placed and provinces removed from Byzantine control.

A problem has arisen however. The new Knights don't upgrade from one to the next and I have a few ideas as to why. This is a hardcoded fix that CA implimented in a particular patch IIRC, so it may be very restricted.

The EarlyRoyalKnights, HighRoyalKnights and LateRoyalKnights must be somehow hardcode linked to the Royal_Court building, and it's upgrades, if there are other dependencies, such as a spearmaker or horse breeder the RK per era upgrades don't function.

It is also possible that EarlyRoyalKnights, HighRoyalKnights and LateRoyalKnights can only be upgraded if they always have the same dependency or dependencies whatever the era, and regardless of what the dependency is.

Another possibility is that the Royal_Court, and it's upgrades, is a unique building (a hardcoded 'feature') that supports the upgrading of any unit that depends exclusively on this building, not units that have multiple dependencies such as the old (Feudal/Chivalric Knights), to the next unit in line (early/high/late specific units).

All of this needs to be tested later. If 'e' is true then things could get rather interesting, but somehow I doubt it is. The way to test all of this is as follows:

Remove all other dependencies, affectively causing all of the RK units to depend on the Royal_Court only (not any additional spearmakers, armourers or horse breeders), this effectively gives us what we had before in a scalable unit with some name changes, and see if that works, if it doesn't then the whole thing could depend on every unit using the same campaign battle map name "Royal Knights". This would be a bit of cheap and dirty, but not impossible.

If it did work then, as another test, other units e.g. peasants, urban militia and militia sergeants could be era restricted (early, high and late respectively) and changing their dependency to the Royal_Court. If they can be upgraded from era to era, then that explains it. The Royal_Court itself is the key and not the units.

A test for the "cheap and dirty" approach would be renaming e.g. "Peasants", "Urban Militia" and "Militia Sergeants" to "Royal Knights" (note: their english language file names and not the internal names) making them era restricted (early, high and late respectively) and changing their dependency to the Royal_Court. If they can be upgraded from era to era, then that explains it. (The cheap and dirty approach. I really doubt this is the case)

Also rename Fyrdmen, Ceorls.

Well Ceorls were the lower class peasants and smaller land owners as opposed to the Thegns (Thanes) who were the upper class landed freemen. Fyrdmen means basically "Army Men" (warriors), the Fyrd being the army. I wouldn't agree with renaming the Fyrdmen as Ceorls because there were roughly three types of Ceorls: Fyrdmen, Gebedmen and Weorcmen (soldiers, priests and workers). Fyrdmen seems to fit the bill.

[Geezer57]

Hi all! I've been lurking in this thread from the beginning, following the discussions with interest. The work you've done sounds fascinating. One question: when you feel these changes are complete enough, is it going to be downloadable somewhere as a mod? I'd love to play with it when the day comes.

[naut]

As you've made Pikemen Town Watch(3) dependant, have you left Halberdiers Town Watch(3) dependant?

[caravel]

Hi all! I've been lurking in this thread from the beginning, following the discussions with interest. The work you've done sounds fascinating. One question: when you feel these changes are complete enough, is it going to be downloadable somewhere as a mod? I'd love to play with it when the day comes.

Once the changes are complete, and my webhosting is back up and running their will be a zip file available for download. This will be the testing version, and only those interested in taking part in testing should install. I'm hoping at that stage that we will get alot of feedback on any changes or tweaks that need to be made. The more people on board the better, as to the name, I hadn't thought about that as yet. Naming such a mod may seem a bit self indulgent and over the top when you consider that this is no where near the scale of mods such as BKB, NTW, HTW or XL. This is more of a patch than anything. I would like to get as much historical accuracy in as possible but I'm no historian. And any history I do read up on tends not to be military based, so though I understand somewhat about e.g. the Byzantine economic and social history, I'm not aware of what shape of helmet was worn by their infantry between 1090 and 1100, for example. My other focus is gameplay. Achieving a better balance and strengthening the AI's position is a priority. The more people involved the better. If people don't understand modding it's not a problem, ideas and information are more important.

As you've made Pikemen Town Watch(3) dependant, have you left Halberdiers Town Watch(3) dependant?

I have. Though Pikeman are only available in Late, so Halberdiers will appear first. I could still make the Pikeman available in Late if I was to lower the build requirement for the Town Watch(4) to a Citadel. At present the depencies are as follows:

TOWN_WATCH - CASTLE
TOWN_WATCH2 - CASTLE4,TOWN_WATCH
TOWN_WATCH3 - CASTLE10, TOWN_WATCH2
TOWN_WATCH4 - CASTLE13, TOWN_WATCH3

They could be restructured like this:

TOWN_WATCH - CASTLE
TOWN_WATCH2 - CASTLE4,TOWN_WATCH
TOWN_WATCH3 - CASTLE7, TOWN_WATCH2
TOWN_WATCH4 - CASTLE10, TOWN_WATCH3

CASTLE7 is the Castle, which was previously not a dependency for the TOWN_WATCH buildings. The previous dependencies were Fort, Keep, Citadel, Fortress. Using this method, the dependency for Pikemen can be changed back to the TOWN_WATCH4.

It seems to me that alot of effort was made to stop the factions from obtaining pikemen and halberdiers too early and in large numbers. This is rather silly because neither are elite troops, and neither are that good, and both are era restricted anyway. I preferred chivalric foot knights (train 20 man units of Royal Knights and dismount before battle) to halberdiers and Chivalric Sergeants to Pikemen. They just don't seem worth the effort with the old dependencies, now with the revised ones I feel I might use them more. (and hopefully the AI will also)

The summary should be updated later with the homelands so far. That is going to be a big job because I'll need to add all of the rest of the units in the game to the list.

[caravel]

They're basically the same as a mine, except with a different name and depending on the forest resource instead of e.g. silver or salt.

[naut]

Just something I've stumbled upon in my own research, as this was brought up about a page ago.

Huscarls is the Saxon/English name, the appropriate Norse/Danish name is Butsecarles. Cnut copied their style of fighting from the Saxon Huscarl style of fighting, and then it was implemented across Scandinavia.

Also Heerthmen/Hirdmen are completely different to Butsecarles. Hirdmen would fight with swords, Butsecarles with axes. But the most interesting thing is that they first appeared as a fighting body between 995 - 1035 and the Vikings began to fade out with the advent of cavalry and civilisation in the late 1100s; entirely appropriate for the Early period.

[Innocentius]

Hirdmen would fight with swords[...]

Well, that really depends. The axe was the weapon favoured in Scandinavia well into the 12th century, and there was no specified "dressing code" for hirdmän, so it's equally possible that a hirdman wielded a sword or an axe. It was quite common that hirds worked as small dragoon units, riding to the battle but fighting on foot.

[Innocentius]

While I'm at it, I might just mention what I know about hirds, if it could be to any use.

Hirds were small bodies of men, used as personal protection to a certain person. Hirdmän/hirdmen were mostly sons of some nobleman, but who were the third or fourth son in line, preventing them from gaining any profitable heritage, or making them "unmarriable". They could of course be bastards (frillosöner) but that wasn't really a disadvantage untill the 13th or 14th century, when christianty had finally rooted properly.
Anyway, these sons or heirs tended to join a hird for some nobleman (mostly a friend or relative to their own family). There were juridical limitations of how big a hird was allowed to be, depending on the class of the person "owning" the hird. For example, the bishop of Skara was allowed to have a 12 men strong hird, but this of course varied from time to time. The biggest hirds were in the hundred or something, IIRC.

[caravel]

Rythmic and Innocentius have obviously done alot of research into this, so I will be happy to impliment in the mod whichever they can agree on. Again though, remember how I broke down the viking units in the game before then named them fitting to their appearance, arms and stats. I do think that the old Thralls should stay as they are at present (Carls), and the that the Old "Vikings" should be the Drangar (the younger more inexperiences warriors). The Landsmenn should remain as the Tegnar (the Thegns, older more veteran warriors) as that really does fit their stats and info pic. The Huscarles I don't really know about, but I've decided to leave them in there for gameplay reasons. I haven't kicked Nizari (Nizari Foot Soldiers), AUM (Andalusian Infantry) and Hashishin (Fedayeen) out so I suppose I can't boot out the Huscarles either. Perhaps both Huscarles and Hirdmen need to be in the game? A new unit based on Landsmenn with the old Viking Carls info pic could possibly be used for Hirdmen? I think there is another also for the Early Varangian Guards, but I can't remember that one. Either way it's likely to be axe wielding.

Another thing is the unit sizes. The Carls would have been in large numbers, the Drangar in moderate numbers and the others in small numbers. The Huscarles perhaps only in scalable 20 man units?

[naut]

Well, that really depends. The axe was the weapon favoured in Scandinavia well into the 12th century, and there was no specified "dressing code" for hirdmän, so it's equally possible that a hirdman wielded a sword or an axe.

Yes, I was just generalising (it is called the Dane axe or Viking axe for a reason )

It was quite common that hirds worked as small dragoon units, riding to the battle but fighting on foot.

Yeah, a tactic also used alot by German(ic) peoples of the Era.

Hirds were small bodies of men, used as personal protection to a certain person. Hirdmän/hirdmen were mostly sons of some nobleman, but who were the third or fourth son in line, preventing them from gaining any profitable heritage, or making them "unmarriable". They could of course be bastards (frillosöner) but that wasn't really a disadvantage untill the 13th or 14th century, when christianty had finally rooted properly.
Anyway, these sons or heirs tended to join a hird for some nobleman (mostly a friend or relative to their own family). There were juridical limitations of how big a hird was allowed to be, depending on the class of the person "owning" the hird. For example, the bishop of Skara was allowed to have a 12 men strong hird, but this of course varied from time to time. The biggest hirds were in the hundred or something, IIRC.

That fills in the gaps of my knowledge. IIRC there were possibly never more than 2000 Hirds across Scandinavia, but I'm not entirely sure of this.

Huscarles perhaps only in scalable 20 man units

For gameplay reasons it sounds like a good idea.

[The Unknown Guy]

Interesting idea. I shall try it, restore men at arms a bit, update sergeants, and nerf cav defense (why did they have defense to begin with?). Other stuff Ive done: removed all dependences upon armoury, changed it for dependences in other stuff. Also now all mercs depend on town-watch buildings and have high upkeep. This hit byz hard, as compensation I updated their units slighty. Also, now arquebuses are late only, with null defense but better accuracy

[The Unknown Guy]

I reduced cav defense to 0-2(depending on the unit. In general i shared the points among the other stats, and left one or two points of defense depending on the refinement of the unit-ie:pktoxotai have a measure of 2 points of def, but avar nobles, while strong and armored attaked, have 0 def- so in general they are good chargers, but cant hold positions. Upped spear defense to 2/3/4/5 (vanilla/feudal/chiv/gothic) and increased a bit maa attack so they can tear spear units. Pikes are a bit more defensive and even have a half decent attack, but late only. This is because i want late to be shorter and have some good but balanced frantic struggle units. Anyway, now the rock paper scissors balance works