Reasons for joining

[Conradus]

In most times there were always men willing to join up when they got a warm meal. I don't think that changed when you got more chance to end up killed before the fight began. Also most navies used to enlist people, whether they wanted it or not. And then there are the idealists,...

[TinCow]

I actually think that casualty rates generally declined with the invention of firearms. While the front ranks would certainly take extremely high casualties during an exchange of volleys, the likelihood of an individual soldier finding himself in that situation tended to decline, thus reducing the overall probability of being wounded or killed. This general decline was most signficantly due to the fact that the ease of use of gunpowder weapons (along with other technological advances) allowed nations to start fielding much larger forces. With exponentially more people fighting, your odds of being unlucky enough to be caught in the front lines at the exact moment of a heavy attack were minimal.

I have no statistics to prove this off the top of my head, but I bet we can dig some up.

[Ironside]

Also about the only way to get rich fast (by looting). The other option was to stumble over a buried treasure (and that happens often...)

[Innocentius]

...propaganda? Enlistment?

[Kagemusha]

secured income. wish to adventure and see other places. To avoid the normal life. Life for most during those times wasnt nice or easy. If you were a peasant,that meant manual labour from sunrise to sundown each and everyday, with not so great diet. For a young man military career was an viable option to make a living,specially if he was a one of the younger children,that the parents couldnt have left anykind of inheritance,since it would have gone to the oldest male child.
From army you would get a place to sleep,food and clothes and also small pension as you retired.All that a normal man would have wanted those days. Ofcourse there was risk to die,but there were plenty of risks for dying those days,even without gepardizing oneself intentionally.

[Derfasciti]

I find myself thinking this again and again and I've gotta say it seems like a good question. Why the heck WOULD someone wanna join up? But as the other members have pointed out, there were some real bonuses. Looting was still not a major moral problem for many soldiers back in those days. You could get some nice money.

A guaranteed meal would surely be an attractive choice and i'm not certain but the chances of dying would've prolly been downplayed.

Also, people back then lived in a much harsher time than we do now. Sure, you could get killed on a battlefield. But did you wanna live out your life as a farmer just struggling to make ends meet or did you want to live a life of adventure with a full belly?

[Boyar Son]

Also about the only way to get rich fast (by looting). The other option was to stumble over a buried treasure (and that happens often...)

Truly the master of useless knoweledge

[CountArach]

The Draft was imposed on them in the majority of cases.

War was also extremely glorified, in fact war was glorified until the end of World War 1.

[Peasant Phill]

Napoleon's armies forced men to recruit by some kind of lottery. I'm not really clear on the way this lottery worked though.

I always wondered if movies like 'the last of the Mohicans' had it right about the warfare of that time. The infantry would march forward to meet the enemies infantry while under artillery fire. Then they seemed to take their turn firing at ach other. It seems dumb to let the opponent get a first round off before you fire.
I would expect a platoon (or whatever a such a group was called) to try to gait the soldiers they faced to fire to early and then close the gap quickly and fire while the enemy was reloading.

[Rodion Romanovich]

I've always wondered if there was any specific procedure for selecting who would stand in the front ranks in a gunpowder era unit Say if it was random after how the unit would position itself, then there would surely have been a lot of movement in the unit to try and get behind some of the others and a lot of disorder. So surely there must have been some procedure for it? And some fairness and taking turns being up front, to assure that not the "front rank soldiers" would desert before every battle... Or extra pay or other rewards for it?