Quote Originally Posted by Martok
The game would simply end. It was long rumored that generals married into the royal family could become the new faction ruler upon the death of the current monarch, but it's (unfortunately) not true.


I agree it would be nice if mercenary regiments in MTW replenished their ranks. Unfortunately, Prussian1 is essentially correct that this would unbalance things. To be specific, it would unbalance things *further*, as the AI does not (and probably cannot) take advantage of mercs at all.

I'm not sure if the mercs can be modded so that their numbers rebound after battle losses. I doubt it, though. I seem to recall others have investigated this, only to discover it was hard-coded.


Me too! The Byzantines were well-known for employing mercenaries who -- for all intents and purposes -- were a part of the regular army.
Seems to me that the game does an okay job of handling mercinaries as part of the Byzantine standing army. The Byzantine Emperor would be the only Christian ruler who could afford to have a standing army, never mind a standing army partly made up of expensive mercinaries. (I cannot comment on Muslim armies because of my shameful ignorance. ) So instead of allowing everyone to nationalize mercs, the game allows the Byzantines to raise units which were historically mercs (Varangian Guard and Bulgarian Brigands) but function - as you say - as part of the regular army. Not a perfect solution, but seems acceptable to me.