Just some small suggestions ;)

[Maksimus]

For EB creators and those powerfull members that make the finall Yes

Ok.. let's go

First, I am playing Epeiros and I would like if Epeiros could use baracks of Macedonia because I like the unit options for Pella that I won't use because of time spent in investing .. so I invest in economy there..see? .. And Is it possible that you make MediumPhalanx enabled to build in Epeiros? I only have Elite and Native now.. Basiclly I am loosing my plans without medium.. Realy..They are effective and they cost lesser..

Second.. and this is a generall proposition.. I think it would be nice if you would enabled Army and Royal Barracks to most Factions at the start.. but making the building time for them 100% longer.. So in that way no one would actually hava an option to build Elite units unless he is rich .. Wich takes time..

But it would be very nice to have Elite Phalanx to build after you sack an enemy city? Yes? So in that way.. the gamer would have at least one Elite unit that ciould boost his Campaign Morall.. this way, many don't even get to elites before they start a new campaign..

And actually I realy belive it would be very good for play if there are just a bit more elephants in the Successors armies.. .. Right now.. we can got as far as India and not to see one.. am I wrong?..

And, I will finish with this .. I think it would be very good if you can use enemy barracks (like - Ptolomei to use Epeiros) to some ponit.. Like, If I gain as Aegypt .. a Macedonian Royal Barracks - I could train some Native Phalanx and Lower-valued Cavalry - but not Elites- if I would like to train elites than .. yes, I would have to build my own from the start..

What do you think?

[Thaatu]

About Pezhetairoi, in 0.81 they were available in Ambrakia, but they were removed in this version. I don't know exactly why, except that Pezhetairoi represent Macedonian foot companions, who probably didn't settle in Epirus. That being said, mainland Epirus has weaker phalangites than other successors, and you should change your tactics, not the recruitment areas, accordingly. An Epirote player should make more use of his Illyrian and other non-hellenistic units, until he annexes Macedonia.

The reason why you haven't encountered elephants could be that you conquered Antioch too soon. That, India and Bactria are the only places where Seleucids can recruit them.

About the shared barracks, I thought using them was kind of a cheat/exploit..? Can't tell for sure.

[keravnos]

And, I will finish with this .. I think it would be very good if you can use enemy barracks (like - Ptolomei to use Epeiros) to some ponit.. Like, If I gain as Aegypt .. a Macedonian Royal Barracks - I could train some Native Phalanx and Lower-valued Cavalry - but not Elites- if I would like to train elites than .. yes, I would have to build my own from the start..

I believe this happens already. And truth be told, the Pezhetairoi that Pyrrhos took with him in Italia were Makedonians (and mercs). I am not sure how the recruitment changed, but I am sure there was a reason for it to change.

[Treverer]

...
I am playing Epeiros and I would like if Epeiros could use baracks of Macedonia because I like the unit options for Pella that I won't use because of time spent in investing .. so I invest in economy there..see? .. And Is it possible that you make MediumPhalanx enabled to build in Epeiros? I only have Elite and Native now.. Basiclly I am loosing my plans without medium.. Realy..They are effective and they cost lesser..

Dear sir, the Epirote starting position is IMHO already very strong, at least for a Human player. Consider the mines of Pella & Dalminion, too.

Here's my point of view, why I consider the Epirote starting postion very strong:

- Pyrrhus and his army can conquer both Makedonia and Thessalia in turn one, thanks to the Elephantes Indikoi.
- After disbanding both the Elephantes and the Petekoterei (spelling ?), the budget is balanced. Both Pella and Dalminion have most valuable mines and more mines are in the vincinity. All modern-day Greece/Albania provinces have/can have ports, thus allowing the profitable sea trade.
- Makedonia and KH are at war with each other, giving Epiros some time to consolidate and to prepare for the complete conquest of Hellas.
- Taras can either be defended by building stone walls, by recruiting Archer/Slingers and by replacing the Hoplites units with Levy Phalanxes. Alternativly it can be abandoned by dispanding all the units and by destroying all the buildings, the later giving a lot of mnai to the budget.
- The gov-buildings provide nice boni with acceptable mali.

Now, adding the Pezhetairoi to Ambrakia's unit rooster would strenghten Epiros further more, both when played by a Human or the AI. IMHO the actual distribution of units offers us players enough possibilies for early (and easy) conquests.

Yours,
Treverer

P.S. I'm actually playing a Epirote campaign on H/M, and even a "Terrible Tactician" like me had no problem in conquering Hellas by turn 20-24. By turn 100, KH's long dead, Makedonia's still reduced to Lesbos and Epiros is on the offensive in Italy ...

[Pharnakes]

TBH, I have never really understood why Maks is aligned with Baktria and KH with Epiros.

Surely it would make more sense to have Maks and Epirotes share, and then the Baktrains and the KH could share, if it was needed to conserve building slots. Afterall, they are the only two factions who use classical and iphracratean hoplites as part of their factional rooster.

[pezhetairoi]

@ Treverer

Uh, sorry but...did you say Epeiros could conquer both Pella and -Thessaloniki-? o.o

[Treverer]

@ Treverer

Uh, sorry but...did you say Epeiros could conquer both Pella and -Thessaloniki-? o.o

Ooops, thank you for pointing me to that stupid error. I've corrected it.

[Maksimus]

Ok.
Main of my post was about.. exploatation of opponents barracks.. so you can't just boost your budget by destroying it - you will need to plan carefully.. That is first main thing i wanted to state

And the second and most important is to make army barracks available at the start for successor states and to make option of them to share their buildings.

Still, I don't think I have made myself clear - I was refering (if not to share the barracks) then to at least make some lower-end units available in enemies barracks to built..

So if I take Pella that has army barracks I would have an option to destroy them and build my own or to use them to some extent..
And it would be nice if you could use enemy barracks 'full' after you build your goverment? No?

[Thaatu]

Well I wouldn't call destroying other cultures' barracks an exploit, because building your own barracks costs more than what you'd gain from the sacking. Of course AI can't destroy buildings, so it's a moral question whether one chooses to destroy enemy barracks. Bear in mind establishing a military recruitment system isn't done in an instant. In a border province which switched sides repeatedly, like Judea between Ptolies and Seleucs, the people were familiar with both sides and served with both armies. That's represented by Ptoly and Seleuc barracks that have not been destroyed by either side. Bleep, I managed to confuse myself...

Let's try again.

In order for a faction to start recruiting units immediately after conquering a settlement, it needs to have owned the place previously and have built barracks there. If all the successor states shared their barracks it would mean that an unknown faction for the newly conquered peoples could recruit immediately from the populace, without pacifying the province or supressing the resistance, which wouldn't be too realistic.

[jhhowell]

Since the thread title is rather general, I hope I may piggyback on this thread.

I would like to suggest a tweak to the recruitment of Scythians in regional MICs. This almost exclusively affects Hayasdan, in practice. They can get Scythian horse-archers in the basic regional MIC, and riders (archers with some melee ability due to the lance) at level 2. My suggestion is that these two units be bumped up a MIC level, so Scythian recruitment would be foot archers at MIC-1, horse archers at MIC-2, and riders at MIC-3.

Reasons:
1. Easy access to horse archers makes Hayasdan campaigns easier than they would be otherwise. A handful of horse-archer units do wonders for squishing rebel stacks or the typical Seleucid mini-stacks invading your land.
2. Since Scythians are so easy to get, both Armenian Skirmisher Cavalry and Armenian Horse Archers are useless units. Javelin cavalry is far worse than horse archers, and the Armenian HA require a factional MIC-3 and cost more than the Scythians but have identical stats. If the Scythians took an extra MIC level to acquire, the jav cav becomes a plausible option for the early game*, and the Armenian HA might well be available in Armavir before Scythians can be recruited in Kotais or Mtmumble.

* = tangential suggestion: switch the starting unit of Aspet Hetselazor for a unit of Armenian Skirmisher Cavalry. That assures that the latter unit will see play, and since early game Hayasdan relies heavily on the bodyguards the loss of a unit of medium cavalry is not very significant.

[bovi]

It's a moral question whether one chooses to destroy enemy barracks. Bear in mind establishing a military recruitment system isn't done in an instant.

You should always destroy any barracks that you don't have the ability to use. It's unrealistic if the original owner retakes the place and can immediately recruit elites. Re-establishing the system might be easier than establishing it in the first place, but you've lost much of what the system consisted of as the place was taken by invaders.

[Maksimus]

You should always destroy any barracks that you don't have the ability to use. It's unrealistic if the original owner retakes the place and can immediately recruit elites. Re-establishing the system might be easier than establishing it in the first place, but you've lost much of what the system consisted of as the place was taken by invaders.

First of all, If you give me 5 members that after Destroying enemy barracks Build their owns - I will applause (this is not the same about Regional b's), because that is simply loss of time and money, and plus, you invest in your own barracks (in Homeland) UNLESS you Cheat?? maybe..
If you cheat in any way.. any realy, and this is for all that are in this thread - you have no real sence of my post.

Second, That prob where it is ''unrealistic if the original owner retakes the place and can immediately recruit elites'' is created by allowing CPU to bulid and have Army and Royal barracks in almost every city after .. I don't know.. 20 historic years.. That means it is realy bad for realisam and historic note that it is even available..

That is solved either by implementing 'CIty Mod' or making 10* longer construction time for barracks! And that wont 'give' cheap levies to CPU because CPU is not even building Elites all the time.. I have every proof for that..
- If you wont AI to use best units after building Army or Royal barracks you must DISABLE him to recruits 'lower-end' units after building Army or Royal B's..
So.. You see, this suggestions of mine are about dinamic's - Becaus you as a player can build Army And Royal barracks after 20 historic years while CPU has them (bcs of EBBS script) after 5 of 10..

My point is to Set construction times for Barracks *10 times and to make All Greek and Indo-Greek or Hellenic faction in general to use each other factions.. That is much more real that from what you stated Bovi..

These posts of mine are result of a simple wish to state my opinion of EB 1 - with a goal to make it better.. I realy like EB, so it is somewhat more pressure on me to express some of the solutins I have implemented in some of my mods - they worked very nice..

thank you

[Thaatu]

You should always destroy any barracks that you don't have the ability to use. It's unrealistic if the original owner retakes the place and can immediately recruit elites. Re-establishing the system might be easier than establishing it in the first place, but you've lost much of what the system consisted of as the place was taken by invaders.

I don't think it's that unrealistic. If you take a highly developed Pella, which is conquered by Epirus for a few turns, then taken back by Macs. If the barracks are destroyed, it'll take more than 7 ½ years to be able to recruit Silver Shields again. What could have realisticly happened during those few seasons that wiped out the memory of Argyraspidai? Personally, I destroy the previous barracks after a few years of occupation, unless I completely sack the place.


Maksimus, remember that if the barracks would take longer to build, you couldn't build anything else during that time. The AI would still focus on barracks, so it wouldn't prevent them from building them, but it would hamper their efforts to improve the settlements.

Edit: Oh, and remember that type 5 MIC can only be built with a type I government. That's sort of a "City mod" restriction, although I too am of the opinion that AI (especially Eleutheroi) developes its provinces too quickly. By 220 BCE there are almost no backwater places left, but that's a basic flaw in RTW.

[konny]

When we take "barracks" not as buildings but as the military organization of a province it wouldn't be unrealistic if all factions share the same local barracks, and if factions of the same culture (for example all Hellenic or all Cetlic-Germanic) would share the same factional barracks.

Local barracks represent a state of military constitution that is genuine to a given province or its population, regardless who controlls it. Therefore it should not be necessary for a new conquerer to establish these institutions as long as some one else had established them before, or there are this old that they are set at game start.

If, for example, the Sweboz conquer a Greek polis in EB they are able to raise Greek Hoplites; but only after installing the appropiate buildings/institutions. When you think it over, it doesn't make much sense, because they are able to raise Hoplites since the local militia is organized in a way that leads to the Hoplites as the major arm. The Hoplites were allready there before the Sweboz, or whoever, came. The Sweboz themselves have nothing of the kind to offer to a new conquered province that would lead to a Hoplites-Army.

So, you could create a recruitement system in which the basic units that about everyone can raise in a given province come from the lowest local MIC and that this local MIC is allready placed at the start. It would be correct, because these unis are the local militia that fight and are equipped in their traditional way, long since before the game starts.


That is not meant as a suggestion to redo the EB recruitement system, so no need for "we won't do"-answers.

[Thaatu]

It would require some persuation for Greek hoplites to join forces with a conquering Germanic horde. I don't think it'd be all that realistic that a Sweboz army conquers a Greek city, and immediately whole Hoplite regiments are willing to fight for the unknown invaders. Of course a few "traitors" (such as spies and diplomats in game) would be willing to help, but not thousands of soldiers.

[konny]

Honestly, I don't think that it is realistic for a Sweboz warband to conquer a Greek city at all. I had used the Sweboz as an example of a faction that had no idea of Hoplite warfare at all. More appropiate might be the Romans, but they did have Hoplites themselves.

On the other hand, I can't imagine what time consuming persuations a conquerer would have used to draft the subjected people to his army. In the end, he is the conquerer...

[Redmeth]

But in the end this engine is what it is and EB is made to fit a game... I don't know how many of you would be willing to play if we made regional MIC build times take 10 years+ or stuff like that, or type I govs taking 20 years or stuff like that...

EB should provide enjoyment while increasing people's historical knowledge for the real deal there's always books...

[Thaatu]

On the other hand, I can't imagine what time consuming persuations a conquerer would have used to draft the subjected people to his army. In the end, he is the conquerer...

The conqueror could force them to be crappy unreliable levies (done in game in three turns), but not true professional soldiers like hoplites, unless he was very politically savvy. Or just enough of a charismatic figure to gain their trust and affection instantly, but that can be represented by mercenaries.

But in the end this engine is what it is and EB is made to fit a game... I don't know how many of you would be willing to play if we made regional MIC build times take 10 years+ or stuff like that, or type I govs taking 20 years or stuff like that...

I miss the version where type I gov took 20 turns to build...

[Redmeth]

I miss the version where type I gov took 20 turns to build...

It would have been too long for the player vs AI (the AI get them free) and it slows the game a bit too much IMO, in reality to establish homeland even 20 turns (5 years) would be too soon I believe.

[konny]

The conqueror could force them to be crappy unreliable levies (done in game in three turns), but not true professional soldiers like hoplites, unless he was very politically savvy. Or just enough of a charismatic figure to gain their trust and affection instantly, but that can be represented by mercenaries.

That is a limitation of the game engine: The conquerer can either have Hoplites or he can not. There is no way to represent his popularity within this class of citizens that might hinder (or improve - the former leaders must not have been very popular among this class) his abilty to raise them.

On the other hand: He is the conquerer of that town and can raise an existing local militia force by simply ordering it.

There is no need for him to establish new military institutions, distribute new equipement or hold new training. That would be the case, for example, when the Romans conquer Taras and start to raise, equipe and train Legionars there (i.e. establishing of factional MICs).

[Tellos Athenaios]

I miss the version where type I gov took 20 turns to build...

Ah that's where you got your avatar from, isn't it? Or... was it yet another version back: 0.74?

Anywho currently there's the difference between Local & Factional troops therefore the difference between Instantly-Available the moment you grab that local MIC & the Long Road to Full Development.

In other words: the MIC sharing already occurs with regional barracks for an in game purpose. The Factional MIC sharing is AFAIK something from 0.8 version and it would mean a LOT of work to change it for no significant effect in game. Conquer the Koinon first if you feel the urge to share MICs, I'd say.

[bovi]

I don't think it's that unrealistic. If you take a highly developed Pella, which is conquered by Epirus for a few turns, then taken back by Macs. If the barracks are destroyed, it'll take more than 7 ½ years to be able to recruit Silver Shields again. What could have realisticly happened during those few seasons that wiped out the memory of Argyraspidai? Personally, I destroy the previous barracks after a few years of occupation, unless I completely sack the place.

The highly developed Pella won't be as highly developed anymore after months or years of occupation where the new rulers are recreating a MIC in their own image, or even just laying waste to the infrastructure of the previous owners. While I am not sure what the differences are between Epeiros and Makedonia's MIC models in particular, I am sure that there were good reasons for not using the same.

You are talking about elites being available immediately upon recapture, elites who used superior equipment and were training a long time to be such elites. Why would their intermediate masters allow them to train in the enemy's fashion while under their rule? 7,5 years may or may not be a more precise time scale for rebuilding what was destroyed or damaged or killed during the occupation than no time at all. Still, it means a representation of the investment needed to rebuild to the previous level, considering getting men of eligible age to be soldiers, training them for years, getting blacksmiths trained (or imported) and the infrastructure those need, etc.

[Maksimus]

First of all. Konny, my hopes are with you on this, I agree in total with your stands on these issues .. - I belive, (and I will make that happen if EBs wont do it on EB 1.1) that regional barracks - are regional and should be in use for all no matter what faction to come along..

And yes, if we compare historic-and EB features at desc_start or at the Campaign start - we come to a fact that there are more then several buildings/walls/sewers/teathers/roads missing at the start of the game that are realy 'setback' in a way of gamplay..

Thaatu, sorry, but the game is simply made that way.. and if we look what Seleuc did after wining Lysimachus.. well .. he just forced his army right away to come at him to Macedon and even when Ptolomy son killed Seleuc in his tent the army came to fight for him in Macedon - that is 3 hand.. like, even Lysimachus forced them to fight at the first place.. So
we can say that every attacker is in practise forcing his army to fight.
So, even if (for example) Celts are to gain Athenai, they would use Hellenic regional units atleast as a part of their 'new' enlighten tough on military warfare for Greece.. The same goes for Casse in India or Hellenes in Spain..

Redmeth, What do you mean by the AI getting something for free? You mean the EBBS script? Or auto process_cq ?...

My point here is.. that, all buildings should have as much as posible mutual faction use.. Offcourse greeks are greeks and nomads are nomads, celts too,
But it is irational ussualy to have to build new regional barracks (for example) in a city that has 20000 population when it is gained from by Greeks from Greeks!
So, I will say shortly - At game start, there should have been more buildings already built (set in descr_start).. At least in Major Ancient centers.. By that pattern, main buildings (like Palaces and barrcks) should take much longer to construct (like in Docks values or x10), and mutual use of these (now rare buildings) by all factions should be wide! Exept some on barb-greek-roman directions.. When Romans and/or Greeks should not have the option to use barb barracks - but barb's could find more than they need to produce their own in Greek/Roman army barracks..

Sorry if this was to long..

[Maksimus]

The highly developed Pella won't be as highly developed anymore after months or years of occupation where the new rulers are recreating a MIC in their own image, or even just laying waste to the infrastructure of the previous owners. While I am not sure what the differences are between Epeiros and Makedonia's MIC models in particular, I am sure that there were good reasons for not using the same.

You are talking about elites being available immediately upon recapture, elites who used superior equipment and were training a long time to be such elites. Why would their intermediate masters allow them to train in the enemy's fashion while under their rule? 7,5 years may or may not be a more precise time scale for rebuilding what was destroyed or damaged or killed during the occupation than no time at all. Still, it means a representation of the investment needed to rebuild to the previous level, considering getting men of eligible age to be soldiers, training them for years, getting blacksmiths trained (or imported) and the infrastructure those need, etc.

The point here is that you are playing a guessing game with us. Because -rebuilding what was destroyed or damaged or killed during the occupation is not a sure stand - you know , you acctually have an option to occupy, exterminate or enslave the population .. And it is bad to belive that any soldier or potentional soldier would be left in the city as it is! The new 'retaken' city would be using it's barracks with new men that would come in the city from the country or other cities.. see? Or we can guess that some 'native phalanx' would pop in elites ranks - while less trained population would fill in Native phalanx ranks..
So, nobody here belives that there would be guerila training camps in occupied town..
There are just wast examples of cities being recaptured ower and ower again during the Diadokhoi Wars.. The barrcks browser should be based on the 'Recrutment viewer' not on limits

[Thaatu]

Thaatu, sorry, but the game is simply made that way.. and if we look what Seleuc did after wining Lysimachus.. well .. he just forced his army right away to come at him to Macedon and even when Ptolomy son killed Seleuc in his tent the army came to fight for him in Macedon - that is 3 hand.. like, even Lysimachus forced them to fight at the first place.. So
we can say that every attacker is in practise forcing his army to fight.
So, even if (for example) Celts are to gain Athenai, they would use Hellenic regional units atleast as a part of their 'new' enlighten tough on military warfare for Greece.. The same goes for Casse in India or Hellenes in Spain..

Taking someones army is easily represented by bribing. I guarantee you that if the (soon to be) Galatians would have conquered Athens, the Athenians wouldn't have joined them and fought in a classic hoplite formation against their own cousins. If the occupation streched out to decades, then the Athenians may have begun serving in their rulers' military (in gameplay terms until the sufficient MIC's were built). Hiring mercenaries is a great way to represent local allies that can be gained immediately, like in Hannibals voyage.

[blacksnail]

Maksimus, a lot of what you are talking about is not possible due to hardcoding, would not work with the way we handle recruitment in 1.0, or it directly goes against the very deliberate pace of exploration in EB. If I was a historian I might be able to say "and it does not follow historical examples," but I am not, so I won't.

[Maksimus]

I realy edited this thing myself.. it is just some export_descr*.txt and descr_start.. Do I am sure it would change the way EB is handling recruitment in 1.0, or that it directly goes against the very deliberate pace of exploration in EB - yes.. sorry, I like EB 1, it's just that I am a hard-coded veteran here and I make mods .. so
The perspective is this... the point actually,.. ok..
All factions are fighting for resources and 'trade routes' (like ports) for money, then they fight for Big Cities - why? - because they need the population to 'tax' and army to use - how? if there are no options for them.. unless to wait 20 years..
In my campaign with Epeiros I took Carthage and I can not build my units at all and there are 'royal bs' ... So now, I will have to give Carthage away, not using it's population for my army and then go in and extermianate all of them just to keep peace I can not hold (because there are 30 000 people)

So, my politic's is that you make a City Mod thing, like making Big Cities Big - or Biger in every aspect, and leave small to be samall by limiting their development only through construction time (that should be set to high, like for some docks)
- In that way, player will be able to finish his campaign while building elites rare (but from the start in his homeland) and still fight big battles for big enemy cities that are now only able to produce Elites.. Nice?
In that way Army barracks and Royal would be rare.. and realistic..

anyway.. I am tired now.. will post tomorow more

[Maksimus]

Taking someones army is easily represented by bribing. I guarantee you that if the (soon to be) Galatians would have conquered Athens, the Athenians wouldn't have joined them and fought in a classic hoplite formation against their own cousins. If the occupation streched out to decades, then the Athenians may have begun serving in their rulers' military (in gameplay terms until the sufficient MIC's were built). Hiring mercenaries is a great way to represent local allies that can be gained immediately, like in Hannibals voyage.

But are there not enough proff for otherwise? Just look at Roman army or Alex in the East..

Still, I belive that too for Athens, but, Imagine that let say Celts win in Athens in any way - even if Hellens would give it for free for the sake of peace - for example.. Now, you are the king of the celts - you go into Athens like China went into Hong Kong.. or NATO in East Europe?? Still those are ancient times -but, you can gain their trust in cuople or steps..
First, you make Athens a 'client kingdom', second you leave your greek king to gather the army of Athenians, and the third - you brain-wash them to go after Corintos or Rhodos fighting for 'democracy' or Athenian clutural influence there...
So, now, you as a Celtic King that has larger army then Athenians just pick up the gold and leave everything else to them.. like in the game..

So, we here are actually guessing.. to much, we all know that you could have 1000 ways of making 'others' fight your battles - if you have dominion.. or stronger army.. That is wery similar today.. (Irak?)

[konny]

I guarantee you that if the (soon to be) Galatians would have conquered Athens, the Athenians wouldn't have joined them and fought in a classic hoplite formation against their own cousins.

Why shouldn't they? They had no problems to march in hughe numbers with Alexander; and a generation before they had no higher opinion of the Makedons than of the Illyrians, Thrakians or Celts. The only reason why the Athenians would not have fought for the Celts would be that the Celts wouldn't had any need for them.

And since it does always take one turn (i.e. 3 month) to raise a unit in an EB town, it still would take them years to raise a full army of Athenians.


But really, I am not intending to change the recruitement system of EB in any way. It is just an idea how a system like this with local and factional MICs could be done in another way.

[Watchman]

Uh... I'm pretty sure Alexander's armies never had a very notable presence of Greek citizen-soldiers. Mercs, and Thessalian horse, yes, but that's not exactly the same thing... and the Persians seem to have had rather more hired Greek foot when it comes to that.

Incidentally, one would imagine the Sweboz with their tribal-warrior system would have an easier time wrapping their heads around the concept of the citizen-soldier hoplite than the Celts with their specialist warrior class...

Also incidentally, Alex's conquest of Persia doesn't really compare since the RTW engine can't really model the way he was able to make use of the inherently divided loyalties of (semi-)feudal aristocracies to secure himself a decent pool of local "quislings" to help run things and free most of the Macedonian troops to fight the war. Feudal nobility is funny that way; if they can't see any merit in bending knee to you they can cause no end of grief (as you need to put down an endless succession of pesky minor opponents, and find a new ruling class somewhere), but if it's in their interests they can jump ship startlingly easily and make for some fairly smooth sailing as most of the day-to-day adminstration continues undisturbed.