The Chronicle of Karguun · Chapter 6

Raising an Army

The draft

Set your draft rate, the share of your population you want under arms, on the Military page, up to 99%. Each day, peasants join as soldiers at your chosen speed until the rate is reached. Each new soldier costs gold, more when the army is already large.

Training

• Soldiers (1/1) are the raw material. They also explore and can be sent to fight.
• Specialists and elites are trained from soldiers and take 24 days. See The Peoples and the Personalities for each people's troops.
• Thieves are trained the same way; wizards come from your Guilds.
• Releasing troops turns specialists, elites and thieves back into soldiers, and soldiers back into peasants.

Wages and efficiency

• Specialists and elites are paid 1.5 gold coins a day each. You may pay between 50% and 200% of the usual wage.
• Pay sets military efficiency: a well-paid army fights better, a starved one worse, and the change comes slowly as the army gets used to its pay.
• A very large army also fights a little less well.

Defence

Your defence is the strength of every soldier, defensive specialist and elite at home, times your defensive efficiency, Forts and spells. It is never less than your land. Armies out attacking do not defend.

Offence

When you attack you choose who marches:

• Specialists, elites and soldiers, each at their attack strength.
• War horses add 1 to each troop that rides one. Stables breed and keep them.
• Mercenaries (3 attack, 350 gold coins each) and prisoners (3 attack) may fight too, one for every 5 troops.
• Generals. You have 5; one always stays home. Every general beyond the first in an army adds 5% to its attack, but an army away keeps its generals until it returns.

Counsel

• Check your Council pages: Military Affairs shows your strength at home and abroad, and the days-ahead table shows what is still training.
• A province with little defence per acre is a tempting target. Watch what your neighbours' networth per acre says about yours.