Mercenaries vs Regulars

[Guomindang]

Is there any difference in combat efficiency, or is it just a matter of gold vs manpower?

[equinox1911]

Since mercs where changed to always have your troop type, that is essentially what it boils down to. (merc arty is still horrible and should never be considered)

[Anaverageguy41]

With a number of ideas, polices etc.
You can probably get cheaper mercs than regular soldiers tbh.
Plus you'll never really suffer W.E because your soldiers aren't dying just mercs

[Kitten Food]

You still get War Exhaustion from mercs, in older versions mercs didn't generate WE.

Mercs can be great to save manpower and push into heavy attrition areas, if you have the money. Even with NIs stacked with Ideas that reduce costs, they won't be cheaper to maintain than normal soldiers, but they can become significantly more affordable to have as a standing army with those reductions.

[Anaverageguy41]

Originally posted by KiteMasaki:

You still get War Exhaustion from mercs, in older versions mercs didn't generate WE.

Mercs can be great to save manpower and push into heavy attrition areas, if you have the money. Even with NIs stacked with Ideas that reduce costs, they won't be cheaper to maintain than normal soldiers, but they can become significantly more affordable to have as a standing army with those reductions.

You do get a lot less W.E though

[EL COCO]

I don't think you can get cheaper mercs than regulars, but you can lower their costs and in the end it would make them better (considering that your cav and art are still regular soldiers), cuz they wont waste your manpower

[Anaverageguy41]

Originally posted by Harry:

I don't think you can get cheaper mercs than regulars, but you can lower their costs and in the end it would make them better (considering that your cav and art are still regular soldiers), cuz they wont waste your manpower

You can get it with Burgundy i think having
Admin Ideas, Innovative ideas, Quantity, Defensive, Economic
Trading in Cloth, Iron
Having a Maintenance advisor.
That brings it the 150% + cost down to less overall than you actuall pay in maintenance for any sort of troop. If I'm not wrong

[Halcyon]

Originally posted by Anaverageguy41:

You can get it with Burgundy i think having
Admin Ideas, Innovative ideas, Quantity, Defensive, Economic
Trading in Cloth, Iron
Having a Maintenance advisor.
That brings it the 150% + cost down to less overall than you actuall pay in maintenance for any sort of troop. If I'm not wrong

I'm going to try this, it sounds hilarious and awesome.

[Anaverageguy41]

Originally posted by Halcyon:

Originally posted by Anaverageguy41:

You can get it with Burgundy i think having
Admin Ideas, Innovative ideas, Quantity, Defensive, Economic
Trading in Cloth, Iron
Having a Maintenance advisor.
That brings it the 150% + cost down to less overall than you actuall pay in maintenance for any sort of troop. If I'm not wrong

I'm going to try this, it sounds hilarious and awesome.

I might as well. I'm pretty certain that my math is correct on this one. So No manpower problems ever!

[Waxen]

Originally posted by Anaverageguy41:

You can get it with Burgundy i think having
Admin Ideas, Innovative ideas, Quantity, Defensive, Economic
Trading in Cloth, Iron
Having a Maintenance advisor.
That brings it the 150% + cost down to less overall than you actuall pay in maintenance for any sort of troop. If I'm not wrong

Mercenary upkeep is

(100% + mercenary cost (base 150%)) * regular regiment cost.

Therefore, assuming a base value of 100% maintenance for normal troops and +150% maintenance of mercenaries. The only way to make mercenaries cheaper compared to regulars is ideas that reduce mercenary costs until that +150% becomes 0 or less, so let's try:

+150% maintenance for mercenaries is reduced by:
25% - innovative
58% - administrative
25% - Burgundy
15% - Trading in cloth

That puts mercenary maintenance at +27%, without maintenance modifiers. Unless I missed 27% worth of modifiers, mercenaries are never cheaper than regulars.

[Anaverageguy41]

Originally posted by !HoNose:

Originally posted by Anaverageguy41:

You can get it with Burgundy i think having
Admin Ideas, Innovative ideas, Quantity, Defensive, Economic
Trading in Cloth, Iron
Having a Maintenance advisor.
That brings it the 150% + cost down to less overall than you actuall pay in maintenance for any sort of troop. If I'm not wrong

Mercenary upkeep is

(100% + mercenary cost (base 150%)) * regular regiment cost.

Therefore, assuming a base value of 100% maintenance for normal troops and +150% maintenance of mercenaries. The only way to make mercenaries cheaper compared to regulars is ideas that reduce mercenary costs until that +150% becomes 0 or less, so let's try:

+150% maintenance for mercenaries is reduced by:
25% - innovative
58% - administrative
25% - Burgundy
15% - Trading in cloth

That puts mercenary maintenance at +27%, without maintenance modifiers. Unless I missed 27% worth of modifiers, mercenaries are never cheaper than regulars.

Mercs are also affected by the same regiment cost and maintenance cost regulars are effected by so you can have cheaper mercs than base cost soldiers

[Waxen]

Originally posted by Anaverageguy41:

Mercs are also affected by the same regiment cost and maintenance cost regulars are effected by so you can have cheaper mercs than base cost soldiers

Oh, you mean cheaper than default price for regulars. Ok, that's possible. I thought you meant have mercenaries be cheaper than regulars at a given time.

[Anaverageguy41]

Originally posted by !HoNose:

Originally posted by Anaverageguy41:

Mercs are also affected by the same regiment cost and maintenance cost regulars are effected by so you can have cheaper mercs than base cost soldiers

Oh, you mean cheaper than default price for regulars. Ok, that's possible. I thought you meant have mercenaries be cheaper than regulars at a given time.

No no. You can get very close at least, and essentially never needed to waste manpower at least though