Military Spending

[Xalmedim]

Does military spending affect how good your generals are or does it just increase how many soldiers pops you have?

[CaptainSiDog]

I've never been able to 100% figure that out myself, but from what I know it doesn't affect soldier pops, as you need to encourage soldiers for that, but I'm not sure if it helps generals and/or soldiers.

[whatamidoing]

It doesn't affect your generals, but it affects the pay and promotion rate for soldiers and officers.

[Lembley42]

What whatamidoing said, just want to add the pay also increases the chance of POPs to turn to Soldiers.

You can click on Population tab, look for some large (for example) Farmer POP, and click on their little icon. You will get a detailed view on their income, expenses, needs, affiliations and conversions. If you hover over the Soldier in the Conversion info panel, you can see what influences them. Pay is a major contributor in 10% steps.

[kevincousino]

it also affects promotions to officer. the more officers, the faster your leadership increases,meaning more generals and admirals. the starting stats are random, so more means better chance one is good with no bad traits. but you could still get best ever on first try.