Lets talk about what it takes now to field an army in Strat

[LLJK_Siggy]

It lowers the villages efficiency...so yeah it lowers the number of goods you can craft. There were something like close to 10 people in Peshmi and it was down to 70% efficiency.

You see this makes things very confusing, as chadz clearly stated:

There are 2 different crafting values: The first percentage is a general percentage for this fief. It's a general yes or no random pick per hour. If this is 100%, you will get to stage 2 every hour. If this is at 0%, you will never produce anything

This means that either chadz changed something without telling us, something is not working properly, or it doesn't really matter if it's at 70% or 100%, as long as it's not at 0% you will still craft. Can we get some sort of confirmation on this?

In the long run I think we need to wait and see what happens. There are rapid daily changes going on, so sitting down and theory crafting things is almost a waste of time because tomorrow some new variable will be added in that completely changes everything. Horses were just made to affect movement speed, but you need a rider per horse. It looks like the troop upkeep formula was changed as well.

At the moment I think things are set up so that once the economy machine is turning gold will come easy, but there is quite a hump to get that initial investment going. Eventually people will have small armies with horses to carry goods and will move much more quickly across the map, allowing them to go further, get better bonuses, and make more gold more quickly. Once the larger clans have achieved this then they can afford to outfit larger armies, which makes travelling to trade more dangerous. You'd have to keep up with your neighbors if you wanted to trade safely.

The problem is at the moment this looks like it could take a couple of weeks for a larger clan to start getting this rolling. Smaller clans can forget about it as they don't have the members to produce and move goods reliably. They may be able to get enough going to set up a very small army and try to ambush an unprotected caravan.

I'm really excited for where this is all going, though. We just need to piddle around making money and trying to adapt to the changes while we see what happens in the end.

[Tovi]

This whole system seems too capitalist and not medieval. In the middle ages you hire men at arm which are already armed. You get money by owning a land.
Land owners should hire mercenaries or lord in the vicinity, including their men and equipment.

[Vibe]

Buy Strat gold for cRPG gold, equip an army in no time!

[RandomDude]

This whole system seems too capitalist and not medieval. In the middle ages you hire men at arm which are already armed. You get money by owning a land.
Land owners should hire mercenaries or lord in the vicinity, including their men and equipment.

Thats not a bad idea.

If recruits came with their own basic gear that would be nice. Also maybe some hirable mercs or something with better gear.

[Zaharist]

If you have 50 people in your clan, it will take them each earning 266 gold every day for a month to make 400,000. You'll have to get the troops via magic because that is with all 50 going full for gold, 0 on recruiting.

Druzhina has about 60 active Strategus players.
It took them several days (mb 2 weeks, don't know when did they start) to field 1,5k fully equipped (low-end equip) army and to take village with 1:1 K:D with less players in roster.

You don't need 2,5k troops with equip worth ~200 gold per troop to start your campaign. Once you own several fiefs (you can manage) and army to guard your caravans you can start trading. The more caravans you have the more gold you get and the better army you have.

[Jacko]

Nerf DRZ, proving whiners wrong and breaking the game.

[Balton]

Exactly my point, I don't wanna play a browser game. I want to play in battles and fights, not to mention how much money it takes to equip a army is only encouraging people to not go to war and either save there money or get more for better equipment.

It's come to a point where clans will be too scared to lose all there money and there pixels.

The game is called Strategus for a reason. It's not "Act-now-think-later-egus." Hence why there is so much "downtime" between battles, so that your strategy is always top notch.

I am really enjoying this strategus, significantly more than the previous ones. Everyday I wake up I find myself thinking about my daily plans on strategus, and how they will impact my future opportunities, for a week, or even a month ahead. Every path a single person  wanders upon will heavily impact an outcome countless days away, when you are in a clan and you have 50+ people, the idea is to orchestrate everyone with such perfection coordination, that in the end, strategy will win over all. A truly unique and magnificent game.

I am sorry if you just want to mindlessly battle without applying strategy, but hey, that's what the regular c-rpg battle server is for.

[dynamike]

The game is called Strategus for a reason. It's not "Act-now-think-later-egus." Hence why there is so much "downtime" between battles, so that your strategy is always top notch.

I am really enjoying this strategus, significantly more than the previous ones. Everyday I wake up I find myself thinking about my daily plans on strategus, and how they will impact my future opportunities, for a week, or even a month ahead. Every path a single person  wanders upon will heavily impact an outcome countless days away, when you are in a clan and you have 50+ people, the idea is to orchestrate everyone with such perfection coordination, that in the end, strategy will win over all. A truly unique and magnificent game.

I am sorry if you just want to mindlessly battle without applying strategy, but hey, that's what the regular c-rpg battle server is for.

WHO ARE YOU AND WHAT DID YOU DO WITH COCKY UNREASONABLE BALTON?

[Erathsmus]

I agree with a prior post saying that most armies should be fielded from 30 to around 60 troops. (with the excpetion of some kings with 100 troops or more) Like in the actual single player.

Having only huge clans be able to rally up 1000 man armies and equip them all really takes away the chances of new clans forming, especially when the difference between manhours per player is so significant.

I suggest that equipment costs are reduced, and fielding armies is easier at low numbers but cost even more for gigantic armies.. (like when you have 130wpf, another 1 point costs so much extra compared to going from 30wpf to 31)

In other words it is pretty easy to start up, but to get that one extra step ahead of everyone else will cost significantly more. (like with hierlooms)

[SPQR]

The problem with making small armies be the norm, is that castles and cities have thousands of population and have default minimum populations. A castle, for instance, has a 1000 minimum population, I think. The city is 2000 or more. So 1000 minimum free defenders is practically insurmountable defensive advantage against all but the strongest of clans. You basically become invunerable to them because they'll never be able to field enough to take from you.

[Beans]

The problem with making small armies be the norm, is that castles and cities have thousands of population and have default minimum populations. A castle, for instance, has a 1000 minimum population, I think. The city is 2000 or more. So 1000 minimum free defenders is practically insurmountable defensive advantage against all but the strongest of clans. You basically become invunerable to them because they'll never be able to field enough to take from you.

Well chadz said he might lower them.

Dunno why they didn't just leave all the numbers the same as before with scaling.

[Zaharist]

IMO in previous versions castles were too easy to take.
One 2hour assault and castle is yours.

[Dehitay]

IMO in previous versions castles were too easy to take.
One 2hour assault and castle is yours.

Did everybody else mentally respond with an immediate WTF like I did?

[Zorato]

Strategus: The Premier Dried Eel Farming Simulator.

[kinngrimm]

Thats not a bad idea.

If recruits came with their own basic gear that would be nice. Also maybe some hirable mercs or something with better gear.

something like? recruiting in
villages => high chance low tear gear
castles  => medium chance medium tear gear
towns  => low chance high tear gear

but i kind of like it that the best chance to recruit is in castles, that gave them in opposite to last strat more meaning.

perhaps we could split the efficency for trading goods and gear
like for trading goods
villages => high chance
castles  => low chance
towns  => medium chance

for gear crafting
villages => low chance
castles  => high chance
towns  => medium chance

that way even if villages or castles are been taken, where castles would take now anyway pretty long to achieve
players would still be able to engage a lot through towns.
the efficency curve in towns needs to be more flat, not that much depenable on players inside so there is room for a lot of guys engaging there.

also have a look at tristans suggestion about a possible trading system