I was playing the Roving Clans for the first time and I was given a mission to take or destroy a specific city. Since the Clans can not declare war I decided to try out sending an army of privateers to sack the city. When they took the city it converted to my control. I love the idea of Privateers but I believe the whole idea behind them is to wage war without anyone knowing who the aggressor truly is. If the mercenary army takes a city and it converts to your control then suddenly the city's previous owner knows it was you attacking him and not that other player that you tried to make your scapegoat by sending your privateers through his territory. Then instead of starting a war between your two enemies you become the one who has been declared war upon. When a Privateer army takes a city it should be destroyed just like when a AI minor faction army seizes a city. That way when my army of Gauran Privateers sacks your city, I can blame it on that conveniently unpacified Gauran town in the region next door. Just consider, what self respecting mercenary, when invading a city, would not take everything not nailed down and burn the rest. Their personnel profit is the reason mercenaries do what they do. Privateers should, when played intelligently, provide plausible deniability to their actions. When your incognito army gives you a city it just told your enemy "I work for him, stop being his friend and immediately declare war on him." If it destroys the city, as long as you do not do something obvious like having a settler right there, you will still set your enemy (or ally if you are devious enough) back while avoiding a costly war. Otherwise the only use for them raiding the countryside destroying minor faction towns and strategic resources or waylaying armies which is useful but a well funded empire can instantly replace them with a buyout and given the cost/time to create of a mercenary army versus a regular one you would not have done much long term damage to you enemy's empire. Players will have keep garrisons in even their most far off city since that mystery army can sail around the world and destroy your cities without ever knowing who to retaliate against. This makes watchtowers more essential to keep an eye for Privateers sneaking in and could encourage players to recon other player's cities to see if they are the ones buying the mercenaries or if it is that player with closed borders. I can imagine a Roving Clans player using his ability to see purchases to potentially selling information on who is building privateer armies or if he is evil, sending Privateers himself and blaming someone else. All this will work best if the Privateers have the ability to do real damage without giving away their allegiance and I again propose that this requires that Privateers destroy cities rather than assimilating them into your empire thus relieving the identity of the aggressor.



Also, you should consider adding some units from the main factions to the market place. Why is it that only the minor factions are getting in on the mercenary buisness? I am sure there are some unscrupulous, greedy, or glory seeking exsoldiers among the player factions (like that army you sold to pay the bills, I am sure some of them are willing to sign up with your enemies).



Well those are my thoughts. I thank you for your consideration.

I like the idea of mercenary units. This will provide a variety of choices in building your army. Assimilating minor factions shouldn't be the only way to get new types of units !! It gets monotonous after awhile.



Besides the mercenary practice has always existed during wars. I loved how cool my army was in Medieval:Total War. It blended a variety of different units, including mercenaries. This gives you the feeling of having your own unique army and brings depth to the game !



It also gives a boost to the market system of Endless Legend.

Do you agree?

I haven't tried Roving Clans yet tbh, but shouldn't there be an option when your privateers capture a city that lets you choose whether you want to raze a city or keep it? It would make sense that privateers raze and pillage the city for their own profit while (thematically) actually working for you. But it should be an option to raze the city immediately or keep it. This way it's up to the player if he/she wants to play sneaky (and smart) or otherwise reveal themselves to their rival. More choice = better gameplay imo



Also I LOVE the idea of having mercenaries from main factions included in the marketplace. In addition, I would like to see some unique units that are ONLY available in the marketplace, which you can obtain after researching a certain technology perhaps... That would be very thematic indeed!

Hello,



First of all, thank you for the suggestion! It's actually what was initially planned! Hopefully your suggestion helped me to bump the bug priority ^^

When players suggest similar ideas to ours, it comforts us in our vision, and when you suggest different things it opens our mind and help us to refine our vision. So all in all, thanks again for suggesting and let the suggestions flow!



Cheers,

Meedoc wrote:
Hello,



First of all, thank you for the suggestion! It's actually what was initially planned! Hopefully your suggestion helped me to bump the bug priority ^^

When players suggest similar ideas to ours, it comforts us in our vision, and when you suggest different things it opens our mind and help us to refine our vision. So all in all, thanks again for suggesting and let the suggestions flow!



Cheers,

Thanks for the response, we all appreciate it. Does that mean we'll have major faction mercenaries and privateers who "secretly" raze cities, confusing our enemies?



Sorry if we're being too demanding, we feel like part of the team and want the best for the game and you guys.

Yeah I am glad the developers are giving players a choice. It would allow those devious players to rampage secretly while providing players who are only interested in short term gains to take a city if they lack influence to declare war. I just want the ability trick a player opponent by sending my mercenary through player 3's territory to attack player 2 and initiate a war between them. Also if my ally is getting to powerful I could secretly send my Privateers to hamper him without breaking relations. If my Privateers can only capture cities, I will be forced to just lay siege or wander around the territory which allows my foe to take his time building an army and dispose of me at his continence. With the choice I could do those things or I could launch my own Pearl Harbor and use my Privateers to take frontier cities before my declaration of war. I am sure there are many other neat ideas pro players could come up with if they give us the choice



As for those unique units, they could represent a unique minor faction whose culture is entirely based on mercenary work and do not have a city because they wander around looking for wars to join. the can also be used in some of the quest that require you to fight AI armies. I also strive for the introduction of main faction units to the market place because no of the factions have available the full roster of unit types. Minor factions are random making them potentially unreliable to fill the gap and some players are uninterested in even using them. Which units are available could be determined by who you are playing with. Your Vaulter army could be supported by fast moving Roving Clans mercenaries courtesy of player 5 but you would not be able to buy Ardent Mages because no other player is using them.



I also would like to put forth the idea of randomly spawned AI armies. I have seen this feature in several Medieval 2 Total War mods. This feature really made me reconsider my play style as compared to how I usually play Total War. It would force players to think carefully about declaring that war or leaving a far off city defenseless when that AI dragon could suddenly appear for a little scorched earth fun. It would provide a use for armies even after the minor cities are pacified and your neighbors are all at peace. We already see it used on quests so it should not be that much trouble to implement on a random generator. We could even tie it into the approval system and have "rebel" armies appear when the approval drops to abysmal levels. When these rebels take the city it could convert to a mini AI faction but this might require too much change in programming and not really something needed in this already impressive game.

Random armies could create very interesting situations. Say you are at war with your neighbor and the tide has turned in your favor. All of you armies are committed to steamrolling the rest of his cities into dust. Then suddenly an ancient army of endless automatons "awakens" at the vulnerable far end of your empire and decides to forcibly remove the intruders on their land. Facing enemies on both sides of your empire with your forces stretched thin, what do you do?

Random spawned AI armies would help maintain balance among the more aggressive players by forcing them to consider the repercussions of sending all their armies to attack and forcing them to keep some armies in reserve against that pesky dragon providing weaker players time to reinforce their defenses. It also forces players to station some units as garrisons all over their empire and not just the border cities. In Endless Space we had pirate fleets appear from nowhere every so often so why not include a similar feature in Endless Legend. Developers could include a option in setup similar to Endless Space allowing Random army spawn, disabling them, or ratcheting up to insanity. Think about it, Endless Legend survival mode. Face numerous AI army spawns while surviving an endless winter.



Sorry about going on and on in my posts but I just want to convey my thoughts on these subjects. I hope the developers take into consideration our thoughts in this thread. If nothing else I really want to see that dragon shown in the first trailer in the game. Hopefully it will be a unit in the mysterious final faction which in my mind is dragon people based on the Endless Legend hero Namkang included in the Founder Pack.



You developers continue your work on this great game.

Agreed. Privateers should destroy cities. If they capture them, then the city/region becomes like the pirate systems in ES. Let's make this more interesting even. Privateers aren't under your control. You hire them and give them a task, but along the way, they should pillage/destroy anything not affiliated with you.

Privateers should be under our control because you have to think about the programing changes needed for giving them orders. Also if they are AIs there is a limit on their intelligence even with the option of orders which could have them wander around in circles. AI control would also remove option for sneaky tactics since they would probably march straight for their target and remove my previous mentioned tactic of sneaking the army through fog of war to attack my target while hiding where the army came from.

MBFalcon wrote:
Also, you should consider adding some units from the main factions to the market place. Why is it that only the minor factions are getting in on the mercenary buisness? I am sure there are some unscrupulous, greedy, or glory seeking exsoldiers among the player factions (like that army you sold to pay the bills, I am sure some of them are willing to sign up with your enemies).

As far as I understand the design documents, the idea is that any disbanded or sold units should show up in the marketplace. However, the AI does not seem to use the marketplace at the moment, so they don't show up. I'm in favor of randomly injecting major faction units to ensure a steady supply, though. For that matter, 10 units available at a time feels really limiting when a lot of the time I get 2 batches of 4 identical units each. Additionally, a little randomization in the equipment of minor faction mercenaries would be nice to see, especially now that different weapons give different special attacks.

The-Cat-o-Nine-Tales wrote:
For that matter, 10 units available at a time feels really limiting when a lot of the time I get 2 batches of 4 identical units each. Additionally, a little randomization in the equipment of minor faction mercenaries would be nice to see, especially now that different weapons give different special attacks.

Agreed, especially with the second sentence.



Regarding the OP, I would prefer that Privateers "loot" the city rather than destroy it, gaining dust per turn while looting and slowly killing population and destroying city improvements, and perhaps not let the city build anything or contribute DSI to the empire. Destroying cities outright isn't a very fun mechanic, there should be some time for the defender to retaliate and regain control of the city.

Privateer armies looting cities instead of destroying them seems like a great idea. Besieging the enemy city already deprives them of a lot of Food and Dust income. A successful attack could kill a few points worth of population, or create a massive loss of ownership, as well as generate dust for the owner of the privateer army.



On the other hand, I do like the idea of giving the player the option to seize the city and give away his identity, leaving his enemy to react to the surprise attack.

What do you think about major faction mercenaries on the market? Is it a good idea, will it fit the game mechanics? Should there be unique units only for the market?