Army Upkeep

Where he stands sets the price

Every soldier costs you Gold just by existing, and how much depends on where he is standing.

Each unit has one base upkeep, and that base is the same everywhere. While your army is away from home the base is paid at a multiple, which is why the same army costs more away than at home. The army screen shows the multiplier next to the state, so you need no sums to see why your Gold is draining.

Three rates

What that comes to

An army that costs 1,000 Gold an hour at home costs 2,000 Gold an hour on campaign, and 3,000 Gold an hour while holding an occupation.

Which state costs what

When it changes

An army that sails

The price changes at exactly the moment the state changes; time up to then is charged at the old price. A campaign is expensive from the moment it leaves the gate to the moment it comes back in. For an army going to another island, that moment is when it starts to board: soldiers boarding at the War Harbour no longer count as your army at home. The same goes for the way back: upkeep drops to ×1 only the moment the army gets home.

Raiding

A raiding army pays ×2 from the moment it sets out until the moment it gets home — after the battle is won and the plunder loaded, too. Coming back laden does not make it cheaper early: it is still on the road.

This is what decides a raid’s real profit: subtract the extra upkeep of the time spent away from what you carried home.

Occupation

Occupation is the expensive one, deliberately. If holding a city indefinitely cost nothing but the army tied up in it, there would be no reason to ever stop.

Triple upkeep IS what an occupation costs. There is nothing else: no occupation tax, no attrition and no forced drain. End it and the force drops to ×2, and only reaching home restores ×1.

A fleet holding a harbour pays the same price: a fleet at sea pays ×2, and one lying in the harbour it holds pays ×3. If upkeep goes unpaid the ships desert, and a fleet with no ships left cannot hold the harbour (Port Occupation).

Reinforcements are part of an occupation too. An army marching to a city you occupy pays ×2 like a campaign, not ×1 like a move between your own cities; the moment it joins the garrison it pays ×3. Soldiers you pull back from the garrison pay ×2 from the moment they set out until they are home, and those who stay keep paying ×3.

In an ally's city

A force you send to an ally's city or harbour pays ×2 from the moment it leaves home until it is back: on the road, while it stands there and on the way back. Its owner pays; nothing comes out of the host's treasury.

The white flag

Calling off a siege does not make the army cheap again straight away. It is outside its city while it regroups and while it walks home, and it pays campaign upkeep for both. Only arriving home changes that.

What this does not cover

Moving troops between your own cities is housekeeping, not a campaign, and stays at ×1. Resource transport, gifts and colony expeditions are civilian cargo, not armies.

A garrison defending its own city is at home: being besieged does not post you abroad. Surrendered troops cannot be used while the occupation lasts, but they are in their own city too, and pay ×1.

On the battlements

A soldier you send up onto the wall's battlements is at home, but he costs more than the army at home: his base upkeep is paid times a multiplier, every hour, at war or not. Walls and Siege gives the multiplier. The moment you bring him down, his upkeep goes back to the price at home.

What if I cannot pay?

Your treasury never goes below zero — but a soldier who is not paid does not wait. One interval after the Gold runs out, a small share of your soldiers at home leave the ranks and become ordinary citizens: nobody dies, they stay in the city, and they pay tax instead of drawing upkeep. The moment the books balance, the desertion stops. Soldiers holding an occupied city desert at the same share; if no fighting man is left, the occupation ends. An army on the road and soldiers in a battle do not desert. The same goes for workers and scholars (Gold and Tax).

Disbanding soldiers

Keeping an army is a standing cost, and over-recruiting is a decision you can take back: units standing in your city can be disbanded. Desertion is an army wasting away in spite of you; disbanding is the same decision made by you.

Disbanding returns 60% of the units' material cost. Gold is not refunded — that paid for their training, and the training time does not come back either. The soldiers return to the city as free citizens, and their upkeep stops immediately.

There are two limits. Only units at home may go: this order cannot be given for troops on a mission, attacking, reinforcing, or committed to a battle — and the same holds for ships. A galley carrying a shipment, a market pickup, a colony expedition or a base convoy is not in port, and neither is a fleet bound in a harbour that has been given up. Whatever the army screen calls available is exactly what you may disband. And the materials coming back are stored only as far as your warehouse has room; if it is full, what does not fit is lost. In the Disband window every unit type at home is its own row: choose how many with the slider, and everything you chose goes home together with one button. The window also tells you how much would be lost before you press it.