What proportion of veteran troops?

[Cort Haus]

I'm facing a problem in my first game - of running out of time (it all seems too short) and facing rapidly increasing training times in my colleges. I won't get many vet troops trained before running out of time to fight the REF.

What proportion of expert troops to militia do people deploy?

[Dale]

Not sure I get the question. You can't train veterans in schools. You only get them from Europe.

[Cort Haus]

Ah - another difference from Col 1, where I used to train my troops up.

Thanks for the clarification.

[armyjournalist]

You don't really get combat bonuses from "veterans" as you did in Col 1. A veteran soldier bought from Europe starts with Leadership, which gives the unit a +100 percent experience bonus (so it levels up faster and gets all kinds of nifty bonuses that way). Aside from buying said unit from Europe, the only other way I know how to get one is to attach a Great General to a unit. If you throw a couple of these guys into a protracted war with the natives, if they survive they'll come out at experience level 5-7 easily.

Only soldiers with time in the box will get those hard-won experience points, regardless of "veteran" status. So, you see the whole "Veteran/militia" ratio is kind of pointless to worry about, since obviously militia you've spent years fighting the natives with will be at higher levels of experience than some dimwit academy grad you found on the docks of Europe three turns before declaring independence.

[Cort Haus]

Thanks, aj

[TimmyKGB]

I tend to buy quite a few veterans if my city locations aren't well suited to buying guns. With the 25% off on troop buys from Europe FF, the vets are often only slightly more expensive than actually buying guns. The extra population and the leadership ability makes up for the price difference.

[PrinceMyshkin]

From my point of view the answer is simple: 0%.

You get only what is willing to come on its own with crosses, or the King willing to send with a lol value...

Don't buy muskets, buy lumberjacks, carpenters, blacksmiths, oreminers and gunsmiths. Train en masse your own statesmen and preachers (you never have enough).

Farmers and fishermen train them en masse from the indians. Don't let their colonies vanish, if you have a mission or it's a good training facility.

Don't buy guns from europe, make them. You are looking for 5 colonies specializing in tools.

Criminals and servants will ALWAYS be your first army recruits and then free colonists, who will become either preachers, statemen, or troops.

If you are looking for pop increase, go all-men-are-free and town spam. Delete some if you like. You should get like 30-40 new recruits only from this.

Delete the 1 guy towns, make troops. In col. I've always been doing around 12 strong and healthy towns.

Focus on navy... gg.