pnoff wrote: ↑Wed Sep 11, 2019 8:43 am
+ if you hire new troops they will go to garrison instead of getting picked off
In the case of regions not in a province. I believe that in a completed Province region, they still go to the capital region. So in Asia minor, this is not quite as effective........but in Athens, Euboea, and Rhodes, all of which are rich non-Province regions, recruited troops will definitely go behind the walls.
The units in most of these cases are super cheap skirmishers, usually about two of them. Crucial regions like Macedon and Cyprus get a pair of Heavy Infantry as well. The skirmishers provide better support than Urban militia, and they have a siege resist value. Against a truly massive army or one perfectly designed for city taking, this won't do that much. But it's cheap enough to raise the bar for conquering the region just a bit.
One other bonus is that the garrison allows you to see armies in neighboring regions. This is why Jimwinsor and I always, always have light cavalry along our shared borders when we're not allied. For big borders, that's more efficient. But never discount the utility of cheap units watching your borders. You can still be surprised by armies with roads and/or generals with movement boosts that can strike from two regions away.........but that's more difficult to pull off.
One thing for Pocus..........sieges feel a bit too vulnerable to assaults. Even with palace guards, though they do make things much more difficult. I've generally stopped waiting for sieges and focus on assaults instead. Maybe if assaults could only happen once a breach was made? There's also the issue of frontage in the assault where urban militia get in the way of better support/ranged units (catapults). So a large garrison is sometimes counter productive.
I've talked with devoncop a bit about this, and maybe a way to get around this would be to add a menu section in a region where you can spend money directly on your existing garrison units to upgrade their capabilities. Rather than buying extra units and having them fight with urban militia for frontage, you could spend that money/manpower/equipment directly on the urban militia to give them extra support, or ranged damage, or combat power. Just think of the customization. Maybe even have it tied to the fortification buildings so that you'd have a reason to invest in those buildings.