User Guide

60
Domestic
Leaders
The final page of the
Domestic Interface is
the Leaders screen. This
is the interface that you
will use to review your
country’s current levels
of military tradition; and
to recruit and review the
various leaders who will
command your military
forces.
Military
Tradition
For the most part, the
leaders that will com-
mand your armies and
navies are recruited from within your country’s
existing armed forces. It’s easiest to think of
them as new, young generals and admirals who
have been “promoted” from a lower echelon of
your existing military forces. Europa Universa-
lis III doesn’t keep track of individual soldiers
who serve in your military, so it is impossible
to tell who might be the most qualified indi-
vidual to assume the new command. Instead,
we use the concept of “military tradition” to
reflect how active your military has been over
a period of time. This, in turn, determines the
likelihood of there being a new leader of excep-
tional talent available to be recruited when you
need one. Each leader you recruit will have a
set of attributes that determine his skill at lead-
ing your forces. The higher his skill levels, the
more effective he is likely to be. For almost all
of your commanders, the skill level is heavily
influenced by the military tradition that your
country has in his field. If you have very high
land tradition, you are much more likely to re-
cruit a highly skilled general. If you have a poor
naval tradition, it is unlikely that you will be
able to recruit an admiral that will give your
fleets much of an advantage in combat. We
will discuss the precise
meaning and effects of a
leader’s attributes in the
chapter on the Military.
Military tradition is
gained primarily by en-
gaging in combat, since
that is the situation
where your potential re-
cruits will gain the nec-
essary experiences to be-
come effective leaders in
the future. Each land bat-
tle that your armies fight
will result in an increase
of your land tradition
that is proportional to
the number of enemy sol-
diers they kill and the size
of your force. Your naval
tradition will increase each time you engage in
a naval battle. There are also province improve-
ments that you can build to increase your tradi-
tion, as well as several national ideas that have
the same effect.You will gradually lose both
land and naval tradition when your forces are
idle. This will happen even if your country is
at war, though the monthly rate of loss is con-
siderably less than it will be when your country
is at peace. Even if you have adopted all of the
beneficial national ideas and built many prov-
ince improvements to try to sustain your lev-
els of tradition, there is a maximum tradition
level of 50% that is imposed during peacetime.
If your tradition is higher than this level, you
might wish to consider hiring a new leader or
two, even if you expect to be at peace in the
near future.
A final method of increasing your military
tradition is through exploration. As your naval
explorers chart new waters they will increase
your naval tradition; and when your conquista-
dors map new lands they will boost your land
tradition. Neither of these activities will allow
your country to exceed the 50% peacetime
cap.