Guilds and cities are an alluring prospect for a young villager or city dweller newly maturing and looking about the land for a future 'calling'. Not all wish to follow their family trades and thus there is a constant flow of CCCs (particularly in cities and villages) of perfect age to be enlisted into the military of a city or a guild.
These 'enlistables' as they are known begin with a strong preference to join a particular city or guild. This is most commonly influenced by a complex blend of factors, many of which can be directly affected by the actions of a particular city or guild.
In the case of guilds, the loyalty of a particular enlistable as it appears is determined by the guild's reputation, ideals (see HELP IDEALS and HELP REPUTATION) and recruitment energies directed towards a particular town or village (see HELP RECRUIT). For instance, a guild with a high reputation and modest portion of its recruiting energies directed to Isabella will be significantly more likely to tempt a prospective youngster to become loyal to that guild.
City enlistables are somewhat more complex and are determined in part by its landwide reputation (and widespread achievement of globe ideals, see HELP GLOBES) , sphere of influence presence, local occupying forces (exacting tributes) and active presence of the citizenry within Avalon. Thus sphere of influence and dominance of the villages and towns is a most crucial aspect of legion warfare for it is this influence (and subsequent tributes) that determines in part the extent of growth a city military may enjoy.
These youngsters will roam around their homeland until they are either enlisted into the military or slain. Enlistment is a process in which all citizens or guildsmen should be encouraged to participate and is the cornerstone of military growth. The enlistment process is a two stage affair, detailed specifically in HELP BECKONING and HELP ENLISTING. Enlistment can only take place in a barracks or dormitory and will require aideship to the Field Marshall or Captain status within your guild.
As a rough breakdown, when a villager or citizen matures into an enlistable their starting loyalty is determined as follows:
- total population of village, town or city
- total number of enlistable-age men already in existence around the continent
- local sphere of influence: occupations, conquests and tribute demands
- foreign tribute-exacting legions present nearby
- individuals in the land, citizenship and guild membership
- popularity of guild and/or city initially favoured by youngster and on
through various possible choices
- recent enlistables locally reduce popularity of choice slightly for each
- recruitment defined by guild, targetting a specific city/guild's youngsters
- city's sphere of influence and recent history (past decade) in the region
- guild rank and city globe-might taken into account
- traditional links or shared homesoil (city or guild alliances/locations)
- individuals in the land near the point of emergence of enlistable
- recent violences done locally to youngsters picking this or that loyalty
- recent successful enlistments completed for those local youngsters
- direct comparison of guildideals versus city citizen ability to live up to,
or success in attacking said ideals; depending on alignment of youngster
- bribes undertaken lately, bribes in place village/citywide, corruption having its minor influence.
The list above is in roughly descending order of importance, the most significant listed first. It is left for the experienced gentlefolk of the land to speculate on and ultimately pinpoint with greater accuracy the weightings of the various influences, to develop their own city/guild tactics for handling the young - recruit, ignore, slaughter, bribe; remember too that youngsters are fickle and left to their own devices too long unrewarded by their initial targets, they are prone to changing direction with remarkable alacrity.
NOTE: in the first month of an enlistable man appearing in a city or village, he will be far more likely to stand firm to his initial convictions and cannot be stolen via the various means of "pilfering" men, e. G. using birds to lead men away to foreign barracks. Beyond the first Avalon month, however, the man is less staunch and become vulnerable to 'persuasion' to join another city or guild's forces.
