Increasing military staff

[Generalshad]

Alright so I am playing in one of the game modes where Canada, the US, and some other countries are broken up into provinces/states. Forget what mode it is but I don't think that's very important.

I am playing as Prince Edward Island from Canada. My first goal was to make money for PEI's bad economy, which I did and now I have 0% taxes and maxed out social spending, I have alot of resources (every resource has it's green bar somewhat filled if not completely filled) and like 40Bil in my treasury. So financially it's all good. My problem is military staff. I cannot find a way to increase my military staff at more than 2-3 reserves per day. As I said, my taxes are at 0% and my social spending is at it's highest, and also my military salaries and maintenence are at it's maximum. My population started at like 100,000 - 120,000 and is now around 170,000. Is there anything else I can do? If I up my taxes or lower my social spending will I get more reserves? Does it have anything to do with my $800,000 GDP per capita?

I am asking this because I have such a small amount of military that I cannot build any type of unit because I do not have enough staff to fill a fabrication. Right now I have my barracks and military complex online, but the fabrication is offline till I get a little over 3000 more reserves.

[Hundane]

Have you set your minister to recruit/increase reserve personel ?

[tkobo]

Military spending in salary and maintance will push your recruitment ,max them and you pretty much max recruitment.If your not at war,your probably better off putting most fo your units in reserve while doing this, as max maintenance spending can be huge when lots of high tech units are on the map.

Now max recruitment can be low due to shortage of population,very low unemployment,etc..and if so,the spending wont have much worthwhile effect til you get more population or create more unemployment.

[Generalshad]

Have you set your minister to recruit/increase reserve personel ?

Yes it's been set since I first started as PEI.

I'm usually pretty patient, but waiting 2-3 years just to be able to build units is not something I want to do given how long a year takes in this game. I really have nothing left to do but build my military. (I suppose I could build more production buildings, but I don't really need it)

[Generalshad]

Military spending in salary and maintance will push your recruitment ,max them and you pretty much max recruitment.If your not at war,your probably better off putting most fo your units in reserve while doing this, as max maintenance spending can be huge when lots of high tech units are on the map.

Now max recruitment can be low due to shortage of population,very low unemployment,etc..and if so,the spending wont have much worthwhile effect til you get more population or create more unemployment.

My military things are maxed. I am at war, but I am surrounded by allies so I'm pretty safe (I'm only at war because I am supporting those allies). Also, you start out with no units at all in PEI, so I don't have units to put in reserve . Money isn't really a problem for me though as I have the game settings on easy and it's very easy to make money with trades.

My unemployment rate is like .5%, how can I increase it?

[tkobo]

My unemployment rate is like .5%, how can I increase it?

Is defcon maxed ?
As for unemployment,depends on particulars.If you have alot of facilities that are staffed,but not making anything you need,shut them down.
If its due to a small population, get more (conquer a large pop region)

[Hundane]

If you have alot garrisons , lower the amount you have. This will increase your reserve.

[Generalshad]

My unemployment rate is like .5%, how can I increase it?

Is defcon maxed ?
As for unemployment,depends on particulars.If you have alot of facilities that are staffed,but not making anything you need,shut them down.
If its due to a small population, get more (conquer a large pop region)

Defcon is at it's minimum while at war (3 I believe?)

I have facilities that are very productive, but I will shut some of them down if it increases my reserves per day significantly.

The proplem with conquer a larger population is that I have no units to do it with...I'm not joking when I say the game starts PEI with 0 units, and the only military structure is a sea pier. In case your wonder my total military staff is about 3000 now. 2080 in my barracks and military complex (which by the way doesn't make sense because together those two buildings only require 1000 staff), and 900 or so in reserves.

[Generalshad]

If you have alot garrisons , lower the amount you have. This will increase your reserve.

I don't have any units but if the actual military staff can garrison, I will look into it.

[tkobo]

PEI =Prince Edward Island ?

If so, no matter what you do, dont expect to be overflowing with reserves unless you grow that population thru conquest.
Youve only got like 150k total population to begin with.

[Generalshad]

PEI =Prince Edward Island ?

If so, no matter what you do, dont expect to be overflowing with reserves unless you grow that population thru conquest.
Youve only got like 150k total population to begin with.

Alright thanks guys. Also it seems as though raising DEFCON get's me an additional 2-3 reserves per day.

I turned down all my production and raised domestic prices but my unemployment rate didn't change :S

This is going to be tougher than I thought

[The_Blind_One]

I remember a while ago somebody used a trick.

I think you have to max out your military staff and make sure there are NO reserves left, then ur reserve pool will grow much quicker per day. Then dissolve the recruited garrisons and wholla, you have a larger reserve pool, or continue creating garrisons and building up military staff untill ur satisfied.

[Generalshad]

That seems like an idea worth trying. How exactly do I use up my reserves? Just building military buildings?

Also to garrison, do I need units, or do actual military staff garrison?

[Graygan]

That seems like an idea worth trying. How exactly do I use up my reserves? Just building military buildings?

Also to garrison, do I need units, or do actual military staff garrison?

Right click your city or installation. If it has no units in that hex it will go straight to the screen you need, if it has units, you will need to click the first button above the screen to get there. When you are there, you will see a little line of empty garrison guys with a + sign to the right and a - sign to the right. Click on the + sign until it's full or you can't click it anymore. Then go to the next city/installation and do the same. Each garrison takes something like 500 men and each city/installation can hold a max of 8 garrisons. When you've used up all your reserves, you won't be able to build any more garrisons until you have enough men for it.

When your reserves are empty, you will gain more men every day. So as pointed out, just keep emptying the reserve until you don't have any more room in your installations/cities for garrisons. Then wait until you have 500 or 1k in reserve and empy your garrisons. You'll get 500 time the number of garrisons in reserve personnel. You can then use them to fill up your military fabrications and start the process over again. Then you'll have enough for real units.

With the PEI, it will still take a while and you'll not have a lot of units until you can take over another nation with a decent population, but that should help you get enough units to bootstrap yourself up through combat. Just do your best to keep your losses down. Missiles are great for that, artillery not so much since it kills off the population of cities you bombard.

[Generalshad]

Wow awesome thanks alot. I'll definetly try this when I get a chance to play