For the similar Napoleon: Total War unit, see Armed Citizenry.
Firelock Armed Citizenry are a type of mob in Empire: Total War.
Description[]
Arming the people is something that leaders find detestable and frightening, necessary perhaps, but certainly unwelcome.
Armed citizenry are a mob, given whatever guns are to hand, with brief training that the muzzle end is to be pointed towards the foe. Weapons do not make soldiers, and arming the people is an act of desperation. On the battlefield, the citizenry are unlikely to do much to damage an enemy, but the size of the mob can at least cause the foe problems. This can give real soldiers enough time to win the battle, or make the enemy pay heavily for their victory.
Historically, arming the people was something that really scared the authorities in every nation, particularly if the population hated the existing regime. It was not wise to supply an angry population with weapons, when these might be turned on the rulers, rather than foreigners. When Austria decided to create landwehr or militia forces, it was careful to exclude many regions from the decision as the loyalty of Austria’s many different ethnic groups could not always be guaranteed.
General Information[]
Firelock Armed Citizenry are free mobs provided to the defender of a region capital while attempting to repel invaders. Their number is dependent on the public order, the wealth of the region, and the regions themselves (for example, France is capable of producing a full stack of twenty regiments of armed citizenry, while Don Voshko would be lucky to get four). The amount of armed citizenry available also depends on the number of regiments already in the region capital. If a region capital is capable of supplying five mobs of armed citizenry, but the army deployed there already has 19 regiments, then only one mob will be provided; the cap of twenty regiments per army still applies.
Firelock armed citizenry have terrible morale, extremely poor accuracy, possess very limited ammo, and are even worse in a melee, but they are certainly better than nothing and completely expendable in the sense that they have no upkeep or training cost whatsoever. Used properly while defending a fortress, it is possible for firelock armed citizenry to hold off superior forces for quite some time, as well as inflicting considerable losses. However, firelock armed citizenry can be dangerous to use in an open battle: their tendency to easily break and flee impacts other units' morale, and can cause a chain rout--even for units with normally good morale. For this reason firelock armed citizenry on open battlefields are best used alone, as sacrificial distractions, or as supporting units that aren't likely to take heavy damage.
Firelock armed citizenry do not spawn in defense of a capital should it be attacked by a rebellion or revolution.