Sailors

Sailors represent the trained seamen of a nation. They are used for ships just as manpower is used for troops. A country whose stockpile of sailors is depleted will be unable to build new ships or repair damaged ones.

Sailors differ from manpower both in what they are used for and in how they are acquired. Only coastal provinces provide sailors, and the amount of sailors depends on the total production development in a province. Sailors are required when constructing new ships, and when ships are “repaired”. Not all ships require the same amount of sailors, with heavy ships needing the most and transports the least. AI nations are coded to never run out of sailors since version 1.24 because they were too ineffective at managing them, so sailors are in effect only relevant to player nations.

Maximum

The maximum sailors available to a country is the sum of the province sailors.

${\text{maximum sailors} = \sum\text{province sailors}}$

Province sailors

Province sailors is the amount of sailors each province contributes to the national sailor maximum. It is computed as follows:
${\text{province sailors} = \text{base} \cdot (1 + \sum\text{modifiers}}) \cdot (1-\text{local autonomy})^{[*]}$

Where base is 30 sailors per point of development in the province.

$*$: Provinces of the Burghers estates are not affected from multiplicative local autonomy effects on province sailors.

Local sailors modifier

	Conditions
+100%	Drydock
+75%	Core
+50%	Dock Important Natural Harbor
+25%	City Important Center of Trade
+25%	Fish as province good produced
+5%	Parliament Seat
+5%	Republican cultural sufferance
-1%	Per 1% of Devastation in the province
-10%	Same culture group
-20%	Non-accepted culture
-50%	During occupation Looted
-100%	In Trade Company

National sailors modifier

	Conditions
+25%	Aristocrats in power in a Merchant Republic
+25%	Trading in fish
+10%	Tyr as Norse personal deity

	Traditions	Ideas	Bonuses	Policies
+50%	—	Maritime idea 2: Merchant Marine	—	—
+25%	Dutch traditions Norwegian traditions	Aragonese idea 2: Protection of the Coastlines Barbary Corsair idea 2: Galley Slaves Clanricarde idea 3: People of the Sea Portuguese idea 1: Legacy of the Navigator Tunisian idea 4: Attract Foreign Pirates	—	Maritime-Economic: The Recruitment Act
+20%	Betsimisaraka traditions Manx traditions Venetian traditions	Genoese idea 3: Rebuilding Genoese Trade	—	—
+15%	—	Hanseatic idea 3: Improved Shipbuilding	—	—
+10%	—	Omani idea 3: Association With Unbelievers	—	—

Using sailors

Sailors are used to man naval vessels. Different vessels require differing numbers of sailors to be at full strength. Similarly, sailors are required to return a damaged ship to full strength, and the number of sailors used to do this is an equivalent fraction of that for the whole ship (repairing a ship from 50% uses 50% of its initial sailor cost).

	Ship type
200	Heavy Ship
100	Galley
50	Light Ship Transport

Sailor maintenance

When fleets are on missions (i.e. not in port), they cost a certain number of sailors each month to maintain.

Ship type	Monthly sailor maintenance
Heavy ship	4
Galley	2
Light ship	1
Transport	1

A number of ideas and bonuses can reduce the number of sailors needed for missions.

	Traditions	Ideas	Bonuses	Policies
−10%	Estonian traditions Greek traditions Madyas traditions Sulawesi traditions	Maritime idea 3: Sheltered Ports Danish idea 4: Reorganize the Klaedekammer Dutch idea 4: Instructie voor de Admiraliteiten English idea 6: The Sick and Hurt Board Luzon idea 1: Barangay State Malayan sultanate idea 5: Trading Fleets Siddi idea 2: Siddi Seamanship Swahili idea 1: Indian Ocean Trade	Betsimisaraka ambition Hormuz ambition Moluccan ambition	—
−5%	—	Arakanese idea 4: Magh and Ferenghi Kono idea 1: Shugo of Iyo Omani idea 5: End of the Shipbuilding Guilds Venetian idea 5: Naval Conscription	—	—

Sailors recovery

Sailors replenish over time until they reach the maximum level. It takes 10 years to fill the sailor reserves from zero. The monthly recovery rate is:

${\text{monthly sailor recovery} = \frac{\sum\text{province sailors} \cdot (1+\text{sailor recovery speed})}{120}}$

If a nation owns at least one coastal province, sailors have a minimum recovery rate of 5 sailors per month.

Sailor recovery speed

Sailor recovery speed modifies the recovery rate of province sailors.

	Conditions
+100%	as invasion nation
+10%	with parliament and “Impressment of Sailors” or “Expand Navy” as active issue
+0.2%	for each point of navy tradition
−1%	for each point of war exhaustion
−20%	for having Recruitment Sabotaged
−100%	if bankrupt

	Traditions	Ideas	Bonuses	Policies
+25%	—	Naval idea 5: Press Gangs	—	—
+10%	—	English idea 6: The Sick and Hurt Board Piratical idea 7: Life of Liberty	—	—
+5%	—	Estonian idea 2: Baltic Ties Hadramhi idea 5: Sailors of the Indian Ocean	—	—

Mothball fleet

Mothballing a fleet will make it immobile and decrease its maintenance costs by 50%, and will cause it to lose 5% of the sailors in the fleet per month (also durability) until the fleet reaches a minimum of 25% sailors/durability. Sailors lost from mothballing are returned to the national sailor pool, but only up to the national sailor limit; any additional sailors above the limit are lost. Un-mothballing a fleet will cause it to repair at the standard rate.

Raid Coasts

Main article: Raid Coasts

Certain nations can gain sailors from raiding another nation’s coastal provinces, even if the maximum number of sailors has been reached. A province that has been raided cannot be raided for another 10 years.

The efficiency of raiding is reduced by fleets on pirate hunting patrol.

Exploit development

Main article: Exploit development

By exploiting the base production of a province, a nation can get a large number of sailors instantly. Doing this will give 60 months worth of that province's sailors.

Warfare

Province mechanics