in which occasion will you raise taxes

[Jasper]

Originally posted by Saber Cherry:
As for LI being historically useful, that's correct. But my impression is that is less due to their mobility, and more because they were so darn cheap compared to HI. Untrained, give'em a spear and point'em at the battle milita should never cost 70% of a well trained broadsword-shield-platemail HI unit in any respect (supply needs, wages, maintenance, initial deployment cost). For similar reasons, despite having more training and being better armed than militia, an LI shouldn't cost the same amount as an HI.

I entirely disagree. Light Troops were tactically very usefull, for example in rough terrain, against elephants, or for the mobility and speed. Light Cavalry in particular were always usefull unless the terrain was just too rough for horses.

Costs were obviously an issue as well, but I don't think they were the defining issue. It certainly wasn't true that light troops were only used because one couldn't instead field more heavy troops.