Consider PD in terms of maintainence free chaff, but _not_ as a replacement for troops. If you had something like 30 PD plus 10-20 troops, maybe a mage or priest (for sermon of courage), you'd probably find that much more effective - the PD soaks up the losses but is renewed so long as you win the battles, while the mage and real troops help ensure that you win, both because of troops quality and because of tactics.
Yes, you have to pay upkeep on those troops there - but upkeep is probably cheaper than the equivalent of 183 troops getting lost because PD sucks.
Even better, you can move those troops and mages as your border shifts, while your investment in 50 PD turns out to be a very poor investment once you've expanded enough beyond that province and it never gets attacked.
(Kind of disheartening to read that PD has actually been nerfed even more, vis a vis Jotuns and whatnot.
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Re: High PD kinda useless.
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