A good idea to have mercenary camps on world map, some camps that you can attack and some LARGE camps where you can recruit other creatures like “Direwolfs”, “Horses” and other creatures for mounting, Orcs, Undead and Goblins to be part of the squad with unique payment, for example:
ORC will have a penalty to loyalty if you will not participate in battles
Goblins want more loot and will panic easily from slightest wound and want to be better payed
Undead, this one is tricky, maybe to add some series of quest to obtain artifact that will unlock the recruitment of undead mercenaries, they do not need food, bu t acquire EXP at only 50% rate
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