Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Azaps
The harsh, warring communities of the Medenci are one of the empires greatest assets; the
low-level fueds between rival tribes and the constant threat of incursion by foreign forces
after the mineral fruit of the Medencis labor provide the imperial army with a huge pool
of glory hungry and adventurous youth, often already with a fair amount of training and
experience in mobile warfare before entering the official military. Because of the
demographically and economically large number of such willing recruits, the empire finds
it unnecessary and impractical to accept most of them into the full time professional units
that form of the backbone of its military. Instead, most are enrolled into the Azaps, units
who, although not regularly on the army payroll, are kept up to a certain level of training
by monthly drills and regular inter-unit competitions, not to mention the normal violent
factors of life in the Eremus system. Fighting as fast, universally motorized units of
infantry (foot-slogging has little to no place within the doctrine of the Medenci Imperial
army) the Azap divisions, although scoffed at by foreigners, are far more deadly than
comparable militia units in most armies. In time of war, units are chosen, either by lottery
or by proximity to the front, to serve in fully-paid positions, providing the great mass of
manpower in most large-scale campaigns waged by the Medenci empire.