Routing

[helm123]

Enjoy playing in sandbox battles and usually almost always pick a single brigade. I'm seeing a lot of the other brigades take off chasing routed units that reform then route again. This leads to a chase across the map that usually only ends when the routed unit finally leaves the map. Which in most cases takes some time and has units scattered all over the map.

Think one of the problems is units can rout and continue to rally and come back into the fight. I would believe after routing two or three times the unit should be shot both morally and physically and not able to rally in the time frame of the battle.

Have the unit rout completely off the map on that third rout or toss up the white flag. Believe this would help with this chase of death that goes all over the map and actually kills a lot of the immersion of this fine game.

[Davinci]

helm123 I only play Open_Play_Games and I have never seen what you just described in any game!

I would take a guess and say that the unit must have been involved in a melee fight and suffered quite a few casualties.

Now, every now and then I will lose a regiment or two after they have lost roughly sixty-percent-casualties , but that is only due to me not paying attention. I should have pulled them off of the line before that happened, and assigned them to some far off guard duty.

The AI units are sort of programmed to constantly push-forward, especially if they detect a weakness in your lines, they will try to push through it!

So, if an enemy unit breaks through the line, try to have another unit ready to engage him. That will probably be sort of hard considering that you only have a single brigade to work with.

But, with all of that said, I just realized that I have never played a game where I didn't have complete control over all of my units.

Hmm, probably why I have never seen this happen!

davinci

[Ingles of the 57th]

I guess one is always more amazed and perplexed at what one's own peer units contrive to do (or not to do) than one is by the enemy.

There's a lot of points going for a surrender which I guess is the motivation for a pursuit by infantry rather than by cavalry whose job it really is.

In my more warlike moments I will often send an artillery battery at full speed after isolated routed enemy just to administer the coup de grace and tidy up the battlefield.

Another sneaky ploy is to work around behind the enemy rear and wait to gobble up routing units. Much easier pickings than actually participating in sordid fighting.

Geoff Laver Late of Her Britannic Majesty's 57th Regiment of Foot

[Col. Manning]

My favorite way to play is at division level with couriers, but lately I've been playing at brigade level, or even taking one battery and just watching the AI action unfold.

I've seen this happen, and as Davinci says, it's more obvious when the AI controls a larger number of the units. This usually makes me say, "Stupid AI!", but I know full well this is one of the best AIs I've seen, considering how much thinking it has to do. To some degree, the mistakes it makes can be considered to be fog of war. For instance, if you were playing HITS it doesn't matter if that support brigade you asked for is doing something silly, it just matters that it's not there.

If this happened a little less frequently, and I saw cavalry chasing down stragglers instead of infantry, it would be more accurate and would look better in game. Just my two cents.

[JTolliver]

Hey there Helm, you wouldn't by chance, by the same Helm from CWG2 would ya?

[RDBoles]

Greetings gentlemen,
This routing and leaving the field and being pursued by the opposing units happens many times with me. I usually play Corps against Corps with at least two to four divisions each. I command a Division and play Hunt them down with one or two objective points. I usually keep close to one division while trying to capture an objective point. The other divisions are spread out and fight with AI units and this is when the routing and pursuing occurs. Which by the way has worked to my advantage if I keep alert. If the AI division has split up pursuing the routed unit or units I then swoop in and crush the remaining units. Not that this happens all the time but when it does, Oh yeah! Big dog all over the little dog. Like Davinci, this doesn't happen when I control all my divisions with me being Corps commander.
BZ26V
RDBoles

[Saddletank]

Its curious what some players see and some do not.

I have often seen regiments retreat and rally and return to the fight, often 2 to 3 times. Eventually though they break irrevocably and head for the hills.

I often see an opposing regiment move towards an enemy that's retreating or is rallying and it usually has the purpose of forcing it to retreat again. Very occasionally this can end up with both units moving quite a distance from the action but this is pretty rare, and its notable when I do see it.

I have never seen a fully routing unit thats heading for the hills being pursued by an opposing regiment. I am fairly certain the AI is coded to not do this since it would result in the useless dispersion of winning forces.

If a winning unit is pursuing a beaten one some distance I am quite certain its because the winning AI sees the beaten AI unit as a threat still. Unfortunately if no other opposing AI is a target in sight/distance I've seen whole brigades go marching off after a weakened enemy unit that's trying desperately to rally, but if the AI perceieves no threat in sight then that side is pretty much onto a home run anyway.

[helm123]

helm123 I only play Open_Play_Games and I have never seen what you just described in any game!

I would take a guess and say that the unit must have been involved in a melee fight and suffered quite a few casualties.

Now, every now and then I will lose a regiment or two after they have lost roughly sixty-percent-casualties , but that is only due to me not paying attention. I should have pulled them off of the line before that happened, and assigned them to some far off guard duty.

The AI units are sort of programmed to constantly push-forward, especially if they detect a weakness in your lines, they will try to push through it!

So, if an enemy unit breaks through the line, try to have another unit ready to engage him. That will probably be sort of hard considering that you only have a single brigade to work with.

But, with all of that said, I just realized that I have never played a game where I didn't have complete control over all of my units.

Hmm, probably why I have never seen this happen!

davinci

Believe you hit the nail on the head. It looks like the AI is pressing home the attack, but in doing so attacks a enemy unit that just rallied. It routs...rallies and the process is repeated many times. The AI brigades end up miles from the original location and the objective chasing the enemy units. Mean while the brigade I'm controlling sits at the objective...per my order watching the show. Was involved in the original fight but not the great chase.

It's actually kind of funny when the AI brigades chase these routed/rallying units off one direction and then chase them back across the original location.


JTolliver,

Nope not the same helm.

[Davinci]

Well, I hope that this type of fighting that you are seeing doesn’t discourage you into thinking that this is typical AI behavior.

The AI is quite the opponent and can be very challenging.

Now, I’m one of those players that trust the AI to handle the movements through the courier-system, but not to do any of the fighting for me.

This is one of my Open-Play-Games where the battle-line stretched four-to-five miles long. The only way that I could stop the ] AI from crushing the center of my line, were to continue to try and flank them.

Basically, I was trying to get them to shift troops from the center by moving them to either the left or right.

That didn’t exactly work out in my favor due to the fact that I keep running into un-seen enemy brigades, so the center of my line fell-back roughly a half-mile.

This is a battle that has been going on for nearly fourteen-hours, after quite a lot of lulls when they run out of ammunition.

But, as you can see there are no enemy units chasing any of my units from the field after so many hours of fighting!

In conclusion after reading your post and the remarks from others, it might be better to try to command as many units as possible to avoid such AI – to – AI mishaps.

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davinci

[JTolliver]

Hi there Davinci. Your map screen mod looks very interesting and I would like to at the very least give it a try. Do you recall where you found this mod and what it's exact name is?

Yr. Obdt. Srvt.
1st Sgt. J. Taliaferro
Co. B., 3rd Regiment (Britton's Battalion)
1st Division, ANV