Rear-Guard Action

[Lehesu]

I have been playing custom games a lot, mainly to hone my combat skills, as very few fighting occurs on my campaign games. Recently, I have found a method of playing that is very fun. I give the ai overwhelming numbers over me, mostly of higher grade troops as well, and then try to see how long I can last or if I can defeat them. A typical set-up might be me defending on a bridge map with only one unit of spearmen, two units of peasants, and one unit of crossbowman. I throw this motley group against an army of say, two units of chivalric knights, two units of feudal knights, two units of chivalric men-at-arms, two units of longbowman, etc. etc. It helps my defensive acumen and provides great satisfaction the few times I achieve a victory, be it killing the enemy general with a lucky shot, or encountering weather that works in my advantage. Adds some fun to custom battles, which, for some reason, many people don't seem to like.

[Nowake]

maybe because the AI plays so damn fine http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/joker.gif

[Foreign Devil]

I don't play custom battles much, I think because I like how in the campaign, the battles fit into a larger whole. Plus, the AI determines who and what I fight- I'm no good at coming up with opposing armies.

I do sometimes play custom castle seiges, from the perspective of the defender, of course. Still have yet to see the AI attack one of my castles in a campaign.

But you're right- winning a battle by using peasants effectivly is always a satisfying expierence.

[frogbeastegg]

I like custom battles, there are only two things I dislike;
1.The battle ends when all of a players units are routing. why? It is very possible to rally and make a comeback. Also it means I can't practise my precision cavalry massacre techniques http://smilies.networkessence.net/s/contrib/monsieurboo/diablotin.gif
2.The random unit selector for the AI is not very good. They always choose about 5 units of cavalry and a peasant. The one in shogun was really good so I don't know what happened here.

I think I shall give your idea a go Lehesu, it'll make a change from 32 berserkers Vs 600 peasants http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/joker.gif

[hrvojej]

Quote[/b] (frogbeastegg @ July 01 2003,14:58)]1.The battle ends when all of a players units are routing. why?
You cannot rally your units if they are all routing, that is, fleeing the filed. You can catch routers, but they have no possibilty of rallying.

[frogbeastegg]

The AI (I count the AI as a player) does it all the time in my campaign battles. It often comes back for a second or third go even if every unit it possesses is running. Even when there are no reinforcements. The battle should continue to the death/exit of the last unit like in the campaign mode making a less abrupt ending and allowing you to kill more AI troops/give them a chance to rally.

I wouldn't know if the rule is different for a human player as I haven't had my entire army route since 1.0. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif

[hrvojej]

Once you get the message "enemies are fleeing the field", there's no rallying any more. This message means that all remaining units are routing or have already withdrawn from the field. As long as there are reinforcements, you won't get the message. Therefore, when the entire army is routing in custom battles, the game is effectively over.

[Kongamato]

There is a point where a unit just wont rally. When this happens to all the units, their operator is finished.

[Lehesu]

I would still like the game to play out to conclusion, regardless of routing. Learning how many additional troops were lost after the melt-down can give some additional information on the usefulness of certain envelopment attacks and even show how damaging certain risky manuevers could be if they failed. The player should, however, get the option of quitting out when the enemy has routed, of course.

[khurjan]

hehehe you mean like in shogun to the last man you been spoilt there...european armies were more liable to fall apart like they do atm in medieval http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wave.gif

[Oaty]

Well I had a problem when my whole army routed. I had a battle that was going badly from the very beginning. When battles go bad from the beginning usually not too many troops are engaged in combat so it is easy to quickly rout your army and I usually save quite a few troops if I do so quickly enough. Anyways it was another risky battle and when I saw I lost a few hundred troops and barely touching the enemies forces I had no chance so I selected the archers and there backup to rout as I had no chance of winning. Shortly after the whole army is routing so I figure its all done with so I basically turned the camera to the enemy to watch them slay my troops. What I didnt know on a mass rout is the ones you selected to rout still can rally. Then I saw some wavering flags and had no idea what was going on so I doubleclick on there banner to see whats going on yep they had rallied and are getting mowed down by there cavalry but if they had kept routing they would have been fine. So if any unit you manually route is still able to be rallied. Saved me once also when I went to group all my units and instead accidentily hit the route button.

[Brutal DLX]

Yes, custom battles are also good for testing new MP armies, or do unit vs. unit tests. As Kongamato said, once you get that "enemies are fleeing the field" message, the game is over for them and one doesn't need to worry about possible comebacks. It mostly happens in MP games if you cause a massive chain rout where all units of an army are running away at the same time, a good start would be the killing or capture of the general. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif

Another thing that gets probably overlooked, are the historical campaigns and battles I have the feeling not many SP or MP players ever played them, yet they should. It's great fun and sometimes very challenging.

[Foreign Devil]

Yes The historical battles are tons of fun. I've some close calls... I won one of the Sulyman (sp?) battles with only 6 men left standing. Thats men, not units.