Crash
08-29-2007, 05:30
Units become shaken, waver, and then rout but why not surrender en-masse? Of course prisoners are taken when routers are caught by pursuers but why wouldn't a unit that is surrounded, hopelessly outnumbered, out-manned or out-gunned and with no escape route whatsoever surrender?
Case in point, the castle of Tunis held by one unit of Sicilian Italian Spear militia was assaulted by my large Venetian army consisting of heavy infantry, dismounted and mounted knights, various types of archers, a four-star general and a ballista unit. The Sicilian unit immediately retreated to the central plaza and went into the Schiltron formation.
My archers literally rained arrows upon them until only 23 remained out of the original 60. As my archers ran out of arrows my heavy infantry and knights stood at the edge of the plaza just watching the arrows raining down on the unfortunate Sicilians. Instead of attacking at this point, I rolled up my ballista unit and positioned it on the corner of the plaza to fire bolts at the Sicilians at point blank range. I was just curious to see what would happen.
The Sicilian spearmen just stood there as I fired bolt after bolt at them, each bolt taking out one or two men at a time. The last man left was the commander. I fired several more bolts at him but they all missed him. Finally I sent my dismounted knights after him. He bravely fought off three of knights for at least a minute two before he finally fell.
Questions:
1. Is it a coincidence or design that the unit commander was the last one to survive the ballista attack? I could understand him being the last survivor of a melee attack but not a missile attack by armor-piercing projectiles.
2. Why did the spearmen not rout and be captured instead of fighting to the death in a hopeless battle? Technically, they didn't even fight, they were just slowly slaughtered by arrows and bolts.
3. Perhaps the TW engine doesn't distinguish defense against melee attacks from defense against missile attacks when it comes to morale?
IMO, the Sicilian unit should have either surrendered en-masse or routed and been captured. Are these possibly bugs or by design?
Case in point, the castle of Tunis held by one unit of Sicilian Italian Spear militia was assaulted by my large Venetian army consisting of heavy infantry, dismounted and mounted knights, various types of archers, a four-star general and a ballista unit. The Sicilian unit immediately retreated to the central plaza and went into the Schiltron formation.
My archers literally rained arrows upon them until only 23 remained out of the original 60. As my archers ran out of arrows my heavy infantry and knights stood at the edge of the plaza just watching the arrows raining down on the unfortunate Sicilians. Instead of attacking at this point, I rolled up my ballista unit and positioned it on the corner of the plaza to fire bolts at the Sicilians at point blank range. I was just curious to see what would happen.
The Sicilian spearmen just stood there as I fired bolt after bolt at them, each bolt taking out one or two men at a time. The last man left was the commander. I fired several more bolts at him but they all missed him. Finally I sent my dismounted knights after him. He bravely fought off three of knights for at least a minute two before he finally fell.
Questions:
1. Is it a coincidence or design that the unit commander was the last one to survive the ballista attack? I could understand him being the last survivor of a melee attack but not a missile attack by armor-piercing projectiles.
2. Why did the spearmen not rout and be captured instead of fighting to the death in a hopeless battle? Technically, they didn't even fight, they were just slowly slaughtered by arrows and bolts.
3. Perhaps the TW engine doesn't distinguish defense against melee attacks from defense against missile attacks when it comes to morale?
IMO, the Sicilian unit should have either surrendered en-masse or routed and been captured. Are these possibly bugs or by design?