Pausing during battles.

[Terraforce]

We all do it at some point or another and not just for taking a break. Some people pause every time the AI makes a move. Enemy calvary got behind you by some luck of the draw? Lets pause the game so we get that slight edge so they don't cause a mass rout. I try to command my troops in real time, I try to only pause when one of my units decides to go through the enemy rather than around them.

How may times do you pause during a battle and why?

[Wausser]

Not often, but a friend always uses pause, he might be a better player, but I always own him when we play RTW through lan just because he can't play in real time...

[Pontius Pilate]

I use the pause button quiet often especially if an enemy, like cavalry gets behind my lines. I also use it to get my bearings and figure out what is the next best move to make. I have to admit though, that pausing does break the momentum and atmosphere of the battle sometimes.

[Celtic_Punk]

I'd like to use it less often to be honest. I've never ever played online though.

[Ibn-Khaldun]

I use it too. Depends how big that battle is and how important. If I could loose some FM's or important army then I pause a lot. I remeber that once I fought a battle 2 hours(It was in vanilla though and I was noob)!

[Celtic_Punk]

I fought an hour long battle. but thats because there was around 10000 troops involved, and i didnt pause once. cept maybe to grab another white russian

[Pontius Pilate]

I fought an hour long battle. but thats because there was around 10000 troops involved, and i didnt pause once. cept maybe to grab another white russian

10000 troops?? Must have been a custom battle with multiple factions right?

[SwissBarbar]

i use it too, because in battle the soldiers are not only lead by ONE general but by his officers.They all have to make decisions for their men, related to the events happening in front of their eyes, not 4 miles away on the other flank of the battlefield. And these desicions happen probably by the same time. The centurion of the left flank does not wait to react on the enemys movement, till the centurion on the right flank has finished giving orders.

The AI reacts anyway extremly faster than you, because its a computer and not a human player. In my opinion its more realistic to use the pause button in campaign.

The multiplayer game of course is a completely different case, because its human vs human

[Celtic_Punk]

Yep. I only play custom battles sometimes, but every so often I wanna have a massive battle you just cant get in campaign mode. The closest ive gotten to 10000 troops in Campaign mode was 7000 or so between me n Makedonia.

[MarcusAureliusAntoninus]

I pause all the time. I use the excuse that I'm getting a good angle for screenshots for my AAR, but I take advantage of pausing all the time.

[Ibrahim]

We all do it at some point or another and not just for taking a break. Some people pause every time the AI makes a move. Enemy calvary got behind you by some luck of the draw? Lets pause the game so we get that slight edge so they don't cause a mass rout. I try to command my troops in real time, I try to only pause when one of my units decides to go through the enemy rather than around them.

How may times do you pause during a battle and why?

I'm embarrased to say this, but:

I do it everytime the AI makes a move. That's because my reaction time is very slow (the fastest I ever reacted was 2.0 secs flat. Why my reaction time is slower than average is unknown; may have sth. to do with my childhood.

needless to say, It cost me the MP tournament. Burakuku, king hannibal, and Neospartan have all pointed that out. (I actually came close to defeating Burakuku mind you).

the only mod where I do not pause at all is N2TW (then again, you don't go hand to hand in that mod).

[zooeyglass]

i ever so very rarely even consider pausing. in fact, most of the time i forget i can pause. i like to speed up the battle mostly, so that would be when i pause when my game is sticking and i want it to stay still until i can get my mouse to the normal speed button. beyond that, i just play, and play it out, see how it's going on the cuff of things, ya know?

[ludwag]

I allways pause after I have pressed Start Battle. Othervise I keep my hand of that button, as much as I can. Try to be prepared for the enemy charge instead of pausing right before they come in contact. If they send horses from behind I sometimes cant keep myself from doing it :(

[theoldbelgian]

I hit pause only when I am in triple speed and something happens where I have to react fast(like enemy charge on my troops while they are still positioning) I only use it otherwise to see from up close how much havoc I am creating(elephant charge, arrow rain, barbarians run into my hoplitai who are after my gates)

[Aemilius Paulus]

I pause all the time. I use the excuse that I'm getting a good angle for screenshots for my AAR, but I take advantage of pausing all the time.

Same here. Pause every minute for various reasons. Sometimes to enjoy the eyecandy, sometimes to get a better grasp of the situation.

[||Lz3||]

the fastest I ever reacted was 2.0 secs flat.

So if I tried to punch you, it would take 2 secs for you to make any move?

-sounds weird : /

[Legosoldier]

I don't always pause during battles, unless it's a forrest battle or I'm trying to get used to playing a battle again because I rarely get to play EB.

[gamerdude873]

I pause generally because the AI can micromanage and command all of its soldiers simultaneously, so i find it fair to pause, but generally i pause a heck of alot more when in a forest, when the battle is humongous, or when my soldiers are far apart and are difficult to manage. If i played against a human player, I think it would be much easier for me because i'd be playing against someone who doesn't think 1000's of times faster and is limited by the camera in viewing the battlefield.

[Terraforce]

You do know that you can disable the restrict camera option to view the entire battlefield right?

[The_Brittunculi]

I pause mainly to perform lots of commands at once which wouldn't be as effective if I had to do them one at a time, since my computer is slow and battles can sometimes be laggy for me. I also pause to see exactly what's going on.

[hoom]

I used to pause all the time in Shogun, less often but still fairly frequently in MTW but hardly at all in RTW and its mods.

I always pause right at the start of a Bridge Defence battle because you don't get to deploy properly before the battle starts & if you don't pause, the enemy is likely to get a bridgehead before your guys get a chance to form up.

Otherwise I only really use it if I made some monumental blunder like immediately starting battle on a Siege Defence without deploying or if I'm in the middle of a battle & accidentally click wrong, sending my army all out of formation.
Sometimes I just play on though with the assumption that my blunder represents a surprise attack or a dunderhead General.

[Chris1959]

Call of nature, phone call (not always, turn sound down though), beeper requires me in the kitchen.

Anyway why would you want to pause in battle!

[Dutchhoplite]

Never do it

[cmacq]

Now, only fight at ground level.

[Cbvani]

I pause to issue certain mass orders, the kind of stuff a general would already have told his troops.
"So whats going to happen is everybody with a ram is going to head for the walls at exactly noon. Everybody got that?"
or
"Ok, so what we're going to do is rush up to the bridge and form a wall of pointy death around our side."
or
"Everybody, in formation, get to that hill double-time!"

[Ibrahim]

So if I tried to punch you, it would take 2 secs for you to make any move?

-sounds weird : /

I know. strage isn't it?

could be me just growing old, but that's probably not tru (I'm only 18 afterall)..

[Grriffon]

I pause A LOT. I want my troops to be doing EXACTLY what I want them to do EXACTLY when I want them to do it. Sometimes this means manually moving troops to an exact location instead of right click attacking a unit, or charging through a unit in order to make sure all soldiers are attacking and not slowly advancing with swords drawn while 3 soldiers fight, or running in a totally different direction because you had more than 1 unit selected at a time.

Since my troops generally behave like retards unless I monitor their every move and tell them what to do individually and sometimes multiple times the pause button is absolutely essential for me.

Also, I LOVE the artwork in this game. Pausing does give me a chance to zoom in and enjoy the action. Pausing before an elephant rush hits home ensures front row seats for the ensuing carnage.

[theoldbelgian]

I pause A LOT. Also, I LOVE the artwork in this game. Pausing does give me a chance to zoom in and enjoy the action. Pausing before an elephant rush hits home ensures front row seats for the ensuing carnage.

my point exactly

[Centurio Nixalsverdrus]

I pause all the time. I think I live more battle-time paused than non-paused. All the good reasons for this behaviour have already been pointed out.

[Aemilius Paulus]

I think I live more battle-time paused than non-paused.

Same here.