Cavalry chasing routers take casualties

**hoom** · 03-17-2009, 10:24

Interesting.
I haven't really had that problem but I've noticed that when cavalry approaches a group of routers the rear few will turn & attempt to make a rear-guard defense.
Haven't noticed any loss of my own cavalry but its certainly a nice touch.

The MTW losses were because routing units counted as charging (but with no follow up attack) so they had potential to mow down guys that blocked their escape.
I actually wish they'd bring that back because you should need to be wary of getting between a desperately fleeing foe & their escape path.

**Ibn-Khaldun** · 03-17-2009, 10:38

A little off-topic question but are routers, if you chase them down, considered dead(a la RTW style) or are they considered prisoners(a la MTW2 style)?

I ask this cause I don't have ETW yet and like to know more about it before I buy it.

**Dead Guy** · 03-17-2009, 10:44

Dead, like RTW dead. ;)

Yeah, I've also noticed the rear-guard thing... I don't think it's those that inflict that many casualties, but I will pay more attention. Maybe also try to charge for example a unit in cover from behind and see if that also results in a lot of dead horses. Or a unit standing on both sides of an obstacle, so to say.

**Meldarion** · 03-17-2009, 10:53

I have also noticed the cavalry thing. I'm not sure if it is the rear guard, I know one time I sent several units of horse after one last unit and took a lot of casualties so I'm thinking they may get in each others way, try using just a single unit of horse per routing enemy see if that helps.

**PBI** · 03-17-2009, 11:48

I've had this happen to my general. The idea about routers having charge bonus sounds plausible, IIRC he was intercepting a routing unit rather than chasing it from behind.

**hoom** · 03-21-2009, 09:28

Well I've been watching my cav chasing routed units & I've definitely seen a bunch of my cav guys kill themselves on walls.
Ones I've seen were trying to cross on quite a fine angle.

I actually like it really, represents horses going lame after jumping or refusing to jump & tossing their riders on their heads.
If that was the case though, you should also get some casualties when just moving units around too, not just on the chase
Though in the chase is when a cavalryman is going to be much more likely to stuffup a jump so arguably they just stopped being careful on the chase?

I suspect that making sure that your cav is crossing at near right angle to the wall will help reduce this casualty rate.

**Tora** · 03-21-2009, 10:49

I've also noticed a couple of times that troops on foot chasing a routing unit can take casualties from their own cavalry.
I had a full unit of line infantry - 160 men - chasing some routing pirates. Sending 2 units of non-missile cavalry to join in and speed things up resulted in about 30 foot soldiers being killed as the cavalry passed through them - at least that seemed to be the only reason for their demise - unlike RTW where anyone being flattened by a 'friendly' elephant merely picked themselves up, dusted themselves off and carried on regardless.