Attacking from different provinces

[Gilrandir]

Hello everybody!
I have a question. Say, you attack your enemy's province (Burgundy) with several armies from different provinces (Lorraine and Anjou). Attacking from Anjou presupposes a bridge battle (an unwanted option), attacking from Lorraine does not. How does the AI decides which it will be? Does it proceed with your larger force, or with the king (if any is in command of the army in question), or with the general who has more stars? Any ideas?

[caravel]

Welcome Gilrandir,

The general's stack is what counts. The border crossing info from his province of origin is used to generate the battlemap.

In the case of the King - he always leads the battle even if he's a 0 star and you have a 9 star general stacked with him.

[Gilrandir]

Thanks for answering, Asai! You mean to say that, for instance, a two-star general leading three units will be seen on the battle map as THE GENERAL of the united army originating from different provinces and consequently the choice of a battle map will proceed from his larger stack, while a four-star general leading one unit from another province will become his subordinate? Would it be impolite to wonder whether you are guessing or are you sure of what you wrote?

[drone]

The "general" will be the highest ranked commander of all the stacks committed to battle, or the faction leader if he is involved. So if the highest ranked commander coming from Lorraine is a 3 star, and the highest ranked commander from Anjou is a 2 star, the map will be chosen from the Lorraine-Burgundy border setting and in the battle the 3-star will be the general.

Welcome to the Org, Gilrandir!

[caravel]

Thanks for answering, Asai! You mean to say that, for instance, a two-star general leading three units will be seen on the battle map as THE GENERAL of the united army originating from different provinces and consequently the choice of a battle map will proceed from his larger stack, while a four-star general leading one unit from another province will become his subordinate? Would it be impolite to wonder whether you are guessing or are you sure of what you wrote?

It would not be impolite at all - though I'm not sure you understood my post correctly as I did not state that a 2 star general would become a 4 star's subordinate. To summarise:

The "general" in a given battle is always the highest ranking unit leader or the King. So even if your 9 star general goes into battle with a 0 star king - the king leads the battle and your 9 star general does not.

If three armies invade i.e. Anjou, from three adjoining provinces - the general's army is where the battle takes place. It's his border crossing point that determines the battle map you fight on. For example, if you send in three stacks as follows:

5 star general - stack of 3 units
1 star general - stack of 2 units
6 star general - stack of 2 units

What goes into battle is a 6 star general led stack of 7 units.

If the 6 star invaded from Aquitaine, then the Aquitaine to Anjou border crossing info is used to determine the battle map you will fight on.




//edit: just saw drone's post now.

[Gilrandir]

It would not be impolite at all - though I'm not sure you understood my post correctly as I did not state that a 2 star general would become a 4 star's subordinate. To summarise:

The "general" in a given battle is always the highest ranking unit leader or the King. So even if your 9 star general goes into battle with a 0 star king - the king leads the battle and your 9 star general does not.

If three armies invade i.e. Anjou, from three adjoining provinces - the general's army is where the battle takes place. It's his border crossing point that determines the battle map you fight on. For example, if you send in three stacks as follows:

5 star general - stack of 3 units
1 star general - stack of 2 units
6 star general - stack of 2 units

What goes into battle is a 6 star general led stack of 7 units.

If the 6 star invaded from Aquitaine, then the Aquitaine to Anjou border crossing info is used to determine the battle map you will fight on.




//edit: just saw drone's post now.

Thanks a lot. (I'm not yet comfortable with posting since it's the first thread I'm participating in, well, I pushed the button "Reply with a quote", let's see what it will be).
Developing the topic of general's army border crossing point, is it really "a point"? Does the exact point where you drag the army across the border matter? I assumed that a river bordering the province will always incur a bridge battle while crossing it. So I experimented with Aragon-Valencia bordercrossing trying to drag the army across where the river wasn't marked on the campaign map. But it was still a bridge battle any time I tried. What I mean to ask is: are some borders just meant for bridge battles and you can't help it (whether the river shows on the campaign map or not), or are there some secrets of "precise dragging" which can help avoid borderriver crossing and thus a bridge battle?

[caravel]

No, it's not that precise - the dragging of stacks/agents from one provinces to another is just like chess.

If we take one province and look at that, i.e. Antioch, there are five frontiers:

Tripoli to Antioch
Syria to Antioch
Edessa to Antioch
Lesser Armenia to Antioch
Western Mediterranean to Antioch

If you right click on tripoli and bring up the information parchment, then mouse over Antioch and look at the bottom of the parchment you will see some information about armies meeting there and the kind of terrain they should expect - this is known as the "border info". The game then randomly selects a map based on the terrain type there. The border info will tell you if a crossing point is, hilly, flat, arid, desert lush or if it has a river, etc. The campaign map texture is purely cosmetic but has been designed to reflect the terrain of each province.

[Gilrandir]

Thanks, I guess I got it. I have other questions but since they concern other issues I think I will start a new thread.