Multiple generals in one battle question

[EatYerGreens]

I was of the opinion that morale/valour bonuses or penalties listed on a general's V&Vs affect him as an individual only, not his whole unit, let alone the rest of his stack or the entire battle force.

Valour boost means he will personally kill more enemy if he gets into the thick of the fight; morale boost means that he will not rout, even if the rest of his unit does eventually gets killed, run away or get captured. Hence the tendency for the dramatic last stand and fight to the death by some unit leaders, generals and Kings.

When its a morale penalty, it only needs to affect him as an individual. He will tend to rout sooner than the rest of the individuals in his unit but when the commanding officer routs, the rest of the unit will act likewise. When it's a valour penalty he just won't be as effective at fighting as the rest of his unit, he will be amongst the first in his unit to get killed and no guesses what happens after that.

If looked at in isolation, his unit has a base level of valour plus a boost based on his command rating but, if you attack with multiple stacks, it's logical to me that the army as a whole receives the valour bonus based on the higher-ranking general only. So the backup general's unit's valour in the battle is its base level plus the boost from the higher level general, at least temporarily. In other words, NOT base level plus two valour boosts added together.

The valour boost from the backup general will still kick-in, in it's own right, applicable to the entire force, not just his unit, in the event that the high-star general is captured or killed during the battle. Thus it seems advisable to bring at least one backup general with you. It must be the sudden 'global' loss of valour which makes your army rout so readily when the general is lost and the melee is still ongoing, even if you were actually winning at that point.

There's an additional benefit to putting the lower rank general in charge of secondary stacks on the strat map, which is that rank-0's left in charge would make good fodder for trainee enemy assassins...