Troops not listening

[megger]

For some reason, it seems that troops are not listening to me. For instance, it sometimes is next to impossible to tell archers to stop, so they sometimes fire right in the back of other people's heads. Argh! Often, it is also impossible to get them to fire at a different group of enemies.

Sometimes, it also seems that it is hard to tell them where to go. This is especially true within cities. I have now lost my second siege battle just because I could not get my troops to the main square in time. Argh again!

Could this be caused by bugs or am I doing something wrong? Often it works fine, but not always. Especially telling archers to stop is a problem it seems, even if I turn fire-at-will and skirmish off.

Any input on how this works would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks
Markus

[ThePeskyPorker]

Yeah I get the same problem. Disabling fire-at-will seems to do nothing. Also I'll target a specific enemy unit, only to have my archers fire one round at them then switch to peppering random enemies :-(

[Maltz]

Within the cities it is a known buggy pathfinding that you cannot move multiple units in a group command. If you issue individual commands to each unit they will do fine. You can go to your destination and drag out the final position you want them to be, and hit "run" (bottom right corner, as depicted in the tutorial). Since I started doing this, I've had no more trouble at all.

The missle units will shoot "once more" when you turn fire at will off, if they have started the animation of drawing arrows and aiming. It is like the parents come into your room yelling "stop playing!" and you said "after finishing this battle!"

For foot archers, there is an emergency way to stop them - a move command. Moving them even one inch forward will work. Since they have to start walking right away, they can't complete the animation and hence cannot shoot.

For horse archers unfortunately you have to let go the last volley. There might be a way, but sorry I am unaware of. You might want to wait a few seconds until that volley set loose, then charge your melee in.

If you want to target a specific unit, then you need to turn fire at will off. ~) Or they will shoot whoever based on their free will, I guess.

[Satyr]

If you want your archers or horse archers to get near the enemy while in cities it also helps to turn off skirmish mode. This will keep them from trying to stay away from the enemy.

There are lots of problems associated with having units grouped. Most of the time in the open battle field grouping is not a problem. However, in cities you need to turn it off and deal with each unit separately. Even in regular battles though, if your units are not behaving correctly it is almost always a bug associated with them being in a group. For instance, sometimes horse archers will not engage when Alt-Left-Clicked on an enemy when grouped, yet when you ungroup them they will do exaclty what they are supposed to.

[Slyspy]

Often close quarters infantry with javelins (like legions, scutarii etc) will not charge when ordered, they will throw their missiles and then charge. Or more likely repare to throw and then get charged themselves due to the high movement speeds. They will even do this when they have no ammo on occassion.

[Didz]

I know what you are talking about.

Missile troops normally fire at least one more volley after you tell them to stop anyway. I think its just a case of 'I've started so I'll finish'.

If they refuse to change targets or stop after FAW is switched off try pressing the stop button too. I've noticed that work for me.

The issue of friendly fire is an unforgivable oversight on the part of the design team as it worked fine in STW and MTW but it looks like someone forgot to copy the code across.

If you ever have problems getting a unit to go where you want it the first thing to do is remove it from the Group its in.

Personally, I think the GROUP function is very badly named as it really isn't a group function at all. Its a Formation Selector button and any units in a group are either locked into maintaining one of the standard formations or in maintaining the same alignment on the other units in the group as they were in when the group was formed. So, sometimes when ordering one unit from a group to move they ignore you because to do what you ask would undermine the implicit formation order you gave to them when you formed the group.

The Group button is useful when you want groups of units to move together whilst maintaining their formation but a damned nuisance if you want to micro manage the movement of troops.

As you mention this is especially true in cities and when crossing bridges as its almost impossible for a group to maintain their formation in enclosed terrain and trying to do so causes all sort of weird behaviour. The most common is that all the units in the group exit the city to try and deploy in required formation outside the walls.

My advice to anyone is to ungroup all your units before you send them into a city or try to make them cross a bridge.

[megger]

Thanks for all this info guys.

I understand that they might still fire one more set of arrows. Sometimes however, they do not listen at all and just keep firing away even though I turn skirmish mode and fire at will off and even tell them to stop. I gotta try the movement thing. Maybe this at least gets them to stop. Not sure how to tell them whom to attack though.

The friendly fire thing is annoying too. I generally lose more troops to friendly fire than enemy fire. "Bummer".

Thanks
Markus

[Red Harvest]

With missile units you have to take them off fire at will, then order halt, THEN order them to run or move somewhere (a lovely three step process.) That usually takes them out of a the trance (but not always.) It also takes an eternity to do this on the 60 second melee battlefield of RTW. Heaven forbid that you should have to do this with more than one or two units at a time.

[megger]

I guess at this point I can probably answer my own question: It seems that archers just do not take orders very well (hardly at all) when more than one archer unit is selected. It does not seem to matter whether they are grouped or whether you just select more than one. Every time more than one is selected then orders are likely to be ignored. If you select them one by one and issue the same order however, they listen pretty much immediately. (Seems like a bug to me...).

This pretty much seems to go for everything but movement. I can always get them to move together, but things like targetting a new group of enemies, or lighting their arrows on fire and that sort of stuff does not work in groups.

I guess this is kinda like managing real people. If you tell a whole group, nobody will take charge and do what you want, but if you tell an individual, things are likely to get done...

[m4rt14n]

I think they have to wait for the general to pull uo his horse's rein waive his hand each time to each of the selected units.. lol

[Didz]

One other annoying trend with skirmishers and archers is the tendancy for them to close formation when you order a group to deploy.

By that I mean that you have carefully laid them out in open order skirmish formation, the battle starts, you select the skirmish group and tell them to advance into missile range, and the idiots immediately reform into a close order line making them easy targets for enemy archers.

[Ptah]

For instance, it sometimes is next to impossible to tell archers to stop, so they sometimes fire right in the back of other people's heads. Argh! Often, it is also impossible to get them to fire at a different group of enemies.

1. When the status command is at "fire at will", the archers will start firing at the nearest target automatically.

2. When archers have started firing volleys without your direct command via "fire at will", changing the status command by turning off "fire at will" will stop them.

3. When an archer is loaded, he will fire that volley before he responds to any other command.
(There is a work around to this issue. Any movement command directly cancels all firing sequence, and the archers immediately respond. So, if you really need to stop them from firing at something immediately, you can click some place on the map, and then quickly press backspace to cancel the command)

4. When archers have started firing volleys with your direct command by mouse-clicking on the enemy, turning ON/OFF "fire at will" will have no effect. This is because your direct command always has priority over their status command(commands such as "guard", "skirmish", "fire at will".. etc etc). Only issuing "halt" orders by backspace(default), will they stop.

5. It is the same principle in work with horse archers. When you order a melee attack with horse archers, they will carry out your direct orders to engage, even if they are in "skirmish" mode. If the horse archers start shooting on their own via "fire at will", turning off "fire at will" will halt them. If you isse direct orders to start shooting at a specific target, they must be given another order to stop.

Sometimes, it also seems that it is hard to tell them where to go. This is especially true within cities. I have now lost my second siege battle just because I could not get my troops to the main square in time. Argh again!

Known issue in the game. While it is a bug and frustrating as it is, somehow it does give the feeling of unorganized attackers being confused in a city. So the best alternative is to send the troops in one by one. Often, issuing way path commands works very good.

[Siris]

Yes, for me to get my soliders into a city in a seige assault I have to individually command each one to go about 20 meters inside of the gate, one there all there, I can command the group to attack the enemy, or rush the square.

My archers always quit firing as soon as I hit the cease fire button, even if there is an enemy 20 ft. infront of them. This came into play very well yesterday when my solo Northern Legion, which cannot sustain losses so it can continue the Campaign there, fired against the gauls around 5,000 arrow's; when they calvery charged the right & left flanks of the enemy missle peltast unit types, I ordered the archer fireing to stop right as the calvery got there, and they did.