How do you behave after the enemy routs?

[Grand Duke Vytautas]

Yep - are you merciful for those poor beggars and don't exploit the game (as I've heard that AI never slaughters your units if it wins) or do you hunt them down, slaughter them like whipped dogs cut their heads and bath in their blood - MUHAHHAHAHAHA!

[King Henry V]

I unleash my cavalry until everyone one of my enemies lies dead, their bloated corpses rotting in the sun as crows peck out their eyes and worms and insects reduce it to a few bare bones.

[Akka]

I kill as much as I can, so that I won't have to face them the next turn again.

[LittleRaven]

I have a weakness for infantry heavy armies, which makes my Pontus games...frustrating, actually. But because of this, I'm frequently not in a position to do much head hunting. It's not like I'm going to catch them.

If I have the horses, though, by all means, kill away...

[Doug-Thompson]

Pursuit is a fine art. I've spent hours in custom battles, perfecting and refining pursuit techniques. Nothing gives me more pleasure in this game than a well-conducted pursuit that leaves none of my enemies alive. I've often given ground when it wasn't strictly necessary so that fewer of my enemies will escape after they finally break.

[edyzmedieval]

I fry and eat them.

I pursue them till every soldier dies. SO I won't have to face them again.

[professorspatula]

I pursue the occasional enemy, perhaps the enemy's stronger units, but I generally end the battle as soon as the option pops up. I think the AI needs all the help it can get in a campaign, and killing all its men after it loses a battle is a bit unfair as it can't do that to your own men.

[Dutch_guy]

I always pursue the enemy , always strong units first then the weaker ones.
To bad you can't capture the enemy , I loved that feature from MTW..

[Celt Centurion]

I pursue the occasional enemy, perhaps the enemy's stronger units, but I generally end the battle as soon as the option pops up. I think the AI needs all the help it can get in a campaign, and killing all its men after it loses a battle is a bit unfair as it can't do that to your own men.

From Celt Centurion,

I recall seeing the AI chasing my men down and killing them as they routed, and being unable to do anything about it.

When I have the enemy routing, I usually turn my cavalry loose on them chasing the ones farther out, and then work back toward where the biggest pile of bodies is. I take my phalanx units out of phalanx formation and send them running after enemy phalanx units. Sometimes, they catch up and cut them down enough for the cavalry to finish off.

My preference is to use cavalry to chase down archers first, peltasts and slingers next, and whatever is left afterward. I rarely overtake a horse, and as such rarely chase them unless in the case of an enemy General. I will then continue chasing the General anyway in the hope that he will turn and my cavalry catch him then.

An enemy killed while running away will not attack me later. Given the choice of totally killing every one of a unit is preferable to a few getting away and those surviving to be the "core" of a retrained unit. If I kill them all, the unit won't be around to retrain will it? It's better to make the enemy train a totally new unit rather than the lesser expense of retraining one. I make it a point to make them train LOTS of totally new units.

I certainly don't want them coming back later with a lot of retrained units.

What I would like to see is being able to "loot" the defeated army after the defence of a city, or for that matter, out in the field. Think about it. Kill some 1300 bad guys, and empty their pockets for money and take their armor as well. That could offset the cost of retraining your own losses, and perhaps even upgrade your armour. In a town with only a blacksmith, it could provide armour to those who didn't have it at all.

Strength and Honor

Celt Centurion

[Siris]

I'll run them down everytime, especailly if I have calverly.

If I do not run them down & massacre them, they will only reform (retrain, or just regroup with another army) & march on me again, forcing my men to fight the same cowards another day.

So I show no mercy for the A.I. in the past has shown me none, as mentioned above, running down my men & slaughtering them.

I strike the larger units first, the more men dead, the better, then I just move down from there.

[Divinus Arma]

Go for the quickest and the furthest first, chase down cavalry with lighter cavalry, then go for the skirmishers, then mop up the bulk.

[zukenft]

yeah...loot would be a great addition to the campaign, especially barbarian armies.
Currently, though, all the loot in battle goes straight to the soldier's pocket. Nothing left for the general...

[Conqueror]

It really depends on many factors:

- I often let them run, especially if I have forced a "fight to death" situation on the campaign map (either surrounding the enemy stack or they ran out of movement points and can't retreat) which means that routed units will be disbanded after the battle and will not rise against me anymore.

- Brigands I tend to destroy more often than the troops of other factions or regional "rebels", because I really have no respect for the bandit scum.

- If I am feeling vengeful/annoyed/angry at a particular faction/army, then I will do my best to destroy them to every last man. I will give absolutely no mercy to those troops of mine that betray my empire ( = bribed by an enemy diplomat).

- If the enemy is going to survive (not disband after battle) and they have particularly dangerous or annoying units, such as wardogs, elephants, etc. then I will try to destroy these specific units but allow the other ones to get away.

- If there is a pressing need to eliminate this force ASAP due to the situation on the campaign map, then I will pursue and kill as many as I can.

[nameless]

I always go for total annihlation I mean why not? First off, your men get experience from the slaughter and second, you don't have to deal with them in the next round. In most cases that I have encountered in RTR 6.0 the greeks kept sending in stack army after stack army at me with no end in site.

Once they start routing I send in the Cavalry and everything I have to mop it up as best as I can.

[Deus ret.]

I pursue the occasional enemy, perhaps the enemy's stronger units, but I generally end the battle as soon as the option pops up. I think the AI needs all the help it can get in a campaign, and killing all its men after it loses a battle is a bit unfair as it can't do that to your own men.

Yep, same for me. Hunting down each one of the enemy's units gives you an unfair advantage.

The AI does kill your routing units, but ends the battle when all your units rout (=when the message would show up). Thus, I deem it unbecoming to systematically wipe out every last enemy unit; additionally, the mopping up consumes much less time. Battles have become significantly shorter since.

Army routing in MTW was far better represented. Firstly, units retained their defence, rendering it likely for some of them to escape the battlefield; secondly, those struck down'd have been captured, "malifying" your general if he killed 'em off too often. This defninitely should be changed again.

[Taurus]

Depends how I'm feeling at the time or whether a faction has annoyed me or whether I need to tactically kill them all so I don't have to fight them again.

[professorspatula]

From Celt Centurion,

I recall seeing the AI chasing my men down and killing them as they routed, and being unable to do anything about it.

There's routing during battle, and there's routing post-battle. During battle, yes the AI chases routers, as do I - that's fair game. Post-battle routing is when every unit on the opponent's side is routing, so the battle is automatically won and the option appears to end the battle immediately. The AI can't do this, the battle just ends for them, and if you're lucky your men escape to fight another day. You on the other hand can wipe them all out. Which is a tad unfair, but each to their own.

[Craterus]

I pursue the occasional enemy, perhaps the enemy's stronger units, but I generally end the battle as soon as the option pops up. I think the AI needs all the help it can get in a campaign, and killing all its men after it loses a battle is a bit unfair as it can't do that to your own men.

Yeah, I never thought of this. Usually, I chase till all are dead.

But now, for more of a challenge, I will let them run free, to trouble me another day. Except for Romans, fleeing Romans make for a better hunt than anything else. Oh yeah, and Egyptians must die too.

[Muska Burnt]

i let one man go so he can tell the tale

[pezhetairoi]

I pursue and cut them all down. Pursuit is an integral part of the battle, killing them means I don't have to see their faces again, and anyway, experience is always a useful thing for my cavalry.

[Seamus Fermanagh]

Gads we're a bloodthirsty lot!

THink of the children.....






Seamus

[Norxis]

Yeah I usually kill them all (or try to), which is why I have a couple of light cavalry with every army. Equites are great for this, and they can usually chase down the enemy generals heavy cavalry unit which is good too. But after seeing some of this post information about what the computer does, maybe I'll stop slaughtering too (unless I need/want an heroic victory)

[SMZ]

Well, historically... (since that seems to be the rage - lol)

... spearing the enemy in the back when they turned to run was the fun part, and until the age of chivalry, such an opportunity was rarely passed up... even then, it was pretty standard procedure... very few commanders would allow an enemy to run off to trouble them another day. Rarely indeed would a general be suitably impressed by the others fortitude, honor, etc to allow them to quit the field in safety. Occasionally, to avoid over-extension, this might be done - but by and large, the loss of the battle by one side marked the begginings of a "great slaughter"...

If you're concerned about fairness to the computer, there's a simple solution. After a loss, disband any troops which you feel would not have been able to escape. That's easily figured out. If they had light cavalry - get rid of most or all of your infantry. If some of your heavy cavalry were close to that light cavalry - get rid of them too, etc, etc. If they were a bunch of plodding phalanxes... keep your men.

[nameless]

... spearing the enemy in the back when they turned to run was the fun part, and until the age of chivalry, such an opportunity was rarely passed up... even then, it was pretty standard procedure... very few commanders would allow an enemy to run off to trouble them another day. Rarely indeed would a general be suitably impressed by the others fortitude, honor, etc to allow them to quit the field in safety. Occasionally, to avoid over-extension, this might be done - but by and large, the loss of the battle by one side marked the begginings of a "great slaughter"...

If I remember correctly there was something that said that Romans tend to allow an opening for the enemy to run as an enemy that is willing to fight to the death will cause casualties on your side.

Though most of the texts I've read usually point out that the armies that lose usually get wiped out though there are still survivors such as Scipio taking with him survivors of the massacre of Cannae to fight Hannibal and so forth. Then there are captured foes but those are for ransoming, especially if they were wealthy people.

Though for Chivarley it wasn't as big as it was then but was still around. Caesar allowing a Gaulic tribe which betrayed him to go in peace in respect of their former alliance and the Parthian Troops who massacred several cohorts which opened their ranks when the remaining 20 legionaries charged them in a suicide run out of respect for their bravery.

[SMZ]

oh yes, don't surround the enemy and force them to fight! Even in game a unit will fight to the death in that situation (try it sometime - box a unit on four sides and attack, they'll fight to the death just like on city walls) But once the foe starts running away thru that convenient gap you've left, casting away weapons and armor so they can run faster, etc... that's the time to quench your weapons thirst... and the Romans did it just as avidly as anybody else...

I agree however, certain generals would let the enemy go on certain occasions due to their personal values... by and large however, worries about one's own casualites or concerns about getting spread out in extremely hostile territory would be the only prevention. Another possible case is that some generals permit a beaten foe to leave because that defeated mentality can infect other armies which the survivors join. But once again - those are exceptions.

You bring up a good point with ransom - I really wish that aspect was in the game... that and looting dead soldiers...

[womble]

I rather wish there was a "general pursuit" command for when the enemy breaks. Yes, most of the time I will pursue to the map limits. Less often with brigands (or if they're not going to reform because I've taken them past the limit of no return, or they're out of moves) because they tend to melt away once defeated.

I so rarely lose to the AI on the tactical map that the advantage I gain over an AI which can't pursue my army is miniscule. Though lately it's taken to accepting the first battle then dong a runner when I start maneuvering to get to grips... That's *really* annoying. Especially when I don't bother pursuing and the encounter is declared a "Draw" (only happened the once, I assure you :-).

[PseRamesses]

In STW I beheaded everyone to spare them the shame of defeat.
In MTW (due to chivalry) I never pursued.
In RTR I cut them down to the last man.

[King Henry V]

When I'm really bloodthirsty is when a garrison sallies out to attack my troops. I don't like sieges, They're costly and long.

[Geoffrey S]

I generally chase them down; it's also what was done in the old days. The most casualties in a battle would usally occur at this point, when battle turned to slaughter.

[gardibolt]

Kill, Baby, Kill!

Faster, Pussycat, Kill! Kill!


Yeah, Exterminating the routing forces is satisfying and seems true to life to me. This ain't the Age of Chivalry.