A couple of Questions

[Atilius]

2. No. But he has a good chance of getting adopted and then appearing in the family tree. It depends on your settlement and general ratio.

Have you ever actually seen this happen? I tried to make this work some time ago. I killed off almost all of my characters and created a new general (not a captain). I had several times more settlements than characters, and my new character fought and won several engagements, yet I never received a "Man of the hour" or adoption message.

[wlesmana]

It's not definitive. We don't really know the exact formula of when a captain (or recruitable general) be made into Man of the Hour. It's possible there's a random chance in the formula because with all else being equal, sometimes it happens, sometimes it doesn't.

Heck, I've had Man of the Hour offered without any battles.