gaining chevrons

[overweightninja]

i have at least a few times, had an army attack me or be attacked and then when we get to the field they flee without a shot being fired or any blood drawn, AND had units gain experience how do you explain that ?

Yup, happens to me quite often, its a bloody pain with EB's loading times.
I've noticed sometimes if I fight a battle and I'm in a very secure position, or if I am able to make (sometimes very few, as little as maybe 10) casualties on the enemy from missile fire without losing too much/anything myself the army will sometimes retreat.

Now apart from crap AI, I theorise that there is a point in the balance of the two armies, that if its on or over in the AIs favour, it thinks "yup I'll have this", and obviously if it's below it thinks "Bollocks to this I'm off!". My theory is that when the battle is engaged, the balance is on or above this point, however when you get in the battle itself, those few casualties or possibly simply the formation/position of your army can make that balance drop back below the midpoint (if it was low enough to begin with), so the enemy retreats.

As I said this is just a theory, but seems pretty plausible to me, hopefully someone can confirm this as truth or rubbish :)

Personally if I see the enemy is definitely withdrawing when I'm up for the fight, I just send my cavalry to chase them down. As neighboring units rarely stop to help their colleagues when retreating, you can usually run them down one at a time until they're dead or off the map.

Cheers