Soldiers don't follow orders.

[Xehh II]

I'm having a real problem with my soldiers not doing what I say.
For example in my Rome campaign I ordered my Acensei to flank and fire into a Phalanx moving towards my line but do they do that? No, instead one unit runs into and melee attacks some Hoplitai while the other unit fires into some Akontistai.
Another example, I ordered my cavalry to charge into some Toxetai that were flanking me but do they do that? No, they decide to charge into the local, neighborhood Phalanx and get murdered.

Has anyone else had this problem? I have it at least once in every single battle I fight, no matter what faction i'm playing as.

[Landwalker]

I've found that if any of the soldiers in a unit "snag" on an enemy, the entire unit converges on that enemy. I suspect that is what happened to you Accensi and yout cavalry. If you repeatedly issue the order to move/withdraw, however, eventually they'll get the message.

Cheers.

[MerlinusCDXX]

I'm having a real problem with my soldiers not doing what I say.
For example in my Rome campaign I ordered my Acensei to flank and fire into a Phalanx moving towards my line but do they do that? No, instead one unit runs into and melee attacks some Hoplitai while the other unit fires into some Akontistai.
Another example, I ordered my cavalry to charge into some Toxetai that were flanking me but do they do that? No, they decide to charge into the local, neighborhood Phalanx and get murdered.

Has anyone else had this problem? I have it at least once in every single battle I fight, no matter what faction i'm playing as.

have you taken your Accensi out of skirmish mode? if missile troops are left in skirmish mode they will try to skirmish away from the closest unit moving towards them...and right into another unit that is stationary or located behind them. also, turn off fire at will, units that 'skirmish away' will, when they stop moving, start firing at some random unit (don't know how the battlefield AI decides how to pick a target)

what type of cavalry unit were you using? if your cav were 'skirmisher cav (this does include the Tarentine Elite Cav, plus most gallic/germanic merc cav)'
you have to get them out of skirmish mode before they will charge properly. it could also have been that there were some men from the Toxotai unit mixed in with the Phalangitai and that is where the AI decided to target those Toxotai.

[konny]

Missle units usually do not follow orders to target enemy units in the second line when there is another unit between them and the target. They will shoot on that unit instead. Sollution: none, that I know of.

Another problem are units in formation: when you order the entire formation to attack a specific enemy unit and there are other enemy units closer to some of the units in your formation they will attack those instead. Sollution: give the order to every single unit in your formation.

On the slingers: Units in larger formation, espacially if these happen to be in wide order, might 'crash' with enemy units when ordered to manouver close to the enemy. Even skirmish mode won't prevent a melee in this case. Sollution: Move them like ships. Give them a destination far from the enemy formation, and once the got 'clear' the enemy, move them in again.

[Tellos Athenaios]

Solution I use:

first right click & drag to set the formation width & depth;
next order them to move away from your flanks (so if you would go for flanking manoeuvres against the left flank, you let them march a good distance to the right before you actually start flanking);
-then move them around the enemy flank;
-attack.

[NeoSpartan]

Me and madmatg had the same issue in MP back when it worked on .81x.

Here is the solutions we came up with:

How to get Archers/skerimishers to attack a specific unit rather than the ones surrounding it.
1-UNselect auto fire (meaning that they won't shoot unless u tell them to)
2-UNgroup them (don't have them in a group)

NOW: select of of them via Ctl+click or whatever & have them shoot. This is the only way to have ur ALL ur missiles shoot at a specific unit that is surrounded by others.

How to get cavarly (regular & skermisher) to charge a specific unit that is sorrouned by others.
1-UNgroup them(don't have them in a group)

NOW: use Ctl+click/C to select all ur cavarly units and have them attack the "specific" unit u want. (btw u need to be careful with pressing "C" because sometimes u put ur cavarly in loose formation by mistake, its just the timing of Ctl+C, so u have to make sure they get back into tight formation)

WHY????

Well missiles will shoot at WHOMEVER is closet to them. And if u have them in a group, they will be shooting at different targets when ur target is surrounded by other units.

Cavarly when u tell it to attack and the cavarly is in a group u run into trouble. IF one of ur cavarly squadrons is touching an enemy soldier from another unit that cavarly squadron will charge at that unit and NOT charge the intended target.

hope this helps

[overweightninja]

I've always put this down to vanilla RTW buggeyness but off the top of my head there are a couple of points I will bring up in case theres some obvious fix I've missed (plus perhaps it's just me? I've never looked...)

Firstly, quite often my units literally don't follow orders...at all. Or even appear to still be concious. They just stand, each man frozen to the spot, in a large, useless blob. Sometimes they show as engaged in melee (sometimes a stray man from the unit is, sometimes no enemies are to be seen), sometimes just appear to be playing statues for the hell of it.

Secondly, often when manoeuvring units (especially in close quarters) they decide to form some bizarre twisting circle pit. Again exact results vary, sometimes they swirl around a little then turn out as ordered (I can live with), sometimes they just appear to "knot" themselves and stay in a wierd little spiral.

As I said I've always just lived with this but as the threads here anyway...

Any comments?

[NeoSpartan]

I've always put this down to vanilla RTW buggeyness but off the top of my head there are a couple of points I will bring up in case theres some obvious fix I've missed (plus perhaps it's just me? I've never looked...)

Firstly, quite often my units literally don't follow orders...at all. Or even appear to still be concious. They just stand, each man frozen to the spot, in a large, useless blob. Sometimes they show as engaged in melee (sometimes a stray man from the unit is, sometimes no enemies are to be seen), sometimes just appear to be playing statues for the hell of it.

Secondly, often when manoeuvring units (especially in close quarters) they decide to form some bizarre twisting circle pit. Again exact results vary, sometimes they swirl around a little then turn out as ordered (I can live with), sometimes they just appear to "knot" themselves and stay in a wierd little spiral.

As I said I've always just lived with this but as the threads here anyway...

Any comments?

too vage a post to provide any help...

1-what unit
2-under what conditions
3-sieging?
4-after the enemy disengaded and retreated (not routing)
5-are they throwing a pila/javeling?
6-are they with "HOLD" on?
7- etc.....

[Xehh II]

Well, according to what you guys are saying, it seems the only thing I'm doing wrong is that I group my units.
So grouping units makes them retarded, ae?
I didn't know that, thanks for helping me.