Too often you'll see units suiciding into enemy regions to scout behind the lines. Defenders are almost powerless to stop them since commanders with retreated units are pretty much untouchable except by assassins. In my opinion this is a very cheap trick to get reports you wouldn't normally get.
I'm not sure I've seen much of that, but that seems like a perfectly reasonable thing to stop allowing.
I mean, if your squire can't even "find you" with a Bounty Board report because you're traveling, a scout is hardly going to get in and out to a scattered unit, right?
No other thougts on this?
One of the things I've wanted to do for years is prevent units that lose a battle from exiting the region they lost it in any way except the way they came in.
That would pretty handily prevent the problems you mention.
Could you illustrate with an example? I'm afraid I don't understand what you're explaining :P
Quote from: Sacha on October 23, 2014, 12:48:48 AM
Could you illustrate with an example? I'm afraid I don't understand what you're explaining :P
An army attacks Orz across the bridge from Santoo. They are defeated, but with low withdraw settings, so they kept a lot of troops. Right now, they could just move straight through into the Giask-controlled area and start looting, scouting, whatever, behind enemy lines.
My change would mean that after that defeat,
they could only return to Santoo. All other travel options would be closed to them.
Well, that is a good idea, but in this particular example, my suggestion would be that the army that was defeated in Orz cannot scout with their units all scattered. This would be to prevent Sir Kepler to just sit in Orz with his unit scattered for days on end, providing scout reports from the regions behind Orz. if Sir Kepler tries to send out scouts, he would get a message back saying something along the lines of "You don't even know where most of your soldiers are, let alone your scouts. Gather your men first."
Quote from: Anaris on October 23, 2014, 12:57:04 AM
An army attacks Orz across the bridge from Santoo. They are defeated, but with low withdraw settings, so they kept a lot of troops. Right now, they could just move straight through into the Giask-controlled area and start looting, scouting, whatever, behind enemy lines.
My change would mean that after that defeat, they could only return to Santoo. All other travel options would be closed to them.
Doesn't that still leave open the option to remain there and therefore still scout the regions immediately behind the enemy force that just attacked you? I think that's part of what Sacha would like solved.
To use your example, the defeated troops in Orz can still scout Outer Giask and Cadier indefinitely, so long as they do not rally their troops.
EDIT: Oh man, I have good timing.
Anyone who sits in a region with retreated or scattered troops is vulnerable to being hunted. Once your troops are hunted down, you can be captured.
Your men are scattered. You can barely do anything until you've rallied them. At the very least, you should be forced to click the 'gather your men' button before being able to scout, and even then the risk of losing your scout should be significantly greater than normal.
Quote from: Sacha on October 23, 2014, 01:49:55 AM
Your men are scattered. You can barely do anything until you've rallied them. At the very least, you should be forced to click the 'gather your men' button before being able to scout, and even then the risk of losing your scout should be significantly greater than normal.
The latter part, I agree with. Scouting when not properly encamped (i.e., stationary in the region) should, indeed, be riskier. In fact, I'd go so far as to say that it should also make it more likely for hunting units to find you, as your scout leads them back to you.
Quote from: Anaris on October 23, 2014, 01:56:39 AM
The latter part, I agree with. Scouting when not properly encamped (i.e., stationary in the region) should, indeed, be riskier. In fact, I'd go so far as to say that it should also make it more likely for hunting units to find you, as your scout leads them back to you.
I like this solution. I like it a lot.
I like it enough to use moving text.
I remember discussing something about scattered and retreated with Anaris.
Maybe on top of what we've discussed, some of changes mentioned here can be implemented as well.
I think 'hunting enemies' should do more than kill a man or two as well. If you are chasing after 'retreated enemies' which probably still have an intact unit, you should expect some kind of resistance - possibly even able to repel your men if the unit is strong enough which in case may cause one of your hunting parties to be completely destroyed - while hunting 'scattered enemies' should be one sided slaughter.
Maybe scouting while scattered should start a battle following turn with a high chance of the noble of the scattered unit being captured?
I don't like the return moves only thing. There's a bigger army that just beat them in the same region. Surely they can deal with it. I've never seen purposely losing a battle to move into the next region ever being used.
Quote from: Kai on October 23, 2014, 03:56:08 AM
I don't like the return moves only thing. There's a bigger army that just beat them in the same region. Surely they can deal with it. I've never seen purposely losing a battle to move into the next region ever being used.
It's been done a few times, but never, as far as I know, with considerable success. It's something that makes the most out of a defeat, but it still remains a defeat.
I don't quite agree with the idea either. The armies all rally around one spot to fight, regardless of where they came from. Allies fight alongside each other, even if logically they could be flanking the enemy if they arrived from opposite directions. There's no reason to only be able to retreat where one came from, as one moved around in the region prior, during, and following the battle.
I know I've been asked not to rally my troops so that I could scout, but I don't think I've seen someone rally and keep moving into enemy lands. Not intentionally, anyway. I feel like I've also seen orders for one or two nobles to go suicide for scouting purposes, but it's usually when there isn't another path around.