Faulty Battle Allegiances

[Andrew]

Step #3 doesn't explain two battles in Nascot where in one, Perdan and Perleone (allies) fought alongside monsters against Highmarch, and another where Perdan just watched as monsters fought against Highmarch.

Highmarch was peasants. Perdan and Perleone are allies, Perleone is at Neutral with Highmarch, and I think Perdan is at Neutral too. Perleone was looting the region and probably had attack orders.

For your situations here, I'd need to know who was already present, who was showing up that turn, and what the battle report said for who took control of the battlefield, to exactly why it happened and/or fix my list of steps.

If I had to guess though, in your Perdan, Perleone, and Monsters vs Highmarch, Highmarch was the defender.

Step ??: Highmarch is assigned Defender A.
Step 12: No Change.
Step 13: Monsters attack because they're at war with EVERYONE.
Step 14: No change.
Step 15: Perleone with attack orders violates their neutrality and joins the assault.
Step 16: No change.
Step 17: No change.
Step 18: Perdan, allied with Perleone, joins their allies assault against Highmarch.

Neutral is not Peace. If Perdan and Highmarch had peace, Perleone would've assaulted alone. 

You can only end up fighting with monsters as your ally if they are NOT the defender, as every realm would see them as the enemy in step 13. Since Highmarch was defending, this made the monsters attackers. Perleone joined due to unit settings, and Perdan followed their ally.

As for Perdan watching monsters and Highmarch fight, it's Perdan's neutrality. In this case I'd have to assume that Monsters were attacking, and Highmarch was defending. Perdan didn't join the defense, because they were neutral with the defenders--in other words, as far as the game could tell, it wasn't Perdan's fight, just Highmarch's.

[edgewater1364]

As the OP, I'm not certain where the question of rogues came in, that was not part of my inquiry, but I -am- satisfied with the level of response here.

Apologies for the aggressive tone but it's very frustrating to play something for over a decade and have it go against what was understood.

My understanding would naturally have been that "At War" would supercede everything else. Not that "in alliance" is the only way realms will fight alongside one another.

Caligus was "at Peace" with Highmarch.
Caligus was "at Alliance" with Redhaven.

Redhaven was "at Alliance" with Caligus.
Redhaven was "at Alliance" with Highmarch, I believe.

Redhaven, Caligus, and Highmarch were all "at War" with Vix Tiramora.

I would have expected Everyone "At War" with Vix Tiramora to band together to fight them.
If Caligus were "At Neutral" with Highmarch, I would have expected them to join with Highmarch to fight Vix Tiramora, or at least with Redhaven, their Allies.

Caligus does not officially trust Highmarch. Their stance is Neutrality, but now, they will be forced into an untrusting Alliance due to this code because they Do Intend to fight together, meaning they intend to continue fighting alongside their allies, Redhaven, Sirion etc. Not necessarily Highmarch.

[Andrew]

I only brought rogues up because if I'm going to detail how it works, I'm going to detail ALL of how it works (which includes rogues).

Should this edge case be addressed? Yes. Delvin, Vita, and I all have bounced ideas around on how to fix it, but I think Delvin wants to finish his current update before adding another change in--which is good, because a focused Delvin means things get done sooner.

Someone should throw that guide I made on your wiki though, in the manual ideally, or it'll probably get lost again like the other times it's been detailed (or so I'm told).