two observations

[fogman]

1. the reaction fire routine needs fixing. the unit should be firing at the nearest unit not some unit at the extreme range. it is very easy to fool enemy troops into firing at distant targets instead of ones in front of them.

2. what makes losing units retreat? it seems random and frustrating when you have worked your way around a fight and ready for a flanking attack and the enemy loses the fight and retreat, and you lose two or three turns trying to get another flanking attack.

[KiwiWarlord]

1. The rule book mentions that the AI reacts to enemy movement or shooting ,so seems random.
Your point does seem valid though.
I'm sure RBS will elaborate.

2.Yes I notice that it happens more under P&S Campaigns and caused me similar problems this morning.
The CT is moral based, maybe higher quality troops recoil as they are better trained ?
Have you noticed the quality of your enemy troops that retreat?

[jomni]

2. Is that about falling back?

[rbodleyscott]

1. the reaction fire routine needs fixing. the unit should be firing at the nearest unit not some unit at the extreme range. it is very easy to fool enemy troops into firing at distant targets instead of ones in front of them.

A detailed algorithm is in fact used to decide whether a unit will reaction fire when an enemy unit moves or shoots. It takes into account distance, arc of fire, and quality of troops. There is also, of course a random element. Good quality troops will be more likely to "wait until they see the whites of their eyes", raw troops will tend to shoot at the first thing that moves. Owing to the random element there will be exceptions to this and if enough things move/shoot nearby, sooner or later even a high quality unit may shoot at a sub-optimal target.

2. what makes losing units retreat? it seems random and frustrating when you have worked your way around a fight and ready for a flanking attack and the enemy loses the fight and retreat, and you lose two or three turns trying to get another flanking attack.

1) Mounted troops break off from foot if they would be disadvantaged in the next melee round.
2) Mounted troops break off from other mounted troops (if permitted) if they lose a round of combat "badly". (By the same criteria as causes a cohesion test modifier). Mounted can only break off from enemy mounted shock troops (mounted with heavy lancers, light lancers or impact mounted capability, and all gendarmes, cavaliers and determined horse) if they themselves (i.e. the breaking-off unit) originally initiated the combat.
3) Foot troops break off from non-shock foot if they lose a round of combat "badly". (Shock foot are keils, or non-light foot with impact foot or salvo capability.) [edited to correct an error]

Troops cannot break off if fighting to flank/rear.

There is no direct random element to the decision to break off, but obviously there is a random element to the combat result and hence whether the unit loses the combat "badly". How likely a unit is to lose "badly" will depend on the POAs, and the cohesion state and relative combat strengths of the units - in many situations it will be impossible, in spite of the random element. The tooltip only reports the overall chances of losing, but a unit with a very low chance of losing will have little or no chance of losing "badly", whereas this is more likely if the odds are fairly even between the two units, and even more so if the odds favour the enemy unit.

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So there is a random element to both of the issues you raised, but the events are in no way purely random, because they do take into account the above-mentioned factors. A certain degree of randomness in a wargame is necessary to realism, because it is impossible to take into account every possible mishap that might affect the result in real life, and certainly impossible for a commander to know in advance exactly how each situation will play out. Also because otherwise when a unit of 2,000 men fought an otherwise identical unit of 1,999 men, the former would always win - which is obviously not the case in real life.

[KiwiWarlord]

[
3) Foot troops break off from other foot (if permitted) if they lose a round of combat badly. (By the same criteria as causes a cohesion test modifier). Foot can only break off from enemy foot shock troops (keils and non-light foot with impact foot or salvo capability) if they themselves originally initiated the combat.

I charged a Fragmented Spanish Keil with a Maurician Mixed Foot unit and the Keil broke off ?? Did not rout, just retreated.
The Maurician Mixed Foot are not Shock Troops and initiated the combat yet the Shock Troops broke off ??

There have been many Break Offs in this particular game

[rbodleyscott]

[
3) Foot troops break off from other foot (if permitted) if they lose a round of combat badly. (By the same criteria as causes a cohesion test modifier). Foot can only break off from enemy foot shock troops (keils and non-light foot with impact foot or salvo capability) if they themselves originally initiated the combat.

I charged a Fragmented Spanish Keil with a Maurician Mixed Foot unit and the Keil broke off ?? Did not rout, just retreated.
The Maurician Mixed Foot are not Shock Troops and initiated the combat yet the Shock Troops broke off ??

There is no rule preventing shock troops from breaking off. The rule restricts the circumstances in which units can break off from shock troops.

In your game, the keil was fortunate enough to pass two cohesion tests - once when you charged it, and once when it lost the combat "badly". Hence it broke off rather than routed.

[KiwiWarlord]

Just read the rule book re Foot Breaking Off.

" Foot may break off from enemy non-shock enemy foot if they
lose badly in close combat."

You posted

" Foot can only break off from enemy foot shock troops (keils and non-light foot with impact foot or salvo capability) if they themselves originally initiated the combat."

Hence my error.

The Spanish Keil's break off was legal after all. Damned thing will probably rally now

[rbodleyscott]

You posted
" Foot can only break off from enemy foot shock troops (keils and non-light foot with impact foot or salvo capability) if they themselves originally initiated the combat."

On rechecking the code, foot cannot break off from foot shock troops even if they (the breakers-off) initiated the combat. This is as per the manual. I will edit the post above to correct the error. Thanks for pointing it out.

[TheGrayMouser]

I like the breakoffs that occur when units already engaged in melee, what I have a problem with is the immediate breakoffs that happen the same turn ( excactly once second) after impact. IE the "cavalry bounce". I would not have issue with it except: in cases of a Kiel attacking cavaly or the cavalry attacking a unit it really shouldnt, like a P&S or kiel, it seems that no matter how many casualties the unit that breaks off takes, it never suffers a cohesion loss.... I dont think its any longer a case of luck as I have seen the phenom. multiple times in the same game, but who knows. If I had some knowledge that the unit lost the combat and tested cohesion but saved, i'd likley feel better about it..

[rbodleyscott]

I like the breakoffs that occur when units already engaged in melee, what I have a problem with is the immediate breakoffs that happen the same turn ( excactly once second) after impact. IE the "cavalry bounce". I would not have issue with it except: in cases of a Kiel attacking cavaly or the cavalry attacking a unit it really shouldnt, like a P&S or kiel, it seems that no matter how many casualties the unit that breaks off takes, it never suffers a cohesion loss.... I dont think its any longer a case of luck as I have seen the phenom. multiple times in the same game, but who knows. If I had some knowledge that the unit lost the combat and tested cohesion but saved, i'd likley feel better about it..

The immediate breakoff after impact combat was introduced to P&S deliberately to make the interaction between reiters and pike blocks work more historically than in FOGR, where the reiters have to survive a round of melee as well the the impact before they can break off, and are mostly wrecked in the process, making the caracole (which was primarily designed for use against pike blocks) non-viable as a tactic.

If a keil charges gendarmes or kurassiers, the gendarmes/kurassiers will break off, not because they lost the combat, but because they will be disadvantaged in the melee. Mostly they will not have lost the impact combat, because the POAs will be even, so they won't usually take a cohesion test. Certainly they do sometimes lose and drop cohesion - but reiters are more likely to do so than gendarmes/kurassiers, because the keil is 100 POA (assuming it is a pure keil) up vs reiters at impact.

Gendarmes/kurassiers/reiters don't usually charge keils frontally - if they do they will probably lose and will then take a cohesion test. But the situation is far less common than keils charging gendarmes/kurassiers.

[TheGrayMouser]

True that keils are more likley to be the agressors here
Havnt played enough of the 1500's part two modules to see how reiters fair but makes sense their average quality will make it more likley for some real damage to be done to them
As long as they test if they lose Im happy!

(I suppose I could contend that perhaps they should test regardless as a unit that "voluntarily" backs away from an approaching keil etc via retrograde motion ie the fallback function, always tests (and seems to lose that test 50% , at least when their my guys lol) and they arnt even in combat yet!)

on a side note re reiters: Some time ago found an interesting take that pistol tactics developed more out of cavalry vs cavalry combat than a tactic to combat pike blocks. I beleive one of the key arguement was that by the time pistols became widely availalbe, pike blocks generally had attached shot anyhow, thus making trading "volley's" suicide or something along those lines .
Such a fascinating era!

[fogman]

1. the reaction fire routine needs fixing. the unit should be firing at the nearest unit not some unit at the extreme range. it is very easy to fool enemy troops into firing at distant targets instead of ones in front of them.

A detailed algorithm is in fact used to decide whether a unit will reaction fire when an enemy unit moves or shoots. It takes into account distance, arc of fire, and quality of troops. There is also, of course a random element. Good quality troops will be more likely to "wait until they see the whites of their eyes", raw troops will tend to shoot at the first thing that moves. Owing to the random element there will be exceptions to this and if enough things move/shoot nearby, sooner or later even a high quality unit may shoot at a sub-optimal target.

the issue is that by altering the sequence of his actions, the players can totally fool the computer into ineffective reaction fire. what i see is there needs to be a priority target, i.e. one most likely to inflict the most damage to the firing unit on that turn and one that the reaction fire is most likely to inflict the most damage on. far away enemy units should not be able to draw fire away from a much closer enemy unit which presents both a greater danger and a greater target. this should not be random since i just don't see it happening in practically any circumstances.

[rbodleyscott]

1. the reaction fire routine needs fixing. the unit should be firing at the nearest unit not some unit at the extreme range. it is very easy to fool enemy troops into firing at distant targets instead of ones in front of them.

A detailed algorithm is in fact used to decide whether a unit will reaction fire when an enemy unit moves or shoots. It takes into account distance, arc of fire, and quality of troops. There is also, of course a random element. Good quality troops will be more likely to "wait until they see the whites of their eyes", raw troops will tend to shoot at the first thing that moves. Owing to the random element there will be exceptions to this and if enough things move/shoot nearby, sooner or later even a high quality unit may shoot at a sub-optimal target.

the issue is that by altering the sequence of his actions, the players can totally fool the computer into ineffective reaction fire. what i see is there needs to be a priority target, i.e. one most likely to inflict the most damage to the firing unit on that turn and one that the reaction fire is most likely to inflict the most damage on. far away enemy units should not be able to draw fire away from a much closer enemy unit which presents both a greater danger and a greater target. this should not be random since i just don't see it happening in practically any circumstances.

The problem with that is that the computer cannot predict what the player will do next, so by making it absolutely predictable whether the reaction fire will occur, you just give the player a different way to manipulate events.

In any case there are plenty of historical cases of units firing inappropriately.

As I say, the AI does currently take into account range and arc of fire when deciding whether units should reaction shoot. We are happy with the current balance in this regard.

[KiwiWarlord]

The immediate breakoff after impact combat was introduced to P&S deliberately to make the interaction between reiters and pike blocks work more historically than in FOGR, where the reiters have to survive a round of melee as well the the impact before they can break off, and are mostly wrecked in the process, making the caracole (which was primarily designed for use against pike blocks) non-viable as a tactic.

Can the Break Off Rule be made to apply to Reiter only ?

[rbodleyscott]

The immediate breakoff after impact combat was introduced to P&S deliberately to make the interaction between reiters and pike blocks work more historically than in FOGR, where the reiters have to survive a round of melee as well the the impact before they can break off, and are mostly wrecked in the process, making the caracole (which was primarily designed for use against pike blocks) non-viable as a tactic.

Can the Break Off Rule be made to apply to Reiter only ?

We are happy with the break off rule as it is. It represents the difficulty of a pike block advancing in the face of gendarmes. If the pikes advance, the gendarmes are assumed to make a controlled countercharge, which once again brings the pike block to a halt. The gendarmes then break off ready to do the same again.

Pike blocks already dominate in their period. Why would we want to make them even better?

[fogman]

it's your game. i can't help but notice however that it is oddly inconsistent that the immediate proximity of an enemy triggers severe restrictions on movement, turning, melee choices, but has zero effect on firing, which at close range, is little different from melee. and i may add that knowledge of the aforementioned restrictions are the key to victory in this game (as well as a healthy dose of luck on morale checks on big units, friendly or enemy) as flanking attacks are totally predicated on that knowledge.

[rbodleyscott]

it's your game. i can't help but notice however that it is oddly inconsistent that the immediate proximity of an enemy triggers severe restrictions on movement, turning, melee choices, but has zero effect on firing.

Priority rules affect turning, which affects the arc of fire on any enemy not directly ahead. So although the game allows units to fire at any target of their choice, they will doing so at half effect against enemies not directly to front.