General Killed when Routing Skirmishers!

[SimonLancaster]

This made me laugh.. Xystophoroi charged and routed some disrupted skirmishers in the open... and they lost their general!

[kronenblatt]

The general and his bodyguard got reckless... Plus, as I wrote in the chat, slingers are lethal when panicking, probably unleashing whatever they had left of those .44 Magnum lead balls....

[SimonLancaster]

I read somewhere that there is a 3% chance to lose a general in a melee.. but I thought that was against heavy/medium inf and cav. Would it still be the case against routing skirmishers?

[SimonLancaster]

Good spot, K. They were Roman skirmishers!

[kronenblatt]

I read somewhere that there is a 3% chance to lose a general in a melee.. but I thought that was against heavy/medium inf and cav. Would it still be the case against routing skirmishers?

It's actually 1-in-90, i.e., slightly above 1%.

[Ray552]

I believe RBS mentioned in a post a while ago that the risk of a general being incapacitated or killed was 1.11% if his unit won or drew a melee, and 3.33% if his unit lost a melee, with the check performed for each individual enemy unit it is fighting (for example, if the general's unit is fighting three enemy units, the killed/wounded check would be done three times per melee phase.)

Apparently the enemy unit type did not matter (skirmishers, infantry, cavalry, etc.) or whether they were heavy, medium, etc.

As mentioned above, the general and his bodyguard probably got overconfident when overrunning the despised slingers, so he took an arrow to the knee, I mean, a sling-bullet right between the baby blues...

Wasn't Pyrrhus taken out by a roof tile dropped on him by an old woman?

[kronenblatt]

Wasn't Pyrrhus taken out by a roof tile dropped on him by an old woman?

Yep, so it's said.

[rbodleyscott]

Generals can't be lost when pursuing routers, but I assumed this happened in the close combat that resulted in the slingers routing.

Maybe he was hit by a sling bolt, or maybe he just fell off his horse and broke his leg. Note that "fallen" generals are not necessarily dead.

Skirmishers are armed with missile weapons, so why shouldn't they kill/wound a general? Alexander and the Emperor Julian were both wounded by javelins (the latter fatally). King Richard I was fatally wounded by a crossbow bolt fired by a peasant boy. As mentioned above, Pyrrhos was killed by a roof tile thrown by an old woman. No doubt there are many other examples, those are just particular famous ones that spring to mind.

Generals should think themselves lucky we don't allow them to be lost from distant shooting.

[melm]

I have about the same experience but it happened to me not my opponent. Cavalry with the genera charged the fragmented skirmisher. Bang! Skirmisher routed, general killed.

[Athos1660]

I must admit I am a fan of unexpected events such as the neutralisation of your (or your opponent's) General by a skirmisher, that both are realistic/historical and add spice to the battle.

[kronenblatt]

I must admit I am a fan of unexpected events such as the neutralisation of your (or your opponent's) General by a skirmisher, that both are realistic/historical and add spice to the battle.

+1

[kronenblatt]

Generals can't be lost when pursuing routers, but I assumed this happened in the close combat that resulted in the slingers routing.

Maybe he was hit by a sling bolt, or maybe he just fell off his horse and broke his leg. Note that "fallen" generals are not necessarily dead.

Skirmishers are armed with missile weapons, so why shouldn't they kill/wound a general? Alexander and the Emperor Julian were both wounded by javelins (the latter fatally). King Richard I was fatally wounded by a crossbow bolt fired by a peasant boy. As mentioned above, Pyrrhos was killed by a roof tile thrown by an old woman. No doubt there are many other examples, those are just particular famous ones that spring to mind.

Generals should think themselves lucky we don't allow them to be lost from distant shooting.

Speaking of Julian, in case you haven't yet read Julian by Gore Vidal, I can strongly recommend it. And also on "the Emperor Julian [was] wounded by javelins (fatally)".