Slitherine

The modifiers do puzzle me as do the use of the general with the trait.
Does the army have to attack to use the trait ?
Are the modifiers for the own troops or do they effect the enemies troops?
The name suggests it's a defensive trait that gives a bonus to your own troops in certain terrain, while the enemy gets a negative modifier for walking in a trap.
Can you give information about these traits please?

They affect the general's own army, so they give a bonus when the attacker and penalty when the defender in the appropriate terrain. According to the manual, the defender is the side with the largest amount of units that did not move during the latest turn resolution tick, so the traits encourage you to stay mobile.

They are probably the most useful on a general that has a higher Offense rating than Defense, in which case you usually want them to try to be the attacker rather than the defender if possible anyway.

Unfortunately, based on that description, it seems like having an unwalled garrison in a region that the enemy is invading will likely screw you over when you have these traits, even if your main army is moving. The manual is not clear on what happens if every unit involved on either side of the battle moved.

Manual 10.7.1. wrote:Each side is either defending or attacking. The defender in a battle is the side with the biggest number of units not having moved this impulse (the only exception to this is if the defenders have sortied from a besieged city). Defenders use the defence rating of their troops, attackers their attack.

It's actually very tricky.
I had a forest ambusher. He attacked a forest region without walls. Took it on first battle with a +1 to his units' attack score. On the same turn, an enemy stack arrived, belatedly, to the region. My ambusher general now gave -1 to all units' defense because he was now in defense. Sure, I had +2 from forest defense, but it hurt.

LDiCesare wrote: ↑Sat Aug 10, 2019 6:16 pm It's actually very tricky.
I had a forest ambusher. He attacked a forest region without walls. Took it on first battle with a +1 to his units' attack score. On the same turn, an enemy stack arrived, belatedly, to the region. My ambusher general now gave -1 to all units' defense because he was now in defense. Sure, I had +2 from forest defense, but it hurt.

Kinda crappy ability, the guy is also expert at BEING ambushed?