Scourge of War Boards

I just did some testing to see how exactly you can run right past enemy units without melee occurring.

The Facts:
First, I had two regiments move right next to each other, both TCed. Neither of them charged, they just shot at each other.


Then I un-TCed the confederate regiment, and they immediately tried to charge. The yankee regiment countercharged despite being TCed (as it should):


Then, I took the yankee unit and tried to run it away, AFTER the had already been meleeing. This worked (as it should not):


Now, at regular intervals, they would automatically turn to go back into melee, despite being TCed, but if I gave them another move order quickly, they'd follow it and stop meleeing.



The problem wasn't the "CantCounterCharge" for column in the drills.csv being set to 1. I also tested the same situation with that turned off and got the same results.

There are two things happening, one is that you can give orders to units that are charging/in melee, though they don't always respond, sometimes they do and it can then be exploited.

The other thing is that TCed units don't automatically charge when they're near the enemy. So if your regiments are all TCed, I'll have no trouble dashing my TCed regiment through yours. And if you click charge I can keep giving orders to continue the run.


My Opinion:
My own opinion is that there should be a radius inside which two regiments will automatically charge each other regardless of TC, and that the only order they'll respond to when inside this radius should be the Retreat command. If the enemy is coming at you and you want to avoid melee, you should have to start your men moving away before they get really close.

When outside that radius though, charging units should be able to stop the charge, maybe by using the Halt command. And of course, this radius should be in one of the mod-able files so we can adjust it to the right spot. I would then try having it quite low, so you can still shoot at each other up close and not have to leave your defensive position too early when the enemy is rushing it, but you'd still be easily able to fit one of your units in this radius with an enemy looking to run through your line.

haha good God, that first image is terrifying. Wouldn't even have to load a ball at that range, just burn your enemies with the powder fash.

MY Opinion

You should Never be forced to charge.
To force a charge is way to gamey especially with the lurkers who stay out of the fight till they
can find tired half routed troops to attack/charge.
This is way more prevalent than the fallback from charge issue.
Why the Hell should I lose a unit that had been fighting hard all day when they can just pull back behind a defence in depth?

Why the Hell should I lose a unit that had been fighting hard all day when they can just pull back behind a defence in depth?

The defender would have to pull back a little bit before the attacking charge reached his line. The real difference would be that if the one side wanted to melee, the other side wouldn't be able to pass through his line and still avoid it. I'm thinking of a very short radius.

We can disagree on that though. That's why I'd want the radius to be mod-able.

Why should you be able to run from a melee when a unit is right on top of you?

There's no way a regiment can form a column and run away from a charging regiment 2 yards away, at least not in real life.

I'd like to see a fall back 20 yards button or something like that. Going into column and running away from a charging unit that's within 5 yards of your regiment is silly.

Besides, Garnier's idea of a regiment not being able to stay in column when it gets within a 100 yards of an enemy infantry regiemnt would cure a lot of things.

Auto Melee as it is now totally s@cks why sholud a unit tced and in column marchin away from advancing infantry be sucked into a melee?

Even worse, retreating regiments now stop and autocharge back into melee over and over: melee, retreat, autocharge, melee, retreat, autocharge, melee, retreat, autocharge.

We were trying to address some situations that we were asked to address during the mp chat. We must not have fully understood the requests.

Auto Melee as it is now totally s@cks why sholud a unit tced and in column marchin away from advancing infantry be sucked into a melee?

Otherwise, a TC'd regiment could (and did before the latest patch) run through enemy units...this Suk'd worse. Obviously, it just had to be fixed...

Even worse, retreating regiments now stop and autocharge back into melee over and over: melee, retreat, autocharge, melee, retreat, autocharge, melee, retreat, autocharge.

Haven't seen this one at all, and I play test a lot...get us a save please, and thanks.