Wraith Crown and routing

[WingedDog]

Why does the comander wearing the Wraith Crown has a chance of routing if he enters an enemy province alone and the skeletons gained by the crown are being killed? According fear and rout manual section - they are supposed to be in one squad with commander in order to cause fear checks, but aren't they just summons?

[MaxWilson]

I believe the 75%-HP autorout rule counts any creatures which are initially on the battleboard at the start of the battle. Thus, anything summoned by Wraith Crown, Holger the Head, Carcator the Pocket Lich, Percival the Pocket Knight, wolves that come with Dai Oni, and PD all get counted, and when 50% of all HP is gone you start making morale checks every round, and at 75% everybody autorouts (except for Morale 50 or 99).

-Max

[vfb]

I agree with Max's analysis.

The worst is Water Elementals from a bottle of water on an assassin. Even though there are a ton of HP left in subsequent shapes, the first time the water elemental gets nailed the assassin will route because of the 75% rule.

[lch]

The worst is Water Elementals from a bottle of water on an assassin. Even though there are a ton of HP left in subsequent shapes, the first time the water elemental gets nailed the assassin will route because of the 75% rule.
Sounds like a :bug: (the incorrect assessment of secondshapes, that is)

[Micah]

The secondshapes thing makes hydras nearly impossible to rout as well from what I've seen.

[MaxWilson]

The worst is Water Elementals from a bottle of water on an assassin. Even though there are a ton of HP left in subsequent shapes, the first time the water elemental gets nailed the assassin will route because of the 75% rule.
Sounds like a :bug: (the incorrect assessment of secondshapes, that is)

Perhaps, but when someone raised this issue with KO about Chayot, he just pointed out that they're supposed to have an escort of Ophanim. Maybe it's WAD.

-Max

[Dectilon]

I often stick a water elemental on my banelord thugs. Doesn't seem to affect them that the WE dies :P

The Wraith Crown thing I have experiences though, and frankly I think it needs to be changed.

[vfb]

The water bottle gives you unit #408, which has 30HP. A Bane Lord has 42 HP. Assuming the Bane Lord is raiding so it's just the 2 units, losing the first form of the water elemental brings you down to 58% of total HP, which is not even enough to trigger a morale check.

[DonCorazon]

A couple of times, I have witnessed a thug or a commander with 2-3 hydras route immediately, before any damage was inflicted. I seemed to remember something from the rulebook, and on p.3 when talking about changes from Dom 2, it mentions a change in which "everyone is subject to a special morale check that takes place for squads with 4 or fewer members. This includes pretenders fighting on their own."

When I looked at what causes a Morale check on p.80 I didn't see anything about a Morale check being triggered by 4 or fewer units, though there is a so-called "survivor" bonus that you would miss out on mentioned on the bottom of the page (so maybe that is what the comment on p.3 referred to).

Anyway, I never figured it out, and maybe I am missing something, but I always wondered if a solo unit was forced to make a morale check each turn.

[chrispedersen]

A couple of times, I have witnessed a thug or a commander with 2-3 hydras route immediately, before any damage was inflicted. I seemed to remember something from the rulebook, and on p.3 when talking about changes from Dom 2, it mentions a change in which "everyone is subject to a special morale check that takes place for squads with 4 or fewer members. This includes pretenders fighting on their own."

When I looked at what causes a Morale check on p.80 I didn't see anything about a Morale check being triggered by 4 or fewer units, though there is a so-called "survivor" bonus that you would miss out on mentioned on the bottom of the page (so maybe that is what the comment on p.3 referred to).

Anyway, I never figured it out, and maybe I am missing something, but I always wondered if a solo unit was forced to make a morale check each turn.

Correct. I do not remember the thread, but I do remember that the developers made a comment (perhaps in the release notes) to the effect that any unit of less than four was subject to melee checks, and that this was specifically caused to balance SC's somewhat.

[Zeldor]

Didn't it apply only to troops, not commanders? Stacks of less than 5 troops.

[DonCorazon]

Didn't it apply only to troops, not commanders? Stacks of less than 5 troops.

I am not sure but the rulebook on p.3 says "This includes pretenders fighting on their own. Supercombatants beware."

The rulebook doesn't seem to go into detail on this anywhere else that I have seen though I may have missed something.

[vfb]

KO posted something a while ago about morale-30 units not having to make some morale checks that normal units were subject to. I can't remember exactly what that was. They still auto-rout because of 75% total HP loss. Maybe it's just immunity to Fear?

[MaxWilson]

Since KO mentioned that Morale 30 units are "special" I have played closer attention to them, and I haven't seen a Morale 30 unit ever rout without the 75% HP limit being passed. They appear to be immune to fear and regular morale checks. I suspect that in this case the manual is overzealous, because all pretenders have Morale 30. The manual should probably be taken to read "this includes really tough units fighting on their own."

-Max

[chrispedersen]

Since KO mentioned that Morale 30 units are "special" I have played closer attention to them, and I haven't seen a Morale 30 unit ever rout without the 75% HP limit being passed. They appear to be immune to fear and regular morale checks. I suspect that in this case the manual is overzealous, because all pretenders have Morale 30. The manual should probably be taken to read "this includes really tough units fighting on their own."

-Max

I have seen SC's with 30 morale route. I think it does not happen commonly because they simply always pass their morale checks.
But the way to do it would be to take a SC, make him offensively useless.. (two shields)

Put him up against another SC with a horror helmet and a rat tail - watch what happens... if you repeat enough times ....

[MaxWilson]

I have observed fights like this--in particular fights with fear--and never seen a Morale 30 creature rout from Fear since I started looking for it. Notably, even high-morale (22) creatures rout when faced with e.g. 300 Hydras after killing maybe 10 of them, but five Morale 30 creatures will kill them all without a problem. (Assuming they're tough enough, that is.) You can actively observe the Morale dropping on the Morale 22 guys, too (Fear causes Morale loss), whereas the Morale 30 guys stay up at 30 the whole time.

Incidentally, this makes Manifestation great against non-Morale 30 creatures, even ones w/ Ritual of Returning, Phoenix Pyre, #secondshape, etc. Ashen Angels have Fear. And if you rout off the edge of the battlefield you just die.

-Max

P.S. At first I had "immortality" listed along w/ RoR, etc., but come to think of it, I don't know of any units w/ immortality that aren't also Morale 30.

[AreaOfEffect]

Still worth noting that, even within their own dominion, immortal units that rout or retreat from an assassination don't come back to life the next turn. They just sort of run off into oblivion I guess.

[vfb]

...
P.S. At first I had "immortality" listed along w/ RoR, etc., but come to think of it, I don't know of any units w/ immortality that aren't also Morale 30.

Vampires (Count/Lord/vanilla), Fay Boars, and TC heroes are not morale 30.

[Psycho]

I remember reading a while ago about a tactic for killing SCs where you would spam them with lesser horrors thus routing them, while also taking adjacent provinces. That would imply that moral 30 creatures (as most SCs are moral 30) are subject to fear, but that you just need a big enough fear score from lots of lesser horrors. I never tried it though.

[MaxWilson]

No, Baalz' tactic doesn't apply to Morale 30 creatures[1]. That's actually what got me interested in Fear mechanics. Prophetizing your SC gives him Morale 30, so you should have at least one SC that is immune to Fear.

-Max

[1] Or at least, the Fear part doesn't apply. Many SCs are not well-equipped to handle a bunch of Horrors or Lesser Horrors, though, and might well rout anyway when they lose 75% HP[2]. (Especially if they're stationed in a province w/ PD.)

[2] One more interesting thing: the 75% limit does not seem to apply to 3rd-party attackers like Horrors, Lammashtas, the undead horde from Ghost Riders, or any creatures that you add w/ Shift+'U' during battles[3].

[3] Sometimes I enjoy tossing a few Doom Horrors into a battle replay, especially one with hundreds of troops attacking a smaller army. "Let's see how this would have played out if you were picking on someone your *OWN* size!" This can also be a good way to gauge the strength of enemy armies and/or see what they have scripted, even if you're only attacking/retreating a scout. It's also good for re-randomizing a battle (add an insignificant unit and kill it w/ Shift+'K') to see if the outcome was a statistical fluke or not.

[SlipperyJim]

I've been playing around with (GoR'ed) Davanas and Seraphs as supercombatants in my current game. They all get Wraith Crowns as standard equipment. And I've never had one of my SCs flee when all of the skellies die ... ever.

I wonder if it's about hitpoints? My SCs have enough hitpoints that losing a few skellies doesn't make much difference to the total.

Anyway, I'm not saying that y'all are wrong. I'm simply saying that my anecdotal experience doesn't match yours. I hope that helps.


PS: A Seraph with the Harvest Blade and Fenris Pelt can kill a whole lotta chaff in a hurry. :D Just remember to bring along someone else (another Seraph?) to bless him, because he won't bless himself.

[AreaOfEffect]

Jim, your right, the 75% auto-rout is based on HP and not number of units. However, if you read closely, all of the other players already know that.

The problem is that not all thugs have as many hit points as a Seraph or Davanas. A Bane Lord is a perfectly acceptable thug, but only has about 42 hit points. Also, if you land on a province with a bunch of corpses you will likely get enough soulless, which are all flush with HP, that an auto-rout is very possible. Moving to provinces with no corpses will change your results dramatically.

[Psycho]

This can also be a good way to gauge the strength of enemy armies and/or see what they have scripted, even if you're only attacking/retreating a scout.

This is a very nice tip. Thanks.