A newbie asks...

[thejeff]

I'd say that H2 priests semi-randomly decide to bless or Sermon. Maybe depending on how many sacred troops will be blessed vs how many can be morale boosted.

Both H1 & H2 may also choose to banish rather than bless if there are enemy undead within range. This can be good if you don't have a bless or bad if your expensive sacreds get slaughtered while the priests try to stop the one commander with a skeleton earring.

I'd say always script the commanders. Mages take some work. Priests and non-mage commanders are easy. You're pretty much going to always want the same orders, so just pick a number key and always put them there.

[Jarkko]

Originally Posted by Kobal2

Commanders without any magic will Stay Behind Troops by default I think.

I am pretty sure they have Attack Closest. It's not once or twice I've lost a commander who I forgot to script, and they then did proceed to run amok towards the enemy while friendly troops had Hold&Attack...

[LDiCesare]

Commanders without orders Stay behind troops. When there are no troops left, they attack closest. It's strange you got some charging, because most of the time I forget to give orders to indy commanders and they absolutely always stay behind troops.

[Edi]

Originally Posted by LDiCesare

Commanders without orders Stay behind troops. When there are no troops left, they attack closest. It's strange you got some charging, because most of the time I forget to give orders to indy commanders and they absolutely always stay behind troops.

If they can't get through the press of the infantry ahead of them, they will mill behind the horde, making it seem as if they were staying behind the troops.

Just try and put them alone in the center with infantry on the wings and maybe a few scattered around the front. To make sure of your test, try it with a mounted commander leading infantry.

In the absence of orders, they attack. This has been my experience 100% of the time.

[LDiCesare]

I tried the following:
7 commanders in the center with 120+ units on the sides and rear:
First thing the commanders do is move backwards. Stay behind troops.
Repeated the test with units on the side, not on the rear, and one commander in the front:
Same thing. Stay behind troops.

I consistently and always get a Stay behind troops behavior (except for mages who cast spells).
I tried with and without mages, mounted, chariot and on foot, with several squads and only one squad on the sides and/or behind, commander in front and in the middle.
I never saw a commander without orders attack when he had troops to lead (except for the usual stuff like being the last fighter, having only one soldier left, going berserk etc.).

[Kobal2]

Originally Posted by LDiCesare

I never saw a commander without orders attack when he had troops to lead (except for the usual stuff like being the last fighter, having only one soldier left, going berserk etc.).

That could be the crux of the issue. Many players bring any number of indie commanders along with their armies, both as insurance against remote attacks and to get someone to ferry the troops in case the primary troop carriers snuff it. These commanders have no troops, no equipment, no nothing, they're just *there*.

In that particular case, they could default to attacking instead of hiding I suppose.

[thejeff]

Yeah, I don't normally contradict Edi, but he's wrong here.
I don't know how he's getting those results, but I just watched both standard and mounted indy commanders run from the center to the rearmost troops and then stay behind the last poor crippled one as he headed for the front lines.
Near as I can tell as long as there are troops on the field, unscripted non-casters will stay behind them. Usually they wind up behind archers.

The only thing that doesn't count is bodyguards. Any troops on guard commander seem to be ignored. Probably to prevent everyone from just hiding behind everyone else.


Whether those commanders personally have squads assigned to them doesn't matter. Troops on the field are all that counts. I've even seen commanders head from the front lines back to the rear to stay behind one newly summoned Soulless.

[Edi]

Hmm, could be I've not been paying enough attention and I do sometimes have extra commanders. Wouldn't be the first time I've been wrong about something. If you guys have tested it, I'll accept those results.

[krpeters]

On the subject of commanders behaving badly, this is the funniest result I've seen:

Playing Arcosephale, I set my commander to "stay behind troops". My elephants attack, get chomped, rout. They crash through my lines, but I've intelligently placed my commander off to the side so he doesn't get trampled.

Next turn my commander decides to move "behind" my elephants.

*trample* dead commander my entire army routs

I've found that setting commanders to "holdholdholdholdholdstaybehindtroops" keeps the commander in the back where you want him rather than charging with the front line.

[thejeff]

The other thing that works particularly well when your trying to avoid elephant stomp is a handful of archers off to the side. They'll stay put and your commanders will stay behind them.