Scouts and their use( COE5 newbie here)

[RetroGrade]

According to the wiki->Every army should have a scout in it. The scout will sneak around in the surrounding areas and discover hidden enemies before they can ambush the army. In combat scouts join the ranks of the archers.
This doesnt make any sense. they cant move on their own, and if dropped in a location for scouting an enemy army just wipes them out.

So how do you actually use them properly?

[Brother Necro]

Basically, you don't need to use them. Simply having a scout in your army allows you to see nearby enemy stealth units and avoid getting ambushed.

Without scouts, you don't know if a seemingly empty farm or town is actually empty, or if there are stealth bandits or eldritch horrors but with one in your army, they will show up.

[Draken]

Scouts are any unit with Acute Senses.
Though some classes, like the Troll King, has it on a lot of units.

This trait allows you to see units with Stealth on the World Map next to you and thus avoid getting ambushed by them.

There is also the rare Spirit Sight, which counters the even rarer Invisibility trait. Those pair also works like Acute Senses and Stealth.

[Underscorecow]

Most of the real scouting is a captain pushing forward with an army thats just designed to kill bandits and animals and clear farms and hamlets (just archers lol)

This doesnt actually necessitate a scout for most human factions as captains tend to shrug of attacks from brigands due to the 1 armor 10 hp.

The actual scout units are mostly a binary check to prevent your important mages from getting ambushed.

[Gilmoy]

Most factions get random Scout offers, maybe 1 every 10 turns.
The mainline is thus:

• suffer ambush losses while waiting for 1st Scout
  
• buy 1st Scout, send jr. Commander back to ferry it
  
• merge into main army, thereafter it moves with main Commander
  
• main army now has 1 Scout, reveals all hostile Stealthy units
  
• buy up additional Scouts, enable additional Commander-Scout squads

In midgame, your main armies may want 2-3 Scout-likes, for redundancy.

A few factions can create Scout-likes at whim. (Any unit with Acute Senses counts.)

• Dwarf Queen always has 1 Outdoor Dwarf (= Scout) every turn, 0 RNG.
  
• Enchanter can get L2 Create Dogs of Silver and Gold, and both count.
  
• Bakemono L1 or L2 ritual can randomly summon Shikome.

The minimal army-with-Acute is thus 1 Dwarf Commander + 1 Outdoor Dwarf.
Dwarf Queen can (famously) do this every single turn. AI Dwarf Queen does

More rarely, some magic items also confer Acute Senses (or Spirit Sight).
Any Commander can equip that item, and become a self-mobile Scout.

• Senator randomly gets Augur, who is a Commander with Spirit Sight(!).

All he needs is 1 random magic item of Floating or Flying, and he go zoom

[RetroGrade]

Thanks for the info!

[SquareDildo]

Okay, tricky question then.
Why do some scouts have Stealth skill if they can't move independently, without a commander?

[Draken]

Originally posted by SquareDildo:

Okay, tricky question then.
Why do some scouts have Stealth skill if they can't move independently, without a commander?

Because a nation might have stealth on a commander. :)
Or you get an item that gives stealth and can then put it on a commander.

That way you can stealthily move around with your commander + scout without running into stealthy enemies.

Though I suspect the real answer is that units get thematic traits. Ghouls have sense dead, so the Scourge Lord can sense dead even though he has no use for that information.
The Druid can summon Goats with Mountain Move even though he has no commander with Mountain Move.

[Underscorecow]

Likely the answer to why scouts have stealth is to hide your army's ability to detect stealth units which is a much bigger deal in pvp where someone setting up an ambush isn't unheard of.

Although most of the time ambushes arn't actually hiding stealth units ready to kill a commander/mage, its just having a bigger army ready to catch another one.

[SquareDildo]

Markgraf has ghouls and then sense dead is useful. You would need to have 2 separate ghoul types, for scourge lord and for everyone else(although it could be useful because you could give it desert move).

[[Mi.Sa]Skullduggery]

Scouts can also be encountered as bandit forces as I've had times where I've been jumped by just a group of nothing but scouts and ambushed or what appeared to be a small bandit force was much bigger due it having a large bunch of scouts too.

[Draken]

Originally posted by Mi.SaSkullduggery:

Scouts can also be encountered as bandit forces as I've had times where I've been jumped by just a group of nothing but scouts and ambushed or what appeared to be a small bandit force was much bigger due it having a large bunch of scouts too.

Those aren't scouts. I think you are talking about Brigands.

[[Mi.Sa]Skullduggery]

So are there two types of bandits ones without stealth and another variety with stealth called something else?

[Draken]

Originally posted by Mi.SaSkullduggery:

So are there two types of bandits ones without stealth and another variety with stealth called something else?

Yes, the non stealth version is called Bandit. They do look the same.
Brigands are the ones you can hire in Old Castle Ruins.

[[Mi.Sa]Skullduggery]

Gotcha I guess I'm muddling up units, could have sworn I've encountered neutral scouts before but I guess I'm just misremembering.

On a more useful tip note don't leave just stealthy units in a fortified as if independents or an army with no scout attacks it will result in an open field battle.

[Draken]

Originally posted by Mi.SaSkullduggery:

Gotcha I guess I'm muddling up units, could have sworn I've encountered neutral scouts before but I guess I'm just misremembering.

On a more useful tip note don't leave just stealthy units in a fortified as if independents or an army with no scout attacks it will result in an open field battle.

Yep. Though it will result in an Ambush battle, which might be worth it.