Units Move On There Own

[EndlessSauron]

I get my units in the position that i want them in right, then for some reason they decide that standing 200ft on their left with the flank showing in better, i am ripping out my hair sreaming at the pc because i keep taking 200 men losses per volley everytime i look away. I am on the verge of deleting this game.

[A Violent Fart]

1. Check to make sure they aren't overlapped. The game requires a level of precision and if the sprites are overlapped at all, they'll automatically adjust to clear their LoS. The game is sensitive. I found myself in the same situation till I learned the nuances.

2. If you've right clicked for them to engage another unit, they might be possibly following it to engage and being flanked.

3. The retreat system needs some refinement. Is the emblem flashing? Occasionally they retreat into the welcoming muzzles of the enemy.

Learning how to play knowing #1 will solve your issues. It did for me

[CrashToDesktop]

Yea, I've had some issues with units simply moving without orders. It happens with all types of Brigades (Infantry, Artillery, Cavalry and Skirmisher), though it's most frustrating when your Artillery decide it's a good idea to just run their guns into the enemy without the curtosy of putting a few rounds of canister their way first, or when your Supply Train decides to just randomly move towards that enemy Skirmisher unit. No idea why they do that.

Originally posted by breadstain:

3. The retreat system needs some refinement. Is the emblem flashing? Occasionally they retreat into the welcoming muzzles of the enemy.

The Retreat system for me tends to work very well. If a unit's banner is flashing, that means the unit is out of your control anbd Wavering and may or may not break and run before officially being Routed. If they're Routed (very definite white flashing), then that means they WILL break and retreat. However, from my experience, depending on the Command rating of the unit, they may recover from Wavering they're Routed. I've got a unit named the Blue Buffalos and they've accompanied my Corps since the first battle, and they've got every stat above 80 (currently just before Antietam). I've seen them very often start to Waver with that flashing, then fire off a couple volleys before they break, or even they'll just flat take their brave pills and return to my command.

[A Violent Fart]

When they retreat before a route... suppose for a minute you try to have them move backwards. On the move, you misjudged it and they take a volley to the rear. The game is programmed for the unit to retreat in the opposite direction they are currently traveling, so it's happened I've had them "retreat" into a bad position flanked on all sides.

Anyhow, option #1 is where most of my automatic moving happens. Sometimes, Skirmishers try to go away from the fire but if flanked, sometimes go toward the fire. Occasionally, you get too close and they automatically go into melter (all units).

Last time my supply wagon infiltrated deep into enemy lines, I thought it was kind of funny that they are such intrepid souls.

[EndlessSauron]

I think that I had units overlapping and it was just so frustrating, I threw my keyboard against the wall, now I have a new one. . . regardless, they had like 2 unit sprites overlapping, eventually I just took the 1200 casualities and just ended the battle. Time to take a break and try to relax.

[Ricco]

Yes, I understand your frustration totally. I had the same experiences with other games like this. What you need is to make your men halt and hold fire, am I correct? There is a task bar at the bottom of the screen that has numerous orders to give your troops. Just mouse-over them to get a description. Then, select your squad, or box of troops, and select the correct button for the order, and your men will do exactly as you say. If you don't give them orders, they assume you want them to do as they please, and will go off on a picnic if they had a mind to.

And don't forget to face your troops in the direction of the enemy or you will loose numbers qickly. Hope any of this helps. Happy hunting.

[Ricco]

Originally posted by breadstain:

When they retreat before a route... suppose for a minute you try to have them move backwards. On the move, you misjudged it and they take a volley to the rear. The game is programmed for the unit to retreat in the opposite direction they are currently traveling, so it's happened I've had them "retreat" into a bad position flanked on all sides.

Anyhow, option #1 is where most of my automatic moving happens. Sometimes, Skirmishers try to go away from the fire but if flanked, sometimes go toward the fire. Occasionally, you get too close and they automatically go into melter (all units).

Last time my supply wagon infiltrated deep into enemy lines, I thought it was kind of funny that they are such intrepid souls.

Regarding skirmishers. They are a fistey unit and their main purpose is to move to engage and retreat. They are best used to draw the enemy in a certain direction... like into a volley of lead, fired from your muskets. If you try to move them back into the line after they have engaged and retreated, they will refuse. They are great for sneaking up on enemy cannon positions and forcing them to move to another location.

[Guernica]

@OP

As others have said, overlapping and having a unit manually targeted are the two main causes to unwanted movement.

MY PROBLEM, is that when I tell a unit to fall back they often just move to the side. This is helpful like 5% of the time. The other 95%, the unit is not getting any further away from enemy fire and is often exposing their flank to enemy fire.

I repeat, this is not so much an issue when a unit routes, but when I order a unit to fall back.

[Ricco]

Originally posted by breadstain:

When they retreat before a route... suppose for a minute you try to have them move backwards. On the move, you misjudged it and they take a volley to the rear. The game is programmed for the unit to retreat in the opposite direction they are currently traveling, so it's happened I've had them "retreat" into a bad position flanked on all sides.

Anyhow, option #1 is where most of my automatic moving happens. Sometimes, Skirmishers try to go away from the fire but if flanked, sometimes go toward the fire. Occasionally, you get too close and they automatically go into melter (all units).

Last time my supply wagon infiltrated deep into enemy lines, I thought it was kind of funny that they are such intrepid souls.

Regarding your units retreating into a flanking position, that's what recon is good for. If you know where the enemy units are, you won't ever be flanked by them. Send scouting units in and out of positions all around the map.

[Ricco]

Originally posted by Boss Lightning:

I think that I had units overlapping and it was just so frustrating, I threw my keyboard against the wall, now I have a new one. . . regardless, they had like 2 unit sprites overlapping, eventually I just took the 1200 casualities and just ended the battle. Time to take a break and try to relax.

Before you destroy another keyboard, try selecting the whole bunch in a box and issuing the seperate and detach button at the bottom of the screen, I'll try to get the right name for it, and a screenshot if I can. Select one of the individual units using their icon, and order them to halt while the other one is in motion.

[A Violent Fart]

Originally posted by Captain Ricco:

Originally posted by breadstain:

When they retreat before a route... suppose for a minute you try to have them move backwards. On the move, you misjudged it and they take a volley to the rear. The game is programmed for the unit to retreat in the opposite direction they are currently traveling, so it's happened I've had them "retreat" into a bad position flanked on all sides.

Anyhow, option #1 is where most of my automatic moving happens. Sometimes, Skirmishers try to go away from the fire but if flanked, sometimes go toward the fire. Occasionally, you get too close and they automatically go into melter (all units).

Last time my supply wagon infiltrated deep into enemy lines, I thought it was kind of funny that they are such intrepid souls.

Regarding your units retreating into a flanking position, that's what recon is good for. If you know where the enemy units are, you won't ever be flanked by them. Send scouting units in and out of positions all around the map.

No no... they "retreat" into the unit firing at them, the one or five that you can see.

[Nemorin]

just put them into "hold" mode by selecting hold or just push space. it will freeze them in the position they currently have. they wont turn or move anymore except for when they are completely outnumbered and break.

[Fapterhouse: Dune]

Originally posted by Kuros:

just put them into "hold" mode by selecting hold or just push space. it will freeze them in the position they currently have. they wont turn or move anymore except for when they are completely outnumbered and break.

Except for when they do.
Sometimes they just up and decide, 'no, we've got to face 100% the opposite direction despite your orders.' It's a real bummer.

[Qossuth]

Originally posted by Guernica:

@OP

As others have said, overlapping and having a unit manually targeted are the two main causes to unwanted movement.

MY PROBLEM, is that when I tell a unit to fall back they often just move to the side. This is helpful like 5% of the time. The other 95%, the unit is not getting any further away from enemy fire and is often exposing their flank to enemy fire.

I repeat, this is not so much an issue when a unit routes, but when I order a unit to fall back.

This lack of tactical control is one of my lead frustrations with the game. The only direction that makes sense, for either gameplay or history, to Fallback is 90 retrograde to current unit's facing.

As far as unit's moving around on their own, this is very frustrating. I'm not sure what can be done about overlapping units -- clearly the game shouldn't allow us to stack 10 brigades on top of each other and stack of doom our way to victory. But on the issue of units manually ordered to engage, I think some of the problem there is that we aren't given separate orders for firefights versus firefights that lead to melees.

If we had an order that said Fire on this enemy but don't move, and another that said Engage this enemy with fire and movement toward melee (which seems to be the current system), I think a lot of breadstain's #2 issue would be reduced. Usually when units are trying to clear overlap they shuffle sideways, which while annoying is often not fatal. It's the guys who leave the safety of our lines to go traipsing off into no man's land to get shot up and flanked and routed, probably because they are chasing some brigade who charged our lines and we ordered our brigade to fight them off. We just wanted to repulse them, send them packing, we did NOT want to move from the safety of our lines in order to try to eliminate the enemy brigade. If we'd have wanted to do that, we'd have ordered that.

[[TFM]bobcat]

What is also needed is for movement to trump engagement orders. I can't tell you how many times a unit has wandered out into no mans land only for that unit to refuse my orders to march backwards becuase it was determined to keep firing on the enemy from its exposed forward position or having enemy units retreating beyond the firing envelope and my units refusing to move forward because they want to keep firing despite no longer being in range

[Koro]

If you need a unit to move in to place immediately without firing, you can click "H" for hold fire and rush them there and allow them to shoot again.
You might find it hard to believe now but in beta, the game was immensely difficult to play because brigades didn't autofire when given command orders. If you moved a life forwards, the whole line would simply be shot to pieces since they didn't return fire. Making any advance was impossible without tracking the reload cycle of every single brigade moving forwards to make sure they got volleys off.
So while it's inconvinient that they sometimes fire when you don't want them to, the alternative is much worse and the micro suggested here, is nothing compared to what I described here.