Which mods fix morale/leadership?

[Kreddi]

I haven't found any solid solution for this routing fiesta yet

[Kreddi]

Originally posted by Lyle Ugleman:

There are quite a few mods that make battles last longer, which in turn means units don't route as often. The ones that do route often (like goblins and skaven) tend to rally a lot as well.

Part of Skaven's whole gimmick is based around routing and rallying often to pull enemy battle lines out of position. They even get a speed boost when their leadership tanks, allowing them to route relatively safely then regroup to fight again.

I was a big fan of Apollo's Mighty Morale Mod for the first warhammer game.
He didn't just brush the game over with a phat '+20 leadership buff', he went in and changed when morale penalties was taken and when it wasn't.
Haven't found a mod for WH2 with the same amount of attention put to it unfortunately.

[Kreddi]

Ohhh boy, another presumptuous comment huh. Neat!
I suppose I just miss a Total War game that doesn't treat it's players like toddlers.

[Longtoke]

Just to add some tabletop experience to the discussion, morale / fear / terror / leadership tests are a MASSIVE part of tabletop and the game itself. It’s an effective tactic to stack your army to cause lots of leadership tests so you can capitalise on the resultant rout.

I’ve had one TT game where HE archers unleashed thier first salvo into a unit of greenskins only to watch in horror as the failed leadership tests cascaded making the entire army flee, general and all.

The only “unbreakable” aspect was through immunity to psychology, which a few select units or heroes had.

[Googley Eye'd Bastard]

Originally posted by Kreddi:

Ohhh boy, another presumptuous comment huh. Neat!
I suppose I just miss a Total War game that doesn't treat it's players like toddlers.

Ahhh, another angry poster who refuses to let anything anyone says enter any sort of logic that would change their opinion, i miss the steam forms that once had decent civil conversations and debates.

[Kreddi]

Originally posted by Great grey wolf Sif:

Originally posted by Kreddi:

Ohhh boy, another presumptuous comment huh. Neat!
I suppose I just miss a Total War game that doesn't treat it's players like toddlers.

Ahhh, another angry poster who refuses to let anything anyone says enter any sort of logic that would change their opinion, i miss the steam forms that once had decent civil conversations and debates.

I managed to have a great conversation on this thread already. Maybe the fault lies somewhere else?

[Wh♂♂par]

Originally posted by Kreddi:

Originally posted by Great grey wolf Sif:

Ahhh, another angry poster who refuses to let anything anyone says enter any sort of logic that would change their opinion, i miss the steam forms that once had decent civil conversations and debates.

I managed to have a great conversation on this thread already. Maybe the fault lies somewhere else?

Yeah, in this conversation a person is disagreeing. :^)

[Kreddi]

Originally posted by Wh♂♂par:

Originally posted by Kreddi:

I managed to have a great conversation on this thread already. Maybe the fault lies somewhere else?

Yeah, in this conversation a person is disagreeing. :^)

It's almost like people can disagree and still coexist. We live in a wild world.

[Father Ribs]

If your Ironbreakers are breaking, either all your leaders are dead, they're getting hit by artillery, most of the army has already routed, you suffered like 20% casualties in one shot, you're being attacked in multiple directions simultaneously, you're fighting something that causes fear/terror like undead or giants or dragons, or a combination of these things.

Your elites are not imortal. This isn't the comic book 300.

I believe they made a very concious choice in the TW:WH games to change the combat dynamic. This isn't two lines of pikemen grinding each other for five minutes before one side finally retreats; this is more like a dramatic battle with units crashing into each other and bodies flying through the air. It was made to be dramatic, not to be grindfests.

There can still be great last stands. I had one battle where the only unit I had left was the white dwarf, everyone else was dead, and the undead had at least four full units of skeletons and a necromancer hero. The fight went on forever and eventually he routed, but not until almost all the enemies were dead. I've had many battles where an understrength garrison is attacked and by all means the town should fall, but managing troops that manage to regroup and a lot of tactrical micro-management, pulled rewarding victories.

If you like last stands, I suggest picking up Attila, and play a West Roman campaign on H or VH. You will have lots of last stands and strategic rearguard actions. Very rewarding, and the battle mechanics and the town/city maps are better designed for desperate defenses.

[Kaaz]

Originally posted by Kreddi-Chan:

Originally posted by Kaaz:

they are trained, not suicidal, unbreakable stuff generally has something that makes it unbreakable, slayers for example are ridiculous and will not back down they just seek more and more things to kill until something gets them

I don't understand why you keep bringing logic from the real world into this.

Slayers isnt a read world logic example...

[(N☆G) Jackal ★JJ★]

Originally posted by Kreddi-Chan:

Originally posted by Great grey wolf Sif:

You would think they'd realize just how valuable they are as ♥♥♥♥ tons of money and time are put into their training and dying without a cause would be wasting that.

Look i get the idea of defending a VERY important city or location to the last, but for gameplay purposes it would be ♥♥♥♥♥♥. For example taking captial cities, especially 10 slot cities, would be a nightmare.

I get that you feel robed of satisfaction when enemys route when you win, but if you wiped out every army in every battle then it prevents enemys from regrouping and restocking their armies and thus makes the game too easy.

Personally i don't think chaos artilary should have unbreakable cuz chaos dwarfs are selfish and out for their own gain, or make it a mechanic that the demon inside it will fight on when the dwarfs route.

You are talking about a universe where some Elves train centuries with a greatsword, to the point of being able to deflect arrows being shot at them.
Lets not argue as if these guys follow a reasonable train of thought.
And again, in history there are countless accounts of people fighting to the death. It's not unreal nor unrealistic.

Originally posted by (N☆G) Jackal ★JJ★:

It sounds like you simply have poor decision making.... units route a lot faster when they are losing the battle, fighting a counter, or get flanked.

Some spells and banners (or simple unit trait) cauaes fear or terror too.

Even for a massive animal if it knows its losing or dying slowly it tries to get away..... and thats real life.

Baseless assumption, you clearly haven't read my first post. Good on you!

I read your first post lol. And it isnt a baseless assumption. Your whole point is crying about how some units have steel resolve vs others.

You are comparing hellcannon chaos dwarves who only know pain and suffering and slavery having steel resolve vs actual units that care about living.

If you had a better example of other steel resolve units vs units that make sense trying to live then id level with you but you have dumb logic so I gave you a solid life logic oand fact that actual large animals legitly try to preserve their lives by running away if they feel like they might die.

Like i said it sounds like you just make poor decision making and now its reinforced by your silly post there since zero thought went into it.

Im done here lol it sounds lile you are simply bad at the game

[MaytheFragsbewithyou]

Try Steel Faith Overhaul it changes a lot about units

[Jerubius]

Originally posted by Kreddi:

Originally posted by Kaaz:

they are trained, not suicidal, unbreakable stuff generally has something that makes it unbreakable, slayers for example are ridiculous and will not back down they just seek more and more things to kill until something gets them

I don't understand why you keep bringing logic from the real world into this. As I said earlier, I'm looking at this as a video game, and I think this game would be much better served with less routing from top-tier units.
There are literally mutated rats launching missiles into orbit and you wanna talk about how unlikely it is that some fight to the death?
♥♥♥♥, there's been people from real life that has fought till death, I don't understand what makes you think it's so illfitting.

Originally posted by Jebus:

In your narrative being unbreakable would depend on the tier of the unit and the location of the army.

That sounds horrible as hell.

Lel how impossible would capitals be to conquer if the army was unable to lose morale.

And i can totally understand why hellcannons specifically are unbreakable.
Even without going into lore.
Just look at the leadership of dwarwes. You dont think chaos corrupted dwarwes would turn that up to 11? we'd have to see once the actual faction gets released.

In my narrative the highest tier of units wouldn't rout like the weakest units in the game. I'd like a narrative where not every single battle ends with one side running and the other having to play whack-a-mole to reduce the amount of troops perfectly healthy after combat is over.

How impossible would it be to capture capitals? Seeing how that's been happening for a decade in earlier iterations I think it should be possible in this game as well.

Again, using lore to reason the artillery-crew being the only unbreakable unit is honestly moronic. But that isn't too far from the target group CA has been going for with these Warhammer games.

So wait, you won't accept real world logic, but you also won't accept lore arguments? So the only valid reasoning in your eyes is a gameplay paradigm no one else seems to hold?

And also, you are wrong, hellcannons are not the only unbreakable units in the game. In the Empire alone, you have steam tanks, flagellants, a couple heroes, and a couple RoR units. True, the High Elves don't have any unbreakable units, but that kind of fits their lore, what with them being a dying race and every soldier lost is an irreplacable loss of military power. In fact, there aren't really any unbreakable units in game 2, but that fits. Lizardmen instead have rampage, which is the same as that fight to the death status you mentioned earlier. Dark Elves are in the same boat as High Elves with population. Skaven are cowardly and selfish. Most game 1 factions have at least one unbreakable unit.

Besides that, you have lots of commander effects that boost leadership or temporarily make units unbreakable, and traits like immune to psychology that make it a lot harder to rout a unit. Higher tier units have much higher base morale, and sometimes don't suffer penalties from lower tier units routing. Improving vigor and keeping units fresh will also prevent some morale loss. Well handled elite units should only rout when down to the last few men at the very end of the battle. I know it can be annoying that the AI doesn't handle their elites this well, leaving them open to easy rear charges, letting them get out of position, or just not properly prioritizing units that have significant morale impact, but just slapping unbreakable on all top tier units and dumbing down a very important aspect of the game because the AI can't handle it well enough just isn't the answer.

[Nodcomandr]

Unbreakable and the leadership mechanics do work well. Even elite units who are the pinnacle are not suicidal and will break after so much has been done. Rear charges, terror, fear, army losses, losing a general, etc, all make sense.

Unbreakable is more reserved for units that are truly immune to morale.

In the case of the hellcannon, it's a giant cannon possessed by DEMONS. Demons don't fear death as they are just sent back to the chaos void. The demon's influence extends to the artillery crew (think possession). It can even go berserk and operate (somewhat) without its crew.

In the case of slayers, they are literally suicidal. They seek a glorious death, preferably at the hands of the largest, meanest, nastiest, most terrifying monster they can find, to redeem their honor.

In the case of vampire counts, they are controlled by the necromancer or vampire. They won't route because they are simply under the control of that individual and he won't let them run. I do feel like with VC, the vampire or necro should be routable, since they aren't immune to leadership failures - only their minions.

In the case of flagellants, they are insane, zealots only bent on spreading the word of Sigmar and subjecting themselves to pain. They aren't capable of thinking of running away and do not fear pain.

All these units have a trend. There's a reason they absolutely will not break no matter what. Their martial skill, years of training/practice don't factor into it. They will not break for a valid reason (demons, suicidal, under a spell, etc). Every other elite unit will break, but only after being subjected to SEVERE losses or issues. Their training and willpower is extreme, but it only goes so far.

Many units dont route until the ♥♥♥♥ has really hit the fan. I've had phoenix guard who would fight down to single digit numbers before routing. Same thing with ironbreakers. These units are truly elite and will fight to the death, almost. It takes a lot to break them, but again, there's only so much they can take before they give up the fight. Losing your general, 80% of the buddies in your unit, getting stabbed in the back by cavalry, fighting a terrifying dragon, and being surrounded, are probably all valid reasons for losing your mind and running away.

From a game, non-lore perspective, it's a bit of a balancing issue as well. Elite units that are dammed tough anyway, who don't break would be a bit rough. Phoenix Guard that are unbreakable? Those would probably be OP. I lost a game where I had two Phoenix Guard left (one at around 7-8 units, the other around 20-23 units) and my opponent had about 30 archers (no ammo) and a heavily hurt lord riding a dragon. I should have won that game, but my PGs routed from some cycle charging from the lord and I lost. Leadership/morale is a key component to the game. Armies being thrown at each other with no concept of leadership/morale, changes the game drastically (such as a general's inspiration aura, some magic spells/items, etc). If you want a game with no leadership, maybe something like Starcraft 2 or Age of Wonders 3 would be more appropriate.

[happyscrub]

Send the OP to a middle east engagement and see if he routes. lol

[Raviollius]

Your units(especially your top/elite ones) are perfectly capable of fighting to the death(or damn close to it)... as long as you pay attention to the OTHER modifiers for leadership.

Is there a general in commanding range? Are they isolated, or do they have allies covering their flanks? Did they lose 60% of their members in fifteen seconds? Are you using leadership-enhancing skills and abilities? Did they get charged on the back? Are they losing a fight with an unit that's also faster than them? Are they taking ranged/artillery fire? Are they being affected by supernatural Fear abilities? Terror? Under specific debuffs that sap their leadership(like spells or the Gobbo grudge thrower ability)?

Managing leadership is part of the game, and all of these(especially together) are good enough explanations for why units would rout. Yes, even elite ones - they will stay and fight way longer under these bad circumstances, but you can't expect all of them to fight to the death in the worst possible situations just because. It is on you, as a general, to see that this doesn't happen.

If it bothers you that much, go play VC. Just don't get surprised when your armies crumble due to low leadership, if you keep ignoring the above.