I need help winning battles.

[Landshark]

So, I just can't figure out how to win battles.

The last 3 major battles I've fought (played as dark elves and also high elves) I've lost.

In some battles I'm coming into the battle with 2x up to 4x more troops than the enemy.

No matter how many I kill, such as in the last battle I fought, out of 2,000 enemy troops, I killed over 1,800 of them, and I still lost even though I still had 600+ troops left, my guys all routed.

These are all early campaign battles, within the first 10 to 30 turns.

Is there some trick I'm missing on battles? Something I should be paying more attention to?

I'm getting enemy troops down to zero leadership (the bar is empty) and they won't route, just stand there and fight forever. I can surround an enemy who has 60 troops left, surround them with 300+, and they don't route, instead they tie-up my troops in a 3 against 1 battle for the entire match until my guys decide to route for whatever reason.

I feel like I'm missing something really drastic here.

[Nito]

From my Total War experience a unit only routs when their flag starts to flash

Numbers doesn't matter in Warhammer i mainly use creatures something like 5 war hydra and 5 black dragons fought against 900 enemies with these units + 5 siege units and 5 black or dreadguard lost no units(but some from the guards...) did the same with lizardmen my army only had 100 troops and 13 giant creatures plus the city defenders we have killed 4 armies of 500 to 600 skaven

Lords have a huge impact in morale of the units i wanted to do a human wave tactics with the skaven i had 40 units in 2 armies i think it was over 2000 units and was facing a 13 unit army of cheap lizardmen still lost even more when they have killed the lord(because units receive a bonus on leadership when a lord is close you also lose a lot of morale when the lord is defeated/killed in battle)

Routing can happen because:

A unit suffers heavy losses in a short time most common
The lord has been killed/defeated. without the head the army breaks
A spell reduces morale(Fear/Terror) there is also spells/equipments that raise morale
A unit causes fear/terror(War Hydra)

[Osttruppen]

Look for Zerkovich videos. That guy has a series of basic and advanced guide on Warhammer tactics. Very easy to understand and interesting.

[them4pples]

you want all the flags to flash and then have the unit break (skull icon next to their unit.) the flag icon means they're running away, but they'll come back and rally unless you chase them off the field. they can only rally 2 times i think though and then they'll break for good.

to prevent them from rallying in the first place you need to put pressure on all troops that haven't broken yet. even one unit still fighting can cause the fight to drag on. that's the basic meta game. watch some battle tutorial videos to learn everything in between

[Lunos]

What difficulty are you playing on? Anything above normal will boost enemy unit stats and make them less likely to rout even with an empty leadership bar.
For breaking units go for shock value. For instance if you flank an enemy unit and it's leadership is really low, charge in with another unit at that moment to break them. Just fighting in a big moshpit usually won't break units until they are practically all dead. Need to utilize charging, spells or missiles to break units effectively. Killing an enemy lord will result in an army wide debuff that will reduce their leadership for a short time. Timed right, this can also really help break the enemy army.

[Nito]

Originally posted by them4pples:

you want all the flags to flash and then have the unit break (skull icon next to their unit.) the flag icon means they're running away, but they'll come back and rally unless you chase them off the field. they can only rally 2 times i think though and then they'll break for good.

to prevent them from rallying in the first place you need to put pressure on all troops that haven't broken yet. even one unit still fighting can cause the fight to drag on. that's the basic meta game. watch some battle tutorial videos to learn everything in between

My Rat Legion returned mutiple times as far as i understood they recover from routing if:

A) No one is chasing
B) They get to a certain distance from the enemy

[Cat]

I'd recommend watching some Legendoftotalwar youtube gameplays and tutorials.

Helped me a lot... There could be some dumb things you do.
Then there are some vids on best lords, magic, heroes, units. It helps to know what to recruit, and what to focus fire on when you're in a fight.

[Chillum]

There are unbreakable units, i.e dwarf slayers, who will stay in the fight until literally the last model dies.

[Ashley]

Originally posted by NightCat:

I'd recommend watching some Legendoftotalwar youtube gameplays and tutorials.

Helped me a lot... There could be some dumb things you do.
Then there are some vids on best lords, magic, heroes, units. It helps to know what to recruit, and what to focus fire on when you're in a fight.

Staunch line of spears but instead of spears it's more ranged.

[CatMeow]

Keep in mind HE/DE matches earlygame aren't typically about the melee encounters - most damage will come from the respective ranged units. Try to have archers focus on taking out darkshards and vice versa.

Trying to grind down a defensive unit like dreadspears with spearmen isn't going to work, and you're actually going to be suffering from army loss if you allow enemy darkshards to fire on your melee line while they're occupied, because shields don't take effect when in melee.

[Landshark]

Thanks for the all responses. Although my issue isn't killing the enemy troops, it's with actually winning the battles.

I can kill 90% or more of the enemy troops and still have 50% of mine left, and still lose the battle.

The recent battle, I killed over 1900 of the enemy and left them with about 130 people left. I still had about 500 people left and I lost.

[CatMeow]

Can we see a screenshot of one of these battles?

[zacharyb]

Take a picture next time cause none of what you said makes sense from a gameplay standpoint, even on harder difficulties the AI will still break if it has taken enough damage, not including unbreakable units.

Are you using mods?

[Landshark]

Originally posted by zacharyb:

Take a picture next time cause none of what you said makes sense from a gameplay standpoint, even on harder difficulties the AI will still break if it has taken enough damage, not including unbreakable units.

Are you using mods?

No mods, just playing on normal difficulty. I'll grab a screenshot after my next battle.

[Nito]

Originally posted by Landshark:

The recent battle, I killed over 1900 of the enemy and left them with about 130 people left. I still had about 500 people left and I lost.

You mean that even when battle says you won you lose when it returns to the campaign map ?

or those 500 simply rout against those 130 left ?

[Landshark]

Originally posted by Nito:

Originally posted by Landshark:

The recent battle, I killed over 1900 of the enemy and left them with about 130 people left. I still had about 500 people left and I lost.

You mean that even when battle says you won you lose when it returns to the campaign map ?

or those 500 simply rout against those 130 left ?

The latter. The 500 are routed against the 130 enemies left.