Debate and Duel (D&D)

[Norfleet]

Originally posted by Osium:
I agree. If a unit cannot retreat and live they should not retreat period scripted or otherwise, and if they are scripted they ignore the order much like they will ignore the order to cast a specific spell if the target is out of range. I mean if you're encircled or trapped you're not gonna try and run away. Maybe a feature we can wish for in the future?

That'd make for a very interesting motivational feature, if units that cannot retreat and live become unbreakable. It'd also make for an interesting application of the Art of War, where it states that when you surround an army, that you should leave an outlet free. Do not press a desperate foe too hard.

Nothing would drive this point in harder than discovering that your opponent will no longer break when he has nowhere to run. And you could then apply the Cortez strategy: When Cortez arrived in the Americas, he burned the boats so that they couldn't retreat: The men were thus more motivated.

[cihset]

Originally posted by Argitoth:
Graeme Won... damn... The battle took around 8 hours to finish. I gave up by turn 66 after my pretender died from an unknown cause casting Stygian Paths. (He didn't die from the spell)

Exactly that has happened to my pretender also, I was playing C'tis, war of Orania scenario. Had a Lord of the Gates pretender, ridiculously powerful with All paths around tenish and Death at 15 (due to some wishing). I was happily moving around with stygian paths or so I thought. The second throw my Pretender went missing, just like yours. In the message it said that noone got missing in the stygian path spell, but my pretender didn't arrive at the destination and the Icon in the message list (next to the message 'Osiris has cast Stygian Path') there was a question mark, not the picture of my pretender.
Which concurs that he has somehow died that turn.

I first thought I was just terribly unlucky to have my pretender the only one vanishing in a 400+ army that moved in the spell, but now when I see that it has happened to Argitoth too, I'm beginning to suspect that something is fishy about this.
Especially since the spell says that everything went fine, noone has been lost.

The spell needs a lookover since I sure as h-ck wont use it if the casting mage has an insane increased risk of getting killed in the casting of the spell.

[Targa]

Let me see if I understand this correctly. Let's say I send my prophet to my southern borders to preach, because an enemy dominion is creeping in. My main army is "up north", fighting Nation X, so I set my prophet to "retreat" on the off chance that my southern neighbor decides to invade. That way he'll retreat into one of my provinces, and I can march him back north while turning my army south. He's preaching away, when suddenly an assassin jumps out from behind a tree. Naturally, he follows his scripted orders to retreat, which he does, and apparently escapes without a scratch. But since "retreating during an assassination attempt" is "illegal" according to the game code, he will then be summarily executed off-screen?

If that's the case, then that makes absolutely no sense. I agree that scripted retreat orders should be ignored by the game code during assassination attempts.

[Argitoth]

Originally posted by cihset:
The spell needs a lookover since I sure as h-ck wont use it if the casting mage has an insane increased risk of getting killed in the casting of the spell.

The mage should be the LEAST likely to die.

#1. He has the knowledge of the underworld
#2. He's the only one leading the army
#3. whatever...

[LordArioch]

IIRC, retreat orders should not be executed by either side during assasinations, but due to a bug, both sides can currently retreat and die.

Still, as it is I find it helps assasains. I've lost my pretender because he was scripted to retreat.

[Osium]

Arryn, I don't think you can consider retreating while on an assasination attempt a basic strategy let alone a strategy in the context it was given. It's not even in the same catergory, the retreat order he scripted was NOT intended for assasination attempts, it was to evade patrols. It is what I like to call an "undocumented game mechanic" in this case it should be called a "contradictory game mechanic". It clearly states, it is not possible to retreat in an assasination attempt when one reads the ingame tips. The only strategic significance I can see to retreating while assasinating, is if you know your opponant likes to script casters to retreat, and try to assasinate them for the free retreat kill.

To me when something says not possible it means not possible. Not "well its possible but you will die so don't have it scripted!" As has been previously pointed it, it appears it is a bug and in future patches we can hope it will be corrected so that retreat scripted orders will be ignored in such events.

Saying "go practice more noob" is such a holier than thou attitude. If something doesn't work the way it should work, as documented, the blame shouldn't be put on the player because he didn't test his strategies enough, blame may be attributed for not adapting to a failed strategy, but not attributed because it failed, especially give the circumstances. If I tested all my strategies before I played a multiplayer game i'd never play a multiplayer game. I'd be too busy seeing if it was feasible within the game engine despite ingame documentation claiming one thing or another. As I said you roll with the punches, sometimes they work sometimes they don't, no real need for you to launch into the whole "test your strats before you play stop crying" thing. To highlight the point. Unless you've actually TRIED to retreat from an assasination attempt, or had a commander/mage/priest scripted to retreat and have an assasination attempt on them, you would never know the unit does retreat and dies doing so. It would never dawn on me to say "you know I wonder if its broken, maybe I CAN retreat from assasinations attempts" /me giggles in anticipation of a major exploitation ;p

Granted, the ingame tip is vague when compared to a spell stating "casting x for y gems results in z summons" it seems to be plenty clear cut when you actually read the tip. As such no fault can be attributed to him for not experiencing that particular mechanic untill that game. This is an extremely deep game. If people with more experience in certain aspects of the game told other people with less in those aspects to go learn more before they play again... Well this wouldn't be a very enjoyable community would it?

[Kristoffer O]

Originally posted by Graeme Dice:

quote:

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Originally posted by Argitoth:
Edit: OMG!!! I THINK I KNOW WHAT HAPPENED TO MY PRETENDER!!! What if he died because the dominion was too high in the province he was attacking? THAT MIGHT BE IT!

Did he have a never healing wound? If so, then that could be it.

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Everyone moving on stygian paths will get a small wound (an) by toxic fumes and harrowing ghosts. Unfortunately there is a bug in the text message. The caster was not added when lost soldiers were counted (thanks for making us notice).