Auto-routing alternatives

[Loren]

Zeldor said:
OTHER important thing that should be done with routing mechanics:

'never routs' attibute given to the defender of the capitol [just fort, not province]. The last soldiers defending the capitol should never even think about leaving the battlefield. They have nowhere to go so they should fight till death. That's good both from thematic and gameplay aspect.

In one game cleveland attacked my army with quite large force. I have won the battle but I had elephants that died. They triggered the auto-rout sequence and it was my last province. So I have lost 38! [thirty eight!] mages! due to auto-rout into enemy territory. I could have successfully defended that fort for 10-20 turns, until someone would bring proper siege force. But no, they decided to run away into enemy territory when winning just because some elephants died. It has sense when you have a place to run away and regroup.

Yes, I think rout behavior should be changed when you have no hope of retreat. It should still happen (people do panic) but the threshold should be much higher, both in terms of morale and time.

Perhaps what should happen in a case like that is if you can't rout you run for the edge of the battlefield but can't leave it. Your morale might recover over time, though.