Why do my berserk commanders disappear after winning fights

[thejeff]

A time limit on berserk would also work nicely.

[Sombre]

So remove rout retreats entirely?

[Graeme Dice]

The word your looking for is not realism, but verisimilitude. The rules of the game should obey their own internal self-consistency. A time-limit that arbitrarily kills units that would otherwise be invulnerable isn't particularly consistent. It is definitely necessary to have some point where battles end though, as otherwise it's possible that some combinations could run indefinitely. Two feebleminded sacred statues staring each other down for example.

[Gregstrom]

The game is in fact extremely realistic - it's just that no-one ever noticed that all units in the game are members of the New Amalgamated Union of Gribblies, Humanoids, Thugs and Yetis (NAUGHTY). Among the NAUGHTY Articles are extremely strict rules on the duration of melee activities any NAUGHTY Member takes part in over any given month. The NAUGHTY rules specify exactly how long the attacking and defending sides can stay involved in combat, and punishment for breaching said rules is carried out on the spot. This is why attacking armies leave so promptly - they're actually going off for the union-mandated tea break.

Pretenders beware - argue with the unions and the NAUGHTY people will come and get you!

[chrispedersen]

Gregstroms point is exactly.. on point.

You could arbitrarily say that combat makes the world unstable and that each round increases the likelihood of death.

Now, if it were me, I'd have horrors show up increasing in numbers and severity. But I have no problem abstracting that part of the equation.

I mean, if you think about it, no one has complained that undead simply go poof. Why should you complain therefor if an SC goes poof?

similarly you don't complain that we abstract the turns - the entire months turn is abstracted to one click. We don't see the armies progressing.

The preeminent question is a balance question, not a versimilitude question.

If you are really saying that you can't stand the versimilitude (vs wanting to make sc's more powerful) then you would be fine with any solution that kept the 75 turn limit autokill, so long as it had a reasonable backstory.

And I don't think that is really what anyone is saying. I think they are just using the versimilitude gripe as a way of attacking the turn limit.

[Rookierookie]

Originally Posted by chrispedersen

Gregstroms point is exactly.. on point.

You could arbitrarily say that combat makes the world unstable and that each round increases the likelihood of death.

Now, if it were me, I'd have horrors show up increasing in numbers and severity. But I have no problem abstracting that part of the equation.

I mean, if you think about it, no one has complained that undead simply go poof. Why should you complain therefor if an SC goes poof?

similarly you don't complain that we abstract the turns - the entire months turn is abstracted to one click. We don't see the armies progressing.

The preeminent question is a balance question, not a versimilitude question.

If you are really saying that you can't stand the versimilitude (vs wanting to make sc's more powerful) then you would be fine with any solution that kept the 75 turn limit autokill, so long as it had a reasonable backstory.

And I don't think that is really what anyone is saying. I think they are just using the versimilitude gripe as a way of attacking the turn limit.

Give me a reasonable backstory to this:
SC attacks province.
Defending army routs.
Some defending units can't run because their fatigue is over 100.
After 75 turns, berserker couldn't kill all defenders and is killed.
SC fatigue is 0 at all times and HP is always full.

[chrispedersen]

I can create reasonable backstory all day long - so can a lot of people. Kind of immaterial because it wouldn't be official, and it would be subjective; ie., what you find perfectly reasonably, I may not.

[Squirrelloid]

Its perfectly plausible to rationalize an autokill at some fixed time - ie, units eventually are too fatigued to fight, undead units need to replenish their dark energy or whatever, etc... So after some number of rounds they simply collapse or shut down and the defenders can do what they will (since they control the land).

The game has rules. Autokill is one of them. Its a perfectly balanced rule, especially since the rules are designed to give the attacker a fair shake at leaving before it happens by auto-routing. The *only* issue is that the game won't let the attackers route if the defenders have already routed. To avoid this, there are two alternatives: (1) let both sides route, (2) instead of auto-killing the attacker, auto-kill the side that routed (keeping auto-route for the attacker at turn 50 - presumption for the defender).

As a game rule issue, that's the end of the discussion.

Once we start talking about removing autokill because its 'unrealistic', we start playing with game balance (autokill is often the only way to kill a pimped-out SC), which means we have to try and make lots of other changes and that leads nowhere good (and probably means we have to do things like remove enc. 0 from the game and/or make SCs a lot weaker - possibly eliminating the role entirely). We have to start rebalancing some spells and abilities (berzerk becomes stupidly powerful without autokill). Removing autokill is not a fix, it forces a total game redesign.

[thejeff]

Is it actually true that attackers can't route if defenders have already routed?

I know I've seen the reverse recently. Attackers route, then defenders.

[Squirrelloid]

Originally Posted by thejeff

Is it actually true that attackers can't route if defenders have already routed?

I know I've seen the reverse recently. Attackers route, then defenders.

Particular squads can rout from both sides, but once one side has globally routed (you see the 'x's forces have routed' message) the other side cannot globally rout, and may not be able to trigger unit routs (not sure about the second).

Auto-route is a global rout, and thus fails if the defenders have globally routed.