1.05RC3 Not retreating after loosing a battle bug

[pgr]

This was originally posted by AndrewKurtz in the general forum. After playing a bit with the current RC, I have seen it in my games often as well.

It seems to be an unforeseen interaction between the rule which has a stack assume an offensive posture if it is in a region where its side has less than 5% MC, and the new retreat logic where a stack chooses not to retreat outside a region if there is no enemy stack present in an offensive posture.

As an illustrative example, McDowell attacks Mananas in Aug 61 with Beauregard in a defensive posture. McDowell retreats from battle, but does not choose to leave the province because there is no enemy force with an attack stance (as reflected by the battle log). In the next turn resolution, even if the player sets McDowell to passive and orders him out of the region to a completely friendly region, the stack's player issued orders are overridden, McDowell's stack assumes an "offensive" posture, and fights another battle in Mananas. He looses, no enemy in an offensive posture, chooses not to retreat out of region... etc.

It's causing failed attackers to get stuck in 0% friendly MC regions. It might be useful to have a rule that stacks never choose to retreat locally if their side has less than 5% friendly MC.

[Pocus]

Good catch on the faulty logic. Can you confirm though that you acquire 5% MC when entering the region and then the next turn, even if you stayed there?

[AndrewKurtz]

I can confirm you never gain MC. McDowell was in Manassas for three turns, MC always stayed at zero.

[pgr]

+1 to Andrew, because you loose the battle you don't even gain 1% friendly MC....

[video=youtube;M5QGkOGZubQ]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M5QGkOGZubQ[/video]

I suppose if even a failed attack would get you 5%, it would make sense to stay.... buy I don't recall any experience in previous versions where a failed attack netted a gain in MC.

[Captain_Orso]

I've had McDowell go in and get draws two turns in a row--not on the patch level.

I honestly don't remember NOT having gained any MC, but probably not much. In the second turn/battle I had McDowell set to DP, but he went to OP anyway. I actually have no idea what causes that. But on the third turn of battle McDowell's army had lost so much cohesion they got kicked out of Fauquier and I lost the 10 NM

[Captain_Orso]

There is currently a plethora of threads going on all having to do with retreat and automatically changing to OP. I think if we are not careful, the entire discussion will become completely unsolvable.

To summarize (this summery I also just wrote in the main CW2 forum in this thread: Not retreating after losing a battle, Post #69

• A stack moves into a region with =<5% MC (=<10% if landing from ships or crossing a major [navigable] river) and, if in DP, will be automatically changed into OP, so that a battle will more than likely occur. (As far as we can tell, no change has been made here.)
• If the stack moving into the low MC region loses the battle, it goes into retreat. If the stack(s) which won the battle is in DP, the retreating stack will not be retreated out of the region, but be put into DP. (This is the first change that occurred.)
• The stack which lost the battle, and is now in DP is being put into OP through an unknown rule. This I believe is a new rule. Reasoning: Before 1.05RC2 it was common to occasionally find a stack in retreat from a battle region in DP. I generally set such stacks into DP with EC (Evade Combat) and hopped for the best. They never went into OP, although they probably had 0 MC in the region from which they were retreating.
• Now, since the stack which lost the battle is not retreating out of the battle region and being put into DP, the second change is putting the stack into OP, although it hasn't entered the region in this turn. This causes the stack which originally had just moved into the region to attack again, and most likely lose again, and the above cycle starts all over again.

I think the first question to answer is, when must/may a stack retreat out of a region after losing a battle? This issue was first presented as a complaint that stacks were retreating into regions with 0 or very low MC after losing a battle. This allowed a stack which had invaded, but not maintained a route of egress, to simply retreat away from a battle and cause a long series of battle-retreat-intercept in enemy territory.

I find the the most prominent issue with this is that the retreating stack is retreating into a region into which it could not move, because of ZOC, were it not being retreated into it. I don't think this should be allowed.

[Barca]

I find the the most prominent issue with this is that the retreating stack is retreating into a region into which it could not move, because of ZOC, were it not being retreated into it. I don't think this should be allowed.

+1

This is the issue for 1.04.

If you are playing against Athena as the CSA, one of the effects of this is that you cannot maintain a defensive line, because defeated Union forces are constantly retreating into your rear areas (where they have 0% MC), and then you have to chase them all over the place.

[Captain_Orso]

If you mean that they are retreating from Union territory into Confederate, that has been addressed already a bit ago. Now the only things in 'enemy' territory that might interest a retreating stack might be friendly troops. But nearly everything else in friendly territory, including the territory itself--actually the MC--will attract them even more.