Your forces Melt Away

[MurkyWaters]

Does anyone know under what precise circumstances you get the "Your forces melt away" message?

In my current Medieval 2 game, my English King was part of an army that was beaten (don't laugh) by the Danes outside Hamburg. The King definitely made it off the battlefield alive, but he was one of a small number of survivors.

However, I got the dreaded "your forces melt away" message and it killed off my King. I couldn't believe it. I mistakenly believed an army under a living general (let alone faction leader) would never melt away. I was wrong!

So, under what exact circumstances do my forces melt away? I'm playing vanila 1.2, on M/M.

Cheers!

[The Sundance Kid]

I dont know, but its ****ing annoying, I can tell you. Those small remnants of troops can be used to bolster the nearby city Im usually trying to defend (thats the only reason I ever fight defensive battles, when the AI go straight for my capital or huge city), but instead I lose a hundred-odd men that couldve staged a spirited defense. No way would a force of a hundred or more just melt into the countryside...

Killing off a character, though? Now thats a doozy of a pickle...

[Captain Spanky]

The only time I got this message when losing a battle with a general is when the general himself was killed during the battle... Never any other time.

[FuriousSpurius]

I think it probably has something to do with percentages of survivors. Typically if you're beaten down pretty badly and each stack that makes it out has a low percentage of their total I think it triggers it.

Most of the time it happens when I beat down small enemy armies and a couple stacks with 1-15 men survive that it seems to happen. My guess would be if a small percentage of your army survives the battle (maybe 1-10%) it happens.

[Drag529]

Well the game was made to be realistic with moral and advantages right… …so my guess is when an army has been so badly beaten the troops will disepear cause of the defeat …..or something like that

[killer_squid]

If you lose a settlement or a very large majority of your army is killed, you will lose the units. They just scatter due to morale loss.

[Lost Crusader]

Under normal circumstances, your general shouldn't die if he withdraws. I had situations when the bodyguard was reduced to 1-2, but the general was alive and he successfully escaped.

The only situation when the whole army gets destroyed if defeated, is when it has nowhere to retreat to. This will be indicated with the white scull (sort of) on the general's picture before the battle.