No way to counter campaign map ambushes?

[aeoleron9]

Say you are Varus and you actually know you are walking into a trap. In fact you just saw that barbarian doomstack disappear in the forest ahead.

What do you do?

To be exact, is there ANYTHING you can do? In RTW and M2 we could send spies to poke around forests until he runs into the hidden enemy, but that doesn't seem work in the newer TWs. I have had spies standing at the exact spot where the enemy is hiding and reveals nothing, but when I march my troops close they still get ambushed. Another frustrating scenario is when enemy stragglers hide in a forest and refuse to attack me even when I'm within ambush range. There's basically no way to flush them out if they don't want to move. Granted, the AI's usually too dumb to exploit that, but human players can and will.

Will we have any way to counter hidden armies on the campaign map in Rome 2?

[AngryTitusPullo]

Yes. Don't go into the forest with the whole legion. Just sent a cavalry ahead singularly. If the current TW battle scheme still being in use then only that single cavalry unit will get ambushed and the rest of the legions will come in reinforcement.

[CDR Hurricane]

Might be kind of hard to do that when "All armies must have a general"

I can't even begin to count how many times I march troops places without a general.... Probably more often than not.

[Dan113112]

Maybe if you have a good enough cavalry component you can thwart ambushes. I've seen this done in Mount & Blade: Warband mods.

[Ichon]

Yeah the whole no army without a general is going to play out in interesting ways. I can see some improvements in this system but also some weirdness. I remember in Heroes of Might and Magic when playing multi the standard tactic was the player moving first would have a whole chain of generals behind the main army and shuttle reinforcements to that general before the other player has their turn. Obvious exploit of endless movement of units but 'chains' of generals across the map shuttling reinforcements might become normal. Or maybe armies automatically can assign generals to command from a pool of senators/praetors/tribunes.

Either way the whole army hiding in a forest impossible to find with scouts should be solved as it is very annoying. I'd recommend simply a 'hide' skill for generals and a 'scouting' skill for spies. On the first turn an army moves into a forest it should remain hidden no matter what. Every subsequent turn the army remains hidden within the spies view range there is a chance of discovery as the spies searches the forest for the main body of the enemy army with the difference between general's 'hide/ambush' skill and the spy's 'scout' skill giving a random chance of discovering that increases each turn the spy is searching. Strategically there is little change in the short term but long term it is impossible to 'hide' an army indefinitely. Perhaps if the army is hiding in the own region or enemy region there is a significant change in the chances of discovery so a German army might hide safely for 3-4 turns within their own territory with 0 risk of discovery even with a spy in view range but doing the same thing in enemy territory is nearly impossible without maxed 'hide' skill on general and minimal 'scout' skill on a spy.

[xjlxking]

Well I'm sure there will be a specific way for you to get out of an ambush with a lot less losses.

[Rijul.J.Ballal]

Maybe when ever we create an army a general will spawn automatically? that seems like a likely scenario

[HinFoo]

.

[Honorable Poncho]

I'm sure there will be some sort of agent that can discover hidden armies. If ambushes are going to be as devastating as they appear to be in Rome 2, it only makes sense that they would (at least I hope). I am picturing an entire army of mine being slaughtered in an ambush and its giving me chills.

[aeoleron9]

I'm sure there will be some sort of agent that can discover hidden armies. If ambushes are going to be as devastating as they appear to be in Rome 2, it only makes sense that they would (at least I hope).

Indeed.

Although, if any 1-star agent can reliably sniff out every single hidden army, it might tip the balance too much in our favor again. Obviously ambush tactics would be pretty important to tribal factions, so we wouldn't want it to be completely nullified by a micromanaging player. Maybe something like the spotting/hiding skill check as Ichon said would be alittle more balanced? Either way, more clarity on the ambushing mechanic would go a long way. It's been a freakin mystery ever since warscape rolled out.

[NitzanLeo]

Why the hell would there be a way to counter ambushes? Except for scouts, there shouldn't be any way to do that. Of course, it's also difficult to lay ambushes, it's not a very simple thing to do. And we're obviously not going to have to play the Teutoburg Forest ambush outside of the historical battles. We're making a different history here. So, yeah, like HinFoo said, take it like a man.

[Ichon]

Detecting an ambush would actually be difficult with a spot vs hide skill check and that any hidden army always gets 1 free turn remaining hidden when an agent first moves into view range. Most of the time it would mean 3-4 spies sitting at least 2 turns but usually more along your armies route of march searching for spies. Such behavior would clearly give away your route of march to an observant enemy as well take considerable planning.

The instances it would be useful are when there is only 1 or 2 small area of forest along a route of march- posting a spy near and waiting 3-4 turns would usually uncover a hidden army but requires planning ahead and also occasionally the spot vs hide test might take 4+ turns to discover the hidden army when in enemy land and the hidden army is led by a general with good ambush/hide skill. It would however at least give a chance to discover a hidden army- most useful is when a defeated/withdrawn army retreats into forest within your own territory. Currently as long as that army doesn't move it can remain hidden forever. Since AI takes 0 or reduced attrition it remains a threat forever requiring heavier garrison in that area. An army shouldn't be able to hide indefinitely within enemy territory. However some effort to root them out should be required to sending a spy to scout out their location and an army to disperse them seems fair.