BUG: Melee units behave inefficiently in battles unless player right-clicks on enemy unit

When testing fighting between different combinations of melee units in HD scenario editor I noticed, that my units tended to perform poorly against an totally equal AI enemy army although they should have performed equally. I further investigated this and found out that for some reason my units tend to waste time when in a battle with enemy units. They choose strange paths around units, stand still while doing nothing, etc. But simply right-clicking once at beginning of battle on any enemy unit drastically improved their battle results! Somehow like it put them into more efficient fighting regime.

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I decided to create testing scenario in order to compare different battle commands and get proven conclusions.

I used expansions data set. Both myself and enemy AI as post-imperial britons. All units at aggressive stance. Game speed at normal (1.5). I arranged battles of different sizes between equal armies where units are so close together, that they attack enemy units immediately.

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Battle commands:

1. Idle - simply watch while doing nothing as my units clash with enemy units

2. Right-click - select my units and right-click on enemy unit in center of nearest enemy row. Then do nothing

3. Patrol - select my units and order them to patrol to behind enemy units (so they go through). Then do nothing

4. Attack-move - select my units and order them to attack-move to behind enemy units (so they go through). Then do nothing

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I tested all battle commands for all battle arrangements 3 times.

I present results for each battle command like this, where X, Y and Z are results for each test, Q is average and "(+/-)" shows difference between my and enemy units remaining after test - "(+/-)X / (+/-)Y / (+/-)Z = (+/-)Q".

Example - "+5/-3/+4 = +2" (I had on average 2 units difference to my favor after test).

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I uploaded my testing scenario, so everybody can test for themselves - http://s000.tinyupload.com/?file_id=16742536105615742134

When testing this scenario notice that enemy has town center (so he doesn't resign) surrounded by wall (so units won't immediately flock to it) and light cavalry for scouting (so he doesn't scout with one of battle units). Also cavaliers are shown as paladins in scenario editor for some reason. But when playing you can see, that they are cavaliers. Use "marco" and "polo" cheats for seeing enemy units after battles. After battles have ended the enemy units will flock to their town center. This is okay, must simply check that they don't influence other battles.

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I will only consider melee units from this point onward, because ranged units are too different case, like tests show.

It seems, that ranged units are best left to do their own thing with no active battle commands. My arbalests won by such large margins because enemy arbalests wasted too much efficiency by constantly moving back.

Notice extreme differences in cavaliers 40v40 (idle -18 vs right-click +8) and champions 40v40 (idle -17 vs right-click +6) battle results.

Champions 20v20 and 10v10 idle battles were pretty exceptional because I won by a large margin although almost all my remaining champions were almost dead.

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Battle commands sorted by summary averages of melee unit (cavaliers and champions) battles:

1. Right-click +6

2. Patrol +1

3. Attack-move -3

4. Idle -5

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When observing those battles I saw what I had previously also noticed:

Units without active battle command (idle) are in inefficient fighting regime - they spend for some reason a lot of time simply moving around units, standing still, etc. They will find enemy unit after a while, with which to fight, but before that they waste a lot of time, which leads to inefficiency. They are clearly in attack mode, searching for enemy unit, but are somehow really clumsy in it. Many times I noticed my unit passing closeby enemy units, with whom they could immediately fight, but instead they kept on moving for no noticeable reason. It is more noticeable in bigger battles, because of bigger amount of units, around which to move. This means, that my units lose drastically in big battles to equal AI armies for no logical reason.

It is very weird. I do not know, what causes it, but it does not seem normal and definitely seems buggy behavior. I also tested this briefly in AOC and it was there also, so it seems like it has always been so.

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Units in attack-move battle command fight more efficiently, but sometimes they will move ahead to destination even though there are remaining enemy units near them. This creates situation, where enemy units can attack them without response and will severely hurt their efficiency.

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Units in patrol battle command fight even more efficiently, but tend to clump too much together instead of spreading out and finding enemy units to kill.

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It seems that units in attack-move and patrol battle commands tend to prioritize too much moving to their destination instead of attacking enemy units. Also results vary greatly, so you can get both massive victory and massive defeat for no apparent reason.

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Units in right-click battle command are in most efficient fighting regime - they actively search for nearest reachable enemy unit and fight with it. After killing him they search for the next one, etc. They perform this effectively, without delays.

It does not seem to matter much, which enemy unit is right-clicked in case of right-click battle command. Units go towards it, but if they can't reach it (because it is surrounded by other units), they will immediately search for other nearby enemy units. It also is not necessary during battle to right-click on any other enemy units, because units will stay in this regime. It is advised during battle to not perform any other right-clicks, because that makes units change targets, which wastes efficiency.

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It seems that currently it is best approach to select all nearby units and right-click once at nearest enemy unit in beginning of battle in order get them all to efficient fighting regime. Otherwise if no command is given (idle), then units will stay in inefficient fighting regime, which leads to much worse result (18 enemy units instead of 8 my units remaining in 40v40 cavaliers battle). Could also use patrol or attack-move, but those are more work, are less efficient and have annoying side effects (units move to destination on the map, although that might not be wanted).

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I think, that this is quite annoying and illogical. I have always expected, that units in battles do the logical thing - if at aggressive stance, then find the nearest reachable enemy unit and fight with it. If I want to give more specific orders, target some high priority unit, etc, then I may do so, but in simple battle situations units should do the simplest thing and simply attack nearest reachable enemy units. This pointless running around and standing still while doing nothing, which can be clearly observed in idle battle command tests, makes no sense.

Also it is problematic that there is no way to identify whether units are in efficient or inefficient fighting regime. If I give right-click battle command to some units but some other my units are also in fight, I can't easily differentiate, which ones were given right-click command and are efficient and which ones were not.

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I would like that units at aggressive stance, which have nearby enemy unit, would always automatically do without me doing anything the same thing they do when I right-click on nearest enemy unit. They should go to efficient fighting regime and attack nearest reachable enemy units without doing long paths around units and wasting time. This releases players from the need to do pointless right-click battle commands simply to prevent their units losing effectiveness.

Behavior is already developed, activatable by right-clicking on enemy unit. AI controlled units appear to use something like this automatically. Developers just need to activate this for human controlled units without needing to right-click!