Winning a Battle at a Tactical price, I call it.  If attacking a city, a won battle might mean having control over it.  So, capturing a Flag would make a lot of sense for that imo, if the flag was always placed on the tile where the city stood.  But, for any other battle I can think of, without anything at stake, except for the unit(s) whats the point of a Flag?  Aren't units always going to be worth more than a Flag?  I've seen scenarios where the Flag is basically disregarded for the High Ground, preserving the unit.  In such a case, what's the point of a having a Flag?  The attacking opponent could rush in and take the Flag with minimal loss, but that Checkmate has no value when the point of the battle is the unit.  So, the attacking opponent realizes this and tries to attack the unit on high ground at a disadvantage.  Im not against turtling a defendable position on a high ground, but if that's the case, shouldn't the Flag be carried by the unit - that way the checkmate is obvious - that unit.  What would the prize be for taking that unit on the High Ground, capturing the Flag?  What if winning the Flag meant winning Gold equalivant to half the buyout cost of producing that unit?  That would make combat worth taking risks for that unit with a Flag imo.

One thing that does make capturing the flag worth it, in my opinion, is the fact that if you don't manage to kill all their units (often not the easiest to do) and you don't capture the flag, you lose the battle and your army retreats quite far. That can seriously upset your plans for conquest and potentially leave your own territory open for a counterattack. So in my opinion the importance of capturing the flag is in winning the battle and keeping the advantage on the strategic level.

Alice99 wrote:
One thing that does make capturing the flag worth it, in my opinion, is the fact that if you don't manage to kill all their units (often not the easiest to do) and you don't capture the flag, you lose the battle and your army retreats quite far. That can seriously upset your plans for conquest and potentially leave your own territory open for a counterattack. So in my opinion the importance of capturing the flag is in winning the battle and keeping the advantage on the strategic level.

The point of a strategic level (no retreat - capture of their Flag) I assume is capturing their map board position - not hunting down their army, although that could be done on the next combat round when you attack their units again, repeatedly if you focus on their units more than the Flag.  So, the Flag I take it is basically something that should be captured if you cant afford the extra turn or two of forced running away it seems to come back into battle, plus you have overwheling strength in comparison to your opponent where you can do so.  Otherwise the question is asked, How much combat strength in battle is worth sacrificing for the capture of their Flag (extending the battle?) when that unit could have been more advantaged on other hexagons during the battle instead?  The Reward of Capturing their Flag just stops a forced retreat!

Progress wrote:

Alice99 wrote:
One thing that does make capturing the flag worth it, in my opinion, is the fact that if you don't manage to kill all their units (often not the easiest to do) and you don't capture the flag, you lose the battle and your army retreats quite far. That can seriously upset your plans for conquest and potentially leave your own territory open for a counterattack. So in my opinion the importance of capturing the flag is in winning the battle and keeping the advantage on the strategic level.

The point of a strategic level (no retreat - capture of their Flag) I assume is capturing their map board position - not hunting down their army, although that could be done on the next combat round when you attack their units again, repeatedly if you focus on their units more than the Flag.  So, the Flag I take it is basically something that should be captured if you cant afford the extra turn or two of forced running away it seems to come back into battle, plus you have overwheling strength in comparison to your opponent where you can do so.  Otherwise the question is asked, How much combat strength in battle is worth sacrificing for the capture of their Flag (extending the battle?) when that unit could have been more advantaged on other hexagons during the battle instead?  The Reward of Capturing their Flag just stops a forced retreat!

A forced retreat which is incredibly annoying. Personally I'd rather fight two battles during which I don't have to retreat than fight one battle in which I manage to kill most of the enemy army. Plus it's not like you necessarily need to expend a lot of combat strength. Depending on the terrain layout and the manoeuvring, it can be as simple as moving a unit onto it quickly to capture it before going off to fight the enemy. In my experience, often you can both capture the flag and do a lot of damage to the enemy in one battle.

Eulogos wrote:
The flag isn't meant to be the goal of all battles, it merely provides a way to settle a defensive stalemate.

How does it settle a defensive stalemate?  Do the units on the defensive High Ground suddenly die if they just allow the attacker to just take the Flag on another hexagon without fighting back?  Presumably, the goal of the attacker is to kill all their units, whereas the defender wants to preserve their units as much as possible.  Is there a point in defending the Flag rather than taking the tactical High Ground for the defensive player?  Does retaining the Flag, also retain units?

Progress wrote:

Eulogos wrote:
The flag isn't meant to be the goal of all battles, it merely provides a way to settle a defensive stalemate.

How does it settle a defensive stalemate?  Do the units on the defensive High Ground suddenly die if they just allow the attacker to just take the Flag on another hexagon without fighting back?  Presumably, the goal of the attacker is to kill all their units, whereas the defender wants to preserve their units as much as possible.  Is there a point in defending the Flag rather than taking the tactical High Ground for the defensive player?  Does retaining the Flag, also retain units?

The units on the high ground would have lost the battle if they lost the flag, forcing them to retreat. That means they'd be giving up their previous defensive position and the attacker can pursue them to terrain that might be much more in their favour. Not to mention potentially having access to a new undefended city or areas to ransack.

Alice99 wrote:
The units on the high ground would have lost the battle if they lost the flag, forcing them to retreat. That means they'd be giving up their previous defensive position and the attacker can pursue them to terrain that might be much more in their favour. Not to mention potentially having access to a new undefended city or areas to ransack.

I understand the point about an undefended city or areas to ransack because there is a prize to be gained from winning.  I don't understand other situations, like a military skirmish.  If the defenders were to preserve their units on the high ground during the course of the battle, where they wouldv'e died without the high ground - protecting their Flag instead, even though they lose their Flag and are forced to retreat, that actually bought them time, where maybe because of that retreat, they have reinforcements to win the next battle.  How would the attacker with a slight edge resolve this?  They could attack and lose because of the high ground, or attack and win because of the Flag, so they are not forced to retreat, in a closely matched army where the High Ground makes all of the difference.  Ideally, the attacker would like to kill their units.  Would it be a mistake for the attacker to declare the battle, even with a slight edge in units and Combat Strength, because the defender can have the high ground with enough advantage from the 1-tile location to fend them off?

PARAdoxiBLE wrote:
Why doesn't anyone mention the morale system? IMO it's one of the biggest reason to capture the flag at multiple casualties. Managing your people's morale (in other words, convincing your people that we are not losing this war) is very crucial and losing some battles can actualy lead to forced surrender.

If such a system, that would put up Morale at stake for winning the battle.  So, a forced retreat, and not extending the battle by Capturing the Flag, can be costly in terms of Morale points, assuming the battle can be won and morale gained.  Capturing the Flag can make sense then, but only to extend the duration of the Fight.  The winning decision would be a calculation, which isn't neccessarily a no-brainer.  Is it better to extend the battle with the tradeoff of battlefield positioning to Capture the Flag, which could costly to a unit capturing it, or is it better to Fight another day a turn or two away after the forced retreat command is given because your troops failed to capture the Flag within a reasonable amount of time given an advantage, thus losing Morale?  How much is morale worth in comparison to units?  Its worth it when your ahead, due to their forced surrender.  Its worth it when your behind, due to you not surrendering.  But, How sensitive is the richter scale inbetween?  Also, side point, I imagine morale doesn't matter at all when fighting against wildlife because its impossible to surrender to it and domestication on the opposite end is done by capturing luxury resources and wildlife might just disappear with time, assuming there would be specific morale systems for specific enemies.