Lord Mark of the Murdough, we too have encountered a similar situation to that which thou does do painfully describe.
In many a battle we have ordered our horseborne and those of us who are fleet of foot to chase the fleeing cowards and broken men in a merciful attempt to end their dishonor and give them a warrior's death that they may meet their gods with heads held high. And many a time the warbands so ordered will run to where the cowards are presently fleeing then mill about uselessly while the broken men continue to flee towards the borders. In our anger, we have cursed our foolish horseborne and threw our helm down in disgust and foamed at the mouth at such treachery.
But then we viewed the field of battle and saw what was really happening. My horseborne were indeed chasing the cowards- they had planted themselves in the midst of the fleeing foe as they saw it. But what we could see that they could not was a fleeing foeman who was far out of position, having taken a few last swings with his weapon at us before following his comrades. Because he was several hundred paces away from his foes, the center of mass of the fleeing warband had no fleeing foemen in it- thus our horseborne were in the right place but at the same time in the wrong place.
We solved this by ordering our horseborne to a place before the fleeing cowards then charging them back into the melee. They cut down the fleeing foe every time they charged through his mass. We also ordered our own cowardly archers to rain death upon the foemen, which often kills the bravest of the lot and returns center of mass of the fleeing foes back to the mass of running feet.
Methinks this same event might be interrupting thy joy of slaying the foes and granting the cowards a better death than they have earned.
The second option we have seen was that when we have ordered an attack upon a dispersed warband, often we must pick out a single soldier and give the order 'Kill that one!'. Ordering such upon a dispersed mob of cowards is difficult, for the stupid horseborne will only obey the order given at that instant, and if our swordpoint or its target has moved in the split second it took our orders to be given, then the foolish horseborne will interpret 'Kill that one' as 'Go here now' and then we experience what thou doest describe. Thou must be very sure that thy sword is upon a foeman or his banner at the very moment thou does give the command- remember that fleeing foes are quick! Sometimes the divine 'Pause' works in these situations when used only to ensure the hoof-heads know precisely what thou does require of them.
[This message has been edited by Terikel706 (edited 09-22-2007 @ 05:21 AM).]