When Monks (or equivalent) are part of the units selected, are standing in formation, and “idle”, changing the formation selection (Z,X,C) does not affect the units selected and they ignore the formation selected. With other units, even when “idle”, they will react to the formation selection and reform their formation to match the selection.
However, strangely, when Monks are part of the units selected and are currently moving as part of a formation, as long as they have not reached the destination and become “idle”, the units selected will react correctly to formation changes.
So overall, this primarily affects formations when “idle”, but can definitely be annoying if you expect the units to behave promptly/correctly and you don’t know why they won’t listen to formation commands.
Testing Monks by themselves:
- Select a small group of Monks.
- Give them a move command or a directional formation move command to have them stand in formation.
- Once they’re done, they should be idle while standing in formation (any type).
- Try and change formation (Z,X,C), and notice they will ignore and not move/reform from their current formation.
- Issuing any type of move commands will still not change their current formation.
- However, if you issue any move command, and they have not yet reached the destination (so they are moving and not “idle” yet), they will react to changes of formation (Z,X,C).
- Selecting multiple types of units that also select any Monks will keep this formation interfering behavior.
Test Environment: Skirmish with at least 3 civilizations.
Build: 5.0.9369.0