In the military, units that do not obey orders are prosecuted

Let me start by saying that I have been very satisfied with the work that has been done.

There is one issue that continuously frustrates me.

When I give a patrol order, which for military units is nearly the only one that I give, the units only initially obey the patrol boundary. That is, upon giving the patrol command, the units move towards the patrol area. However, once in the patrol area, any unit encountering the enemy promptly leaves the patrol area in pursuit of the enemy; for me this often means that the offending units die since they are outside the range of fixed defenses and/or massive numbers. These vigilantes have taken upon themselves to act without my authorization, and have therefore exposed themselves since they do not have the benefits of the patrol area that I have defined. Furthermore, the AI seems to exploit this by constantly testing all directions with scouts, which subsequently draws out my units beyond fixed defenses. The idiotic result is that I must micromanage all of these events. PA advertised minimal micromanagement. As such, I hope PA will address this issue.

I would totally understand if the unit was under fire, and if the unit in question had the ability to return fire. In such a scenario, the unit would have leave to pursue, but only up to some other limitation.

I propose that the patrol command should have an engagement radius and a pursuit radius.

Thank you for your interest!

Have you tried playing with the movement settings? When selecting units in the command bar, you can tell them not to roam, that is, follow the enemy to the end of the earth.

I don't use those often, so that may not be what you want. But maybe it is.

^ This guy hit the nail on the head. There is a solution to the problem of which you speak.

That's not to say I don't still sympathize with the "units not following orders" plight every once in a while...

Yea, it's an annoying default behavior and it's not just due to patrol.