Yea, there is no way to change this.  I wish we could arrange the units before combat, but at least the initial placement has gotten better with normal troops like archers.  But, yea, would like to see my sov in front if he is a bad ass warrior.

Exactly, this behavior leads to exposing the weaker members of the group instead to shield them. Especially when the enemy has fast moving high initiative units.

To add insult to the injury two of my companions in the group are Ironeer women. He is literally hiding behind women. The shame, oh the shame.

I should made him into an assassin instead a defender.

I hate this happening, so I use a simple rule of thumb.  I do not field armies with more than four melee units.

As for pioneers, if this were my game, I'd give pioneers a ranged weapon 'crude sling' with a damage of 1 and an initiative penalty of 10.  It's not going to change game balance, and it will fix a few gameplay problems.

Parrottmath, you are the to-go-craftsman when it comes to getting solid and simple mods for things that belong in vanilla.  Any chance you add this to snaking and bridge mods, and release it as the what-should-be-in-vanilla mod?

(Yes, I do know that slings are a powerful weapon that was better than bows for a long period of history, that it requires a lot more skill than almost any ranged weapon, and that this implementation would do it injustice.  This is a gameplay fix)

Hee. I wish I could have taken a screen shot of the end game Sov picture for one game - female melee Sov clad in champions plate, riding a Capitar warhorse and wielding Curgens Hammer. I'd hide behind her any day

GinsuKnives includes a sling.  That could like be added to Pioneers pretty easily.  Want my to try it out?

I would hide behind the actress playing Sahara Conner in the TV Terminator the Sarah Connor Chronicles, which also happen to be Queen Cersei Lannister in Games of Thrones. In one case she is a badass with a shotgun, in other case people in front of her tend to involuntarily "catch" knifes with their backs.

Well, if you're going to force us away from our hormones...

I would with respect disagree.  I figure that my troops always proceed forward in a disciplined fashion, scouting the terrain.  Mages, archer and pioneer units would be at the back (or if we ever get attacks from all sides, in the center).  Melee types would be at the front.  I don't figure that being surprised would change this, because these are disciplined warriors.