Why did I randomly lose 1/3 of my men?

[Hooahguy]

So I played a battle. Had very light losses as I was fighting some low level bandits. There were enough of them (about 300 or so) that it was split into two parts. When the second part of the battle came around, I noticed that I only had 2/3 of my men available, and all the archers were gone (~75 of them). No idea why, as I didnt lose very many people (like 4-5 maybe) in the battle. At the end of the battle, 1/3 of my men were gone, including almost all of my companions (again!) and many high level troops so Im trying to figure out what happened. Now I will say this, in the first part of the battle I did the pre-battle orders so maybe that had something to do with it? I basically never do that so perhaps that is what caused it.

[H3YimDR3W]

So I played a battle. Had very light losses as I was fighting some low level bandits. There were enough of them (about 300 or so) that it was split into two parts. When the second part of the battle came around, I noticed that I only had 2/3 of my men available, and all the archers were gone (~75 of them). No idea why, as I didnt lose very many people (like 4-5 maybe) in the battle. At the end of the battle, 1/3 of my men were gone, including almost all of my companions (again!) and many high level troops so Im trying to figure out what happened. Now I will say this, in the first part of the battle I did the pre-battle orders so maybe that had something to do with it? I basically never do that so perhaps that is what caused it.

I don't think pre-battle orders would have done this cause I use them nearly every battle. Have you got low morale in the party?

[Hooahguy]

Ok I figured out whats causing the loss of troops! Whenever I pick who joins me in a battle I end up losing a chunk of men after the battle.

I had excellent command but when I used the option to pick who joined me in battle I would lose like ~100 men after.

[Produno]

Did you set battle size for this? Thanks for finding where the issue is, at least it givves me somewhere to start looking!

[Hooahguy]

In my settings the battle size is the max as I recall, yet when picking who to come with me I can only pick about 13-22 people. Then more of my men will show up via reinforcements.

[Draven]

Ok I figured out whats causing the loss of troops! Whenever I pick who joins me in a battle I end up losing a chunk of men after the battle.

I had excellent command but when I used the option to pick who joined me in battle I would lose like ~100 men after.

Happened to me too. For some reason when you actively select the type of troops to go, when you exit the battle, only those troops (types, not just the possible number you selected) remain. This included my companions. Since party size is determined by combined leadership (and the other factors), without companions leadership, my 180~ troops where cut to 63/49 (i was still above party limit). Waited a week, even enabled cheats to hop from city to city to find the companions but they seemed to have disappeared. This is really gamebreaking.
I have to say, i usually save before every battle, and noticed it doesn't happen every time, so loading and fighting again may clear the issue, but battles usually take 10 - 15 minutes IRL, not to mention you won't be able to reproduce your performance.
Untill the issue is adressed, i recomend selecting types of troops by plancing them at the top on the party screen. 

[Hooahguy]

So companions will return to you after about 2 weeks. Its annoying, but at least they come back.