I agree with this assessment. Even if you spend days in another map, in an underworld map (like montero shafts or the river of memory), the main map remains unchanged. In a way, that is extremely inconvenient, especially in such cases. A player has got his army to full strength (finally), he's ready to start exploring a new island and bang! He has to fight a battle where he/she's outnumbered and will most likely need to backtrack a little to replenish his troops.
I have to say that I absolutely agree with the idea that this should be fixed - or at least make it so that the player has at least a few seconds to react to the incoming threat - either by moving away or at least preparing for the battle (swap troops and such).
BTW, Metathron, have you tried hitting the space when the map had just loaded? This may pause/freeze the game and give you at least half a second to do something.
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