View Full Version : Feedback & Campaign reports
You have done a wonderfull job with this mod. I have only had time to play a little bit, forgive me if you have already covered this.
Trees.....I do hate the trees from MTW, is there a way to improve?
Unit description pics-are pixelated...is this so or am I needing to flip a switch in my preferences.
Army formations-at the beginning of a battle I am unable to clcik on a unit and place them, I only have the option to set the army formation....or is that just the attacker? Anyway can we set some Samurai-like army formations available?
How about a short mfile added in about Bushido? And maybe one about basic tactics? With a few illustrations...just to add to the mood and enjoyment. There will be folks playing this who didnt play STW......
Ok i`m going back in
dimeolas
...am getting a `spare hero` slot....
....are you going to redo the interface?
...and i`ll assume the evnt pics...
Dimeolas
R'as al Ghul
07-18-2006, 09:36
Hello Dimeolas,
seems you have some catching up to do. It's all in the threads. :smile:
Unit info pics are being worked on.
When attacking you can only choose a formation, we can't change that.
Formations, we might change them also, but it doesn't have priority now.
Spare Hero Slot will be substituted by a huge list of characters barocca has prepared.
The campaign interface looks now exactly as in S:TW.
All event pics have been changed.
Screenshots:
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=48442
Main thread:
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=48323
I don't think you have the last avaiable version?
...thank you, sounds like this is well towards completion then. I must have either missed something in download or installation because my event pics are from MTW as is the interface. No matter at this point tho......just having fun with it.
dimeolas
I must have either missed something in download or installation because my event pics are from MTW as is the interface.
Next version will have the STW interface and new event pics.
...dont know if itys just the mod settings but I remember it happening in the MTW....when there is a rebellion and the original extinct clan reemerges...and they have 3 and a half full armies of the toughest and most expensive troops....bad for gameplay and balance and not historically accurate. Can anything be done. happened in a neighboring province that had been ravaged by war for years. The conquerors were attacked and i stepped in to save them...the origianl owners reemerged with 57 troops of high caliber......where were these guys hiding all along. I know where they will go....game unbalance.
dimeolas
R'as al Ghul
08-02-2006, 09:08
Thanks for the feedback, Dimeolas.
I've been tinkering with the rebellious_troop_mix trigger.
I can define the probabilities of each unit and in which kind of rebellion it will emerge.
Faction reemergence is a bit different, though and not that easy to trigger in tests. If you have a savegame I'd be happy to test it.
:bow:
faction re-emergence is meant to be tough, they get large stacks of the best troops because the developers dont want them getting wiped out too easily,
there were (when medieval came out v1.0) lots of threads from people complaining that their was no point to re-emerging factions because they were so easy to beat.
So the devs made em tough. very tough.
but still not tough enough in my opinion - get some good troops and a good general
knock out their first wave and the leader and the rest of the re-emergence will crumble
OF course, if you dont have enough troops nearby...well, it might take a little longer to finish them off - and that is bad, VERY BAD,
they breed like rabbits,
If the leader gets "it on" with so much as one serving wench, well, 15 years down the track and baaaack they come....
.....so what you are saying is that i should raid their provinces and round up every serving wench i can find.......?
dimeolas
well that Would be an effective way to improve the morale of your troops...
...have played several as the Uesegi.....I start out expanding along the N coast...consolidate in the east.......one game was then tempted by a dying Takeda clan and took them out...only to have two of their allies to my west send me reeling. The strategic AI seems better. That samurai cav rocks......my first meeting with them was rather unfortunate for me. They slammed me with a left hook that i couldnt stop.
Again thx gentlemen...
dimeolas
You definitely need yari samurai to stop cavalry unless you have sufficient cavalry yourself. Even then it's better to have yari samurai because cavalry are expensive to replace.
...playing this game as Ashikaga.....and to begin the provinces to my south are rebel...but they do not have any troops in them......all but 1 or 2 dont have any buildings. Is this right?
dimeolas
I think that's correct that some rebel provinces have no troops, but you have to be careful to move into those provinces with strong forces or else they will revolt and then there will be lots of rebels.
....I took them all...no problem, except tieing down troops until they were pacified. The Mogami to my east took good opp to strike and gave me a very tenacious conflict. They didnt go down until the last man was 6 feet under. Takeda even took advantage to slip a knife in between my ribs. But they paid dearly and then gladly accepted peace.
It is now quiet.....peace and marraige with takeda to the east...allies to the west......ravaged by years of warfare.....yet managed to get the coffers up into the 6000 range. have a positive income all things equal...going to consolidate and gain strength.
playing on normal and the AI is able to give a good game for a lowend player like me. Very nice.
d
I hope Takeda doesn't yet possess all the provinces to the east (north) because they are rich provinces.
The AI gives quite a good game on normal difficulty. STW had the suicide general and it didn't flank with cavalry. Both of these things are corrected in the MTW/VI battle AI.
Takeda has not yet taken the north.....it appears this game they are more active than the others. When I can get back in will finish spying the north and do some much needed consolidation. I have learned not to trust the South.......if I were to hit takeda now they would hit me in the back.
d
...installed the latest and have played briefly...beautifull man...just beautifull.
dimeolas
Samurai Waki
09-12-2006, 10:32
Been having a go as Maeda. Woohooo it's been interesting. Captured the rebel province to the Northeast, not a prob. then Chosakobe decide to sack my Capital... very bad. I turn my entire army back to my home Province, and Chosakobe decide not to take the field and return to their invading province.
It's time to go on the attack, Attacked the Chosakobe province to my south. Chosakobe force flees to their home Province. A small force is holding up in their Castle, and preventing me from moving further on. Meanwhile the Rebel Province that I took is taken back by Rebels. I send in a Fresh Force of Yari Ashigaru and Samurai Archers, with the Help of my Second Eldest Prince.
Next Turn: Chosakobe attack in Force. Thankfully my one unit of Monks decisively take out their No-Dachi and can wheel in to destroy their Samurai Spearmen. Chosakobe Force decides to flee. Battle won with small losses, despite them having a larger force.
The Battle to retake my lost Province goes a bit awry, Two Horse Archer Units pound my forces unmercifully so I move them into heavy woods, and let them fire away. Took Minimal Casualties there. After their pounding I was expecting a charge, but instead the Rebel Force flees the field and I take the Province by default.
I Hire a few Yari Cav. and 1 Cav. Archer Ronin in my Home Province and move them in to reinforce my main army still occupying the Chosakobe Province. Next Turn, things go better. Warrior Monks are trained at my Capital and move to reinforce my main army. Dissent is still high in my province to the north but no has rebelled. No-one has yet to Capitalise on the minimal amount of troops in my home province.
I assault the Chosakobe Fort to my south losing about 120 men. But the Province is mine.
Next Turn: I attack the Chosakobe Home Province, the Chosakobe Shogun flees to their southern Province without reinforcing their Castle, so I take it. I start training a Yari Ashigaru there and move to their final Province with my main force.
Next Turn: Faction to the North Invades my Home Province, but by this time I have two Warrior Monks and a Samurai Archer Holding it. I beat them back using trickery (and steep slopes with heavy woods).
My Final Battle with the Chosakobe Shogun goes very well, using my Main Force of Yari Samurai and No-Dachi I attack their line. Then using my Ronin Yari Cav I flank them. The Battle is decided there, and the Chosakobe are finished.
However, things are not so good as they seem. By using mercs I am now 1000 Koku in debt. I need to finish this war as soon as possible, disband expensive troops and start building up. The Good Part is, that in 10 years I have quadrupled the size of my rising Shogunate.
ChaosLord
09-16-2006, 00:21
I started up a game as the Chosokabe on normal with the goal to unite that island quickly and expand from there. Sadly, it took nearly 40-50 years to do it and turned three of my clan's family(Two of them Daimyos) into cowards. I started off well by allying Ukita and taking Awa, then when I gathered my forces and hit Sanuki.
Through mis-use of troops and several units of Hatamoto on their side I managed to get myself beat. Then to add insult to injury the Ukita invade and easily beats what left of their forces. Not to be denied my goal so easily I built up some more troops, allied with Clan Sanada? to break the Ukita alliance and invaded with my Prince...and got beat. Then thinking I could do it I scrambled nearly all the forces I had and threw them at Sanuki with my other Princes...and got beat. So now my entire clan were known as good runners.
Luckily the Ukita didn't press the attack from there and I was able to rebuild. Fast forward like 20-30 years after economic boosting and troop training I was ready to invade Ukita again, my cowardly Daimyo wanted revenge! It was the perfect time to do it too, just as I was ready to go the Ukita invaded Awaja to try and kill Clan Sanada leaving me to waltz into a poorly defended Sanuki.
Not happy with just Sanuki I left a token force beseiging the castle there and went to Awaja. I caught the Ukita Daimyo and what i'm pretty sure was all of his heirs with nowhere to go. I thorougly enjoyed the slaughter that followed, but didn't execute them after the battle since I needed the koku. So in keeping with my luck after I rescue Clan Sanada the Miyoshi Clan re-emerges in Sanuki and I have to run out and resume the waiting game.
I rebuilt my armies and then waited for a chance and I got it when they Miyoshi invaded Awaja and crushed Clan Sanada. Instead of invading with my rmy immediatedly I built up a force of 11 Ninja Assassins and sent them after the Miyoshi heirs and Daimyo. Amazingly one Assassin killed the heir, the Daimyo, and then the next Daimyo that was lucky enough to come of age the same year.
So finally I invaded and united my island, and then eventually took Awaja after Clan Sanada re-emerged, but that was many years later. I spent awhile turtling the developing. After I took Awaja I was trying to think of where to expand to and I got another lucky break. Three clans died out, and three others re-emerged in the same year(1560). Most of them were small ones but the Ryzumo had owned all of their island and the tail end of mainland Japan when they went.
So I sailed over and took half of the island before the Shimazu re-emerged and took the other half. After another disasterous war (my tactics suck now) I sent das uber Ninja over to the island and wiped out the Shimazu allowing me to take half their land...and now when I should be uniting this island too the Ryzumo have re-emerged with three stacks in the remaining two provinces. And thats where i'm at now, I think i'm just going to sic my Ninja on them and bribe what rebels remain if possible.
On the Japan-wide scale things have been pretty interesting. Oda has remained a constant power in the middle of Japan despite having to fight off the Ukita and Satame when they were both large, and countless faction re-emergences. The Satame were leading things till I guess the Mogami and Date re-emerged and ended their little party. Ukita were doing good as well, then they died without any heirs. Most of the other clans have just been food or stagnant, aside from the Ryzumo like I said had taken a large chunk.
On the bug reporting/balance suggestment side of things I did notice some stuff. Ships built in Tosa end up the Bugen Straight rather then Tosa Bay. A few maps seem to be messed up but it might be the tile issue I heard about, if not I can list all of them.
Also Ninjas seem to be rampant in this game and I don't think they're costing any upkeep. Did they not in S:TW either or is this a bug? Because spaming them can make taking out targets easy and the AI has been going nuts with them.
Lastly I think re-emergence chance may be set too high, the human can reasonably prevent it from happening to him but the AI doesn't seem to be able to deal with it in my games. This is just one game though so i'll see how it goes once i'm finished with this and play a few more.
Oh and great mod/conversion, i'm loving it even if I do keep getting beat.
R'as al Ghul
09-16-2006, 10:13
Hello ChaosLord,
thanks for the report, reads like straight from the history book. :wink:
It appears that I'm not the only one having problems to win battles. I think the beta_7 campaign offers a very demanding gameplay, even on normal. The reduced number of units (compared to M:TW) and the very clear usability labels I gave to the AI for using that troops brings out the very best of the AI. The tactics the AI uses in battle are very sound, imho.
To your points: (numbered by me)
1. On the bug reporting/balance suggestment side of things I did notice some stuff. Ships built in Tosa end up the Bugen Straight rather then Tosa Bay.
2. A few maps seem to be messed up but it might be the tile issue I heard about, if not I can list all of them.
3. Also Ninjas seem to be rampant in this game and I don't think they're costing any upkeep. Did they not in S:TW either or is this a bug? Because spaming them can make taking out targets easy and the AI has been going nuts with them.
4. Lastly I think re-emergence chance may be set too high, the human can reasonably prevent it from happening to him but the AI doesn't seem to be able to deal with it in my games. This is just one game though so i'll see how it goes once i'm finished with this and play a few more.
1. The port bugs are a rather old issue that we haven't got around fixing yet. Maybe we'll fix it in the next patch but rather in the next beta (8).
2. Do you have the beta_ 7.1 patch installed? It should fix the map issue. If it doesn't I'll have to check this.
3. Well,agents don't cost any upkeep cost in M:TW either. If it is the general consent that they should we can easily add that. I'll also look into the production choices for them to see if they're set to high. But actually I find it very nice to hear that the AI sends Assassins. :2thumbsup:
4. A reemergence can appear if a clan got wiped out but an underage heir survived. Having many clans does of course increase the chance of having reemergences. I only have limited influence on the number of heirs (only starting heirs), as soon as the campaign runs the AI will start "producing" heirs to secure the lineage.
Some of the clans that the beta_7 features are completely out of the time frame: Taira and Minamoto are pre-Sengoku, while Tokugawa are mainly post-Sengoku. The idea is to have several eras in the final version. The Sengoku or classic campaign will be closer to the revised beta_5 era included in the beta_7 plus a few more clans. Think classic Shogun*2.
R'as
STWmod beta 7, Takeda campaign starts with Takeda Shingen I as the daimyo, but there is an underage Takeda Shingen as well and he eventually comes of age, so you have two Takeda Shingens.
ChaosLord
09-17-2006, 23:32
I've got the 7.1 patch installed so maybe something is still off with some. The two maps I noticed this on was Awaji's battle map and Higo's castle battle map. On Awaji it was all dirt/roads in squares, the whole map like that if I remember right. For Higo it didn't have the new castles, but the old castle not linked fully, looked really weird.
On the Ninja thing I had just gotten used to their upkeep from RTW I guess. Its probably best not to introduce upkeep for them to keep things simpler for the AI, though if possible(I don't remember alot of MTW modding capabilities) increasing build priorites for border forts, or starting more regions with them would help the AI fight off massed assassins.
As for re-emergences I had thought they could be tweaked, but I was probably thinking of rebellions. I guess it just felt like it was higher because of all the clans like you said.
I decided to resign my game as the Chosokabe, it was nearly 1590 and the Ryzumo and their uber generals were slowly driving me out of their island, then the Ukita re-emerged with three stacks on my border making things look grim. So now that i've had a crash course on how to play again i'm going to start up a fresh game. I'll report any more oddities/bugs I come across here.
Castles on Easy difficulty are actually "Easy"... as in, I can finally successfully assault one with an inferior force. So it could be too easy. ;) But it's n00b/non-RTS'er friendly.
I've got the 7.1 patch installed so maybe something is still off with some. The two maps I noticed this on was Awaji's battle map and Higo's castle battle map. On Awaji it was all dirt/roads in squares, the whole map like that if I remember right. For Higo it didn't have the new castles, but the old castle not linked fully, looked really weird.
OK. We've found the causes of these two problems, and they will be corrected in the next release which should be available soon.
Castles on Easy difficulty are actually "Easy"... as in, I can finally successfully assault one with an inferior force. So it could be too easy.
Based on a preliminary battle on a small castle, I made all walls, towers and the keep the shooting type for all castles, and I even included some shooting guardhouses inside the larger castles. This is the maximum strength I can make a castle right now. If we find that even the large castles are too weak, I think the shooting rate or the defensive value of the structures can be increased. Once we get into making the large maps, we can make some very large castles.
Castles on Easy difficulty are actually "Easy"... as in, I can finally successfully assault one with an inferior force. So it could be too easy.
Based on a preliminary battle on a small castle, I made all walls, towers and the keep the shooting type for all castles, and I even included some shooting guardhouses inside the larger castles. This is the maximum strength I can make a castle right now. If we find that even the large castles are too weak, I think the shooting rate or the defensive value of the structures can be increased. Once we get into making the large maps, we can make some very large castles.
I have now assaulted almost every castle in the game. (Screw waiting for a siege--I don't have time for that crap, and the losses are atrocious.) Small, large, everything but fortresses and citadels. I can tell you that, on Easy, I can always beat the "auto-resolve" losses by a factor of 2 or 3. I think it's good, I just added the disclaimer because generally in RTS'es, if I think it's good, then other players post that whatever's in question is too easy.
The shooting guardhouses and so-on are an excellent addition. In the Sengoku Jidai (and as far as I know all other eras), all occupants of a castle were expected to bear arms against attackers, men and women, lords and dungscrubbers. This is where would-be female warriors could gain a reputation to build off from. It's also (according to my learning) where the idea of the Naginata as a woman's weapon came from--it's an excellent defensive weapon, especially for someone outclassed. But it was not until after the Sengoku Jidai that it was considered female-only.
General Campaign Feedback:
Most excellent. I have 7.1 installed and have terrain tiles messing up, but I don't really care. I don't seem to recall any rhyme or reason as to which maps it is, but again, it doesn't bother me so I didn't pay any attention to it. Sorry. My laptop died, so I can't go check. :(
Easy was Easy, or at least doable. Starting as Shimazu, I took Kyuushuu in about a decade, then Shikoku and Nagato prefecture in Honshu. Awaji was a simple assault and is always a good choice to sieze and hold. From Awa and Awaji I assaulted eastern Sannyo--Bizen and Bitchuu, and proceeded through Mimasaka to secure a right flank on Mori. As I was allied to him, I spend the next couple of decades securing my right flank until I reached Kansai, where I was allied to Oda and Ashikaga and could count on them to hate everyone else more than me. So finally--and oddly enough when my Daimyou died--I was ready to kick Mori out of my domain.
That little prick. All those freaking armouries! Which were, of course, mostly destroyed when I defeated a province. Let me tell you, an armoured army of samurai (he had few Ashigaru after the first few probes) can stand up to fifteen Kensai of ranks 3-8 with a rank 5 Hatamoto for a lot longer than you'd expect! Yes, as soon as I could produce them I was replacing most of my army with Kensai. I'd never gotten this far in S:TW, so all I knew was that they were markedly cheaper in upkeep compared to any other units available. Their effectiveness in battle is incomparable, yet their loss to an archer is most devastating. Eventually I had 3 task forces of Yari Ashigaru from Tosa, No-Dachi from Satsuma, and Kensai from Osumi. A sprinkling of random Samurai archers and Cavalry archers round the formations out. Mori lasted about 2 years in most provinces. He was a worthy foe.
By this time I was rolling in Okane ($¥ to the rest of you), so I bought Noto and Sado, allowing the bribed officials to gain rank by fighting off rebels. Uesugi and Takeda both hated each other more than me, so despite the threat I showed by being in their backyard, they kept their alliance. Handy.
Ashikaga had to go, he was getting annoying being all Imperial and such. I also got bored and paranoid, as Oda's border forts destroyed 16 of my 18 Shinobi, annihilating my intelligence capabilities. And, knowing Oda, the moment I took the capital he would attack my rear. So, I sent two task forces against him. Due to a problem he had with rebels in Iga, Kansai crumbled before me. The only delay was the other green guy, I can't recall his name. He was a very good neighbor, so I made sure to assemble my best men to give him a quick, painless death. I'm still a little disappointed by our little war.
So that's where I sat before my laptop went kablooie--I followed Sony's tech support, including a step I knew was stupid but said, "Well, if it were that dangerous there'd be some warning." HAH! >_< But that's neither here nor there. I got the notice in-game that no-one could challenge my claim to Shogun-hood. That was an awesome moment, deciding to take all of Japan. So was the rebel fleet that terrorized Uesugi and I. I remember coiling my fleet forward like a spring being released. They sunk five of my ships before 2 fleets of 10 swooped in on them.
All in all, a remarkable mod. I miss the ninja videos though. :(
I have now assaulted almost every castle in the game. (Screw waiting for a siege--I don't have time for that crap, and the losses are atrocious.) Small, large, everything but fortresses and citadels. I can tell you that, on Easy, I can always beat the "auto-resolve" losses by a factor of 2 or 3. I think it's good, I just added the disclaimer because generally in RTS'es, if I think it's good, then other players post that whatever's in question is too easy.
For the next release, I've increased the number of towers on the castles because the walls are not shooting. The walls come in shooting and non-shooting types for balancing purposes, but none of them shoot. I'll email barocca and ask him to look into this. I've seen towers shoot, but I have to test this further to make sure they are all shooting. It's good to know the guard houses are shooting.
I have 7.1 installed and have terrain tiles messing up, but I don't really care. I don't seem to recall any rhyme or reason as to which maps it is, but again, it doesn't bother me so I didn't pay any attention to it. Sorry. My laptop died, so I can't go check.
I've got the maps straightened out, and R'as fixed the arid regions by changing them to lush or temperate. I'm testing the campaign now, and have fought 8 campaign battles. The maps are coming up properly now and the impassable terrain is correct. For some reason the attacker is starting at the bottom of the minimap. This doesn't happen in custom battle. So, we'll look into the reason for it.
Let me tell you, an armoured army of samurai (he had few Ashigaru after the first few probes) can stand up to fifteen Kensai of ranks 3-8 with a rank 5 Hatamoto for a lot longer than you'd expect! Yes, as soon as I could produce them I was replacing most of my army with Kensai. I'd never gotten this far in S:TW, so all I knew was that they were markedly cheaper in upkeep compared to any other units available. Their effectiveness in battle is incomparable, yet their loss to an archer is most devastating. Eventually I had 3 task forces of Yari Ashigaru from Tosa, No-Dachi from Satsuma, and Kensai from Osumi. A sprinkling of random Samurai archers and Cavalry archers round the formations out. Mori lasted about 2 years in most provinces. He was a worthy foe.
Kensai is a unit that may need rebalancing.
So that's where I sat before my laptop went kablooie
Sorry to hear that. I hope the repair isn't too expensive. Thanks for the feedback on the campaign.
Kensai is a unit that may need rebalancing.
I'm not sure how it works, but if you could make them more vulnerable to arrows/missiles, that would be a great balancer IMO. Right now, I feel gypped when I lose one to mere Ashigaru Crossbowmen... but anyone dumb enough to charge into 60 men with crossbows ought to be either turned into a pincushion or on the level of Ogami Itto. And even he had a babycart.
Hmmmm... Samurai Executioner w/Babycart unit? ;) LOL But no, it's a good balance. A very powerful foot unit with very low maintenance costs, which can be taken out of battle by the cheapest of missile units. It forces a well-rounded army, and forces better tactics than "CTRL+A, Click."
Sorry to hear that. I hope the repair isn't too expensive. Thanks for the feedback on the campaign.
Now that my wife found the recovery disk, it's only going to cost shipping. BTW, I would strongly suggest that everyone running XP with access to a CD/DVD burner head to MaximumPC (http://www.maximumpc.com)'s website, go to their tutorial's section and make a bootable CD of XP.
Firstly, I would like to say how fantastic this mod is. I was bowled over by Beta 5 and then Beta 7 came along...
As for a campaign report, I always seem to find Tohoku is the most dominating region of the game. It seems that whoever wins the initial 2 or three wars over Dewa and Mutsu (usually between Date and Satake), then goes on to steamroll over the rest of Japan (at least, without player intervention).
One more thing, I was wondering, would there be any way to make any suggestions or even contributions to the mod?
Once again, many thanks to all those involved in this mod, best one I`ve played in a long, long time. :2thumbsup:
(First time poster, apologies if I`ve made any mistakes in this post.) :oops:
R'as al Ghul
10-06-2006, 11:50
Thanks aokubi,
your feedback is appreciated very much. It's encouraging to know that people actually play the mod. So it's already a good contribution to let us know that you like it. :2thumbsup:
Suggestions are also welcome but keep in mind that this mod is very old and a lot of suggestions are stored in the diverse threads. For example, we've had a lot of suggestions concerning the mongols but don't have put any of them in the game yet. But don't let this discourage you. Speak your mind.
R'as
Thanks R`as.
I guess the first suggestion that comes to mind is about the Portuguese Teppo. I think in the original STW, the Portuguese arquebusiers were an early access firearms unit which came with a price (acceptance of christianity). I think it would be a good to put the PTeppo back into this kind of context and perhaps increase the effectiveness of the firearms to reflect their historical value. In MTW, they were probably more novelty units than anything else, but in Japan, the firearm had an instant impact on the nature of warfare. Maybe this trend towards guns could be shown more in the campaign, perhaps forcing the player to seriously think about adopting the same tactics (I know I for one hardly ever used the gun units in the original STW, simply never felt that they were a threat to the traditional units).
Ok, I hope I didn`t squeeze too much into that suggestion!
R'as al Ghul
10-06-2006, 15:41
Thanks R`as.
I guess the first suggestion that comes to mind is about the Portuguese Teppo. I think in the original STW, the Portuguese arquebusiers were an early access firearms unit which came with a price (acceptance of christianity). I think it would be a good to put the PTeppo back into this kind of context and perhaps increase the effectiveness of the firearms to reflect their historical value.
Okay I 've to make some interpretation here as I'm not 100% sure if I understand correctly.
1. You'd like to have the firearms earlier.
2. You'd like to see a connection to religion like in original S:TW.
3. You'd like to have the effectiveness increased.
In S:TW you had to wait for the Portuguese to arrive in your province and accept a change of religion to get the firearms. This is not provided by the engine of M:TW. We can only tie the access to a certain date or to a religion/ faction. Changing a factions religion in game is not possible. But, I do agree that getting the firearm units takes rather long in campaign play. So we may make them available earlier. I could also imagine different eras for the final version of the mod, where you could start off with firearms available from the start.
The stats of the units have been worked on for literally years and are close to perfect. But they are mainly tailored for Multiplayer. We've since the beta_7 seperated eras and stats for Multiplayer and SP campaign. So we can make changes to the campaign play without affecting the MP part too much. However the projectile stats are used by all eras and increasing the effectiveness of any teppo will effect MP gameplay. A workaround would be to provide a seperate projectile file that those who don't play MP can use.
Have you played to the stage where firearms are available? I did some playtesting and long auto-run tests to ensure that the AI trains them and was quite satisfied with the results. A problem is that teppos are missile units and thus are played with the "skirmish mode on" on default. The AI doesn't know that the teppos are meant to be used in "close formation" and I can't teach it. But the Ai does use them quite well under the given circumstances.
So, there're a lot of details to consider and before we alter their stats I'd also like to hear some more opinions.
R'as
Ah, right. Well, what I mean is, for the Portuguese Teppo to be an early firearm unit (available a good few turns before the Japanese teppo), but with a catch (a religious one).
I started to tinker with Beta 5 a while (just to tailor it more to my own prefs) and I managed to get the Jesuit Church and cathederal in the game and used them as prerequisites for the Portuguese teppo. As you said, it`s not possible to change religion in MTW, but I did manage to get the buildings to produce penalties (as well as bonuses - for incentive). It`s not perfect (you can end up with 100% of the people following different faiths!), but at least it gives the Portuguese units that 'early gunpowder units, but with complications', feel.
So, its not to have the guns earlier (I kind of like long games anyway), just really to restore the Portuguese Teppo as the earliest unit, which the player has to make a decision whether to use them is worth the associated hassle.
Hmm, I forgot about the MP projectile stats. I take your point there.
Yeah, I`ve played to the late era, and I`m not so much talking about the battle behaviour, (I know there`s not much scope for influencing that, but I' pretty happt with MTW`s default behaviour anyway) but more the distribution of the units. It seems the AI builds a few here and there, but doesn`t seem to rely on them too heavily as battle winning units. They're usually outnumbered or equalled by archers.
Just a note, I also added the LateAshiYari back in as a kind of pike unit to support the teppo in their era. They seem to work pretty well as a kind of cavalry screen.
Hope I explained myself a bit better there.
The guns are more powerful than they were in STW v1.12. The Portuguese teppo is equivalent to the musket in STW v1.12, and the Japanese teppo is 50% stronger. If troop morale is getting too high in the campaign, the guns will loose their ability to rout enemy units. Units of morale 8 or higher won't be routed by guns. We could lower the morale of all the SP units to offset excessive morale boosting by campaign bonuses.
I think the reason it's taking a long time for guns to become available is because the campaign starts in 1470. The STW v1.12 campaign started in 1530, and the Portuguese arrive in 1545. I think it wasn't until the Battle of Nagashino in 1575 that guns demonstrated high effectiveness, and that was when they were protected by palisades and samurai and they were shooting at cavalry which was charging up an embankment and across wet ground.
I never thought to compare the stats to those in STW 1.12. I never really used the gun units in STW, and I didn`t feel that they posed much of a threat when the ai used them, so I suppose my memory of the STW units is a little bit dim. But maybe offsetting the morale is a good idea though, the VnV's make a big contribution to morale, which of course STW didn`t have.
I don`t think it takes a long time for the guns to become available (SW Mod = 73 turns, STW = 60 turns), I just think it would be good to have the Portuguese teppo available as the earliest (but least effective, as you said, Nagashino was the first time they were utilised well) firearms unit. Maybe putting them in the high era & pushing the Japanese Teppo up to the Late.
R'as,
I have a Takeda 1515 campaign savegame that crashes at the point where the date is about to change to 1517.
R'as al Ghul
10-08-2006, 12:58
No idea what might cause this.
I checked the date and there's a hero coming at age in 1516 but his name is defined....
Please send it to me.
R'as
Castles in SWb7, Easy difficulty: after playin vanilla MTW for a while, are on par with MTW castles of equal difficulty. Maybe just a touch easier.
Castles in SWb7, Easy difficulty: after playin vanilla MTW for a while, are on par with MTW castles of equal difficulty. Maybe just a touch easier.
Ok. Thanks. I have increased the number of towers on the castles. These will be available with the fixed STW maps in Beta 8. The maps and castles are all finished, and we're just waiting for an installer to be finished that will clear the /battle/maps folder before installing the new maps and textures.
...am I the only one who cant stand for there to be envoys/princesses in his provinces? I KNOW they are up to no good......so I counterspy each and every province then produce some extra ninja and start cleaning. Of course if there is someone from a clan that i want to deal with in my province I wait until they can contact me.....then they die. Then when my provinces are clear I figure my neighbors want that same sense of security......so I clean their provinces as well. And well....since `I` dont trust their people...well better safe than sorry.
D
Some things I've noticed.... there are still some ports that weren't placing ships that were just produced into the right places. This happened in Satsuma and Osumi where ships from the former were placed in the yatsushiyo sea, while ships from the latter where placed in kagoshima bay. I noticed a map was also looking weird, it was on Suruga with me on the defensive a stone castle in place.
But... this is still a great mod in my eyes! The campaign was done brilliantly with every faction balanced and the AI itself improved a great deal. Congratulations again to everyone!!
Edit: Oh, and do the Kensai really come in one-man units??
Some things I've noticed.... there are still some ports that weren't placing ships that were just produced into the right places. This happened in Satsuma and Osumi where ships from the former were placed in the yatsushiyo sea, while ships from the latter where placed in kagoshima bay.
I haven't worked on this part of the mod. Maybe R'as can look into it.
I noticed a map was also looking weird, it was on Suruga with me on the defensive a stone castle in place.
All the MTW and VI maps will be removed by the beta8 install, so weird maps won't be possible. I will be rechecking the border info and making sure that there are maps for all border combinations since that is what determines which map is used in a battle. If you know where the attack came from when you were defending Suruga, I'd be interested in knowing that.
Oh, and do the Kensai really come in one-man units??
Yes.
Puzz, thanks for the reply. I figure that the ship issue might be caused by border placement faults.
R'as al Ghul
10-30-2006, 15:07
Some things I've noticed.... there are still some ports that weren't placing ships that were just produced into the right places. This happened in Satsuma and Osumi where ships from the former were placed in the yatsushiyo sea, while ships from the latter where placed in kagoshima bay.
Several port bugs have been reported. They'll be fixed in beta_8.
I've just tested a fix for Satsuma and Osumi. They work correctly now.
I noticed a map was also looking weird, it was on Suruga with me on the defensive a stone castle in place.
All the MTW and VI maps will be removed by the beta8 install, so weird maps won't be possible. I will be rechecking the border info and making sure that there are maps for all border combinations since that is what determines which map is used in a battle. If you know where the attack came from when you were defending Suruga, I'd be interested in knowing that.
Yes, some maps are still messed up in beta_7. That's because they're labelled ARID or ROCKY_DESERT. We've only changed LUSH and TEMPERATE climates.
In the new beta_8 there'll be only LUSH and TEMPERATE climates. They effect only the chosen battle maps. Since we have changed the textures to the original STW set, that offers only one set instead of 4, we'll only use them in the future. So all border combinations will be set to to LUSH and TEMPERATE.
For Suruga there're 6 ARID borders defined in beta_7. beta_8 will set those to LUSH or TEMPERATE.
For a future version we could think about installing the same STW textures into all climate folders. We could then use all climates and have different weather and rain expections all on the same textures set.
But... this is still a great mod in my eyes! The campaign was done brilliantly with every faction balanced and the AI itself improved a great deal. Congratulations again to everyone!!
We'll drop a few factions in beta_8 to make it less crowded and tune down the general stars (again).
Personally I think that even the Normal campaign is very hard to play for most factions, especially those that have poor provinces. Personally I like to play Takeda and it's very hard to expand.
I've edited the support cost and initial costs for SP units and am testing those at the moment. Running the campaign map in auto play i've noticed that after about 20 turns most factions are dirt poor.
:bow:
R'as
Several port bugs have been reported. They'll be fixed in beta_8.
I've just tested a fix for Satsuma and Osumi. They work correctly now.
Great! :2thumbsup: It's really not that much of a problem though but it does cause some annoyances in moving ships around..
We'll drop a few factions in beta_8 to make it less crowded and tune down the general stars (again).
Personally I think that even the Normal campaign is very hard to play for most factions, especially those that have poor provinces. Personally I like to play Takeda and it's very hard to expand.
I've edited the support cost and initial costs for SP units and am testing those at the moment. Running the campaign map in auto play i've noticed that after about 20 turns most factions are dirt poor.
:bow:
R'as
Now that you mention it, central Japan does seem a bit crowded with the eastern factions needing to get into a major war before gaining any new territories.
And it's not only the AI that goes dirt poor within the first 20 turns, I usually also go in the red within the first 10...But that's just me.:sweatdrop:
R'as al Ghul
10-30-2006, 15:52
Now that you mention it, central Japan does seem a bit crowded with the eastern factions needing to get into a major war before gaining any new territories.
And it's not only the AI that goes dirt poor within the first 20 turns, I usually also go in the red within the first 10...But that's just me.:sweatdrop:
It was a bit of a showoff. We were exited to have that many factions. :smile:
One has to play very aggressively in this campaign. And Sengoku Jidai is Total war after all. Of course you need to get into major war if you want to be Shogun. :wink:
For factions like Shimazu it's rather easy but Amako or Sanada are very hard. It's a tough calculation between support cost for troops and province income. Although one starts with full coffers troops are expensive. It's adviable to check your income/expense data sheet from time to time. When you have negative income you need to expand but that could mean losing an alliance and stretching the forces thinner.
Usually, when one neighbour notices that you're attacking somebody else and one of your provinces is only protected by a small force, they'll backstab you and invade. Almost always. :grin:
In my experience the AI understands the value of certain units very well and handles them good in battle.
R'as
In my experience the AI understands the value of certain units very well and handles them good in battle.
R'as
Yep. I've won(fortunately) in almost all of my battles against the AI but at a great cost. The kill ratio is consistently at 1:1 or even greater, in favor of the AI. Most of my old tactics that were quite succesful in vanilla MTW VI are near useless here. ~:mecry: You guys have created a monster here!:2thumbsup:
R'as al Ghul
10-31-2006, 11:37
Most of my old tactics that were quite succesful in vanilla MTW VI are near useless here. ~:mecry: You guys have created a monster here!:2thumbsup:
I just gave it some teeths. :eyebrows:
The engine is actually quite good but not optimized in vanilla M:TW, imho.
R'as
I just gave it some teeths. :eyebrows:
The engine is actually quite good but not optimized in vanilla M:TW, imho.
R'as
Veeery sharp teeth...:skull: Anyway, I've been experiencing some random and unexplainable ctd's. When I load the game up to before the ctd, it doesn't repeat at the same turn but occurs again sometime later. It just might be my comp acting up again though.
R'as al Ghul
10-31-2006, 15:28
Anyway, I've been experiencing some random and unexplainable ctd's. When I load the game up to before the ctd, it doesn't repeat at the same turn but occurs again sometime later. It just might be my comp acting up again though.
:wall: Nooooooooooooooooooo!
I was afraid that someone would say that because Yuuki and I had it before, too. Until now I thought that editing/modding the game can cause CTD's and of course there's the well known savegame bug but now I can't be sure anymore.
The thing is that I can't record all the minor details that may lead to a CTD. I can't reproduce them and thus can't fix them. I've the theory that the names of the Kings and Heroes could be bugged but the files look okay.
There's a workaround, though. If you know at what point it crashes you can press ' or # at the end of the turn (you need to run the game with the -ian command). That gives control over your faction to the AI and does sometimes help to skip the critical point.
I tested this on Puzz3D's corrupted savegame and after a few turns it went fine again.
GAH!
R'as
Hey, don't fret over it. It happened to me while I was trying to exit to the main menu to start a new campaign and while I was hitting the end turn button in another campaign. And it is quite random... I have no idea myself what might be causing it.
There's a workaround, though. If you know at what point it crashes you can press ' or # at the end of the turn (you need to run the game with the -ian command). That gives control over your faction to the AI and does sometimes help to skip the critical point.
I tested this on Puzz3D's corrupted savegame and after a few turns it went fine again.
My problem wasn't a CTD. It was a freezing of the game just before the date was about to change and it would be my turn to move.
I used the # command to let the AI take over my clan for a move, and that got me past the problem and the campaign is running ok since then. One thing I noticed was that during the turn the AI had my clan it started building 2 new buildings. This wasn't good because my clan only had about 3000 koku. This is no doubt why the AI clans have no money after a while. The AI spends its money on buildings when it should keep a reserve for emergency training. If an AI clan looses a rich province, it quickly goes into debt, and can't train any new troops to replace losses.
One thing I noticed was that during the turn the AI had my clan it started building 2 new buildings. This wasn't good because my clan only had about 3000 koku. This is no doubt why the AI clans have no money after a while. The AI spends its money on buildings when it should keep a reserve for emergency training. If an AI clan looses a rich province, it quickly goes into debt, and can't train any new troops to replace losses.
Shows just how inexperienced I am. I'm actually acting just like the AI here, I can't resist queing a new building if I see an empty slot.
First, let me say Amazing Mod!!!! I'm having so much fun with this - brings back great memories of the glory days of STW.
If you're still looking for campaign feedback, I have some constructive comments (that you should feel free to ignore - you guys probably know much, much more about this than I do)...
1 - A cap on the stars given to generated heroes (maybe 5 or 6 stars?), so that anything above that would really have to be earned (either in battle or by using prov titles). In looking over the forum I see that this issue has been worked on, but I think a little more could still be done (something about running into a 9 star general enemy just gives me nightmares :-) )
2 - Fewer mercenaries (and maybe of lesser quality). Maybe this is an exploit, but I find that using merc armies I can overpower the AI. If the number can't be lessened, maybe make them a bit more expensive, limit it so that you can only access them if you're actively engaged in a war, or make the building required to hire them either a level up (border fort over watchtower), or raise the price/ and or build time of those buildings.
3 - Place rebel armies in rebel provinces. I appreciate that the mod keeps the original Shogun flavor by having rebel provinces be empty, but I think it makes expansion too easy. If there were rebel armies, it would add to the complexity/strategy required and would also allow players to bribe those armies (I always find that bribe successful message so invigorating!)
But these minor issues do nothing to diminish my enjoyment of this great mod!!!! Keep up the great work guys and a beta 8 would make my year!!! (Not sure what that says about my life :-) )
I did notice one other thing, but I'm not sure what to make of it. Playing on Expert as Mogami I was a good ten or twelve years in - at least 1481 or 1482 and though I had fought Date and others, there had been NO other wars... So I matteosartori'ed it to see what was developing, and although there had been some expansion into rebel areas, there were a lot of alliances, but no AI v AI battles. Is there a way to tweak or increase AI aggressiveness?
Thanks again.
I really appreciate all the work that has gone into this.
This mod is a ton of fun.
You guys rock!!!
If at any point you need any more beta-testers, I'd love to help out.
- amarok
If you're still looking for campaign feedback, I have some constructive comments
Yes. We've been a bit bogged down trying to get the new animations working in MP, but the good news is it looks like R'as has gotten them working now.
1 - A cap on the stars given to generated heroes (maybe 5 or 6 stars?), so that anything above that would really have to be earned (either in battle or by using prov titles). In looking over the forum I see that this issue has been worked on, but I think a little more could still be done (something about running into a 9 star general enemy just gives me nightmares :-) )
Right. I think they are still too high. Testing a preliminary beta8 which may still be a beta7 in this regard, as Takeda I had a 5 star general to start, and when I gave him a title he became a 9 star general. This title gave 4 command stars, and maybe that's what should be reduced.
2 - Fewer mercenaries (and maybe of lesser quality). Maybe this is an exploit, but I find that using merc armies I can overpower the AI. If the number can't be lessened, maybe make them a bit more expensive, limit it so that you can only access them if you're actively engaged in a war, or make the building required to hire them either a level up (border fort over watchtower), or raise the price/ and or build time of those buildings.
They do give you a big offensive punch instantaneously, and I used them to advantage to expand rapidly once I decided to attack in a beta7 Takeda campaign which essentially gave me a won position. I think fewer mercenaries would make the campaign harder, and that might be desireable. I'm not sure if the strategic AI knows how to use them.
3 - Place rebel armies in rebel provinces. I appreciate that the mod keeps the original Shogun flavor by having rebel provinces be empty, but I think it makes expansion too easy. If there were rebel armies, it would add to the complexity/strategy required and would also allow players to bribe those armies (I always find that bribe successful message so invigorating!)
You can take the province, but then you have to garrison it. In a Takeda campaign, the ones you can get early aren't very valuable.
I did notice one other thing, but I'm not sure what to make of it. Playing on Expert as Mogami I was a good ten or twelve years in - at least 1481 or 1482 and though I had fought Date and others, there had been NO other wars... So I matteosartori'ed it to see what was developing, and although there had been some expansion into rebel areas, there were a lot of alliances, but no AI v AI battles. Is there a way to tweak or increase AI aggressiveness?
If the AI becomes too aggressive, the AI clans will beat themselves back into the stone age. I think the AI clans are dangerous when they are building up and waiting for a weakness at which to strike. You have to maintain the pace of the Ai clan's strategic buildup so that they won't attack you. Further into the campaign you will see AI vs AI wars, and that's what gives me the opportunity in a Takeda campaign to expand beyond Kii, Sagami and Musahi.
If at any point you need any more beta-testers, I'd love to help out.
Thanks for the feedback. R'as takes care of these strategic gameplay issues. I'm not sure how much he can affect these particular issues with adjustments. Once beta8 is out, which will be soon, some major technical issues will be behind us, and we can focus more on gameplay issues. Testing the campaign is just a matter of having the latest beta version and playing it. We test MP on Sundays at 19:00 gmt.
R'as al Ghul
03-20-2007, 09:57
1 - A cap on the stars given to generated heroes (maybe 5 or 6 stars?), so that anything above that would really have to be earned (either in battle or by using prov titles). In looking over the forum I see that this issue has been worked on, but I think a little more could still be done (something about running into a 9 star general enemy just gives me nightmares :-) )
I've now set the office titles to give a max of 2 command stars.
I'm considering to set the command star bonus for province titles to zero.
Heroes will be set to a max of 4 stars, so with title that makes 6*.
Kings will have higher max stars, about 4-6, because they can't be boosted by titles.
2. I'll look into it.
3. You could bribe rebel armies, giving you an extra bonus. I'll consider it.
4. Erm, Iirc the beta_7 map was a bit crowded? 1482 isn't far into the campaign, it's still early game. It takes a bit time for the AI to make first moves, it's dangerous to attack when being under constant threat from all sides. All factions are set to aggressive expansionists, though. when I start an autorun campaign it looks like this in 1492:
Amako - Taira
Asai - Hosokawa
Hatakeyama - Satake
Hoganji - Oda, Maeda
Honda - Tokugawa
Hosokawa - Asai, Maeda
Minamoto - Mori
Uesugi - Mogami
etc.
The list goes on but I stop here.
Thanks for your support.
R'as
I'm playing a Takeda campaign with beta8 on normal difficulty. I'm at 1526 (59 turns into the campaign) and it has been quite difficult. I expanded from the initial 2 provinces to 4, but lost one to a civil war. Now 2 clans have been attacking me in Kii for a while, and I'm being worn down. The battles have been very good. The reduction in command stars seems to be working well. I attacked a castle, and that worked properly, but it seems the castle was a 3rd level castle when it should have been a 2nd level castle. I'll have to investigate this more. The initial 24 clans have been reduced to 19, and most clans are at war with at least one other clan. Clans around me have definitely weakened themselves by war, but I don't have the military strength to take advantage of it.
A few suggestions concerning the strategic game:
The rebelliousness of edge provinces could be increased especially those of Tohoku (Dewa & Mutsu) as they create a huge "edge effect" and in my experience campaign winners come from there (essentially a cookie cutter: take Echigo, then Dewa then Mutsu = 50% Shogun campaign wise). This should balance better the strategic game as they will either have to be garrisoned more heavily or else create trouble if their owners expand while neglecting them and only collect taxes.
Japan being a squashed elipsoid, whoever conquers a rich edge is bound to win as he has only one way to go (single front wars) and his back covered. His chances of survival are increased by much if things go wrong. This is what is happening 90% in my SWs and original Shogun campaigns. Kyushu (southern island) is a less dangerous place in that respect as it is much less rich. Historically Tohoku was a sort of backwater place and i have no clue why these provinces are the richest in the original game. The lands Hojo occupy however were indeed as rich as they are portrayed in SWs/STW and in fact gave Ieyasu the advantage when he accepted Hideyoshi's offer to trade his provinces (Mikawa, Totomi, Suruga and Shinano) with those (Hideyoshi was looking to get him as far from the Kyoto/Osaka centre as possible in order to reduce his influence - however his plan backfired as Ieyasu became the single richest daimiyo in the country able to challenge any coallition).
Sad to see Tokugawa off the starting list but it is fair enough and historically accurate.
The "large wooden" castles are in proportion and they look much better, a great plus.
Less command stars = great campaigns!
The battles are simply sheer joy to play, be it Sp or Mp.
All in all: Otskare sama! (Well done in nihongo)
:karate:
I survived another 100 turns until 1629. There were about 6 clans left at that point, and Uesugi was the largest and strongest owning the entire southern half of the map. I've started another Takeda campaign, and will play more aggressively this time. I'll also pay more attention to disbanding low loyalty taishos.
R'as al Ghul
04-03-2007, 14:24
I don't feel well, can hardly concentrate. :sick2:
About the disloyal taishos....is it something that we need to fix?
You do know that by marrying off princesses and giving titles you
can increase their loyalty?
Interesting to hear that Uesugi survived, in my games he was almost always conquered by Mogami or Date. Satake and Satomi can also become very powerful.
Do we need to change the province income? I'd like the map to be fair, meaning that all clans should have the possibility to rise to power.
BTW, farming upgrades boost the income considerably.
:zzz:
About the disloyal taishos....is it something that we need to fix?
No. I wasn't making use of all the options to improve loyalty.
Do we need to change the province income? I'd like the map to be fair, meaning that all clans should have the possibility to rise to power.
I don't know. Takeda's starting position is precarious because he is in contact with 10 clans. It requires alliances and finesse to survive. I ransom captives after battles to gain money. After taking Mino and Kii, you really have to wait for a weakness to expand further. The key province to take would be Musashi. In my second campaign, I have been able to take advantage of a weaken Satomi to take Musashi in 1509. With 5 provinces (Mino, Hida, Shinano, Kii and Musashi), I have 9700 koku, income of 4880. expenses of 3190 and a total force of 2000 men. I had to win 1 battle in Hida, 1 in Kii, 3 in Mino and 1 in Musashi to get to this point. Currently I'm allied with Uesugi, Hosakawa and Honda, and at war with Hoganji and Satomi.
Played 13 1v1 MP battles with beta_8 over the last couple of days with a couple of players, and there were no drops or desyncs.
I was plowing through the campaign as the mighty salad green Satake, trampling weaklings with my horde of naginata cavalry and assasinating their ugly princesses. That is, until I met... "him".
Mr. Kensai with 8 command, 9 valour, "Famously Brave" AND a "Famous Warrior". Singlehandedly, fighting uphill, he mowed down my elite army of about 600 naginata cav, 400 nodachi and 300 monks, all led by a 6 star general.
That is when I pressed ctrl+alt+del.
Mr. Kensai with 8 command, 9 valour, "Famously Brave" AND a "Famous Warrior". Singlehandedly, fighting uphill, he mowed down my elite army of about 600 naginata cav, 400 nodachi and 300 monks, all led by a 6 star general.
Shooting him with guns would be best. Each penetrating hit would take away 4 hitpoints, and just about any hit by a gun will be a penetrating hit. As a general, he would have between 6 and 25 hitpoints. So, you would need somewhere between 2 and 7 hits to kill him. If you don't have guns, shooting him with archers would be the next best, but they only take away 1 hitpoint with a penetrating hit. Less arrows penetrate, but it's offset by the higher accuracy.
The kensai is balanced to be equivalent to a 60 man warrior monk unit in melee. However, the main problem in this case is the 9 valour combined with the multiple lives from being the general. Your 6 star general is only going to boost the valour of your units by 3. So, the kensai is going to be about 6 valour higher than your troops which is a 12 combat point advantage (1.2**12 = 8.9). That would make him equivalent to about 9 warrior monk units for each one of his lives. If he had the minimum 6 lives that a general gets, it would take about 3000 warrior monks to beat him in melee. It's possible the kensai should be toned down in melee, but then he won't be worth his cost at the base level.
I adore Kensai... because I adore Chanbara-style films. They're really fun. However... is there any way (even via a .bat file) to swap out an OOB set or stat set or whatever it is in this game, that excludes Kensai? So you can play wth OR without them.
for backup purposes MAKE A DUPLICATE OF this file
STW_SP12_unit_prod.txt
(put the duplicate into it own folder - do NOT leave it in the main game folder)
then open STW_SP12_unit_prod.txt in notepad
do a find on the word Kensai
carefully read through the next few lines after STW_Kensai looking for
ALL_FACTIONS (it is below all the CATH_LOYALISTS blah blah blah)
change all_factions to read
NO_FACTION
(be carefull not to adjust or interfere any tabs in the file)
Voila - no kensai (just tested here and it works fine)
if the game misbehaves simply put the duplicate file back
cheers
B.
change all_factions to read
NO_FACTION
(be carefull not to adjust or interfere any tabs in the file)
If you use the gnome editor, that parameter is in column 49 and there is no danger of upsetting the format of the file.
KyodaiSteeleye
08-20-2007, 23:43
Hi,
I watched Ran for the first time yesterday, and it got me thinking about those old Shogun playing days. I tried to download my old shogun, but unfortunately I've mislaid the box and so the CD key. Never mind, I downloaded your mod instead!
First of all I like to say - good job! I'm having a lot of fun playing with the slightly amended Shogun world - although the newer games are also fun, I appreciate the simplicity of the limited unit roster and more basic economics.
I might even venture onto the MP server at some point - I did play on Samurai lords when it was first produced - also a lot of fun!
If you're still making improvements to the mod, i've noticed a couple of little bugs, plus some comments that have occured to me as i've been playing:
In some regions if you attack the castle, or are attacked, there is no castle model, and it plays out like a normal battle
Some vices/virtues are assigned to 'spare hero slot'
On a number of occasions i've had a unit being recruited disappear - sometimes they reappear in the right province a few turns later - sometimes they don't.
In terms of comments - I really like the large number of clans in the game - however, i have noticed that because they are so close to each other are all very cautious, and don't tend to expand very fast - this can be a problem if you then get powerful and are opposed by puny opponents.
I was a bit dissappointed you decided to retained the Ashigaru crossbowmen unit - I thought this was a bit pants in the MI expansion - did they even use crossbows in Japan?
I like the Hatamoto unit - however with heirs, the seed seems to have been set quite virulent at the moment, and if you're not careful you end up with masses of heirs and ex-heirs.
Anyway, great mod, I may see you online!
I like the Hatamoto unit - however with heirs, the seed seems to have been set quite virulent at the moment, and if you're not careful you end up with masses of heirs and ex-heirs.
I don't find this to be a problem. You get to develop a glorious lineage!! Plus deal with all those annoying, royal relatives of yours sucking up scads of money whilst doing precious little. ... Unless you use them as shock troops, gallantly leading the charge into battle. This tends to keep their numbers down to a decidedly manageable level. ;) In other words, it just changes the gameplay a bit.
R'as al Ghul
08-21-2007, 12:55
If you're still making improvements to the mod, i've noticed a couple of little bugs, plus some comments that have occured to me as i've been playing:
In some regions if you attack the castle, or are attacked, there is no castle model, and it plays out like a normal battle
Some vices/virtues are assigned to 'spare hero slot'
On a number of occasions i've had a unit being recruited disappear - sometimes they reappear in the right province a few turns later - sometimes they don't.
In terms of comments - I really like the large number of clans in the game - however, i have noticed that because they are so close to each other are all very cautious, and don't tend to expand very fast - this can be a problem if you then get powerful and are opposed by puny opponents.
I was a bit dissappointed you decided to retained the Ashigaru crossbowmen unit - I thought this was a bit pants in the MI expansion - did they even use crossbows in Japan?
I like the Hatamoto unit - however with heirs, the seed seems to have been set quite virulent at the moment, and if you're not careful you end up with masses of heirs and ex-heirs.
Anyway, great mod, I may see you online!
Hi Kyodai,
thx for the comments. We could use another MP player. A beta_9 will be released some time.....
- castles: We're aware of that and it will eventually be fixed.
- yes we still have some spare hero slots and they'll be filled with names
- I suppose the unit may hide behind the province's castle; try to switch off the castles with "c" I think, may only work together with -ian
- the number of clans was a bit of a showoff, for the final version barocca has planned several starting eras, Minamoto and Taira for example will get their own era and the rest will be spread over the other historic eras when those clans played a relevant role
- i'm not too fond of the ashi-xbow myself, I think the idea was to restrict them to a very early era
- the heirs, heros etc. need to be spread out more, so that they don't come all at once
Thanks,
R'as
MiniKiller
08-24-2007, 02:05
the number of clans was a bit of a showoff, for the final version barocca has planned several starting eras, Minamoto and Taira for example will get their own era and the rest will be spread over the other historic eras when those clans played a relevant role
-
I personally love all the factions in the game. I like the selection and the fact that since many start small its much more random which grow to be powers. How many eras where you thinking of having? 2? So would you have more factions but more spread out across the eras?
ChaosLord
08-27-2007, 02:06
Well, I came around while downloading the huge M2TW patch, and saw this had been updated since I last played it. So I had to stop the patch dl and give this a go again. I went with the altered province income and started a game as the Ukita. Went well intially, then I got embroiled in a war with Asai. Long story short, I win the war thanks to allies but get crippled by support costs. With three provinces as the Ukita I was paying around half or more of my income to support my Daimyo + heirs.
So I just spent that game using my meager income to build up my provinces and get a feel for things again. It finally ended when the Mori got tired of all my castle building and invaded.
So after that one I edited the support costs for Hatamoto down to 64(so its 88 for Heirs/Regular, 96 for King) and started a game as the Mori. I expanded into rebel held lands, then consolidated my games making allies as I prepared to deal with the Amako. My slow buildup must have annoyed the Ukita however(funny how that goes) and they declare war on me in 1497. Naturally the Amako who I refused to allie(so I wouldn't be seen as a backstabber when I finally did invade) also declared war on me.
I got tossed into a two front war with all of my provinces able to be attacked, not an attractive position. Luckily, the Ukita were also at war with the Sanada, so they could only send a token force or two at me now and then without risking their own lands to a Sanada assault. With them occupied I focused on breaking the back of the Amako. We went back and forth for a decade, him raiding and me retreating into fortresses or fighting.
I managed to win all the battles and releive those that looked too risky, until finally I saw Iwami open and invaded. With their forces stretched thin they didn't fight, and I got a nice bit of plunder. That made them desperate, so only a few years later our armies met in battle. It was disasterous for them, my warrior monks chewed up their few elite units and ripped apart their ashigaru. After that they had Nagato rebel and I took Iwami once more, then finally Izumo.
They last of their forces got defeated in Izumo, then I seiged their Daimyo to death finishing off the Amako. Interestingly, my Daimyo died the same year as the Amako. I guess he died happy knowing they were vanquished as well. I've spent the few years since shoring up the defenses and re-building my armies. I'm going to consolidate my gains a bit quicker this time, then move agains the Ukita. After that...perhaps the Miyoshi, depends on how Japan looks then.
Heres my game in 1516: https://img166.imageshack.us/img166/5057/japan1516cm5.jpg
Having alot of fun with beta 8, though I know it'll probably spoil me and leave me wishing M2TW was like it when I finally get around to reinstalling it and patching.
ChaosLord
08-28-2007, 02:36
Don't know if anyones reading this thread anymore, but I might as well update. After the Amako I consolidated my gains as plans, then led the assault on Ukita. They fell pretty quickly, having mostly ashigaru. After them I had another long period of teching up and building my armies before moving on to the Miyoshi in like 1554, conquest of their island took a decade or so. Though I had to occupy it with my main army for longer to keep rebellion down.
They put up the hardest fight yet, having more trained(non-ashigaru) troops than the Amako or Ukita. I'm only playing on normal, but the battles have been interesting because i've been playing it so only my Daimyo can command the offensive attacks. So far, my best Daimyo has been the starting one, and after that a 3 star skilled attacked. My current one is only a 1 Star due to Pride, but is also a Great Warrior so I plan to get some good use out of him in the 20-30 years he has left.
Right now i'm at another crossroads, i've spent the past couple of decades consolidating and teching up. Now i've got a couple modern armies ready to go bash some skulls. I could either try to wipe out the Otomo, Ryou-whatever, and Shimazu to secure my southern borders, or launch an invasion of Oda's territory once they finish off the Asai. The Oda are obviously the bigger threat, but I would like to take all of the south under Mori control.
Anyway, heres the look in 1581: https://img169.imageshack.us/img169/4986/japan1581iw3.jpg
Thanks for the feedback on the campaign game. I haven't tried Mori, but you have a long way to go to win. The campaign won't go beyond 1868 IIRC, so you have about 270 turns left to win it. Faction re-emergence can really slow you down, so I maintain fairly strong garrisions in all my provinces which unfortunately also slows down my expansion. I would worry if one clan starts to dominate the northern half of the map, so you would probably want to take action against a clan that becomes significantly stronger than the other clans. The new province incomes reduce the difference in income between the northern and southern halves of the map, so I don't think it's absolutely necessary to always go for the northern half which leaves you with the two strategic options you now have.
On normal difficulty playing Ashikaga, I've only been able to get control of 9 provinces by 1632, but I did eliminate Oda. Playing Oda I controlled 14 provinces by 1631, and 25 provinces by 1740. That only leaves me 130 turns to get the remaining 39 provinces, but I have almost all of the northern half of the map.
To save money, I disband the hatamoto that no longer have heirs. However, that can put the AI at a disadvantage because it doesn't do that. On the other hand, the AI makes its moves after you make yours, so that's an advantage for the AI.
Awww! There's an end-date? I want to plunge the "known world" into feudal war for unending aeons!
ChaosLord
08-29-2007, 02:45
I'm playing with the altered income, and cheaper Hatamoto support costs so I haven't been disbanding them. They've been a mobile reserve/garrison force. For normal garrisons I occupy until they settle down, then leave one unit of Yari Samurai/Samurai Archers as the garrison. More expensive then ashigaruiunits, but I can pull garrisons to build a better defensive army in the event of an evasion.
Anyway, I decided to go south and landed on the only Otomo province, going for all or nothing(my 20 something year old heir-less Daimyo led armies). Luckily, my modern army crushed the Otomo and I got a healthy respect for the power of my Japanese Teppo. From there I made quick work of the Shimazu, they had been in a war with the Ryuzoji too long to muster up a large army. After I took them out I was going to turn on the Ryuzoji, but they beat me to the punch and attacked.
They severed my trade network and connections with my territory, making rebellion a very real possibilities as I scrambled to shuffle garrisons around to compensate. This disruption didn't save the Ryuzoji though, as my army was still enough to roll over their provinces. I had to kill three of their Daimyos before it ended, and fight one battle with the odds against me but I brought all of their lands under my control.
I turned my one-star Daimyo into a three-star general with seven influence, who killed 5 Daimyos(1 Otomo, 1 Shimazu, and 3 Ryuzoji) before he finally died at age 51. Just on the heels of his death the rise of Mori Motonari the III to power came the re-emergence of the Asai. I had to shuffle garrisons again, but they were happy enough to consume the rebel territories left from the Usegai civil war and marry one of my princesses...
That is, until they attacked a few years later(should have known something was up when they wouldn't give me a Princess to marry). But by then I had move defensive armies into position, and my offensive army was back on the mainlad recovering from the long campaign. Once it was fully restored I marched against the Asai with my Daimyo at the head as always, they retreated at first. Then got crushed in a field battle that saw 800 kills and 1700 prisoners.
The Asai Daimyo had "Retreats Often" from his failed assault and retreating from the first assault, so not much of a suprise there. Their faction died on the battlefield, and I kept things on the move, turning south against the Oda. Normally I might have waited, but they had broken their alliance with me in favor of the Asai. So I allied with the re-emerged Hogangi and marched on Tambi and Yasa-whatsit(the one with Kyoto). Took Tambi with a quick fight, and they retreated from Kyoto.
Now its 40 years later from the last update, and i'm preparing to wipe out the Oda. To this end I built an all-Kensai army for kicks, and i'm preparing to land it along the Oda's eastern coast. Its led by a 6-star hero Kensai. They all have full armor/weapon upgrades, so they'll start with max armor/weapons and 4 valour. This late i'm not sure how we'll they'll do, but it should be entertaining to watch.
Japan in 1621: https://img295.imageshack.us/img295/6011/japan1621kk7.jpg
R'as al Ghul
08-29-2007, 10:16
Hey ChaosLord,
thanks for the campaign feedback. It's always nice to know that people are playing the campaign and are having fun. I think you're doing very well.
I'm curious, do you play on normal difficulty? I think that anything harder can get very frustrating on the battle field. Do you use any Shinobi to keep order in provinces or do just use garrisons?
R'as
ChaosLord
08-29-2007, 20:06
Playing on normal, and no Shinobis. I was going to place one in every province, but was conserving koku early and never got around to building the structures for them. So ended up just using garrisons. Worked well enough though, never suffered any rebellions or re-emergences on my own land. Anyway I finished my game as the Mori, after I swept through Oda-land and took a province from the Hoganji(after they backstabbed me) I got the option for the partial win and control of shogunate.
I went ahead and took it since the only threat left was the Takeda, and they'd like lose 1/3rd of their provinces to me before committing to a field battle and by then it'd be over for them. I'm going to try moving up to hard now, and playing one of the northern clans. All the chokepoints in the south make things too easy I think, along with the abundant iron. The game ended in 1631.
N00bunaga
05-13-2008, 18:53
Hi,
I just finished a Shimazu-campaign on expert (conquered the last province in 1610), now giving Oda a try (expert). Imho the campaign difficulty level is way too low, its 1520 now and i have already started owning the AI-controlled clans, hauling in an obscene income, dominating the seas.
From my observation the AI´s main problem is that when it conquers a province too many buildings are destroyed or damaged leaving the AI effectively crippled very soon.
And of course it cant handle naval warfare, an aspect of the game which is too easy to be exploited by the human player.
Might be a good idea to remove all the ships from the game.
And the rebels shud either be removed or made insanely strong :laugh4: ,
and the rebelliousness of all provinces shud be raised somewhat, requiring the player to focus more on securing rear areas, its too easy now to concentrate all forces on the frontlines and overwhelm the AI.
Otherwise its a sweet mod! ~;)
N00bunaga
05-13-2008, 19:10
And its a bad idea to assign command stars to provincial titles since the AI will always appoint the highest ranking general available at that time to govenor regardless of his acumen.
And its a bad idea to assign command stars to provincial titles since the AI will always appoint the highest ranking general available at that time to govenor regardless of his acumen.
So if we remove the command stars the AI will assign governors based on acumen? If that's so, I think we should make that change in the next release.
I just finished a Shimazu-campaign on expert (conquered the last province in 1610), now giving Oda a try (expert). Imho the campaign difficulty level is way too low, its 1520 now and i have already started owning the AI-controlled clans, hauling in an obscene income, dominating the seas.
Are you using the modified province incomes? How many provinces do you control, and what is your income and expenses in 1520? What strategy are you using?
I thought it was necessary to maintain sizable garrisons in each province to prevent faction re-emergence. If not, then land expansion could be faster than I was thinking it could be. I know it's relatively easy to dominate the sea, but my experience is that it retards land expansion as you build up naval power.
Expert difficulty gives the AI a 30% advantage in battle whereas a two command star advantage gives a 40% advantage, so if you routinely have a two command star advantage that more than compensates for the expert difficulty.
N00bunaga
05-15-2008, 18:04
Are you using the modified province incomes? How many provinces do you control, and what is your income and expenses in 1520? What strategy are you using?
No, vanilla STW income; in 1520 I controll the center of Honshu from the Owari-Omi-Wakasa line to Harima-Inaba.
I earn 19,563 koku (7,198 trade income) for 8,581 upkeep per turn leaving me with 10,982 net income.
My top provinces are Owari, Ise and Kii. Each with 9-Acumen+Steward+FamousTrader+100%FarmUp, this trio reaps in more than 10,000 per turn.
In the opening I grabbed Ise, Iga and Yamato, built up for the inevitable AI-attack, fought off a more or less coordinated Ashikaga-Honganji-Hosokawa offensive and grabbed Yamashiro, Kii, Kawachi, Tamba, Wakasa, Tajima, Harima, Inaba in that order, built a fleet meanwhile. I stayed low tech with YariAshigaru and SamuraiArchers forming the bulk of my forces plus a few NoDachi and WarriorMonks.
I thought it was necessary to maintain sizable garrisons in each province to prevent faction re-emergence.
Right now, all you need are 2 Ashigaru units to keep a province at bay almost forever.
The main factor for determining rebelliousness is the distance between a specific province and the Daimyo. With a ship in every sea region no province is more than 2 jumps away from the Daimyo, so no rebellion can ever happen after you have pacified a province.
I tested this with my Shimazu campaign: once I removed the ships rebellions and faction reemergencies(sp?) took place all over the map unless I had thousands of men in a province and so my 59 province-empire with tens of thousands of soldiers collapsed within a few years (i had no shinobis, bad idea)
And I noticed that the AI´s force composition just sucks. It masses those useless AshigaruXBows but no Archers, and of course has no idea how to use them. And from my observation the AI absolutely needs a well balanced army or else it will loose most of the time despite having superior numbers and good leaders on its side.
No, vanilla STW income; in 1520 I controll the center of Honshu from the Owari-Omi-Wakasa line to Harima-Inaba.
I earn 19,563 koku (7,198 trade income) for 8,581 upkeep per turn leaving me with 10,982 net income.
My top provinces are Owari, Ise and Kii. Each with 9-Acumen+Steward+FamousTrader+100%FarmUp, this trio reaps in more than 10,000 per turn.
This problem also arises with the rich northern provinces. The modified province incomes (https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=82292&page=5) (scroll down to barocca's post #95) reduce the economic advantage of owning a few rich provinces. We calculated new incomes for all of the provinces with a formula that maintains the total average income for all of Japan but narrows the distribution around that average. Under the old STW incomes, Owari + Ise + Kii = 2518 koku. Under the new income structure that trio of provinces = 1919 koku which is a 24% reduction in income. The reverse happens for provinces under the average as those incomes increase.
That 19,563 koku income is a more than I thought was possible for Oda with those province holdings. I didn't realize that trade income could be that high. The relatively easy domination of the sea by the player is perhaps the main factor here which also removes any threat of enemy naval invasion. Removing ships altogether seems drastic but would stop the player from gaining a economic advantage over AI clans via sea trade. That would remove the possibility of naval invasions, but AFAIK there were no naval invasions that took place historically during the Sengoku Jidai.
Right now, all you need are 2 Ashigaru units to keep a province at bay almost forever. The main factor for determining rebelliousness is the distance between a specific province and the Daimyo. With a ship in every sea region no province is more than 2 jumps away from the Daimyo, so no rebellion can ever happen after you have pacified a province.
I tested this with my Shimazu campaign: once I removed the ships rebellions and faction reemergencies(sp?) took place all over the map unless I had thousands of men in a province and so my 59 province-empire with tens of thousands of soldiers collapsed within a few years (i had no shinobis, bad idea)
Right. So, once again the player gains a large advantage simply by dominating the sea regions which is very easy to do due to the ineptitude of the naval AI.
And I noticed that the AI´s force composition just sucks. It masses those useless AshigaruXBows but no Archers, and of course has no idea how to use them. And from my observation the AI absolutely needs a well balanced army or else it will loose most of the time despite having superior numbers and good leaders on its side.
I think the xbow should be removed. It was very hard to balance that unit because the AI doesn't use ranged units very well; especially units with long reload times. Making the xbow stronger in firepower won't help because the player will exploit that to his advantage. Without the xbow unit the AI will have to train archers which I think it uses better due to their short reload time. Therefore, the AI clans may fair better in the early battles vs the player, and these early battles are critical.
Wavesword
01-05-2010, 14:40
Thanks for this mod. I'm currently in the middle of a great campaign with Date, where my home and adjacent provinces have been captured and rescued multiple times! Oda is now the superpower and I'm off to fight an eight star Sanuki general who outnumbers me 2 to 1 and just betrayed our alliance... good times I guess! The AI does feel superior to Shoggy at points so it's great for my laptop play.
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