You face a rush army - how you can beat it?!

I see many people struggling vs rushing armies.

Here is a guide how to counter it and what to do.


In the first place, the moral of this game is screwy, many units (especially with moral of 10 or higher) wont rout, even while flanked or reared. This said, the game is in favor of rush armies.
If you rush you are in advance. Especially as your archer wont do enough kills vs. units like naginata with an high armor.

The most rushes are done by naginata samurai, simply as their armor is high and your missles are pretty useless against these units.


How to overcome it:

1. have a rush army yourself - thats not really fun to play, but its an option
2. use a balanced army

Point 1. is clear, not much to say.
If you use a balanced army, you will have more success on the long run ( at least till 10k games, once we go for 14k or above rush armies become much stronger).

In 5k games i go with this setup:

General - costs 1800 at lvl 10 -- i got 1 point in bowery, so my general can shoot
1 Bow cav
1 yari cav
1 bow ashi
1 gun - veteran -- actual thats the heavy counter vs. naginata rusher
2 loan swords
1 spear ashi

In 5k games, I move my 3 cavs in front (im using a melee general, with inspire and 1 point in bowery), since rush armies mostly dont got any missles at all, they cant touch my 2 archer cavs (general and bow cav).

Meanwhile I move my footy back, you can walk circles, just ensure, that you always move those units away.
Remember, he is the rusher, he will get shot, he has more pressure as you have.

If you have your army good grouped, it is very easy to move your footy and also move your cavs near the enemy.
You shoot him to pieces, by moving cav back ....shoot....move back.... shoot.... not much he can do about.
You can rip of like half his army, even with the high armor, unless he is moving into woods.

If he is moving into woods, get your footy´s close and retreat once hes coming out and start the game again with your cav-archer.

If he is having cav. Well, it depends on the kind of units and the amount. He wont have too many, Yari cav is expensive with 800 Koku and light cav you kill in no time with your general and the Yari cav. So i dont expect more than 4 light cav or 2 yari cav.

The enemy cant really catch your cav with his cav, the only unit wich is slower, is your general, you need at least 3 points in speed to make it even! If he bring his lightcav (we assume its 4) than your kill them easy with your general (put bansai and inspire up on him) and the Yari cav. Once they rout, use your bow-cav as well (hitting "F" - to turn into melee) to chase them...

Bowcav and general with 1 point in bowery is a must for this counter. With only footy or no mobile archer you are doomed to fight it.
Bowcav is not easy to use, also, vs. other balanced armies bowcav is not so strong, its very easy to counter.
So be aware. All in all, this setup has a good chance vs. rush armies and also vs. other setups.

About the gun. If you decide to not go with cavarcher or a bowgeneral, than you have only 2 chances:

1. bring 2 good guns
2. catch his general

Guns are hardcore on close distance, depends a bit on what guns you want to bring, but they do insane damage to close units.
What I do is, make one spear ashi to a big line and move it in. The friendly kills are very high, dont shoot behind your own units, unless its just this one unit.

Inspire on guns/archer. I personal dont like this boost, its a bit silly, but as its there.... lets use it!
You should play-test it, put inspire on a shooter and than look at the stats (mouseover the unit on the bottom), you will see a huge increase in reload- and accuracy skill. Its some small micro, but very effective. I use it on my gun and let the gun go mad. In most cases, the gun need 2 shots to rip of, and many times even rout, the enemy melee-unit. 3 Shots and its dead. If timed well, you get easy 6-7 shots out of the gun, before the melee is close and you have to move the gun back.


So here we go: The spread spear you move in, block 2,3 or more of the naginatas (or other units) and than let the gun behind your spear shoot in the bunched units. You spear wont hold very long, but long enough to get your gun some good shots into the bunched units. Since you just have one unit in and the enemy (they mostly attack frontal, since they are not the best player) many, you kill some of your own, but a lot more from the enemy.

At some point the spear will break, you have to ensure, that your general-circle has the spear unit in range! Else it will rout in no time.
You can also use rally, to pump your units up with moral.

At the moment the spear is breaking, you have to move the gun back (turn fire at will off - shift-3) and move your melee in.
You have 2 options to handle with the gun now.

1. let it stay behind and dont shoot - or maybe very late, if your units are almost dead
2. move the gun to a side and shoot from there, so you avoid friendly kills

If you move it to a side, it will take time. You also have to ensure, that you dont move the gun to a flank in 1 rank, it will get stuck into some enemy units and start fighting. Once a missle is touched by an enemy soldier, the unit wont shoot. It turn on melee-mode.
Its very important that you move missles clean to their spot without touching other units!



I will add here a video soon!

pretty neat set up there koc. had fun playing 2v2 with u & won all matches :)

after that i learnt using my guns slightly more effectively.

Sorry I'm not using an english version of the game so what do you call guns : matchlock; bombs, bow ?

Thanks for the great guide anyway !

Quote:

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Originally Posted by stilgar

Sorry I'm not using an english version of the game so what do you call guns : matchlock; bombs, bow ?

Thanks for the great guide anyway !

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Matchlocks in general. Any gun will do great vs. rusher. Imo a rush army has no chance, unless the terrain is absolut in his favor.
If you can make your muskets work a "rusher" will lose tons of units, not to mention the moral shock.

Ok thanks a lot !

But I have one question : how can we do with a basic army, because we can't know before we start that the guy will rush us ?
So what kind of behaviour would you recommand with an "normal" army, because with a normal army with have not much horse cavalery and matchlock ?

Thanks !

Quote:

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Originally Posted by stilgar

Ok thanks a lot !

But I have one question : how can we do with a basic army, because we can't know before we start that the guy will rush us ?
So what kind of behaviour would you recommand with an "normal" army, because with a normal army with have not much horse cavalery and matchlock ?

Thanks !

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I personal play always with a balanced army, it depends a bit on the map. My balanced army include 2 monk-guns upgraded with rapid shot and range, that units costs 1035 (with 5% retainer) or 2-3 ashi-guns, also with rapidshot. The first 4 skillpoints are reload and accuracy.

In 22k games I sometimes go with 3 monk-guns, but in 10/14k i use 2. To give you some impression, these guns usually kill around 100-130 each and that in a very short time. You can do the maths, base reload 50, 70 from rapid shot and 50 from inspire. This units have a 170 reload, this means, that those guns can pump out around 8-10 shots on melee in the 150 range until the units arrive the guns, with some help of cheap ashi block units.

In many of my games, this 2 units and my 2 ashi are all i need to win.

It depends all on the fund you play, with 10k my setup looks like this:

2 Yari cav
2 ashi spears (one is 569 with inspire)
3 loan swoards (5 lvl upgraded)
2-3 cheap ashi archer
2 monk guns (1035 each)
1 Monk (depends on the other units, but if possible my inspire monk for 1159)

I play almost only 2v2, my ally bring 1 monk bow at least and we use bow-gens both, else I would get me a monk bow myself.

Also note, that I use up to 3 inspire!