Originally Posted by
Voigtkampf
Oddly enough, I dropped my focus from the navy entirely. Playing as Choshu, I focused on fortifying my assets, expand only slowly, one province at the time, and build up just enough forces to hold the province from invaders. I usually beat them to a bloody pulp when they assault my castle. Navy upkeep costs a lot of money, so I focused on ishin shishi and inciting rebellions in provinces behind enemy lines. Once my immediate neighbors find themselves with only a couple of provinces under their command, they lose the will to sail around my borders pretty fast.
When playing on harder difficulties, I found that the navy upkeep is better spent on the improvement of my infrastructure, and whereas I did in fact got bombarded few times, it was well worth the cost. Not to mention that once you've expanded you can go and build massive fleets within a blink of an eye and stomp everyone into the ground...Erm, water... Hmpf...