A bunch of questions

[RedKnight]

Hi folks,

I have a bunch of little questions. I am sure many are answered in various posts on the forum here - I'd appreciate a link if so - but still, I am hoping at least half of these are simple answers.

1. Are agents in destroyed armies, destroyed? It looks like they are... or maybe they're sent back to the enemy capitol??
2. What are the differences in difficulty levels for games? Are details listed somewhere?
3. What does it mean when e.g. a Warehouse says its effect is an "increase to trade income (tariffs only) by +30%". If I lay Chokosabe and own the whole island of Shikuko, all trade seems to come my capital Tosa, but Tosa can't have Warehouses... does that mean that Naval Tradition (and Warehouses) everywhere on the map are useless for me, for increased Trade income? (On what info pane can one see increases to trade income? It would be hard to discern on the Trade pane... is it buried there somewhere?)
4. Yet another related question: What is "improves export capacity (increases trade values) by +80" for a Trading Port? Again - is it useless if it's not Chosokabe's capital? (other items such as the ability to build ships, aside)
5. Related question: Is there any reason to upgrade a Trading Port to a Military Port, on the basis of wealth alone? It only seems to add ship-building capacity and ship types.
6. Has anything been written on the relation of the TWS2 map to current Japan? Does Japan still have provinces like this?
7. Is there any use to have your Daimyo at your capital? I saw one post that implied it's good, but nothing else specific.
8. True or False: Blocking a port derives the enemy of any trade income through that port (only works on ports with dotted lines), but gives you no money. Conversely, blocking a sea trade route gives you some of the money, but does not totally block the opponent'd trade.
9. Related question: Is it useless to block ports without dotted lines? Except perhaps to hem in an enemy fleet.
10. Related: What is the deal with raiding trade routes? At sea, I can divvy up a big fleet on the same route and get more money, but it seems to be successively less. Still, it encourages micromanagement. This is based on "Other" income seen on the Economy pane... are we encouraged to divvy up our fleet to attack a given trade lane at a lot of places?
11. How do admin costs work? Does it just scale by number of provinces? Anyone know the formula?
12. Anyone know a nice place that lists all the Arts and Character Skills in a nice big graphic or table? Especially for the Character Skills, it's really hard to see where you're going over all (you can't see higher-level skill levels unless you've unlocked one).
13. Will vassals stay vassals across Realm Divide? (Does RD affect them?)

Thanking you in advance if you can help, or point me to answers!

I live in awe of the day some game will be released together with all you'd ever want to know about its mechanics. (Chess excepted.)

RK

[xploring]

12. Anyone know a nice place that lists all the Arts and Character Skills in a nice big graphic or table? Especially for the Character Skills, it's really hard to see where you're going over all (you can't see higher-level skill levels unless you've unlocked one).

Character Skills
http://www.twcenter.net/wiki/Categor...rs_%28TWSII%29

Arts (couldn't find one with research tree graphic)
https://forums.totalwar.org/wiki/ind...:TWS2_Research

13. Most likely not, but maybe possible if they have enemy to keep them occupied.
You can have a look at Dribb's Diplomacy Guide to see if it helps you.
http://forums.totalwar.com/showthrea...atic-Relations
I don't really understand how a lot of it works though even after reading it.

[Rothe]

13. You can keep allies and vassals after the RD if you have enough diplomatic bonuses.
I have finished 2 campaigns where in each I had one ally and one vassal from pre-RD time.
The key is to have a long trade agreement (max bonus to relations) and max tech bonus (+30). If possible, get a marriage in there too. You might have to pay some incentives at later times when the RD penalty caps at -200, but that might mean something like 3k every 4 - 8 turns which is manageable if your economy is well structured.

[Gregoshi]

Regarding #1, I have no experience with field armies, but after taking a town/castle (and destroying the army inside), I've seen enemy metsuke and a ninja booted outside the town. I'd think a field army would be the same. Heck at the ninja at least should get away - throw down a few hundred smoke bombs or a few thousand caltrops and get way from the pursuing army.

My take on #5 is that upgrading the port adds to the number of trade routes that can come into the port. This benefit seems more important if you have few ports but many sea trade routes like in the early part of the campaign...but that is just my understanding and impression. It may also help shut up the advisor.

BTW, some great questions RK. I've wondered at the meaning of a few building "benefits" myself (#3 & 4).

[xploring]

6. Didn't know until I looked up wikipedia.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_provinces_of_Japan

[Poulp']

3. What does it mean when e.g. a Warehouse says its effect is an "increase to trade income (tariffs only) by +30%". If I lay Chokosabe and own the whole island of Shikuko, all trade seems to come my capital Tosa, but Tosa can't have Warehouses... does that mean that Naval Tradition (and Warehouses) everywhere on the map are useless for me, for increased Trade income? (On what info pane can one see increases to trade income? It would be hard to discern on the Trade pane... is it buried there somewhere?)
4. Yet another related question: What is "improves export capacity (increases trade values) by +80" for a Trading Port? Again - is it useless if it's not Chosokabe's capital? (other items such as the ability to build ships, aside)
5. Related question: Is there any reason to upgrade a Trading Port to a Military Port, on the basis of wealth alone? It only seems to add ship-building capacity and ship types.

When you click on the financial/trade tab and mouse over the different ressources, you'll see that the ressources you have and trade to others are sent on a unit basis, upgrading the ports lets you send more.
As I understand it, trade goes between capitals, through the shortest route, and if your capital has no port (Takeda), through the shortest available port (Kai-Imagawa through a trade deal?, sent to Chosokabe) and once this port is at full capacity, through the nearest one.

WRONG, I'll make amends.

Edit:
You can't trade through an ally/vassal/trade deal port to a third party. Just checked, you can't; trade deals are bilateral.
You can have unlimited trade* on land, even if there's no road, as long as two provinces meets; playing Oda and having conquered Mino, I can trade with Ikko Ikki and Kiga, even though there's no road.
*To the limit of factions, peaceful trade partners.

On port;
Port export capacity is only second to the number of sea lanes the port allows you to have.
1 port gives you 1 sea lane, except namban which gives you 2.
1 sea lane means 1 trade deal available (through sea, there's no limit to how many land trade deals you can have) and export capacity influences how much ressources you can send/money you can make with that sea lane.
If you get another port (or a namban quarter), you can initiate another deal through that new available sea lane.

Capitals don't have anything to do with this, although traded goods reach your partner's capital; trading with Date, I can see their capital of Iwate and while the province has a port, my trade goes through Miyagi province.
This means that either:
- Trade goes to the nearest port
- The port in Iwate is already full with another, earlier trade deal (not mine, obviously)

I strongly think the second option is the correct one.

I've yet to discover if the bonus to tariffs is like the school bonus; clan-wide, or only applies to the port with the red seal company. Truth be told, I can't be bothered to play my vanilla Shimazu campaign again to find out. Until I mod this game, I can't be bothered to play, period.

[Poulp']

# True or False: Blocking a port derives the enemy of any trade income through that port (only works on ports with dotted lines), but gives you no money. Conversely, blocking a sea trade route gives you some of the money, but does not totally block the opponent'd trade.
# Related question: Is it useless to block ports without dotted lines? Except perhaps to hem in an enemy fleet.

Since I'm on a roll...

Blocking a port, I didn't see any change in my projected income, but a blockaded port can't produce new ships. Clear the seas of Chosokabe ships, block their ports, they are essentially out of the picture.

You've got two means for the same end; crippling their economy. And you can either do it like a hammer, blocking their ports but they will know where to find you. Or play it guerilla-like and raid their sea lanes which can be very long (Shimazu-Date for instance).
Now that I think about it, it is surprisingly subtle.

I didn't blockaded ports long enough to check if they would switch trade lanes. That's actually an interesting issue.

[Poulp']

Keeping the rock rollin'

From the Official Shogun 2 FAQ

13: What are the differences between the difficulty levels?

A: There are many speculations, such as persistent, temporary or initial bonuses given in different amounts to the AI, to seemingly more aggressive AI the higher difficulty you play. At time of writing there are no revealed details about how different the campaign experience will be when varied across difficulty settings.

Officially, no one knows...

[frogbeastegg]

(on difficulties) Officially, no one knows...

Well, if a certain rumoured guide existed it would have that information contained within it. Shame that section is 4 pages long and not suitable for posting yet the guide is only a rumour.



Here's a question for the collection. I saw someone say that all of your agents disappear if you convert to Christianity. Is this true?! Surely not. They had to have been confused with Buddhist monks vanishing, right?

[RedKnight]

Thanks everybody, wow I asked way too many questions. In the mean time I have been playing, and answered a few for myself.

xploring, thanks for your answer, but I submit, nobody has made a clear and easy "all in one" graphic, nor has anyone made anything that comes close to "if I only want to to ultimately excel in [fill in blank], here's how it's done". A tougher question for characters, than Arts. If anyone can help here, I'd appreciate it.

ploring and Rothe, I am thinking "plan for the worst and pray for the best" on my qeustion 13, RD... plus considering keeping them alive as a zombie, er I meant vassal or ally, after RD

Gregoshi, thanks for the tip on agents embebbed in armies where the army got killed (my #1), I am still keeping an eye on that...

I need to look up nanban stuff. Starting as Chosokabe on Shikuko means, very limited trade by sea (before RD and everyone stops trading), but then, if all of Shikuko goes Christian ... well heck. That could be an interesting game. I haven't found the trigger for a Nanban District. I'm sure I will; just now starting my third Short Normal campaign.

xploring, thanks for that excellent link on wikipedia

Poulp, as Chosokabe on Shikuko, I think we agree that sea lane equals port means sea lane(?). I will get around to experimenting with Christians, but Skikuko can only have three trade ports, and only three trade partners (once you own it all), all by sea. Capitals clearly have something to do with it. Tosa (Chosokabe capital on Shikuko) only has 3 sea ports it can reach by land. Thanks for your comments and not being bother to play the game again - I wish games would say what things mean, too.

Hi frogbeastegg! Wow, what a blast from the... wait... as Buddha would say, from the present. How've you been? I love the geisha movies in TWS2. I think women can be lethal warriors. Oh wait. Suddenly I feel very sick and can hardly see your face

Thanks to all for enduring my many questions. And good to see you all!










Poulp, don't block one of my current Chosokabe ports, bro... Here's a big payment, thanks muchly

[xploring]

has anyone made anything that comes close to "if I only want to to ultimately excel in [fill in blank], here's how it's done". A tougher question for characters, than Arts. If anyone can help here, I'd appreciate it.

It feels more fun to me to work it out by myself than following a guide, but econ21 has explained the choices clearly in this thread, may be it's what you are looking for. (Missionary and Geisha haven't really been discussed by anybody)

Here's a thread for discussion arts research priorities if you haven't read it.

I read over at the official forum, Shadow_Warrior worked out that command bonus for generals means +1 melee attack, defense and morale for the General and his bodyguards. But abilities that give this type of bonus are all placed on the right side of the skill tree, so I am a little skeptical about this at the moment.

Hope that helps. I like to ask lot of questions too, so it's good to see someone else do it so I don't have to worry about asking silly questions. :)

[xploring]

11. How do admin costs work? Does it just scale by number of provinces? Anyone know the formula?

Maurice76 has come up with a formula that almost matches all the values for admin cost.

He also gathered the following table for admin cost vs provinces.

For those interested, here's the data table with all GAC's for provinces 1 - 65, as shown ingame on the financial tab (values have been accurate through 2 different Normal Domination campaigns):

01 - 00.0 ___ 16 - 44.1 ___ 31 - 54.2 ___ 46 - 60.1 ___ 61 - 64.2
02 - 14.2 ___ 17 - 45.0 ___ 32 - 54.7 ___ 47 - 60.4 ___ 62 - 64.5
03 - 19.7 ___ 18 - 45.9 ___ 33 - 55.2 ___ 48 - 60.8 ___ 63 - 64.7
04 - 23.6 ___ 19 - 46.7 ___ 34 - 55.6 ___ 49 - 61.1 ___ 64 - 64.9
05 - 26.7 ___ 20 - 47.5 ___ 35 - 56.1 ___ 50 - 61.4 ___ 65 - 65.2
06 - 29.3 ___ 21 - 48.3 ___ 36 - 56.5 ___ 51 - 61.6
07 - 31.6 ___ 22 - 49.0 ___ 37 - 56.9 ___ 52 - 61.9
08 - 33.5 ___ 23 - 49.7 ___ 38 - 57.3 ___ 53 - 62.2
09 - 35.3 ___ 24 - 50.3 ___ 39 - 57.7 ___ 54 - 62.5
10 - 36.9 ___ 25 - 50.9 ___ 40 - 58.1 ___ 55 - 62.7
11 - 38.3 ___ 26 - 51.5 ___ 41 - 58.4 ___ 56 - 63.0
12 - 39.7 ___ 27 - 52.1 ___ 42 - 58.8 ___ 57 - 63.3
13 - 40.9 ___ 28 - 52.7 ___ 43 - 59.1 ___ 58 - 63.5
14 - 42.0 ___ 29 - 53.2 ___ 44 - 59.5 ___ 59 - 63.8
15 - 43.1 ___ 30 - 53.7 ___ 45 - 59.8 ___ 60 - 64.0

[RedKnight]

Maurice76 has come up with a formula that almost matches all the values for admin cost.

He also gathered the following table for admin cost vs provinces.

Thanks for all your tips, xploring!

I didn't read much of Maurice's post, but Admin Cost = 15.131386ln(Provinces) + 2.176254 fits the data above, with an R² of 0.999286 ...

I will read more there, when I get some time. Busy days for me.