View Full Version : Pagans' Requiem: Shimazu (Domination, Legendary)
Table of Content
Introduction (https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?140228-Pagans-Requiem-Shimazu-(Domination-Legendary)&p=2053424547&viewfull=1#post2053424547)
Book 1 - Libera Me Domine
Chapter 01. Saving precious honor (https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?140228-Pagans-Requiem-Shimazu-(Domination-Legendary)&p=2053424612&viewfull=1#post2053424612)
Chapter 02. Death by one too many alliance (https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?140228-Pagans-Requiem-Shimazu-(Domination-Legendary)&p=2053424828&viewfull=1#post2053424828)
Chapter 03. Bait, not hidden (https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?140228-Pagans-Requiem-Shimazu-(Domination-Legendary)&p=2053425447&viewfull=1#post2053425447)
Chapter 04. Rebellion doomed by incompetency (https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?140228-Pagans-Requiem-Shimazu-(Domination-Legendary)&p=2053425995&viewfull=1#post2053425995)
Chapter 05. The contraction before born again (https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?140228-Pagans-Requiem-Shimazu-(Domination-Legendary)&p=2053426345&viewfull=1#post2053426345)
Book 2 - Agnus Dei (Lamb of God)
Chapter 06. Gospel of chaos (https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?140228-Pagans-Requiem-Shimazu-(Domination-Legendary)&p=2053426670&viewfull=1#post2053426670)
Chapter 07. Dodging the sharpest arrows (https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?140228-Pagans-Requiem-Shimazu-(Domination-Legendary)&p=2053426807&viewfull=1#post2053426807)
Tactics: "Bait and not hidden" (https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?140228-Pagans-Requiem-Shimazu-(Domination-Legendary)&p=2053426909&viewfull=1#post2053426909)
Chapter 08. Technological Gap (https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?140228-Pagans-Requiem-Shimazu-(Domination-Legendary)&p=2053427101&viewfull=1#post2053427101)
Chapter 09. Long shot to redemption (https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?140228-Pagans-Requiem-Shimazu-(Domination-Legendary)&p=2053427470&viewfull=1#post2053427470)
Book 3 - In Paradisum
Chapter 10. Prosper in heavenly peace (https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?140228-Pagans-Requiem-Shimazu-(Domination-Legendary)&p=2053427706&viewfull=1#post2053427706)
Chapter 11. Ashigaru versus samurai (https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?140228-Pagans-Requiem-Shimazu-(Domination-Legendary)&p=2053428517&viewfull=1#post2053428517)
Chapter 12. Our loyal samurai, Takeda (https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?140228-Pagans-Requiem-Shimazu-(Domination-Legendary)&p=2053428775&viewfull=1#post2053428775)
Conversion to Christianity - Pros and Cons (https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?140228-Pagans-Requiem-Shimazu-(Domination-Legendary)&p=2053429600&viewfull=1#post2053429600)
INTRODUCTION
Hello, Daimyos! :bow: This is my second story of STW2, aiming at finishing a Shimazu campaign (Domination + Legendary). Many of the strategic and tactical discussions are based on the first story (Chosokabe, here is the link (https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?139997-Discharge-the-Honourable-Chosokabe-(Legendary-Domination))).
In fact, I seriously hate the Shimazu clan because they are usually hardly any strategy required to win with them in any Sengoku game. Maybe I can make this one a little harder.
Premises
(1) Must convert to Christianity. Shimazu's family crest is the Christian cross. So we must convert.
(2) Must use tactics favored by the historical Shimazu clan "Bait and Hidden". Please see explaination below.
(3) Must figure out an effective field tactics with guns, like the historical Shimazu.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4009&d=1329709398
The above diagram shows what "Bait and Hidden" basically is. I am not sure why Shimazu made such a big deal out of this to give it a unique name and became famous for it, because this tactic is nothing but luring an enemy into a trap - any 1-star general should know this trick. :sweatdrop: But apparently Shimazu's opponents were all dumb enough to fall for this elementary-school trick again and again. Maybe not marching into a likely trap is a sign of cowardness and dishonor?
Or maybe Shimazu's large number of guns requires this tactics, because guns cannot be used behind their main line - the straight-travelling bullets would shoot their own men's back. Shimazu had to arrange the guns on both sides so they could shoot the enemy's side and back. Instead of crediting Shimazu's cunning tactics or their enemy's incompetency, maybe it is Shimazu's only choice. If they win, it is because they managed to move the guns to the sides. If they lose, maybe their line did not hold long enough for their guns to rout their enemy.
Let's get started!
Peasant Phill
02-20-2012, 12:24
I'm curious how you'll succeed in this.
Book 1 - Libera Me Domine
Chapter 01. Saving Precious Honor
Daimyos! My name is Shimazu Takahisa, the daimyo of the Shimazu clan. :bow: From now on I will proudly present the glorious story of Shimazu. Let me start with introducing our clan.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4010&d=1329715011
First, Shimazu has absolutely the sickest location nihon. We have few powerful enemies, but we are so close to all trade nodes. As long as we are not complete idiots, we should be able to defeat one enemy after one. The only reason for us to fail is that we expand too slowly and allow another clan to unite pretty much the rest of Japan. This is pretty much what happened in the history.
Shimazu has the best Katana Samurai in Japan, although in a closer look you will see that they are not really that much better than the rest. This sword light infantry is excellent in offence, but has relatively poor melee defence and armor. Certainly, we would train them using the expert armorers stationed in Satsuma to improve their longevity on the battlefield. We also have to accompany them with Yari Ashigaru early on, and Naginata Samurai later on.
Shimazu is the only great clan that is blessed by the option to construct a Nanban Trading Port from the start. The Nanban Port will allow us to import Matchlocks to train Matchlock Ashigaru. After the conversion, we will be able to upgrade the port into a Nanban Quarter to import European Cannons and Nanban Trade Ship. Since all of the above imports are ranged units, we are curious that if we build in port in Buzen, our "imported" units would receive the accuracy bonus of the province. We will have to find out.
Converting to Christianity definitely has its drawbacks. I will be veiwed as a dishonored daimyo (-2), which could have widespread negative consequences. Other clans will dislike us (-40) simply because of the religious difference. We will need some extra time to convert all our provinces to Christianity before we can move on. So this means that we will expand more slowly. But when we do, maybe we will be so powerful that nobody can stop us! :evilgrin:
You know, I have always heard people commenting that my face really resembles the Chosokabe Daimyo, the Mori Damiyo, the Takeda Daimyo, the Uesugi daimyo... OK, maybe we are all clones. Let's switch the topic to how to better prepare for a seamless conversion to the Nanban religion.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4011&d=1329715013
Saving Precious Honor
The most important thing about preparing for the conversion is Honor. My personal honor is important in three ways, the happiness of my people, the diplomatic popularity of the clan, and the loyalty of my generals.
For the happiness of my people, Honors have the following effect:
Honor = 1 or less: -2 penalty to happiness
Honor = 2: -1 penalty to happiness
Honor = 3: no effect
Honor = 4: no effect
Honor = 5: +1 bonus to happiness
Honor = 6 or above: +2 bonus to happiness
So I should at least avoid my honor to drop to 2 or below.
The effect of my honor on diplomatic popularity is quite random. At really high honor, it is possible to obtain up to +60 relationship from certain clans, although it is more reasonable to expect +30 or less (often there is no effect at all). Also, even for the same clan, in different seasons they tend to view honor differently. It is hard to predict. Let's just aim to increase Honor as much as possible.
The effect of my honor on general's loyalty is of little concern here, since we Shimazu clan is famous for our loyal generals. They will forgive me for beliving in even the flying spaghetti monster.
Since converting to Christianity reduces Honor by 2, I have to look for ways to restore my honor and hopefully still reach the maximum of 6. So I will be looking for five points of extra honor.
Here are the ways to improve Honor:
Default (+3) - Just like my clones everywhere in Japan... I start with 3 points of personal honor.
Arts (up to +1) - Tea Ceremony
Skills (up to +2) - Honorable, starting at level 4
Vassal (up to +1) - Only one is needed
Retainers (up to +3) - at level 2, 4, and 6
Random event (up to +1) - when another clan has a terrible harvest, donate 2500 koku to them. This may not happen at all.
What's no longer/will not be available:
Heroic victory (+1) - this has probably been taken out by patching
Polite Wife (+1) - sadly, I have to be polite to my wife in exchange for a quiet evening.
Order a disloyal general to commit Seppoku (up to +1) - our clan has extra-loyal generals, so this won't happen.
The earliest available honors are Vassal and Retainer at level 2 (20 experience required), for a total of +2 Honor. This will offset my Christianity conversion penalty and brings my Honor back to +3, the minimal Honor to avoid penalty.
When I reach level 4 (120 experience required), I will be able to obtain the Honorable Skill and another Retainer for up to 3 more honor points to push my Honor to max (+6). Or I can save one point of skill but research the art of Tea Ceremony, which is a pre-requisite for other arts that boost our diplomatic standing with other clans. We could really use those positive quirks in diplomacy to improve our anti-Buddha image.
So we could convert to Christianity as soon as we have a Vassal and I reach level 2. However, the instant diplomatic penalty might not be worth the risk. We need to establish all the trade relations first. Maybe a more reasonable timing is until I get to level 4, and have a robust economy supported by prosperous trade network.
I will discuss the other preparations for conversion later.
I am now 31 years old, but I still recall the days I was young and passionate... :sweatdrop:
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4012&d=1329715013
So now I have three sons aged at 12, 10, and 8! I have heard that other daimyos's kids joining the clan affairs as early as 14 years of age. So very soon the Shimazu clan will have a lot of generals running around. We probably have the best family roster among all clans in Japan.
Our first objective is to occupy the Osumi province, which is right beside Satsuma. We should be able to reach the castle there in the same season. Upon completion of the objective we will be rewarded by a year of increased recruitment capacity.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4013&d=1329715013
The Osumi province is owned by the Ito clan, which is already at war with us. Fighting them is quite the obvious choice.
Right now we only know two clans: the hostile Ito clan to the east, and the neutral (but trading) Sagara clan to the north. While Ito has two provinces and Sagara only one, Ito's provinces range from average to poor, and Sagara's Higo is one of the richest provinces in Japan. However, there is one port in Ito's provinces, but none for Sagara.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4014&d=1329715013
As I have been living in Satsuma for 31 years, I of course have heard the existence of other clans in Kyushu island. Currently, the Shoni clan owns two very rich provinces in the north. The Shoni clan is probably going to war the Otomo clan in the east, if they have not already. Otomo's Bungo province already has a Naban Trade Port. We will avoid capturing this province before building our own Naban Trade Port in another province (we are planning for Buzen).
While in history the Otomo clan will become a great power in northern Kyushu, here Otomo is likely to fail in no time, because they are diplomatically imcompetent idiots. Very soon they will go to war with pretty much everybody nearby, and while one army marches toward their castle, they will promptly empty the castle to invade the opposite direction. So they are strategically incompetent morons as well.
Otomo's inevitable complete failure in diplomacy might be a result of their Nanban religion. Let's hope we will not end up like them.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4015&d=1329715013
Let's deal with Ito's Osumi province first! Did someone mention Shimazu is so darn easy? Surprisingly there were not even a general there to defend. The defenders have one more Bow Ashigaru unit, light cavalry and samurai retainer, but we have two generals and Yari Samurai. We can still expect an easy win here.
The Osumi is located beside the coast. Anyone who has a basic sense of direction knows that the coast is to the southeast. Since on the battlemap the coast appears on the top, we know that Ito's reinforcement, which is located northeast of the castle, must appear the bottom-left of the battlefield. Right?
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4016&d=1329715013
Wrong! Apparently the battleifled is always arranged with north on the top. This means that Ito's reinforcement will appear on the northeast. Maybe the local coast has a strange twist so the ocean appears to the north - something like this:
*****
****
***
**
*
* **C**
*******
******
****
**
*
Oh wait the second - the Osumi castle is not even located by the coast on the campaign map! Maybe the water on the battlefield is just a wide river. Anyway, we successfully intercepted Ito's reinforcement by deploying on the top-right. (Lesson learned: Army's campaign map layout matches with the battlefield reinforcement direction - north is top) Their Light Cavalry foolishly charged at us, right into our yari infantry. They were routed very quickly.
Our own reinforcement, which is ME alone with my bodyguards, appear on the top-left of the battle. There is actually a shortcut from top-left to top-right along the coast. So I ordered my men to ran on the beach. Nice sand.
So this is probably not a river. Hm...
After routing Ito's Light Cavalry, their Yari Ashigaru charged at us, so we charged at them!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4017&d=1329715013
They have two units of Yari Ashigaru. We also have two units of Yari Ashigaru plus one unit of Yari Samurai. So we are bound to win this encouter. Besides, my general is going to perform a back charge on them immediately.
Ha! Ito's Yari Ashigaru routed even before my general's bodyguards' katana cut their fat arses into four. Seeing all its comrades fleeing, ito's Bow Ashigaru is about to lose its will to fight!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4018&d=1329715013
That's right, my general will charge them next!
The moment my general made contact, Ito's Bow Ashigaru started fleeing toward the beach, hoping to make their way into the Osumi castle.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4019&d=1329715013
Oh, they don't know what's waiting for them on the beach. :laugh4:
Note: It seems that patches have made fleeing reinforcement flee into the castle, instead of fleeing out of the battlefield. This could get them all killed badly should their fleeing route is blocked by the attacker's army.
The beach is quite wide, but strangely Ito's fleeing men prefer to make a straight long line.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4020&d=1329715013
At the moment I was rushing ahead to intercept the fleeing Bow Ashigaru. Ito's fleeing Light Cavalry bumped right into me like a traffic accident - none of them survived the collision. :sweatdrop:
When the collision happened, some of my bodyguards were jammed on the scene, and I actually rode off with the rest of the bodyguards without waiting for them.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4021&d=1329715013
This was a pure accident. I only realized all this when my bodyguards told me about it (watching the replay) later. :dizzy2:
My general also had a hard time catching the fleeing Bow Ashigaru. Apparently these runners liked to hug the cliff also in a line, even though there are so much more space on the beach.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4022&d=1329715013
But here comes another collision! :wall:
No! One of them got away! Don't let him escape!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4023&d=1329715013
Ranged units retreating back into the castle is bad news for us.
Great! None of the reinforcement made into the castle. Now we can take our time with our Bow Ashigaru to shoot the defenders...
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4024&d=1329715013
Wait, who left the battle timer on 20 minutes?! We only have 10 minutes left?! :wall: (Note: it was also a pure accident.)
So we have to rush the rest! The yari units are used to distract the defenders, while our Bow Ashigaru shoot their back. But many of them are sheltered by structure, so we failed to kill most of them before we decide to proceed with the storm directly.
(Note: if we have more time, we can re-position the army to encourage the defenders to regroup and pick another spot, so hopefully everyone of them will be exposed.)
After we burned down the castle gate, the defending Samurai retainers attempted to block our entry.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4025&d=1329715013
But we encouraged them to move away with 3 volleys of arrows - which failed to kill any of them, by the way. :shout:
So it is time to storm in! As there were no spear units inside, my general and I also joined the battle, one responsible for each unit along with one Yari Ashigaru.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4026&d=1329715013
I lost 9 bodyguards to those samurai retainers! :sweatdrop:
Not a great victory due to our mistake on forgetting battle timer (no wonder it was so dark on the battlefield) - but at least the Osumi province is ours.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4027&d=1329715013
The resistance was a little high in Osumi, so we will have to stay here for the summer to wait for three units of Bow Ashigaru to arrive from Satsuma.
In the meantime, let's get an alliance with Sagara so they don't attack Satsuma while our army is away to deal with Ito.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4028&d=1329715013
They are willing to pay 6 koku for alliance! That will shift their ambition elsewhere.
We also sold military access to them. In spring they paid 490 koku for 5 turns of military access. In summer they paid 2150 koku for 10 turns of military accesss (which is only 6 more turns). Nice!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4030&d=1329715013
Now we have the cash to hire more soldiers and improve some of our infrastructure. Of course, we rushed for a Harbor in Satsuma so we can reserve the four trade nodes west of Kyushu.
Just when we were eager to sell 20 turns of military access to Sagara in autumn, Otomo the moron declared war on Sagara! Because I cannot afford to lose any honor, I have to join the war on Sagara's side. This automatically grants Sagara indefinite military access to Sagara.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4031&d=1329715013
Can't sell military access anymore! :wall:
Anyway, at least Sagara is occupied by Otomo and is unlikely to betray us.
As we marched toward Ito's capital in Hyuga, we met their small army on the road close to our border! So Ito's daimyo was foolish enough to attack us with that small army? We already managed to recruit two more units of Yari Ashigaru in Osumi, so we are now a lot more powerful than Ito.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4032&d=1329715013
As a result the Ito initially retreated, but they can't run far! We chased them and force them to fight!
Victory was certain, so let's ignore the details (auto-resolved). This also allowed us to interview a large number of retainers. I made sure that I get the retainer that offers +1 honor. My general picked up +10 accuracy from ranged units.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4033&d=1329715013
Now that Ito's capital must be shaken in fear. Our army will certainly reach them next spring.
But that also gives us a better idea. Hyuga is THE poorest province in Japan - no resource, barren soil, no port... simply garbage. If we own this province, we will at most make 200-300 koku from tax...
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4034&d=1329715013
But since Ito is so scared that they are willing to do anything for us, we can turn them into a vassal and trade with them. The trade income will bring us way more koku from the province, and Ito can act as a buffer between us and the crazy Otomo who attacks everybody. (Soon they started fighting with Ito, too.)
In order to improve our relationship with Ito, we also asked their daimyo's daughter to marry into our clan to an unnamed bachelor (probably my cousin's cousin).
Another Honor point, to a total of +5! We have taken two steps toward the conversion - although we do not have this option yet. We need to own a province that has a high Christian population. And we are certainly going to work on that next.
This concludes chapter 1 of our story. :bow:
Chapter 02. Death by one too many alliance
Welcome back, daimyos! I am Shimazu Takahisa, now a little more honorable than before.
Now that Ito has become our Vassal, our Shimazu army can find another direction to expand. Now our indefinite military access to Sagara (due to our mutual enemy Otomo) can be used to our advantage as well. We will simply march across Sagara's territory to find another clan to attack.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4041&d=1329796647
There is really no better victim than Shoni (just like the Chosokabe campaign). They have taken Otomo's Buzen (as usual), holding three great provinces: Hizen, Tsukushi, and Buzen of northern Kyushu. Let's steal their richness!
As our army marched in front of Sagara's emptied Higo castle (Sagara launched an attack on Otomo when Otomo's army is away to attack Ito), we met Otomo's Nanban missionary. Our ninja had a chance to end his service, but since we would like to convert later, we will let the missionary live to save some work for us.
While Sagara has become our ally for a year and half, we learned a new complication: Sagara has a new friend, Shoni, probably because their mutual dislike of Otomo.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4042&d=1329796647
So when we declare war on Shoni, there is no guarantee that Sagara will help us.
But if we stand in Sagara's shoes, we realize Sagara faces a much worse dilemma. When one ally attacks another ally, they will have to make a difficult choice. If they stay with Shimazu, they will lose honor (for failing to defend another ally) and fight a rich and powerful clan. If they stay with Shoni, they will instantly lose their only province, as Shimazu's army is right beside its castle! (Important: with a military access treaty in effect, when war is declared between the two clans, the foreign army within the border is not bumped out of the border.)
So Sagara's over-alliance has accidentally created a very bad situation for them. Who could have thought that Shimazu would use their temporary military access to attack another clan on the other side? :sweatdrop:
Well, it seems that Sagara thinks honor is more important than lives! They chose to stay with Shoni!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4043&d=1329796647
That's also a good news for us - because we will glady take their castle. There is also no diplomatic penalty for us to attack a former-ally, as in a sense it was Sagara who betrayed us.
And we will galdy march into the almost empty Higo castle. We did not even have to break the castle gate, as our arrows can easily kill the Samurai Retainers in a manual battle.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4044&d=1329796647
Lucky for Sagara - their army has not left the border of Higo. (If they had left the border, the army will instantly vanish.) So we still have to deal with them. This is still not a bad news for us, as we will receive a military crackdown bonus to the population happiness in Higo when we put down Sagara's army.
Sagara's army has shown up and set a fire to the farms.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4045&d=1329796647
At the same time, we noticed that Otomo has invaded Ito (just crossed the Bungo-Hyuga provincial border), and Ito might be a little too weak to repel Otomo's invasion. Not only will we lose a vassal, but our capital will also be threatened.
Hm, maybe we can trick Otomo into peace since now they probably have no defenders in Bungo.
Did someone say Otomo are idiots?
They actually agreed to become our vassal! :laugh4: Why not? We can use half of their income on any day. And if anybody could declare war on Otomo, it would be Shoni, which we are already at war with. So there is no additional protection duty. You have a deal!
Note: Otomo actually has one little accomplishment - they rushed to the cotton trade node before we did.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4046&d=1329796647
Strangely, Otomo and Shoni are not at war at this moment - so how did Otomo lose Buzen to Shoni? Maybe they have reached peace after that.
As our vassal, Otomo presented their map, and we were introduced the Chosokabe clan in Shigoku. They have quicky expanded to own three provinces! Maybe they will soon invade Kyushu.
We have to delay that - not until we are ready - like having a Nanban Trade Ship to sink their full stack before they lands on our shore. :grin3:
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4047&d=1329796647
Doesn't Chosokabe's daimyo have a daughter Nana? Let's propose a marriage! They agreed to pay the boat fee, too! But strangey Chosokabe has absolutely no interest to trade with us. We will need to send a scout ship to meet with more potential trade partners in the east.
Note: Poor Nana, she also married to an unnamed second cousin of the Shimazu daimyo.
As we took Otomo as our second vassal, we instantly received the recognitiion from the emperor.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4048&d=1329796647
We have not even fought a difficult battle, and we already have 3 provinces and 2 vassals. :sweatdrop:
Here is a chance to prove ourselves! The Sagara army is camped very close to the Higo castle.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4049&d=1329796647
Quite an even match! We have the same number of cavalry (2:2) and spears (6:6, we have slightly better quality), and we have a slight ranged advantage (8:6).
The Sagara army did not actively march towards us (probably because our ranged advantage was not very obvious). So we will have to go to them to see if we can "lure any of their army into our trap".
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4050&d=1329796647
Sagara put their spears at front, so we moved our bows to the front to take some free shots. The Sagara bow gladly took the challenge for a duel. But what are they thinking here - 2 vs. 8? :bigcry: In a short time, most of these two units' men were pinned down on the spot. But nobody was lured into our trap.
When both of their bow ashigaru units were gone, Sagara's Yari Ashigaru was exposed to our arrows. They were ordered to charge us (and yes - into our trap!), but they turned around even before making contact with the trap.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4051&d=1329796647
In the meantime, Sagara has moved up the rest of their Bow Ashigaru to duel ours.
Sagara's general managed to rally their fleeing spear units. Very soon, they issued the charge order to all their melee infantry. Since we have the same number of units, we can assign our own to match them one on one, with one more spear on the far right flank.
Note: It seems that the AI always like to have a wide and shallow formation (especially when they have a lot of archers), so it is hard to surround them without more units.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4052&d=1329796647
However, the chaotic spear matches also created a gap of our line. The Sagara general took the risk and charged into the gap, toward my general!
My spare Yari Ashigaru is too far away to help. So I had to order two nearby Bow Ashigaru units to throw their lives at the Sagara general. They will be slaughterd, but they will buy some time for me and my bodyguards to arrive on time. And we will attack the Sagara general together!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4053&d=1329796647
The other Sagara general has curiously charged into our Yari Ashigaru's spears in the middle. At least try to circle to the flank or back... but then our spare Yari Ashigaru will find his arse. :rolleyes:
We were definitely winning every single local match. The other Sagara genera who charged into our spears died in no time. One after another, the Sagara units fled the battlefield.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4054&d=1329796647
The Sagara general has to fight four Shimazu units together. He did not last long.
What a great battle! We earned a landmark for this decisive encounter, too!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4055&d=1329796647
The remainder of the Sagara army dissolved on the stop. Military crackdown for extra happiness! We can safely leave no garrison in the Higo castle, and march our 4/5 stack to the border - very ready to attack one of Shoni's defenceless castles next spring.
By now we already have two Ninjas, and they are invaluable in helpin us to moniter Shoni's move.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4056&d=1329796647
In response to our pending invasion, Shoni marched its menacing full stack into a forest just west of the road. They probably attempted to ambush us, but their location is off by a little - we can still march on the road without triggering the ambush. Or they are just here to lure us to attack. They seem to be camped on a hill.
Well, that's why we have brought ninjas! The fact that Shoni's full stack is out means that Shoni must be relatively defenceless in its castles. We can Hizen has 0 garrison.
So why don't we happily receive Shoni's gift to us through the hands of our ninja? :grin3:
"My lord, our army has been sabotaged by Shimazu ninja!"
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4057&d=1329796647
"My lord, our Hizen castle is under siege by Shimazu army!"
"My Lord, our Tsukushi castle is under siege by another Shimazu army!"
"Darn! We have to rush back to take back the lost castle!"
"We cannot move this season, my Lord!"
"But they can move before us next season and take our last province?"
"Yes, my Lord! We are doomed!"
"NOOOOOO~~~~: :bigcry:
We received a mission to blockade any hostile clan's port.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4058&d=1329796647
The nice thing about this mission is that we only need to temporarily blockade a port - we can cancel the blockade immediately afterwards, not even before ending the turn. So we easily accomplished this mission by doing nothing meaningful.
This is the result of our attack on Shoni's last castle in Buzen (auto-resolved, for it is a Stronghold with arrow towers). We had to leave half of the men in Tsukushi due to the unrest, but what we have is certainly enough.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4059&d=1329796647
Shoni's full stack vanished in Hizen before they could move again!
Ten dramatic seasons - we are now the only power in Kyushu!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4060&d=1329796647
It is a good time to cocoon up and develop - and actively prepare to convert to the Nanban religion. When we emerge from the cocoon, we will become a force to be feared by all.
This concludes chapter 2 of our story. :bow:
Another very informative and polished write-up, Maltz, thanks. :thumbsup:
Legendary or not, I pity the remaining AI factions. They must be looking anxiously west to Kyushu. :sweatdrop:
Peasant Phill
02-23-2012, 00:16
I said I would be following this and it has both been entertaining and educational.
Chapter 03. Bait, not hidden
Welcome back, daimyos! :bow:
Now we have Kyushu under control, we can shift more attention to conversion.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4079&d=1329956189
Honor
As discussed, it is better for me to reach level 4, so I will have one more retainer and skill. The fastest way to reach that is to hop on a Bow Kabuya and run in circles for the Ouchi fleet to chase after in vain.
The Wako pirates have appeared to harass our trade fleet. However, once we ordered all our slow trade ships to retreat and leave only the Bow Kabuya, which we purposely left to "protect" the fleet, the Wako Pirates would only exhaust themselves in the resuming chase. Our trade fleet is therefore competely safe.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4080&d=1329956189
Note: The third western trade node (incense) features lots of lands but little sea, and even a Bow Kabuya will have a hard to surviving the naval battle there. So battles should be avoided there. A full-stack trade fleet is more than enough to prevent the Wako from attacking (as they will lose in auto-combat).
After a few failed attempt to catch me on the water, the Ouchi clan daimyo launched a full attack on land. Although we can easily block the strait with our invincible Bow Kabuya, why don't we accept the challenge since we have nothing else to fight anyway? If we win, we might be able to force Ouchi to sign a fat peace treaty.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4081&d=1329956189
Right now Ouchi's stack is slightly more powerful than ours. We should be able to soften Ouchi a little - our Ninjas are always prepared for actions! :yes:
Both Ouchi generals suddely collapsed from tea poisoning on the same day! It is our chance to strike!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4082&d=1329956189
Ouchi has one more Bow Ashigaru than us, o they probably will not actively march to us. Their two extra spear units could also pose problem should they find our cavalry. We can't engage them blindly.
The Ouchi army formed a very long and thin line and camped on a small hill. But it does not really matter, because we have no plan to simply attack.
The Ouchi army put their Yari Ashigaru at front. Let's see if we can use a little bait...
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4083&d=1329956189
Indeed, when our Bow Ashigaru got just close enough to start shooting at their spear units, 4 units of Ouchi Bow Ashigaru marched forward. This is good - we can win a duel 8:4. Now we only need to back up a little, so the rest of Ouchi army will stand and watch. That's... really stupid, by the way.
Note: Alternatively, we can back up really far away, and charge the lured units with cavalry. But sometimes the lure units will not fall for it, as they soon turn around and return.
The 8:4 fight went well - especially when some of them tried to shoot our spear units, who were running around to waste their arrows.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4084&d=1329956189
70% of those 4 units of Bow Ashigaru are now corpses on the ground! The rest routed. We suffered very reasonable losses in the meantime.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4085&d=1329956189
So we only need to repeat this lure and... well, we are not hidden. We are out in the open. :sweatdrop: Here comes another 2 units of Ouchi Bow Ashigaru. Not a problem! The only concern is that we had to back up far away enough so they do not receive shelter from a few trees in the middle.
Here comes another 2 units! So that leaves only ONE (9-4-2-2 = 1) Bow Ashigaru on the hill.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4086&d=1329956189
After we routed these two, Ouchi was on a definite disadvantage of ranged power. But they still stood stil.
Two of our Bow Ashigaru units ran out of arrows, so now they become our new reserve. After a bit of rest, we made the move - the same old luring routine. But this time we seemed to have attracted the attention of everyone! The Light Cavalry charges ahead of spears (who have become quite tired as they remained in spear wall formation since the beginning - what are they thinking?)!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4087&d=1329956189
So we rushed our spear wall forward and set the Bow units on skirmish!
Of course we have recalled the once targeted Yari Samurai. The Ouchi light cavalry picked the wrong place to charge! But just to be safe, we will add in the no-ammo Bow Ashigaru reserve anyway.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4088&d=1329956189
And our spear wall has been setup - ready to hold their Ouchi counterparts!
Although Ouchi's Yari Ashigaru had all their numbers intact, they still had very poor morale due to the loss of their Bow comrades. Soon after impact, they started wavering. The mass route followed momentarily, carrying the last unit of Bow Ashigaru on the hill with them. It happened sooner than we expected - our cavalry still needed a few moments to start charging their back yet! What a pity. :laugh4:
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4089&d=1329956189
That's it - a classic bait and... not hidden tactics! :sweatdrop: Let's see if we can ever find something to hide inside later.
A nice victory!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4090&d=1329956189
And there were just enough Ouchi men exiting the battlefield so we can have another easy battle for experiences gathering.
After extensive interviews, I picked up another retainer who makes me more honorable with an extra bonus on attacking on land.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4091&d=1329956189
Note: The maximum number of honors received from Retainers and Skills combined is 3. So after picking up two +1 honor retainers, I only need to spent 1 skill point in "Honorable".
Normally we would happily counter attack to take both Ouchi's defenceless provinces, but for the sake of conversion, we do not want to over-stretch. We have two vassals at home, who have been rapidly raising a large army. We have to stay in Kyushu for now.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4093&d=1329956189
Ouchi's daimyo still appears uncomfortable from the tea poisoning. Well, now all his army is gone, he is more than happy to sign a peace treaty with all he can offer.
We also signed a trade deal with Mori.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4094&d=1329956189
However, soon Mori defeated the severely weakened Ouchi. Somehow that also broke our trade deal with Mori. How the hack did that happen? It is still a myth. :sweatdrop:
For now we have no enemy. Let's get back to the topic of preparing for the conversion.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4095&d=1329956189
Nanban Trade Port
As planned, we started working on the construction of a Trading Port in Buzen. The reason we waited for Buzen is that we expect to receive up to 25% Accuracy bonus for Imported Matchlock Ashigaru (and later on European cannons) in this province. This is true as confirmed later. What a HUGE bonus for these miserable inaccurate guys! They will aim better than Matchlock Samurai (accuracy 60 vs. 50)!
Once we convert, we will immediately upgrade that to Nanban Quarters.
Planning for Guns
There are four types of gun units:
Matchlock Ashigaru: the imported version (35 accuracy, 15 reload, 100 range) has slightly better stats, and is available as early as Nanban Trade Port. Ours will have 45 accuracy at start, and 60 accuracy later. Very nice!
Matchlock Samurai: (50 accuracy, 20 reload, 100 range). Requires Gunsmith. Gunsmith is unlocked by the Bushido Arts Gunpowder Mastery, one of the second-last-tier Bushido Arts.
Shimazu Heavy Gunner: (50 accuracy, 20 reload, 125 range). Better range than Matchlock Samurai. Requires Gunsmith and Armory (one of the upgrades of Encampment). So they are essentially the replacement of Matchlock Samurai.
Firerockets: (25 accuracy, 15 reload, 250 range, 5 ammo). Very good range, but very few ammo. Requires Arsenal, the ugprade of Gunsmith. It won't be available until the very end of the campaign.
Obviously, Imported Matchlock Ashigaru is only the way to go before we pause just before the Realm Divide. Then we rush for the Gunpowder Mastery art to train an elite army of Heavy Gunners from Buzen (+25% accuracy).
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4096&d=1329956189
Research
Since we need to rush a very high-level tech Gunpowder Mastery to unlock better guns, we need to simplify the research on anything else. Essentially we will only have 4 goals after getting the basic and fast techs:
(1) Essence of Spirit - required at the beginning of the conversion so we can build second-tier Nanban temple called "missionary".
(2) Heaven and Earth - for Encampment and improved quality soldiers for the second wave of expansion (from conversion to the pause before realm divide)
(3) Equal Fields -> Chonindo - for a trade-independent economy.
(4) Gunpowder Mastery - for the elite army after Realm-Divide.
Agents
5 Ninjas -> 5 Metsuke -> 5 Missionaries: We only have six provinces, so we need to carefully consider the build order of agent buildings. First, we build 5 Sake Dens for 5 ninjas. Then we demolish the Sake Dens and build 5 Markets and hire five 2-star Metsuke from Tsukushi. Metsukes are excellent agents to increase happiness levels, which will come in very handy when we start the conversion. This way we will be able to easily have the provinces under control. Then, we demolish the markets and build Chapels for 5 missionaries.
Training missionaries to become competent converters could be tricky, when we do not have a rebel province to generate infinite save points.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4097&d=1329956189
Oh great, trade bonus!
The Yamana clan took the Warhorse trade node easily. So they would PAY us sell them to us (because we pretended we did not have Chinese silks and Indonesian incense :laugh4:). Why not?
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4098&d=1329956189
Unfortunately, Yamana soon lost their port to trade with us, and was unwilling to resume trade. Trading diplomacy needs to become more reasonable and predictable. :rolleyes:
My second son turned into adult before my oldest son! What an impatient dude. Let's get him a wife to put his passion into good use. After some asking around, only the weak Ashina clan has a un-married daughter. Why not? She is a shrewish wife... so my second son will be whipped to travel a little bit (5%) further. The loyalty drop is not a concern at all, since we Shimazu generals are very loyal anyway.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4099&d=1329956189
By the way, we have enlisted another general about a year ago. He has been training with the Wako pirates for a while. Picked up a useless little knife as his first retainer, though.
The Nanban trade port is completed! Can't wait for our extra-accurate Matchlock Ashigaru! But since we will convert very soon, maybe we will put this on hold, and focus on getting the Bow variety first to ready our second army.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4100&d=1329956189
We also need to upgrade the Buzen castle all thew way to... a castle (level 4), so we will have 3 recruitment slots and +2 experience bonus on Ashigaru. We are rich now! Wohoo! :laugh4:
Oh what is this? We received a warning that one of our vasslas, yes the more stupid one, is planning to attack us! :confused:
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4101&d=1329956189
Is that for real? Let's get our army and ninja ready for action again! :smash:
This concludes chapter 3 of our story. :bow:
Peasant Phill
02-24-2012, 12:37
I'm reading this with a blocnote in hand. I'm learning a lot. A bit to much powergaming for my taste though.
So your tactic is:
1) take out enemy ranged units with superior numbers of ranged units of your own
2a) go nuts on the rest of the opposing army until they charge
2b) use fast cavalry to lure enemy units out of formation
3) flank and destroy isolated units.
Glad my old MTW tactic (on the attack) is still succesful.
Any chance you could give your favourite early army?
How will you adjust your tactic when fitting in matchlocks and cannons?
In older TW games, a great way to route the enemy quickly is to have at least ONE more melee units to effectively backstab an enemy stack, rout them, free up two stacks, and continue the chain reaction. Your tactics 2b and 3 are also very good examples of what works.
But the Legendary mode in STW2 makes these practices really difficult for average-speed fingers like mine. Since we cannot issue any command on pause, not even moving the camera, and without slow motion, managing lots of individual units is quite difficult. Usually I would leave a cavalry to be charged by spears, or allow some melee to chase routed units fruitlessly.
So naturally brining more ranged units make the battle more managable (but less variable).
Chapter 04. Rebellion doomed by incompetency
It is hard to believe minion Otomo would want to revolt against *cough* master Shimazu AFTER we have controlled all of Kyushu. But we must still give credit to the warning from the mysterious voice from heaven. It would be nice if this warning comes every time before somebody declares war on us.
So to better prepare for Otomo's betrayal, I marched my full stack south from Buzen, and hid in the forest north of Bungo. Since Otomo is our vassal, we have infinite military access to their land. Should Otomo declared war and attack north, we can intercept and ambush them on the way. Should they march west or south, we will steal their Bungo castle easily.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4107&d=1330093105
Indeed, Otomo broke free!
And very strangely we were declared war by the Imagawa clan, which is half a Japan away. We have just met them a few seasons ago.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4108&d=1330093105
Why? Did they make a typo in the war declaration press release? :inquisitive:
Maybe it is not a mistake. Imagawa shipped their full-stack army with a half-stack fleet. And they have made their way to the north shore of Kyushu! But why would Imagawa want to attack someone who has absolutely nothing to deal with them?
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4109&d=1330093105
And judging from the distance of our exploring Bow Kabuya to Imagawa's territory, it seems that Imagawa launched the invasion the monent they met us. What kind of greeting is this? :furious3:
Note: Maybe (some?) AI is cripted that when it runs out of other AI clans to fight on land, they must launch an invasion on the human player - no matter how far away they are. This could be very important if we want to detect/prepare for invasion later. Maybe we should always leave a Ninja defending home so we can freeze them indefinitely. It will be even better if they declare war before the landing, so our future Nanban fleet can come in for the scream. :laugh4:
Another interesting news is that the Ouchi clan has revived themselves in Suo. Maybe Mori did not leave enough garrison in the province.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4110&d=1330093105
You would think that they would become automatic enemies with Mori as they had to at least fight Mori the occupier to take back their province. But strangely they are not at war with Mori. Maybe they signed a peace deal immediately after? Anyway, they are no longer our enemy, either. So we can charge them to trade with us.
Yet another trade partner. It is rare to see Honma on Sado island actually ships out its army to attack someone. Honma is willing to pay us so much, because we later found that they have occupied the northeastern Iron trade node. Having access to Honma's foreign iron also enables us to upgrade the Armorer in Satsuma.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4111&d=1330093114
Kyushu has 5 ports, and 2 of them can be upgraded to have 2 (Nanban Trade Port) and 3 (Nanban Quarters) trade routes. So in total we can have 8 sea trade partners in a short time. We will easily afford anything we need for the conversion.
Imagawa would not land until the next season. Back to Otomo.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4112&d=1330093114
You'd think someone plotting against their master would at least prepare. Otomo could move their army to the border, so as soon as they declare war, they can attack a defenceless castle within one season's march. They could setup an ambush in their own territory, in the hope to crush a Shimazu invasion. They could use agents to incite rebellion as a distraction, etc.
But Otomo does not do any of that. They declared war, but their full stack sits quietly just outside their castle. It feels like there is a miscommunication between their spokeperson and their chief of defence!
So we will gladly use a ninja to sabotage that army, and march into their undefended castle. We don't even have to break the gate!
Instant occupation!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4113&d=1330093114
Funny that there is actually an option to turn them into a vassal again. Since Otomo's full stack is still intact, they will probably break free immediately after. Now we have another Nanban Port built in Buzen, so there is nothing to prevent us from using Bungo's Nanban Port.
But we decide not to fight Otomo's army this season (summer), as my army is a little tired from the march. We can finish them off next season.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4114&d=1330093114
The Takeda clan did not want to trade with us, but suddenly they think it is a good idea. But no way we will pay them 3700 koku. By pretending that we do not have silk and incense, we easily signed the deal with Takeda - they paid us a few hundred koku.
The Hattori clan has pretty much controlled the southern Kinki (area surrounding the capital Kyoto). They did not want to trade with us before, but just like Takeda, they suddenly think it is a good idea.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4115&d=1330093114
4700 koku? And again, later we signed the deal without having to pay anything.
Note: It seems that all AI trade script is controlled by the same master-mind so they all come to ask at the same time. It also seems that the more army we have, the more likely they would trade with us, as a good trade partner may turn into a good ally later. (But we will never trust an AI ally anyway.)
By not dealing with Otomo's army in the previous season, we actually received a mission to quench the Otomo's rebellion! The reward is very nice - 8 seasons of +4 repression/happiness across all provinces.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4116&d=1330093114
Unfortunately, after jumping from a parallel universe to restart this season, this mission disappeared into thin air. :wall:
Note: Come to think of it, this reward is not that important, as the religious unrest from conversion peaks AFTER the 8th seasons. So we will need to the same garrison/agents to deal with the peak unrest anyway.
The Imagawa army made its landing just north of the Tsukushi castle! We have almost no army nearby!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4117&d=1330093114
But nobody panicked. This is our turf! We have 3 ninjas in Buzen and 1 Metsuke nearby. So we easily sabotaged that army (which turned out to be unecessary), wounded their generals, and bribed the general-less army with our Metsuke. Not all army was bribed, but most of them.
All that's left for Imagawa is 4 units of Ashigaru.
We are not letting their navy go easily, either. Right now we only have Bow Kabuya and Trade Ships, but we assembled a full stack of them. Some of them received some damage from Wako fights which took place a few seasons ago.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4118&d=1330093114
First battle was a success! (auto-resolved)
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4119&d=1330093114
Also good experience for our generals. We simply have to create training oppurtunities for every general before we find a good rebel province for that purpose.
Enough of Imagawa's fleet escaped - so now we have the second battle. More experience awaits!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4120&d=1330093114
By the way, we purposely approached the first battle from the east, so the defeated Imgawa fleet will retreat to the west. If they retreat east, they will travel a large distance and out of our reach. If they retreat west, they only travel a short distance and can be destroyed immediately after.
Easily won!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4121&d=1330093142
We definitely ended up with more ships than before - so we sank the four captured Bow Kabuya because we have no use of them.
And now we finish up the remaining of Imagawa's army. With 2/3 of their stack deflecting to our koku, it seems so easy.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4122&d=1330093142
And we suddenly have the second army as well! Can't really blame the mighty koku.
Note: By the way, the constant naval battles created numerous auto save point to ensure our agent's always successful missions.
Now Imagawa's invasion has turned into a trategy, we can sign a fat peace treaty with them. They even agree to break all their current alliance!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4123&d=1330093142
This might give them new enemies to fight, so they won't make another silly invasion later.
Adding another trade partner to the list - Hojo.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4124&d=1330093142
In order to avoiding paying more for the trade deal after conversion (due to the large -40 religious penalty on diplomacy), we must secure as many trade partners as we can before the conversion.
Back to Otomo again! Otomo has three generals in the army, and our Ninja's effort reduced that number to one.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4125&d=1330093142
It really looks like we are outmatched by unit quality - they have 8 units of Samurai and 2 units of Imported Matchlock Ashigaru! But the commander (cough, that's me) makes a lot of difference. Let's fight!
OK, Otomo really has a peculiar way of thinking. They deploy just behind a little hill... But we have no intention to race to the top of the hill (marked as "1"), since our numerous Bow Ashigaru's arrows will be blocked by trees.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4142&d=1330142546
It is better to fight them on open ground. The height advantage on that tiny hill is limited to just a few units, and is not worthwhile. So we will approach them from the open (marked as "2").
Otomo decides to backup to the corner, on a little hill. The terrain is open - just what we wanted.
As Otomo camps, it is unlikely that it will mobilize its entire army to march at us until we deliver enough damage to its ranged units.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4143&d=1330142546
At the front of the Otomo's formation are two units of Imported Matchlock Ashigaru (range 100). So we can probably safely attack it with our Bow Ashigaru (range 150) without taking any bullets. Of course, I would inspire the archers so they aim better than they would normally.
Wow that one got him in the stomach! Blood splashes on the camera!... what is camera? :sweatdrop:
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4128&d=1330142546
Otomo's Matchlock Ashigaru pretty much just stands there to take arrows. Only after they take significant damage would they retreat to the back (and come back later to receive more arrows).
After we dealt enough damage to Otomo's guns, Otomo sent three units of Bow Ashigaru to challenge us. We sent up five units to accept the challenge!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4129&d=1330142546
Should have sent up the entire archer crew, but soon we noticed something...
We saw that Otomo's entire melee is charging forward!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4130&d=1330142546
So we quickly move up the Yari Ashigaru line and ordered them to form a spear wall!
The two lines made impact! Our spear wal was not long enough to contain all of Otomo's Yari Ashigaru and Samurai, so our reserve Yari Samurai (the unit closest to us) had to come forward extend the line to stop one unit's advance.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4131&d=1330142546
There were still more Otomo's Yari Ashigaru coming up, so we sent out the reserve Yari Cavalry (on the far side) to distract them. There is no way Otomo's spearmen can reach them.
Our line contained Otomo's numerous melee units very well, while our superior number of range units quickly reduced their morale. The Ashigaru units routed, and the samurai followed.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4132&d=1330142546
Otomo's Yari Samurai was not really living to their names - this unit routed with 85% of their men alive! Lesson learned: Don't waste money to mix samurai with ashigaru to take the heat.
Although the Otomo general (the only one who were luckily not assassinated by our ninja) was the last unit to rout. But it was a little late - most of them were trapped by our chasing Yari Ashigaru.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4133&d=1330142546
All that's left of Otomo was a very well-aligned white line (their bodies) on the battlefield.
Even Otomo had a large number of samurai units, our more experience Ashigaru (and a better commander *cough*) took the day.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4134&d=1330142546
Actually, there were two units who made it out of the battlefield. So there was more free experience for me!
Now that we crushed Otomo's short-lived rebellion and Imagawa's short-lived invasion, we can conver to Christianity as planned.
Why did it take this long? We were waiting for the 5th and last Metsuke to be recruited from Tsukushi last season, so we can demolish all Markets and forget about them for a while. When we convert this season (winter of 1550), we can immediately begin the construction of Chapels in all provinces that's not already Christian (all provinces except Buzen and Bungo).
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4135&d=1330142546
This is a difficult road to travel, but here we are!
This concludes chapter 4 of our story. :bow:
Chapter 05. The contraction before born again
Welcome back, daimyos! I am Shimazu Takahisa, daimyo of the Shimazu clan! :bow:
We are now "born again" Christians! But technically speaking, we are still in the womb, because most of my people are still believers of Buddha. Conversion to the nanban religion will take some time, and we will have to endure increasing religious unrest in the provinces, just like the contraction before giving birth. Only after we get through the most violent contraction can we really be "born again", and start to invade others in the name of the Nanban God! Er... cough. :sweatdrop:
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4136&d=1330142390
Immediately we can start constructing the Nanban Quarter, which is an upgrade of the Nanban Trade Port. The nice thing about Nanban Quarter is that it does not require any research art, and it allows us to import European Cannons and construct Nanban Trade Ship. The former is a beast on the land. The latter is the ruler of sea. In order to get very accurate European cannons, we definitely chose Buzen to build our Nanban Quarter (only one is allowed).
Religious unrest increases by about 1 point per season. So eventually our Metsuke cannot control the unrest all by himself. There are too many radical religious zealots to arrest! So we have to start hiring garrisons. Ideally, we maintain a public order at perfect neutral of "0" to minimize our spending in garrison upkeep.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4137&d=1330142390
Everything looks good at first until... Ouchi declared war! This is what they do after reviving themselves - not to seek revenge from whom destroyed them in the first place (Mori), but to turn to their friendly trade partners (and leaving their capital completely undefended)? :furious3:
Otomo is not the only idiot in this world. War it is, then! (Note: it really seems that the AI will prioritize on attacking the human player even if this is totally against their interest of survival... we will just treat them as AIs and mow down all of them anyway.)
By the way, Ouchi managed to upgrade their port to Military port, and started producing Sengoku Bune. This ship is very fast when it rides the wind. This has created some problem for my second son, Yoshihiro's Bow Kabuya while he attempted to play cat-and-mouse with them on the sea. There are still chances to remain unharmed for 20 minutes, but it requires quite a bit of maneuevering.
There seems to be more trouble with our other Vassal, Ito. Suddenly we observed that Ito's full stack moved away from its caste, and... there is no where else they can tour on Kyushu but in OUR territory! It is very likely Ito is planning for a rebellion. :furious3:
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4144&d=1330142390
But that also gives us a perfect chance to er... relief them from their vassal duty without any bad feelings. :rolleyes: Hyuga is one of the poorest provinces in Japan, so we have no interest in occupying it, either. This way, we can occupy one more good provinces before pausing for pre-Realm Divide.
So what do we do to... relief Ito of their vassal duty? You probably have guessed it right!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4145&d=1330142390
(1) Ninja: Sabotage army
(2) Missionary: Recite rebellion.
The spawning spot of the rebellion (pointed by the arrow) is right between Ito's army and its defenceless castle. Since their army cannot move, the rebel will have a free shot at the castle. And the Christian rebels happily did.
This season also saw a rare oppurtunity to pay 2500 koku to train more experienced Bow (+2) infantry for a whooping 10 seasons!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4147&d=1330142390
It looks like we will have to put the Import Matchlock Ashigaru on hold for now. We already imported 4 units of Imported Matchlock Ashigaru so far. Maybe Ouchi will march something close for us to do target practice. :laugh4:
There are plans, and there are... revised plans. :sweatdrop: Since we expect to lose Ito, our own remaining vassal, we can definitely use something else to boost my honor, so we receive happiness bonus in the provinces and maybe more positive images on the diplomacy table.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4148&d=1330142390
So naturally we now look at Tea Ceremony. We will research that first, then go for Chonindo. Then we go for Gun Mastery as planned before.
You must be joking - Imagawa sent ANOTHER full stack and is now just south of Shigoku. Is the nanban god testing my patience with the stupid designs of this world? :bomb2: What the hack is this absurdity? What can't you find someone else close to you to fight? :furious3:
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4149&d=1330142390
But strangely, as we have started mass hiring of garrison units to control religious unrest in all provinces, our military power quickly boosted from Strong to Mighty. Then Imagawa's fleet actually backed off. So... OK, at least there is a way to avoid this absurdity - hire more army!
Well, not all absurdity of this world brings anger. Sometimes they bring gifts. For example, even if we already lost Ito as our vassal... it is not reflected in the official record! My honor bonus from "Vassal established +1" never disappeared even after Ito is replaced by Christian rebels. Or maybe the nanban god did not think it is my fault to lose this vassal anyway. Hm... isn't He supposed to know everything? So He knows I caused all this... :sweatdrop:
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4150&d=1330142390
Note: The real purpose of turning Hyuga to rebel is to create a conveniently located Infinite save point. Now our agent horde can go out in full force! Woohoo! :laugh4:
Hm, we wished for a target practice for the Matchlocks... here they come! Ouchi's full stack has crossed the strait and is just outside the castle of Buzen. Let's fight!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4151&d=1330142390
Ouchi's stack contained a crazy number of 5 generals and a Metsuke. Even if we have three ninjas in Buzen, we could only reduced them to 3 generals and... no Metsuke. Our army is not very well-balanced, with only 4 units of spears, as we just moved away 3 units of Yari Ashigaru to help Tsukushi to maintain order. We have to fight this battle very carefully.
The battefield features a tall hill, which the Ouchi army happily camped on. It is OK - we have no intention to attack them on the hill anyway.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4152&d=1330142390
We chose to march al the way to Ouchi's south side, and camped on the edge of the battlefield. Although it remains a mystery why we can't back off for a few steps more. The reason that we chose this spot is that there are two short cliffs on both side to protect our flanks. So our very short line of four spear units is still sufficient.
But we still prefer not to have the full-army clash too early. We have a lot more arrows than them (as we have completed the Heaven and Earth art, which also increases Gun units' ammo by 50%!), so we want to water down their numbers before the showndown.
We first attempd to lure Ouchi's units with Bow Ashigaru. This Yari Ashigaru, when they realized they were being shot at, gladly charged down the hill, without any support.
This is Shimazu's famous "Bait and... not hidden" tactics! That Yari Ashigaru chased our men all the way into the range of all of our range units. Hundreds of arrows and bullets made our welcome... capped by Light Cavalry's charge.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4153&d=1330142390
Amen. One down, 17 more (3 generals, 5 bows, 9 yari) to go!
Soon we were able to bait another Yari Ashigaru unit down. This time our bait ran across our line from right to left to increase the exposure of the prey to our fire power.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4154&d=1330142390
Amen. Two down, 16 more (3 generals, 5 bows, 8 yari) to go!
After two units of Yari, we attracted a Bow unit this time. We easily out-duelled it with two Bow Ashigaru units of ours (should have used more, but I was a little over confident).
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4155&d=1330142390
The Bow unit started fleeing... but there is no time to chase it, because...
Because Ouchi's entire army was moving to their right (our left)!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4156&d=1330142390
We definitely recognizes this as the prequel of a full-force assault. However, if we do not move, our left flank will take most of the heat. We don't want this to happen when we have such a disadvantage in melee. So we have to relocate to a better place... the south-east corner!
Interestingly, the moment Ouchi's Bow Ashigaru stopped fleeing, Ouchi abandoned their full assault plan, and resumed their camping on the hill. I did not realize this until we have finished our relocation to the south-east corner.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4157&d=1330142390
So what do we do? We tried to lure Ouchi's unit all the way from the corner. And it actually worked! This time it is a general! But when our bait (my second son) ran back to hide behind spears, Ouchi's general promptly retreated. He is not that stupid.
But we learn more quickly than he does. They actually can't learn. :sweatdrop:
So we tried to lure Ouchi's general again. And this time we welcome him with spears! Four units of spears charging from both sides. As long as contact is made, no matter how small, the entire unit is trapped!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4158&d=1330142390
Amen! Three down, 15 more (2 generals, 5 bows, 8 yari) to go!
Let's see what can we lure next... a Yari Ashigaru unit!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4159&d=1330142390
Amen! Four down, 14 more (2 generals, 5 bows, 7 yari) to go!
Somehow I had a feeling that Ouchi wil soon start their total assault, so I rearranged the army formation to allow tighter packing and shorter lines to defend. I also moved the Matchlock units behind the lines to protect them.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4160&d=1330142390
But my feeling was wrong - Ouchi is not coming yet. :sweatdrop:
So what can we lure next... another general!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4161&d=1330142390
Amen! Five down, 13 more (1 general, 5 bows, 7 yari) to go!
Let's bait more... a Bow Ashigaru unit! Let's shoot at it with 5 Bow Ashigaru!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4162&d=1330142390
But I forgot to disable their melee mode! I didn't realize and lost maybe 50 men unecessarily. Then they are easily routed.
Amen! Six down, 12 more (1 general, 4 bows, 7 yari) to go!
It really seemed that Ouchi was sensitive about losing Bow units. Twice they prepared to assault us with everything when their Bow Ashigaru number dropped to 4. But any melee units lost in the middle did not trigger anything.
So here they come! Although they still have a lot more Yari units than us, ourline was long enough to hold all of them.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4163&d=1330142390
Taste the arrows and bullets!
The sound of gunfire were music to the ears! Ouchi's Yari Ashigaru were routed quickly. Amen many times! Even their general could not save it. Their Bows soon started fleeing as well. The battle is over!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4164&d=1330142390
We also made some valuable observation about Matchlock Ashigaru's functions.
(1) Guns to not reduce morale very significantly. Everybody said the sound of gunfire makes men crap their pants. Not true. At most, there is probably only ONE (or NO) point drop of morale per round fired. So four units can't even rout Ashigaru in a short time. Bows, on the other hand, quickly reduced their numbers, and they will rout as soon as they suffer heavily losses. Using bows along with guns do help to rout Ashigaru more quicky.
(2) Guns who are behind the lines, but uphill, CAN fire at the enemies, but they only do so when they have a clear line of sight. For example, when the Ouchi Yari Ashigaru are engaged, our gun did not fire a bullet. However, when they started to flee away from our line, they resumed firing. This means that we better NOT leave the guns behind the lines even if they are high-up enough to not be blocked by our own men. We have to move them to the flank.
But this creates a problem that any enemy reserve (such as their general) may easiy charge into the guns. This is a risk we must take, unfortunately.
Ouchi's second invasion was crushed as well - with just enough leftover so we had another easy battle for experience purpose.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4165&d=1330142390
The opponent definitely has predictable patterns we have learned from this battle. We will have another independent discussion dedicated to the bait and trap tactics.
Ouchi was crushed yet again, so we can again demand for compensation. They actually agreed to become our vassal, but who wants this ungrateful bastard to become a vassal? They will betray us in no time anyway. For the time being ;let's just keep them as a trade partner.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4166&d=1330142390
Maybe soon they will come back with another full stack... but we can use them to come up with good gun tactics. :yes:
The Nanban quarter is completed! We are now connected to one more trade partner.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4167&d=1330142390
The Yammana clan stil holds the Warhorse trade node, so they will gladly pay us to dump their product. Of course, they didn't know soon we wil dump our incense, silk, and cotton (Otomo is finished, so we have taken over their Cotton node) to them. :grin3:
Our religious unrest builds up, but there is finally a limit of unhappiness. It seems that when the population reaches 33% Christian, the unrest tops off at -7. And it will slowly decline when the percentage of Christian rise further.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4168&d=1330142390
This is great! We can start disbanding useless Yari Ashigaru units. Our army missionary can't wait to turn all Japan into chaos... I mean, the land of the nanban god! :sweatdrop:
That concludes chapter 5 of our story. :bow:
Book 2 - Agnus Dei (Lamb of God)
Chapter 06. Gospel of chaos
Welcome back, daimyos! :bow: I am Shimazu Takahisa, daimyo of the Shimazu clan.
Our painful contraction of conversion is finally over! We are reborn, to become the second most unpopular clan in Japan! (The first prize was taken by Ikko-Ikki.) While we slowly disband the temporary garrison inside our territory (those low-grade Ashigaru can't really face any enemy), we can afford to spread the nanban religion to the rest of Japan with our agents and gunpowder! Certainly the rest of Japan will fall into the same contraction... :sweatdrop: Let the gospel of chaos been heard and smelled!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4178&d=1330316405
While our Missionaries stepped onto the soil of Honshu, the Ouchi clan has sent a Metsuke to stop us! But soon he realized the love of Christ and decided to resign from this sinful career. Amen. :grin3:
My oldest son has finally joined the military - he is already 20! And to apologize for his laziness, he brought a good friend to enlist at the same time.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4179&d=1330316405
Now we have 6 generals, but not so much army for everyone to lead. So I will invite them to the "Hyuga training camp" to have some horse riding exercise with me.
Remember we saw Imagawa shipping another full stack toward us, but turned back when we had more army?
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4180&d=1330316405
They are back, with TWO full stacks! This is disgusting! :furious3:
But strangely, Imagawa's fleet and army fell into a circular logical trap here. They keep sailing forward and backward... making no progress at all. Think of how much they could accomplish with these two full stacks if they use it on its two NEW ENEMIES (Takeda and Hojo).
"We should sneak attack Shimazu!"
"That takes too long! We should go back and attack our enemies Takeda and Hojo!"
"That takes too long! We should go forward and attack our trade partner Shimazu!"
"That takes too long! We should...
:bomb:
Now my oldest son is born, I should find him a wife. Since spreading Chrsitianity to all Japan takes a lot of time, we might actually see the day of our third generations taking the field. Even if not, young boys can be used as hostages, too.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4181&d=1330316405
The only worthy clan that has an unmarried daughter is Date! They agreed to marry their daughter to my heir - no strings attached! Date is a good friend to make, as they are located at the opposite end of Japan.
Although a Bow Kabuya needs to sail 3 years to reach Date's port, Date's daughter was shipped to us immediately! A beautiful wife for my son Yoshihisa. Their age is similar, too.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4182&d=1330316405
And suddenly I realized that I gave my second son, Yoshihiro, a wife (from Ashina) who is 10 years older than him. :sweatdrop: My good Yoshihiro never complained his shrewish wife, although I know he liked me a little less afterwards. Well, at least they are still making baby.
Now that we have finished reseaching Tea Ceremony, my honor should have returned to maximum (6). Indeed... but it is NOT because of the Tea Ceremony! Unfortunately, we did not realize the fact that Arts, Skils, and Traits all go to the same counter, which max out at 3. Tea Ceremony, which is an art, did NOT increase my honor at all.
If we knew about this, we would have skipped Tea Ceremony. But at least it improves diplomatic relationships with other clans a bit (10). Tea party at my place!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4183&d=1330316405
Interestingly, I actually got one extra point of honor from Great Victories. I guess being chased by overwhelming rebels every season is quite a feat.
Note: So Great Victories +1 Is possible, possibly after a few defensive heroic victories?
Our agents are not wasting tax-payers money. Those who landed in Shigoku immediately incited Chosokabe's Ito province's 1-season-old Christian population to rebel against Chosokabe!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4184&d=1330316405
And of course my second son, Yoshihiro's army followed it up before Chosokabe was able to respond... because Chosokabe's army had a little accident on the road. We officially have nothing to do with it. :devilish:
The rebels were very well equipped, probably because of the existing military facilities in Ito castle town.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4185&d=1330316405
But there are not a lot of them. Yoshihiro took care of them easily (auto-resolved).
As more of our missionaries come to Honshu, they found a Metsuke from Imagawa! He walked all the way from half a Japan away to mess with us!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4186&d=1330316405
... he walks all the way here, only to realize that Jesus loves him. Amen. :bow:
One of our missionary witness the peaceful and indirect transition of Mori's Suo province to Shimazu (via Rebes). This is our second full-stack army, led by my my most experienced general.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4187&d=1330316405
That's our first foothold on Honshu the main island! There is a long way to spread Christianity from here.
Some time ago our trade with Mori was broken for no reason. Now it is time to restore trade. Mori is willing to pay us even if we do not hide any of our trade ships. They pay us... 12810 koku! This is a new record! Thank you very much, come again! :bow:
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4188&d=1330316405
Strangely, when we removed all trade ships and ask again, we actually get less reward from Mori. Not sure what happens here, a short-circuit in their brain, maybe? :dizzy2:
Chosokabe just declared war on their trade partner Miyoshi. So their army is away...
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4189&d=1330316405
So again our missionary facilitated the we peaceful transaction of Chosokabe's capital Tosa to Shimazu. It seems that Great Clan's capitals all have especially high resistance at the beginning of the conquest. And we still expect scale-7 unrest in a few years... So we probably have to exmpt the tax in Tosa for quite some time.
Here we completed the mission to acquire any unit of Siege Weapon. Our choice of weapon is nothing else but the BEST siege weapon - European Cannon!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4190&d=1330316405
And for that we can recruit even better quality European Cannon for a year and half, plus a free unit of Fire Projecting Mangonels. Must do some field testing for both of them later.
Our mass hiring of Ashigaru also triggered 2 years of high-quality Ashigaru recruit. Great! We have been planning for the third and fourth full stack.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4191&d=1330316405
We will definitely add some more (+15 accuracy) Imported Matchlock Ashigaru in Buzen, and (+5 armor) Yari Ashigaru in Satsuma.
Ouchi is finally destroyed by Mori. Now we can find another trade partner. Our in-laws Ashina also agrees to pay us to trade! And very strangely they also want to pay more when we do not hide our trade fleets.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4192&d=1330316405
Maybe they actually want to have Chinese silk?
While (again) putting an end to Ouchi, Mori's daimyo and his numerous sons and generals (in total, 5 generals) used a very powerful army.
It would be very troublesome if we allow such a powerful full-stack get so close to us. They might suddenly get the wrong and stupid idea to throw away their 12,000-koku-bought trade partner.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4193&d=1330316405
So we were pro-active and... in a year, Mori's daimyo, Mori Motonari, and all his sons died from various food poisoning accidents. What a tragic disruption for the Mori Dynasty. :devilish:
Peasant Phill
02-27-2012, 13:05
Maltz, I've thanked you for a few informative posts.
I've also got an additional question:
It seems that AI factions are very agressive against you. Is this because of the legendary difficulty or because of christianity?
Great stuff, Maltz :2thumbsup:
Keep it coming.
It seems that AI factions are very aggressive against you. Is this because of the legendary difficulty or because of christianity?
From experience, AI decides whether to declare war on a clan based on a few things:
(1) Whether they have no one else to attack. I find this to be the primary reason of war declaration. Whenever they have no one else to fight (land locked by you, or they have made allies with all other neighbors), the AI turns on its only target even if it is unwise to do so (such as breaking an alliance, turning on a loyal trade partner, even turning on a vassal).
(2) Relationship level. In the previous Chosokabe campaign, I could avoid a war with Ouchi if I marry into their clan immediately before. Maybe on higher difficulties, a higher relationship is required to maintain peace. But if the 1st reason is fulfilled, we need a really high relationship level (+100 at least) to avoid war. So converting to Christianity definitely makes avoiding war more difficult.
(3) Power difference. Having a weak military is an invitation of attacks. This is probably why in this campaign Imagawa's two full stacks chooses to wait on the sea south of Shigoku. We have also seen vassals breaking loose as soon as they get a full stack back. But if we don't land lock them, they have a healthy outlet of their troops.
After we made two peaceful transactions of Chosokabe's territory and turned a third province white in the name of the nanban lord, they angrily declared war!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4194&d=1330314378
Actually, this is probably because Chosokabe have just wiped out Miyoshi in the past season, and they have no one else to fight.
We, in fact, have no intention to occupy Chosokabe's provinces right now. We need a lot of time to finish building the chapels -> missions in Iyo and Tosa, and we only have 2 missionaries here to accelerate conversion. Taking too many provinces too quicky is definitely bad news.
Our plan is to defend in our current territory, attempt to defeat Chosokabe's invasion (this was their land though), and force a treaty. Hey, maybe we can sneak in a rebellion in their two remaining provinces while their army is away in ours.
The "Daimyo" magazine gives Chosokabe's military a ranking of "Moderate". This means that they have at least one full stack, but probably less than two. So my second son may required a little assistance in Shigoku, especially when we have transferred one of the two ninjas there to Chugoku to assassinate Mori's generals.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4195&d=1330314380
That means we need the third full stack. We have been hiring non-stop from Buzen and Satsuma, so we can make the shipment to Shigoku in just two seasons.
This will be led by no one else but me. I have to leave the Hyuga training camp (as a 5-star general). My oldest son and his friend will keep training there. The rebels here first had a unit of Light Cavalry, which I handled with two other units of Light Cavalry. Then they are just infantry left, and training has never been so safe and easy.
We are always looking for ways to spread the love of the Lord. Here, we handed Mori's capital Aki to Christian rebel's hand, and we promptly took over. Amen
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4196&d=1330314380
The battle was really simple (auto-resolve) and we recovered in full strength within a season or two.
The acquisition of Aki made us natioanlly famous (or infamous). Well, at least people do not hate us for "territorial expansion".
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4197&d=1330314380
We still have a long way to go until we pause before reaching the Realm Divide. After occupation, it takes a year or two for a province to reach the maximal religious unrest (7). Only then we consider to move on to the next province. Now we have extracted two Metsuke from Kyushu to help in both fronts.
Wako pirates spawned yet again! But we already have two Nanban Trade Ships waiting in a trade node nearby. We fought the battle manually just to see how the cannons rock.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4198&d=1330314380
Unfortunately, two Nanban trade ship's cannon is not as good as one Black Ship's cannon. Good enough to win this battle almost unharmed (lost 2 sailors out of... 600+).
After turning another Mori's province to rebels, suddenly Mori declares war on us, too! We had that feeling already (that's why we assassinated all of their 5 generals nearby), since Mori was not at war with anybody else closeby (they were separated from Ikko-Ikki by their ally Yamana). It is in theory the best choice to fight Shimazu. Of course this is a bad decision in reality.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4199&d=1330314380
Mori is a much tougher opponent than Chosokabe, as they not only have a lot more military strength, but also a large navy. We might need to sacrifice significant trade income to wipe out their main fleet.
Maybe we could avoid this war if we first asked for an alliance with Mori and asked them to break alliance with Yamana. However, we wanted to expand in Mori's lands anyway, as their remaining large stack (now without a general) in Nagato province has been crushing Christian rebellions. It might be a good thing that now we have a faster way to open Chugoku's north route - when we have the army for it. Right now we don't. We need to finish the fight with Chosokabe quickly...
This concludes Chapter 6 of our story. :bow:
Chapter 07. Dodging the sharpest arrows
Welcome back, daimyos. After declaring war on us, Chosokabe quickly launched an invasion force of almost two full stacks in autumn. The first stack was led by their daimyo, heir, and their best general. The second stack was led by a nobody.
We only had one full stack, led by my son Yoshihiro, and one ninja. Our second full stack, led by myself, is one the way and can arrive on the battlefield next spring. So we need to delay their progress.
First, our ninja there sabotaged the more powerful army, led by the Chosokabe daimyo. Then Yoshihiro laid an ambush inside a forest by the crossroad, hoping to catch the weaker army when it passes by.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4200&d=1330314380
Got them! It is by no means a weak army - more than half of the stacks are samurai! Let's fight them!
Chosokabe's formation is quite similar to what Otomo had (which is similar to what everybody else has) - their Imported Matchlock Ashigaru goes to front, backed up by Spears, then Bows. The two flanks are protected by Spears. The general and cavalry goes to the back. A very standard formation.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4201&d=1330314380
While they did not have a lot of bow units (4 samurai + 1 ashigaru), Chosokabe still decided to camp. This is good for us. Our line of Yari Ashigaru will have seriously difficulty holding off the superior Yari Samurai. We need to weaken them a little first.
So although we have the oppurtunity to surround Chosokabe during deployment, we choose to tuck in a corner and possibly bait some Chosokabe units.
While Chosokabe has three fast cavalry units in the back, we put our money on that they won't move if our bait, a unit of Bow Ashigaru, approaches from the front. We slowly marched forward until we can start shooting at Chosokabe's Matchlock. And... we shot them until they routed.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4202&d=1330314380
There was absolutely no reaction from Chosokabe as if they don't care about the guns.
Note: It seems that the AI has no pain nerve in their guns at front. As long as our bow's range coverage does not extend far enough to cover their other units, they generously watch we destroy their guns.
When our bait walked up a little further to shoot at Chosokabe's Yari Samurai, their Bow Samurai marched forward. We successfully lured them to duel all of our 9 bow Ashigaru. Even if Chosokabe has the best Bow Samurai in all Japan, their suffering ended very quickly.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4203&d=1330314380
Now Chosokabe is down to only 3 bow units versus our 9. We suppose that they will launch their full attack...
And here they come!
Our camping site is located on a slope, backed by the edge of the battlefield. We are also protected on the right flank by a "cliff" that looks no different from a steep slope. So that only leaves our left flank vulnerable. We had one unit of Yari Samurai and Light Cavalry there as reserves.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4204&d=1330314380
Seeing that our right flank is well protected by the "cliff", Chosokabe's furstrated cavalry charged right into our spears! Thanks for making our lives easier. :yes:
We also decided to leave the guns on the slope, although they did not have a lot of rooms up there to make a wide formation. The advantage of being up there is that they can still fire at the enemy while being completely safe, and we can just leave them on fire at will and expect a very safe right flank.
The alternative is to move the guns to the left flank and wait for their chances to march up to wrap around. But we expected that Chosokabe will attempt to flank our left flank as it has multiple cavalry units.
And indeed their cavalry tried to flank us!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4205&d=1330314380
We are quite prepared for this, as our Yari Samurai has been waiting for the perfectly unfair matchup. But Chosokabe is sending another Yari Cavalry and Yari Samurai this way! This could spell disaster for us if we do not rout the first unit quickly.
Our line in the middle held very well. Most of Chosokabe's units have routed, and we were only playing an archer's duel there.
But the left flank is turning into a bigger and bigger problem. Our Yari Samurai is now tied up by Chosokabe's Yari Samurai, and their second Yari Cavalry is about to charge into their back...
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4206&d=1330314380
So we have to throw everything nearby in the fray! The Light Cavalry, the Bow Ashigaru, the Yari Ashigaru... anybody who does not have anything to fight at this moment must charge!
Cavalry is only powerful when they charge. If the charge fail to route a unit (it probably will not), it will have to stand and fight with spears.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4207&d=1330314380
So we were able to rout the two Yari Cavalry with the mob of inferior units. Chosokabe's Yari Samurai was wavering, and they didn't last long after that.
Slightly earlier we also managed to kill the Chosokabe general, who charged into our "inpenetrable" right flank (which is the spear wall). Our right flank was perfectly exposed, but they just can't find a safe path to it.
Seeing their attack had failed, the rest of the Chosokabe army fled!
It was a heard earned victory for our Yari Samurai, who have reached the 7th level! They should be feared by cavalries from all Japan.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4208&d=1330314380
But we can't let our guard down. We still have the more powerful Chosokabe army to fight after this.
Now Chosokabe's army is away from its remaining two provinces - our missionary has certainly begun what he does best. All of a sudden Chosokabe only has one province left!
Spring has come!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4209&d=1330314380
Ops, there was a scandal about nanban missionaries enjoying the company boys. Well, for the sake of cheaper Matchlock Ashigaru and some town growth, we will forgive them this time. We don't need to make people in Osumi happier (+4) anyway, as they are already happy enough without garrison.
We still have the more powerful Chosokabe army to fight. I am here to help! I also brought two ninjas!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4210&d=1330314380
All of Chosokabe's general in that army were removed from duty for various reasons - some suddenly had their throat slit during a meeting, some had tea poisoning and had to be shipped to their capital's hospital. Just before the battle, their men heard the gospel of peace and love.
That's all preparation we can do. Let's fight!
I actually brought a unit of European Cannon to Shigoku, but after some field testing we found that it is better to leave them out of a field battle.
The worst thing about brgining Cannons to the field is that it forces the enmy to march towards you, but you might not have a good spot to camp as the Cannons are immobile. The cannon balls don't explode in a large area, and can't kill enough of the enemies before the they get too close. If we don't have the Cannon, the enemy might decides to camp, and only charge us after we have weakend them through bait tactics.
So Cannons are only good for castle sieges to blast doors open and to destroy arrow towers, etc.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4211&d=1330314380
Chosokabe fields a quite experienced army with 10 units of Bows (6 Samurai, 4 Ashigaru), quite a few spear infantry (1 Samurai, which is the make-shift general, and 6 Ashigaru). There is also a unit of Impomrted Ashigaru. Their formation is very easy to guess.
So where do we begin?
Indeed, we begin with shooting their Imported Matchlock with our baiting bow Ashigaru.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4212&d=1330314380
Standing on Chosokabe's second line are Yari Ashigaru. They have a tendency to charge us all by themselves. Each charging Yari Ashigaru will follow our bait back, to be penalized by 8 units of very accurate Bow Ashigaru and 2 units of Matchlock Ashigaru.
Here goes one!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4213&d=1330314380
Here goes two! We still haven't figured out a good way to put the Mathlocks. Their range is simply too short - the enemy started fleeing way too quickly. Can't blame the peasants.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4214&d=1330314380
Here goes three! Finally, we found a way to at least allow the guns to fire. The bait unit has to retreated to the back of the matchlock from the side (to not block their line of sight), so the prey will head into the bullet's way.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4215&d=1330314380
Here goes four. We are getting better at this, too. With cavalry ready to charge the fleeing men, we allow nobody to leave the trap alive.
You might ask: why hasn't Chosokabe launched the full attack? This is likely because that their numerous bow units (10) are completely unharmed (yet). We don't expect them to come to us until much later. In the meantime, we can enjoy baiting all of their Yari Ashigaru.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4216&d=1330314380
Chosokabe's Yari Ashigaru were too eager to charge us! Finally we had enough arrows on their Matchlock Ashigaru to send them running.
Here goes the fifth Yari Ashigaru unit!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4217&d=1330314380
Seeing some regrouping in the Chosokabe line, We decided to backup to the hill, since they are coming anyway. The height advantage allows our units to fight better should Chosokabe suddenly decide to attack with everything.
It turned out that they were simply regrouping. With all their strong bows intact, they have no intention to launch the final attack. In the meantime, we are consistenly draining their Yari Ashigaru supply.
That's their last Yari Ashigaru unit!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4218&d=1330314380
Now Chosokabe has 10 bow units and 1 spear - their general. We tried to bait their general into charging us, but he is a lot more resistance to the urge of dying a silly death. Probably because his unit is a Yari Samurai, not Yari Ashigaru.
So we should start luring their bow units.
It is quite a difficult task to lure bow units, since they are much more cautious than Yari Ashigaru. If we are ahead for too much and too long, they turn back.
As a result, we decided to abandon the hill and march closer. A perfect distance between our line and theirs is about 2-3 bow's range. This way there is a good chance for our bait to draw their bows into locking in a shootout with our trap before they decide to go back. This is also a safe distance that no matter how much fire the baited units take, the rest of the army is not coming up to help.
A good bait for Bow is Cavalry, since we can quickly change their running direction to avoid any arrow fired at them.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4219&d=1330314380
We managed to draw four units of Bow at the same time. Since Chosokabe has the best bow units in Japan, and the fact that they are quite experienced Samurai units, this is a little tough for our 8 units. But we still managed to rout them one by one with reasonable losses.
During the quite difficult 4:8 duel, our first row were taking lots of damage, so we moved them back to let the second row take some damage for them.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4220&d=1330314380
The idea is to take damage even throughout all units, so we need just one or two seasons to regain full strength after the battle.
Now Chosokabe still has 6 Bow units left - and they are still camping! That's... a lot of confidence.
Some of our units are running low on arrows (a rare feat after Heaven and Earth). So we regrouped them to move units with more spare arrows to the front row.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4221&d=1330314380
And then we repeated the bait tactics and attracted two more bow units. Six down! Only four left!
Iis a shame that it took me so long to realize that we can sneak in a Light Cavalry to the back of the enemy line to cut down every fleeing man. :sweatdrop:
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4222&d=1330314380
You can't make it out alive unless we let you!
Now Chosokabe is down to 1 Yari Samurai and 4 Bow units. And they are still camping! This is insane!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4223&d=1330314380
Our arrows are running low, so maybe they think they still get a better shot by playing defence. (They just don't realize that they have a tendency to be baited and killed one by one.)
But just when we marched up our bait (this time Bow Ashigaru) again, their general finally decided to charge!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4224&d=1330314380
Alone! And they squarely ran into arrows and bullets! To his glorious death!
It also took us this long to realize that the best place to put the guns are right at front (as long as the retreating bait does not block their line-of-sight).
The instant Chosokabe lost their general, the remaining four units of bow units decided to flee, even before they took any damage... but they were automatically killed anyway.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4225&d=1330314380
The battle is finally over! This is probably a classic example of the "Bait and not hidden" tactics. We killed 13 out of 17 units this way.
Both Chosokabe's armies are wiped out on the field - they have 0 units in their only remaining province.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4226&d=1330314380
So what are we waiting for? We... asked for war compensation and turn them into our vassal! Immediate profit AND 100+ koku of extra income per season - until they turn against us.
That chance to break free might never come for Chosokabe, though. Our brother in Christ already prepared a nasty present for them in Awaji.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4227&d=1330314380
Technically we can sabotage Chosokabe's army this season and wait for them to vanish when Awaji falls to the rebels. But battles are fun! Plus we get to take the remaining of their treasury. Why not? :yes:
This concludes chapter 7 of our story. :bow:
Tactics: "Bait and not hidden"
The famous (but simple) Shimazu tactics Bait and Hidden can be achieved in STW2 for great effects - and it is quite easy to do as you don't even have to hide anything (hence the name "not hidden").
Army Composition - 40-50% ranged units
Anything would do. But the best effect is probably achieved by having 40-50% of ranged units. At least one longer-ranged unit (any bow suffices). However, mixing a couple of matchlock is not a bad idea for they help rout the prey more quickly (followed by cavalry mop up), and thus conserve ammo for the damage dealers.
If we don't have enough ranged power (or our arrows are about to run out), we will rely on melee units to beat down melee-type prey. There might be inevitable casaulties. But this also gives us more chance to play the baiting game as the AI is less likely to charge us until it is really low in ranged power.
Important: More than 50% ranged unit is NOT preferred. This is because that the AI will charge everything at us when our ranged power is significantly better than theirs. The LESS ranged units we have, the longer the baiting game lasts.
So essentially we want to find a balance of maximizing baiting, but also have enough ammo or melee units left to rout the rest of the enemies in the final full assault.
OK. So you did not bring too many ranged units so the CPU decides to camp. Great! Now we can start the baiting. (If they do come to you, you can use the "Machine Grinder" formation explained near the end of the Chosokabe story and hopefully kick their butt.)
Of course, an obvious situation for the AI to actively attack is that it IS the attacker. Initiate the battle yourself - during your turn, or during their turn as the ambusher.
Terrain
Ideally we want the CPU army out in the open. Hill or plain does not matter. But forest is really bad news. This is because the AI sets a very high priority on remaining hidden in the forest. Try to find open terrains. Try approaching them from a different angle - this usually gives you a different battlefield.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4228&d=1330316405
Formation and Site
The diagram above is an example. Guns units at front (so they actually have a chance to fire), followed by bow units. A general/cavalry and a bow unit will be the baiting.
In the baiting stage, there is no hiding necessary. Finding an edge/cliff or not is unimportant, but it could be an important advanatge for the full assault, where we need to watch our flanks.
Scout the battlefield in advance (during deployment, there is no camera restriction) and pick the best place for the final stage, and set your baiting ground somewhere in the middle of your final spot and the enemy. This way, you can easily fall back to the designated spot when the final stage begins.
For your baiting site, your army should be at least 2 bow's range away from the enemies. If you get too close, you might accidentally trigger the full assault before you want it. In theory, once a bait is on the hook, you can take them as far as you want. But keeping bow units behind you all the way across the battlefield is very tricky and time consuming, even if you execute it perfectly.
Order of Baiting
(0) Matchlock. If the CPU has guns, they are likely positioned at front for you to shoot. They are easily our first target. The matchlock might run to the back row when they suffer some damage (then you have to move on to other units until they come back), or they remain still. Slap an inspiration on the bows for more efficient kills.
(1) Defensive Infantry. The best bait for melee infantry is cavalry, such as our general's bodyguard. But bows can do the trick if the enemy has no cavalry (or if your bait stay away from AI's cavalry).
If the CPU has Yari Ashigaru, they easily charge at you once you get close (about 1 bow's range). Maintain a steady lead to bring them back to your trap. We can either shoot them with our arrows, or simply arrange multiple melee infantry to charge them at the same time to break their morale. Which one is better depends on how much arrow you have left, and how healthy your melee units are.
Ashigaru rout pretty quickly, so get your general/cavalry ready to kill them off before they flee off the field. Sometimes it is possible to sneak a Light Cavalry unit to the back of the enemy's lines to pick them clean.
After the units at the front rows has charged and died, the AI will regroup and send fresh units to the front row. This re-group may look a little like they are going to attack together. But since they only lost melee infantry, they are very likely NOT going to attack together. From experience, they only do that after they lose ranged units.
You can also try to approach their melee infantry from the sides. Their bows can't fire at you unless they turn to face you, which gives you some time to get closer without being shot at.
It is theoretically possible to make every single unit of Yari Ashigaru charge and die before we start baiting the other units. When we attempt to bait them, the bows might be triggered at the same time, but due to their cautious nature, only the Ashigaru will follow us back.
It is much harder to bait Yari Samurai than Yari Ashigaru, for the former are more disciplined. But as you saw in the story, it was possible to bait samurai after a while. If no matter what you do, the only units that respnded your bait was ranged units, then maybe it is a good time to move on.
(2) General, Cavalry
While luring the melee infantry, it is possible to "accidentally" lure General and Cavalry when our bait gets close to them. This is especially likely if the AI is camped on a high hill - some scripts really favor their general to charge down even if your bait is still far away.
Since cavalry is fast, ranged units alone might not be able to rout them quickly. We better use spear units to lay the trap. If we allow our bait to pass through a gap in the trap, we can easily catch the prey as soon as we make a little contact to the prey with one of the trap units.
If the CPU has fast cavalry (Yari, Light), but you have a slow cavalry (such as general's bodyguard), you need to start running back a lot sooner (especially if your trap is far away), and start charging your spears sooner.
(3) Bows
The best bait for bow units are cavalry, for their speed enable them to escape harm quickly. Bows should be our last target to bait - only after we have destroyed all other units that can be baited. The reason is that once we weaken the CPU's ranged power, they might decide to launch the full assault.
Maintaining the interests of baited bow units is an art. If you are too far away from them for too long, they will turn around. From time to time, you have to wait for them to start shooting at your bait. Once they are about to shoot, or just fired, quickly run in another direction. The arrows are quite easy to dodge even if they already left the bow, as they only target the place where you were, or the place you are about to be if you had not changed direction and speed.
If too many bow units are lured, you can selectively let loose a few of them (just walk back faster) to keep the remainder managable. A good rule of thumb is to duel bows with at least a 2:1 advantage. You can also mop them up with your cavalry and melee horde charging from three directions. But don't do it right in front of the rest of the enemy. Lure them farther away (which is the hard part).
If there are still some AI's melee units left, you may try to lure them again. The loss of their bows might expose them and make them more easily baited.
You can repeat this bait and trap process until the AI realizes that it is time for them to commit suicide and march everything to you. Whenever you see the entire AI's army suddenly mobilized for no reason after a bow unit starts routing - they are probably coming (even if they may appear to march away initially)!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4229&d=1330316405
The Final Trap
The above is a picture of what happens when the AI decides to charge us all together. We have a good defensive line backed up by ranged units. On any exposed flank, we have reserves who can effectively deal with cavalry. We are also prepared to charge their bow units in the back with our own cavalry on the flank (it is OK if we don't - the bows will rout eventually). This is largely identical to the "machine grinder" formation, except that we have two places to place guns - definitely not directly behind our lines!
(1) High ground. It is possible to find a good terrain to leave the guns high up and safe. Then by all means do it - they will help rout the challengers. But after the melee lines engage, they might avoid firing, as it would cause friendly fire casualties.
(2) Flank. If the coast is clear (all enemies' melee engaged), we can march our guns up to take some liberal shots at enemies' back. But this luxury does not happen everyday - if we have not reduced the enemy's melee units effectively, they will have reserves. Hopefully we have reduced the number of their reserves with the baiting tactics earlier.
Happy fighting! :bow:
Chapter 08. Technological Gap
Welcome back, Daimyos! I am Shimazu Takahisa. :bow:
Just when we think we can take a little break after defeating two full-stacks from Chosokabe, the Mori clan immediately launched a series attacks! The first wave is eaded by their new Daimyo, a distant nephew of Mori Motonari (the assassinated old daimyo), with again lots off samurais!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4235&d=1330434520
And my second son Yoshihiro os responsible for defence! (We shipped him to Honshu, while I stay in Shigoku to take care of the rest.) We have added one unit of Shimazu Katana Samurai in his army. Let's hope they shine on the battlefield!
A good read, even if I'm half asleep, will have to take another look at it when my brain reboots. Keep up the good work !
One a side note Japan has 4 main islands, from N-S they are: Hokkaidō Honshū Shikoku Kyūshū
Perhaps I misread it (sorry), but you wrote as far as I recall with my misty eyes Shigoku but is it not Shikoku ? Ok now it's time to hit the sack, hope to see more informative reading when I recharged my batteries.
Best regards !
Since we were attacked, the enemy actively marched toward us, and there is no chance to use our Bait tactics. We scouted the terrain and found a very interesting way to defence. There is a large hill that provides a lot of protection for ranged units stationed up there. Our two Matchlock Ashigaru formed the first line, followed by Bow Ashigaru.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4236&d=1330434520
Our melee units formed a thick line on the edge of forest for some added protection. In order to attack us, the Mori army has to march along the cliff while exposed to our ranged attack. For those units that survive the arrows and bullets, our melee units will stop their advance at the end, keeping them in the range of our arrows and bullets.
Ideally, Mori's troops will be funneled into a long line, allowing us to destroy them one by one.
A good read, even if I'm half asleep, will have to take another look at it when my brain reboots. Keep up the good work !
One a side note Japan has 4 main islands, from N-S they are: Hokkaidō Honshū Shikoku Kyūshū
Best regards !
It must be my akucent! :bow: Will correctly use your provided spelling later on.
I also just realized that the small bow ships are "小早", which should "Bow Ko-Haya", but in Sengoku people's accent calls it "Bow Ko-Baya". Will also correct that. :bow:
Here Mori's men come! Some of them might be trying to circle to our back by climbin that huge hill. It should take them a while. Let's focus on what we can kill now.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4237&d=1330434520
Ready, fire!
Even though Mori had brave Samurai, they were easily shattered by all the arrows and bullets. Even if they could reach our Yari Ashigaru's spear wall, they turned around quickly.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4238&d=1330434520
One unit tried to circle to the back of our line! It is actually an accident, as they were chasing our Light Cavalry, which were out in the open chasing routing units. As we pulled the Cavalry back, the Yari Samurai unit naturally circled to the back of our line.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4239&d=1330434520
But we have three units of Yari Ashigaru and our Katana Samurai nearby. THe moment we started charging their back, their will broke and started fleeing. :laugh4:
Mori has abandoned their plan to climb that tall hill to reach our back. They decide to embrace bullets and arrows al together! Let's take their charge!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4240&d=1330434520
You can see how far our bullets and arrows cover. This is just perfect! :mad:
The Mori general charged uphill, hoping to reach our guns!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4241&d=1330434520
But our bullets handled him in point blank!
Mori's first wave of invasion ended in disaster. He should have waited for more samurai to get a full stack.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4242&d=1330434520
But they would have been funneled into the valley of death anyway. :rolleyes:
HopAlongBunny
02-28-2012, 16:20
Thank you for this Maltz!
A story well told and illustrated to boot :)
"Bait and not hidden" is truly a winner; if only we had some Turcomans and Jinettes! Actually I'm embarrassed I didn't think of it until reading this; lure and kill has been the "go to" tactic since what? MTW?
Although Mori's first invasion from the east failed, they soon attacked from the west from Nagato (Ouchi's last province). All of a sudden Mori spawned two generals in the castle to lead the attack.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4243&d=1330434539
Upon entering the battlefield, we quickly realized that this is not our day to die. The heavy rain will greatly reduce our ranged units' power, so we would have to rely on melee. But our melee is mostly Yari Ashigaru, while Mori had elite Yari Samurai.
So we promptedly retreated from the battlefield unharmed.
Notes:
(1) If we want to retreat, it is better to enter the battle then retreat, than simply retreat on the campaign map. When we retreat from the battlefield, we retreat further back, and the enemy is likely unable to follow up and force us into a second battle (where we cannot retreat).
(2) Retreat the low-morale ashigaru first, followed by samurai, and finally the general. This way none of our men rout before their exit (and get lost).
Mori's second invasion granted them a meaningless victory. Then immediately they lauched the first attack! A full stack of Mori's elite fleet attacks a bottleneck in western Kyushu, guarded by two of our Nanban Trade Ships and 2 Bow Kobaya.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4244&d=1330434539
We quickly rushed to a upwind corner and parked there, with all of our cannons facing Mori's approaching fleet. Mori's fleet quickly closed in against the wind, but they were unable to find any weakness on our gigantic Nanban ship. The sound of cannon fire rocked the sea. The crossfire area turned into a brutal a ship slaughter yard. The rest of Mori's ships withdrew. We beat a full stack by losing just 1 out of 10 cannon.
Note: Strangely, we cannot auto-resolve with Nanban Trade Ship - they always lose miserably even though the yellow bar almost fills up all the way. That's probably why we can auto-resolve and win fights with the Black Ship.
Mori is known for the best navy in Japan. In fact, just before this attack, our Bow Kobaya had to retreat from another sea battle because we were simply too slow compared to their Bow Kohaya.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4245&d=1330434539
But this this battle proves that the Nanban Trade Ship (beat you up, then force you to trade) is the new ruler of the sea! We will team them up in 2s and destroy everything!
Summer has come! We have prepared Mori's elite samurai army, which attempted to hide in the forest to setup am ambush but was easily detected, with two ninjas and two missionaries. They are now without the leadership of generals, and they seriously feel the love of Christ (double demoralized).
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4246&d=1330434539
So here we come!
Mori has 7 units of Yari Samurai, and 7 units of Bows (3 Bow Samurai, 4 Bow Ashigaru). Let's first see if we can draw out any of their Yari Samurai with our general, the best bait we can offer.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4247&d=1330434539
Hm, they are really well disciplined. Nobody turned their head to take a good look at the enemy general. :sweatdrop:
Next let's try shooting their Yari Samurai in the first line with our Bow Ashigaru...
As soon as our Bow Ashigaru approaches, two of Mori's Bow units responded. Our bait retreated a little too quickly, so only one of the units followed our bait into the trap.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4248&d=1330434539
7 yari and 6 bows left!
The next time we let our bait retreat a little more slowly...
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4249&d=1330434539
And we drawed all of Mori's 6 bow units! That's too much to handle. We let our bait ran back for the last bit, but only 1 bow unit turned back. So it became a 5 vs. 8 shootout!
Oh wait, we have two units of Matchlock. Let's march them up a fire! We have a good chance to win 10 vs. 5. Plus Mori's men are all bunched up. Our bullets might miss the first unit, but they would certainly find somebody in that dense pack.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4250&d=1330434539
Indeed, the shootout went very well for us. We had twice more men, and had the correct (loose) formation to reduce casualty. Rarely can we fire so many rounds of bullets like this!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4251&d=1330434539
As Mori's bow units lost the shootout, their Yari Samurai started marching forward. The final clash is about to begin. So we promptly moved up our line of Yari Ashigaru plus one Yari Samurai.
As all of Mori's yari charged into our line, we pulled back our guns to the flank, ready to have some nice "shoot them in the back" action!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4252&d=1330434539
But since we had much more powerful support fire in the back, Mori's line of elite Yari Samurai, who not only had lost their two generals but also had been double-demoralized before the battle, could not hold! They started fleeing like screaming Yari Ashigarus! The battle was over before our matchlock fired another shot!
It was Mori's men to die. But just enough of them escaped so we could have another easy battle.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4253&d=1330434539
Now all of Mori's land invasion was crushed. Let's finish them off on the sea, too.
So we spotted Mori's reamining fleet! We are not giving them a chance to get repaired.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4254&d=1330434539
Here come more iron candies for ya!
What a productive summer for my general - that's his third victory this season. (But too bad he cannot get the "Summer Son" trait.) Mori's second invasion left its Nagato province defenseless, so a rebel force easily took the castle after they left.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4255&d=1330434539
And of course we will take it over from here (auto-resolved).
Mori's first invasion also left another province defenseless. My son Yoshihiro grabbed this oppurtunity and claimed another Mori's province (auto-resolved) with a landslide win!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4256&d=1330434539
Now we have two new provinces... it is time to slow down and spread the word of nanban god. Mori is severly weakened - it is in their best interest to sign the peace treaty, too. (We can't turn them into a vassal until they have only one province left.)
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4257&d=1330434539
In the peace treaty they agreed to break their alliance and trade with Yamana, and resume trade with us. Hopefully this finds both Mori and Yamana a new enemy, and they won't bother us for a while.
We are again trading with everybody but the very hostile Ikko-Ikki clan and the land-locked Ashikaga Shogunate. It might be a good time to disband a few under experienced/upgraded units and replace them with better ones. We are already experience some difficulties fighting Samurai-rich armies.
After beating Japan's most powerful Mori navy, we have established ourselves as the undisputed naval power. We already have four Nanban Trade ships in two fleets. In total we hope to have at least 6 ships in three fleets, so we can afford to defend our western trade nodes, while properly patrolling both shores should any hostile fleet approaches - Imagawa's two full stacks are still lingering just outside Shikoku. It would be a pleasure to sink their ships before they can land!
This concludes chapter 8 of our story. :bow:
Peasant Phill
02-29-2012, 12:46
Great read so far.
Chapter 09. Long shot to redemption
Welcome back, daimyos! I am Shimazu Takahisa. :bow:
After taking care of Chosokabe and Mori's invasion, we can resume our slow but steady conversion/expansion toward the province limit before Realm-Divide. Here are our priorities:
(1) Minimize army upkeep. So far, we have enough units for more than 4 full-stacks of army. We hope to slim down to 3 functional full-stacks plus spare parts for special purposes (more spears against cavalry, more guns against infantry, etc.)
After some counting and planning, we will shape our 3 functional armies into:
- General
- 8 units of spears (Yari Ashigaru/Yari Samurai)
- 9 units of Bow Ashigaru
- 4 units of Imported Matchlock Ashigaru
- 1 unit of Katana Samurai
- 1 unit of Light Cavalry
- 1 unit of European Cannon (follows army)
This gives us 25 units per army (5 spare units), allowing some unit swapping according to the enemy's composition (ranged beats light infantry and other ranged units, spear beats cavalry, gun beats heavy infantry, etc.) Having spare parts will increase our upkeep, but there are units that we do not want to disband, as they were hired during special "promotion" events with +2 experience. And there are sensational units like the European Cannon.
(2) Upgrade all farms to the highest level (Land Consolidation). We might not have enough savings to upgrade all farms at once. But after trimming down the expenses, we should be able to afford them in a stretch of several years. This will provide us with the solid tax income required for post Realm-Divide).
(3) Weaken other clans with agents. We have to minimize expensive agent activites such as reciting rebellion until we have all farms upgraded. It is probably better to keep the missionaries home to accelerate conversion anyway. Then, our Metsuke can be freed up to manage rich provinces (right now all 5 of them are on the field), or train on enemy agents (such as from the constant string of monks in Kyoto).
(4) Prepare an elite army. This is the last thing to do before we march on Kyoto. This army will look completely different from the three Ashigaru armies. It will be an army rich in Heavy Gunners and Fire Rockets. The building requirement of Armoury, an upgrade of Encampment, means that we have to rebuild the Encampment line in Buzen and lose 5% accuracy bonus, but gain a couple points of armor.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4265&d=1330523734
Back to present. My force in Shikoku's Sanuki is ready to take the sally of the fortress's defenders! I took a look at the layout of the Fortress and decided to wait for the sally that takes place later in the season, because there is very little exploitable vulnerability. The European Canon may help, but it will costs us one more season.
I chose a mild hill to camp. There is a little cliff on the hill that allowed me to deploy the Matchlocks directly above it.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4266&d=1330523734
From hindsight, I should have guarded them with a unit Yari Ashigaru reserve. I did have one reserve, but it is on the other flank.
The rebels sent their spear units charging uphill. Naturally that ended very poorly for them. We stopped the Light Cavalry coming to the right flank with a reserve unit. But there was no reserve to stop the Light Cavalry coming to the left flank. I over-estimated the usefulness of the small cliff.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4267&d=1330523734
I was waiting for the guns to fire at them, but the Light Cavalry were simply too fast compared to our Matchlock's reload rate. So they had no problem charging into our guys before taking any casualty.
Lesson learned: Always protect an exposed flank. The cavalry will come no matter what.
I ordered the two Matchlock units to either attack or fire at the Light Cavalry. Can't really complain about their damage output at close range - as long as that bullets are fired, they kill! The Light Cavalry unit was shattered quickly when it made a second charge attempt by temporarily pulling out of the melee.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4268&d=1330523734
And we managed to rout all of the rebel's spear units. The rebels have nothing but ranged units left.
So we charged all of our Yari Ashigaru forward, while our ranged units kept pouring arrows on the rebels' Bow Cavalry and Bow Ashigaru. The rebels started fleeing soon after.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4269&d=1330523734
The battle did not go as well as I wanted, but it gets the job done! Er... actually, there was one Light Cavalry unit who fled the battlefield, so we had to assault the castle in the next season anyway. :sweatdrop:
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4270&d=1330523734
Fortunately, we have no time pressure dealing with the rebels.
Since conversion is very slow for provinces that do not have a lot of borders (to recieve Christian influence), we have to take our time moving on Mori's former provinces (turned to rebel by us). We pulled three Metsuke from home to help, losing about 1000 koku of tax income. But maybe we save more on temporary garrison in those unstable provinces and gain more income from accelerated expansion.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4271&d=1330523734
The Date clan bumped away Honma's trading fleet, but did not bother to replace with their own (yet). We are the only one in line!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4272&d=1330523734
It will be a while until our trade fleet arrives, though.
We have decided to stop hiring and start cutting military, but we probably just hired enough to trigger the Clan Might event. In total, this event gave us exactly 1 extra unit of +2 experience Imported Matchlock Ashigaru.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4273&d=1330523734
Here I continued to push forth in Shikoku. The rebels are so weak here that I actually forgot how we won this one (auto-resolved). :sweatdrop:
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4274&d=1330523734
Imagawa's two full stacks have finally got out of their circular logical loop south of Shikoku island. They realized that there is another... circular logical loop! When they sail to Settsu, I thought they are defintely going to surprise attack Hattori, which is their ally!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4275&d=1330523734
But maybe they too realized that, so they immediately sailed down again. Another two turns wasted! A few seasons later, they finally sailed back to their home provinces. I almost felt happy for them.
Imagawa lost their trading provinces to Hojo, but got it right back in the same season.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4276&d=1330523734
Strangely this still broke our trade agreement, so we have to restablish it. Can't complain if they offer to pay us again! Please break it every season! :yes:
My youngest son is finally mature enough to join the service. Somehow after converting to the nanban religion, my sons tend to mature late.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4277&d=1330523734
Let me force him into adulthood by giving him a suitable wife. Let's see who has a daughter... oh yeah, Takeda's daughter is only one year younger than him. This is a good match! And Takeda only charges us 140 koku.
In fact, this is quite an important diplomatic move. Right now, the rest of Japan is divided into three major groups. (Please refer to the map two pictures above.)
(1) Takeda + Hojo + Ikko-Ikki
Takeda has alliance with Hojo and Ikko-Ikki, together owning about 18 provinces. This is the most powerful group in Japan right now, although they pretty much made enemies with everyone else. The team makes steady advances on their enemies. Takeda is beating up Hattori (which puzzles us, as Hattori's military ranking is higher than Takeda's); Hojo is beating up on Imagawa; Ikko-ikki is holding well on their own. It is reasonable to assume that this team will end up controlling the rest of Japan if they do not go mad and turn against each other half-way through.
Takeda's daughter is our entry ticket to tear apart this team later.
(2) Hattori + Imagawa + Ashikaga Shogunate
Hattori signed alliance with Imagawa and Ashikaga; together they own about 13 provinces. Hattori is a powerful clan in central Japan, battling Ikko-Ikki but without any noticable progress. Imagawa has mysteriously survived with all of their army far away on the sea. Recently, Imagawa has taken an offensive push toward west, but they are losing provinces to Hojo on the east. Takeda then launched a powerful invasion on Hattori and took two Hattori's heart provinces.
Any clan allying with the Ashikaga Shogunate will become our enemy (as we have to declare war on Ashikaga later).
(3) Date + Ashina
These two allied clans, which control just 5-6 provinces, are battling Hojo and Takeda, neither winning or losing. Date is also fighting Honma (from Sado island), which still holds one of their north-eastern provinces. They are not really making any advances.
My oldest son is married to Date daimyo's daughter. My second son is married to Ashina daimyo's daughter.
(4) Yamana
Mori's old friend, controlling 6 provinces. They are among the numerous enemies of Ikko-Ikki. But just like the others, they were not making any progress. This will be the only clan that will border us in the near future. If they declare war on us, we should be able to easily beat them down and (force them to) continue trading with us. Either way, they will continue to trade with us, and eventually become the next victim of our missionaries.
As usual Takeda's daughter is instantly shipped to us! Let's take a good look at her... hm, she definitely possesses better-than-average reproductive parts, let's keep it this way.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4278&d=1330523734
Now I have found wives for all my three sons! Good luck, boys!
Another Mori's province turned to rebel. It is hard for Mori to hire any new army if their castles are constantly covered in smokes.:rolleyes:
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4279&d=1330523734
The Ashikaga Shogunate has become increasingly nervous about our expansion!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4280&d=1330523734
Compared to the other clans who fight everyone like crazy dogs, we are actually keeping a low key. Whoever declares war on us takes a good beating, and then we allow them to plead for peace and resume trading. We are a model clan for all Japan!
There was a sudden surge of Wako pirates, so we had to fight a group with just one Nanban Trade ship.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4281&d=1330523734
It took a lot longer... but it was still easy! Their arrows almost had no effect on our sailors. How come? They must be wondering about that, too.
Another province peacefully transferred from the crippled Mori (auto-resolved).
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4282&d=1330523734
Another province (indirectly) from Mori (auto-resolved). At this moment we were experimenting with the idea of the 4th full stack that carries all the spare parts. So we had the rare oppurtunity to have almost two full stacks against these poor rebels.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4283&d=1330523734
This is the Awaji island! Now we have controlled all Shikoku. Maybe during the peace time I can take some time off and train with my sons somewhere else. So I can reach the top level when the tough battles begin.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4284&d=1330523734
Suddenly Ikko-Ikki agreed to trade with us!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4285&d=1330523734
But we soon learned that this is a mistake! Our traders were blocked outside Ikko-Ikki's port, because it was under blockade of the Hattori clan, which quickly learned that we would start trading with them! So we actually LOSE trade income by signing this deal because we had to first allocate some goods to ship to Ikko-Ikki.
Let's hope Hattori's fleet will be mysteriously removed or Ikko-Ikki's trade port to us will mysteriously relocate. From experience, though, this will never happen. That blockade fleet will be parking there like rocks. There is nothing we can do unless we incite a rebellion in Ikko-Ikki's port province to break the trade.
There is a good news for the clan! A son is born! Let's see which of my son has the good news...
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4286&d=1330523734
What?! It is my son?! I don't even remember the last time... (cough). My youngest son is even younger by my oldest grandson. That really sounds strange.
We are actually losing a lot of trade income from our trade partners' fighting:
- Hattori is blocking Ikko-Ikki's trade port to us.
- Ikko-Ikki is blocking Yamana's trade port to us. What a bunch of morons - why don't you pull your fleet and lift the blockade of your own port?! :furious:
- Hattori's trade is interrupted because their capital is under siege by Takeda. Assault that darn castle - there is nobody defending it! Idiot! :furious3:
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4287&d=1330523734
We also lost Takeda's trade as they have lost their only port. Anyway, we better don't rely on the others. By the helps of our Metsuke and Missionaries, we have quickly expanded over Mori's old province. Their last castle just fell to the rebels.
Our new neighbor Yanama has been gathering a good (mostly samurai) army close to our borders. This could be interesting! Since we have almost two full stacks there, we actually hope them to declare war. We have not had any serious actions for a few years!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4288&d=1330523734
This concludes chapter 9 of our story. :bow:
Book 3 - In Paradisum
Chapter 10. Prosper in heavenly peace
Welcome back daimyos! I am Shimazu Takahisa. :bow:
At the end of the last chapter we noted a large Yamana samurai army approaching us. However, after taking out all of their generals, the soldiers remained almost stationary in Hoki, their border province. We were reluctant to declare war, as we were rapidly approaching the province count for Realm Divide.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4312&d=1330609233
So we decided to give up Hoki's northern route but to expand on the southern route, taking Harima and Settsu. Here is the siege of Harima. Nothing special (auto-resolved).
That's our first 6-star Ninja! Since we are short on money, we have followed him on the path of... MacGyver. He can always improvise. He uses free herbal sedatives. He makes bumbs from soaps. We do not have give him any budget to operate.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4311&d=1330609233
And of course, he is just like as lucky as MacGyver. He may get occasionally injured, but he will always make it.
That's Settsu, the 22nd and last province! We have established a direct land-route to Kyoto. We can also resume trade with Hattori and Yamana. Things are a little tricky for Yamana, since we need to somehow harmlessly cancel our trade over the sea (currently the port is under Ikko-Ikki's blockade).
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4310&d=1330609233
Let's trade with the Shogunate first. The Ashikaga Shogun belongs to the Hattori-Imagawa team, which is not doing so well recently.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4309&d=1330609233
An oppurtunity to earn more koku! The foreign prosperity seems to be a better option, since we have four trade nodes with full-stack trade fleets.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4308&d=1330609233
Finally, we finished the research on Chonindo thanks to the huge bonuses on Chi research from Missions.
Now we can switch gear to Bushido and head straight for Mastery of Guns! There are two prerequisite techs. In total, it will take us 20+ more turns. After that, we need a few more turns to build the Gunsmith, hire the units, and ship them. So a reasonable time frame to trigger Realm Divide is 8-10 years later.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4307&d=1330609233
Note: We could stay in the Chi route for longer and enjoy the hyper-speed of Chi research. But none of the remaining techs are so good to worth the extra waiting turns:
Calligrahy - +20 diplomatic relations. We are already operating at optimal diplomacy, which is to trade with everyone. Maybe just before triggering Realm Divide we will complete this, so we can grab allies more easily.
Scholarship, Neo-Confucianism - Unlocks Church/Cathedral. We have 8 or more years to spread Christianity, that's far more than enough to make our provinces 100% Christians. Those buildings are also too expensive. Neo-Confucianism might be a good option after triggering Realm Divide, so we can convert new provinces slightly more quickly.
Kinza Mint - for 5% extra town growth (x 70% under 30% tax rate). Requires a useless prerequisite tech. After finishing all the Land Conslidation upgrades, we will have almost +50 food surplus. Takes too long for too little benefit.
Shi - the ultimate tech gives 10 extra town growth (x 70% under 30% tax rate). Also requires that useless prerequisite tech. Again, takes too long for too little benefit.
Our ninja reported that there is going to be a huge fight happening in Kinki! It would be Hattori's great attempt to reclaim their heartlands from Takeda. Hattori's ally, Imagawa, also has some good stacks nearby.
We Shimazu stay neutral, but it is our secret desire that Takeda, the more powerful team (with Hojo and Ikko-Ikki), loses this battle.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4306&d=1330609233
If Hattori is able to focus its attack on one of the Takeda stacks, they should be take out both of Takeda's army. But Takeda acts before Hattori, so this might not happen.
We recalled our Ninja afterward so we did not know the exact outcome of the battle. But Takeda was able to keep their territory after this battle, so at least they did not lose badly.
We have successfully resolved the clogged trade routes, so our income (12000+ koku per season) looks very healthy again.
Yamana - We incited a rebellion in their port province under Ikko-Ikki's blockade, so the trade had to be relocated. We now have Settsu, so we can ship products to them via land route.
Hattori - Takeda has taken Hattori's capital. As Hattori had to relocate and we own Settsu, we established a land trade route.
Ikko-Ikki - The monk from Kyoto incited a rebellion in Echizen, which harbors our trade port. The rebels took over the castle thanks to pure stupidity of Ikko-Ikki local forces. But we are unable to resume trade as their port has been fully occupied. It is OK, we can sell the products to others.
By the way, Ikko-Ikki has driven away Yamana's trade ships guarding the war horse trade node. Guess who is the only clan in line for that node? Very soon we will be shipping products from all 6 trade nodes to the rest of Japan.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4305&d=1330609233
To our little disappointment, Yamana's large samurai army in Hoki remains stationary probably because they are waiting for a general to lead. They do have generals in their eastern provinces, but we have turned their middle provinces to rebel. And the general-less army is not smart enough to reclaim the rebel provinces, even though they can do it with extreme ease.
There is a good reason that team Takeda is winning - they know diplomacy! So far they are the only clan who have asked us for a military alliance.
"What would the two most powerful clans in Japan accomplish together?" the Takeda daimyo says.
"Didn't my son and your daughter just made a baby?" I said.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4304&d=1330609233
But we would be idiots to agree - we still want to trade with the rest of Japan! But allying with Takeda just before triggering the Realm Divide is indeed our plan. Just not right now.
Our ninja lost sight of the large armies of Takeda and Hattori... here they are! Apparently they did NOT have a great battle a few seasons before. Are they going to give some action now?
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4323&d=1330692491
Actually no. Since Takeda acted first, they promptly took the Ise castle and moved on.
The Hattori army could easily reclaim the castle and trap the Takeda army on the field. But they... they retreated north... What the hack is this?! No wonder Takeda has such an easy time in Kinki.
That's it! Apparently I have nothing more to learn from running away from rebels! I can happily lay on a couch in Settsu and watch drama and feed my carps.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4318&d=1330692491
Somehow our Shimazu clan gained some more respect (+10) from my new fish pets. Maybe this fish die so easily, so the fact that I have raised them to be fat and colorful is worth the respect?
Oh, here is another clan's emissionary knocking on our door. It is the Hattori clan!
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4319&d=1330692491
Hm, but they are too incompetent to be worth of our time. Go home and do something stupid.
But since they are still trading with us from Kii (note: Apparently no "road" connection is required for trade. As long as two provinces shares a border, land trade is possible.), allowing them to die from their stupidity is not in our best interest (yet).
We will slow down Takeda a bit for you.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4320&d=1330692491
I know a lot of people have to visit the fertility clinic nowadays due to their exposure to constant stress, pollutants, radiations, and chemical additives in their food... but MAN can my sons make babies! :dizzy2: I have to partly thank myself for my good gene and my choices of their reproductive wives.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=4321&d=1330692491
Hattori clan is down to their LAST province without even trying to fight the invaders! At least camp in a castle or setup an ambush! This has to stop.
Since we have learned from Yamana's Hoki that an army without a general does not initiate any offensive action on its own, the best way to slow down Takeda is to force their generals to take a break - a sick leave, or a permenant retirement.
The Legendary Takeda Shingen has been volunteered by our MacGyver Ninja's soap bomb for a permenant retirement! So have all his generals active in the Kinki area.
Now Takeda's army is without leaders - they will stay still.
vBulletin® v3.7.1, Copyright ©2000-2025, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.