shinobis ain\'t working

[Darth Wart]

I keep reading that if you put shinobis in enemy provinces, you can cause a revolt there and get the province without bloodshed.

So how is this supposed to work exactly. I've played the FULL CAMPAIGN over 20 times from one end of the map to the other, and on every game I've tried to get this to happen and it doesn't.

Do you have to give the shinobis special instructions or something? If so, how?

Obviously, this ain't gonna work if there's a big enemy army in that province, but even if there's not, it still doesn't work for me. How many shinobis do you have to put? How are you guys doing this?

[hecose]

I don't think you can use shinobis to conquer an enemy's province. But you can use shinobis to cause revolts in the province. I have done that many times. I usually send 15 or more shinobis into the province. Better have large numbers because some of them will get caught by border forts and enemy shinobis.

Do note that causing revolts in enemy provinces might eventually be disadvantageous to you. E.g. the enemy has a small army in the province, but you "raise" a large ronin army using your shinobis. The ronin army defeats the enemy army, and in the end you have to face a ronin army larger than the original enemy army. Another example. You raise a ronin army. Your enemy army defeats it. You raise another ronin army, and the enemy defeats it again. Repeat this a few more times and your enemy taisho will gain ranks. You end up having to face a high rank enemy taisho.

[Tenchimuyo]

Don't worry, what you have to do is to put a lot of shinobi's in one of the enemy's province. No less than 5! Then just wait for the peasant's to go crazy on their masters. BTW, the higher the shinobi's hounor the better.

[This message has been edited by Tenchimuyo (edited 12-14-2000).]

[Shiro]

I've found I can do it with 4 high honor shinobi! http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/wink.gif
-Shiro

[hecose]

I always use around 15 shinobis. Before I can afford such large numbers of shinobis, I usually just use my shinobis as counterspies and to keep my population happy. I only think about causing revolts in enemy provinces when I really have many extra shinobis. One thing good about sending many shinobis is whenever they cause a revolt, every one of them will gain honour. Once I had an army of 15-20 Honour 4 shinobis because I kept rotating them between 2-3 enemy provinces causing revolts wherever they go. The loyalty of those provinces dropped to negative! http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/biggrin.gif

[Tenchimuyo]

Wow, negative loyalty! first time hearing that. Amazing what a little shinobi can accomplish!

[Darth Wart]

Oh, oh, oh!

FIFTEEN?!? I've been trying to do it with three or four. That explains stuff.

One more questions, gents: when you have a shinobi in the other guy's province, it'll say "population loyalty 134%"

But loyalty for WHOM? The current owner or towards YOU? In other words, do you wanna get that figure way ABOVE 100% or way below it?

[hecose]

Tenchimuyo,

I made the enemy province's loyalty drop below zero using a huge army of shinobis (I think more than 20 at the time). Definitely not just using one little shinobi. http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/smile.gif

Darth Wart,

Loyalty 134% of the enemy province is the loyalty towards the enemy clan, not your clan. So to cause a revolt you need to make the loyalty drop way below 100%. The AI is not stupid though. When it notices that one of it's provinces is dropping in loyalty, it will send in garrisons.

Well, using armies of shinobi is just my style. It's not really necessary to do that if 7 or 8 can do the job. I haven't tried so I don't know what's the "minimum requirement". I always go overkill. http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/smile.gif

[Tenchimuyo]

Sorry if I have offended your shinobis but it was just a figure of speech. I didn't really mean just ONE little shinobi.

[Slyspy]

I always got bored moving all those shinobi one by one around the map, and usually sent the troops in instead. I've never actually managed to get an enemy province to rebel in this way (probably because I have little patience), so now I just don't bother. Use ninja to assassinate their taisho and send in the army!

------------------
"Put 'em in blue coats, put 'em in red coats, the bastards will run all the same!"

[solypsist]

Yep. 15 shinobis, with a ninja or two just to keep them from getting caught and killed too quickly. the cool thing is that if they cause an enemy revolt, everybody's honor goes up, making it that much easier to cause another revolt in the next province. keep this up and your opponent's armies will start whittling themselves down in no time.

[hecose]

Tenchimuyo, Sorry I misunderstood your meaning. I just wanted to clarify. Nope. I'm not offended or anything.

In terms of using the "people of the shadow", I prefer to use shinobis as counterspies because they protect your generals from ninjas and they don't get killed. I'm always reluctant to send shinobis or ninjas to enemy provinces because if they get caught that's 100/200 koku gone. I'm also reluctant to use ninja's for assassinations because when they fail, that's another 200 koku gone (equivalent to one unit of yari samurai!). So, I really seldom train ninja. Just shinobis, shinobis all the way. http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/smile.gif To spy on enemy provinces, I use emissaries. Just make sure they move around a lot and don't get caught by enemy ninjas.

I totally agree with Slyspy that it's very tedious to move 15+ shinobis around. So I'm hoping in the next patch they'll make shinobis stackable like regular armies.