Using Daimo as general

[Peasant Phill]

The tutorial seems to suggest you should protect your Daimo but there are some great advantages to using your daimo as a general.
Are there disadvantages and what are they?

[TinCow]

Well, dying is the main disadvantage. However, I really don't see any advantage to not fighting with ANY commander, regardless of whether they are the Daimyo, heir, son, or general. Those units are really only useful because of their ability to hold office and boost province and army stats, but all of those boosts depend on the level of the commander. A level 1 commander is relatively useless in all categories. Better to risk their lives and let them level up than let them sit around doing nothing forever. In some of the older TW titles, commanders would become really good province governors if you just let them sit and build. However, from ETW onwards they removed that feature and gave development boosting abilities to agent units. That may have been a good choice, but the fact remains that it removed the only incentive the player has to let a commander do anything other than fight.

I really wish CA would patch the game to let multiple general units in the same stack gain experience after a battle though. It makes no sense, and it's a pain to have to split your 'student' into a second stack before each battle just to achieve this.

[Peasant Phill]

Does something nasty happen if your Daimyo dies without an heir?

[TinCow]

It depends on the circumstances. If you have an underage son, then there is a Regency until the son comes of age. If you have no son at all, the eldest brother becomes Daimyo. If no brothers, one of your Generals takes over. If no Generals, then the game generates a 'cousin' who appears and takes over. In all cases, having your Daimyo die in battle is not a good thing. I've heard that there can be some nasty penalties for a while if this happens, and apparently there are various penalties to order/diplomacy and such with all scenarios where you do not have a proper heir ready to take over, though I have never experienced them myself.

[spicykorean]

It depends on the circumstances. If you have an underage son, then there is a Regency until the son comes of age. If you have no son at all, the eldest brother becomes Daimyo. If no brothers, one of your Generals takes over. If no Generals, then the game generates a 'cousin' who appears and takes over. In all cases, having your Daimyo die in battle is not a good thing. I've heard that there can be some nasty penalties for a while if this happens, and apparently there are various penalties to order/diplomacy and such with all scenarios where you do not have a proper heir ready to take over, though I have never experienced them myself.

In battles, you should try to keep your daimyo out of harm's way and protected by your troops.
However, it's necessary to use the daimyo to lead armies to get xp and level up because a low honor daimyo starts giving you annoying consequences such as disloyal generals, penalty to diplomatic relations and penalty to public order/happiness.

[Cecil XIX]

Don't generals with a higher command stat then the Daimyo get a loyalty penalty as well?

[andrewt]

I need to watch out, then. I just started a new Date campaign and essentially left my Daimyo in the capital. I chose to level up the generals who are also office holders.

[Major Robert Dump]

Leaving General sitting around will possibly get them negative traits, mainly penalties to movement and upkeep. I have yet to see a positive trait come from sitting around building, although I have seen temporary clan bonuses in a province based on development and/or garrisons

A general is a free unit, you might as well use him. Also, keep additional generals outside of main army so they come into battle as reinforcements, dont stack multiple gens to one army unless it is an emergency. Only one general gets xp per army, but if you have 3 generals in 3 "armies" (even if the army is just the general) then they all 3 get some xp.

Leveling your Daimyo is good because, amongst other things, they left skill tree gives honor, whihc will gain you diplomacy and/or some wiggle room should you feel the need to loot a rich province you just captured. If your honor goes too low, so will your generals, not to mention diplomacy issues

[TinCow]

I have one note of caution about keeping extra generals outside the main stack. I agree it's very important to do this so that you can level up multiple generals, which will make a big difference to your clan 'offices' and will allow you to put a good leader at the head of a brand new army instead of an inexperienced leader. There is one situation where I've found this to be problematic though: frontline castle defense. If your army is garrisoning a castle, keeping your general outside the main stack as a reinforcement results in the reinforcement not being in the castle at the start of the battle. Usually enemy armies attack from all, or nearly all, directions simultaneously at the start of a siege assault. This means that regardless of where your reinforcing general enters the field, there will usually be enemy units between him and the safety of the castle. In addition, generals cannot hide on the battle map, so the AI will instantly see your general and will frequently attack him. While you can certainly get around this situation with some micromanagement and some luck, I have lost multiple generals this way. As a result, I no longer keep my back-up general outside the main stack when the main stack is a castle garrison unless the back-up general has at least a couple units with him to help him survive.

[Major Robert Dump]

YEah I try not to use that trick on castle defense, usually only in battles I know I can win. The first time it happened to me at a castle, I could not figure out why his 3 generals abandoned their post just outside of garrison archer range and took off like demons into the tree line. Then I got my mesage that a general was dead, then another, and I realized they came in after I lost a couple units defending.

It is easier to make this mistake when you have a full garrison, because you get distracted, whereas when they come in at the start you can be attentive, although it is still very dangerous, especially if the enemy has light cav

[Jacobin]

Isn't there also a diplomacy penalty for Daimyos with command stars?

I used my Oda Daimyo as my main general and ended up with everyone hating me far quicker than I expected.

(Admittedly with the Oda just leaving him in Owari means he'll be fighting every couple of turns as that province really is an enemy stack magnet).

Plus every time he got defeated personally another clan declared war on me - now this may have been coincidence but I am wondering...

[Liberator]

No, on the contrary, if your Daimyo levels up his honor will increase, which has a positive effect on diplomacy.

[Vladimir]

I enjoy leveling mine just to take advantage of being able to add to his honor in the skill tree. Very useful.

[Peasant Phill]

My Daimyo has 3 stars at the moment but I haven't noticed any change in honor. Or is this only possible by sinking points into honorable?

[andrewt]

Yeah, I started using my daimyo when I realized that generals get -1 loyalty for every point of command they have higher than him. It's not so bad when it's only around 2 stars, though.

That said, I'm not sure what else triggers realm divide as I want to conquer another province (Echizen for accuracy) before turtling for realm divide. Pretty sure it triggered at 20-21 provinces in my previous game and Echizen will be my 22nd one in this game. The description seems like honor may possibly count.