how the hell do people win on expert level full campaign???

[Tankdogg123]

I can't see how u people do it. When I tried I went takeda and straight away mori attacked 2 of my provinces with 3 units where I only had 1 I lost them both. I don't doubt my own skills on the battlefiled it's the other part of the game I need to learn. How do I get time to build an army big enough to serious challenge these people with my provinces being took over so quickly?

[Papewaio]

This is both a game of real time combat and chess/ real estate
Practice
Practice
Practice the real time combat until you can win against the AI defending 2:1 (which is the normal trigger level)

Location
Location
Location pick which provinces you are going to sacrifice and the others you want to develop.

To win using just strategy play the game at normal and automatically resolve all battles... this removes your ability on the field and focuses it on the strategic.
When playing like this;
1) RETREAT before battle commences if you can't win.
2) Bulk your armies up.

Once you can win just using autoresolve at normal, try it at hard.

Then play at expert without using autoresolve your strategy should be viable and your field tactics can beat the AI far better then autoresolve does.

This has the advantage that it takes about 45 mins to complete a campaign and figure out better strategies.
[I've beat the Mongols on Hard just using autoresolve]



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Victory first, Battle last.

[Lord Toranoga]

I have only played the Mori.
I have read that a lot of players think playing the Mori is one of the hardest clans.
I like there posistion. I like the armories you can build there and nothing but Ronins around early on.

I first capture the surrounding provinces, then leave only two defensive armies on my East front.
I have read that moving west is the wrong strategy but I have success with it.
I attack the Shimazu(before they grow too strong) and bribe the Ronins on the island to the south of me blocking the Shimazu in.
While I am defeating the Shimazu the rest of the clans to the east are fighting amongst themselves while I am conquering the whole left side of the map.
Then after the Shimazu are no more, I upgrade my troops and send them East to destroy everything in my path. By this time my Geishas are asassinating everyone in site, which is no fun so I wish we could turn them off or something.
Two tips I will give you are: 1. I use a lot of Shinobies to keep the population happy and the taxes high, and 2. I never fight a battle I dont think I will win. I will give up ground to them, then counter attack when I am sure to win.



[This message has been edited by Lord Toranoga (edited 11-13-2001).]

[AMPmortog]

when i used takeda i abandoned my provinces near hojo and moved all my armies to the castle i was givin near mori and form 2 huge armies having my damyio lead 1 army to plow the mori clan to the right and use a 2nd to take a few provinces on the left and hold ground there...as im takin out mori i from i slowly from other armies taking out what i can each turn none stop attacking...as im doing this i only use koku for traing yari sams,building castles,spear dojos, and watch towers to keep newly provinces from revolting...after taking mori's castles and the ronin castles i can train monks,dachi and archers which i then use for battle and i always end a seige as soon as i can instead of waiting months for it to auto end...if ur good at fighting battles within no time ur elimitating the clans...its pretty easy

[Whitey]

Are you playing slow?

if so it is a far greater challenge...you want to be shogun, attack...attack...attack...

pull back when you can't win - don't try and kill all the enemy, just try to rout them - low casualty battles are always better for the human player (until you learn how to *wipe out* the AI, then its...well...a lot easier )

but yeah

practice...practice...practice...sleep...practice......practice...practice...sleep...practice...prac tice...practice...die of hunger/thirst (your preference)

[Tankdogg123]

I have just started a expert campaign with mori and I have to say mori is quite easy. My problem was always getting off the ground but with Mori I was able to take the 3 takeda provinces within my first 2 turns Then I allied with shimazu enabling me to concentrate onb the east. I have now gained lands and I own most land west up to the centre of japan around the province omi. I broke my alliance with Shimazu to take his land through a port and there is only 3 or 4 provinces in the west which I am yet to take. Lord hojo is my biggest rival he has the biggest army but I have been help slightly by the fact that usegi has been brought back to life. I can also take many of hojo's labds whenever I want to through ports but after reading some posts that is deemed to be unfair (even though I have used it once) I think if I do it again it will be made too easy. So for me Mori is the best clan to go as they start off with stronger troops enabling me to be able to get started.

[Khan7]

I of course prefer to put myself in very disadvantaged scenarios on Normal rather than up the difficulty and screw my sense for the battlefield toughness of units.

For instance, try this-- take the 1580 campaign, and turn all of Imagawa's lands into Ronin. Then put Imagawa in Tosa, with a small castle, a Spear Dojo and an Archery Dojo, and 2 Ashis and an Archer unit.

I got to controlling all of the two southern islands before my ATI video card + crappy BIOS started overloading my video memory on the battles.

I was of course only able to accomplish this because of the greater relative toughness of Ashis with my Real Deal mod...

Oh well, I would imagine you guys might have fun trying variants of things like this. I at least prefer it to Expert level.

Matt

[Maltz]

I guess one must be aggressive enough.

There are also some other traits that might help. One of them is being shameless - keep save and load until you get a satisfactory outcome

[Gothmog]

Quote Originally posted by Khan7:
I of course prefer to put myself in very disadvantaged scenarios on Normal rather than up the difficulty and screw my sense for the battlefield toughness of units.
[/QUOTE]

While it might be necessary for someone who is really into MOD thing like you, to test-play it on normal level, I'd like to point out that normal and hard are probably not as frequenently played as easy (for really really newly newbie) or expert (for those who have played for a bit).