Muskets - How do you experts do it?

[Magamushi Myoshi]

Hi there,

I have a problem. I am not a newbee since I´ve played about 150-180 games online but lately I have had some difficulties winning a battle. The key is the muskets I think. What is the optimal honour, added weapon, added protection parameters for lets say a 8000 koku game, on a flat map, for muskets. I have tried all kinds of contellations with few, high honour muskets and many low honour muskets. Also tried 2,3,4 lines depths.
PROBLEM: 1) If I have few muskets (high hon.) = They get shot to pieces (By usually a large number of enemy gunners), and after that my support troops follows their destiny if I don´t immediately attack. 2) If I have a lot of muskets (low hon.) = After some shooting they usually get scared away by the high loss rate. And the same ending as scenario 1 follows.
In all cases the enemy lines have minor losses! Are my muskets cross-eyed or what?! And this is regardless of height advantage or not. I have all muskets involved in the battle and have even tried all muskets aiming at only one group of the enemy muskets to make them run away by the high losses. No luck! And getting desperate!

And what about deploying one group of muskets, in 2 line rows, directly in front of another? Since they have very few, or none, accidental kills by their own muskets.

Please give me some advice on the issue or I will probably loose the motivation for this game.

Thanx

[Kocmoc]

u have archer?

if u have archer, what u shoot with them?

u need archer to focus the enemy guns too...
they kill faster and give ur own guns an advantage....

koc

[Vanya]

There are 2 types of players in the world: those whose strategy is to simply win by winning a shootout and those that use missile units as simply a part in an integrated strategy.

Given that it seems you are the former, make sure that you always have what it takes to win a shootout. To this end, yee must:

1. Outgun the enemy -- that is, have more missile units (gun or archer) than they.

2. Wear out the enemy and force them to attack you. Make them the ones that must face their destiny by doing a suicide charge on your lines.

3. Make sure your gunnies have a chance. Max their armor and honor (skip weapons) with your available koku. If this means you can't afford anything but Ashigaru to back up your guns, so be it.

4. (Of course, you knew this one was comming, didn't you?) Put the guns in wedgies and charge the enemy when they charge you. This is probably the best advice you will ever receive in STW!


Well... Your Honor, I have, with this, completed my Community Service sentence! WOOHOO!

[Puzz3D]

Magamushi Myoshi,

1) Definitely use gun units in ranks 3 deep. They will beat a gun in two ranks. Once you loose enough men in the unit that it drops to 2 ranks, reform it into 3 ranks.

2) Don't put another unit in front of a gun unit. The reason you don't get many friendly kills when you do is that men who don't have a clear line of sight don't fire. So, you don't get maximum firepower when another unit is in front of the gun.

3) Engage just inside max range if you're going to be taking return fire right away. If your unit stands at exactly max range, very often part of the front line fails to shoot. However, don't march forward taking volley after volley because you will never make up the difference in lost men once your guns start shooting.

4) Try to engage in such a way that all your guns are operating, but some of the enemy's guns are out of range. A good opponent will never actually let you do this, but you can try. If you can set up a crossfire, it's devastating.

5) For an 8000 koku game, I use H2 guns. I find H2 guns will stand in there quite well as long as you don't get too close to the enemy line. I would only upgrade honor and armor on guns if your intent is to win the battle by standing and shooting.

6) Archers can severely weaken a gun unit. It doesn't take much of an advantage to win a 1 on 1 shootout. A 60 man gun will beat a 50 man gun. With each volley, the stronger gun unit will increase it's advantange. That's why it's important to get off to a good start or get in the first volley.

7) Use CA on the flank to nip away at the gun on the end. Protect your CA with a YC against enemy cav. Don't go head-to-head with CA against the gun. The CA will loose.

8) Don't reposition ranged units unnecessarily. They start the reload cycle over again each time they move.

9) You can use loose formation to reduce losses. However, it can be difficult to get the necessary concentrated firepower with several units in loose, and they will reposition themselves after a while if they overlap. You also loose morale when in loose formation. It's not easy to use loose formation effectively unless you're in a 1 on 1 exchange.

10) Although frontal assault on fresh guns will usually fail, it's not necessary to completely eliminate the guns. Weakened and tired guns loose a lot of effectiveness and can be charged. If you can combine an infantry assualt with cav from the flank or rear going for the guns, you're in good shape.

11) Once the guns are starting to waver from losses, put a couple of units close behind them for morale support. If you do that too soon, the supporting units get shot to pieces. You can also put the supporting units right in the line with the guns to avoid losses which is an idea from Kocmoc.

12) See if your opponent will play with a 4 gun limit since that gives a pretty good game. I tend to take 6 ranged units with 4 of them being musk on the open maps. If you know your opponent takes 5 or 6 guns, then it might be good to take that many yourself. Although it's possible to win in spite of a gun deficit, you have to be active and precise in your tactics.

Despite all these suggestions, I too do not care for the way guns dominate many online battles. I think the 250 koku for the musk is still too low, and should be more like 400 koku.

MizuYuuki ~~~
Clan Takiyama ~~~

[This message has been edited by Puzz3D (edited 02-08-2002).]

[BomilkarDate]

Use two Cav Archers on one flank protected by two HC or YC. Then try to get to the enemies flank.
It is a bit silly, but 3 of 4 guys just don't react if you start firing on their guns from the flank until you killed about 10 of their musks. Then they turn, you retreat a bit, flank again, try not to let him any time to think. As soon as u think you can win the gunfight with your own guys, do so. Perhaps you will have to sacrifice one or two Cavs for this (by charging into the gunnies from the flank). If you cant win the gunfight flank with your cav and kill him with your monks.

Ah yes, use your guns 3 men deep and perhaps sometimes in loose formation.
But, well guns are beaten by archers. And a Musk is nothing than a long-sighted Arq.

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Strength and honour

Bomilkar Date

Apart from Yuuki's suggestions...
1) Starting shooting first can give you the upper hand sometimes...
2) if your guns are on a slightly high ground, they'll wreck...

If you're witty enough, you can plan an attack on guns by cavalry. Confuse the enemy by doing something that will take his attention...in the meantime order the cavalry to move...when the enemy is occupied on another front.

Tera

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Honour to Clan Kenchikuka.
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Visit my resource site here!

[Gothmog]

Quote Originally posted by BomilkarDate:
But, well guns are beaten by archers. And a Musk is nothing than a long-sighted Arq.

[/QUOTE]

Hummm, are you saying that Arqs have longer range?

As far as I know, it's quite the opposite. And arqs suck to the core.

[Katasaki Hirojima]

Heh, I'm terrible with guns. But I'm great with cavalry. I typically do Takeda style charges. I devide the enemy mentally in to two parts. The left front and the right front. I charge my cavalry into either front of the enemy and focus my muskets on the other. My muskets usually get gutted right away, but no prob. My yari samurai always prevail. ;p

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"I maintain none the less that Yin-Yang Dualism can be overcome. With sufficent enlightment, we can give substance to any distinction: Mind without body, north without south, pleasure without pain. Renember, enlightment is a function of will power, not of physical strength."- Shang-ji Yang, essays on mind and matter.

[BomilkarDate]

Gothmog,
What I wanted to say is that musks are nothing than a Arq that can see better on big distances (I tried to make kind of a joke (cos, guns suck)), but well I guess my English is not good enough to make jokes. So i wont try to choke anymore.

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Strength and honour

Bomilkar Date

[evilc]

adding weapons up-grades onyl affects h2h, so dont give it to guns.

Musk range = 5000
Arg range = 4000

4 guns is enough, H3 maybe for 8000, armour is not worth it.

[theforce]

4 guns and 2 archers are the key. Use archers to fire from the flank of the other guy's guns.
Beef up archer honor. When enemy changes put them infront of guns in hold position and formation and let yer guns fire at the poor units that are close. Archers won't last long though. :P
Use higher ground with guns(simple but most effective).Anyway playing with guns is hard to command cause some times things can get shitty.
Key in Shogun now is to win the projectile fight and making the other peep attack. Don't spend too much koku on guns though since you will find the rest fo your army week later on. Also making 2 guns unit firing on one other unit will make it run faster and reduce the morale of the other guns. Also when units are not well protected and many gunmen are killed a cav change will rout them easily.

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Don't use only honour, use theforce, too.
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