Samurai Warlords XIX

**AggonyDuck** · 12-13-2006, 16:10

Actually, I didn't get the highest kill score seen in the competition yet. I've got a logfile with CBR killing 1213 in a battle during the Samurai Warlords XVII session and later on during the same session, in the failed attack by me, Tomi and Yuuki, I managed to get 1224 kills. But I wouldn't be surprised if CBR has gained higher kills during one of the earlier sessions.

Anyway I was testing the use of Ashis on Sunday. Initially I tried them at v0 in the first game and I was impressed by their speed. So in the second game in winter, where I had saved a lot of florins by buying Cavalry Archers over Heavy Cavalry, I decided to test out what valoured up Yari Ashigaru could do. Well overall I liked their performance, their better speed allowed them to have greater mobility than Yari Samurai and also allowed them to catch cavalry a bit better, while still having the same combat power as v0 YS. Additionally they also had +2 morale compared to the v0 YS, but this cost me an additional 178 florins. If they face any infantry stronger than v0 YS, they're pretty much done for.

About the v1 Nodachi. Nodachi have always been my favourite infantry unit in STW and that is also the case in Samurai Wars. Initially when I played earlier versions of Sam Wars, I had used v1 Nodachi as my mainstay infantry (the 10k days). They had been the perfect complement to my rather cav heavy armies. But when I started playing the new version of Sam Wars with the new 9k florin standard my old army selection had been mauled. I could no longer afford the old 4 NC, 1 YC, 3 CA, 4 v1 ND and 4 musks army I had used previously, simply because I couldn't afford it.

At first I tried the same army type, but I replaced the v1 ND with v0 ND and overall the results were pretty poor. The lack of spears in my army made it rather weak against the yari heavy armies of this version. Eventually I was forced to start using spears. This meant that I had to reduce the amount of cavalry in my armies and go for a combined arms approach instead.

I wanted a strong shock infantry to deal with enemy Yari's, but I've always disliked Monks and they cost you an arm and leg, so I had make do with the Nodachi.

Nodachi at v0 have always seemed to me as light shock infantry, which is very vulnerable to pretty much anything, so I wanted a unit that would combine the offensive nature of the ND with a bit more staying power. Eventually I remembered my v1 Nodachi, from the previous versions and decided to give them a go. Somehow the addition of that +1 valour had made my Nodachis something of a medium infantry unit, while still retaining the initial strengths of the ND. Balance wise the unit still loses in head on fights against HC, NC, WM and Naginata, but at the same time it fares a lot better against any opposition. I had found the unit that suited me and I believe the performance of my Nodachis speak for themselves.

**Puzz3D** · 12-13-2006, 18:43

Those two particular upgrades, V2 YA at 578 koku and V1 ND at 850 koku, essentially provide two new unit types that are still affordable within a 9k army. These two units still occupy proper positions in the spear/sword/cav RPS, so I don't think they break the stat. They are both high speed infantry, and can operate more independently with their increased morale. They have a higher kill rate than either YS or WM respectively, but are vulnerable to archers.

Keep in mind that upgrades do not increase a unit's combat power proportionate to the cost of the upgrade. For instance using a V0 ND costing 500 as the basis, a V1 ND costs 850 and has +2 combat points (approx 1.4x better ) while a V0 WM costs 1000 and has +4 combat points (approx 1.9x better). It would take a V2 ND costing 1445 to equal the combat power of a V0 WM, although it would have better charge and higher morale. So if you don't use valor upgrades, your army will have more raw combat power.

**ELITEofWARMANGINGERYBREADMEN88** · 12-13-2006, 19:16

Very Inersting Indeed Tomi :)

Congrats Ducky, can we eat some free duck then :-)?

**Tomisama** · 12-14-2006, 02:47

You can eat what you kill

Ducky in that last battle I was totally useless. What I had thought to do was to move over almost behind you to fain a double on CBR. The idea being to draw Methi off his perch, and then turn to catch him on more even ground. But at the time couldn’t figure how to communicate all of that without causing a lengthy delay, so just went dumbly forward.

In hindsight, it would have been worth the effort, in that particular case anyway. And in the future promise to take a few minutes to at least try to make a plan in similar circumstances

**AggonyDuck** · 12-14-2006, 11:49

Not totally useless, I managed to get a couple units advantage against CBR due to you. I believe he sent 3-4 units against you, which gave me the upper hand. I wouldn't call 391 kills useless.

**Puzz3D** · 12-15-2006, 19:24

I just watched the last 3v3 played last Sunday which I distributed as STW_3v3_60 in the #6 replay group. I noticed that Tomi used 2 CA supported by 1 YC very aggressively, and I wasn't surprised when they were wiped out by R'as with a couple of YC and his hatamoto with R'as only loosing 45 YC. That's a 2200 koku loss for Tomi (24% of his army costwise) vs a 750 koku loss for R'as (8% of his army costwise), and there isn't any offsetting compensation for the attackers who still have to take a fortified hill position.

In STW, the YC cost 475 and the CA 450 at honor 2 which was the default honor level. In Samurai Wars, costs are doubled but CA do not cost 900 because they are modeled closer to their Honor 1 STW equivalent which would be 321 koku. Many players used CA at honor 1 in STW, and experts even used them at Honor 0 (cost 230). We didn't take CA that far in Samurai Wars, but the honor 1 equivalent modeling means CA are not good in melee especially against YC which are their arch enemy. YC are 7 combat points (358%) better than CA in melee, and the YC are 20% faster. Even if a CA is able to make a flanking attack on a YC, it will not be very effective. So, when R'as sends his first YC out to challenge Tomi's 2 CA and 1 YC, the correct move is for Tomi to block R'as YC with his own YC which he did, and then get his 2 CA out of there which he didn't.

It's a fine art of the gameplay to utilize CA to entice the enemy to attack without loosing the CA. Ideally, you try to trap the enemy units that come out to attack the CA with other units or at least shoot the enemy units when they attempt to return to their lines. Archers are quite effective when shooting units that are moving directly away from them.

**Tomisama** · 12-16-2006, 16:06

Concerning the CA and YS situation described above (replay 60).

When my three unit contingent was countered by the single yari cav unit, my two archers were pulled away, and my yari sent directly against his. Seeing the downhill disadvantage my men had, I sent the archers back, one in melee on the flank, and the other firing from a short distance.

The fight went on and on in what seemed to be forever, while the hata generals unit got closer and closer. But right up to the point they (the hata) crested the hill, it still looked like I might at least be able to break even. I mean look at the proportion of his yari to mine in the 4th screen.

I expected his men to rout at any moment, and then all of my units would make a run for it. But his yari were like supermen, severally diminished and out numbered, they were still undaunted, and I can’t get loose from them…

At the time this seemed unbelievable to me. But as the battle progressed, and I incurred continuing and similar defeats on those slopes, I must surmise that I was underestimating the height advantage they provided. Steeper than they looked from my vantage point I guess