Smaller Armys

[TosaInu]

Control is easy Tomi.

Hello,

It isn't easy, but you can do a few things to make it easier for yourself. And yes, less units can mean less headache ^*.

Make groups and supgroups, learn a system, so you can do something even in the most chaotic heat of battle.

My defensive infantry (ys, ya and ni), is 'always' CONTROL SHIFT 1. The gunners are always group 0, a second and third infantry missile group are group 9 and 8. The left wing shock units are group 3, the right wing are group 4.
The whole infantry stack is group 2, so I can move them all at the same time, that sometimes includes the taisho.
Cavalry is group 5. It's possible to modify a bit when using special armies, but best is to keep it the same and get used to it.

^* It happened a few times to me that I felt to be in the game after 75% of my units were erased. You can try a few things here too. First of all you can take less, but more powerful units: 4 WM and 4 HC cost 8,800, get a teppo to spend all money. Of course that is a vulnerable army in the open, but there are teamgames and specialty maps that would make such a punch tactic viable.

Another thing you could do is buy more strong units than normal, but complement it with cheap to make the numbers. You could spend 800 on 4 ya, 800 on 4 arq, 4,000 on 4 WM, that leaves 3400 for four (or less!) more units (avg 850). Examples: 2 HC and 2 Nod, 2 NC and 2 NI. Of course you want the cheap ya and arq to do something good, but you do not have to worry too much about it, your money is in 8 units that are out of harms way and wait to turn the tide. Even just using the cheap units to soak up enemy fire is good.

Yet another idea is to buy a solid army like usual, but include units that can take care of themselves. Examples are NI on hold hold and CA on skirmish (which you can also use to make waves: keep your whole army out of harms way and send some bugs to keep the other busy). The BN can be used like that too. It's a bit of a wildcard unit, it can make over one hundred kills, it can be near useless, best use them in woods. As it is invisible you can show a weak belly and trick your opponent.
If you buy 2 NI, 2 CA and 1 BN, you have only 11 units to really care about.

Use the terrain and stay calm, no matter what. Hide a few units in the woods during deployment and just never touch them until you really really really need them (of course not so far away from the action that they'll be too late). Be aware that your opponent may wonder and start to scout, so it may pay to have something to counter the eyes.

You can do a southpaw deployment and ambush something north (do not forget to disable FAW). Either grab the chance and kill some guns early on or let the whole army pass and have Rangers for the endbattle.

Of course you can mix one or more of those tips, whatever works for you and whatever your opponent doesn't expect you to do.

Edit: the hatamoto is an excellent unit for taisho. It is 'cheap', fast, tough, has good range and skirmish abilities and can be left alone for a bit. When the area is 'secure' even completely forgotten.

[CBR]

Hello,

It isn't easy, but you can do a few things to make it easier for yourself. And yes, less units can mean less headache ^*.

Make groups and supgroups, learn a system, so you can do something even in the most chaotic heat of battle. *snip*

Im using stuff like one main infantry group (swords and spears mixed) with either a secondary group behind it or on one flank, or individual units on both flank but behind main group (mostly one spear) So anything from 3 groups to just one group and a few individual units.

Cavalry is generally single or in groups of 2 although I might start out with one large if I have many of one type (4 YC) and then release the ones I need.

Most group movement is done by dragging a line so I know precisely where it ends and its facing. And if desperate I use it too for the attack, and if I have time I do the individual attacks before the line hits enemy units.


CBR

[Togakure]

Some great tips. I use control groups much like Tosa describes, and it helps a lot. For next week I will be customizing my control buttons. I've been using the stock ones and they're not really handy for this lefty.

Practice games (not just battles, but practicing manuevers with another on the battlefield) can work wonders. if you're interested and ever have the time, I would enjoy doing this. I need the practice too, and can usually meet in the evenings on weeknights after 7 PM EST. I can show you the kinds of things I do, and you could show me what you do. Maybe George would join us (he said he is planning to next weekend, yay!). Sometimes Yuuki is around, maybe he might join us occasionally. I used to do this all the time with new 47 Ronin. It accelerated their learning curve from beginner to intermediate dramatically. For us though, going from intermediate to advanced takes more time, and of course, practice, practice, practice. Maybe we will discover new tricks.

As Yuuki says, match-ups are so important in SW--more so than in the other TW games because it's well-balanced and we don't upgrade. Also crucial are use of terrain, getting a good charge in with cav, supporting units with others for morale--particularly when in the midst of a lot of enemies. Timing attacks with the coming and going of rain can work wonders--particularly against their cav if they don't have many and you have more, and against their pesky archers and CA who tend to come out of hiding when it rains.

I realize how hard the reserves concept can be. I am still playing en masse, using my whole army as one much of the time. From the standpoint of using morale as a weapon, this can be good, but when you commit, you commit! If you commit in error ... well you know how that goes, lol. I will be trying a more divided approach as I get used to SamWars, to see if I like it better. Really though, it's all about the right approach under a particular set of circumstances.