Shogun, Part II

[Urban Ranger]

I started playing my first campaign game last night. It seems easy. I was able to sweep the Hojo clan during the third year. All I need to do now is sit around and consolidate.

[Youngsun]

Which clan did choose? Clan Takeda?

If I play as Oda, I crush Ikko-Ikki first then Imagawa or Uesugi.

If Imagawa, I migrate to Kyushu with all my army to crush Shimazu for firm base.

If Takeda, I bring up all my army from Kansai to crush Hojo.

If Uesugi, Hojo frist.

If Hojo, Uesugi first.

If Mori, Hmmm Shikoku rebels(Chosokabe maybe) then Oda.

It all seems clan Mori has got the safest staring position I guess.

[Urban Ranger]

Uesugi, or something like that. Their position is pretty good: fetile fields, rich mineral deposits, got iron, and a good defensive position.

I found that emissaries aren't very useful. My dude got knocked off by a random ninja. Ugh! On the other hand, Shobonis (sp?) make good spies.

[Youngsun]

I thought Uesugi's position was quite vulnerable to early Hojo onslaught so I used to give up one province that are located furtherst from my capital for solid defence.

That's not a random ninja. They are all from clan Imagawa during the early stage of the game. That clan has two ninjas to begin with.
Shinobi is not bad. Have you used Geisha before? Last night one of my geisha wiped out clan Mori by assasinating Mori's heirs and Mori himself haha . Sure their clan got disintegrated into rebel states. what a pity they had no allies to get some share of their land.

[Urban Ranger]

You're an evil man, Youngsun. I better watch my back now :-) That's what I am trying to do, wiping out the Hojo dudes with ninjas. I know they aren' as efficient, so I am sending them on practice runs, killing off the Hojo generals

Just a few questions:

1. How do you detect ninjas? Since they seem to be invisible.

2. Same goes with shinobis.

It seems that different clans have different starting strengths. The Imagawa clan has a port, which can't be built after the game has started as there wasn't enough time when I found it.

The Uesugis' starting location aren't that bad. Hojo can be a problem, but since he has to watch his back (Imagawa), it's hard for him to muster a campaign against me.

I found it kinda a pain in the butt to have to swap CDs (and why would they have a serial number for? ugh!). Also the game crashed last time when I was trying to save a game! This is most upsetting! It is a stupid idea not to have the save game routine loaded in memory when the main game is running.

[Urban Ranger]

I have just completed my sweep of the Hojo clan early this morning that I have started in the third year of my first game. The final battle was my daimyo leading 1000+ men against the Hojo daimyo with 625 men. He was defending behind a river, which made it difficult to attack him. What I did was I kept moving units of Yuri Samurai across the bridge, which were met with stiff opposition in the beginning. However, as my own archers rained death upon the Hojo troops, the defenders weavered after awhile, allowing my own units room to spread out and attack. I was holding back my daimyo as a reserve until I had a clear shot at the Hojo dude, who had been worn down. He was quickly killed by my heavy calvary which caused the remainder of his troops to flee the battlefield. Since he had no heir his faction disintegrated. The remaining province went to Imagawa, and the province I was attacking became a rebel faction. Since his last province had no defenders and I was at war with Imagawa, I just moved a unit in there to seize it. The castle fell to my seige in one season. Which is good, since I am planning on targeting the rebels anyway, so this saved me trouble.

Some of my observations:

1. The AI might be decent in tactical combat, but sucks in the strategic segment. I was able to pushed the Hojo clan back with fewer troops then he had, and used the newly conquered provinces to help building up my army until I could overpower him in the final battle. Hojo kept attacking Takeda even though the provinces he could have taken -- he failed to take any -- were bad compared to the ones he had lost to me.

2. Imagawa attacked me even though I had allied with them and they are supposed to be quite honorable. The funny thing was he kept attacking my outlaying province which was thinly garrisoned. But due to the terrain I was able to repel him while causing him huge casualties (usually about 10:1, in my favour). My general over there kept getting better, and eventually one of the samurai reached legendary status, allowing me to build sword dojos. What a fool

3. Neither the manual nor the Road of Daimyo e-document (electronic document) tells you everything. After I crushed Hojo in that final battle the computer told me "4 structures destroyed." Isn't that a nice surprise? I wonder what other surprises lie in wait?

4. You can have a certain maximum number of troops on the field at once, since I kept getting the message "Reinforcements have arrived." Another surprise, no?

Several major design flaws:

1. There is no arial or 2-D map view of the battlefield, making it very difficult to give commands when you have a large amount of troops. This situation is aggravated by

2. The camera is "bound" to a unit: it can't roam free on the battlefield. Which is further compounded by

3. There is no keyboard command to rotate through your units so you know what the heck they are doing.

4. As I said before, the save game routines aren't stored in memory all the time, and the game has to switch it in. Such switching seems to cause crashes more often than being in the middle of some part. This is thoroughly stupid as save game is supposed to use to alleviate crash situations.

5. The game does not make use of population. In fact, there is no such item in the game, which borders on the ludicrous. It just stands to reason that a province produces more when there are more people, and takes less time for constructions to complete. Also, the number of units that can be trained in a province should be proportional to the population there. Lastly, number of garrisons needed in a conquered province should also be proportional to the population.

Minor Gripes:

1. It's hard to tell which units are yours on the main map. The little units are cute but totally useless, esp when the little symbols on top of the flags aren't used anywhere. These units should just bear the flag of various clans, so a player can tell whose are they with just one glance.

2. Many operations on the main map can only be done by dropping one (group of) unit(s) on top of another. Since it's quite difficult to aim on the map, this is a major pain in the arse.

3. There should be more status reports, such as what units you have in each province, what each province is building, and so forth.

4. The Throne Room is totally useless, and so is the advisor.

5. Why is half the map darken, even after I sent several shinobis and emissaries to map it out? It should be mapped in slowly as I gain information.
[This message has been edited by Urban Ranger (edited July 08, 2000).]

[Youngsun]

Urban Ranger

I don't think there is any other way to detect any ninjas or shinobis by other units but if you have "border forts" built, they get random chance to kill these infiltrators. Perhaps combined with your shinobis or ninjas border forts' might get increased bonus but I'm not so sure about that.

Clan Takeda has ports too. You can only build/have one port per costal province.

The game has got "autosave function".

quote: The AI might be decent in tactical combat, but sucks in the strategic segment

true. I agree.

quote: . Imagawa attacked me even though I had allied with them and they are supposed to be quite honorable

Imagawa honourable? he is such a traitorous dog! .

quote: 4 structures destroyed

I reckon this destruction of facilities thing makes the game quite frustrating and unreal. If I'm damn lucky half of the buildings will get damaged and stay otherwise total destrcution.

quote: There is no arial or 2-D map view of the battlefield

There is one though quite small and useless. Didn't you see the little window popped up at the corner of your main battle filed view? You can use zoom too but I totally ignore this window.

quote: The camera is "bound" to a unit

Go to the option menu then change the option. I did that just after my first battle(so pissed off at that time).

quote: The game does not make use of population. In fact, there is no such item in the game, which borders on the ludicrous. It just stands to reason that a province produces more when there are more people, and takes less time for constructions to complete. Also, the number of units that can be trained in a province should be proportional to the population there. Lastly, number of garrisons needed in a conquered province should also be proportional to the population.

I completely agree with you. At least "Koku" should have some effect similar to that of population.

quote: It's hard to tell which units are yours on the main map

Go to the option then click the video menu and click the "x" of "use 8 bit texture" to not to use 8 bit texture then you can see the colour of each clan very clear such as Mori's light crimson banners or Imagawa's blue banners. Easy distinction guranteed! If you want quality colour choose the option below to your previous one. Was it "software ***"? Try but my CPU can't handle this option. too slow

I also agree with your criticisms other aspect of the game. good work.

[Urban Ranger]

Youngsun,

Thanks for the clues

[Ramo]

Woohoo, I just finished my first campaign game [on "Normal"] with the Oda clan!

My Gripes [other than the ones UR mentioned]:

1. There's no f*cking "support cost"! You can amass these gargantuan armies that aren't f*cking possible! In my book, it loses points for realism.

2. There aren't any "happiness" buildings where one can increase the happiness level of a province, if built.

3. The AI always retreats into their castles if faced with overwhelming odds, basically losing them without taking out any of my guys.....

4. All of the structures always get destroyed when a province is conquered...... More points lost for realism.

I agree. The computer does tactical combat fairly well, but sucks a** in strategy (the computer didn't declare war on me when an entire front was undefended - the emperor told all the clans to not declare on me, but a really dishonorable clan didn't even build up his troops on the undefended front!).......

[Youngsun]

sorry double post
[This message has been edited by Youngsun (edited July 10, 2000).]

[Youngsun]

Urban Ranger

My pleasure

Ramo

quote: There's no f*cking "support cost"!

There is. Ramo I'm not so sure about the exact amount for each unit but 120 Ashigaru need 60 koku each turn to maintain if you play as Oda.

Happiness builiding? what have you in mind? something like red-light street infra? haha

quote: The AI always retreats into their castles if faced with overwhelming odds

Hmmm you're right. after the retreat then they just starve in the castle right?

quote: All of the structures always get destroyed when a province is conquered.

Not always! keep playing Shogun then one day you will get damaged facilities as your war booty.

Did you buy many Ashigarus while you were playing as Oda? I think clan Oda is great due to affordability to cheaper/stonger Ashigaru. We all know our early dependency on massed Ashigaru tactics. Ashigarus have many good points;

1.Faster than other normal foot soldiers(easy pursuing when enemy get routed)

2.Damn cheap

3.So versatile(a.form main body of my army. b.can be used as cannon fodder c.can be used as local police to boost loyalty)

I wonder why clan Oda got lowest rank from the clan popularity poll in other Shogun site.

[Urban Ranger]

Hm.


Haven't play the Oda clan yet, so I can tell if their Ashigari units are any different, but mine suck. I suppose the only thing to do is to pit at least three against a regular enemy unit, though that seems to need a high degree of coordination so your units arrive there more or less at the same time, or they will get chewed up serially


Some more gripes regarding tactical combat: your units lacks autonomy, and there aren't enough commands to use. For example, they should have added commands such as:


1. Attack closest unit (that's not running away)
2. Attack closest missile unit
3. Attack closest non-missile unit
4. Flanking attack (maybe for calvary only)


I also found irregularities before battle. Sometimes you can pick up a unit and place it in a new spot. Sometimes you could only choose from one of the battle formations, which are largely useless.


Ramo,


Youngsun is right, you do need support costs. Read the breakdown every winter and you'll see.


Youngsun,


I reckon building structures such as Tea House, Tranquil Garden, or Buddhist Temple should make the population happier.


At any rate, after I have swept the Hojo clan the game seems to have grinded to a halt. I am still unwilling to attack the Takeda clan as though they should be my next target. On the other front, I have repressed the rebels, although the mad monks in Kaga had costed me an arm and a leg in men.
[This message has been edited by Urban Ranger (edited July 10, 2000).]

[Youngsun]

Urban Ranger

If I'm not Oda I usually buy Yari samurais. Ashigarus are good only if produced from "Owari" or "Tosa" and Owari is clan Oda's turf so he can churn out Ashigaru every single turn. Unit coordination is key to use these fragile units successfully(usually flanking)

quote: 1. Attack closest unit (that's not running away) 2. Attack closest missile unit 3. Attack closest non-missile unit 4. Flanking attack (maybe for calvary only)

These suggestions are excellent ones I think. can not agree with you more.

quote: I also found irregularities before battle. Sometimes you can pick up a unit and place it in a new spot. Sometimes you could only choose from one of the battle formations, which are largely useless.

It is regular. Urban Ranger. When you defend you get chance to deploy your troops before battle and when you attack you get pre-set deployment done by AI.

Try Shimazu at expert level. You will be busy all the time. It's like every time you put down one enemy then stonger one block your way and again and again until you reach might y Hojo as your final foe.

[Urban Ranger]

Youngsun,

Ah, that's the difference. Still the battle formations are useless

I'll try your suggestion after I finish my current game. Thanks.

[Youngsun]

quote: Still the battle formations are useless

Not entirely. I don't often use the "Wedge formation" but "spreading thin" is good when you're under enemy arrow barrage.