Shogun, Part II - Page 2

Youngsun · July 25, 2000, 03:48

Using "Yari samurais" is cheaper and more effective way to deal with enemy daimyo and his body guards.

Urban Ranger · July 26, 2000, 01:45

I suppose if you just have a spare yari samurai that is hanging around doing nothing

What's 10 bodyguards to these men, right?

Youngsun · July 27, 2000, 05:39

Yari samurais receive massive defence bonus against cavalry considering its own bonus vs. Cav with the penalty the enemy cavalry suffer.(double bonus!!)

If you are sick and tired of playing normal daimyos try "ronins and rebels".

Just type .conan. while you are playing as other daimyo then the "Ronins" are under your command instead of the one you had played(very easy to play so it is highly recommended to do it at Expert level).

Urban Ranger · July 27, 2000, 22:02

What are you supposed to do when you play the "ronin and rebel" faction? To overthrow the monachy and establish a democratic system?

Youngsun · July 28, 2000, 00:06

I haven't finished the game as Ronin so I have no idea. Perhaps Japan in endless turmoil as finishing demo with the messege "You ruined Japanese history! you bastard!"?

Urban Ranger · July 31, 2000, 00:22

That would be way cool!

Youngsun · August 1, 2000, 06:12

I had little thought about using the battle field engine of Shogun for other Napolenic battle simulations.

Yari cavalry:lancers
Heavy cavalry:cuirassier/Dragoons
Arquebusier/musketeer:Napoleonic ones with bayonets(can form square!! oh yeah!)
only artillery units are completely new.

Urban Ranger · August 1, 2000, 23:23

What about warrior monks? Maybe elite guards or something

Urban Ranger · August 5, 2000, 22:46

I remember something that irritates me. Even when you have win a battle decisively by killing the enemy taisho, you still have to wait till the enemy troops have finished running away. I wish they could just end the tactical right there. Or maybe they could throw in variable speed so I don't have to wait so long when I am defending.

I can't remember if I have complained about this before

Youngsun · August 6, 2000, 23:23

Press Ctrl+T(or was it shift+T?)then battle field time will go a lot faster!!!!

Kinjiru · August 7, 2000, 17:39

Does anyone else think Geisha are WAY overpowered? They have very high success rates, and even if they don't succeed, they do not get killed, they just keep trying.

I rarely can beat a Geisha with Ninja, so that is a useless tactic. Geisha vs. geisha is the only way to counter.

In every MP game I have played, the first player to get Geishas always wins.

Youngsun · August 9, 2000, 02:07

True. "Geisha" is one of the most unrealistic parts of the game. I've never played MP so I don't have any clue how people use her. I can only guess if the game has progressed that far Japan might be under contol of 2~3 lords and everyone has vast number of shadow army as well as convential one thus making Geisha sorta power balance breaker. At least you can see enemy Geishas so you can put away your daimyo and heirs from approaching Geishas until you produce one for yourself. Of course that can hinder your strategic moves but I think someone who heavily invested on the infra to produce Geishas deserve to get some advantage over other players. What's your favourite tactics and units Kinjiru?

Urban Ranger · August 9, 2000, 02:50

Youngsun: *sigh* No icons to click? Maybe we could write a strategic guide just for the hack of it.

Kinjiru · August 9, 2000, 09:19

I try not to have *favorite* units, but instead let the flow of the game and my strategic situation dictate my force strucutres. However, I do really love those warrior monks!

As far as tactics, I am a very big proponent of using forest cover. I just love to station a bunch of cav in the forests and let the other player come to me. Since only about half my units are out in the open, I let the opponent slaughter them, but in piecemeal fashion. Essentially I try to get my open units to position first and engage. After the initial skirimish I will pull my open guys back a little and re-engage. The opponent always is ahead at this point because when I turn to run away, he can obviously hurt me badly. So, after about half my (open) guys are gone, the opponent becomes confident of his victory and gets sloppy. That is when I bring out my cav. It's great because usually I have withdrawn my open guys enough so that my cav charges in from behind the opponent.

It never ceases to amaze me how often people will fail to make effective use of scouts.My biggest peice of advice to anyone playing MP would be to send out scouts to any possible place where your opponent could hide some troops. There is nothing worse than being hit by a cavalry charge from the woods, or having some arrows suddenly rain down from behind that little cleft you are marching past.

Urban Ranger · August 10, 2000, 00:37

But there are no scout units, i.e., units with better search and observation abilities. So I am assuming you are suggesting sending out cheapo Ashigaru units to wander about the battlefield. But this could be bad since a lone Ashigaru unit tend to get destroyed quickly.

Youngsun · August 10, 2000, 03:33

quote:

let the flow of the game and my strategic situation dictate my force strucutres. However, I do really love those warrior monks!

same here. Though I like Ashigarus a lot I wouldn't produce them much unless I play as Oda.

quote:

As far as tactics, I am a very big proponent of using forest cover. I just love to station a bunch of cav in the forests and let the other player come to me. Since only about half my units are out in the open, I let the opponent slaughter them, but in piecemeal fashion. Essentially I try to get my open units to position first and engage. After the initial skirimish I will pull my open guys back a little and re-engage. The opponent always is ahead at this point because when I turn to run away, he can obviously hurt me badly. So, after about half my (open) guys are gone, the opponent becomes confident of his victory and gets sloppy. That is when I bring out my cav. It's great because usually I have withdrawn my open guys enough so that my cav charges in from behind the opponent.

I'm not that used to defence but if I'm forced to defend I wouldn't divert my troops unless I've got numerical advantage and it is usually the enemy who has it when they attack. I always do "head counting" before I fully engage with main enemy body so if the number shows somewhat less than what I've seen about the total number of the enemy troop I begin searching forest areas.
[This message has been edited by Youngsun (edited August 10, 2000).]

Kinjiru · August 10, 2000, 09:07

Urban Ranger: yeah I ususally use the Ashis for scouting however, there is often a better choice. Let's say in one battle you end with a unit of light cav in which most of guys have been killed. Well, from that point on, this severly reduced unit is not going to be much help in a fight, but it would be PERFECT for scouting. So I try to keep such units around for just that purpose; they are very fast and do not usually need to retreat when they do find some hidden units. Instead they can just outrun the newly found bad guys and keep exploring!

Youngsun - good point about counting heads. I am usually to busy trying to get my units arrayed and facing the right direction to do that, but it would be a smart thing for me to start doing!

Youngsun · August 12, 2000, 10:55

Anyone noticed "legiondary swordman" event can occur even you auto-resolve a battle?

Urban Ranger · August 14, 2000, 06:21

Youngsun,

I am a big fan of defending. You get to choose your terrain pretty much, and wait for the attackers to arrive tired. If you are careful, you can repel enemies much bigger than you.

Youngsun · August 14, 2000, 08:34

Well, in tactical sense defending is marvelous but for strategic sense I'm not so sure whether that's so rewarding or not and I certainly would attack whenever chances arise rather than waiting for perfectly planned defence using difficult terrain.

My play style is sort of a man gone bersek to kill everybody.

I build many yari dojos to outproduce enemy clans and my endless bloody campaign consumes my warriors'lives like the cookie monster eating cookies. However I do enjoy defending and like using thick forest for large scale ambush.

Urban Ranger · August 15, 2000, 01:32

Lovely, vivid description of your campaigns, Youngsun

I guess they could go hand in hand. A defensive game wears down your opponents while giving your troops much needed experience. Then you can turn the table by launching attacks spearheaded by these battle hardened veterans.

Which reminds me that troops don't get experiences, just the taishos do. Troops could only get better from strcturesstrctures or their originating geographical locations. This is a flaw IMO.

Youngsun · August 15, 2000, 08:04

Haha you liked it? Perhaps the WWII German properganda leaflet showing monster mountains of Italy eating up all the allied soldiers would have been better description.

Troops do get higher honour(experience) through battles they fought. I don't know how the system works but they do get better.

Urban Ranger · August 15, 2000, 22:34

Troops do? Hm, I better check. Too bad the manual is standard EA issue, which means that it tells you nothing important.

[This message has been edited by Urban Ranger (edited August 15, 2000).]

Youngsun · August 17, 2000, 08:46

I'm really suprised EA made that worthless manual. Maybe they spent too much time on developing better battlefield engine so have forgotten to make a manual more appropriate.

Urban Ranger · August 17, 2000, 21:40

Nah, standard EA practice. Not that I have many EA games. For a strategy game an incomplete manual is a grave transgression.

At any rate, have you completed your game as ronins? What happened at the end?

Youngsun · August 18, 2000, 10:06

Not yet. I don't know I just stop playing after my victory get ensured then start another campaigne. Maybe I like initial stages of the game more. There are more than 20 saved files but not a single file had a chance to be played by me again.

Urban Ranger · August 22, 2000, 00:18

Same here. I just lose interest in a game when the others no longer have a chance to turn the table around. This seems to be an inherent flaw with strategy games. Dunno how this can be fixed...

Kinjiru · August 22, 2000, 09:31

I think the only way to 'fix' this inherent problem is to program the AI to do the same thing a human player would do when that player has no hope of winning... simply try to take out as much of the 'other' guy as possible.

For example, you know how when a province gets taken over, half the facilities are destroyed? Well, make the AI attack provinces that it can probably take over, but never hold more than a single turn. Let's say you have 3 other clans on the ropes. If each of them concentrate on making constant raids wherever you are weakest, then you will face two problems.
1) You must split your forces to mop up each of the invaders.
2) You will be getting less output from every single province attacked.

This kind of AI would provide a challenge at almost any stage of the game. If you do not deal with the invaders, you will eventually be unable to retain control of your fledgling empire. And if you want to deal with them effectively, you will need a strategy beyond the 'just send a bunch of armies to the current hotspot'.

-Just my 2 cents

Urban Ranger · August 23, 2000, 00:13

Another way to get around this, I think, is to provide intelligent winning conditions. Say you have taken control of 75% of the land, with only three other warlords opposing you, and they have no hope of winning. The game should declare you the winner at that point and make you Shogun, so you can start a new one.

PMLF · August 24, 2000, 00:08

Anyone knows Shoguns cheats ?
Do these cheats really works ?

Before anyone talk, I know that cheat is a bad thing, but I want to see these cheats only for fun .