Date Campaign Guide

[gonzo90806]

i thought the master weapon smith upgrades melee and ranged weapons. My archers show that they are upgraded

update
yah i just checked lol, It is just melee doh. Guess my melee units can kick butt still

[Gaizokubanou]

i thought the master weapon smith upgrades melee and ranged weapons. My archers show that they are upgraded

Yeah your archer's melee attack is upgraded, not their shooting skill.

[Noif de Bodemloze]

Always what is happened for me on Date campaign: Date Masamune die always in first conquered area. He has not seen other places

[Fallenonez]

Wow Realm Divide ed me up, especially since now I am no longer pumping out 5k per turn, my provinces all want to revolt so I exclude taxes which means even less money, and I am about to lose! =[

[RealDarko]

Can someone give me some tips to play correctly the Date campaign in Normal please? I'm having great difficulties in winning enough money to mantain my province and the conquered one in the west, so further expansion is totally out of reach. Is really possible to conquet those 25 territories together with Kyoto?

[Shabby_Ronin]

Can someone give me some tips to play correctly the Date campaign in Normal please? I'm having great difficulties in winning enough money to mantain my province and the conquered one in the west, so further expansion is totally out of reach. Is really possible to conquet those 25 territories together with Kyoto?

You have rich farmland in the north, get the trade node near you and if you can, Sado island with its gold. Send a ship immediately after you have a harbor along the coasts to get trade agreements.

[phraetorian]

Just finish date on very hard at the year of 1575, spring. wasn't so hard. the last battle with the shogun was epic. 5000 under my daimyo againsnt around 15 heroes samurai unit. so its like 5000vs 700, and i got a close victory. date masamune is nowhere to be found? just want t know what his armour look like and does he have an eye patch before he became daiymo?

[phraetorian]

Hey, trying to play Date and it seem to be impossible on hard. I just manage to get the four north eastern provinces and then I have 2 big clans declearing war on me! now it was the hojo (8 provinces) and takeda (9) with a vassal army (just one province, far away, but he sent a full stack!) gang up on me. and the north isnt really that rich. it is really hard to get anything done! any tips?

i finish it on very hard, diplomacy is a must, i even exchange hotage with takeda, marry my daughter to him and demand his daughter for teramune to get his trust. it last for about 15 turns but thats more than enough time to prepare for realm divide

[Khisanth Magus]

I've noticed 2 important things about playing Date in my 2 failed attempts to start one before one finally got on a roll:

1) Blitz the 3 closest provinces to you. You need to get these before Takeda or Hojo can get them.

2) Takeda and Hojo always seem to ally, which makes progressing beyond the 4 provinces to the NE difficult, as they will provide a solid wall of provinces blocking out further expansion. Strangely, even though they were allied during my successful playthrough, Takeda did not join the war when the Hojo finally declared war on me, which allowed me to defeat the attacking Hojo army, then send 2 stacks down to sweep through their provinces before they could recover enough to defend. Probably helped that I was generously bribing the Takeda for several turns prior to Hojo declaring war on me.

[RAFAEL]

Just a small tip don't rush to take Kyoto, In my Date game I managed to take half of Japan till the borders of Kyoto and I had Takeada and Imwaga as vassals and they really supported me during the division state but after I took Tokyo they turned on my forcing me to retreat all the way back from Kyoto....So just keep the division state as long as u can (well destroy as many enemies as possible) then take Kyoto..
Rafael

[Monsieur Alphonse]

Just a small tip don't rush to take Tokyo, In my Date game I managed to take half of Japan till the borders of Tokyo and I had Takeada and Imwaga as vassals and they really supported me during the division state but after I took Tokyo they turned on my forcing me to retreat all the way back from Tokyo....So just keep the division state as long as u can (well destroy as many enemies as possible) then take Tokyo..
Rafael

Tokyo??? You mean Kyoto (couldn't resist)

[phraetorian]

2 key to win: build a bufferzone of vassals: oda, takeda,hojo, imagawa..., next use naval invasion go straight to kyoto, recommended 5000 troops and loot every town u cam across, then wait for them to rebel while hiding swhere in the forest.
boom! u isolate kyoto, becoming wealthy and have no risk of invasion from ur surrounding. all that left is ur battle with kyoto

[RAFAEL]

And regarding the Hojo-Takeada alliance, I usually fight hojo and hurt them really bad then ask them for peace,break alliance with Takeada,(alliance if possible). The Takeada soon declares war on them along with Imwaga....

[Grouchio]

Any other strategems?

[luckybeaver]

From what I've seen on Hard and Very Hard, and from whats worked for me so far is to grab the 4 provinces up north and sit tight, max out the north trade node and send bow kobaya's down each side of the island to encounter all the clans and set up trade relations.

As for the Takeda-Hojo Alliance... Its not certain but every campaign I've played they have eventually broken it and went to war with each other. If that happens I suggest trade with Takeda over Hojo because, typically Hojo will have the provinces closer to your borders, meaning that if you help the Takeda you can grab some easy territories from Hojo without losing diplomatic relations for breaking treaties or being super aggressive. At least, thats my experience. Hojo has ALWAYS been super aggressive, in both my Hard and Very Hard Hojo had like 12 provinces and was "Terrifying" and "Affluent" by 1550's.

I also find that trading with clans on the western side of Honshu is better than trading with immediate neighbours, simply because you are not as likely to go to war with them, and you can give your relations time to steadily improve through long lasting trade so that by realm divide your alliances are strong enough to last a while afterwards (until you're ready to take them over).

Key places to take are the ones with smiths as a unique trait. So Sagami and Echizen (I think); this allows you to build up weaponsmiths (I prefer them over armorsmiths) so that, once you get master sword dojos you can pump out high vet samurais with increased attack in one turn in areas that are close to your frontlines and buffers.

Most of the strategies have already been suggested here. I might add that use of ninjas and monks is particularly useful for sabotaging farms; do it constantly to force the AI to spend money repairing them. Eventually they will stop and the massive food shortage will result in widespread riots and rebellions. Its a nifty tactic to use if you find yourself surrounded in allies and unable to expand without betraying one.

Other than that, always make sure you get the charge off in battle, since you don't want that bonus attack to go to waste.

[Urobulos]

I posted a longish report in the Legendary completed campaign thread, but I have no idea how to link to a specific post instead of the url link to the entire thread. Looked at http://www.twcenter.net/wiki/TWC:FAQ and couldn't find anything.

Instead of copy pasting a wall of text you can go to this thread http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...=435553&page=6 and look for post #119. Beware it is a few minutes worth of reading. I tried the Date quite a few times at Legendary with many different starting approaches, but the one that worked for me (Hatekayama backstabbing Mogami) is something I've seen only once in about a dozen starts. Also I played a domination campaign and I think that is much easier than the short one. It allows you to hit a much bigger size before triggering Realm Divide and provides more time to build up and customize your lands. Obviously the first 10 years tend to be just as murderous as short campaigns, but in short campaign you end up having to sit on 14 provinces or getting yourself at war with all of Japan before you really prepare for it. On domination you can own almost a third of all of Japan before Realm Divide starts. Also you can engineer your lands better. I ended up pumping units out from Kai (cavalry), Hitachi (archery, would also get siege, but I tend to ignore them, prefer the higher movement speeds on campaign map) and Sagami (all infantry plus a few archery units to soak up arrows in loose formation if I wanted to force the enemy to fire all of its fire arrows at some disposable units). Kept all other cities at minimum levels to maximize growth from food surplus. This also works better the more provinces you have, because it is easier to get a higher surplus and it's a blanket modifier which can be used to all provinces. With more time to achieve victory, 10 years of this can give you an economy which requires no trade to support armies that will crush all of Japan, legendary or not. Though getting to this stage is definitely just as hard as in shorter campaigns.

[b_133]

I'm playing a Date campaign on N right now which is progressing very well.
At 1562, I'm pretty much Japan's biggest superpower.

Best observation\tip? Form alliances and stay loyal to them, but also be careful who you ally with (I thought it was a good idea to ally myself to Chosokabe for some reason, until they attacked my other ally, Hatakeyama).
Right now i'm in a very long standing alliance with Hatakeyama, who have performed a pretty magnificent comeback from the dead, at some point they were down to 1 province with barely any army to speak of, but somehow they ended up a major force with almost 10 provinces and a strong military. I suspect i may have wiped out the Uesugi before they managed to wipe out the Hatakeyama, so in that sense they proved a useful distraction.

Right now i'm sharing eastern Japan with Hatakeyama and expanding along the southern coast - just wiped out Hojo in a battle befitting a last stand, 2v2, near full stacks each, it's a shame the AI gets a huge advantage here as it gets all of the reinforcements while you only get what the interface can show on screen, but i pulled it off anyway.
Next up are the Imagawa who have been very successful in my save, but still easy prey, then i'll take what used to be Hattori lands and make my way to Kyoto, was thinking about stabbing Hatakeyama in the back but they're growing on me, that said i'm still keeping spies around their border cities as i don't fully trust the AI not to pull off the classic TW double crossing yet.

Enjoying the Date a lot, i'd definitely recommend it to people who like playing as the attacking force, as the charge bonus is very good.

[smack]

How about some specifics for the first few turns?

1. What do you recruit, where do you take your initial armies immediately after killing the rebels?

2. What do you build and exactly how soon after start?

I just had my hat handed to me on VH because of two things: The Mogami refused to give up their second province and now have 8 katana rounding out a 16 unit stack. Mother.... And the Wako pirates showed up just when my Kobayas were most of the way down the coasts and I had 3+1+1 trade ships, meaning I had to turn tail and go into the red for upkeep. I'm restarting and am going to try to flush out the Mogami either faster, or with more guile (catch them in a seige maybe and have them come to me, at the very least).

Side note: In every faction guide that starts with rebels I see people suggest: "Kill the rebels but only use X troops or they run away". I've never had the rebels run, although I have failed to kill them all with the first encounter, but I always use both generals and get a clean fight.

Liking the big provinces and rich farmland, but whoa, VH Katanas put the kybosh on my Yari stack...

[OTZ]

Playing on VH, started last night.

T1: Attack the rebels with your starting army, with your other General as reinforcement. This should be an easy victory if played right - I advanced to the center hill and used it as my right flank.

Sell 5 turn military access to Hatakeyama for 400, build farm and harbour, and 2 Yari spear units.

T2: Get your butt in gear and move into Mogami territory. Build roads, and recruit a Katana samurai. Move those yari spearmen down the Kyoto Express and park them for a turn!

T3: you should be able to assualt the northernmost Mogami castle. This is a more challenging task as you will be distracted by the Mogami army heading in the other distraction. Don't worry, be happy! Recruit yari bowmen from your capital, to join up with the Katana unit that will be finished next turn. repair the captured castle if needed, otherwise, build a harbour and a Yari spear men.

T4: merge your newly recruited katana/bowmen with the two parked spearmen. These will be the southern pincer of a two pronged attack. Your northern army will leave your castle and strike at the rampaging Mogami army. This should be a quick victory as well. Build a Bow ship to capture the trade node.

If you left your newly acquired castle empty, you may want to exempt it from taxes, or take the chance that it won't revolt.

Build/Recruitment is up to you at this point, but more men won't hurt.

T5: Re-up the military access to Hata - should fetch more money this time around. Move towards the Mogami stronghold with your combined army, with the expectation that some more men are on the way. The key is continually apply pressure or you'll let Mogami recover.

...and that's as far as I got.

[smack]

Cool. Thanks OTZ! While you were writing that I finally got the ball rolling properly on my third attempt.

T1: Plow through rebels and move everyone towards Mogami #1 (Ugo). Recruit spear/bow and start harbor.

T2: Move into Mogami-land, recruit another spear+bow. You can put taxes on high during the first 2 turns as your recruited units will suppress dissent as they are built.

T3: The Mogami Daimyo will be moving towards the Ugo castle from the Ugami highway, but you're ahead of him. You can go ahead and march on the castle now, falling just short on T3, or you can lure the Daimyo into a pincer. If you place your non-general units just around the T-intersection rather than toward the Ugo castle immediately, they will still have enough movement to attack the castle in Winter (T4) after being used to attack the approaching Daimyo in fall.

Recruit 1 Katana (to use for taking the 3rd province ~turn 7-8 or so) and recruit another Yari. Build a bow kobaya if you can afford it.

T4: Attack the Daimyo and his army with a general using your troops along the highway as reinforcements. This saves the movement of these troops. Cheeky, but very effective! I was not able to completely destroy him, but he stupidly doesn't run away after you take the Ugo castle, so you can destroy him utterly in T5.

Take Ugo castle, which will be a close battle any way you play it. I was able to lure archers from the castle, but it is winnable without exploits as well, even on auto-resolve.

Taxes on normal. Exempt Ugo for a turn whilst you pursue and destroy the Mogami's Daimyo if need be.

Recruit Yari and build a bow kobaya. Start building a trade port and second harbor if you can afford it. Send kobayas out to explore and take nodes.

T5-8: Consolidate. Move forces to border of Uzen. After winter invade with everything you've got, barring a few stragglers to maintain order in Ugo. The taxes are important.

Battle the remaining Mogami on the road to Uzen's castle. This will be your hardest fight as he'll have 3 Katana vs. your single Katana. But you'll have 2 generals vs. his greenhorn. Take the castle before the end of winter 1547. (should be possible in Autumn unless you wait for more reinforcements).

That's where I've stopped because that should be enough to be considered a foothold. I'm going with the idea of taking the Hatakeyama province of Miyagi next, as other's have done, even though Hatakeyama are quite strong so far. I'm sure they'll fade fast as usual soon enough.

Like all the other clans it seems that the faster you rush the better in the beginning, at least on VH, and there is a sort of magic formula of moves that makes it possible to take your first enemy down without ridiculous odds against you for waiting "too long". Too long turns out to be not maximizing every single turn. I hate it! But at least its over for Date.