How do you plan properly when you first start playing the game?

[egervari]

One the things that I've always found difficult with total war games is the amount of knowledge you need to set yourself up well during a campaign.

For example, in Napoleon, it is highly advantageous to know what the AI is going to do. If you know where the AI plans on moving and what it intends to do, you can easily send troops or fleets to intercept preemptively. I actually feel this is sort of cheap in a way, because it's not like you had the VISION to know to do this, but you are highly rewarded if you memorize the AI's initial moves, which tend to be the same if you are playing the same campaign.

Another troubling aspect with Total War games is that I'm not sure if I should be thinking in terms of "what would work in real life" from "what works best against the AI" - both on the campaign map, and in real time battles.

For example, you could usually take cheap sloops in Napoleon and spread them across the seas raiding all the ports every turn. These ships are so vulnerable, yet the AI does nothing to stop you from absolutely wrecking their trade income and preventing them from doing anything at sea. There are times where they have a General with a sizable fleet to stop you... and yet it does nothing.

For a new player, they could "decide" not to do these risky maneauvers... because hey, in real life, you'd never get away with this. But if you know this tactic works, it really helps you out during the campaign.

I guess my question, how do you properly plan for a total war campaign personally? Is it really possible to casually play the game do really well, or is lots of trial and error, planning, etc. required to do well, especially at harder difficulties?

Beyond this, in most total war games, there are so many things you can do on turn 1 and 2 that it's really overwhelming. I actually think CA did a better job keeping it down to a minimum this time around. When I played the campaigns in Napoleon, there was just so many micro-level things to do... I'm like, "What the hell?!" Guys like feanor68 are genuises. I don't know if he just thought all of this stuff up out of thin air, or if he played the campaigns so many times that he just eventually figured it out. I just don't think I would have ever figured out that level of depth and sophistication as he did.

If you have any other comments on this subject, please feel free to discuss them.

[Alsn]

A good rule of thumb that has worked for me is that if you are playing on normal(or the rough equivalent to normal in previous tw games) then using "cheesy" play that exploits the AI's tendencies isn't really productive, since you'll win the game so damn fast. Chances are I would get more enjoyment out of playing it more in a historically correct manner.

On very hard or legendary however, the computer tends to cheat so much that if you go in without intending to "beat the AI", it tends to just become very boring. The fun part about very hard and legendary is how difficult it is and all the small things you can do to optimize your clan enough that you can actually beat all those advantages the AI gets.

That's not to say that you can't play it "properly" on vh/legendary and still win. I just personally feel cheated when I go out of my way to play "fair" but the computer cheats at every turn.

[Raimeken]

I don't plan...because so far, each game is random for me. I've played as the Uesugi nearly 10 times now (restarts) each time I had different relationships with the people around me and what factions became large, small, or eliminated.

[egervari]

Then it must be different from Napoleon, which generally played very much the same if you played the same moves. I'm not all too experienced with shogun 2 yet, and I am quite bad at it.

Sometimes I am not sure what will work though. I don't know how the mechanics are programmed. I don't know if doing the real-life thing will work in the game, will have no effect, or will be bad for me. I am also not sure what the AI will do.

I find myself in a lot of trouble in the campaign when armies just pop out of nowhere and I am being attacked from multiple fronts.

I haven't quite figured out how to manage my money yet. When I built enough units to deal with the crisis' that develop, I have no money to upgrade buildings. But if I go for an economic build, I have no units.

Sometimes the enemy has 7 bow archers, and there's just no way I can how to take their castle without taking crazy loses. Other times the enemy has no archers, and it's relatively easy to steamroll their castle. It's entirely random to me though what they have. Sometimes I don't know and there's no ninja available because it was just too early in the game to even get one. So in that case, reloading the campaign, changing my army, and doing the campaign over actually works.

I wish the game broke you in a bit better. The siege in the tutorial basically gives you all the units under the sun and says, "Here, use them and win." I think that battle couldn't possibly be any worse to throw in a new user's face.

In a lot of ways, I want to be exposed to things 1 at a time, and learn how something works and see the differences. It'd be kind of nice to setup mock battles with exact units - even very small armies, just to get a feel for what does what against what and to better anticipate what is going to happen.

How is that shogun 2 strategy guide?

[Stil]

I have a loose plan at the start, but the best plans should be flexible.

I normally plan my initial techs route, diplomacy, attack paths, focus (eg - 'early sea/trade route control' or 'get to the land choke ASAP and build fortress there, then grow') and such, but these are subject to review as the game progresses.

[Death_Sheep]

Have goals, not plans.

When you have a set goal, your plans can change and shift according to what occurs turn by turn.

Make a simple plan like this:

'I want to control the gold mine on Sado'

Now, what will you need to take that island? What kind and how many troops will you need to bring? Will you need to bring a monk to help pacify that land afterward?

Now that you have a goal, and a plan with how to obtain that goal, lets throw in a complication.

The Hojo have decided to declare war on you, and have taken one of your provinces.

While you can attack Sado and destroy the Honma clan, thereby taking their gold mine, the Hojo would have consolidated their hold on your province and have likely moved further into your territory.

Set backs and complications like that are what will give you the most trouble. But they can also be opportunities, if you can find them.

Remember to have a set goal, and to be flexible with your planning and execution of those plans.

[egervari]

What if the goal is wrong? :/

Like, what if getting that gold mine is really not that important and there was 3 or 5 other goals that should have been on my list instead, but I just didn't think of them?

[Stil]

Then you transition into something else. In the hypothetical case of getting that gold mine - now you have higher income (at the expense of initial expansion and troop numbers). So long as you can keep alive you are in a good position to complete other goals by spending all that extra money!!

Having a goal - even not an optimal one, is better than doing things willy-nilly.

[vyyye]

What if the goal is wrong? :/

Like, what if getting that gold mine is really not that important and there was 3 or 5 other goals that should have been on my list instead, but I just didn't think of them?

Then you'll learn that after losing/failing to obtain said goal and know better next time. I can't see what you're getting at.

[egervari]

But wouldn't it better to restart the campaign and not get the gold mine and do something better, so by the same turn, you'll have an even greater advantage?

How perfect do you need to be to win?

Maybe these are dumb questions, but I am constantly put into a stupor when I play total war. It's like analysis paralysis.

[Stil]

I suppose you could restart and not get that gold mine... But then 50 turns later you might say to yourself 'I need to restart and get that early eco boost from the gold to fund everything'.

So I wouldn't let things like that stop you from playing your game out - some ways are better than others, but there is no single perfect strategy. Specialisation or diversification? Both have pros and cons and it's up to your play style really. The worst case scenario - a game decision that cripples you some 10 turns later, at least you'll have learnt a valuable lesson. Knowing what you can get away with and can't get away with through trial and error is worth some lost games.

[Stil]

How perfect do you need to be to win?
It's like analysis paralysis.

Anything below legendary I think will be forgiving if you don't follow a very rigid set of instructions/build orders etc.

And I understand what you mean by analysis paralysis! I get that alot too

[Cattlehunter]

The game really isn't that sophisticated. Decide what your primary goal will be (presumably, winning the campaign), then decide what secondary goals you think will best let you accomplish this (then tertiary goals, etc, etc).

I could write a longer rant about it, but generally you can't go wrong with money. Your first goal should be (mine is anyway) to conquer as many of your surrounding regions as is safe/reasonable, then fortify the outlying ones and build your economy and diplomatic relations while maintaining as small a standing army as you can get away with. Upgrade your border regions with as high-level fortresses as you can. Garrison them with mostly archers, and you can fend off basically anything the AI throws at you without having to pay huge upkeep costs for the enormous standing armies that'd be needed to defeat the AI's armies on equal terms. The free garrisoned troops that come with fortresses are also amazing since they cost no upkeep, and are 100% expendable during battles.

Anyway, if you can accomplish that simple mission then you've basically already won the game. The AI will never be able to break down fortified border regions, and at this point you can basically do whatever you want.

Personally, I go with one of two options - either sit there all game and tech up to super troops while building up a huge stockpile of money, then train 3-4 full stacks of +4/6 experience & +4 attack & +2 armor (or whatever your fancy may be) troops, and conquer all of japan with them in one swifth offensive, or - alternatively (and less boringly) - instead of stockpiling hundreds of thousands of the game's resources, instead make huge amounts of crappy armies and throw them at enemy cities nonstop. Because army upkeep costs an absolutely disgustingly huge amount of resources, it doesn't really matter if your troops die by the thousands as it barely costs any more to simply recruit new ones in the newly conquered regions.

TL;DR: Conquer a satisfying number of regions, in good positions that let you defend your entire area of control by simply fortifying 2-3 regions, then build up the economy of those cities and destroy your enemies whenever you feel like you're ready to do so. Even if your offensives do fail epicly in those situations, you can simply fall back to your fortified regions and try again later.

(Be aware of SURPRISE LANDING armies coming out of nowhere though. That's why I nearly always go christian and build european trade ships to guard all my beaches, since they are invincible.)