I am a bit confused playing FOTS..

[nicknitro]

Just started a campaign in FOTS and have a couple questions. I started as the pro-imperial Shimazu (or whatever they are) clan. I am surrounded by all pro-imperial clans, I assume it's best I don't attack them, right? I have trade agreements with all of them and we are listed as 'very friendly'. The nearest pro-shogun clan is a good 4 turns away via ship. I assume I am only supposed to really attack the pro-shogun clans, right?

Also, I have been getting slaughted when trying to attack a castle. I had 4 groups of Line Infantry routed and destroyed by 1 group of infantry on the walls firing down on them. It's like my volley's barely even hit them. I tried sending in spears, they all routed before they got close to the walls. I used cannons but eventually they ran out of ammo and when I sent my infantry in they again got routed.

Any advice/information?

[Stellarnight]

While it is nice to form alliances with your own faction, the truth is that FOTS early game is Free for All. The AI wont hesitate to gobble you up if you are weak even if you are aligned with them. So dont worry about expanding and eating up your "allies". What matters is making yourself strong. Consolidate control of Kyushu and maybe ally with the Saga if you want, take out all the minor clans regardless of their allegiance. As for the small outlying islands around Kyushu, you might want to consider taking the northernmost island as there is a gold mine on it. Plus i think they are imperial so they deserve to die

Only upon realm divide do all pro-shogunate clans rally under your banner, before that its pretty much every man for themselves.

As for castle sieging, i would say just siege and wait them out. The losses taken by storming a castle is not really worth it. Alternatively if you want to storm, send expendables levies in front to soak up bullets while hiding your powerful melee troops right behind. Katana Kachi, Shogitai make good work of the defenders if they climb up.

As for cannons, i like to aim them at the wall where they garrison their defense. For some strange reason, if the wall health is reduced to 0%, the wall "explodes" killing alot of people who garrison there. So i would have the cannon aim the wall first then at troops in the open.

When possible, pull your naval ships near the towns in order to call for naval bombardment which is very devastating. Avoid a firefight with wall defenders. They take very little damage due to the wall nullifying much of the shots. I would rather rush them with high level line infantry or melee troops.

[Arima]

Some Major Tips for you.

Every Clan that is Computer-Controlled is Unreliable and Unpredictable in the fact that they will change allegiance at anytime. Meaning that your Pro-Imperial neighbors could abandon the Emperor's Cause and go after you as traitors for the Shogunate.

Recruit 5 Shinsengumi/Ishin-Shishi as soon as possible and use them to bring provinces that you've conquered or are planning to conquer over to your Clan's Allegiance.
An Awesome Strategy that you can use them for is to incite rebellions in friendly provinces and have them fall under Rebel Control. This allows you to walk in and claim the Province for yourself without having to seriously damage your diplomatic standing by declaring war.

[arun]

Recruit 5 Shinsengumi/Ishin-Shishi as soon as possible and use them to bring provinces that you've conquered or are planning to conquer over to your Clan's Allegiance.
An Awesome Strategy that you can use them for is to incite rebellions in friendly provinces and have them fall under Rebel Control. This allows you to walk in and claim the Province for yourself without having to seriously damage your diplomatic standing by declaring war.

Very good advice. I just used it to capture another province on Kyushu when it was captured by a moderately powerful "friend" of mine. Without it, I wouldn't have been able to capture the Very Fertile province next door. Thanks!

However, a word of caution about using it during the early stages of the game. The rebel army spawned can be really big - in my case 6 sabre cavalry and 10 levy infantry were spawned. The also reduced the town wealth of the province to zero. I was running around my Daimyo, plus 6 spear levy, 3 line infantry and 2 levy infantry. I had to siege and wait for them to sally forth in order to take the city. It helped that I assassinated the rebel general beforehand

[Arima]

Very good advice. I just used it to capture another province on Kyushu when it was captured by a moderately powerful "friend" of mine. Without it, I wouldn't have been able to capture the Very Fertile province next door. Thanks!

However, a word of caution about using it during the early stages of the game. The rebel army spawned can be really big - in my case 6 sabre cavalry and 10 levy infantry were spawned. The also reduced the town wealth of the province to zero. I was running around my Daimyo, plus 6 spear levy, 3 line infantry and 2 levy infantry. I had to siege and wait for them to sally forth in order to take the city. It helped that I assassinated the rebel general beforehand

Even though the Provincial Wealth will drop, it is much better to take a Province under Rebel Control than it is to take it from a Clan. Especially if the targeted clan has some troublesome allies.

[Noif de Bodemloze]

Just started a campaign in FOTS and have a couple questions. I started as the pro-imperial Shimazu (or whatever they are) clan. I am surrounded by all pro-imperial clans, I assume it's best I don't attack them, right? I have trade agreements with all of them and we are listed as 'very friendly'. The nearest pro-shogun clan is a good 4 turns away via ship. I assume I am only supposed to really attack the pro-shogun clans, right?

As my satsuma campaign, I dont care are they pro-shogunate or -imperial. You know as from Shogun 2 shimazu clan: Take kyushu island under your control. Same I do on my Satsuma. Wipe all clans who are in same island with you. After you are cleaned all clans out from Kyushu. Then you have 2 way: Go to mainland or take Tosa's island.

[arun]

Agreed. Better those Levy and Sabre with a few hundred less town wealth than to having to face 2-3 factions with Line Infantry and Navies to harass you. Plus, it is good XP for the Ishin Shishi.

[Father Ribs]

Are you talking about wooden cannon? They're pretty weak weapons...they disrupt formations more than kill people. Once you get "real" cannon sieges become more palatable.

Not that it matters at the mid-difficulty levels, but if you only expand at the expense of "your" faction, there will be fewer buffer states for when RD comes. Not as much an issue for Shogunate but the games I've played the Imperial forces often get squeezed out if you are too aggressive.

[DeliCiousTZM]

Secure all of Kyushu,then decide which Imperial clans you wanna spare. I can tell that you are pretty noob, so here are some other advice. Don't manually assault castles in FOTS unless you have a healthy dose of melee units preferable backed by Parrot or armstrong. The prefered thing to do is auto resolve win. But keep in mind that you cannot have a heavy traditional unit army when auto resolving,they are considered piss all in FOTS. The easiest way to win is to just siege them and wait for them to sally out.

[arun]

Secure all of Kyushu,then decide which Imperial clans you wanna spare. I can tell that you are pretty noob, so here are some other advice. Don't manually assault castles in FOTS unless you have a healthy dose of melee units preferable backed by Parrot or armstrong. The prefered thing to do is auto resolve win. But keep in mind that you cannot have a heavy traditional unit army when auto resolving,they are considered piss all in FOTS. The easiest way to win is to just siege them and wait for them to sally out.

You're not replying to me but...

Ah, so that's why my +3-5 XP levy spear rich army was giving me such bad 'combat odds' even though I was able to kill the AI army with only minor to moderate losses. Its good that I am going for a mostly modern army then. Should make the small and unimportant battles take less time. If only the Naval autoresolve gave me less problems.