Rise of the Samurai Question/Advice

[Jet Jaguar]

I'm playing Rise of the Samurai as The Fujiwara clan (the most northern family) on H/H and the only mod I'm using is one which extends the end date.

It seems like the best way to expand in RotS is to mix up having provinces join you and conquering others by force.

In my current campaign, I'd like to own the one-province island to the north of Echico (sp?); can't remember it's name. It has gold as a resource.

It favors another family by 100%. My question is: Is it better to just conquer it if I can? Or would I be better off dropping off one or two of the RotS-version metsuke for a while, then ask it to join?

Thanks in adavnce

[Himster]

It's quicker to conquer it.
But either way you have to send an agent to convince the populace that your family is the superior one: after being conquered, the people are more easily convinced. So I'd weigh your options, do you have an army, fleet and agent available, how many clans are threatening your border, how many armies do you think you need to defend your borders, are there provinces that won't be converted to your allegiance? It will take 12-15 turns for an agent take the province on his own (also bear in mind how much it costs to request allegiance), whereas if you conquer the province and then convert them it could just take 6 turns.

Considering that this province has gold it'd be best to conquer it, because that means more turns where you can develop and take advantage of the mines (even if the people disagree), the cost of having an army there for a while is covered by that and more, also in the mind of speed and agression: it's prudent to attack the Inoue clan as they can be quite aggressive later on in the campaign if left alone (much like the Honma), so it's best to take them out quickly.