Where is the Gamebalance?!

[Der Kraken!]

Hello guys.

First to say, I'm a Total war veteran. Completed Rome: Total war back the days 2-3times with the Julier. Also later with high difficult ai on campaign. Beat Empire: Total war with the Sweden and snowballed so hard also both on the highest difficulty. Never had any problems.

Now bought yesterday Shogun 2. Started as Date. thought since they are listed as normal difficulty its a fair deal for a vet. Good start, was very fair and funny and high difficulty on the battles and were won pretty easy. Though archers find them pretty useless. Anyhow. 1550 And had some wrong moves accidently and lost about 3-4 turns threw that.

I let the Hatekayama life and Honma too cause I wanted to focus on the Satake as they had 3 provinces and take them the way back. I currently own 3, unluckily Date have such huge movements to take cause of the large provinces. During this time i think about 5 great clans were already destroyed....CRAZY.
I met the Takeda and they owned 9 provinces. Prepared a war and then 2 turns later the Satake were destroyed by the Hojo and Takeda. They are allies. Good god. The Takeda (11 Provinces) declared later war on me but Hojo (9 Prvinces now) were still friendly. Scared of the big war, I planned a marriage with my Daughter with the Hojo. Hojo trade aggrement, marriage +150 in relation. Next turn..... They also declared war on me.
Moved with my second little army into Takeda provinces overseas. Wanted to fight but they take action and I face a 16 Yari, 4 Bowmen army. WTF?!
They're main army moved in that time into my homeland and i retreated back to my City. To recrute more units and wait for reinforcments. Cause winter comes and wait cause i think they will besiege me and take losses.
Then next shock. I cant let them besiege me, like I can with enemys. Only fight or autofight.
Also defended against takeda 3 seabattles yet.

Where is the logic and balance behind all this?! In 5 years, I eleminated a clan and only faced smaller or same size army and continuesly recruted new units. And all of a sudden Takeda have 3 huge army 2 with low tier and the third with 4 star generals, half of the units with rank 3-4. LOL`? Also Satakae had 5 provinces how can they loose everything in 5 turns? since i saw that they also had 2 big armies.
And the other clans dont give a single ♥♥♥♥ of Takeda and Hojo ♥♥♥♥tard behavior nor the shogunate. But when I would attack a clan with only 1 bastion and at war with 4 others, no allies I would get massiv decrease in reputation.
Especially the thing with the marriage and +150 reputation and 1 turn later war. is jsut plain stupid. I am a rich and moderate influence kingdom its not like im just a unimportant guy on the table.
Is that normal to happen on normal difficulty? Even with a perfect movement and money spending I could get 2 provinces more (Honma and Hatekayama) and would still face overpowered massiv armies. with no chance of survival.
Why should a besieged army with supply reserve face the enemy on battlefield when thy could wait and let the enemy starve.

I am really dissapointed and surprised that the game have sucha good rating. Took all the fun.

Sry for the not so good text, but im kinda mad atm and shocked how unbalanced everything is...


Greetings.


PS: btw the condition of 60 provinces is that the whole map? Took it cause i remembered in the other total war you need about a 4th of all provinces with the most difficult winnning condition but here...

[easytarget]

I'm not sure I agree with CA's listing of Date as normal difficulty, I assume they did this because they start at the end of the island by themselves allowing the player to initiallly have only one front to defend.

The problem though is expansion and trade income. Date face a three way conumdrum in expanding as they run into Takeda, Uesugi and Hojo (and more than likely Oda and even Ikko-Ikki if you own that DLC). Couple this with limited trade because the Date initially have limited contact with other clans along with the long travel times down the island for reinforcements and you've got yourself a pretty tough start imho.

Interestingly this is the first clan I played in my first campaign, had no idea what I was in for, you can persevere. Pick either the weakest or strongest between Uesugi/Takeda/Hojo and form an alliance, then work on taking out the other two, plus run trade ships down each coast to expose more clans for trade. It can most definitely be done, I did it first time out and had no idea what I was in for, suffice it to say there's yet another surprise awaiting you mid-campaign.

And yes, you've chosen domination if you are tasked with taking 60 provinces, not sure that would have been my first campaign choice, long is actually enough of a task with the goal being 40.

So, if this is just about venting that you've found a TW game that presents a challenge, learn the game better and you'll no doubt find a way to win.

If instead this is a venting session that means you're likely to give up before you've even really begun, and certainly before you've uncovered the true nature of this game and why critics and gamers alike consider it one of the best TW's made, then may I suggest you consider starting a new camapign set for Long and play as the Shimazu. If you elect to go this route and run into challenges you want to discuss tactics and strategies to handle drop back by, I and others wlll be happy to talk it through.

[Ville Valste]

The reason you cannot have the enemy outside your castle just stand there and do nothing is because the AI thinks it can beat your army inside without starving it out. Still, when you are besieging, if you have smaller army than the besieged, he will attack you on his turn to break the siege. When the besieged attacks, the battle will be fought outside the castle, when besiegers attacks, the besiegers has to assault the castle in a siege battle.

[bkkm12]

You make one big mistakes, you try to be friend with Hojo but didn't allied with him. Which Hojo will indeed help Takeda once he calls-in. Satake losing 5 provinces in 5 turns is possible because usually they are strong in front and weak in the back provinces. From what i see, it is your strategies didn't set out well..

[Minoris]

I'm no expert or strategist, and I'm not one to go "well do this and you'll be fine" so I'm not going to give you any advice, but...
Rome and Empire are bad practice for this game. Rome was a fantastic game, but it works very differently from Shogun 2. The gap is big enough for you to lose yourself in it, I think. And Empire... Empire was a cakewalk. I remember when it first came out, someone from Paradox Studios (Johan?) publicly stated how easy and and idiotic the AI was. He basically chose Sweden, took the starting army (didn't build anything if I recall correctly) and conquered all of Scandinavia right off the bat.

Take your time man, Shogun 2 is a weird beast. I hated it when I first bought it some years ago, but I got back into it a few days ago and now I'm having a blast. I changed my mindset (took me long enough, mind you) and I now look at the game pretty differently. (Also: I played some Rome 2 in the meantime... go and play Rome 2, you'll soon be longing for Shogun 2 pretty hard... :P)

[Der Kraken!]

Is there a possibility to change the mission to long from the epic? I won't give up. just defended my castle with 400 to enemy 1700 losses. But hojo coming after me too :(

I gave my daughter to Hojo when she give birth to a boy, is there a possibility that i take they're provinces when its the only male heir left?

[War1Machine]

I too started as Date on Hard and thought I could handle it as I used to play Medieval 2 on the hardest setting and that was only occasionally challenging in the early game. The problem is Date have that huge province and neighbour large land provinces, the movement speed means armies will need careful planning before moving into enemy provinces. Most other provinces are only two moves away from enemy castle towns and quick conquest (and henceforth more funds) is more acheivable. I restarted on Normal and it's much easier (I think it's due to the AI being prevented from spawning in large unit stacks like they do on harder settings), which is a shame because I wanted more of a balance.

[Galactic Origins]

yeah, some AI clans expand like wild fire ... not happy with it at all.

[easytarget]

Originally posted by Der Kraken!:

Is there a possibility to change the mission to long from the epic? I won't give up. just defended my castle with 400 to enemy 1700 losses. But hojo coming after me too :(

I gave my daughter to Hojo when she give birth to a boy, is there a possibility that i take they're provinces when its the only male heir left?

I don't believe you can change the objectives once a campaign is started, if it began as domination/long/short it stays that way for the duration of the campaign, same for difficulty.

Not sure about your 2nd question as I only marry off daughters pursuant to alliances I need. And the only way to take their provinces is likely by force.

[easytarget]

Originally posted by Galactic Origins:

yeah, some AI clans expand like wild fire ... not happy with it at all.

Which is why it's a good idea to get a grip on major clans in your clans vicinity, otherwise that expansion is going to be at your expense, and if left unchecked will likely prove insurmountable mid campaign.

[Raveneye]

I started with the Date (albeight on normal difficulty), and I found expanding quickly and taking the northern Hatekayama out is a good strategy (though deal with the Mogami clan first cause they're gonna be a pain in the ass if you don't) as their Iron mines allow you to upgrade your blacksmith rather early in addition to extra trade income. Also, the key to the Date are roads early on, since those huge provinces make the roads' movement bonuses actually mean something and also allows you to reinforce your armies with troops from your main province (which is where you should be building your armies until you take the Hojo out for the bonus stats). For some reason the Tekada tend to be OP in nearly every campaign, and because of their aggressive nature and short distance between provinces, they are THE clan to ally with, so do so and then slowly build up your armies and provinces by killing the Satake and Hojo (which you can get the Tekeda to ditch them for about 4000 ryo and very good relations if needed).

Also, Shogun 2 requires you to actually plan out what your provinces do in advance, since you won't be able to build everything in them like in Empire and Rome 1. Don't be afraid to burn down troop buildings in provinces that don't provide bonuses for them and replace them with markets or sake dens for the money. Also, rice paddies are fairly decent up in that area, so upgrade them (from very fertile rating down) early for more money. Seriously, in this game money is king and harder to come by then in Empire or Rome unless you work on your infastructure or start near a lot of trade nodes. Hope this helps a bit.

[Brotherscompany]

Dude I have a important test tomorrow so I wont reply now.

Let me reply like tomorrow or 2 days from now