No One's Guide to the FOTS Historical Battles

In this guide, I will tell you how to win all of the Fall of the Samurai historical battles. This guide is clear and short. I will also tell you how to get the achievement for each battle. If you have questions, please leave them in the comments. Hope this helps you.

Battle of Toba-Fushimi

Objectives:

-do not let any enemy units from leaving the map at the arrows
-keep Saigo Takamori alive

How to Win

The enemies will be coming to you, so put all of your line infantry in a line and shoot anyone who comes close. I recommend these general positons.

The Achievement

Not On My Watch
Chase down and rout an enemy unit as it tries to escape at the Battle of Toba-Fushimi.
If an enemy unit gets within a certain distance of an exit, a small cutscene will play and you can quickly kill the unit. Don't worry, the enemy does not have to get THAT close to an exit.

Battle of Osaka

Objectives:

-capture the castle to rout/kill all enemies
-keep Saigo Takamori alive

How to Win

Advance around the fort to the bridge on the far side of the castle. It is the only way you can actually get into the castle. The two key buldings have fences where the enemies take cover. Just surround them and shoot from all sides, and use your Sharpshooters to pick them off. Place your cannons at the Archery Dojo for infinite ammo and blow the heck out of the castle defenders. After that, burn the gate, bring in all your troops, and kill the rest of them. There is a hidden cavalry force in the forest near the Archery Dojo. If you don't want the achievement, you can blow up the gunpowder towers and the enemy will stream out of the castle and you can slaughter them as they are unable to fire and crammed together on the bridge.

The Achievement

Uphill Struggle
Win the Battle of Osaka after both bridges get blown up by the defenders.
Use your Armstrong guns to blow up the gatehouses or march a unit near the bridge to trigger the explosion. Do this to the first two bridges. The bridges won't blow if you blow up the gunpowder towers!

Battle of Ueno

Objectives:

-kill/rout all of the enemies
-keep Saigo Takamori alive

How to Win

The enemy is entrenched behind fences. Do not engage them directly. Use your wits to rout them. Send flanking units to shoot them from the side or back. They can't face two directions at once! Also, use your cavalry to shoot then pull the cav out before the enemy can reposition to fire on them. Even better, cavalry can fire over high fences that the enemy can't shoot over, because they are taller!

The is one enemy artillery across the lake, a Parrot gun. You have to use third-person mode and snipe the enemy arty or they will give you a headache.

The Achievement

A Blow to the Temple
Win the Battle of Ueno without capturing any key buildings.
Just because you can't capture the buildings doesn't mean you can't uncapture them to their neutral state. Then no one gets the benefit!

Battle of Aizu

Objectives:

-kill/rout all enemy units or capture the castle
-keep Saigo Takamori alive

How to Win

The are lots of enemy artillery, so snipe them with your own arty or sneak your sharpshooters up close through the trees then shoot the arty up while your own snipers remain hidden. You have to keep your men in the trees or the arty will shoot them.
Beware of the four hidden enemy forces. And most importantly, save your ammo. The battle can be long, so don't let your men fire at shattered units.

The Achievement

Wrecking Ball
Win the Battle of Aizu after provoking all four hidden armies at once.
The description is misleading. You do not have to provoke the four hidden armies at the same time. You just cannot completely destroy/rout one of the hidden armies before finding all four. I would reccommend sneaking your cavalry all across the map and finding all of the armies. As in, sneak your cav around the WHOLE map, circling the whole perimeter. Camp your force close to the world border away from the battle until you have found all 4 forces. Then, you may do as you wish and attack.

Battle of Miyako Bay

Objectives:

-rout/destroy all enemy ships
-do not lose the Kotetsu

How to Win

All you can do is put all of your ships in a good position were they can fire. The coastal batteries can be useful, as are your torpedo boats. Use them well. When the Kotetsu is ready for battle, place her in the rear of your fleet out of danger and let her gun do its work. Make sure you avoid damage to her, and watch for torpedoes.

Remember, ships under repair can still shoot if controlled in third-person mode.

The Achievement

The Iron Lady
Complete the Battle of Miyako Bay with the Kotetsu having taken less than 25% damage.
If you keep the Kotetsu in the rear of your fleet, it shouldn't take much damage, if at all.

Battle of Hakodate

Objectives:

-kill/rout all of the enemies or capture the castle
-keep Saigo Takamori alive

How to Win

This battle can be won quite easily if you move all your units straight to the castle by way of the bridge on the castle's right side. You will bypass all enemy unis besides the couple units in the castle. Use your arty to soften up the garrison, then climb the walls with all of your troops. Kill the rest of the garrision, and capture the tenshu.


Saigo Takamori and three rifle units are on the other side of the map. Camp them there and let them them hold off the successive waves of enemies. Your riflemen will run out of bullets and be overwhelmed on harder difficulties, so you may not have time to use your artillery. Just conserve ammo and cap the castle quickly.

The Achievement

Perfect Ten
Win the Battle of Hakodate without any of the Imperial units being routed.
If you go straight to the castle and cap it, you only have to overcome the 4- or 5- unit garrison instead of 20+ units, and no one should rout.

Epilogue

I hope this guide helped you. If it did, please leave a thumbs up. I will answer any questions in the comments.

For the Republic!

[AranwenL]

f the toba achievement. the ai would rather go for the middle exists, that im actively guarding, than go for the open southern exit to let me ambush them.
ty for the guide.

[l0rf]

Thanks for actually explaining the Not On My Watch achievement trigger, no other guide did. Sucks that you have to play suboptimally for it to trigger, the enemy ignored all but the furthest exit and never got close unless I actively encouraged them to take an opening.

[EmotionallyBroken]

Is this guide from the faceless men?

[standardtrickyness]

theres a weird bug where my cannons at the info ammo place can't seem to hit the defenders line of sight blocked etc

[No One In Particular]

oh, interesting, if I remember correctly I was able to rush the bridge on very hard, but that was a long time ago. I'm glad you found a strategy that worked!

[Hat8]

The bridge strategy doesn't really work on the final mission on Very Hard. They rush Saigo's position if you cross.

Its better to soften up the enemy while they're in the town and massacre them at bottle necks when they retreat to the fort.

They have big mobs in the town that can be massacred with the Armstrong guns and they retreat once they take high enough losses.

[Luiz_Alex007]

Thanks for the hint. I sent a detachement from each side. The first to go was the left flank and that messed the enemy's positioning. I ended up losing both Imperial cav. I will try again when I have time and disposition. It's a type of challenge that I enjoy undertaking.

[No One In Particular]

I tried counter-clockwise, if I remember correctly. But be patient, evade, and DO remember that the battle IS possible. You will get it. Have fun as you do so.

[Luiz_Alex007]

The Aizu battle is a kick in the balls. I tried walking my cav around the map and they got shredded by the first White Tiger force after walking right into them.

[[PBS] Dré]

Awesome bud, keep up the good work and thank you again!