So now that I've covered most of the core mechanics in the game let's play this thing proper.
Now I have test played through the Otomo about 5 times before starting this playthrough so I know the other factions usually always build either spear units or bow units which katana samurai can cut through like butter. So researching Bushido for the sword school is going to pay off in spades later on.
So as I showed earlier in the diplomacy screen the Otomo clan starts off at war with two minor factions: the Shoni seen here launching a raid on my papercrafts which will put a dent in my economy and the other, the Ouchi seen here who positioned an army near my military production center.
So here you can see the battle screen. You can see here who is leading the both armies, in this case both clan leaders, what their army composition looks like, and what the terrain will be like. Now as you can see I have about a 75% chance of victory here due to my army being twice as large and having firearm troops. This is the first major battle in the game as with this I pretty much eliminate any more opposition from the Ouchi as they get into a war with other minor factions located on mainland Japan and can barely support any invasion of me.
Always good to talk shit about your opponent, especially when they do suck ass.
For this battle I separated my forces into two groups, the main group here accompanied by my general for morale boosting purposes
And my gun platoons were to attack form the side to cause massive casualties and morale shocks to their crappy troops.
As you can see firearms are a pretty good way to thin out enemy peasants as spreading out doesn't do shit when getting shot in the face. That unit of archers ran away after that because sustaining over half casualties in one volley of musket fire sucks fat dicks.
To try and attack my riflemen the enemy general rode out to try and kill as many as he could but ended up between two units of spearmen and got killed in about 15 seconds. Doesn't matter how great of a horsemen you are, if you ride into a pointy stick you will get killed.
The final moments of the battle were of my general slaughtering the other archer unit causing the enemy spear troops to collectively shit their pants and run away.
Huzzah! God shall be proud of us killing heathens! Also a plus were that the only real casualties were my crap spear peasants which can be replenished in one turn due to the amazing basic training of giving a rice farmer a spear and showing him where to stab.
Now to turn my attention west, to where the Shoni continued to harass my territory. To make sure I didn't have to lose more men then necessary because being the cowardly fucks they are they usually hide in the trees and always have high ground advantage which usually ends up killing more men than I kill theirs. So I take a subtler route.
If the Shoni prefer to fight hidden in the trees I shall fight them through proxy rebel armies. I incited a rebellion in the closest province and as luck would have it it spawned with many samurai units giving the enemy a pretty hard time and killing about half their men. Due to the province being heavily converted to Christianity I could incite rebellions fairly easily and as a bonus, when I took the province I would be greeted as a liberator and not conquerer. Mission Accomplished motherfucker.
But as my luck often does I got the shit end of the stick yet again.
This really came out of nowhere for me, not only that they would declare war on me but that they were still around in the game. Usually the Shimazu are eliminated by the Sagara after about 7 turns due to the Shimazu only building sword units and the Sagara building cavalry to kill them off. Well I guess I'll have to find out how to beat them the old fashioned way.
So I promised that I would do this and here it is, my play-through of Shogun 2 with the Otomo Clan.
The only Christian clan in Japan at the start of the game, I plan to not only have the Otomo clan become the ruling family but to convert the entire populace to the one true faith. The benefits of being a Christian faction are that gun units are cheaper, more effective, and when I upgrade the trade port to its final level I can recruit Portuguese soldiers into my armies to help cleanse Japan of heathens through guns show the Japanese people that Jesus is the one true savior.
So we start off pretty good for ourselves. We have two provinces, both majority Christian with Bungo being 90% and Buzen being 80%. We also start on Kyushu which has nearly everything you'd ever need to become shogun, it has horse breeders for better cavalry, paper crafts for trading or improving accuracy on ranged units, a philosophical tradition which can improve our metsukes (money making agents) or boost research. It also has only one other major clan, the Shimazu, who usually get taken out pretty fast by the AI which is pretty funny considering they are ranked as easy on clan difficulty.
Our first mission in the game is to build a chapel in one of our towns. Pretty easy stuff as it will help the conversion of the populace as the peasantry become massively butthurt if so much as 0.01% of the population in their town is not of the clan religion. Love and Compassion for all. But I always build chapels everywhere to get missionaries for scouting and converting far off provinces I'll eventually attack, or to just destabilize a certain area by inciting rebellion. Chapels also help with boosting research on the more passive side of the research.
On the subject of research here are the arts of mastery we can get throughout the course of the game.
It's always a good option to go into into the Way of Chi as the first thing to master unless you the clan you play as is specialized in some weapon like the Katana or No-Dachi. I usually get it as no matter how well an army you can make in the game, sheer numbers always will bring it down due to swarm tactics.
Now let's take a look into Clan management.
This screen gives an overview on how the clan is doing, from your religion, how much money you have, and capital location.
Clan traits are awards or penalties that you will get depending on certain actions or choices you make on missions. Fame is how large your clan is, if you get too large the Shogun will declare you an enemy of the state having everyone in the game break ties and declare war on you. I have turned this off because it is complete horseshit and nothing but artificial difficulty to have the game slow to a crawl as you fight off everyone.
You can also see that we are at war with two clans but they are both pretty shit and no real cause for concern.
Onto the Family and Council screen:
So here is the entire family at the start of the game, one Daimyo, his wife and son, and a general who can be brought into the family but I never let them unless it becomes dire. You can also appoint members of the clan to council positions such as my general being the minister of war. I will probably promote to son to being minster of finance or something that brings me money.
Here on the Diplomacy screen you can see all the clans we have encountered, their disposition towards us, and if we can trade with them or not. The Sagara clan is the only clan available who can trade with us and doesnt hate us so let's see how well our Diplomatic measures go over.
Offend your merchants? WTF? Alright fuck you then.
One last thing before I start to kick this off and that is the honor of your faction leader.
Every faction leader will have a base of 3 honor, which is where you'll have no problems with unrest whatsoever. Unfortunately being a christian faction we take a -1 to honor so our populace is a little upset that we have less honor than others. There are modifiers to help fix this such as gaining retinue that boost honor, researching chi masteries that grant honor, or taking a vassal instead of conquering them outright all boost honor. Losing honor is also pretty simple to avoid. Just don't loot castles, betray allies, go bankrupt, or get your ass kicked brutally and you'll be golden.
The next update I'll do tomorrow will show you how I go about setting up to take out both clans that are at war with me. See you all next time.
So I've started a blog now to house all the screenshot LP's I have planned as I have discovered that facebook is not conducive to making an LP. This will also allow me to post other such bullshit without fear of getting banned or having the page shut down. So if your jimmies get rustled because of some NSFW content don't cry about it, or do so that I may laugh at you.
So as of right now I have 4 options lined up to make content
1. I do a Shogun 2 playthrough as the new Christian faction they released and show the heathen samurai how to accept Jesus.
2. I do a playthrough of Fallot: New Vegas and become the hero the Mojave deserves or just a blood thirsty psycho who kills everything that moves.
3. I playthrough Jagged Alliance 2 and try to weave some sort of terrible fanfiction grade narrative into it.
4. I go through the Mass Effect trilogy as Madea Shepard, a mad black woman who takes no shit and don't need no man.
