13:54
A teacher
I am playing an extensive amount of multiplayer in Shogun 2 at the moment. This is something I have wanted to do for a far time, and something that has been challenging.
As I said already in this blog, I played the original Shogun extensively, clocking the campaign on the hardest difficulty. While at the time I thought this an achievement, the truth is that I merely knew the game mechanics. I could beat the AI with any army as I know how to exploit it. It was to my sadness that I was uanble to play anyone online, as my success against the AI made me feel that I was expert.
The first thing about mutliplayer in any game, let alone an RTS game, is that the difficulty is more than that of the AI. AI difficult often increases by making the game mechanics unfair (that is, making their troops simply better than your equivalents). This is, of course, not particularly rewarding. A human RTS player, though, has psychology: they can intimidate or be intimidated. In the 80 or so battles that I have fought, many have been enjoyable. Players have brought balanced armies, and I have met some quality gamers. At the moment, I have 3-4 players I play against regularly who offer courteous banter always.
Of course, not all players are like this. Top peeves are:
1) Not saying hello in the welcome screen.
The community is poor. Forums are decent, but the actual chat is terrible, with no conversations, and with many players simply clicking the 'go' button as soon as the army selection screen appears. Depending on how good the player is, and if I've already had a few games, I give them a few different salutations before giving them the game.
2) Choosing a 'spam' army.
The game is not designed to hamper certain spam armies. Selecting solely cavalry or solely monk or even solely ashigaru swordsmen leads to easy wins against balanced armies. Of course, there are the counterbalances to these armies (an all-spear army vs the cavalry for example, or bows vs the monks) but there is no way this can be chosen in the battle selection screen. If I encounter a spam, I'll play on if the player courteously acknowledges that they are trying a spam build for whatever reason, otherwise I'll give them the points. Spam armies are poor
3) Poor match-making.
I have played too many matches against people who have topped 1500+ hours in the game. For me the game is a waste of time for myself and my opponent: they have top veteran units that defeat anything I can muster in 1-on-1 fights. Again, if the player is chatty, I'll fight on. Otherwise, if I've had enough, I'll give them the match.
4) Overpowered retainers.
What makes the game tremendous is beating another player through distraction or deliberate tactics. I'll go through some of my tactics soon, but I find that some retainers dispense with these. One in particular, 'World Weary' debuffs your veteran units (which are essentially to success in multiplayer). I played a game where I caught all my opponents cav, held him off with a spear wall, took the melee-based dojos, flanked him with swords and rear-charged him with cav. He didn't break, I did, and I laughed long and hard. The shame is that my opponent, rightly or wrongly, gets no kudos for the win. Again, if we were playing a series of battles he could at least bluff with the idea that I might take a vanilla (non-veteran) army to avoid the effects of this retainer.
My tactics
I can't even remember the tactics I first used when I went online. I lost many battles, and without really knowing why. The best video I saw, though, was by fishsandwichpatrol (google him!) He showed how to use group formation buttons, and how to control eight melee units with one button. This is essential to even begin to start playing, and something I have shown those friends I play with online most often.
The first tactics I used with success involved the following build:
General - bow
6 Samurai swords
2 samuari spears
2-4 cav
2 ashigaru bowmen
My tactics were to sacrifice my bowmen on one side of the field, largely to distract his cav. Sometimes I would lure his cav to attack my bowmen,who would last between 5 and 10 seconds. In that time, I would reveal my cav, would who get free charges against him. Sometimes, I would leave my bow to die while I micro-managed my melee force to hit him (usually on an angle or a flank where I could). I won many battles using this tactic, but came unstuck against against the all-veteran armies the better players employ.
My new build is
General - leadership
A spearwall consisting of either 2 Yari or 2 Naginata
Flanking units consist of 3 of Katana, No-Dachi or Loan-Sword
1 missile unit consisting of monk guns or monk bows
2-4 cav, depending on the cost of my other units. These range from light, yari and great guard.
1-2 naginata attendents
1 monk naginata
My tactics with this build are follows:
Skirmishing and establishing the initiative:
If I have the cav advantage, I see to take some of the dojos with an unmounted light cav whilst they are protected elsewhere. I will try to bait him into fighting, and will seek to get some charges against unprotected infantry units. These charges will see my cav retreat as soon as they make contact. Sometimes running a cav unit across the front lines is enough to make my opponent break his lines.
My spear wall charges towards a building, and forms a solid, thin line with one flank protected. The Yaris are less durable, but they offer a great dimension of tactics with their ability to run faster. Naginata are better against opponents who take missile troops. Few do, though.
My main block of infantry are in the Alt + 4 group formation. When behind the spear wall, I will either begin to snipe with the monk bows, or look to establish firing lines with my monk guns. Both these units will do little in terms of wiping out units, but they will hopefully force him to engage my spearwall.
Bow cav are tremendous for baiting opponents. If unchecked, they can caused tremendous damage. They can't flee forever, though, and need to be retreated back through your lines to truly protect them (or via a larger contingent of cavalry).
Engaging
When my opponent chooses to engage me, I sometimes retreat my spearwall a second or two before it is due to hit. This allows me to rear charge him with my flanking swords easier, and serves to unnerve him, too. At this point, some opponents will seek to overwhelm your spear wall. I vet my spearwalls with melee defence as much as I can, as their job is to hold the enemy line in place for as long as possible. My 2-3 swords will flank where they can.
Better opponents will seek to flank your position. It is now that I place my general just behind my spearwall (something that causes many opponents to launch more melee against my wavering line to get to him). The stand and fight buff, though, causes them to stay for between 15 and 30 seconds, which is enough time to get flank charges off.
If one part of the spearwall breaks (thanks to excessively vetted opponents, for example) then my monks charge in to plug the line. Otherwise, they seek to engage and flankers and/or cav. If I have some spare koku, I take some unvetted nag attendents to hold up rear cav charges. They can't hurt any unit 1-on-1, but are excellent support to slow down cav attacks.
Winning the melee
I regularly beat superior numbers by compressing the battlefield. When units are taking morale shocks, it doesn't matter too much how many men they have. I have many replays where I am outnumbered 4 or 5 to 1, and yet my flanking wins the day.
Against campers/camping, I usually sacrifice a unit (such as the bow cav) in order to distract my opponent. By microing my cav as I engage in melee, my opponent might miss the initial charge. The remainder of my cav then seek to exploit a hole in his line when he moves to engage and break my spearwall, usually by charging his general. It is a worthwhile loss of most/all my cav to kill his general.
Finishing off your opponent
When your opponent is fleeing, seek to chase down his most dangerous units. It is no good having nearly all his units broken if they reform. I have many replays when my units have rallied and counterattacked, and won.
Flanking is everything
One battle against a great opponent with 5k Koku (small) saw me end with 1 unit of katana and my general against 3 units of ashigaru, and 1 unit of katana. My opponent charged uphill at me, outnumbering me 4 to 1. I stretched my remaining unit wide (so they wouldn't be flanked) and then flank charged the initial unit that hit me with my general. Upon hitting, I immediately retreated him and charged again. On the second charge, his unit broke, which then led to chain-routing by the rest of his army. I had already gg'd (good game - term when you finish a game) by that point, and we were both astounded that I had won. A great win!
Overpowered units are not rewarding
I have a battle where my opponent outplayed me on all fronts. He took the dojos, he shot my cav, and he engaged me exceptionally well. My melee units were surrounded, his cav had just down my archers, and he had caught my two units of great guard with Yari Samurai. I had 3 units of melee left (all wavering) while my general stood in stand and fight in the midst of their last stand.
Cue the Great Guard: with one unit down to 10, the other unit (down to 40) charged through (!) the spears and engaged one of his two bow cav units (the other bow cav flank charging my cornered army). The Great Guard decimated this unit from 60 to 40 in about four to six seconds. At this point I was down to two wavering units in melee, both either side of my general.
The only mistake my opponent made now was the charge his general into melee. A full general unit was wiped out by my half-strong Great Guard unit (even when he was supported by the remnants of his bow cav) in about another five to eight seconds. This caused the morale of his melee units (even though they were moments from winning) to drop dramatically.
The fragment of my Great Guard unit (who never flee!) then spread themselves at the rear of his main body of troops, and charged. Instantly his entire army shattered. From an entirely losing position, to winning emphatically - the Great Guard's overpowered status was proved yet again.
The battle ended with his original Yari Samurai unit that had held up my Great Guard charging towards my remaining two units, and then thinking better of it...
I am thinking of creating a youtube channel of my battles, not least as I think some of the best battles for me are fought at my level. Those who are much better (1500 hours+) seem to know the mechanics of the game to extent that I once knew the original shogun. At that level, I wonder how psychology plays a role, and how much of the game is having the best retainers and the best-vetted units.
As I said already in this blog, I played the original Shogun extensively, clocking the campaign on the hardest difficulty. While at the time I thought this an achievement, the truth is that I merely knew the game mechanics. I could beat the AI with any army as I know how to exploit it. It was to my sadness that I was uanble to play anyone online, as my success against the AI made me feel that I was expert.
The first thing about mutliplayer in any game, let alone an RTS game, is that the difficulty is more than that of the AI. AI difficult often increases by making the game mechanics unfair (that is, making their troops simply better than your equivalents). This is, of course, not particularly rewarding. A human RTS player, though, has psychology: they can intimidate or be intimidated. In the 80 or so battles that I have fought, many have been enjoyable. Players have brought balanced armies, and I have met some quality gamers. At the moment, I have 3-4 players I play against regularly who offer courteous banter always.
Of course, not all players are like this. Top peeves are:
1) Not saying hello in the welcome screen.
The community is poor. Forums are decent, but the actual chat is terrible, with no conversations, and with many players simply clicking the 'go' button as soon as the army selection screen appears. Depending on how good the player is, and if I've already had a few games, I give them a few different salutations before giving them the game.
2) Choosing a 'spam' army.
The game is not designed to hamper certain spam armies. Selecting solely cavalry or solely monk or even solely ashigaru swordsmen leads to easy wins against balanced armies. Of course, there are the counterbalances to these armies (an all-spear army vs the cavalry for example, or bows vs the monks) but there is no way this can be chosen in the battle selection screen. If I encounter a spam, I'll play on if the player courteously acknowledges that they are trying a spam build for whatever reason, otherwise I'll give them the points. Spam armies are poor
3) Poor match-making.
I have played too many matches against people who have topped 1500+ hours in the game. For me the game is a waste of time for myself and my opponent: they have top veteran units that defeat anything I can muster in 1-on-1 fights. Again, if the player is chatty, I'll fight on. Otherwise, if I've had enough, I'll give them the match.
4) Overpowered retainers.
What makes the game tremendous is beating another player through distraction or deliberate tactics. I'll go through some of my tactics soon, but I find that some retainers dispense with these. One in particular, 'World Weary' debuffs your veteran units (which are essentially to success in multiplayer). I played a game where I caught all my opponents cav, held him off with a spear wall, took the melee-based dojos, flanked him with swords and rear-charged him with cav. He didn't break, I did, and I laughed long and hard. The shame is that my opponent, rightly or wrongly, gets no kudos for the win. Again, if we were playing a series of battles he could at least bluff with the idea that I might take a vanilla (non-veteran) army to avoid the effects of this retainer.
My tactics
I can't even remember the tactics I first used when I went online. I lost many battles, and without really knowing why. The best video I saw, though, was by fishsandwichpatrol (google him!) He showed how to use group formation buttons, and how to control eight melee units with one button. This is essential to even begin to start playing, and something I have shown those friends I play with online most often.
The first tactics I used with success involved the following build:
General - bow
6 Samurai swords
2 samuari spears
2-4 cav
2 ashigaru bowmen
My tactics were to sacrifice my bowmen on one side of the field, largely to distract his cav. Sometimes I would lure his cav to attack my bowmen,who would last between 5 and 10 seconds. In that time, I would reveal my cav, would who get free charges against him. Sometimes, I would leave my bow to die while I micro-managed my melee force to hit him (usually on an angle or a flank where I could). I won many battles using this tactic, but came unstuck against against the all-veteran armies the better players employ.
My new build is
General - leadership
A spearwall consisting of either 2 Yari or 2 Naginata
Flanking units consist of 3 of Katana, No-Dachi or Loan-Sword
1 missile unit consisting of monk guns or monk bows
2-4 cav, depending on the cost of my other units. These range from light, yari and great guard.
1-2 naginata attendents
1 monk naginata
My tactics with this build are follows:
Skirmishing and establishing the initiative:
If I have the cav advantage, I see to take some of the dojos with an unmounted light cav whilst they are protected elsewhere. I will try to bait him into fighting, and will seek to get some charges against unprotected infantry units. These charges will see my cav retreat as soon as they make contact. Sometimes running a cav unit across the front lines is enough to make my opponent break his lines.
My spear wall charges towards a building, and forms a solid, thin line with one flank protected. The Yaris are less durable, but they offer a great dimension of tactics with their ability to run faster. Naginata are better against opponents who take missile troops. Few do, though.
My main block of infantry are in the Alt + 4 group formation. When behind the spear wall, I will either begin to snipe with the monk bows, or look to establish firing lines with my monk guns. Both these units will do little in terms of wiping out units, but they will hopefully force him to engage my spearwall.
Bow cav are tremendous for baiting opponents. If unchecked, they can caused tremendous damage. They can't flee forever, though, and need to be retreated back through your lines to truly protect them (or via a larger contingent of cavalry).
Engaging
When my opponent chooses to engage me, I sometimes retreat my spearwall a second or two before it is due to hit. This allows me to rear charge him with my flanking swords easier, and serves to unnerve him, too. At this point, some opponents will seek to overwhelm your spear wall. I vet my spearwalls with melee defence as much as I can, as their job is to hold the enemy line in place for as long as possible. My 2-3 swords will flank where they can.
Better opponents will seek to flank your position. It is now that I place my general just behind my spearwall (something that causes many opponents to launch more melee against my wavering line to get to him). The stand and fight buff, though, causes them to stay for between 15 and 30 seconds, which is enough time to get flank charges off.
If one part of the spearwall breaks (thanks to excessively vetted opponents, for example) then my monks charge in to plug the line. Otherwise, they seek to engage and flankers and/or cav. If I have some spare koku, I take some unvetted nag attendents to hold up rear cav charges. They can't hurt any unit 1-on-1, but are excellent support to slow down cav attacks.
Winning the melee
I regularly beat superior numbers by compressing the battlefield. When units are taking morale shocks, it doesn't matter too much how many men they have. I have many replays where I am outnumbered 4 or 5 to 1, and yet my flanking wins the day.
Against campers/camping, I usually sacrifice a unit (such as the bow cav) in order to distract my opponent. By microing my cav as I engage in melee, my opponent might miss the initial charge. The remainder of my cav then seek to exploit a hole in his line when he moves to engage and break my spearwall, usually by charging his general. It is a worthwhile loss of most/all my cav to kill his general.
Finishing off your opponent
When your opponent is fleeing, seek to chase down his most dangerous units. It is no good having nearly all his units broken if they reform. I have many replays when my units have rallied and counterattacked, and won.
Flanking is everything
One battle against a great opponent with 5k Koku (small) saw me end with 1 unit of katana and my general against 3 units of ashigaru, and 1 unit of katana. My opponent charged uphill at me, outnumbering me 4 to 1. I stretched my remaining unit wide (so they wouldn't be flanked) and then flank charged the initial unit that hit me with my general. Upon hitting, I immediately retreated him and charged again. On the second charge, his unit broke, which then led to chain-routing by the rest of his army. I had already gg'd (good game - term when you finish a game) by that point, and we were both astounded that I had won. A great win!
Overpowered units are not rewarding
I have a battle where my opponent outplayed me on all fronts. He took the dojos, he shot my cav, and he engaged me exceptionally well. My melee units were surrounded, his cav had just down my archers, and he had caught my two units of great guard with Yari Samurai. I had 3 units of melee left (all wavering) while my general stood in stand and fight in the midst of their last stand.
Cue the Great Guard: with one unit down to 10, the other unit (down to 40) charged through (!) the spears and engaged one of his two bow cav units (the other bow cav flank charging my cornered army). The Great Guard decimated this unit from 60 to 40 in about four to six seconds. At this point I was down to two wavering units in melee, both either side of my general.
The only mistake my opponent made now was the charge his general into melee. A full general unit was wiped out by my half-strong Great Guard unit (even when he was supported by the remnants of his bow cav) in about another five to eight seconds. This caused the morale of his melee units (even though they were moments from winning) to drop dramatically.
The fragment of my Great Guard unit (who never flee!) then spread themselves at the rear of his main body of troops, and charged. Instantly his entire army shattered. From an entirely losing position, to winning emphatically - the Great Guard's overpowered status was proved yet again.
The battle ended with his original Yari Samurai unit that had held up my Great Guard charging towards my remaining two units, and then thinking better of it...
I am thinking of creating a youtube channel of my battles, not least as I think some of the best battles for me are fought at my level. Those who are much better (1500 hours+) seem to know the mechanics of the game to extent that I once knew the original shogun. At that level, I wonder how psychology plays a role, and how much of the game is having the best retainers and the best-vetted units.
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