Return of the Samurai (Online Battle #51)

Hey what's up guys it's Oakley and I'm going to bridge the gap between Napoleon that I've been showing you a lot of and now we're going to be going into Shogun. The gap is going to be existing because right here this is going to be a sort of a more modern army and I'm going to be facing off against it using the traditional Japanese army. So, well maybe not necessarily traditional but at least traditional in the era where people were actually using Ashigaru armed peasants in their forces. So not entirely accurate in the last Samurai during that time period where they kind of pitted muskets against sword. During that time period actually the Japanese had been using muskets for several hundred years at that point. Many of the armies were fielded by peasants who were familiar with guns at that point. Guns had been around in Japan for a while. So that movie is a little bit misleading but I think the general face off between different approaches to warfare are going to be a little bit more evident in this battle. Anyways, it's going to be underway on this battle which has a nice river in here. I do love Shogun 2's maps, they're perhaps my favorite for multiplayer in all of the Total War series. They're too much fun, they're very well balanced and all have interesting geometry and stuff to them. So, the initial engagement is going to be right here. I know that I have to pick off his forces using archers and cavalry. That's the main way you're going to be taking out opposing forces. So what I did, positioned my guys in here. These are going to be my bow cavalry. I do have a couple of veterans of these in my force. Additionally, I sent in some more archers in here. Bow warrior monks. I brought those guys through their extreme range. So those guys are going to be helping me to pick off these forces. You can see they do have very nice range here. He's going to get some shots off against some of my guys. Tosa rifles have very excellent range. I wasn't actually sure how far they'd be able to shoot. So I do retreat right there. But yeah, my volleys are coming in. And line of fire, yeah you can hear that, picking off men here and there. Line of fire, he's not going to have very good shots. Even if he does engage, look at all the woods he has to shoot through. So the main engagement is going to be, as I said, in the center here. I'm going to decide to try and push and take this workshop and also this position here. I've placed my bow cavalry behind the hill, hoping to get some shots off, although a little bit of my forces are exposed here. Now he's getting shots off. I'm going to pull out my cavalry, because they are a little bit larger targets, and let my bow warrior monks take the bulk of the fire. And you can see, yeah, he's taking almost no damage. And my arrows still go through the woods. So 30 of his men have been lost to 2 of my guys. Every single volley of mine is going to be doing good amounts of damage. I move these guys here to try and get some shots off. Now he's going to cross the river, put the pressure on. I do have hidden forces here on this wing. They're going to be deployed to get the flank of these guys. Over here, I see his forces are moving up. I was able to get some initial shots off, killed about 5 guys with these men. Every volley is picking off more and more of him. Although now, yeah, those black bear infantry are taking their toll on my guys. So I'm going to pull them back in the near future. These bows are going to move up to help cover that. In the center, his forces are routing. Right here, I decide that I'm going to split these forces. When you're facing against these types of units, you don't want to charge straight at them. So these guys are going to charge forward, just to draw fire, allow these guys to charge from the side. And then I'm going to pull them back. Charging too far would just expose them to these guys. They would lose a lot of men. I move up these bow ashigaro to do some damage to these guys as they deploy. Then I'm going to put two cavalry guys on this flank to try and oppose my opponent. However, he does have a couple tricks up his sleeves. Two hidden cavalry units here, and you'll see shortly, two hidden cavs over there. So he was anticipating this attack. And these imperial guard cavs can shoot while on the move, so that's a lot of damage against my guys. There he goes. Those light cavalry were destroyed, but I was able to kill about 40 or so of these men. So I think that was a worthy trade for exposing his cavalry. And what I'm going to be doing is repositioning my guys here. These guys are pretty well covered by this workshop. My matchlock are going to be holding up this front, and then I have more infantry back here. Over on this flank is where he basically undeployed his cavalry. I'm going to be pulling back behind this ridge, and now I spring the remainder of my forces here. Let's go ahead and watch this volley as it gets off. So they're going to form up, and now they're going to get their bows right at these guys cresting the hill. They didn't know what they were charging at. So I'm going to pull back, make sure he can't attack me. Same over here. I'm going to pull back behind the crest of the hill, and then counter charge once I've got these guys. Yeah, and actually, this is going to be a noble attack from my outnumbered bow cav, but it's going to be enough to tie them down. Charge around with these guys. Over here, I'm going to constantly pull my forces back and try and get more shots. Light cavalry forces are going to come, pull back, and attack these guys before I believe they can even get a volley off. Yep, point blank shots, followed up by a charge. Those guys are done for. That's going to open up this flank. These guys are basically outclassed by my own katana cav, and my mount, or no, no, that's just one unit killing his saber cav. So very good. The traditional forces definitely have better units, and light cavalry are going to come even that fight. Over on this flank, he did charge and destroy my troops who were hidden here. However, it does put these guys sort of in the line of fire of my units here. Let's go ahead and watch. One of the cool things from Shogun 2 is they introduce a little bit better mechanics, or at least for representing this point of use. We're going to go ahead and watch this cav charge from point blank. Hopefully, I can get some shots off here. I can't remember what happened. Oh, ----. Oh, wow. I don't know if you guys saw that animation, but, oops, didn't mean to do that. Go ahead and play. But yeah, one of the animations that happened there is he threw a spear at one of my guys. So I soaked up the charge, and I'm going to be coming in with my cav, moving my general around here. He's been upgraded with leadership and melee traits, so he's been moving around. Finished off this wing. The forces positioned here are not going to be doing well. Moving in my archers, matchlocks firing on them, and over here, cav are going to take out his own general's bodyguard, although he does, yeah, wipe out basically half of these guys in the initial charge. So I'm going to leave these guys to tangle with them. Then I'm going to send the third guys to knock out these troops. These are the last remaining forces in his line. Then I'm going to go ahead, and as you saw earlier, swarm around here. My general's going to be coming in, cutting down these guys, and I love the skins, especially look at that, the dragon armor, I guess, they put on the horse head. That's very, very cool. Given the confusion that's going on here, I'm going to charge ahead with my infantry, lone swords to soak up the charge, followed up by katana samurai. These are the better guys, and over here, katana samurai are going to be cutting into these guys, so let's actually watch these guys on the charge. Coming in here, katana's raised, basically cutting up these troops right there. I love the animations in this game, it's so epic, especially against the swords. But yeah, then I'm going to charge back in here, finish off his general, and that's going to be essentially it. That's it for his army. So pretty cool battle, old versus new, and I liked how my opponent hit his cav that almost got me, but I was able to pull back on both flanks, draw them in too much, I think he would have been better off just forcing my guys back and pressing the assault in the middle, because I was just able to envelop his guys who charged out too far in advance. Anyways, that's going to be it for this battle, hope you guys enjoyed, we're going to go ahead and end it right there, and yeah, there'll be more of these. I'm going to keep trying to do a mix of the various Total War games, so let me know in the comments below what you guys want to see next. I do have a couple of these games I played recently in Shogun that I hope you guys will enjoy. Thanks so much, peace out guys.