The best muzzle flashes, smoke and sound for guns of any total war game by far

As both and Oda and Otomo player, i laugh whenever the AI starts teching up and spending so much on samurai only for them to be obliterated by a few volleys from my veteran matchlock ashigaru Personally I take lots of inspiration from tercio pike and shot formations. When total war warhammer came out, i was saddened that matchlocks seemed to be so much worse in that game, but the strategy still worked marvelously with thunderers and handgunners

Use hills - the steeper, the better. Place your melee line at the foot of a hill, and your matchlocks behind them, further up the slope. The enemy will engage your melee units on the flat plain, allowing your matchlocks a (relatively) unobstructed line-of-sight over your melee line.

Crazy how people die when you shoot then unlike newer total wars

Fire by rank is great only when you are capable of microing them and only once during the start of the fight since it is as bugged as in empire by the need of every model in a unit having their gun reloaded and every model being in formation. In short use fire by rank once and after that deactivate fire by rank until the end of fight.

Good video, well thought out and presented. Lots of food for thought in there. Matchlocks: Fire by rank can be highly effective. The matchlock unit needs protection - behind the bamboo screen (so we're talking about a defensive battle here). Placed centrally opposite a bridge in a river crossing battle, I have had a matchlock unit rack up more than 800 kills (defending a river crossing against a 4 stack enemy). The trick is to chain the bamboo screen to left and right with the archer barricade (the one that provides no protection but does make a linear obstacle). Then between the bamboo screen and the barricades, place the defensive unit of your choice (the enemy will be funneled towards these points) so yari ashigaru in spear wall, or naginata samurai if you're feeling extravagant. Step the archers and matchlocks back from the screen/barricade a couple of paces (it's crazy the tiny gaps the AI manages to sneak units through), then you can pretty much zoom in on the matchlock unit and watch them go through their drill as they annihilate the enemy. The reason the matchlocks are vulnerable to melee infantry in other battles is because there is no fatigue penalty to movement for infantry units in the game (for me this is perhaps the biggest game breaking screw-up in Shogun). If you apply the fatigue penalties that are in the database to all infantry units, the enemy will not close to contact so quickly, allowing at least the first two ranks to fire and, chances are, the third rank won't need to. Nanban Trade Port: I nearly always go for this for access to the imported matchlock - guaranteed if I am Chosokabe as I want the extra trade route from the port. Rather than leave a monk there to counter the religion, I put an upgraded temple in two neighbouring provinces to spread religion into the nanban province. I use monks aggressively as anti-agent units (convert character) so getting 3 of them early is not unusual for me. Siege defence: Placing a unit off-the-wall for the AI to target (instead of the units on the wall) and luring them into the range of the guns looks like a bait tactic. It is one of several exploits that I have come across for defensive sieges that, taken together, make me reluctant to fight defensive siege battles at all. Bow Ashigaru: These guys get a bad rep. Recruit them in a province with an Artisan, give them armour from the encampment chain, deploy them in loose formation (preferably in trees), and have them in range of your commander for morale boost. They will defeat bow samurai.

Fire by rank is so great I wish there just wasn’t the delayed response issue. Even commanding them to attack a particular unit doesn’t have them stop and fire the moment the unit is in range.

Also when used aggressively the micro intensive pike and shot works wonders and can make your army extremely mobile on the battlefield since the idea is to exploit gaps that the enemy hasn't engaged with matchlock, while the units the enemy has engaged are formations with matchlock and Yaris. They're bogged down with yari wall, you swoop around and fire at the flanks

People really underestimate just how effective of morale breakers guns are in this game To not mention the ignore armor properties. In my opinion it makes guns specially suited for focus firing on small number important units like heroes and specially generals Sniping a general while peppering normal troops can lead to very quick routs

I quick note on fire by rank. While it doesn't work very well in base Shogun 2, it's very effective and works perfectly fine in Fall of the Samurai.

Morale breaking effect of matchlock is overpowered even more because the combat is based on the dynamic of battle. Also the AI has a tendancy to charge you with samurai units so given high accuracy you'll absolutely shred them then push the ashigaru that are right behind them in yari wall while the Matchlock's skitmish mode makes them retreat. Push the flanks with sword units and use Yari Cav to wipe out missile units once dealt with start hammer and anvil. Bonus if there is a steep hill behind you then the Matchlock can go high up and shoot down over your melee lines. This is how you win every battle assuming you're not terribly out numbered. Matchlocks 10/10 defensive units. Portuguese Tercos 1000/10 overall unit.

Makes me happy that people still play and analyze this game so many years later. Me too am also just recently learning more nuanced things in each campaign.

Really good informative video. Thanks!

I once had a single unit of Levvy Garrison (Fall of The Samurai) and they managed to hold of an ENTIRE MASSIVE flank offensive, only losing around 50 men, and making almost the whole enemy army (Minus about 7 attacking on different fronts) rout, including their general. They were also Garrison Infantry

Matchlock units with the kneel fire (from fots) mod are monsters in the battlefield.

For me shogun has the best gunpowder feature in total war

As a player who is generally a “SNAIL”, I tend to include 4 matchlock ashigaru in my army so after taking a castle I stay there for a while able to defend it.

I know its not the OG Shogun 2. But i really REALLY loved how they inplemented Gunpowder units in Fall of the Samurai! The artillery system is amazing and the units manning castles is also great! I wish we could get empire or napoleon total war on the engine they used for FotS!

To get matchlocks early I just invade otomo lands as early as possible. Just started an Oda campaign and placed 4 each of yari and bow ashigaru then shipped them to Bungo and invaded. Instant nanban access. Burned it down though and moved my nanban port to Iwari and turned it into a matchlock factory while slowly consuming kyushu and northern Japan.

@mrsherman2906 The mod to fix the matchlock unit can be found by searching for 'Officer Fix for Matchlock Units' in the steam workshop for Shogun 2.

I actually pull my units into one line and stagger them so one shot then they move back behind the next one ready to shoot. It’s lot of micromanaging but pays off big time

Put a matchlock on a wall, put Ashigaru in front of the wall, on the low ground... start to count bodies dropped.

I use monk bow units with matchlocks, monks will shoot down all the enemy archers and the machlocks will protect the monk bows from any dumb enough to charge

Speaking of dealing with enemy archers, Their is a REASON the "smith" chain has 2 different paths. Melee Attack is good, but if you get killed before you get their...... you see my point. The Armor chain does help counter Archers with the Extra armor (plus 5?), combined with the Armory "camp" upgrade (plus 2? or 3?) and you got yourself like.... eh screw it i can't remember but its a NICE amount of extra armor. After all, Melee Attack can always be improved with SKILL (xp), but Armor is STATIC and can only be improved via upgrades. It also occurs to me that Bonzai charges from No Dashi Samurai are the melee counter to Gun troops in the field. (since Bonzai freezes their moral in place)

All tremble before the fearsome matchlock men of the Oda Clan!

I play completely vanilla except for one mod. I think it's called 'realistic hinawa' or something and raises the range of the match locks and increases the speed of the reload animation. I just want to use fire by rank and watch the lines of men cut the Samurai down centuries early.

I'd love a Bannerlord like Shogun2 mix game. 1st person Banzai. Anyway, if you're using mods, a few will make the range of guns longer, at 180 range. 200, 220 range depending on the unit. (Hero, Veteran) Ultimate immersive mod I think does this.

On the field, i use the U formation: Close combat units on both sides and mathlock in the middle. But yeah, using matchlock to attack or siege is extremely hard.

I love fresh content for a game getting this old!

Yari ashigaru, the well-acknowledged hidden power behind every Shogun 2 strategy.

Fast yari samurai as a reserve unit to shore up the line were the ashigarus are wavering is my favourite use of the unit. They can also counter charge and absolutely murder ennemy cavalry that would file in between the line allowing me to space out the yari walls more and shoot better. They're not a very good unit overall but they really have their uses.

My favorite thing in shogun 2 is to take a full 20 stack of fire rockets to a siege and just carpet bomb the place.

11:43 how do you Get Bamboo fence, i dont know how to Get it

Matchlocks on a defensive campaign are very good, i was on a losing campaign, my armies were very far away and i got betrayed by my allies now im facing 3 fronts against full stacks armies. i spammed matchlocks and yaris on a siege battle, they did the work although i lost. the armies i faced were now very thined out with only half or less a stack remaining which made retaking territory very easy.

The days of your when you could upgrade them to be like machine guns 😂🤣 reload skill, inspiration and accuracy...

Good: Clean Hills Defence sieges With way to retreat Bad: Bad hills. (Mostly too accidental) / in the lowest part of a hill Too close to the enemy without support

I tried using Matchlock on the flanks... waiting until the battlelines are joint and shooting into the sides of the enemy formations. It's a lot of micro, especially if the enemy still has its cavalry. Checkerboard formation (as here in the video) and actual Tercio formation might be workable but it seems like a lot of micro, too. In the heat of battle I like to use easy and reliable tactics... matchlocks are "cool" and really make you smile if it works. But the outcome is just too random for me.

I love Shogun 2, do you use Darthmod?

wait why your cam not shaking when the rocket hits? is that a mod?

Do all matchlocks completely ignore armour? I thought they ignored a certain percentage

Personally when it comes to more late game usage of matchlock my armies are usually composed of 3 ashigaru 2 no dachi and at least 5 guns with 2-3 archers (either samurai or monk depending on the tech). The matchlock would be the first line closely followed in the line by the no dachi who would charge through to meet the enemy melee with a banzai buff, followed by the yari wall slowly to hold the enemy in place and pull back the no dachi. I'll definitely give a try to the staggered line you mentioned, maybe its just what I need for those weird battles were my peasants just abandon me to die.

Every unit of guns you take is one less unit of Bow Monks you take. Unless it's fire rain rocket or shimazu heavy gunner, matchlocks are just too bothersome and micro intensive to use in offensive armies.

Quickest way to use guns: Otomo

I like keeping my gunpowder units in the flanks and use them to move behind the enemy and shoot them in the back when they engange with my frontline melee

How good is the checkboard in this game?

ngl I've never found matchlocks to get few kills. When I do decide to use matchlocks early I use chevron formations on my cheap yari wall frontline with matchlocks between giving them absolute line of sight over incoming enemies with archers hiding within the chevrons. This let's you push a line of cheap units semi-aggressively into far more expensive armies. This way they get 70% of the kills even if I only take 4 units of them, if they get front charged I narrow the gap, if they get rear charged I push my yari samurai reserves on the cav

I know my handgunners might be disappointed on me saying this. Oda Matchlock Ashigaru Rocks !

Sometimes I wonder what would happen if all total war players were made into actual military officials…

Nothing beats successfully baiting the AI into charging their cav units straight towards your matchlocks that are hiding in forests. >:)

This is why FOTS is a literal godsend to me I cannot in my life play Shogun 2 , big skill issue

I want new total war with gun power and naval battle. By the way, Otomo is my main clan.

Still cant believe this was made during ps3 era

Honestly i think guns are better in this game than napoleon

still waiting for the 1 hour asmr matchlock video massacring ashigaru units nonstop. bruh

Guns are great in a ambush ??? Let them stay inside a forrest and destroy the enemy c:

I never liked the base game shogun 2 musket unit behaviour, its just clunky and reminds me of how painful the units in Empire could be. Curiously FoTS has the firearms unit behave far more sensibly despite being the same game.

Good video a criticism though. I think you and me both agree that bows in this game generally under perform but are needed for sieges in a minimal capacity early to cheese (I watched your bow video.) So… I have been this way for years and while it IS boring and optimal my army is generally 1 general 4 bow units and 15 Yari Ashigaru who just encircle with Yari wall with rushing. I also never rice economy because it’s never worth (wish it was). So I could see bringing 1 matchlock unit just for moral debuffs but no more than that. Guns are better than bows by far. Edit: You really though never made a case to why bringing them over another melee unit in SP was a better option. Melee rushing is stupidly strong.

Guns for the guns god!

In short: matchlock are effective if you actually use your brain and stop whining about the low range.

honorabru

Guns conquered Japan Guns and a lot of cheap infantry

Really like your take on matchlocks though I must say I probably wont use them for any other purpose than to fill up my garrisons, it is not because they are useless but bc CA made gun units a mess since empire, nothing in these game is as infuriating as watching how your unit that was sent to flank the enemy and shoot in their back starts doing a fuckin tap dance contest instead, and of course the rest of the unit waits for these models to get into place bc they are true bros and wont shoot if even one of them is not in the right place, like what the fuck is going on, or their shitty "stun lock" like when they get shot and wont shoot back bc again true line infatry cant shoot if their line isnt complete, so they wait forever for soldiers from back ranks to fill the gaps, meanwhile getting shot again, or unit randomly not shooting bc fuck you thats why. These problems are even more visible in FOTS as its more gun-centric than vanilia shogun, when everything works fine playing with guns is fantastic, but really if i got a choice between bringing gun unit and wondering if this time everything will be ok or just getting anything else that i know is reliable i prefer second option.

Just play Oda

dude wtf is a matchlock, how was that not explained? lol? im a med 2 / rome total war player.

im trying to learn shogun 2 but i have so much problem dealing with the garissons in early game even when i play on normal difficulty. i take huge huge losses which makes sense but it cripples me in the long term

Why is this game getting hate?its way better then most total war games.Battle,armor guns etc all so good.some people are really dumb.I tries warhammer 3 let me tell you its weird af.people this days have shit taste