The Conquests
- Thread starter choxorn
- Start date
This sums it up quite nicely for myself too. I do sometimes force myself to post something to let people know I'm still alive but mostly it's just me lurking in the shadows.
MTB4884
Emperor
I know from my own experience as a writer in the CivIII forums that it can be tough when the story you spent a good deal of time working doesn't get any replies. Something that has helped me is keeping an eye on the total view count. There are a lot of folks here in the forums who read the stories, past and present, even if they seldom or never post. We might not have the sheer numbers in the CivIII forums in November 2014 that were here thirteen years ago or so when CivIII first came out, but great stories are still being written and are still being read. I for one am still looking forward to reading more of your story. Go Miyoshi! 
Chapter 60: Shifting Alliances
The various Samurai and Yamabushi stationed on the Urakami-Miyoshi border knew that getting complacent and letting their guard down would be dangerous. As quiet as this war had been, and as weak as the Urakami had looked lately, they were still a dangerous opponent, not to be underestimated.
And yet, in August, 1526, they felt pretty safe- as far as they could tell, there were no Urakami anywhere near them, and given the lack of roads and the hilly terrain of the border regions, they figured that only Yamabushi could move fast enough to get to them before they could react, and Yamabushi weren't terribly threatening attackers.
There was, however, one thing they hadn't taken into account yet- they hadn't seen the Urakami use their Jade to hire any Ronin or Ninja yet to fight them, but given that these were Ronin and Ninja, it was to be expected that the Miyoshi couldn't see them.
So they were caught pretty much totally off-guard when a group of Ninja attacked one of the units of Samurai Warriors.
Luckily, the Samurai managed to recover from their initial surprise and kill their attackers, but they sure didn't like how totally out of nowhere the Ninja came.
"We have reports of a Ninja attack recently on our Western front. We suspect that the Urakami hired them, though we aren't certain. Luckily, the attack was unsuccessful, but we'll need to be prepared in case more Ninja attack us in the future."
Miyoshi Nagayoshi read the reports his advisor had given him.
"I see... did anything else happen in the war recently?"
"Not between us and the Urakami, no, but you know that isolated Oda city, Gifu, on the border between the Hojo and Takeda? Well, it looks like the Hojo finally captured it."
"Figured that would happen sooner or later- well, at least our allies are doing what we hoped they'd would: get their asses kicked by the Hojo, because better them than us."
Wanting to have some more advanced warning for future Ninja attacks, the Miyoshi sent some Yamabushi to go run around Urakami territory in October and report if they found anything. The Yamabushi didn't see anything interesting, certainly not any Ninja. The Miyoshi were rather happy to hear that the Urakami weren't sending any serious counter-offensive their way, that would give them more time to rebuild their forces and prepare for their attacks on the western half of Urakami territory, starting with Nishiwaki, and hopefully, eventually reaching Fukuchiyama and its Jade.
On the other hand, even if the Urakami couldn't mount a serious counter-offensive, a not-so-serious counter-offensive was easily in their grasp- specifically, a lone unit of Yamabushi and some Settlers guarded by Crossbowmen.
The Yamabushi were easily dealt with in January of 1527 by some Samurai Warriors after a bit of bombardment from Catapults and Archers. The Settlers would have to wait a bit, though- they weren't in in area the Miyoshi military could easily reach.
In the meantime, the Miyoshi's Yamabushi continued to run around Urakami territory finding nothing, until it was attacked by Samurai Warriors in March. The Yamabushi fought valiantly, but could only take down one unit of Samurai Warriors before dying. It was a little disappointing that they could only take down one considering the advantage they got from being on a Mountain, but oh well.
On the bright side, the settlers and crossbowmen moved to a more easily reached hill, so in April, some Miyoshi Samurai Archers decided to use the Crossbowmen for target practice, then went over to the Settlers and thanked the Urakami for their "gift" of some more slave workers. The Archers were soon joined by two units of Mounted Samurai on their way to Nishiwaki, and a total of six more units of Samurai Warriors and Archers were well on the way, arriving by boat to take full advantage of their amphibious abilities.
The Urakami weren't about the give Nishiwaki up without a fight, though. They couldn't do much about the naval attack, but they could sure meet the Mounted Samurai on land, so they sent some of their Samurai Warriors to attack them in May. Despite the high ground the Miyoshi held, they couldn't hold the Warriors off, and both of the Mounted Warrior units were forced to run for their lives. The Samurai Archers still held the hill, but it's not like that did them a whole lot of good. They couldn't reach Nishiwaki when the ships did.
As the ships got closer to the city, they started hearing reports of a great construction project finishing to the west of them: The Ryuzoji had built that Trade Network that they, the Hojo, and the Takeda had been working on for the past decade or two.
The Miyoshi were pleased to see that the city it was located in, Fukuoka, wasn't the Ryuzoji's capital- that meant that it wouldn't be destroyed when their Daimyo died, and that meant that perhaps at some point in the future, the Miyoshi could own it...
But that was for later. They had the Urakami to worry about now.
Knowing that they'd have to deal with the Samurai Warriors outside the city first if they didn't want to lose Nishiwaki as soon as they took it, the first move the Miyoshi made when they reached the city in July was to send the two units of Samurai Archers from their Caravels to kill them. This went swimmingly- the Miyoshi lost neither of their Archer units and wiped out both units of Warriors.
The second part of their plan, sending the 4 Samurai Warrior units they had to attack the Samurai Spearmen in Nishiwaki- that didn't go so well.
Actually, it would be more accurate to say that they sent 3 units of Samurai Warriors, and after seeing how poorly that turned out for them, decided that sending a 4th would be pointless.
"We can't win here, not now at least. We can come back later, with a bigger army, and some catapults."
"Maybe we won't even need catapults- the scientists sound like they've got something better in store."
Their retreat got that last Warrior unit and two of the three Archer units to safety, but one of the units of Archers was still stuck on the shore from attacking those Warriors at the start of the battle. Some Urakami Samurai Warriors got to them in August before they could get back onto the boats, and they were, sadly, lost.
As bad as the last couple of months had been for the Miyoshi, though, they had gone much worse for one of their allies against the Hojo- the Imagawa.
First, came the news that the Hojo had gotten someone else to declare war on them. This wouldn't have been so bad if it wasn't for the fact that "someone else" was the Imagawa's other very powerful neighbor, the Takeda.
"Well, that's not good," said Miyoshi Nagayoshi upon hearing the news. "The Imagawa aren't that strong, they won't last long if both the Takeda and the Hojo are trying their best to kill them."
Miyoshi's prediction that they wouldn't last long was quickly shown to be a good one: the ink on this alliance hadn't even dried yet when the Hojo captured Kawasaki, an Imagawa city on the border between them.
"Let's just hope they last long enough that we can get out of this war with the Hojo. After that, eh, screw 'em."
The Miyoshi military continued falling back to re-strengthen in October, still finding some hope from the knowledge that whatever it was the scientists were working on, it could certainly help them somehow.
The Urakami took advantage of the brief lull in action to move some settlers around and send a lone unit of Samurai Warriors in the direction of Kakogawa.
November was a fairly active month on the diplomatic front. The Takeda and Hojo were quite active in getting allies to join them in their wars. The Takeda convinced the Chosokabe to declare war on the Imagawa, a move which might make the Imagawa fell more threatened if there wasn't a large amount of sea and distance between the Chosokabe and them. They also demanded a bit of gold from the Miyoshi, a "request" the Miyoshi would ordinarily refuse if they didn't have so many other things to deal with.
The Hojo, meanwhile, sought an audience with the Date, and whatever it was they did, the Date were very happy about it, as it was enough to convince them to declare war on the Uesugi, Imagawa, and Oda- all of the Hojo's enemies except the Miyoshi. The Miyoshi wondered why they didn't want the Date to declare war on them, but their question was soon answered- the Hojo sent diplomats their way with an offer of peace. It appeared the Hojo were just as tired of fighting them as they were of fighting the Hojo. The Miyoshi didn't sign peace yet- they still had some time left on their agreements to fight the Hojo with the Oda, Uesugi, and Imagawa, and weren't about to abandon them just yet- but as soon as they could, they'd get out of this war.
Finally, towards the end of 1527, came the moment the Miyoshi had long been waiting for: From some research coming from their earlier encounters with the Portuguese, they developed a powerful new explosive weapon: Gunpowder.
Their elation at this new invention was soon replaced by despair that they couldn't use it: A key ingredient, Saltpeter, existed nowhere within their territory. There was some in the western part of Urakami territory and in that region of the Chosokabe's territory that had every other strategic resource, for some reason- and even better, there was some much more accessible Saltpeter on a small island just off the coast between the Miyoshi, Urakami, and Chosokabe that was unclaimed by anyone...
...except for a massive horde of Ainu, that is. Well, no problem, just kill the Ainu and settle the island! It couldn't be that difficult, could it?
The Miyoshi would need a lot of Samurai Warriors to deal with those Ainu, though, and they didn't have anyone available to settle the island anyway, so they'd focus on fighting the Urakami for now, starting with that unit of Samurai Warriors near Kakogawa.
That extremely stubborn unit of Warriors, which killed the first unit of attacking Mounted Samurai in January, 1528...
...okay, two units....
...*sigh* and now a third retreated? Come on, how powerful are these guys?
Finally, they were brought down, but the Miyoshi couldn't afford battles like that. They needed to get back to winning most of the time, and they needed to get back to winning now.
The Urakami sent yet another of their one-unit "attacks" in February, this time in the form of a unit of Yamabushi. They also, after years of trying, finally built the city they'd been trying to build, Himeji. Unexpectedly, they'd built it within their own territory rather than trying to go into the neutral zone between them and the Miyoshi again (I can't remember the last time I saw an AI build a city in their own territory... they pretty much always build in neutral territory)
February proved to be just as busy diplomatically as November of the previous year, although this time, it was in ways less good for the Miyoshi- aside from the start of the month, when the Shimazu approached them with an offer of peace, which the Miyoshi accepted, considering the pointlessness in fighting them. They even got the Shimazu to throw in a little bit of tribute.
A bit after that, the Imagawa, a bit unnerved by all the people declaring war on them lately, asked the Miyoshi for help against the Date. All the other clans fighting the Hojo were fighting the Date, so why not the Miyoshi?
"What's the point of that? They're practically on the other side of the island, and the Hojo are between us. It would be pointless to fight them."
Then came the bad news: The Hojo finally convinced a meaningful clan to join the fight against the Miyoshi: The Mori, their not-quite-neighbors to the west.
"Oh come on, I thought we were in peace talks! Our alliances end in July! You couldn't wait that long, Hojo?"
Then came the worse news: The Mori brought another ally with them: The Miyoshi's eastern neighbors, the Oda.
"You too, Oda Nobunaga?"
"Yeah, it's payback for that time you attacked us 70 years ago."
"That was a long time ago! I thought we were friends! We were fighting the Hojo together!"
"Like we were ever anything more than allies of convenience. Thanks for the Horses, though. We'll make sure to put them to good use fighting you."
Miyoshi Nagayoshi swore to get the Oda for this betrayal. Somehow, they would pay for this.
After spending April dealing with the "attacking" Urakami Yamabushi and losing another unit of Mounted Samurai in the process, the Miyoshi realized that making the Oda pay and continuing to fight the Urakami would be difficult to do at the same time, and that fighting three of their closest neighbors at once was tantamount to suicide. And anyway, they'd already long ago fulfilled two important objectives by securing the resources outside of Kakogawa they'd been so angry about failing to get themselves a long time ago and getting rid of Ako to give Kasuga more water to work with, thus making its Izumo Shrine more useful. Sure, they still didn't have Jade or Saltpeter, but attacking the Ainu island seemed like an easier way to get Saltpeter than fighting the Urakami- and maybe they could find some other way to get Jade.
The point was, it was clearly time to end the fighting against the Urakami- for now, at least.
It had to help the case for peace that the Urakami had suffered a lot more than the Miyoshi in the war and were willing to give up a lot to them to end it- a lot of gold, a map, and and they even threw in the city they'd just built. The Miyoshi found this offer to be perfectly acceptable.
With one less enemy to deal with, the Miyoshi turned their attention to making the Ainu Saltpeter Island the No-Longer-Ainu Saltpeter Island, so they could have some Saltpeter. Two units of Samurai Warriors started the process of clearing the Ainu out by killing 2 of the Ronin units on the island, leaving only 12 Ronin units to go. And 2 Ashigaru units. Still, that was progress!
May was a lot quieter on the diplomatic front compared to the last few months, with the only notable events being that the Hojo again decided that being on a separate island didn't mean that another clan wouldn't make a useful ally, and got the Ichijo to declare war on the Oda. The War Council elections also popped up into discussion again, and, as usual, the Miyoshi had no interest in holding any elections- it wasn't like they'd get anywhere with them anyway, with all the wars going on.
Finally, in July, the Miyoshi-Uesugi-Imagawa alliance against the Hojo ran out (the Oda no longer counted as part of the alliance, what with their betrayal and all), and the Miyoshi happily left their former allies to deal with the Hojo themselves, because they didn't want to have to deal with the Hojo's great eagerness to sign military alliances any more.
The Hojo, for what it's worth, seemed happy to end the war too, even though they'd just signed such an alliance with the Mori against the Miyoshi a few months ago- they also seemed to take an opinion of "screw them, they're on their own" with their allies, and unlike the Miyoshi, they didn't even care if their alliances were actually over or not yet.
With the number of clans the Miyoshi were at war with down to 2 and neither of those 2 appearing to do much of anything at the moment, they doubled down on grabbing that Saltpeter Island, sending enough Samurai Warriors and Archers at it to kill 5 more Ronin.
Just as soon as they'd said the Mori and Oda weren't doing anything, though, the first sign of the Mori appeared, in the form of a unit of Yamabushi- and, more troubling, a Ryuzoji Caravel appeared, and brought 2 units of Samurai Warriors, 2 units of Samurai Archers, and a Yamabushi unit to a hill outside of Himeji.
The Takeda also decided that having half of the island of Shikoku fighting the Imagawa wasn't enough, so they got the Ichijo to declare war on the Imagawa to make it all of the island of Shikoku they were fighting. The Imagawa briefly pretended that that concerned them more than fighting the Hojo and Takeda concerned them.
"So, what do we do about the Ryuzoji?"
The Miyoshi government met in October to discuss this invasion, and quickly came to the decision that it had no idea what to do- the Ryuzoji certainly weren't there to plant flowers or engage in "routine training missions" or anything of that sort, so they'd have to be dealt with somehow- but perhaps they could be turned away somehow?
"Unlikely. They're going to attack us, and there's no getting around that."
They knew this was the likely outcome, and so they made sure to give Himeji enough Samurai Warriors to fend off any attack. But still, having to deal with them, the Mori, and the Oda all at the same time would be a problem, and relocating their Warriors there meant that they couldn't be fighting the Ainu on the Saltpeter Island.
Then, a plan came.
"I have a crazy idea- we can still talk to them right now, what if we convinced them to declare war on the Mori for a large deferred gold payment? Either they backstab us and we get our enemies to fight each other for practically nothing, or they don't backstab us, in which case we don't have to deal with them and they're still fighting the Mori."
"That's so crazy... it just might work."
The one issue was that the Miyoshi didn't currently have an embassy with the Ryuzoji, but that was a perfectly solvable problem with a bit of gold. The Miyoshi found themselves quite impressed by the Ryuzoji capital of Kitakyushu- it had decent infrastructure, a ton of defending Yamabushi, and it was really big and productive- and only getting bigger. It held the Ryuzoji's Izumo Shrine and made very good use of it.
"Impressive... most impressive."
The Ryuzoji seemed to be very much on board with the Miyoshi's crazy plan- or at least, they were more than willing to take a huge amount of gold to declare war on the Mori.
The Ryuzoji proceeded to throw this very large gold payment away a month later by attacking Himeji.
The Miyoshi responded with pretending to be shocked by something they were totally expected. Miyoshi Nagayoshi, upon hearing the news of the attack, said something along the lines of "Curse your sudden yet inevitable betrayal!"
The attack on Himeji proved mostly fruitless- the Ryuzoji quickly lost 60% of their invasion force to the Warriors and Mounted Samurai defending the city, only managing to kill a single Miyoshi Mounted unit with their own Warriors. The Yamabushi decided to go run east, deep into Miyoshi territory. The Mori Yamabushi made a similar decision.
The only other major news of the month concerned the Oda, who noticed that the Miyoshi's other enemies were sending troops to attack them, so they might as well do the same, and they sent a lone unit of Samurai Archers towards Maizuru.
They also found out they had another enemy, as the Hojo had once again decided that finding allies on Shikoku and Kyushu was a good use of their money: The Shimazu declared war on the Oda.
Another new year came around, and in January, 1529, the Miyoshi had quite a full plate to deal with: Three wars with close neighbors, some of whom posed a real threat, and still no time to get the Saltpeter they needed.
They decided the first thing they'd do would be dealing with those annoying Mori and Ryuzoji Yamabushi before they pillaged half the countryside, so they did just that. Sadly, it cost them a unit of Samurai Warriors, but they had to deal with the Yamabushi somehow.
And, after thinking about it for a while, they decided they could really use some friends in their fight. They probably didn't need anyone's help to deal with the Oda (and the Oda were already fighting a ton of wars anyway), but the Mori and Ryuzoji were another story- and with the Takeda and Hojo busy dealing with the Imagawa and Oda, it wasn't like they could easily help against the Mori and Ryuzoji, and the other clans to the northeast of them were either otherwise involved in wars or too weak to help. The Shikoku clans certainly couldn't do much, and the Ryuzoji would cut through the Shimazu like a knife through butter.
So that left just one possible helpful ally: The Urakami.
Somewhat to the Miyoshi's surprise, the Urakami were actually willing to join the clan they'd just gotten out of a long war with and fight their western neighbors, at least, for a small price...
They didn't join against the Ryuzoji, but the Miyoshi weren't expecting them to- they really wanted to end that war as fast as possible, and as long as the Mori were keeping them busy, the Miyoshi hoped that that could be done, and that the Ryuzoji wouldn't get too alliance-happy in the meantime.
The Miyoshi and Urakami may not have been fully aligned against all of their opponents, but then again, all of the other wars going on didn't have many clans in full alignment either- the Miyoshi admittedly didn't have access to the diplomatic goings-on of all of them, but it appeared that, aside from the Date and Hojo, who were both at war with the Oda, Imagawa, and Uesugi and nobody else, the rest of the wars that mostly involved the Oda, Imagawa, and Uesugi were just a chaotic mess.
Miyoshi Nagayoshi hoped that the Miyoshi wouldn't get too caught up in this mess...
The various Samurai and Yamabushi stationed on the Urakami-Miyoshi border knew that getting complacent and letting their guard down would be dangerous. As quiet as this war had been, and as weak as the Urakami had looked lately, they were still a dangerous opponent, not to be underestimated.
And yet, in August, 1526, they felt pretty safe- as far as they could tell, there were no Urakami anywhere near them, and given the lack of roads and the hilly terrain of the border regions, they figured that only Yamabushi could move fast enough to get to them before they could react, and Yamabushi weren't terribly threatening attackers.
There was, however, one thing they hadn't taken into account yet- they hadn't seen the Urakami use their Jade to hire any Ronin or Ninja yet to fight them, but given that these were Ronin and Ninja, it was to be expected that the Miyoshi couldn't see them.
So they were caught pretty much totally off-guard when a group of Ninja attacked one of the units of Samurai Warriors.
Luckily, the Samurai managed to recover from their initial surprise and kill their attackers, but they sure didn't like how totally out of nowhere the Ninja came.
"We have reports of a Ninja attack recently on our Western front. We suspect that the Urakami hired them, though we aren't certain. Luckily, the attack was unsuccessful, but we'll need to be prepared in case more Ninja attack us in the future."
Miyoshi Nagayoshi read the reports his advisor had given him.
"I see... did anything else happen in the war recently?"
"Not between us and the Urakami, no, but you know that isolated Oda city, Gifu, on the border between the Hojo and Takeda? Well, it looks like the Hojo finally captured it."
"Figured that would happen sooner or later- well, at least our allies are doing what we hoped they'd would: get their asses kicked by the Hojo, because better them than us."
Wanting to have some more advanced warning for future Ninja attacks, the Miyoshi sent some Yamabushi to go run around Urakami territory in October and report if they found anything. The Yamabushi didn't see anything interesting, certainly not any Ninja. The Miyoshi were rather happy to hear that the Urakami weren't sending any serious counter-offensive their way, that would give them more time to rebuild their forces and prepare for their attacks on the western half of Urakami territory, starting with Nishiwaki, and hopefully, eventually reaching Fukuchiyama and its Jade.
On the other hand, even if the Urakami couldn't mount a serious counter-offensive, a not-so-serious counter-offensive was easily in their grasp- specifically, a lone unit of Yamabushi and some Settlers guarded by Crossbowmen.
The Yamabushi were easily dealt with in January of 1527 by some Samurai Warriors after a bit of bombardment from Catapults and Archers. The Settlers would have to wait a bit, though- they weren't in in area the Miyoshi military could easily reach.
In the meantime, the Miyoshi's Yamabushi continued to run around Urakami territory finding nothing, until it was attacked by Samurai Warriors in March. The Yamabushi fought valiantly, but could only take down one unit of Samurai Warriors before dying. It was a little disappointing that they could only take down one considering the advantage they got from being on a Mountain, but oh well.
On the bright side, the settlers and crossbowmen moved to a more easily reached hill, so in April, some Miyoshi Samurai Archers decided to use the Crossbowmen for target practice, then went over to the Settlers and thanked the Urakami for their "gift" of some more slave workers. The Archers were soon joined by two units of Mounted Samurai on their way to Nishiwaki, and a total of six more units of Samurai Warriors and Archers were well on the way, arriving by boat to take full advantage of their amphibious abilities.
The Urakami weren't about the give Nishiwaki up without a fight, though. They couldn't do much about the naval attack, but they could sure meet the Mounted Samurai on land, so they sent some of their Samurai Warriors to attack them in May. Despite the high ground the Miyoshi held, they couldn't hold the Warriors off, and both of the Mounted Warrior units were forced to run for their lives. The Samurai Archers still held the hill, but it's not like that did them a whole lot of good. They couldn't reach Nishiwaki when the ships did.
As the ships got closer to the city, they started hearing reports of a great construction project finishing to the west of them: The Ryuzoji had built that Trade Network that they, the Hojo, and the Takeda had been working on for the past decade or two.
The Miyoshi were pleased to see that the city it was located in, Fukuoka, wasn't the Ryuzoji's capital- that meant that it wouldn't be destroyed when their Daimyo died, and that meant that perhaps at some point in the future, the Miyoshi could own it...
But that was for later. They had the Urakami to worry about now.
Knowing that they'd have to deal with the Samurai Warriors outside the city first if they didn't want to lose Nishiwaki as soon as they took it, the first move the Miyoshi made when they reached the city in July was to send the two units of Samurai Archers from their Caravels to kill them. This went swimmingly- the Miyoshi lost neither of their Archer units and wiped out both units of Warriors.
The second part of their plan, sending the 4 Samurai Warrior units they had to attack the Samurai Spearmen in Nishiwaki- that didn't go so well.
Actually, it would be more accurate to say that they sent 3 units of Samurai Warriors, and after seeing how poorly that turned out for them, decided that sending a 4th would be pointless.
"We can't win here, not now at least. We can come back later, with a bigger army, and some catapults."
"Maybe we won't even need catapults- the scientists sound like they've got something better in store."
Their retreat got that last Warrior unit and two of the three Archer units to safety, but one of the units of Archers was still stuck on the shore from attacking those Warriors at the start of the battle. Some Urakami Samurai Warriors got to them in August before they could get back onto the boats, and they were, sadly, lost.
As bad as the last couple of months had been for the Miyoshi, though, they had gone much worse for one of their allies against the Hojo- the Imagawa.
First, came the news that the Hojo had gotten someone else to declare war on them. This wouldn't have been so bad if it wasn't for the fact that "someone else" was the Imagawa's other very powerful neighbor, the Takeda.
"Well, that's not good," said Miyoshi Nagayoshi upon hearing the news. "The Imagawa aren't that strong, they won't last long if both the Takeda and the Hojo are trying their best to kill them."
Miyoshi's prediction that they wouldn't last long was quickly shown to be a good one: the ink on this alliance hadn't even dried yet when the Hojo captured Kawasaki, an Imagawa city on the border between them.
"Let's just hope they last long enough that we can get out of this war with the Hojo. After that, eh, screw 'em."
The Miyoshi military continued falling back to re-strengthen in October, still finding some hope from the knowledge that whatever it was the scientists were working on, it could certainly help them somehow.
The Urakami took advantage of the brief lull in action to move some settlers around and send a lone unit of Samurai Warriors in the direction of Kakogawa.
November was a fairly active month on the diplomatic front. The Takeda and Hojo were quite active in getting allies to join them in their wars. The Takeda convinced the Chosokabe to declare war on the Imagawa, a move which might make the Imagawa fell more threatened if there wasn't a large amount of sea and distance between the Chosokabe and them. They also demanded a bit of gold from the Miyoshi, a "request" the Miyoshi would ordinarily refuse if they didn't have so many other things to deal with.
The Hojo, meanwhile, sought an audience with the Date, and whatever it was they did, the Date were very happy about it, as it was enough to convince them to declare war on the Uesugi, Imagawa, and Oda- all of the Hojo's enemies except the Miyoshi. The Miyoshi wondered why they didn't want the Date to declare war on them, but their question was soon answered- the Hojo sent diplomats their way with an offer of peace. It appeared the Hojo were just as tired of fighting them as they were of fighting the Hojo. The Miyoshi didn't sign peace yet- they still had some time left on their agreements to fight the Hojo with the Oda, Uesugi, and Imagawa, and weren't about to abandon them just yet- but as soon as they could, they'd get out of this war.
Finally, towards the end of 1527, came the moment the Miyoshi had long been waiting for: From some research coming from their earlier encounters with the Portuguese, they developed a powerful new explosive weapon: Gunpowder.
Their elation at this new invention was soon replaced by despair that they couldn't use it: A key ingredient, Saltpeter, existed nowhere within their territory. There was some in the western part of Urakami territory and in that region of the Chosokabe's territory that had every other strategic resource, for some reason- and even better, there was some much more accessible Saltpeter on a small island just off the coast between the Miyoshi, Urakami, and Chosokabe that was unclaimed by anyone...
...except for a massive horde of Ainu, that is. Well, no problem, just kill the Ainu and settle the island! It couldn't be that difficult, could it?
The Miyoshi would need a lot of Samurai Warriors to deal with those Ainu, though, and they didn't have anyone available to settle the island anyway, so they'd focus on fighting the Urakami for now, starting with that unit of Samurai Warriors near Kakogawa.
That extremely stubborn unit of Warriors, which killed the first unit of attacking Mounted Samurai in January, 1528...
...okay, two units....
...*sigh* and now a third retreated? Come on, how powerful are these guys?
Finally, they were brought down, but the Miyoshi couldn't afford battles like that. They needed to get back to winning most of the time, and they needed to get back to winning now.
The Urakami sent yet another of their one-unit "attacks" in February, this time in the form of a unit of Yamabushi. They also, after years of trying, finally built the city they'd been trying to build, Himeji. Unexpectedly, they'd built it within their own territory rather than trying to go into the neutral zone between them and the Miyoshi again (I can't remember the last time I saw an AI build a city in their own territory... they pretty much always build in neutral territory)
February proved to be just as busy diplomatically as November of the previous year, although this time, it was in ways less good for the Miyoshi- aside from the start of the month, when the Shimazu approached them with an offer of peace, which the Miyoshi accepted, considering the pointlessness in fighting them. They even got the Shimazu to throw in a little bit of tribute.
A bit after that, the Imagawa, a bit unnerved by all the people declaring war on them lately, asked the Miyoshi for help against the Date. All the other clans fighting the Hojo were fighting the Date, so why not the Miyoshi?
"What's the point of that? They're practically on the other side of the island, and the Hojo are between us. It would be pointless to fight them."
Then came the bad news: The Hojo finally convinced a meaningful clan to join the fight against the Miyoshi: The Mori, their not-quite-neighbors to the west.
"Oh come on, I thought we were in peace talks! Our alliances end in July! You couldn't wait that long, Hojo?"
Then came the worse news: The Mori brought another ally with them: The Miyoshi's eastern neighbors, the Oda.
"You too, Oda Nobunaga?"
"Yeah, it's payback for that time you attacked us 70 years ago."
"That was a long time ago! I thought we were friends! We were fighting the Hojo together!"
"Like we were ever anything more than allies of convenience. Thanks for the Horses, though. We'll make sure to put them to good use fighting you."
Miyoshi Nagayoshi swore to get the Oda for this betrayal. Somehow, they would pay for this.
After spending April dealing with the "attacking" Urakami Yamabushi and losing another unit of Mounted Samurai in the process, the Miyoshi realized that making the Oda pay and continuing to fight the Urakami would be difficult to do at the same time, and that fighting three of their closest neighbors at once was tantamount to suicide. And anyway, they'd already long ago fulfilled two important objectives by securing the resources outside of Kakogawa they'd been so angry about failing to get themselves a long time ago and getting rid of Ako to give Kasuga more water to work with, thus making its Izumo Shrine more useful. Sure, they still didn't have Jade or Saltpeter, but attacking the Ainu island seemed like an easier way to get Saltpeter than fighting the Urakami- and maybe they could find some other way to get Jade.
The point was, it was clearly time to end the fighting against the Urakami- for now, at least.
It had to help the case for peace that the Urakami had suffered a lot more than the Miyoshi in the war and were willing to give up a lot to them to end it- a lot of gold, a map, and and they even threw in the city they'd just built. The Miyoshi found this offer to be perfectly acceptable.
With one less enemy to deal with, the Miyoshi turned their attention to making the Ainu Saltpeter Island the No-Longer-Ainu Saltpeter Island, so they could have some Saltpeter. Two units of Samurai Warriors started the process of clearing the Ainu out by killing 2 of the Ronin units on the island, leaving only 12 Ronin units to go. And 2 Ashigaru units. Still, that was progress!
May was a lot quieter on the diplomatic front compared to the last few months, with the only notable events being that the Hojo again decided that being on a separate island didn't mean that another clan wouldn't make a useful ally, and got the Ichijo to declare war on the Oda. The War Council elections also popped up into discussion again, and, as usual, the Miyoshi had no interest in holding any elections- it wasn't like they'd get anywhere with them anyway, with all the wars going on.
Finally, in July, the Miyoshi-Uesugi-Imagawa alliance against the Hojo ran out (the Oda no longer counted as part of the alliance, what with their betrayal and all), and the Miyoshi happily left their former allies to deal with the Hojo themselves, because they didn't want to have to deal with the Hojo's great eagerness to sign military alliances any more.
The Hojo, for what it's worth, seemed happy to end the war too, even though they'd just signed such an alliance with the Mori against the Miyoshi a few months ago- they also seemed to take an opinion of "screw them, they're on their own" with their allies, and unlike the Miyoshi, they didn't even care if their alliances were actually over or not yet.
With the number of clans the Miyoshi were at war with down to 2 and neither of those 2 appearing to do much of anything at the moment, they doubled down on grabbing that Saltpeter Island, sending enough Samurai Warriors and Archers at it to kill 5 more Ronin.
Just as soon as they'd said the Mori and Oda weren't doing anything, though, the first sign of the Mori appeared, in the form of a unit of Yamabushi- and, more troubling, a Ryuzoji Caravel appeared, and brought 2 units of Samurai Warriors, 2 units of Samurai Archers, and a Yamabushi unit to a hill outside of Himeji.
The Takeda also decided that having half of the island of Shikoku fighting the Imagawa wasn't enough, so they got the Ichijo to declare war on the Imagawa to make it all of the island of Shikoku they were fighting. The Imagawa briefly pretended that that concerned them more than fighting the Hojo and Takeda concerned them.
"So, what do we do about the Ryuzoji?"
The Miyoshi government met in October to discuss this invasion, and quickly came to the decision that it had no idea what to do- the Ryuzoji certainly weren't there to plant flowers or engage in "routine training missions" or anything of that sort, so they'd have to be dealt with somehow- but perhaps they could be turned away somehow?
"Unlikely. They're going to attack us, and there's no getting around that."
They knew this was the likely outcome, and so they made sure to give Himeji enough Samurai Warriors to fend off any attack. But still, having to deal with them, the Mori, and the Oda all at the same time would be a problem, and relocating their Warriors there meant that they couldn't be fighting the Ainu on the Saltpeter Island.
Then, a plan came.
"I have a crazy idea- we can still talk to them right now, what if we convinced them to declare war on the Mori for a large deferred gold payment? Either they backstab us and we get our enemies to fight each other for practically nothing, or they don't backstab us, in which case we don't have to deal with them and they're still fighting the Mori."
"That's so crazy... it just might work."
The one issue was that the Miyoshi didn't currently have an embassy with the Ryuzoji, but that was a perfectly solvable problem with a bit of gold. The Miyoshi found themselves quite impressed by the Ryuzoji capital of Kitakyushu- it had decent infrastructure, a ton of defending Yamabushi, and it was really big and productive- and only getting bigger. It held the Ryuzoji's Izumo Shrine and made very good use of it.
"Impressive... most impressive."
The Ryuzoji seemed to be very much on board with the Miyoshi's crazy plan- or at least, they were more than willing to take a huge amount of gold to declare war on the Mori.
The Ryuzoji proceeded to throw this very large gold payment away a month later by attacking Himeji.
The Miyoshi responded with pretending to be shocked by something they were totally expected. Miyoshi Nagayoshi, upon hearing the news of the attack, said something along the lines of "Curse your sudden yet inevitable betrayal!"
The attack on Himeji proved mostly fruitless- the Ryuzoji quickly lost 60% of their invasion force to the Warriors and Mounted Samurai defending the city, only managing to kill a single Miyoshi Mounted unit with their own Warriors. The Yamabushi decided to go run east, deep into Miyoshi territory. The Mori Yamabushi made a similar decision.
The only other major news of the month concerned the Oda, who noticed that the Miyoshi's other enemies were sending troops to attack them, so they might as well do the same, and they sent a lone unit of Samurai Archers towards Maizuru.
They also found out they had another enemy, as the Hojo had once again decided that finding allies on Shikoku and Kyushu was a good use of their money: The Shimazu declared war on the Oda.
Another new year came around, and in January, 1529, the Miyoshi had quite a full plate to deal with: Three wars with close neighbors, some of whom posed a real threat, and still no time to get the Saltpeter they needed.
They decided the first thing they'd do would be dealing with those annoying Mori and Ryuzoji Yamabushi before they pillaged half the countryside, so they did just that. Sadly, it cost them a unit of Samurai Warriors, but they had to deal with the Yamabushi somehow.
And, after thinking about it for a while, they decided they could really use some friends in their fight. They probably didn't need anyone's help to deal with the Oda (and the Oda were already fighting a ton of wars anyway), but the Mori and Ryuzoji were another story- and with the Takeda and Hojo busy dealing with the Imagawa and Oda, it wasn't like they could easily help against the Mori and Ryuzoji, and the other clans to the northeast of them were either otherwise involved in wars or too weak to help. The Shikoku clans certainly couldn't do much, and the Ryuzoji would cut through the Shimazu like a knife through butter.
So that left just one possible helpful ally: The Urakami.
Somewhat to the Miyoshi's surprise, the Urakami were actually willing to join the clan they'd just gotten out of a long war with and fight their western neighbors, at least, for a small price...
They didn't join against the Ryuzoji, but the Miyoshi weren't expecting them to- they really wanted to end that war as fast as possible, and as long as the Mori were keeping them busy, the Miyoshi hoped that that could be done, and that the Ryuzoji wouldn't get too alliance-happy in the meantime.
The Miyoshi and Urakami may not have been fully aligned against all of their opponents, but then again, all of the other wars going on didn't have many clans in full alignment either- the Miyoshi admittedly didn't have access to the diplomatic goings-on of all of them, but it appeared that, aside from the Date and Hojo, who were both at war with the Oda, Imagawa, and Uesugi and nobody else, the rest of the wars that mostly involved the Oda, Imagawa, and Uesugi were just a chaotic mess.
Miyoshi Nagayoshi hoped that the Miyoshi wouldn't get too caught up in this mess...
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Toxicman007
Custom User Title
An excellent Christmas present! The Miyoshi look like they could be in trouble with a world war looming (or perhaps already happening).
I foresee 5 wins and 2 losses with 7 Conquests complete, chox!
I foresee 5 wins and 2 losses with 7 Conquests complete, chox!
Nice updates! Those were a rough few years on the western front. But a very exciting few years. My favorite part was the Oda backstab - you can always count on the AI to attack you when they're already allied with you against another foe, and the dialog went with it perfectly. Hopefully you can show them who rules this part of Japan.
Are my calculations right that the game is about 210 turns in, out of 540 total? That seems too early for being so far along in the tech tree, but that's what my math is telling me.
Are my calculations right that the game is about 210 turns in, out of 540 total? That seems too early for being so far along in the tech tree, but that's what my math is telling me.
206 turns, as of the end of the last chapter. I've actually played a few more turns into the game since then.
Yeah, this scenario has a pretty fast tech rate- having 18 civs tends to accelerate things with trading a bit, but it's also a pretty shallow tech tree- there's only three ages, one of which has only 4 techs and the first 2 have 18 and 16 (for comparison, the main game has 21 AA techs and 22 MA techs)
All of the conquests have pretty fast tech rates, for that matter, but most of them are shorter than this one- this one is 540 turns long. The second-longest conquest is the Middle Ages, at 204 turns.
That's not to say that the number of turns is a perfect indicator of how long a scenario will take- Mesopotamia, Rise and Fall of Rome, Mesoamerica, and Age of Discovery are all somewhere between 130 (Rise of Rome) and 175 (Mesoamerica), but Rise of Rome feels way longer than Mesoamerica and Mesopotamia did, because you already start Rise of Rome with a fairly settled empire and spend the entire scenario at war- in Mesoamerica and Mesopotamia, you start with almost nothing and spend a lot of time just building your civ up. Even so, Sengoku has so many turns that it ends up being way longer than anything else just because of that- you have both the empire-building and the fight-everyone-else parts of the game to play.
Yeah, this scenario has a pretty fast tech rate- having 18 civs tends to accelerate things with trading a bit, but it's also a pretty shallow tech tree- there's only three ages, one of which has only 4 techs and the first 2 have 18 and 16 (for comparison, the main game has 21 AA techs and 22 MA techs)
All of the conquests have pretty fast tech rates, for that matter, but most of them are shorter than this one- this one is 540 turns long. The second-longest conquest is the Middle Ages, at 204 turns.
That's not to say that the number of turns is a perfect indicator of how long a scenario will take- Mesopotamia, Rise and Fall of Rome, Mesoamerica, and Age of Discovery are all somewhere between 130 (Rise of Rome) and 175 (Mesoamerica), but Rise of Rome feels way longer than Mesoamerica and Mesopotamia did, because you already start Rise of Rome with a fairly settled empire and spend the entire scenario at war- in Mesoamerica and Mesopotamia, you start with almost nothing and spend a lot of time just building your civ up. Even so, Sengoku has so many turns that it ends up being way longer than anything else just because of that- you have both the empire-building and the fight-everyone-else parts of the game to play.
Hey. Haven't mentioned it yet but I really enjoy this thread 
.
I have been playing Age of Discovery this past week and looked over your game closely
. I have played as France(emperor- doing ok) England (emperor- doing well) and France (monarch) and kicking but. I have also played as the Aztecs... had a huge empire that was well protected. Couldn't kill anything with Jags to save my (and their) life. 
I have found that Portugal starts so strong... you have to hope they go to war or have someone declare on them fairly early to weaken their empire.
France (monarch) I have some experience with the map now... and explore (build) in just the right places. I can hang pretty well early because the AI doesn't get so many free units as with emporer. I have ruined the English, Dutch and Iroquois in N.America by blocking their settlers with workers/explorer/pikes-infantry so they couldn't get to the furs westward that they love to go for. I also blocked them from getting ANY cities on the east coast
. I have even set up a city/harbor in deep S.America to get the two horses there... nobody would trade any to me. Currently it is 1558 and Spain has been at war with Portugal for like 20 years without getting anything but an island city I think. In the last 3 years the Spanish have had England helping them so they all have been a bit occupied. Iroquois have been fighting the Aztecs for like 10 years... severely hampering their westward expansion. Spain has a solid foothold in todays Florida. I have the entire Carribean from todays Puerto Rico to todays Cuba. I also have 1 city beside the gems in S.Africa . Tobbacco in todays Virginia area of N.America and the Carribean. Spices there too.
I love this Age.
Anyway... thanks for all your hard work posting your play (which is excellent by the way) and playing these Conquest. I also like the Middle Ages, WWII and Napolean for my war-like tendencies. The AofD one is more building/exploring/etc for me... but I really like it.
Thanks again!!!
.I have been playing Age of Discovery this past week and looked over your game closely
. I have played as France(emperor- doing ok) England (emperor- doing well) and France (monarch) and kicking but. I have also played as the Aztecs... had a huge empire that was well protected. Couldn't kill anything with Jags to save my (and their) life. I have found that Portugal starts so strong... you have to hope they go to war or have someone declare on them fairly early to weaken their empire.
France (monarch) I have some experience with the map now... and explore (build) in just the right places. I can hang pretty well early because the AI doesn't get so many free units as with emporer. I have ruined the English, Dutch and Iroquois in N.America by blocking their settlers with workers/explorer/pikes-infantry so they couldn't get to the furs westward that they love to go for. I also blocked them from getting ANY cities on the east coast
. I have even set up a city/harbor in deep S.America to get the two horses there... nobody would trade any to me. Currently it is 1558 and Spain has been at war with Portugal for like 20 years without getting anything but an island city I think. In the last 3 years the Spanish have had England helping them so they all have been a bit occupied. Iroquois have been fighting the Aztecs for like 10 years... severely hampering their westward expansion. Spain has a solid foothold in todays Florida. I have the entire Carribean from todays Puerto Rico to todays Cuba. I also have 1 city beside the gems in S.Africa . Tobbacco in todays Virginia area of N.America and the Carribean. Spices there too.I love this Age.
Anyway... thanks for all your hard work posting your play (which is excellent by the way) and playing these Conquest. I also like the Middle Ages, WWII and Napolean for my war-like tendencies. The AofD one is more building/exploring/etc for me... but I really like it.
Thanks again!!!
I got tickled when I read you questioning the English Seadogs (privateer) colors... I did the exact same thing. They don't get privateers.
Another thing interesting to me was about the future Jamestown settler running for the furs... instead of settling on the first, second or third good spot. Must have an AI treasure maker 'marker' there. I guess that is why Portugal and Spain always send settlers to the exact same places every game. Like future Florida and Africa/S.America.
I don't know how you play thru all those diplomatic moves in the scenarios with large numbers of AIs. I get flustered and easily confused with so many. Probably why I like WWII one so much... besides other reasons.
Thanks again for the fun reading/lurking!
I like the Middle Ages one and the Napoleon one for other strange reasons in addition to the fun... my last name is Frederick (Friedrich in Nap) and my daughter's name is Lindsey... which is a town for the Anglo-Saxons in Middle Ages 
.
Another thing interesting to me was about the future Jamestown settler running for the furs... instead of settling on the first, second or third good spot. Must have an AI treasure maker 'marker' there. I guess that is why Portugal and Spain always send settlers to the exact same places every game. Like future Florida and Africa/S.America.
I don't know how you play thru all those diplomatic moves in the scenarios with large numbers of AIs. I get flustered and easily confused with so many. Probably why I like WWII one so much... besides other reasons.
Thanks again for the fun reading/lurking!
I like the Middle Ages one and the Napoleon one for other strange reasons in addition to the fun... my last name is Frederick
(Friedrich in Nap) and my daughter's name is Lindsey... which is a town for the Anglo-Saxons in Middle Ages .I had some time and decided to continue doing this. Ch's 21-23 now have fixed images.
Only one more Chapter in Part 3 to go... and then all of Part 4 and 5... sigh.
Toxicman007
Custom User Title
Aww, chox, I got all excited and thought you posted an update
Will we get an update soon
?
Will we get an update soon
?walletta
King
Subscribed, since i read Terrain-Unwise Romans and found it amazing, and this is no different. In fact, now i want to play the Mesopotamia conquest again.
I am replying to this only 5 years late: A to subscribe so the software will take me to the first unread post and B to endorse the above message. A fun read!
Just so you know, you can subscribe to a thread without posting in it, not that anyone ever does subscribe to a thread without posting in it.
In other news, I got off my lazy butt and finished fixing the pictures for Part 3, so only two more parts (and the Intro of 6) to go before all the images work again. And then eventually I suppose I should fix the images in Terrain-Unwise Romans that don't work.
And at some point I'm sure I'll get around to writing an actual update.
In other news, I got off my lazy butt and finished fixing the pictures for Part 3, so only two more parts (and the Intro of 6) to go before all the images work again. And then eventually I suppose I should fix the images in Terrain-Unwise Romans that don't work.
And at some point I'm sure I'll get around to writing an actual update.
MjM
Deity
Just read your whole story from beginning til now. A few of the pics are still broken in the middle, but overall, great read and I like the abundance of pictures. Good to see people are still playing civ3. I recently started playing all the conquests again on Deity, myself.
Thanks! I've been slowly, lazily getting to fixing them, right now I think I'm only missing the pictures for Part 4 and Part 5. Re-read them when I have the pictures fixed, if you want to get a better idea of what's going on!
Lord Plebian
Chieftain
Awesome story so far, choxorn! Just got done reading all of it. Hope there will be an update soon. I love the Conquests, though I haven't seriously played them in a while. Sat down to play as Norway in the Middle Ages the other day, but they aren't really my style.BMartini28
Chieftain
- Joined
- Jan 10, 2011
- Messages
- 33
Fired up my old laptop and saw the conquests icon on my desktop, man it's been a while but nothing beats a good game of conquests especially Napoleonic Europe, RoR and the Middle Ages.
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