Honestly it's a little too new wave for my taste. But when the Vampire Counts came out in '18, I think they really came into their own, criminally and artistically. The whole unit roster has a clear, crisp sound, and a mossy sheen of consummate professionalism that really gives the cannons a big boost. Luthor Harkon has been compared to Magnus the Great, but I think Luthor has a far more bitter, cynical sense of humor. In 19, Creative Assembly released this; Curse of the Vampire Coast, their most accomplished DLC yet. I think their undisputed masterpiece is "Queen Bess". An artillery unit so loud, most people probably don't listen to the to the battle ambience. But they should, because it's not just about the pleasures of artilley and the how it turns warfare into a gentlemanly brawl. It's also a personal statement about vampire pirates themselves.

On offense, this ratio is a bit more difficult to use. Basically you have two options. First is to keep advancing your archers, which can cause the enemy army to retreat due to the potential for the archers to take out half a unit with each volley (that's a lot of archers though). Problem is you're still fighting uphill, and if you don't have a good vanguard for the archers they just get rushed and cut down. Second option is to position yourself somewhere that makes the defender think they can defeat you, but only if they come down from their superior position. If you were facing a human that would be far more difficult, but the Shogun 2 AI seems to prefer offense to defense, so even when they're the defending army, you can mostly expect them to charge you. The exception there being when you're attacking fortressess, in which case the first option works much better.

To continue the discussion we had about tactics in total war, suffice it to say that I like arrows. I played the Mori clan (no bonus to land units), but I should go with the Chokosabe (improved archers, improved farms). My Archers to Spearmen (typically didn't go with swords, as I prefered to have the enemy come to me, and spearmen are better at defense) to cavalry ratio was probably 4:2:1. This ratio obviously presents some issues when the battle has truly started, but that can be dealt with by superior positioning. Basically, if you're the defender, the strategy is relatively simple: find the highest ground (that isn't surrounded by forest), sit there and shoot anything that comes close. Cavalry are used to make sure that the enemy archers and general aren't going anywhere you don't like, but with this strategy you tend to lose them to the enemy cavalry, as they have greater numbers. Just don't use light cavalry. They suck at anything other than cutting down routing units.

Circles and eyeballs, circles are pretty...

BREE