Oda is, in a word, Awesome

[Vampiresbane]

I now completely understand why France's Elan! with 20% morale is so powerful.

Oda gets 10% from traditions and 10% from being a daimyo and I just obliterated the Shogun's 11k army with my 12k stack. Stackwiped the poor bastard. Hell, when I had to fight rebels in multiple spots after I had swiftly taken the second 1/2 of Japan, I wondered if 6k stacks could take on 12k rebel stacks?

Short answer? Yes, yes they could. Easily.

And I've only unlocked the first two National Ideas for Oda. This just gets better? Holy cow, does it.

3rd idea gives you 10% less core cost AND 10% war score cost? What madness is this? Godlike.
+1 leader shock, fire, and siege? Godlike
+10% fire damage? Kinglike
+10% morale comes with +10 infantry combat as their tradition? Godlike
+20% manpower? Kinglike

Combine this with either Daimyo or Independent Daimyo government and I can see why Oda is amazing.
Shimazu was pretty damn good, but Oda is just out of control.

 

[Sfan]

Manpower? Is that the thing you use for your cannons?

 

[Less2]

Note that the Shogunate government type is very good as well. It's basically the equivalent of HRE after revoking the privilege in that you can accrue huge numbers of vassals to swarm anyone. Which also makes it trivially easy to conquer huge amounts of land (with -warscore cost) beyond 100%, 200%, even 500% OE, then just release vassals and continue the next war. It's an entirely unlisted effect but one of the most powerful in the game.

Manpower? Is that the thing you use for your cannons?

There IS a merc limit, unfortunately.

 

[Badesumofu]

Morale is funny. It can be super-powerful in some circumstances (like for you when it means you stackwipe enemies) but it can also do not very much in other circumstances. It will reduce your casualties by shortening battles, but it's also reducing enemy casualties (because they run away sooner).

Reman's most recent video goes into some detail on this.

 

[Aythne]

Reman's most recent video goes into some detail on this.

Ugh, can we please not use that video as some kind of reference bible? It's got some adequate basic information, but the conclusions are often very simplistic. When he badmouths morale he is only referencing its application to total casualties, which is irrelevant in most situations single or multiplayer. You don't win wars by fighting a bunch of battles and killing all their men (multiplayer world war grindfests excluded), you win them with sieges. Battles are a last resort, and you want them over as soon as possible (so the AI decides not to reinforce, and to catch player stacks out of position in multiplayer). Also you fight more rebels than you do anything in the game, and morale is how you stomp them.

I'm not arguing that CA/Disc and other casualty modifiers aren't great. They are, and especially in multiplayer I prioritize them over morale; but too many people have latched onto this idea that morale is somehow not good unless you're stackwiping, and it's a bit ridiculous.

 

[Badesumofu]

I'm not arguing that CA/Disc and other casualty modifiers aren't great. They are, and especially in multiplayer I prioritize them over morale; but too many people have latched onto this idea that morale is somehow not good unless you're stackwiping, and it's a bit ridiculous.

I'm not sure who has latched onto that because that's not what is stated in the video and not what was stated by me either.

It is true that morale can seem much better than it is if it just happens that you just got a morale modifier that put you over a breakpoint relative to your opponent.

 

[Aythne]

I'm not sure who has latched onto that because that's not what is stated in the video and not what was stated by me either.

It is true that morale can seem much better than it is if it just happens that you just got a morale modifier that put you over a breakpoint relative to your opponent.

Except there is no 'breakpoint' because rolls aren't fixed. Your spectrum can easily go from "stackwipe" to "lose battle" depending on the dice. So more morale is always better.

 

[hrimhari]

Ugh, can we please not use that video as some kind of reference bible? It's got some adequate basic information, but the conclusions are often very simplistic. When he badmouths morale he is only referencing its application to total casualties, which is irrelevant in most situations single or multiplayer. You don't win wars by fighting a bunch of battles and killing all their men (multiplayer world war grindfests excluded), you win them with sieges. Battles are a last resort, and you want them over as soon as possible (so the AI decides not to reinforce, and to catch player stacks out of position in multiplayer). Also you fight more rebels than you do anything in the game, and morale is how you stomp them.

I'm not arguing that CA/Disc and other casualty modifiers aren't great. They are, and especially in multiplayer I prioritize them over morale; but too many people have latched onto this idea that morale is somehow not good unless you're stackwiping, and it's a bit ridiculous.

If it's about preserving manpower, you know what mod is best in my experience?

Attrition reduction.

Unless I'm seriously micromanaging, I get far more deaths from attrition than combat. And if I do try to micromanage, my siege stacks get wiped by enemy counter-attack. Makes defensive/humanist hard to go past, imo.

 

[Gratak]

Imho, morale is at it's best if you are weaker than your enemy and when fighting lots of different enemies at the same time. AI is going over-confident as soon as it has more units than you and splits it's armies like crazy (and by that I don't mean carpet siege, which is usually a good idea and really well implemented for the AI nowadays). You can get so many stackwipes against such an enemy with good morale, you almost start to feel sorry for your enemies after a while

To the OP topic. Awesome indeed. Oda for next dev clash

 

[Lor360]

Except there is no 'breakpoint' because rolls aren't fixed. Your spectrum can easily go from "stackwipe" to "lose battle" depending on the dice. So more morale is always better.

Reman specificaly states this in his morale analysys. He even goes out of his way to make a nice little graphic explaining it.

 

[PhoenixG]

fight rebels in multiple spots after I had swiftly taken the second 1/2 of Japan, I wondered if 6k stacks could take on 12k rebel stacks?

Short answer? Yes, yes they could. Easily.

That is because rebels don't get your morale modifiers, unlike CA and disp.

It will reduce your casualties by shortening battles, but it's also reducing enemy casualties (because they run away sooner)..

Unless you stackwipe, it won't shorten battles and often increase battle length. Due the length you'll lose more men, since morale does nothing to increase casualties damage. It only increase your staying power at cost of your men.

Morale is great if you can beat the enemy in short battles aka in 12-15 days. But if it drags on longer it will hurt you, since you'll just literally throwing bodies in the battle. Unless you got the discipline to back that up. Long battles morale will win, but it's always the question at what cost? In my Oda WC and was fighting the timi. While I got more morale than him. I got less discipline. While most fight I won, but after each fight my stack was grind to around 50% while his retreating army has lost only 25%.

Except there is no 'breakpoint' because rolls aren't fixed. Your spectrum can easily go from "stackwipe" to "lose battle" depending on the dice. So more morale is always better.

Yes, morale will/can win battles. The main question is at what cost? Unlike discipline it does nothing to deal more damage nor decrease casualties.

For me what Oda truly shines isn't France level elan, but his generals. With offensive, defensive and aristocratic. You'll get a base general of 2/2/1/2. My best rolled general with Oda was a 6/6/5/5 and a 6/5/5/6. And that 6/5/5/6 general made me siege down lvl 9 London fort in one siege tick (with barrage/without blockade).

 

[Aythne]

Reman specificaly states this in his morale analysys. He even goes out of his way to make a nice little graphic explaining it.

Yes, which I referenced when I'm saying that his criticism is only to do with its influence on casualties. But due to the way its all presented (the caveat is very short, most of the information is about how ineffective morale is) there have been many people parroting the critique without the nuance. The initial post on this thread was exactly that "Morale is good if you're stackwiping, otherwise it doesn't do much" which is flat out untrue.

That is because rebels don't get your morale modifiers, unlike CA and disp.

Yes, morale will/can win battles. The main question is at what cost? Unlike discipline it does nothing to deal more damage nor decrease casualties.

Again, in singleplayer you fight far more battles against rebels than against "grindy" enemies where battlefield casualties become an issue. So morale is doing a very important job saving your manpower. I can attack enemies at a time of my choosing, I can bait them and maneuver them into situations I want, which more often than not involves not fighting them at all. Rebels do rebel shit, and they need to be dealt with fast: in the grand scheme of things rebel battles are far more costly in both manpower and gold.

Also the "cost" of morale is a silly argument. When do you ever choose between morale and discipline? Basically, the advisor. (I'm ignoring Defensive v Offensive/Quality because those decisions don't really come down to a simple question of MvD, and more about the entire group and its benefits) Otherwise you max out both numbers because they're very useful. So we're talking a grand total of 10% morale versus 5% discipline to which there's no one size fits all answer.

 

[Dominion]

Except there is no 'breakpoint' because rolls aren't fixed. Your spectrum can easily go from "stackwipe" to "lose battle" depending on the dice. So more morale is always better.

Technically you can always stackwipe if you're strong enough to win the initial battle.

I refrain from doing it because it's a borderline-exploit way to play the game, but to say there's a spectrum is incorrect.

Are you strong enough to win a fight? If yes, get your setup right and every battle will be a stackwipe.

 

[Aythne]

Technically you can always stackwipe if you're strong enough to win the initial battle.

I refrain from doing it because it's a borderline-exploit way to play the game, but to say there's a spectrum is incorrect.

Are you strong enough to win a fight? If yes, get your setup right and every battle will be a stackwipe.

That's a good point, but I try to avoid exploits/clearly unintended features and especially ones that require a sizeable amount of micromanagement. I play mostly multiplayer now so when I do drop into solo play I'm not keen on slowing things down even further.

 

[Sfan]

You can pretty much stackwipe anything so long as you have full drill, perfect composition and a 6 fire general lategame. Fire phase comes first, a 40-0-40 stack will destroy any ennemy first phase by sheer destruction of any ennemy unit, no matter what the morale is, because AIs will not have the proper composition.

And early on you can consistently stackwipe if you micro to have perfect flank with cav, then to reinforce a week later with reserves. But that's insanely tedious to always do that.

 

[Dominion]

You can pretty much stackwipe anything so long as you have full drill, perfect composition and a 6 fire general lategame. Fire phase comes first, a 40-0-40 stack will destroy any ennemy first phase by sheer destruction of any ennemy unit, no matter what the morale is, because AIs will not have the proper composition.

And early on you can consistently stackwipe if you micro to have perfect flank with cav, then to reinforce a week later with reserves. But that's insanely tedious to always do that.

Nah, Aythne and I are talking about the actual guaranteed stackwipe here.

Send in 2 stacks. One is your main force, the other one needs to be strong enough to survive for a day or two.
Go into combat, have them drop to low morale, retreat with your main force into a neighbouring province, have your minor stack continue fighting.
Main force retreats and re-enters, even gets a monthly morale tick if you timed it well, enemies are being denied a monthly tick and barely get any morale back because the morale boost after any victory against a few units is laughable.

You re-enter with your now refreshed mainforce, they weren't able to flee because combat locked them into place, their units are extremely low on morale, it counts as a completely new battle.
Instant stackwipe.

As Aythne and I said, it's micromanaging that's borderline exploit usage and has nothing to do with army composition or whatever.

 

[Sfan]

Oh you thought about that. To me that's beyond the border of exploits. You can do this indefinitely, even without morale, so long as you outnumber the enemy. You can win battles while bankrupt with that, this is absurd.