Great video! I would have put horses in S tier simply because AI will trade with you, if you have it. On top of that, I have had AIs pay 20k for trading agreements.
Haha, yesterday in the stream I was able to sell the horses to the Takeda for 34k iirc. I wanted to keep the actual building and the resources a bit sepperated, but warhorses are so ridiculously important that I just couldn't ignore it.
Yeah im pretty sure I've gotten 40k for trade agreements. I wait till I have captured the trade nodes and warhorses are vital. Takes time but well worth the wait.
@@TheVikingGeneral I would rank smith higher, naginata samurai with armor can soak up all the enemies ammo and ashigaru with melee upgrade make them endgame viable also, I think you should, when ranking these consider how easy or hard it is to reach the third upgrade for exaple smithee requires iron which you can get by either trading or just sending a small 2 ship navy + tradeship north early the bowmaker however requires a lot of research investment (though it's ueseful research)
recruiting 5 monks at tier 3 means +30% chi research which will go up to +90% as you level them to tier 6, the chi bonus skill set also combines well with going for demoralizing armies build, which is a free high chance action to quickly level up and make mass routes easier
Kind of a late comment but something I've always thought is that if you directly control a wood or stone province, it should provide that reduced cost clan-wide. Maybe it shouldn't be as good, like stone would reduce building costs in that province by 10% and reduce clan-wide building costs by 5%, increasing at higher levels of development. Realistically you should be able to ship that resource to all your provinces and it would make those buildings a little more useful and worth it to develop. If max level quarry's reduced clan-wide construction costs by say 12-15% it would pay for itself very quickly. Just an offhand thought I had
I recommend watching Epic History TV's take on castles. They are most often build close to the source/mine due to the high weight and cost of transportation of stone. Thus it wouldn't make sense to transport stone across Japan.
Naval tradition should be B or C. The bonus for ships is meh but if you're going to rank gold as S tier because of the early game cash boost you get, naval tradition's trade chain is also good for the same reason. But, I tend to be a trade heavy player so maybe it's just me.
Haha, maybe. Naval tradition isn't bad, the trade tarrif bonus is okayish, but the RTI is quite low for clans who are not going to trade or will have a lot of trade good lying around.
Very gratifying seeing ninja village get some love. Level 1 ninjas as such painfully incompetent goobers that it feels like an exercise in masochism. And you can develop the other locations into tax-based gold mines. Since they're clustered around Kyoto and imho the area is hard to defend, I agree that they're less strategic than S-tier but I do see them as part of the high points in the campaign.
I rank the ninja higher too especially as ikko ikki great income when leveled up and since they don't get metsuke I use ninjas every turn the army sabotage ability is a clan saver. You can pin down an enemy army for as many turns as you need to bring up reinforcements and damage them by attrition when in my territory. Plus who doesn't love a good ninja cutsene?
I owuld agree, except if my scrub Ninjas were competent I wouldn't get to watch the slapstick fail videos, so I'm rating this both an advantage and a drawback. 🤪
Armoury + Master Bow Maker is just so good. Turns Bow Ashigaru into budget Bow Samurai and turns Bow Monks into actually decently armored mega-snipers.
@@gorgit You did, but it's a very easy mistake to make: - Armourer/Master Armourer is one of the paths for the smithing provincial specialty chain, and hence can never be combined with a Bowmaker/Master Bowmaker. - Armoury is one of the options for upgrading the regular Encampment chain.
Nice video, some thoughts on the rankings. Horses should be S tier for the simple reason that you cannot recruit any cavalry unit other than light cav. without it, if the AI has it and you don't, good luck getting a trade deal with them. Stone should be A, same as above not having this resource locks off higher level castles but since you can realistically win a campaign without it, an A is high enough.
Thank you for your comment. :) I tried to keep the resource itself apart from the actual buildings themselves. Access to trade goods is generally fairly easy to accomplish. But I just couldn't ignore the power of the warhorse resource, that's why I upped the Horses specialty to A, since the building itself would only warrant a B tier.
Hollowed ground is great for improvement moral of your ashigaru units. Giving them moral equal to there samurai counter parts but I can see why you put it there from a economic view.
Better morale is definitely strong, since that's basically the health of your unit. But there are so many other ways of boosting morale, that the increase that it does give doesn't matter that much.
Personally, I do find these types of videos quite helpful especially for people who are still not very familiar with the game, or just plain curious. Love the vids btw:D
Naval traditions can be op, the boost of stats that you get because of the experience Is HUGE Literally a fast ship can capture a big one with that boost
Yup, but sadly, you pretty much don't need a navy in shogun 2. I mean, you can definitely get some benefit out of it, but it'll will generally just be a drain on your finances.
The thing with getting better accuracy for your archers and Only going with ashigaru bowmen is that you save money on the upkeep and don't have to build the archery dojo, making you more money
Kyushu is just a league apart xD. But no, for me, the most important thing is having money to actually pay for your troops. Better troops helps, since you might need less troops, but more troops is generally better. ;)
I disagree. I prefer small, more capable armies. That way the AI always comes to you rather than having to chase armies around the map, thinking it can smash you with a full stack, only for the stack to be deleted from the game by a smaller, more potent force.
@@bradmonk69 You're wrong though, the correct way of playing is having multiple stacks of cheap units, that's why the oda are the strongest clan and it's not even close. Btw if you play anything below legendary your input is irrelevant.
the gold income is good and all, but i don't think it's that important.. All of the gold province only have meager soil, which mean they have to depend entirely on gold. Compared to the province with fertile soils, they do produce more income, though not by much..
The thing with the farms is that you'll have to master the required arts, while gold will always be available. Even with it's long construction time, it has one of the best return on investment times of all the buildings in the game.
I'm afraid I will have to disagree with most of your tiers. In the beginning of the video you stated that you will rate the buildings based on how important they are to a successful campaign. I will give my detailed opinion on each one of them. Gold is not required for a successful campaign. It certainly makes things easier and super helpful in the early game but it does not unlock special units or even regular units. Add to the fact that there are only 3 locations all over the map where you can get it, and only the Hojo, Uesugi and Mori may feasibly get it early enough to make a difference, I would rate it B-Tier. Philosophical Tradition is nice to have as it ranks up your metsuke and give a boost to research but the same as Gold its not necessary for a successful campaign. Does it make things easier? sure but considering you can only ever have 5 metsuke, its value decreases a lot by mid-game. A C-Tier. Ninja Villages are very limited in their availability despite there being 3 locations of them, they are all in the center region around Kyoto. The only starting clans that will benefit from it are the Hattori, Ikko Ikki and Oda. Extra ranks for Ninja is overrated since you still need to invest in research in order to get the maximum benefit and by the time you get the research done your Ninja would have already ranked twice from sitting in a castle. While I'm at it I will also rate Hallowed Ground for the same reason. Both are C-Tier. I agree with you on Fletchers and Blacksmith being A-Tier. They are strategically placed in locations that would allow any clan to poach them early on and get the best benefits with their starting army even if its all Ashigaru. Horses and Iron however I disagree with you entirely. They are the best specialties in the game and ones you need to secure as fast as possible whether through trade or conquest since you don't need to upgrade them in order to get their full benefits which is unlocking essential Samurai units that you will use in your campaign. Horses even more than Iron since Yari Ashigaru can carry you to the late game but can you honestly tell me you can play an entire game without Yari or Katana Cavalry? Both S-Tier Stone is underrated as its important to upgrade your castles as well as the construction discount they provide along with the income. Still, its rare to fully upgrade a castle due to the food costs so I will tentatively agree with you on keeping it in C-Tier though I may bump it to B-Tier if I'm playing the Hojo. Wood and Naval I agree with you. I may argue that Naval is more important as it allows you to recruit the Red Seal trade ship which can defend well against attackers but both would still be D-Tier to me. Goof video regardless and one of a kind considering the many YT channels that cover Shogun 2 for 10 years now and haven't made a similar video.
I really value economic buildings and regions, that's why economic stuff always gets a leg up. From a single fully build gold mine, you'll be able to finance a complete ashigaru army. I generally don't really care about the quality of my troops, but I do care about being able to pay them ;). Properly developed metsukes can singlehandedly carry your economy. My Ninja turnover rate is quite high, since I generally have them in enemy territory most of the time. So whenever I get to that part of the map, I'm always glad that I'm able to have the +2 ranks. Since a rank 3 ninja is all I need for the max points in army sabotage. For the Horses, Iron and Stone, I tried hard to not be influenced too much by the actual trade good it provides. I was mostly looking at what the buildings themselves provided. I did get swayed by the Horses, as I would've putten the building in B-tier, but I can indeed just not overlook the fact that the warhorse resource is so important throughout the entire game. Iron and Stone trade resource are less important, since you'll only need it for the construction. You will want to build up before RD anyway, so'll you'll probably be able to trade for it if you lack it, and after RD by the time you need it again, you'll probably have captured a province of it anyway. And if you're really desperate for horses and find yourself with a navy somehow, you can always use the trade node xD But thank you for your insight! It's good to have people not simply agreeing with me, keeps me from getting complacent. :)
You only need Iron to upgrade the blacksmith; after that, it's more or less forgettable.. Stone should be C regardless, as it's only useful in the late game. Even as Hojo, you don't go around upgrading castle everywhere - most of your castle should be Tier 1 only, and save the food for town growth (+50 growth per turn in all your provinces is no joke). In fact, i would tear down all the excess castle the AI build in stone province - if i could.. Ninja is S tier.. The Ninja chain is the easiest one to unlock legendary building, and you can just add that on top of the specialty building to product rank 5 ninja from the get-go.. And since Ninja is the one under the most risk, the ability to replace them in 1 turn is S-Tier.. Tech rush is always B tier at worst, especially when you can shave off 1/3rd of the research time for each of these.. A or S tier.
Smiths is S tier for me playing ikko ikki I turn my warrior monks into tanks with 7 armor combined with the encampment upgrade. A must when their base armor is at 2.
I don't agree with gold being S tier. Gold mines don't provide something that can't be replicated elsewhere. Blacksmith/the plus accuracy building potentially yields much more gold, as it allows you to either have less units in your army, or use ashigaru instead of samurai. Horses are even more so s tier as it enables you to recruit cavalry.
I disagree with some of the entries. Warhorses: Should be in S, not only do they make your cav way better but the ai that usually does not want to trade throws ridiculous sums of money at you, more than you could reasonably get with gold mines unless your campaign is rather long, investing these 5 digit sums properly will make the rest of the campaign a breeze. Gold Mines: They look good on paper, but they are mid tier at best. Not only does it take forever to build it up, it is costly as well, and regions with gold are bad at everything else like having horrendous farming for example. For them to become profitable, money, metsukes and time are necessary, lots of it. Hallowed Ground: Together with the highest temple it allows you to recruit level 5 monks right away, which is very useful as you have a cheap and never ending supply of competent revolt starters, research accelerators and enemy Metsuke deleters, definitely belongs in A with the ninjas.
I specifically did not want to rate the provinces on the trade good they provide. I agree that warhorses are extremely useful. Gold mines give the best ROI compared to ANY other building in the entire game. Even early in the game, it's worth investing in them. Yeah, with hallowed ground I also see your point, but I don't rate monks as high as ninja's or metsuke's, mostly due to my personal playstyle. But it can definitely be very good.
@@TheVikingGeneral My experience with gold mines might be somewhat skewed, because pretty much every time I get the Sado goldmine as Uesugi my early game becomes MUCH harder due to the goldmine taking forever to actually come online. As Hojo the goldmine is definitely better since you start out with it and most main provinces are not really rich to begin with. I definitely see them as a lot worse than very rich farming provinces when it comes to how quick they make you a lot of money, as lvl 1-2 gold mines are simply crap, especially without good metsukes.
personally i think charge bonus is more important mid end game, having a maxed out great guard to use with a checkerboard rush formation right when first wave clashes use the great guard in tandem at an angle itll damn near insta route them. and you keep rinse repeating for each wave of soldier that keeps hitting the frontline.
I've been recruiting my archers in blacksmith provinces- I find that the +5 armour you can get from the armourer and encampment building combined make them extremely tankyz especially given the AIs archery cheats. Has anyone else tried this and how do you find thr results of this compared to the accuracy buff?
Blacksmith is single most important building, plus five armor is game changer to any units. Warhorse is S tier building, other clan will pay massive payment in trade and kickstart your campaign and willingness to trade with you.
@@TheFlyingZulunecro post But to my knowledge armor works both in melee and against missile fire. Add that to the extra melee attack/morale and melee defense when a unit levels. Plus other external bonus's and you got a great Yari wall
Hi Viking. I personally would put Naval Tradition higher. B at least. (for Clans near Kycho Island and the Trade Points it's very handy to have) higher Experience Ships gives massiv Stats & Moral Boost for Ships. (Moral is very OP in Naval Battle/Auto resolve) A few Fleets with experience Medium Bune & Bow Kobaya (+ Fire Arrow) give you a very good & Cost effectiv Fleet. And it easy to Block northern Kyscho, which helps against Naval Invasion. (I'm looking at you Homna
Yeah, I can understand your reasoning there! I just personally never build or use navy in any large capacity, and when I do I generally end up regretting investing in it. But the arts on their own are pretty good if you want to do naval stuff indeed.
@@TheVikingGeneral Yeah, I understand. Vanilla Shogun 2 Naval is very special. (FotS Naval rocks tough!). But so far in my experience. A fleet of 1-2 Medium Bunes + 6-8 Bow Kobaya with 5 experience is pretty good even in Auto resolve. (I like some Flamebomb Kobaya as well) But I usually dont play on Legendary Difficulty, so I dont know if this works on highest Difficultly. PS: I like your Channel. keep up the good work ^^
Will you do research tier list like this? Kinda curious what research is the most beneficial to the campaign, my best guest is tax reform, equal fields, and sumo tournament for chi art. And heaven and earth, and way of the bow for bushido art
I was thinking how I would cover the arts mastery, and a tierlist isn't a bad idea actually. Without actually doing it, I would agree with you, except for the sumo tournament. It's a good art, but it's preceded by a relative useless one, so that makes it less valuable for me.
@@TheVikingGeneral yeah, noh it's shit art, but tea ceremony is ok for honor, other than that, it gives happiness. Other art that gives happiness is zen (you can get early on), and neo confucianism (late game art)
On a second note. I'm really suprised you rank the Ninja-Building so high. I never Prioritised them, mostly bc of their Location. With most Clan I Operatet left or right side of them Map. At the time I reach Kyoto. I normaly already recruited my 5 Ninjas so .I never quite get to use them. Well maybe I have to try it next time .
Why is everyone hating navies? I really cannot imagine wining any camping without defending trade, raiding trade routes, defending from invasions. Am i playing this game wrong?
Craftworks should be B Tier because you need an expensive Art to fully upgrade it. There's a similar problem with blacksmiths, but as long as you have warhorses, you can trade for the necessary iron. If you don't have warhorses, there's probably a trade node with iron not too far from you.
The Chonindo art is a very good art for long term economy strategies, so if the game goes on long enough, you'll probably want it anyway. ;) And getting access to iron isn't that difficult indeed.
@@TheVikingGeneral It is. But if you want Bow Warrior Monks with max accuracy, you're going to need Chonindo, Essence of the Spirit, Way of the Bow, AND Heaven and Earth. All useful arts to be sure (except maybe Essence of the Spirit), but that's going to take a very long time to research.
Blacksmithing not being S tier :O. Suprising. Gold - takes long and cost an arm and a leg, without any growth modifier which means that this will be diminishing with corruption as game progresses. I wouldn't go out of my way to get it. And also you need Metsuke which is additional investment for a province with non fertile soil and no substantial turn 1 town wealth. Fletcher - way worse than Blacksmithing cause it only applies to ranged units while every unit benefits from extra armor. Also it is awkard that at the point you unlock it, it's kinda meh. Chonindo to grant +20 Accuracy from which Ashigaru would benefit most (cause low accuracy + high model count) but at this point of game you would have something better. And no granting even +25 Acc to Ashigaru doesn't put's them on even ground with Bow Samurai cause Sams have better arrow type. Ninja - I'm of opinion that people seriously overlook how great +5 Experience on hybrid unit is. Kisho Ninja are of the few units that utilizes every aspect of experience chevrons and getting +10 Accuracy/Reload on top of what? 3-4 Melee Attack and defence is wild. Ability to push out 5th lvl units to replace loses means, units at least won't lose experience and should keep leveling up. I really like it as Kisho are nice support units for Yari Walls. Iron/Naval/Wood - not discussing their place but they enable some interesting strategies. Ability to churn out units for 20-30% cheaper plays nicely with aggresive playstyle of looting Japan and living on the credit. Also sea battles are great at leveling up your generals - quicker leveling and perhaps more max level generals.
Yeah, I personally don't value the quality of troops that much. And while armour is nice, melee attack generally has a bigger impact with my playstyle, so I tend to go for melee attack. Also, bow ashigaru being on par with bow samurai was meant to be stat wise, the arrow type still makes a difference depending on the target. Furthermore, craftworks also has a slightly bigger economic impact that the blacksmith. Gold is one of the best economic buildings R.O.I. wise, being on par with the market and the first farm upgrade on fertile land. Town wealth, if you go for it, only really kicks in during the mid to late game, and gold will definitely be a huge early game booster. The extra experience on kisho ninja's is great indeed, but it's only boosting a special unit type. While the unit is good, I feel that the ninja agent utility greatly outshines the kisho ninja combat ability.
No it’s not… it’s I-URN, not I-ON you can still here the R… he’s saying it weird because he’s saying the word so quickly. If he slows it down just a little he would be saying iron exactly like a native speaker.
English is not my native language no, but the pronunciation of iron is as you can see from the other comment dialect based ;) But in my case I did pronounce it a bit weird because I indeed was talking quickly.
@@TheVikingGeneral Hey if anyone gives you crap about your ability to speak a SECOND language just speak to them in your native tongue. When they say that they cant speak it make fun of them for only being able to speak a single language.
@@MERCENARYTAO1 Haha, don't worry about it. Generally I recieve a lot of praise for my english irl, so I'm not too worried about it ;) And I do welcome tips about how to improve it, so it's nice to get pointers now and then.
Great video!
I would have put horses in S tier simply because AI will trade with you, if you have it. On top of that, I have had AIs pay 20k for trading agreements.
Haha, yesterday in the stream I was able to sell the horses to the Takeda for 34k iirc. I wanted to keep the actual building and the resources a bit sepperated, but warhorses are so ridiculously important that I just couldn't ignore it.
Yeah im pretty sure I've gotten 40k for trade agreements. I wait till I have captured the trade nodes and warhorses are vital. Takes time but well worth the wait.
yeah the AI would disagree, they reallly want their upgraded stables ... only to not recruit a ton of advanced cavalry XD
@@TheVikingGeneral I would rank smith higher, naginata samurai with armor can soak up all the enemies ammo
and ashigaru with melee upgrade make them endgame viable
also, I think you should, when ranking these consider how easy or hard it is to reach the third upgrade
for exaple smithee requires iron which you can get by either trading or just sending a small 2 ship navy + tradeship north early
the bowmaker however requires a lot of research investment (though it's ueseful research)
recruiting 5 monks at tier 3 means +30% chi research which will go up to +90% as you level them to tier 6, the chi bonus skill set also combines well with going for demoralizing armies build, which is a free high chance action to quickly level up and make mass routes easier
Kind of a late comment but something I've always thought is that if you directly control a wood or stone province, it should provide that reduced cost clan-wide. Maybe it shouldn't be as good, like stone would reduce building costs in that province by 10% and reduce clan-wide building costs by 5%, increasing at higher levels of development. Realistically you should be able to ship that resource to all your provinces and it would make those buildings a little more useful and worth it to develop. If max level quarry's reduced clan-wide construction costs by say 12-15% it would pay for itself very quickly. Just an offhand thought I had
I recommend watching Epic History TV's take on castles. They are most often build close to the source/mine due to the high weight and cost of transportation of stone. Thus it wouldn't make sense to transport stone across Japan.
@@hasbilksar985ok this is a game, not an irl simulator
@@marcoaraiza9381 but it's based on reality
@@hasbilksar985 it's based on reality but it's not a simulation of reality. Every game sacrifices realism for fun, and they should.
Naval tradition should be B or C. The bonus for ships is meh but if you're going to rank gold as S tier because of the early game cash boost you get, naval tradition's trade chain is also good for the same reason. But, I tend to be a trade heavy player so maybe it's just me.
Haha, maybe. Naval tradition isn't bad, the trade tarrif bonus is okayish, but the RTI is quite low for clans who are not going to trade or will have a lot of trade good lying around.
Warhorses also buff infantry. So you could also throw it on ashigaru.
Yup, but infantry will generally benefit more from attack/armour. ;)
Very gratifying seeing ninja village get some love. Level 1 ninjas as such painfully incompetent goobers that it feels like an exercise in masochism. And you can develop the other locations into tax-based gold mines. Since they're clustered around Kyoto and imho the area is hard to defend, I agree that they're less strategic than S-tier but I do see them as part of the high points in the campaign.
Yeah, the location just holds them back from being S-tier. In a vacuum they're awesome, but for certain clans it's simply not viable to rush for them.
I rank the ninja higher too especially as ikko ikki great income when leveled up and since they don't get metsuke I use ninjas every turn the army sabotage ability is a clan saver. You can pin down an enemy army for as many turns as you need to bring up reinforcements and damage them by attrition when in my territory. Plus who doesn't love a good ninja cutsene?
I owuld agree, except if my scrub Ninjas were competent I wouldn't get to watch the slapstick fail videos, so I'm rating this both an advantage and a drawback. 🤪
Armoury + Master Bow Maker is just so good. Turns Bow Ashigaru into budget Bow Samurai and turns Bow Monks into actually decently armored mega-snipers.
Isnt it that only one of these can be in a province? Or did I mess something up?
@@gorgit You did, but it's a very easy mistake to make:
- Armourer/Master Armourer is one of the paths for the smithing provincial specialty chain, and hence can never be combined with a Bowmaker/Master Bowmaker.
- Armoury is one of the options for upgrading the regular Encampment chain.
@@magni5648 ahh, thanks for clarifying! Im new to the game, so I was really confused
Nice video, some thoughts on the rankings.
Horses should be S tier for the simple reason that you cannot recruit any cavalry unit other than light cav. without it, if the AI has it and you don't, good luck getting a trade deal with them.
Stone should be A, same as above not having this resource locks off higher level castles but since you can realistically win a campaign without it, an A is high enough.
Thank you for your comment. :) I tried to keep the resource itself apart from the actual buildings themselves. Access to trade goods is generally fairly easy to accomplish. But I just couldn't ignore the power of the warhorse resource, that's why I upped the Horses specialty to A, since the building itself would only warrant a B tier.
When it is the other way around you get massive trade deals
Hollowed ground is great for improvement moral of your ashigaru units. Giving them moral equal to there samurai counter parts but I can see why you put it there from a economic view.
Better morale is definitely strong, since that's basically the health of your unit. But there are so many other ways of boosting morale, that the increase that it does give doesn't matter that much.
Hello everyone! Let me know if you like these kinds of videos :) I would love to hear your thoughts!
Personally, I do find these types of videos quite helpful especially for people who are still not very familiar with the game, or just plain curious. Love the vids btw:D
Naval traditions can be op, the boost of stats that you get because of the experience Is HUGE
Literally a fast ship can capture a big one with that boost
Yup, but sadly, you pretty much don't need a navy in shogun 2. I mean, you can definitely get some benefit out of it, but it'll will generally just be a drain on your finances.
The thing with getting better accuracy for your archers and Only going with ashigaru bowmen is that you save money on the upkeep and don't have to build the archery dojo, making you more money
Smithing isn't S tier? I'm confused a bit, but intrigued
Edit: 3:30 "limiting factor is money" Laughs in Kyushu:)
Kyushu is just a league apart xD. But no, for me, the most important thing is having money to actually pay for your troops. Better troops helps, since you might need less troops, but more troops is generally better. ;)
I disagree. I prefer small, more capable armies. That way the AI always comes to you rather than having to chase armies around the map, thinking it can smash you with a full stack, only for the stack to be deleted from the game by a smaller, more potent force.
@@bradmonk69 You're wrong though, the correct way of playing is having multiple stacks of cheap units, that's why the oda are the strongest clan and it's not even close. Btw if you play anything below legendary your input is irrelevant.
The tier list format is a good idea, it makes it easier to understand. Thanks for the video, it's very helpful!
Glad it was helpful! :)
Damn man. This is a phenomenal video.
the gold income is good and all, but i don't think it's that important.. All of the gold province only have meager soil, which mean they have to depend entirely on gold. Compared to the province with fertile soils, they do produce more income, though not by much..
The thing with the farms is that you'll have to master the required arts, while gold will always be available. Even with it's long construction time, it has one of the best return on investment times of all the buildings in the game.
A very thoughtful video. I like how you put things in order for us. It will help my thinking in future campaigns.
Glad it was helpful! :)
I'm not a fan of tier lists but this one is to put it simply is an exception its useful informative and helps you prioritize.
Glad you like it :)
"prioritize" as if we all don't just take a region when there's a chance hahaha
Love the tier lists! Would be nice if you make another one
Tank you! I'll try to come up with something interesting :P
I'm afraid I will have to disagree with most of your tiers. In the beginning of the video you stated that you will rate the buildings based on how important they are to a successful campaign. I will give my detailed opinion on each one of them.
Gold is not required for a successful campaign. It certainly makes things easier and super helpful in the early game but it does not unlock special units or even regular units. Add to the fact that there are only 3 locations all over the map where you can get it, and only the Hojo, Uesugi and Mori may feasibly get it early enough to make a difference, I would rate it B-Tier.
Philosophical Tradition is nice to have as it ranks up your metsuke and give a boost to research but the same as Gold its not necessary for a successful campaign. Does it make things easier? sure but considering you can only ever have 5 metsuke, its value decreases a lot by mid-game. A C-Tier.
Ninja Villages are very limited in their availability despite there being 3 locations of them, they are all in the center region around Kyoto. The only starting clans that will benefit from it are the Hattori, Ikko Ikki and Oda. Extra ranks for Ninja is overrated since you still need to invest in research in order to get the maximum benefit and by the time you get the research done your Ninja would have already ranked twice from sitting in a castle. While I'm at it I will also rate Hallowed Ground for the same reason. Both are C-Tier.
I agree with you on Fletchers and Blacksmith being A-Tier. They are strategically placed in locations that would allow any clan to poach them early on and get the best benefits with their starting army even if its all Ashigaru.
Horses and Iron however I disagree with you entirely. They are the best specialties in the game and ones you need to secure as fast as possible whether through trade or conquest since you don't need to upgrade them in order to get their full benefits which is unlocking essential Samurai units that you will use in your campaign. Horses even more than Iron since Yari Ashigaru can carry you to the late game but can you honestly tell me you can play an entire game without Yari or Katana Cavalry? Both S-Tier
Stone is underrated as its important to upgrade your castles as well as the construction discount they provide along with the income. Still, its rare to fully upgrade a castle due to the food costs so I will tentatively agree with you on keeping it in C-Tier though I may bump it to B-Tier if I'm playing the Hojo.
Wood and Naval I agree with you. I may argue that Naval is more important as it allows you to recruit the Red Seal trade ship which can defend well against attackers but both would still be D-Tier to me.
Goof video regardless and one of a kind considering the many YT channels that cover Shogun 2 for 10 years now and haven't made a similar video.
I really value economic buildings and regions, that's why economic stuff always gets a leg up. From a single fully build gold mine, you'll be able to finance a complete ashigaru army. I generally don't really care about the quality of my troops, but I do care about being able to pay them ;). Properly developed metsukes can singlehandedly carry your economy.
My Ninja turnover rate is quite high, since I generally have them in enemy territory most of the time. So whenever I get to that part of the map, I'm always glad that I'm able to have the +2 ranks. Since a rank 3 ninja is all I need for the max points in army sabotage.
For the Horses, Iron and Stone, I tried hard to not be influenced too much by the actual trade good it provides. I was mostly looking at what the buildings themselves provided. I did get swayed by the Horses, as I would've putten the building in B-tier, but I can indeed just not overlook the fact that the warhorse resource is so important throughout the entire game. Iron and Stone trade resource are less important, since you'll only need it for the construction. You will want to build up before RD anyway, so'll you'll probably be able to trade for it if you lack it, and after RD by the time you need it again, you'll probably have captured a province of it anyway.
And if you're really desperate for horses and find yourself with a navy somehow, you can always use the trade node xD
But thank you for your insight! It's good to have people not simply agreeing with me, keeps me from getting complacent. :)
You only need Iron to upgrade the blacksmith; after that, it's more or less forgettable..
Stone should be C regardless, as it's only useful in the late game. Even as Hojo, you don't go around upgrading castle everywhere - most of your castle should be Tier 1 only, and save the food for town growth (+50 growth per turn in all your provinces is no joke). In fact, i would tear down all the excess castle the AI build in stone province - if i could..
Ninja is S tier.. The Ninja chain is the easiest one to unlock legendary building, and you can just add that on top of the specialty building to product rank 5 ninja from the get-go.. And since Ninja is the one under the most risk, the ability to replace them in 1 turn is S-Tier..
Tech rush is always B tier at worst, especially when you can shave off 1/3rd of the research time for each of these.. A or S tier.
Dam, listening to the background really makes me want to get back into gekokujo
I'm just hoping they will be able to make that mod for bannerlord as well
Smiths is S tier for me playing ikko ikki I turn my warrior monks into tanks with 7 armor combined with the encampment upgrade. A must when their base armor is at 2.
Wow great job man. Your videos are amazing.Thank you so much.
the shrine strongest perk is not even the monk level, it's the insane +3 morale to all land units.
I don't agree with gold being S tier. Gold mines don't provide something that can't be replicated elsewhere. Blacksmith/the plus accuracy building potentially yields much more gold, as it allows you to either have less units in your army, or use ashigaru instead of samurai. Horses are even more so s tier as it enables you to recruit cavalry.
I disagree with some of the entries.
Warhorses: Should be in S, not only do they make your cav way better but the ai that usually does not want to trade throws ridiculous sums of money at you, more than you could reasonably get with gold mines unless your campaign is rather long, investing these 5 digit sums properly will make the rest of the campaign a breeze.
Gold Mines: They look good on paper, but they are mid tier at best. Not only does it take forever to build it up, it is costly as well, and regions with gold are bad at everything else like having horrendous farming for example. For them to become profitable, money, metsukes and time are necessary, lots of it.
Hallowed Ground: Together with the highest temple it allows you to recruit level 5 monks right away, which is very useful as you have a cheap and never ending supply of competent revolt starters, research accelerators and enemy Metsuke deleters, definitely belongs in A with the ninjas.
I specifically did not want to rate the provinces on the trade good they provide. I agree that warhorses are extremely useful.
Gold mines give the best ROI compared to ANY other building in the entire game. Even early in the game, it's worth investing in them.
Yeah, with hallowed ground I also see your point, but I don't rate monks as high as ninja's or metsuke's, mostly due to my personal playstyle. But it can definitely be very good.
@@TheVikingGeneral My experience with gold mines might be somewhat skewed, because pretty much every time I get the Sado goldmine as Uesugi my early game becomes MUCH harder due to the goldmine taking forever to actually come online. As Hojo the goldmine is definitely better since you start out with it and most main provinces are not really rich to begin with. I definitely see them as a lot worse than very rich farming provinces when it comes to how quick they make you a lot of money, as lvl 1-2 gold mines are simply crap, especially without good metsukes.
personally i think charge bonus is more important mid end game, having a maxed out great guard to use with a checkerboard rush formation right when first wave clashes use the great guard in tandem at an angle itll damn near insta route them. and you keep rinse repeating for each wave of soldier that keeps hitting the frontline.
I've been recruiting my archers in blacksmith provinces- I find that the +5 armour you can get from the armourer and encampment building combined make them extremely tankyz especially given the AIs archery cheats.
Has anyone else tried this and how do you find thr results of this compared to the accuracy buff?
Bow maker is S tier with pimped up bows, you don't need any artillery when taking castles
Blacksmith is single most important building, plus five armor is game changer to any units. Warhorse is S tier building, other clan will pay massive payment in trade and kickstart your campaign and willingness to trade with you.
Armor is better than the attack bonus? I always go for the attack because I think the armor bonus from the blacksmithing only help against arrows.
@@TheFlyingZulunecro post
But to my knowledge armor works both in melee and against missile fire.
Add that to the extra melee attack/morale and melee defense when a unit levels. Plus other external bonus's and you got a great Yari wall
Hi Viking.
I personally would put Naval Tradition higher. B at least.
(for Clans near Kycho Island and the Trade Points it's very handy to have)
higher Experience Ships gives massiv Stats & Moral Boost for Ships. (Moral is very OP in Naval Battle/Auto resolve)
A few Fleets with experience Medium Bune & Bow Kobaya (+ Fire Arrow) give you a very good & Cost effectiv Fleet.
And it easy to Block northern Kyscho, which helps against Naval Invasion. (I'm looking at you Homna
Yeah, I can understand your reasoning there! I just personally never build or use navy in any large capacity, and when I do I generally end up regretting investing in it. But the arts on their own are pretty good if you want to do naval stuff indeed.
@@TheVikingGeneral Yeah, I understand. Vanilla Shogun 2 Naval is very special. (FotS Naval rocks tough!).
But so far in my experience. A fleet of 1-2 Medium Bunes + 6-8 Bow Kobaya with 5 experience is pretty good even in Auto resolve. (I like some Flamebomb Kobaya as well)
But I usually dont play on Legendary Difficulty, so I dont know if this works on highest Difficultly.
PS: I like your Channel. keep up the good work ^^
Will you do research tier list like this? Kinda curious what research is the most beneficial to the campaign, my best guest is tax reform, equal fields, and sumo tournament for chi art. And heaven and earth, and way of the bow for bushido art
I was thinking how I would cover the arts mastery, and a tierlist isn't a bad idea actually. Without actually doing it, I would agree with you, except for the sumo tournament. It's a good art, but it's preceded by a relative useless one, so that makes it less valuable for me.
@@TheVikingGeneral yeah, noh it's shit art, but tea ceremony is ok for honor, other than that, it gives happiness. Other art that gives happiness is zen (you can get early on), and neo confucianism (late game art)
On a second note. I'm really suprised you rank the Ninja-Building so high. I never Prioritised them, mostly bc of their Location. With most Clan I Operatet left or right side of them Map. At the time I reach Kyoto. I normaly already recruited my 5 Ninjas so .I never quite get to use them. Well maybe I have to try it next time .
It's an awesome building, but the location is just a tad annoying for most clans.
Why is everyone hating navies? I really cannot imagine wining any camping without defending trade, raiding trade routes, defending from invasions. Am i playing this game wrong?
smithing is my #1 choice
You didn’t put the arrows on the map om the horse specialty :)
sssshhhhh :P (the first time after rendering I put up the smithing specialty twice)
Craftworks should be B Tier because you need an expensive Art to fully upgrade it. There's a similar problem with blacksmiths, but as long as you have warhorses, you can trade for the necessary iron. If you don't have warhorses, there's probably a trade node with iron not too far from you.
The Chonindo art is a very good art for long term economy strategies, so if the game goes on long enough, you'll probably want it anyway. ;)
And getting access to iron isn't that difficult indeed.
@@TheVikingGeneral It is. But if you want Bow Warrior Monks with max accuracy, you're going to need Chonindo, Essence of the Spirit, Way of the Bow, AND Heaven and Earth. All useful arts to be sure (except maybe Essence of the Spirit), but that's going to take a very long time to research.
@@AvengerAtIlipa Yup, warrior monks in general take a long time to field. Might as well throw on a little bit extra no? :P
Hallowed Ground is the worst if your Christian. Kind of weird you can't convert them to a monastery or re-dedicate to a Christian Saint.
navy is very important for controlling all the trade node
Blacksmithing not being S tier :O. Suprising.
Gold - takes long and cost an arm and a leg, without any growth modifier which means that this will be diminishing with corruption as game progresses. I wouldn't go out of my way to get it. And also you need Metsuke which is additional investment for a province with non fertile soil and no substantial turn 1 town wealth.
Fletcher - way worse than Blacksmithing cause it only applies to ranged units while every unit benefits from extra armor. Also it is awkard that at the point you unlock it, it's kinda meh. Chonindo to grant +20 Accuracy from which Ashigaru would benefit most (cause low accuracy + high model count) but at this point of game you would have something better. And no granting even +25 Acc to Ashigaru doesn't put's them on even ground with Bow Samurai cause Sams have better arrow type.
Ninja - I'm of opinion that people seriously overlook how great +5 Experience on hybrid unit is. Kisho Ninja are of the few units that utilizes every aspect of experience chevrons and getting +10 Accuracy/Reload on top of what? 3-4 Melee Attack and defence is wild. Ability to push out 5th lvl units to replace loses means, units at least won't lose experience and should keep leveling up. I really like it as Kisho are nice support units for Yari Walls.
Iron/Naval/Wood - not discussing their place but they enable some interesting strategies. Ability to churn out units for 20-30% cheaper plays nicely with aggresive playstyle of looting Japan and living on the credit. Also sea battles are great at leveling up your generals - quicker leveling and perhaps more max level generals.
Yeah, I personally don't value the quality of troops that much. And while armour is nice, melee attack generally has a bigger impact with my playstyle, so I tend to go for melee attack. Also, bow ashigaru being on par with bow samurai was meant to be stat wise, the arrow type still makes a difference depending on the target. Furthermore, craftworks also has a slightly bigger economic impact that the blacksmith.
Gold is one of the best economic buildings R.O.I. wise, being on par with the market and the first farm upgrade on fertile land. Town wealth, if you go for it, only really kicks in during the mid to late game, and gold will definitely be a huge early game booster.
The extra experience on kisho ninja's is great indeed, but it's only boosting a special unit type. While the unit is good, I feel that the ninja agent utility greatly outshines the kisho ninja combat ability.
sorry i totally forgot about liking, comenting but never about subscribing ;)
That's understandable, I find myself forgetting to like and commenting on videos I like as well ;)
horses are SS tier because AI will pay you thousands for your trade deals once you have them
Hey man, pretty sure English is not your first language but the r is silent in iron. Also love you content! Keep it up
No it’s not… it’s I-URN, not I-ON you can still here the R… he’s saying it weird because he’s saying the word so quickly. If he slows it down just a little he would be saying iron exactly like a native speaker.
English is not my native language no, but the pronunciation of iron is as you can see from the other comment dialect based ;) But in my case I did pronounce it a bit weird because I indeed was talking quickly.
@@TheVikingGeneral Hey if anyone gives you crap about your ability to speak a SECOND language just speak to them in your native tongue. When they say that they cant speak it make fun of them for only being able to speak a single language.
@@MERCENARYTAO1 Haha, don't worry about it. Generally I recieve a lot of praise for my english irl, so I'm not too worried about it ;) And I do welcome tips about how to improve it, so it's nice to get pointers now and then.
Lol I pronounce is I-RUN... But I've got a bit of a southern accent.
No, thank you