Conference rusure::nintendo

    I played the game for about 2 hours before deciding it was just
    not a game for me.  It is similiar to the board game RISK.  You
    have so much money you can spend on things like clearing land for
    rice  patties, building dams, training and hiring men of arms,
    exctra...
    
    The game to me moves slow, is not straight forward as far as how
    to figure your statagies (ie: you have 100 men, you go to attack
    a neighboring providence, and for some reason you only have 15 of
    your men and end up getting you hind end kicked!).  I know alot
    of these problems could have been ovoided or lessed if I spend a
    long time reading the intructions and continuing to play.  But at
    $60 a pop, I feel the game was poorly designed as far as playability
    goes.
    
    A game long on stratagy, short on getting the player involved, I
    give it a 3-4 (especially for the price!).
    
    Craig

    This game is mind-boggling in its complexity.  It's one of those games
    that you really can't appreciate until you've put several hours of play
    into it.  The game is set in the mid 1500's during Japan's civil wars. 
    The object of the game is to unify Japan (Nobunaga's Ambition).  
    
    There are two versions of the game: a 17-feif version and a 50-feif 
    version.  I haven't attempted the 50-feif version yet.  Each version 
    can be played at one of five levels of sophistication.  I'm still 
    struggling along at level 1.
    
    At the beginning of the game, you become the daimyo (leader) of a fief 
    of your choice. As leader, you have personality traits which influence
    your overall success such as health, drive, charisma, IQ.  You set
    the values of these traits before the game starts and these values 
    change throughout the game. 
    
    The game is historically accurate and it helps to do a little reading
    up on the history of the period to select which daimyo you'd like to
    be.  Choose the wrong one and you will have a real uphill battle trying
    to change history (it can be done, however).
    
    The game takes place in increments of seasons.  At the beginning of a
    season you make various decisions about which parameters you'd like to
    adjust and hit the A button. The game controls all the other fiefs 
    automatically except the ones controlled by other players (the game 
    can be played by 1 to 8 players at once).  Your decision on which
    parameters to adjust depends on an understanding of how one parameter
    may affect another.  You have to read the instructions carefully.
    
    An example of how complex this can all get is the decision to wage war
    (which must be taken carefully). In order to win a war, your men must
    either outnumber, outmanuever and/or be more highly trained than your
    opponent.  OK, so say you have 100 men and you want to use 50 of those 
    to fight a neighbor.  However, you lose 45 men in battle, so you are 
    left with only 5 men in that fief (which is now a prime target for 
    anyone) and you have weakened your home fief (only 50 there now). 
    And that's only the beginning, folks.
    
    In general, the more you play this one the more you will astounded by
    it.  It's not the average shoot-em-up Nintendo fare.  I'd be interested
    in what others might have to say on this one.  Maybe one of our readers
    from Japan could tell us more about these civil wars and the
    personalities involved?
                                                        
    Jason
    
    
      
    
      
    
      

    Does it have a password feature of some sort?
    

    ...but it may take you quite a while to learn to play a game that can
    be saved (i.e., you're pretty quickly and mercilessly disposed of if
    you make bad decisions).
    

    I got this game for my fellow travelers after getting hooked on "Desert
    Commander."  The 10-year-old played it without the instructions and was
    doing quite well before I pulled out the instructions.
    
    We've also come up against what was complained about in an earlier
    reply: how to make a specific number of soldiers available for a war
    campaign.  (Maybe I'd like to take them all?)
    
    It's also not clear whether contiguity or proximity of friendly forces
    help in battles.  And since the five war units are always moved in the
    same sequence, it's tough to have misplaced Unit 5 ahead of Unit 4 in a
    narrow pass, since the two will typically have a an empty space buffer
    between them.
    
    We've gotten hooked on this one as well and saved a promising scenario
    (my fiefdom got eliminated after I conquered and was divided, and my
    buddy stayed home, put up his feet and had his men train, train,
    train).
    
    Overall, Nobunaga's Ambition is like a mix of Risk and Hammurabi (you
    know, the old "how much shall we feed the peasants, sire?" BASIC game).
    
    Frank

    
    	Some spilers!!!
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    	Some of you don't know why you can't use all of your men during
    war. Tell me this, if you were going to go to war, wouldn't you
    want to get payed at least onpiece of gold???
    
    	Also, a strategy move is:
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    	Look at an opponent's fief, see if it's his home fief after
    he/she has conquered  5 or 6 other fiefs. If you conquer the home
    fief, you get all the other land, gold, and men.
    
    
    	I hope this will help some of you. 

    re: previous spoiler
    
    
    
    I'd like to have something to eat on my month of campaigning, as well.
    
    It's not true that you get the enemy's extra fiefs and land if you
    conquer his home fief.  You must kill the enemy daimyo.  Since they
    will often choose to retreat rather than fight at ruinous odds, mostly
    you don't kill them.
    
    Notice that cutting them off from all the rest of their fiefs, and
    *then* conquering the home fief always works, as the enemy has nowhere
    to flee.
    
    

    Anyone actually lived very long at level 5?
    
    It seems that all the enemy troops are too tough.  I've gone into
    combat against troops that are inferior to mine in every way:  I have
    better morale, skill and arms.  Yet I still get clobbered.  (Worst
    case: I had attacked 9 enemy men with 40 of my own.  He stayed in his
    castle, and I killed exactly 4! of his men while losing all 40 of
    mine.)
    
    The only difference I see is that the enemy commanders are so much more
    experienced than I.  They all have IQs well up into the 120s and 130s,
    while I'm stuck with a maximum of 109 at startup.  Does this really
    make that much of a difference, or is there some other trick I'm
    missing?
    
    Level 1 was too easy. Except for a minor typo or two, (*Don't* attack
    with 150 men and only 15 rice, because you missed the last zero!) I
    marched from one end of Japan to the other with no real problems. 
    Level 5 seems impossible - you can't fight even with overwhelming
    numbers on your side and win *any* combat.  And of course, the enemies
    all start off with much better peasant loyalty than you, so you're
    behind in the economic war as well.  This means you can't outproduce
    him, and your troops act like green recruits until you get a victory or
    10 under your belt, and that sure looks like a classic catch-22.
    
    Any hints?

       here's my two cents worth since I just attempted this game last
    weekend.  I like the game overall, it is a RISK type game.  I don't
    know who this person is who marched from one end of Japan to the
    other, but hey, you must be good.  I played a game with five friends
    last sunday and on my third turn took five separate attacks of which
    the fifth finished me.  All attacks were by the computer, by the
    way.  You must have enough gold to pay your men, along with enough
    rice.  Also, when attacking, it's a good idea to bring along all
    of your men because when you've conquered a fief, you get a separate
    turn with that fief, which allows you to move men back into your
    old one.  When on the defensive, lure the computer to use all his
    men to take your daimyo while using your own men to get his. He'll
    play the chase game while you corner his daimyo.  Try to avoid fighting
    his men since when you kill him, you get all his men, gold, and rice.
    
    Overall, I'm addicted.  I put an add in the wanted section, but
    if anyone in here wants to get rid of it, contact me.  Otherwise,
    does anyone know what the cost is for this game, or where it could
    be found in the southern NH area?
    
    thanks for any help (or spoilers).  

    Thanks for the compliment.
    
    However, it wasn't all skill.  Persistence helps, too, since
    experimenting with the start positions of the different daimyos is
    mandatory.  
    
    This is because:
    
    
    
    The easiest way to build an army is to have someone else send it to
    you.  There are many techniques for doing this - pick the one for the
    situation at hand.)  
    
    One you have already hit on - lure his men away and kill his daimyo. 
    This is most effective when the computer's daimyo is in a small unit. 
    You can get upwards of 75% of the enemy force this way.  
    
    (I like to build my army into 3 - yes, three - units.  Build the rifles
    unit up to its maximum.  Build the cavalry unit up to 50 or 60%.  Put
    the rest of the soldiers into the your unit 0.  Then, on defense, use
    the rifles to defend the your castle, put your daimyo immediately
    *behind* the castle if you can, and put the cavalry out somewhere near
    where you expect the enemy to show up.  Dodge or avoid all his other
    units with the cavalry until you can close with and kill his daimyo.)
    
    The second technique is to kill all of the enemy's units BUT his
    daimyo, and then run away until he gives up in exhaustion.  This is
    most effective when the enemies units approximate 50% of his force.
    
    Finally, there's the overwhelming attack strategy.  If you can get him
    to run away without fighting, you capture 100% of his men!  This is
    another reason I find the single large cavalry unit appealing.  If you
    can get it up to the daimyo, the daimyo will often run away.
    
    - Chris

    Couple of quick, novice questions... Can I only do one think per season,
    such as adjust tax rate, build dams, train army, etc?  I couldn't
    figure out how to collect taxes, train my army or get more soldiers in
    anywhere near the speed the computer did.  Is there any fief that would
    be easier for a novice war gamer to learn with?
    
    What is best, build your city, increase taxes to xx%, by and train
    armies or what.  I think I'm goona like this game if I could get it
    going just a little.
    
    Thanks,
    Monte ("The Mello") VanDeusen

    I haven't touched this in a while, so my memory is like my controller
    fingers...atrophied.  In our introduction to N's A we would spend
    season after season training men and fiddle with the tax rate to see
    the effects.  I didn't have the impression that the one-task-per-move
    was a limiting factor, but one does itch to go get somebody pretty
    soon.  I guess NES daimyos need to be as patient as the real ones.
    
    For a novice, go check the experience levels of the daimyos and select
    one who has pretty high levels all around.  In other words, avoid the
    ones with "defects" that need a keen player-strategist to overcome.
    
    Frank

    re: General strategy
    
    I found it was more important to have a good tax base (peasants with
    high morale and large cities) over anything else.  Large numbers of
    inexperienced but well armed troops will overwhelm your opponents.
    
    (Of course, I don't do very well at the higher levels, so take this
    advice with a grain of salt.  But I have beaten the game at level 3,
    anyway.)
    
    In the very early going, pray your peasants don't revolt and build your
    city.  Also, adjust your tax rate up a bit from the ridiculously low
    20% that you start with.  I found 30% to be reasonable.
    
    After you start to generate a little cash, go root, hog or die for
    peasant loyalty.  
    
    Keep your soldier's morale up, too.
    
    - chris

    my stategy...
    
    this is how I begin each game.  Your tax rate begins at 20%, way too
    low.  I usually raise it to about 60%  (yeah, just like Mass.).  On the
    following turn give all of your gold to the peasants.  This brings up
    the wealth of your fief and you'll recieve alot of gold.  Then use it to
    BUILD up your town and GROW your output.  I like to keep a well armed
    force because in a recent game I saw what one could do against a far
    better skilled army of equal size.  Also, you should try to TRADE
    almost every turn because merchants are hard to come by.  Try level one
    first, and only attempt level 2 once you've won.  I tried level three
    once and needless to say got my butt kicked.  
    
    My personal favorite in the game is ODA.  In the 17 fief variant he is
    #17.  In the 50 fief variant he is #25.  He starts off strong and has    
    great potential.  The only problem is that he is usually surrounded by
    other huge daimyo's.  You must take it one at a time.
    
    Secret strategy tip =>  if you are bordered by a huge army, try a
    summer ninja strike against his town, which is ARSON, and he may not be
    able to pay all his men in the fall.  They in turn will disappear from
    his fief.
    
    ...george 

    Here are some of my tips for your NA gaming fun.  I have spent close
    to 50 hours on the NES version and perhaps 135 on the PC version.
    
    1) Immediatly raise your tax to 46% and never higher or revolts
    will get your A$#.
    2) Next lavish gold/rice on your peasants and get their loyalty
    and wealth up and keeeeeeep it up. Remember that building towns will 
    reduce this and growing will reduce this too.
    3) Next both train and lavish your troops to get their morale and
    skill and arms high, at least in the 150's.
    4) Buy rice when the price is low and sell rice when the price is
    high. You can do this througout the game (if a trader is present), I
    would not do this in an early move.
    5) As indicated in .10 assign your troops from the even deployment
    to on that favors units 2,3 and 1.  Assignment costs Gold to perform
    so do this early but only when you can afford it.
    6) Rice output and gold output in the fall is a direct function
    of loyalty, wealth output and dams with some town thrown in.
    7) Certain feifs have almost 100% access to traders while some of
    the mountain fiefs could have a trader appear only once per year.
    In the 17 fief vs. computer senario I have done well with ODA =
    17 and 15 = Mioshi?sp?
    8) As mentioned earlier sending ninja to burn towns or destroy dams
    and plunder rice can starve an opponent's army.
    9) General guidline, keep at least 60% units of rice and gold in
    your coffers in the season of summer to feed you army as they consume
    in that month.  Consumption and commodity price is a function of rate, which
    is an overall economic indicator.
    10) Try not to defend from within your own town as you will eventually
    destroy it and thus some of your fiefs economy and peasantry. Conversly
    if at all possible attack by moving into an opponent's twon, especially
    in early battles, in a final battle, you are actually hurting yourself
    assuming the town will soon be yours.   
    
    The NES version does not show, I suppose due to memory constraints,
    the number of peasants in other feifs as well as your own. This
    is sad since peasants can be lured away from opponent's feifs thus
    reducing output and Gold production.  Sometimes when Ninja are
    unleashed upon you and you do not know what has happened it is because
    20% of your peasants have left but the NES version give you no f&*%$#@
    way of knowing it!
    
    When in battle mode you can do an automatic unit pass by hitting
    the button on the left.  If you can invest the hours, NA is a good
    strategy game. I understand that KOEI's Gengas Khan will be out
    in February 1990. Enjoy. I hope these pearls will be of help.
    
    

>>>    strategy game. I understand that KOEI's Gengas Khan will be out
>>>    in February 1990. Enjoy. I hope these pearls will be of help.
    
    How does Gengas Khan compare?  I'm about ready to buy one of these two
    games and it looked like Gengas might have a little better graphics...
    
    Thanks for any info.
    
    Monte