Dong Zhuo’s Rivals Unite – 189 A.D.
Yuan Shu – 22. Wan Strategy:
Yuan Shu is a top ruler in this scenario. First of all, Wan castle is a decent one to start off in despite the fact that there aren’t many new officers here for a while. Wan is the neighbor to four estates; Xin Ye and Xu Chang (both not taken, although Liu Biao likes to move into the former and the latter is usually moved into shortly as well) and also to Chang An and Luo Yang, two powerful Dong Zhuo strongholds. If you stand pat, Dong Zhuo will probably crush you at some point, or at least attack you with a force more formidable than yours. That said you can paralyze Dong Zhuo without even sending a soldier his way, and it’s probably the first thing you should focus on doing.
Actually I’d have one of your lesser military officers (ie Liang Gang or Chen Lan) spy on these two Dong Zhuo cities. Meanwhile, turn Qiao Rui into a Civil Officer, and have him, Han Yin, and Yuan Yin upgrade Economy for six months. Continue this process until your economy is in the mid 1000’s. Everyone else should work on training and rallying the soldiers, and try to split them up in a way where Yuan Shu, Ji Ling and Zhang Xun are controlling most of them. When you have some spare officers and your spies at Chang An and Luo Yang are reporting, try to do a few things to the disloyal members of Dong Zhuo’s army.
Zhu Jun at Chang An is a must; generally Dong Zhuo switches him out of the Governor position in favor of Jia Xue or Li Ju, as Zhu Jun has a 70 loyalty and it drops. Dong Cheng and Zhong Yao are at 70 loyalty and are also recruitable here and Jia Xue is too, although the latter is in the early 90’s for loyalty so it’ll be hard. Your best bet is to recruit Zhu Jun before Dong Zhuo changes his Governors; if you’re too late (sometimes he does it the first turn) then you should still recruit Zhu Jun, as he will still have his Governor soldiers even if he was displaced of the position (leaving Chang An with roughly 3000 soldiers). The other generals here won’t have many soldiers left if you get Zhu Jun, and if you get Zhu Jun before he is displaced as Governor, then Chang An is yours very easily. Jia Xue is the real prize here, as you can give him a War Manual of Sun Tzu and he’ll have over 100 Intelligence (ie a perfect advisor). If you can manage to recruit him at a high loyalty, all the better. Getting Chang An is essential for closing in on Dong Zhuo and not having him escape (which is the problem if you go after Luo Yang first). At some point you’re going to want to send Jia Xue back to Yuan Shu’s capital of Wan. You’ll want his 104 intelligence (with the War Manual) for every decision from here on out. With his help, you can strip the rest of the discontents in Dong Zhuo’s army (anyone from 95 and under I believe, getting harder as it gets closer to 95). Remember though, that Jia Xue will ALWAYS give you the correct advise if he has a War Manual of Sun Tzu, so just keep trying until he says it’ll happen.
Now Dong Zhuo also is at Luo Yang and has quite the force, economically and militarily. In most cases, he moves his troops at Hong Nong to Luo Yang as well. Then he’ll either split some of them off to 4. Jin Yang or 19. Xu Chang, or sometimes both. Lu Bu is with him yet only has an 80 loyalty. You need to be all over this; use the Rebel plot on him, and it’s very likely he’ll rebel. After this, he’ll either be a Free Officer or he’ll join you (generally he just joins you). There are some good Civil Officers in Luo Yang to get as well, seeing as though Wan castle needs all the Civil Officers it can get. Wang Yun, Huangfu Song (a military officer who SHOULD be a civil officer), and Han Xian are all attainable here. After getting some or none of these, it’s time to dig in and build up Wan castle (and Chang An if you already stole it) so you can destroy Dong Zhuo when the time presents itself.
If you already have Chang An, chances are you can circle around and take Hong Nong pretty easily. Careful though, if you send all your soldiers to Chang An to attack Hong Nong, Dong Zhuo may attack Wan. Worse yet Cao Cao may move to Xu Chang which complicates matters. I’d try to ally with him ASAP, although be wary as Yuan Shu doesn’t exactly have a good reputation and rulers generally say no to him. Do give up whatever it takes (well, be realistic; give him a bunch of light arrows or something) to ally with Cao Cao as him betraying you is when you’ll make your move to take over China. Don’t bother with Dong Zhuo, he’s on the downside from the minute you chose Yuan Shu.
The computer Yuan Shu in 189 likes to sometimes move part of the army to Xin Ye. I don’t understand this; Xin Ye is a nice city with good potential, but you’re better served to ignore the south and take advantage of the chaotic Dong Zhuo. If Liu Biao moves into Xin Ye, which he might, then you’ll have to deal with him. Chances are he won’t bring too tough of a force to Xin Ye anyway and you probably won’t be warring with him until you settle the area immediately north of Wan. May want to ally with him anyway to buy yourself some time in the center and east, or just attack him at Xin Ye and force him to retreat back to Xiang Yang.
Once you have Dong Zhuo’s three cities and Wan, you’ll either be able to go east towards Cao Cao or south towards Liu Biao. Personally, I’d ally with both and work on getting your cities up to par in economy (mid 1000’s is good enough) and then work your army up as your economy provides. Don’t rush into invading Cao Cao; he has a deep and loyal army, while going after Liu Biao will result in Cao Cao likely betraying you and leaving you in a tough situation. If you can hold Luo Yang and Wan while you venture towards Xiang Yang and Liu Biao, then go forth and do so.
Anyway, once your economy is around the 1000’s in Wan, you can probably start getting yourself ready for a double-invasion on Luo Yang, if it’s not taken already. Chances are Cao Cao has the center area wrapped up by the mid 190’s. Again, that might not happen, but you might as well bank on Cao Cao being a force. If he somehow goes down (it happens) then be glad. Separate into two armies, one coming from Chang An and one from Wan. The one from Chang An will be weaker, but Hong Nong is probably very weak at this point anyway so that’s about right. Take Hong Nong, ignoring your back side (as Chang An will be near no enemies) but being careful of reinforcements from Luo Yang. Once Hong Nong is yours you can converge on Luo Yang, hopefully with Lu Bu and some of the Dong Zhuo Chang An generals on your side.
Once Luo Yang is settled, try to set up base there and in Wan. Now, you control the gateway from the east and west, a crucial point. Liu Biao still probably isn’t an issue and is probably directing his attention to Sun Jian. It’s possible Sun Jian will take out Liu Biao and Liu will flee to the northwest. Under this permutation you could be fighting Sun Jian earlier than you’d like, but chances are you’ll be left alone from the southlanders for a while. Meanwhile, Chang An will be able to produce economically with the good civil officers that come out of that area in the mid-190’s. Send this gold to the forefront (generally either Wan or Luo Yang, although they are probably well off themselves).
First, get the checkpoints around Luo Yang and Wan, assuming they aren’t Cao Cao’s (your ally hopefully). By the way, treat your alliance with Cao Cao as something to buy yourself time to be in the advantageous position when he betrays you. If at any point you can bury Cao Cao, do it, even if you’re allied with him. Likely though you’ll be heading north to Jin Yang to clean up the Dong Zhuo (or Dong Min/Huang) army and to further surround the center.
If you really got stuff done quick and Han Fu is around, by all means take Han Fu and Ye castle. Hopefully Cao Cao hasn’t expanded too far east or north, but there is a good chance he does while you’re doing all this Dong Zhuo stuff.
As you are hopefully searching each turn, eventually the Hereditary Seal will show up in Luo Yang. Pick this up and Yuan Shu will be much improved. At about 194 in both of my quests, Dong Zhuo fled to Jin Yang and ended up going into exile, while Liu Biao moved into Xin Ye and I allied with him so I could spend time building up to prepare for an attack by Cao Cao (who is also my ally). Recruiting generals should be easier for you now, with Yuan Shu being established and having the Hereditary Seal (100 charm), along with the advising abilities of Jia Xue.
As you can see by 197 the tide is definitely in Yuan Shu’s favor. Cao Cao still holds a decent amount of cities, but he also had Ye and Xu Chang. Fortunately, he betrayed someone (not me) and I recruited Fu Gan (the governor who’s loyalty dropped) at Xu Chang to gain 20 of his officers. Ye was taken by force by the Chang An group that took over Luo Yang. Meanwhile, Yuan Shu and the rest of the Wan warriors invaded Xin Ye, Xiang Yang, and Jiang Xia (along with Chang Ban) and simply overpowered them. Now when January hit, my advisor (see above) asked me to become Emperor. I recall this somewhat and am unsure if it is only for Yuan Shu, although I kind of assume it is. If you don’t accept nothing happens (I think), but if you do ascend to Emperor, the entire nation will become more hostile towards you. Still, declare yourself Emperor; it’s Yuan Shu and it wouldn’t be right if you did otherwise, plus you’re more powerful than anyone at this point (including Cao Cao probably).
The Sun family (Sun Jian might be dead at this point) should put up a decent fight, so I’d ally with them while you’re waiting to destroy Liu Biao. Meanwhile push further east on Cao Cao as he is still threat number one and when you choose to attack him, it’s best to go for the throat. If you take a few castles and get complacent, watch out, he can build up soldiers and officers like no other. Prior to me applying pressure to Xu Chang and Ye, Cao Cao was proceeding east swiftly. However he’s been losing battles to Sun Qian lately. That said don’t spread yourself too thin, you’re still vulnerable and you probably don’t have a very deep army (ie your unprotected castles are probably meager yet are beginning to produce economically).
As you can see, the Yuan Shu army has taken control from 197-199. Initially I took out Pu Yang, and then Ding Yao to seal off Cao Cao’s escape route. I then killed him at Chen Liu and mopped up Cao Hong and the remnants of the Cao family. The north was being taken simultaneously, as Yuan Shao was overloaded on officers (a common Yuan Shao f-up) and Gongsun Zan was nothing as usual. Kong Rong had good cities in Ping Yuan and Bei Hai but alas was overwhelmed also. In the winter of 198, I finished off Sun Qian and made my way towards mopping up the weak Wang Lang. Liu Biao is still alive but is very weak after several attacks by Sun Jian, while Han Fu and Liu Bei appeared in Yong An and Shang Yong, respectively. Finally, we sent Xu Huang and some others to Han Zhong to being preparations on a Liu Yan attack.
Sun Ce is still pretty powerful in the south (we assume, we haven’t actually spied on them yet), while we’re simply waiting for the Wang Lang business to be done so we can finish off Liu Biao and concern ourselves with the Sun family. Currently though we are allied with them and Liu Zhang (Liu Yan died recently).
Is it possible to finish before the year 200? Probably not, but we’re already at the second-to-the-last music, which is a good sign. Again, as you mop up central and northern China, you’ll tend to save the Sun’s and Liu’s in the south and southwest for last. Ma Teng and Wang Lang/Gongsun Zan/Yan Baihu are just the exterior limits of China and offer little resistance when the time comes to mop them up. At this point, the only thing that could derail our army is low loyalty or weak depth. The loyalty isn’t necessarily an issue and those who are still disloyal to the Hereditary Seal-carrying Yuan Shu aren’t on the frontline and thus can’t screw us over. Our depth is rather weak, but Han Zhong, Shang Yong, Jiang Xia, and Jian Ye are well fortified. More or less, Shang Yong and Jiang Xia are Yuan Shu’s direct army (Ji Ling, Zhang Xun, Li Feng, Lei Bo, Chen Lan, etc.) while Jian Ye is ran by Cao Cao and Dong Zhuo’s castoffs (the loyal ones at least). At this point, we’re waiting for the east to get settled, and as they work south through Lu Jiang and Chai Sang we’ll prepare for an invasion on the Sun family (we already have Chi Bi fortunately).
The passage through southeastern Wu is a swift one. This group heads further south and conquers the rest of these goombas (Xue Li took over for Sun Quan and was “ruling” Chai Sang). Now it’s time to move on the Sun family. He must have betrayed Liu Biao at some point because most of his officers are in the 80’s for loyalty, which means easy pickings and they also tend to be loyal to Yuan Shu (I believe Yuan Shu leans towards the Wu spectrum) anyway . With Yuan Shu’s army we take Jiang Ling; with the new army from the east that just arrived, well, they take Chang Shai. These are the toughest battles, as they’ll have built up castles and soldiers. However you should have your entire army brought to this part, and you should be able to overwhelm them assuming you have loyal warriors. Sun Jian is mopped up and Wang Kuang (who had taken refuge in 46 Nan Hai, god bless him) just gives up to us.
Now we surround Han Fu at Yong An and threaten him; he gives up also. Yong An is built up and Yuan Shu is here, combined with the army that was with him at Wu. Everyone else is at Han Zhong, building up and waiting for the pincer on Liu Zhang. Yuan Shu’s army is faster, tearing through Jiang Zhou (which is actually pretty decently guarded, with Yan Yan and others) and then Cheng Dou (which had upwards of 3600 for economy, but only Leng Bao guarding???). Before I can get up to go to the bathroom, Jian Ning and Yunnan are gobbled up like the food Lord Yuan Shu is going to consume in about five minutes once he finishes conquering China. The only surviving general of his army, Yang Huai, is left at Zi Tong. He gives up, and then it’s time to lay seige on Kong Zhou, who had moved in Xia Bian. He is captured and killed, and Ji Ling and Zhang Xun then move the army to Tian Shui. The next turn, Yuan Shu threatens Ma Teng, who is “honored to serve us”. Li Feng is then sent to An Ding while Lei Bo is sent back to the uncovered city of Xia Bian. Thus in December of 200, China belongs to the great Yuan Shu. More or less, once Cao Cao was trampled, it was only a matter of expanding out of the central area (common theme) one part at a time, with the 10 or so western cities being conquered in about six months.
Chances are you didn’t have too hard of a time completing this quest with the early shift in power towards Yuan Shu.
22. Wan Recruits:
Chen Ji (196)
Yuan Xiang (196)
Zhang Xian (197)
Hu Cher (197)