L'Empereur (for the Nintendo Entertainment System)
Quick Start Guide
GameFAQs: culwin
Email: nowhere4321@yahoo
NintendoAge: WashYourFace
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Preface
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I wrote this guide to help a new player jump into the game as quickly as
possible AFTER READING THE MANUAL. The manual does a good job of telling
you some basic things, such as how combat works, controls, etc. However,
it jumps around a lot and doesn't tell you everything it should.
The FAQ/Strategy Guide by madmanmike25 on GameFAQs is excellent, and you will
still need to read that guide after reading this to understand the intricacies
of the game.
Unfortunately, the hardest part of the game (and the part with the most to do)
is the very first turn which can be overwhelming to a new player. Think of
this guide as filling the gap between the manual and the in-depth FAQ.
Note that this guide focuses solely on the 4th scenario, which you must beat
to get the ending. I can't say how helpful it might be for the other scenarios.
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Terminology note:
I will use the term "general" only for Napoleon and the 5 officers that you
can directly order.
"Officer" and "army" may be used interchangably since every officer has an
army (even if it is an army of just himself).
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Protip: Get used to the "SEND" command. You will use it a lot, especially in
the National Phase.
Arranging Units for Defense/Offense
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So you've started the game, selected scenario 4, and bam! you're presented
with the National Phase screen. What to do??
Your #1 goal is arranging your armies (with SEND command) in such a way to
maximize the strength of your attacking armies but still have enough to defend
your border cities. There is no reason to ever leave guys in cities that don't
border another nation (with the exception of guys following generals). Ideally
you want just enough defensive guys in a border city to dissuade anyone from
attacking you, because any extra defenders are doing nothing but consuming
resources (don't forget to count reserves as well as active armies).
In my experience, around 600 troops (whether infantry, cavalry, reserves, etc)
is a good approximate number for defending a border city, especially on the
English side of the map, although you may need a bit more or less. You may
have to experiment; use the View command on a foreign city to see enemy troop
strength, and reload save games if needed to find an appropriate number.
Remember you have an alliance with Austria for the first 3 years, so you
should be able to leave cities bordering them undefended for awhile.
So what you will usually want to do first during the National phase, is move
units to defend your border cities, and move any extras towards your attacking
group. YES, THIS WILL TAKE TIME.
You may want to move generals around with the plan during the City Phase to
pick up these extra units and help move them to the front lines. You will also
want to move some generals in anticipation of recruiting (see next section) or
doing other city commands. Remember that moving units in the National phase
does not count against moving them in the City phase (you can move units from
A to B in National and then from B to C in City) - but you can only control
your 6 generals during City Phase.
Planning ahead is the key!
Recruiting (ARMY > RECRUIT)
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Your #2 goal in the beginning is to get troops. Even if you battle well, you
still need enough guys to defend your border cities, and replenish your offense.
The max you can recruit is always 5% of the total population. It costs 5 food
per man, so if you don't have enough food, then that will limit how many you
can recruit. (You also need enough space in reserves which is 999 max)
Therefore: you want to plan to get a GENERAL and ENOUGH FOOD to those cities
with the HIGHEST population, when you are ready to recruit (which should be as
early as possible).
Again, planning ahead is key! Anticipate what you will need! It's fine to
attack in the first months, but at the same time you should be moving food and
generals towards high-population cities to recruit.
Resources (City)
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Your #3, and most laborious, goal is managing resources: food, gold, materials.
What they can be used for:
Cities want to have food and materials - and will consume them regularly and
automatically (cities don't consume gold, but they WILL complain if they don't
have some present for defending armies).
Armies consume gold and food (but not materials).
Food is used to recruit soldiers, and gold is used to buy horses if you want
to use cavalry (this is a good reason to not bother with cavalry).
Gold can be invested in your cities (in City phase) to raise commerce,
industry, or agriculture.
The only other thing gold is used for is cannons (ARMY > WAR EXPENDITURES) or
ships, but these are done at the National level each quarter.
Conclusion:
You will need to constantly move resources around, so that your cities have
enough food and materials to keep the people happy, along with a bit of gold.
In cities with offensive/large armies, you will want as much gold & food as
possible, for feeding your armies, attacking, recruiting, etc.
But how much is "enough"?
Unfortunately, I don't exactly know, and it is hard to tell how many resources
are consumed by your people/armies.
(exceptions: soldiers cost 5 food each, horses cost 5 gold each, cannons cost
50 gold each, ships are 100 gold each).
It is also difficult to keep track of which months different resource
consumption is calculated - See the manual pages 34 & 35 for details.
You will have to play with the food/material amounts for your cities, and
estimate as best you can what will keep them happy. However, this isn't as
important later in the game where a city going on strike is probably no big
deal.
But as a rule of thumb, if one city has over 1000 materials or many thousands
of food, it is probably too much and can be reallocated.
If you have a general in a city, you can see exactly how much the resources
will change NEXT month, by pressing B in a city. The plus or minus over a
resource will be the gain/loss NEXT month.
Additional note:
The consumption rate of food/materials by a city population is affected by
whether you have them set to consume "low" or "high" under the SUPPLY command
(using this command does not use a turn for your general so you can switch it
back and forth). If it is set to "high", they consume about twice as much, but
are presumably happier. The food/material sufficiency (the bread/scroll
symbols in boxes) are red if SUPPLY is set to low - even if it is at 100. All
I know is that the city is happier if it the consumption rate is set to high.
Resources (National)
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1.
You will start with some food and materials in your national treasury.
I recommend that you distribute it to your cities as soon as possible (GIVE
command) and never move any of these to your treasury again.
It does nothing for you sitting in the treasury, and you won't have to worry
about these commands again (unless you designate "Supply Cities").
2.
You will also gain money in your treasure every January (see next section for
formula).
Again, I recommend allocating this money to a city/cities as soon as you can
(SEND > TREASURY) each year.
I recommend investing most or all of it in just 1 or 2 cities, and using any
left over for your main attacking army.
*The only possible exception is if you want to buy ships, do that first. 100
gold per ship.
QUESTIONS & ANSWERS:
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What are Food and Material "Sufficiency"?
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In the City screen, there are icons for Food Sufficiency and Material
Sufficiency (the bread/scroll symbol in boxes).
All I know is, these numbers gradually go down and the lower they go, the
greater the chance for a strike/revolt.
You can increase these numbers immediately by giving a lot of food/materials
back to the city with the GIVE command.
But don't bother using GIVE unless you have a lot to give (thousands) and the
sufficiency is pretty low, because it takes a lot to increase these numbers.
Increasing material sufficiency is especially difficult in the beginning. It
is probably better to focus on investing in industry (and perhaps agriculture).
Also remember what I said in the Resources (City) section about setting the
consumption rate - "low" they will consume 1/2 as much but will be less happy
(sufficiency number will be red).
Especially at the beginning, cut your consumption to low in cities that don't
produce much food/materials, worry about making them happy later.
The most important thing, at least initially, seems to be just HAVING enough
materials and food present to keep them above 0 - these are the bread/scroll
icons without the boxes around them.
What do the city Industry/Commerce/Agriculture values do?
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Credit to "David K." for these formulas, at
http://www.cheatbook.de/files/lempereur.htm
These are for the PC version of this game, and they are the same for the NES
version.
Gold (city) is calculated quarterly (Mar/Jun/Sep/Dec)
- commercial x 10, plus 10.
Materials are calculated quarterly (Mar/Jun/Sep/Dec)
- industry x 26, plus 26.
Food is calculated ANNUALLY (September)
- agriculture x 100, plus 100.
Cities also get annual tax in January
- population divided by 3, rounded down.
Got anything to say about combat?
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Cannons are the key. The other key is getting enemy units in a "disorder" state.
Attacking even a weak enemy unit that is NOT in disordered state can still
mean needless loss of your troops.
Bombard them with your cannons and make it easy on yourself. I have gotten
enemy troops disordered with only 5 cannons, so bring plenty of cannons!
Also, know which squares are in range of your enemy cannons, and avoid them!
Use the "CANNON RANGE" command - it's free!
Protip:
SUMMARY > INTERNAL can be your best friend. It is free to use and tells you
lots of valuable stuff about your cities.
Bugs/Issues:
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On your turn, the game iterates through each of your cities - you can see it
going through the list - and only stops where you have a general to command or
some special event happens. This allows your generals to sometimes do two
commands. Suppose a general is in city A and moves (with food/gold/units) to
city B. If city B hasn't taken its turn yet, then that general will get a
chance to do another command (although he will not be able to move a second
time). I'm not sure if this is intentional, but it seems like an oversight by
the developers.
Both the manual and FAQ state that every general can recruit once and only
once per year (March-February), however this is NOT true. I have had generals
recruit more than once per year and also had some not be able to recruit at
all. I don't know why this happens, though, and it usually doesn't. Might be
related to the issue I just mentioned where a general can do two commands in a
row by moving cities.
If you have more than one general in a city, you will only get the chance to
issue commands to one of them on that turn. The other one is ignored like a
regular officer. Again, not sure if this is intentional, but it's an important
fact to be aware of.
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I hope this guide helps you a bit starting out.
Just keep moving units/resources around, recruit, invest, attack, and repeat.
Just remember that the first year is the hardest... the more cities you
conquer, as long as you can keep recruiting, the game will only get easier.
Good luck, and send me any questions/comments/criticisms!
©Copyright 2013 culwin, nowhere4321@yahoo
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