Clan Selection
Use this screen to select a clan to play as during your grand campaign. As you select a clan mon from the top of the screen notice that their starting provinces are displayed on the map of Japan below, along with a short description of their recent history. A longer description can be read by pressing the button marked "encyclopaedia" or by clicking here. Before you choose a clan, select a campaign game mode via the drop-down box on the right-hand side of the screen, consider their required victory conditions and use the slider to set the overall difficulty of the game. Use the checkbox in the bottom right-hand corner to enable drop-in battles and press the gameplay options button to adjust game settings.
Legendary Difficulty
On the clan selection screen it is also possible to choose to play on a "legendary" level of difficulty. When selected, legendary difficulty will apply to both campaign map and battlefield play and enables the unique achievement of "Legendary Commander". On the campaign map it carries the following restrictions: manual saving will be disabled; you will be prompted to enter a savegame name for your campaign at its very beginning and auto-saving will occur only at the end of the winter season turn. On the battlefield legendary difficulty will carry the following restrictions: the radar map will be minimised - it will not be possible to re-open it; it will not be possible to issue orders or move the camera when the battle is paused - it will only be possible to open the game menu and exit the battle; all enemy unit tooltips will be switched off to prevent easy identification; camera movement will be limited to within 200 metres of any of your units; any enemy units more than 600 metres away will function as if hiding.
Drop-in Battles
A drop-in battle is a feature allowing a human opponent to take the place of the AI clan in a campaign battle or fight a battle in another's campaign in place of the AI. This is achieved via the on-line battle mechanism. If you check the enable drop-in battles checkbox when setting up your campaign you will occasionally receive an invitation to fight another player in a battle from their campaign. If accepted, your current campaign progress will be saved before you join them on the battlefield. Once the battle is over, the campaign automatically resumes where it was left off. If you have a multiplayer avatar set up he will gain experience from every drop-in battle you fight during a single player campaign.