Guide to the Han Empire

This is a summarized version of the guide below, for youtubers and those who don't want to scroll through 10 pages of notes.

Turn 1
-You will go bankrupt on turn 2 (-19k income) and by turn 2 you'll lose most of your northern territories to major factions
-Sell off as much land in the north that you can, capture the YTR farmland south of Zhang Yan so you can sell off your western lands to Gao Gan.
-Dong Zhuo should get most of the land, give one province to Liu Biao, one to each of the western minors, Tao Qian gets the Langye peninsula, Gongsun Du the far northeast, Gao Gan the north.
-Disband the retinues and delete the northern armies, suicide charge the rest
-Make trade deals with anyone you still can
-Don't delete the armies next to Sun Jian's starting force (march the strategist between the trade port and the champion's forces), do delete the armies across the empire.
Turn 1 Endturn
-Destroy Sun Jian's force
Turn 2
-Muster a full retinue to destroy Sun Jian before he snowballs
--Rest of campaign
-Disband most of your nobles, you only need 10 max, keep anyone who has decreased desire (for admin/promotion/both)
-The less land you have the less corruption, can't sell across rivers
-Liu Bei can freely take your lands, eliminate him as soon as you can.
-Turtle in the south
-Majors may march south to try and take your land, try to use the Yangtze as a chokepoint.

Preface The game does not want you to survive, you are designed to act like the Rebels in Rome 1 and Medieval 2, and act as settlements for major factions and the player to gobble up for expansion. This is contrary to Rome 2 and Attila, where every province was occupied by some minor faction.

My difficulty settings for my current campaign are N/L as I don't play legendary campaigns until I have won a campaign as said faction on normal first. However I always use legendary difficulty in battles.

You might not survive the first time you try this campaign, if you've ever played as the Rebels in Rome 1 you know what I'm talking about, if you haven't, this campaign takes multiple attempts to figure out, I'm on attempt 10* and thats after writing most of this guide.
*NI = Attempt 15

Mods Required
The first two are the mod and its submod (the submod is strongly recommended), the third is the English translation
https://steamcommunity.com/workshop/filedetails/?id=1794247900

https://steamcommunity.com/workshop/filedetails/?id=1794260672

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1803231743

NI: Will update with new screenshots!

You're losing 19k a turn due to all your armies + lack of development

While you have towns that are level 3 and 4, all of the minor settlements you own are level 1, meaning you aren't making much from the economy and should you be attacked (more on that later), you'll have tiny garrisons to defend with.

You're enemies with all those factions in red, most of your enemies are in the Northeast but there's one exception, Sun Jian. He warrants his own chapter.

*NI: Taken from a older save

Your armies are mostly stuff like this, a level 1 general with two units of Ji Militia or Sabre Militia, sometimes with an extra two Archer Militia, they won't be able to stand up to the starting armies of major factions like Cao Cao and Gongsun Zan.

You start with 92% corruption, meaning the best settlements you own will only be making 26 coin.

Since you'll be losing the Northeast, let's kill two birds with one stone, solve your money problems and screw all these major powers out of expansion room. You can't raise taxes because of your status as Imperial Holdings, so lets fix that.

PART I Demolition;
Demolish all the buildings north of the Yangtze - first the buildings in the cities then the cities themselves (because otherwise you won't get the money from the demolished buildings) - in the Northeast except for the commandery highlighted, Donghai, as it's protected on all sides by friendly powers. You don't have time to wait, you need to remove these provinces this turn if possible. If you find any minor provinces, demolish them aswell.

PART II Deleting Useless Armies

Part of your massive amount of debt comes from having tons of generals and retinues. For much of the campaign you'll only need a dozen generals, and you start with more than 20. Delete retinues wherever possible (except the armies next to Sun Jian, you need them) and recall all generals that you can. It seems like suicide now, but you are about to sell off all this land anyways, and next turn you will need to dismiss most of your generals anyways.

Taken after step 3, this shows that if you dismissed most of your generals you'd be making a profit. Plus most of said starting generals come with bad traits.

PART III Selling Land Down to the Yangtze;
NI: Do not sell off Badong or Xihe, you can hold on to these territories to kill of Zheng Jiang.

Go into the diplomacy menu and start selling off the land to peaceful factions. Its not hard to figure out who you are at peace with since the people you are at war with you can't even speak to. You cannot sell land to a lord who isn't adjacent to it. So if you wanted to sell of Chen, which is south of Cao Cao, and you wanted Dong Zhuo to own it, you'd need to give him all the land to the west of it first. But don't give anyone anything, sell it all off for 10 turn money deals. I recommend Dong Zhuo as he has a 0.5 starting price, meaning you can make much more off him than any other lord.

Despite really wanting to give the Dong all your scorched earth land, you can only give Luoyang at first, so start with that.
NI: Both screenshots are from older saves

Look at that, you sold a lumberyard that's level 1 and located right next to Yuan Shu (who will most likely take said lumber yard next turn) for 840 coins!

In many places, the one non-enemy you have there is the person you sell your land to. Destroyed land is equal in value to a built up city, so why not scorch the earth? Plus, it makes these minor factions who currently are at peace with everyone more powerful than the likes of Yuan Shao. You are setting up a long term plan here, the major factions have the potential to wipe you out if left unchecked, the minor factions simply aren't as powerful because they don't have those legendary units and unique faction mechanics. No Gao Gan vassal hordes. Liu Biao is the exception for major factions you should boost, he is a Han loyalist forever*, he will be your shield against the north.

*NI: not actually forever, he might betray you in <100 turns.

The starting armies will not attack land that they are at peace with, meaning if a faction was nomadic and you sold off the land they'd take (like Zheng Jiang), they will walk towards the nearest enemy territory. You've locked the AI out of expansion. This compiled with the minor factions large expansion means that many, normally big, factions would now be limited to one province.

You can't sell the land between Han Fu and Gongsun Zan, due to having nobody to sell it to, sadly.*

*NI: If you can capture the Yellow Turban settlement between Gao Gan's new lands and your unsellable lands, you can suddenly create a massive Gao Gan blob across the Northeast. More money for you.

The result of my deals; Gongsun Du owns the land pressing him up against Gongsun Zan, Gao Gan owns all the land that Zheng Jiang would normally take*, leaving her in a nomadic state, Dong Zhuo has expanded far east of his start and Tao Qian now owns the Langye peninsula. You can sell off the land I sold to Dong Zhuo to Liu Biao if you want, or even to a minor faction. I sold Shangyong province off to Zhang Lu (he normally gets attacked by the Dong) and Jia Long/Liu Yan

*NI: He eventually will own Xihe, but first you'll need to recruit a one retinue army there to fight off Zheng Jiang.

PART IV TRADE TIME

As you can tell by the Quick Deal, there are alot of people who would like to trade with the Han. So who do I recommend? Dong Zhuo, of course, because you can get the best deal from him (starts at 0.3 afterall), and Liu Biao since he's a major power. As for the other 9 agreements you can make (10 from Imperial Holdings 1 because 1 at start), my only recommendation is Shi Xie, King of Vietnam, since he's peaceful and will never attack you. Otherwise, its up to you. NI: Once you sold off all your land north of the Yangtze you'll find that you can't trade with as many people.

TURN 1 ODDS AND ENDS

If you can sell off non-aggression pacts, do it. You might be able to earn another 1000 from these 10 a turn deals. Han Sui and Liu Biao both want non-aggression pacts with me, so I sold them off to them. Don't pay for a non-aggression pact, even if it says maybe, its unlikely these minor factions will declare war on the strongest power at game's start*, and if you build up the south, you'll stay the strongest.
*NI: Due to patches in the unlock all factions mod that I use, minor factions will now act more like major factions; however, its unlikely some tiny faction will declare war on you immediately, its more likely to happen 30 turns in.

You have a few legendary generals, Taishi Chi, Xu Huang and Xun You. Taishi Chi can slay other generals with his amazing bow. Xu Huang and Taishi Chi start off with Humble/Modest/other traits that reduce desire for administrator. Which is good, because after a recent mod patch, the Han Empire can recruit Sima Liang's unit, Imperial Guards.

Corruption is caused by owning lots of land. At game start you have 92% corruption, if you sell off all the land north of the Yangtze you'll be left with about 72% corruption. Which is a vast improvement.

Move the general from Jingling, Zheng Tai (and encamp him) halfway between Jingling and Quan Rou. This may cause Sun Jian to attack Zheng Tai, allowing the three armies to fight in one battle

Step 5 END TURN SEQUENCE TURN 1

Anyone who couldn't be deleted in the north will die in these battles. That is unavoidable, plus it reduces your very high general salary.

There is one army, one general, one lord you must defeat, however drum roll

Combine your armies that are near him in Turn 1, so that when he attacks you might be able to push him off. If he succeeds you must defeat him at the trade port. If he wins at the trade port, the whole campaign is now over since he will just pull armies out of his *** and run across the map going "ha ha you can't catch the Sun I'm going to eat up all your land now".

Unlike every other major faction, Sun Jian starts in the South. The rest of the major factions have Liu Biao blocking them from the Han heartland, and they are all busy fighting eachother to expand south. But Sun Jian has no neighbors. Sure he has Liu Biao's vassals a province to the north, but if left unchecked, he will expand in all directions. In all my failed attempts, he expanded eastwards towards the barren lands that weren't colonized. He can grow to take up all of your land, and since most of your garrisons are 6 units at best, and he has three generals and 18 units, your best case scenario is a wild goose chase across the South (even if you muster full retinues, you have to predict where he's going) with him only getting more armies as you knock one down.

You must wipe him out by turn 4. Or he will send armies to the east and just as you kill one off you'll have lost a few territories, territories which have garrisons that pose a threat to you since you are stuck with terrible milita units and he has his legendary prowess and mercenaries. Remember most of your generals are level 1 or 2, they can't recruit anything beyond Ji Milita, Archer Milita, Sabre Militia and light cav.

The strategy for wiping him out requires that you don't spend money Turn 1, and on Turn 2 you immediately muster 2 full stacks in the Changsha Armor Craftsman. You'll lose about 2000 a turn income, but there's no other option. Turn 3 you march from the craftsman to Changsha, you might face a newly recruited army there, destroy it before he musters more. Bring a strategist with one or two trebuchets, I bought Mao Jie from the character pool and used him. That battle against the new army might result in bringing in the Changsha garrison; if so, good, destroy everything you can. Turn 4 you attack Changsha and with two full stacks you should be able to autoresolve the battle. A close victory is all you need. I chose to fight the battles manually since I have a grudge against Sun Jian since he's been responsible for all my defeats, also because there's something satisfied about cooked southerner.

Part I: Sun Jian

Muster one armies next to Changsha, full retinue, and by turn 3 you should immediately march on Sun Jian and destroy him in one turn, thus preventing his snowballing. At the same time, start sending generals to colonize all that land to your southwest/southeast. Forget about colonizing all the land to your southeast and southwest, build up minor provinces first, then settlements, as you would in your other campaigns.

Part II: Bandits and Courtiers

Take your time, go slowly for the first few turns. You only need one army for Sun Jian, and you should start deleting useless generals. Anyone with increased desire for admin should be removed, as should any who have bad traits. Recruit Mao Jie as he is a excellent strategist, and keep maybe 3 more strategists. Beyond that, build the court as you wish. With Sentinels getting Imperial Guards, I don't mind keeping them around. Commanders and their fast raiding cav are also useful for a massive empire.

This is a turn later, my retinue, despite not being fully mustered, is still marching on Sun Jian.

At the same time, I am building up farmlands across the empire, and Zheng Jiang has arrived in Hedong. I could either let her capture it to auto-move my capital, or I could muster a general (Taishi Chi) and 6 units to attack her.

I mustered Taishi Chi, 1 Imperial Guard and 5 sabre milita, then two other generals (this removes their lack of purpose), generals who I will likely keep later on. I wasn't yet purging my court, due to commissioning 'suicide' generals; generals who are useless and I will send off to die in battles such as this.

After Zheng Jiang I purged my court of ~10 characters (specifically the ones that would get unhappy the fastest).

Part II: Liu Bei + Going Forward

You last main priority for the campaign is to destroy Liu Bei. He can freely annex your lands without fighting your garrisons, so he must be dealt with quickly. I suggest a army including a full retinue of Imperial Guards. Once you destroy him you should go on the defensive and try and hold onto the land you have.

This guide can't go beyond the early game, due to the variable nature of Three Kingdoms. In my many attempts at the Han, I've seen everyone from Yellow Turban Rebels to Gao Gan take the throne.

Some tips for the campaign:
-Watch out for debt, you don't make that much money and you likely won't get peace for a long time.
-Its your choice whether you want to retreat far south and wait until the TK period begins (which is when youll finally go independant) or to try and march north and wipe out factions
-Liu Biao will eventually declare war on you, be prepared for that.
-Coalitions might rise and fall, major factions will likely march south to take your lands except for people like Yuan Shu who will attack the Dong directly.
-Gong Du may or may not capture the entire west
-More to come with time (its late here)

THIS IS WIP, DUE TO THE OLDER INFORMATION FROM HERE ON BEING OUTDATED, IT WAS REMOVED AND WILL BE REDONE.