MP unlocks

As you fight multiplayer battles you'll be unlocking enough persistent content to put a Call of Duty title to shame. To start with, your general will advance down a huge skill tree with three different paths relating to his melee prowess, his archery and his personality (inspiring troops, scaring enemies and so on). Units that distinguish themselves in a battle also may become special veteran units with their own skill trees, with the twist that when veteran units suffer casualties it takes time to find replacements. If you decide to field a few hundred veteran samurai from your collection, chances are you won't be using them for the next few matches.

Every achievement in Shogun 2, single player or otherwise, unlocks a piece of armour for your multiplayer general. Players who then go into the multiplayer to play dress-up will find themselves looking at a simplified paper map of Japan, with their general represented by a token. Hovering the cursor over all the map, they'll see that each conquered province unlocks a unit type, or some other bonus. It's only when you attack a province that the game goes off and finds you an opponent. This is Shogun 2's multiplayer renovation - trying to give the multiplayer battles a lite version of the single player's dramatic context.

Finally there are your retainers - dozens upon dozens of individuals with their own unique woodcarving portraits, ranging from the Sake Peddler to the Master Blacksmith, all of whom give you a tiny benefit in multiplayer battles if you choose to take them along. Cultivating your collection of retainers (and unlocking extra slots for them) is like a simple collectible card game, and yet more of an incentive to get the Total War player base online.

SOURCE

losttimefound(who went to a CA Q&A demo) said:

Quote :

Another thing I thought was cool was that you can name your units when they turn veteran. Kieran told the story of a coworker named Ian that he finally broke with a cavalry charge. The cavalry earned veteran status, and he got to name them. For the rest of his multiplayer experience, that unit was called "Ian's Lement". I love that idea. Can't wait to build up an army that feels personal like that.

Cool huh?