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I feel like I'm the only person who ever thinks Napoleonic wargaming units should be smaller, not bigger. Almost no Napoleonic rulesets use model removal, so if you're already abstracting 1000 men into a handful of models, why not make it an easy 12 models per unit and call it a day? Four stands of 3 men would still let you do any formations you want, and you could double/triple the total # of units you're fielding. I suggested this in the Napoleonic Wargaming group and the response was absolute horror - as if I had advocated sawing off our arms and kicking them into the ocean.
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Aug 4, 2021 17:16
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Class Warcraft posted:I feel like I'm the only person who ever thinks Napoleonic wargaming units should be smaller, not bigger. Yes. They should all be 6mm-12mm.
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Aug 4, 2021 17:55
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Class Warcraft posted:I feel like I'm the only person who ever thinks Napoleonic wargaming units should be smaller, not bigger. I'm in agreement. This is why I've been smoothbraining my games like DBN, Blucher, OWH:H&M or AE with half the bases he suggests.
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Aug 4, 2021 18:08
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Counterpoint: every single one of us would poo poo our pants for the 1:1 division
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Aug 4, 2021 18:54
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Yeah the counter-argument is that 12 minis battalions might make more sense, like, in every practical way, but looks sad when you’ve seen 36 man battalions. Dammit let me wreck myself on the hobby altar of Napoleon!
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Aug 4, 2021 22:00
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StashAugustine posted:out of curiosity, what historical system best represents Roman-era barbarian armies? I've got the ADLG rulebook and a lot of them are just undifferentiated masses of medium swordsmen, and I seem to remember FoG being similar
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Aug 4, 2021 22:44
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Walked into a book shop I haven't been into in years and they have all the Osprey, Warlord and Battlefront books on mega clearence due to not getting random wargamer footfall over the last years. I was tempted to get FoW Nam and Arab Israeli War hardbacks for a tenner each, but I've got the original freebie versions and never played those either so I got some cyberpunk skirmish game instead. Was a struggle not to get all the Bolt Action splatbooks though.
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Aug 8, 2021 22:36
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Was it Reality's Edge? Forgot about that one, I liked This is Not A Test, that dude's post apocalyptic game.
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Aug 9, 2021 01:16
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Yes actually, it was that exactly. I just vaguely remembered hearing the name when I saw the book, and it's a heckin' chonk of a hardback with a pricetag of €43.75 on the back, and €19.99 on the front so well worth the gamble. And by "gamble" I mean "I will likely never play this, or even finish reading it".
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Aug 9, 2021 03:10
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As a person whose shelves are also full of wargaming books for games I’ve never played, I respect that
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Aug 9, 2021 03:13
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I was tempted to get the "Seasons" expansion for the zombie game too, even knowing that I don't have the core book and I also own exactly one (1) modern zombie figure.
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Aug 9, 2021 03:31
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Class Warcraft posted:I feel like I'm the only person who ever thinks Napoleonic wargaming units should be smaller, not bigger. I agree with you, print me a 6-12mm napoleonic army and lets throw down.
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Aug 11, 2021 00:46
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Zuul the Cat posted:I agree with you, print me a 6-12mm napoleonic army and lets throw down. You’ll get 28mm so you can spend a week painting a single mini and suffer as I do —- Edit: Any recommendations for Samurai mass battle rulesets? I’ve got Ronin and Test of Honor for skirmish stuff, but I’d like something for bigger battles. Class Warcraft fucked around with this message at 03:01 on Aug 11, 2021 |
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Aug 11, 2021 02:58
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LittleWars did one but they didn't seem to like it very much as a game. Apparently it's great as a reference source but sucks to play. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ts5v4a6OMms
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Aug 11, 2021 12:14
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Springfield Fatts posted:LittleWars did one but they didn't seem to like it very much as a game. Apparently it's great as a reference source but sucks to play. Haha, reference charts within reference charts. I would hate that ruleset, I think. It is a little strange how few available rulesets there seems to be for this period of history, especially considering how iconic it is.
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Aug 11, 2021 12:32
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I'm not well versed on the period so I don't know how accurate they are but ADLG and TtS! both have lists from this period in them.
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Aug 11, 2021 12:54
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Class Warcraft posted:Edit: I know both ADLG and Hail Caesar have Samurai units in them, but they aren't very fleshed out (Hail Caesar having next to nothing). Edit: Skimming over the rules, ADLG has both late and early Feudal Japan, and a decent selection of units for each (compared to other factions in the game). But ADLG is designed for Country A to fight Country B, so I imagine some hot samurai on samurai action would start to feel shallow after a couple of games. Fashionable Jorts fucked around with this message at 16:26 on Aug 11, 2021 |
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Aug 11, 2021 16:16
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You might want to check out Triumph! By Washington Grand Company. They've got tons of army lists for almost every period, including korean/japanese. I've got a copy from wargamevault but haven't played it yet, but I'm hearing good things.
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Aug 11, 2021 20:43
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The problem with samurai battles is that most games use a western medieval game and just change the stats, often based on very dodgy research, so it doesn’t play like samurai battles at all. Art de la guerre, hail caesar etc, it’s like using bolt action to play napoleonic battles. I have a stalled 6mm samurai project. I used it for DBA and FoG, and surprise, it felt like playing a western medieval game, of course. If I’m restarting it, I’ll do sonae (kind of brigades of mixed unit troops, a foundation of samurai warfare that simply doesn’t work in most rulesets) bases and start fiddling with the stuff posted for Tenka Fubu, a For Kings And Parliament hack that’s written by someone who has done more research than just watching some Kurosawa movies, which puts it far ahead of 90% of the samurai hacks of other games you’ll find. He has grafted a command system from a japanese hex wargame on top of king and parliament, which is one of the things I feel is missing from most games to make them start resembling the feudal command and control that is so intrinsic in samurai warfare. https://tenkafubu608971038.wordpress.com/ lilljonas fucked around with this message at 22:24 on Aug 11, 2021 |
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Aug 11, 2021 22:14
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can I bait someone into an effortpost about why feudal Japanese warfare was so different?
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Aug 11, 2021 22:49
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I would also like to learn more about what aspects of Japanese warfare are not seeing good representation on the tabletop.
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Aug 11, 2021 22:55
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lilljonas posted:The problem with samurai battles is that most games use a western medieval game and just change the stats, often based on very dodgy research, so it doesn’t play like samurai battles at all. Art de la guerre, hail caesar etc, it’s like using bolt action to play napoleonic battles. The funniest part of this to me is that most of these games aren't particularly good at simulating western medieval battles either. As you mentioned later in your post, feudal command and control is very rarely expressed in these games in any meaningful, mechanical sense.
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Aug 12, 2021 00:43
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The MilHist threads of years past had some huge detail on Chinese and Japanese warfare. The formations are totally different to what European ideals at the times were. A lot of weird mixed-arms spearheads that do different tasks at different times and I barely understood it when it was fresh in my head.Endman posted:The funniest part of this to me is that most of these games aren't particularly good at simulating western medieval battles either. As you mentioned later in your post, feudal command and control is very rarely expressed in these games in any meaningful, mechanical sense.
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Aug 12, 2021 01:10
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ADLG does at least have some rudimentary command control with each flank having its own commander, but there's no distinction between different army types other than general skill
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Aug 12, 2021 03:25
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Endman posted:As you mentioned later in your post, feudal command and control is very rarely expressed in these games in any meaningful, mechanical sense. What IS the mechanics of feudal command and control?
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Aug 12, 2021 05:07
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Comstar posted:What IS the mechanics of feudal command and control? I'm by no means an expert, but I reckon a game could benefit from a TFL-style "Big Man" system. The King can honk horns and wave flags as much as he pleases, but in the midst of battle it's the guy shouting at you that you're most likely to pay attention to.
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Aug 12, 2021 07:05
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Depending on what area of the pretty long feudal period you're referring to of course, but a (by no means exhaustive) list is: Musicians, drill, individual chieftains or aristocrats below the king or duke who command segments of an army by shouting or deferred signals.
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Aug 12, 2021 07:56
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StashAugustine posted:can I bait someone into an effortpost about why feudal Japanese warfare was so different? An Small Attempt at Effortpost on Japanese Feudal Warfare (and why most tabletop games suck at it) *caveat: "feudalism" is tricky to translate exactly to Japanese history, and could, if you're being a wise-rear end, cover a millenia where battles went from handfuls of mounted archers duelling in a type of fashion that would maybe even work as a What a Tanker hack, to basically American Civil War armies. I'm mostly speaking here of 1550ish to 1615, but that also included huge military and social changes BUT.... Army command and loyalty Let's start at the big picture with the politics. Except for the Imjin War in Korea, which was very much the anomaly, these battles were civil wars of personal and family ambition. Yes, that could be said of many other places and times, but it is fundamental to how wars were fought. The climactic battle of the period was decided not by the men who fought it, but the men who decided to turn up but not engage and the men that turned up and switched sides. A warlord might be powerful on paper, but on the battlefield his plans were going to be carried out by a mix of fiercely loyal friends, family members of questionable loyalty, former enemies that he had conquered and rising captains with their own dreams of greatness. Again, yes, things were chaotic in Europe too, but this tenuous command structure is to me the soul of the period. In any wargame where the command system at most limits the speed by which your commands are enacted, it's just not used enough. In a game where units do what you say, it's just wrong. Knowing who to trust with what roles and places on the battlefield was what made or broke samurai lords. Army organization Then comes army structure. Imagine a famous battle like Agincourt. You know it by heart: the English positioned their archers and foot soldiers up front, the French charged with their cavalry, get bogged down, and then massacred when they arrive exhausted at the line. Wargames tends to try to recreate this by allowing you to buy neat units of archers, units of men-at-arms, units of knights and so on. That's just not how a Japanese 16th century existed. Going with the trend of dubious allegiancies, Japanese armies were feudal to the fingertips in how they were assembled. A lord had subordinates, who had subordinates, who had subordinates, and so on, each one expected to bring a certain number of troops of certain types to the battlefield, down to the lowest rung of the ladder. These men would not, like in the Agincourt example, be pooled into units based on how they were equipped. Instead, Japanese feudal armies were very much combined arms affairs, down to the lowest tactical level. Basically a Big Shot Samurai would be daimyo, a "big name", someone who has a large network of vassals, which together form a kashindan or a loose military network of soldiers possible to call for muster. Each vassal were supposed to supply both troops that he would lead personally, and troops that would be formed up into his lord's command structure. As armies grew in size both due to technological and strategic advances and daimyo gradually increasing their domains, the kashindan would be organized in sonae, up to maybe a thousand men at the most, but typically smaller. The important thing here is that the sonae were not units of archers, or units of cavalry, or units of spearmen: they were created to operate as a tactical mix of all of them. Like a Napoleonic corps, they were expected to be able to operate as an army in itself. This means that unless you're doing a 1:1 mini to man kind of deal, typically wargames suck at representing this. It gets even worse, as even on the smaller tactical level the types of soldiers mixed. Shooting? Once gunpowder got introduced, this was done by a mix of archers, aquebuses and some infantry for close support.   Here's another image of a arquebus unit. Note how it is a diverse mix of more heavily armoured samurai with arquebus as a screen, then ligher armoured ashigaru with bows and arquebuses providing the main firepower, backed by officers on foot and mounted as well as extra samurai with arquebuses that can lend support. Now think about how many "samurai" army lists that would divide these into completely different formations of ashigaru with bows, ashigaru with guns, samurai with guns etc. Cavalry? Mounted samurai fought in small groups of horsemen mixed with lighter armoured spearmen. There's no cavalry units rushing around charging the flanks, but even cavalry charges as such were not really what you imagine with Western heavily armoured war horses doing impact charges. This is for example the main reason why Shogun: Total War is so much worse at depicting samurai warfare than people think it is, and why people are taught that samurai battles look and work completely different than it did. A completely wrong image is depicted again and again, through video games, movies, comics etc.  (look at all those pages following by foot: you're not going to speed across the table at twice the speed of infantry on your horses with them) And the infantry? This should be the simple part right, as every army list will neatly organize them into units of "ashigaru" (which are samurai!) and "samurai", with neat different quality levels, morale, combat values etc? Forget it, they operated closely together in mixed formations, with the heavier troops close by to give support.  Needless to say this is where most wargames, even those who say they are made entirely to represent samurai warfare, break down completely. We are so married to the idea of units of troops with identical equipment that we just walk into this trap again and again when making samurai warfare game. I know that this is not accurate for pretty much any feudal armies, but it is just so much more off IMHO for samurai armies than for, say, a renaissance Italian army. This is why I do believe that the best idea, if trying to represent this, is either to fight small skirmishes with a 1:1 ratio, with mixed units, or simply go big: make the sonae the basic unit you move on the table, just like some games use the brigade as the smallest building brick of the army. I also am convinced, despite my hordes of painted 28mm samurai, that 6mm is a better scale for this as you can build a unit as a diorama, basically representing these mixes of troop types working together:  So: either borrow as much as possible from games that have been forced by other historical mixed formations (like the tercio) to try to allow mixed units, or go up a level or three and move around large formations of mixed troops. lilljonas fucked around with this message at 10:03 on Aug 12, 2021 |
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Aug 12, 2021 08:59
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Excellent post! This honestly reminds me of the huge difference between the Wars of the Roses in tabletop games versus reality where, somewhat similar to what you’ve described above, most battles were skirmishes between a series of dudes and their personal retinues. Those retinues were often a mix of bowmen, billmen and men at arms and not usually broken up by equipment but rather mixed in together.
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Aug 12, 2021 12:14
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Endman posted:Excellent post! Indeed, this is far more common in history than your typical wargaming rules would make you think. But even then, at least in WotR or 30YW armies you would still like, have separately operating cavalry. Where like, everyone's on horses. You don't really even have that in samurai armies.
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Aug 12, 2021 12:18
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lilljonas posted:Indeed, this is far more common in history than your typical wargaming rules would make you think. But even then, at least in WotR or 30YW armies you would still like, have separately operating cavalry. Where like, everyone's on horses. You don't really even have that in samurai armies. Oh for sure! This is honestly making me think about picking up some samurai. You could make some really interesting looking units on multi bases with that kind of low level variety.
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Aug 12, 2021 12:22
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Endman posted:Oh for sure! This is honestly making me think about picking up some samurai. You could make some really interesting looking units on multi bases with that kind of low level variety. Yes, multibases is pretty much the way to go. I've sinced rebased most of my 28mm samurai on multibases, but even then I kept my units a bit too separate. I still have more that I haven't finished and that I will mix more, so the cavalry has infantrymen mixed in the cavalry bases, archers and arquebuses mixed and so on. There's just too many other stuff getting in the way for my samurai, both 28mm and 6mm.  Here's a blurry image of my 6mm samurai, where I've mixed infantry and cavalry:  It's a very fun and rewarding army to paint. lilljonas fucked around with this message at 12:47 on Aug 12, 2021 |
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Aug 12, 2021 12:35
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This discussion makes me think that a Feudal Japan game could be really awesome if built from the ground up. The mixed units make the actual tactical level potentially somewhat boring, because all the units would have shooting and cc roles and at best you're looking at some being better and some worse but you lose some of the rock/paper/scissor element that's so common in wargames. So make the game mostly about the loyalty issue - I can imagine some kind of "perceived loyalty" mechanic where commanders are rated by perceived loyalty and you have to decide which lords to put in charge of which formations, but the actual final rating isn't discovered until you order them to attack or something like that. Make the game about the risk/reward tradeoffs of having troops standing around being safe but useless versus when they're ordered to attack they may switch sides suddenly.
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Aug 12, 2021 15:46
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It's an operational-scale board game and a bit abstract, but has anyone played Sekigahara? It's a block wargame where the major mechanic is that troops will only actually fight in a battle if you have their clan's loyalty (represented by a hand of cards)
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Aug 12, 2021 15:55
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lilljonas posted:An Small Attempt at Effortpost on Japanese Feudal Warfare (and why most tabletop games suck at it) Wicked post, super cool to see a history I've (like you said) never read about, and cool to tie it to the wargames. I think you're right as well that very small scale figures abstracted to that whole unit seems like the best way to go. If you had to do a 1:1 battle at say 28mm of one of those unit groups fighting, would that work if it was just one "company" vs another?
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Aug 12, 2021 16:44
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lilljonas posted:An Small Attempt at Effortpost on Japanese Feudal Warfare (and why most tabletop games suck at it) A fantastic post, thanks for taking the time to write it. But what I'm getting from this, is the Games Workshop Lord of the Rings game is the right system to build samurai armies with, as that game is all about mixed weapon units! (I'm a big fan of that game, okay?)
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Aug 12, 2021 16:56
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Notahippie posted:This discussion makes me think that a Feudal Japan game could be really awesome if built from the ground up. The mixed units make the actual tactical level potentially somewhat boring, because all the units would have shooting and cc roles and at best you're looking at some being better and some worse but you lose some of the rock/paper/scissor element that's so common in wargames. So make the game mostly about the loyalty issue - I can imagine some kind of "perceived loyalty" mechanic where commanders are rated by perceived loyalty and you have to decide which lords to put in charge of which formations, but the actual final rating isn't discovered until you order them to attack or something like that. Make the game about the risk/reward tradeoffs of having troops standing around being safe but useless versus when they're ordered to attack they may switch sides suddenly. Yeah I've been thinking for a while about a sonae based 6mm samurai warfare game where you basically have unit cards with stats for the sonae as a fighting force, and unit cards with stats for the commander. So imagine each side has like, 4-6 of these sonae, which can have varying quality (size, morale etc) and varying personalities leading them. Maybe a hothead that is super inspiring for the troops in combat but very likely to advance into danger no matter his order, or a wiley uncle that is unlikely to get stuck in if others are not already in combat. Or someone that's more likely to get pissed off if you give them orders repeatedly, and so on. Then you act as the damiyo, herding these cats into battle. The idea would be to somehow be able to have a risk/reward command system where the odds could be affected by how happy or pissed off the commanders are , but also depending on the morale of the men they are leading. Troops led by a less bold general will retreat more easily, generals leading a sonae in disarray is less likely to obey your orders, things like that.To make it more interesting, you'd be able to mess with the opponent as well, reflecting spies, bad luck and other things that puts your plan in danger. Just imagine it as a company management boardgame, with swords. So yeah, a little bit board gameish with some of the same ideas as the Sekigahara board game that StashAugustine mentions, with the actual combat being VERY simplified and abstracted as it would not be the main dish at all. This is my personal mini wargaming hearbreaker, next to a 1/300 scale Japanese feudal naval game. BaronVanAwesome posted:Wicked post, super cool to see a history I've (like you said) never read about, and cool to tie it to the wargames. Yes, I think that if you have for example 5 men with bows and arquebuses as a unit, or a single base, you could represent a skirmish between a very small sonae or parts of a sonae meeting up. Or you could aim at say, 1:2, then one of those spearman units would be 12 ashigaru long spears backed by 12 samurai with shorter spears. That's very much doable in 28mm. You could probably have them represented as a single unit on the tabletop, with the samurai as the second rank, instead of having them as two or three separate units. I think the biggest and most important step is just to get away from uniform units of the same equipment. Once to have rules to allow for that, you're on a good path. Fashionable Jorts posted:A fantastic post, thanks for taking the time to write it. I haven't played it, but from what I've seen: yes, better than say, Warhammer Historicals. Now I'm getting hype for samurai painting, which is bad timing as I'm sculpting completely other stuff. :P lilljonas fucked around with this message at 18:40 on Aug 12, 2021 |
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Aug 12, 2021 18:26
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Fashionable Jorts posted:But what I'm getting from this, is the Games Workshop Lord of the Rings game is the right system to build samurai armies with, as that game is all about mixed weapon units! lilljonas posted:I haven't played it, but from what I've seen: yes, better than say, Warhammer Historicals. 1) Who gets Sauron/The Balrog's stats 2) Curious to hear your thoughts lilljonas on the effects of powerful angelic spellcasters in the Edo period of warfare
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Aug 12, 2021 19:54
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BaronVanAwesome posted:1) Who gets Sauron/The Balrog's stats Balrog clearly represents a Portuguese Black Ship
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Aug 12, 2021 20:05
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lilljonas posted:Yeah I've been thinking for a while about a sonae based 6mm samurai warfare game where you basically have unit cards with stats for the sonae as a fighting force, and unit cards with stats for the commander. So imagine each side has like, 4-6 of these sonae, which can have varying quality (size, morale etc) and varying personalities leading them. Maybe a hothead that is super inspiring for the troops in combat but very likely to advance into danger no matter his order, or a wiley uncle that is unlikely to get stuck in if others are not already in combat. Or someone that's more likely to get pissed off if you give them orders repeatedly, and so on. come to think of it this also kinda ties into the question I asked a bit ago about how to represent barbarian armies as more interesting than "medium swordsman, impetuous"- somebody mentioned Infamy, Infamy which is skirmish and custom made for late republic/early imperial Rome vs Gaul/Germans/Britons but is largely based around command in this way
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Aug 12, 2021 20:11
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