Friday 24 February 2017

a Sengoku set to

Andrew brought over his Japanese to have a go at a Lion Rampant game.  In part it was an experiment of basing styles as his are based for Armati which he plays with the White Rock Gamers, and mine which I merely placed on pre-cut wood shapes of ovals and circles from an art store .  While my units had a greater arc of fire - the rules have range simply based upon nearest point - and I have wider units, it did not seem to have much obvious effect. ( as he was victorious ).
Andrew's "tight formations" of arquebus armed ashigaru advance against my mixed armed unit of Takeda ashigaru in the foreground.

And the battle was a bloody affair with courage tests being passed by good dice...as compared to most of our combat rolls....

The scenario, as it was, to have Andrew take the village while I was to defend it.  The orchard and houses created lanes of attack so the battle had a form of north and south zones.  His primarily teppo  force  [ arquebus armed units ] moved against my mixed weapon [ bow and spear armed ] units in the 'north' while his samurai, both foot and horse, moved against the Takeda teppo and samurai in the 'south'.
the 'northern' section of the battle
..and in the 'south' Andrew's Dixon mounted samurai unit moves against my Kingsford types - a clash which my Takeda took the worst 
the clash of foot samurai 

In future I shall look at some of the more inventive scenario plans for perhaps a more interesting game but as a test, the rules work well for the period as we simply used LR attributes.  My archers did seem to do a bit better than his teppo inclusive units so might increase the arquebus power as the Japanese of the era gave the firepower more like the flintlock than a medieval handgonne.
my ashigaru await the onslaught. 

The Takeda arquebus behind their pavises however could not shoot well but Andrew likewise could not get his foot samurai to advance quickly - or in Lion Rampant terms...failed activation often which gave me another turn to fail to inflict casualties!  

a rare view from the 'other side'!  Andrew's foot samurai charging from the left finally get to grips with my teppo unit.

the pavises cost 2 points but increase 'armor' protection. Homemade by gluing three wooden coffee stir sticks side by side and painted in the clan 'colours'

Speaking of activation, we employed the two and out rather than having the first fail to stop your turn.  Much better feel - more to the player's frustration level than to the game play,  but the game is
supposed to be fun...