EARLY SAMURAI QUESTION

I am thinking of doing an Early Samurai Army (Extra Impetus 5, List 8, The Mongol Empire and the Far East) and the notes are somewhat confusing. The Notes read "At least 50% of deployed Samurai (Mounted on foot) must form Large Units with Followers". Is the wording Mounted on foot a typo? Should it read Mounted OR Foot?

For example, if I use Mounted Samurai, must 50% of them be the Supported Mounted Samurai or does the 50% only apply if I use the Supported Samurai on Foot? Does the 50% apply to any and all Samurai that are used?

For less confusion I would suggest the wording should be "At least 50% of any Samurai used must form Large Units with Followers".

Your views please.

Dennis

I have used early samurai several times. I've always assumed that the typo means that at least 50% of the total number of samurai must be LUs with followers. I have not taken the requirement as applying separately to foot and mounted or applying only to foot. That is to be contrasted with middle samurai, where the 50% rule appears to apply to foot samurai only.

Early samurai can be a very powerful army. They have T who shoot like English longbowmen, but can charge and fight. When fielded as LUs, they have FL and CM units which are 6/2 or 6/3 and can lose 4 casualties before they lose impetus. They can have cavalry which can shoot as well as any and still be tough in a fight.

However, they are a very small army. Depending how many LUs you have, you are likely to have only 6 to 8 units at 300 points and probably only one more at 350. So their flanks can be vulnerable.

They either destroy the enemy or get swamped and die, which I suppose is right for samurai.

One other thing. I checked on the old forum and Lorenzo confirmed that you can have followers which don't follow - i.e. are independent units. They don't all have to be in LUs with samurai.

RogerC

What figures are you planning to use Maxentius?

Roger is correct.
Don't forget also if you take monks they have to be in a separate command with their own commander. Expensive army points wise all up. I used Old Glory 25mm for mine btw....they paint up ok good value for the money.

Thanks guys.   I was probably reading too much into it because of the distinction made in the Middle Samurai list.   I do like the Early List for the same reasons stated by Roger.   Haven't decided what figs to use yet.   I currently have a few 28mm Old Glory Bowmen and Eureka Naginata armed troops. I do quite like the Old Glory figs.

Cheers,

Dennis

I used figures from The Assault Group, but I don't know how easy (or expensive) it is to get them in Australia.

They are early samurai, of the Gempai War/Kamakura period, with 'boxy' armour, rather than later samurai of the Sengoku period with sashimono (back banners) supported by ashigaru foot. I think Old Glory are Sengoku period; not that it matters for the game.

I am not skilled enough to paint 28mm figures myself, particularly samurai, but here are some photos of my figures. You can see the entire army in one of the photo, but even then I've never yet managed to have them all on the table in one game.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/figurepainting/sets/72157649552542558/

RogerC

Very nice, thanks Roger. I've never heard of or seen The Assault Group. And you are correct, the Old Glory range is based on the Later Samurai period, but still look good and I'm not about to start buying, painting and basing slightly different figs for early, middle and late period armies. Just gets toooooo expensive.

I understand entirely. My Chinese have been Song, Han, and many armies between when I've wanted them to be.

It is interesting (to me at least) how I'm willing to allow figures to stand in for troops in some armies and periods, but not allow stand-ins in other armies/periods. As an example, I cannot imagine having 7YW troops as part of a Napoleonic army (troops about 50 years apart) but could easily field my Seljuks as Seleucid light cavalry (over 1000 years apart). The cost is a factor, but sometimes not the main one.

Is it just that playing 'ancients' makes you less fussy than playing other periods?

RogerC

Old Glory 25s don't have sashimono Roger however the 15s do ( maybe that's what your thinking of ? )
They're ok for early stuff not perfect but close enough. We've done both Taira and Minamoto clans for the Gempei wars....planning on a campaign soon hopefully.

RogerC wrote:I understand entirely. My Chinese have been Song, Han, and many armies between when I've wanted them to be.
RogerC

When is someone going to do Ming ?? strange really considering how much late Japanese stuff is out there.