Holla Forums commands 18,000 Samurai

WHAT: The Battle of Liaoning
WHEN: 1594 AD
WHERE: Just across the Korean border into China

Armchair generals of Holla Forums, gather around! The time for battle has come again. The conquest of the Korean peninsula is complete and now we are making our drive towards Beijing. Although we have defeated the Ming expeditionary force to Korea, the Chinese have raised another army to stop us. Our two warhosts have met in the province of Liaoning and have mutually accepted open battle.

Our forces:

Our order of battle:


The Terrain:

Generally open. The path towards the enemy is open plain, although in our deployment area there's a marsh of limited importance. To our left is a patch of forest which we could *probably* use to mask our approach of our left flank to a degree - should we choose to advance that way, anyway. It is hilly beyond this forest. The Chinese have a hill on their side and will likely deploy artillery there.

The Enemy:

We are facing the Ming Northern Army. It is materially well-equipped but spiritually lacking. It is safe to say that their infantry, despite their combined arms tactics (musket regiments with light spears + regimental guns) is inferior to ours, and in melee they will not last long.

We will probably be facing substantial amount of cavalry and must prepare for this. The horsemen who defend China against Mongol incursions are ironically Mongols themselves, so there will be no question of their spirit or skill. They favor the bow, but can use the sword just as well. In constrast, our mounted Samurai are equipped only with lances and swords, as use of the bow on horseback has fallen out of favor among our fighting elite.

The Chinese are fond of deploying field guns. In such open terrain we are going to be pelted by them. We can take a defensive stance if the enemy chooses not to move, but if he does not deign to sally out, we must bring the fight to him.

Us:

We are the Japanese. Our army is the result of over 100 years of civil war. Our men are therefore better than the hopelessly underfunded Ming government forces and unlike them, all sport standardized, mass-produced armor and effective matchlocks. Our adoption of pike-and-shot tactics means that our spear ashigaru units are close-order foot, and will be terribly disordered in rough terrain such as forests. If we should enter such terrain, we should let our sword-armed foot lead the way.

Our Samurai still fight one-on-one with the enemy like the honorable fellows they are, and therefore have poor cohesion. They might get carried away while pursuing routers and get surrounded as a result. We must prepare for this.

As for our horsemen, our cavalry arm must be the worst in East Asia. We can expect them to hold in melee but Ming cavalry will probably evade their charges and counter-fire with their bows.

Standard Japanese tactics during of the period have an emphasis on melee. Musket infantry would close in, weathering enemy fire, to let loose a volley that would hopefully disorder the enemy ranks and make them more vulnerable for the Japanese charge.

The Plan:

That's up to you. What the hell do we do, Holla Forums?

fuck man I am not Lord of War, but as Tsu Zu say once "kill the mother fuckers confusian and shit"

I didn't understand any of that except pike and shot.

Use the plus-shaped forest to secure a flank of the pikes, infiltrate swordsmen through the forest towards the hill they have for guns, posture with cavalry in the open field to the right of the pikes but use the pikes as cover against the Ming cavalry.

Keep in mind that due to the autistic feudal nature of the Japanese army, we must deploy our army as divisions. Battalions leaving their generals' area of command get a penalty to their movement. Good thing General Harutora - whose divisions has most of our forces - has a ridiculously large command range and we should be able to do some really fancy maneuvers because of this.

What game is this?

Sengoku Jidai: Shadow of the Shogun

Sengoku Jidai: Shadow of the Shogun + Mandate of Heaven Expansion

So here's the forest infiltrator regimental combat team (wow fancy) I've assembled, consisting of all of General Suketeru's force plus 1 Teppo Ashigaru and 1 Yumi Samurai unit from General Harutora's division.

It's important to note that Archer Samurai in this game are not weaklings in melee unlike their portrayal Total War. They are actually superb in melee.

Also, do you see that unit with the trailing "things" behind them? Those are Teppo Samurai. They fight as dragoons, riding to the battlefield, dismounting to let loose a volley, before getting away. We could send them west alongside Suketeru's cavalry guard to skirmish/posture.

Thank you honorabru anons

...

Would you recommend this to a fan of the Panzer General/Corps series? Are there any games you could compare it to?

Well if no-one has any other ideas, this will be our plan and deployment.

This plan, like all others, will probably shatter in the face of our enemy.

If you're autistic enough to play something like OoB, then sure. It's a tad bit more autistic than that series though. As for similar games, I can think of none except Total War, but Total War is trash.

Looks great, victory is assured.

So when the battle starts, we see that the Chinese have deployed much like we predicted. They've placed a lot of artillery and artillery-equipped infantry battalions on the hill. Guarding their flanks are a bunch of cavalry. In the distance, we can see a Ming General overseeing things on top of a particularly tall hill.

We can see that the enemy has deployed their cavalry quite close to the front lines. Should we reconsider an immediate infantry assault on their guns and take up a more defensive stance on the left?

There's also definitely a whole bunch of units in the shadow behind that hill that we can't see yet.

Hell yeah

As we advance, we are pelted by Ming artillery. Our brave warriors weather the barrage alright except for one battalion of Teppo Ashigaru, which fail their cohesion check and are now Disrupted, which basically halves their fighting capability. The Ming have opted not to move any of their units during all of this.

Meanwhile, the Teppo Samurai under General Suketeru move quite a distance forward, giving us a view of most of the Ming Army. We can see then, that behind their checkered deployment on the hill, they have lots of infantry in reserve.

Our left flank is threatened by 6 battalions of Ming cavalry, which are all skilled bow- and swordsmen. As we have sword-equipped infantry at the forefront in our forest infiltrators, we will probably lose badly against them. It will take a couple more turns for the follow-up force and their spearmen to catch up.

Since the Ming are determined to stay still, it is ultimately up to us to make the assault. What do we do?

Kill our own general.

We send General Suketeru and his cavalry guard alone. He is quickly surrounded by the enemy cavalry despite supporting fire from our Teppo Samurai. I was going to order him to charge a unit that had no general attached, but he insists in fighting Generla Xie Shide. His guard loses 9 men in the Impact Phase, while Shide's own loses 10.

Supporting this bold action, we move 2 Samurai battalions and some ranged forward. Following Japanese tactical doctrine, concentrated musket and arrow fire are directed towards the nearest enemy cavalry unit, and at least 50 are wounded or killed. The order to charge is given, but they run away and our foot troops cannot catch up.

In the center, we begin to move our forces up. We manage to Disrupt an enemy musket unit in volley-duel with our own Teppo Ashigaru. The enemy moves its melee Kuijia Bubing to intercept our advancing Samurai. All our men manage to pass their cohesion checks against enemy artillery.

At the right flank, General Okinori's cavalry guard is disrupted by fierce artillery bombardment. A Ming cavalry battalion moves to intercept him but he and his men ride past them, opting to hopefully charge the nuisance artillery next time. To check this cavalry battalion we have ordered ranged and spear units up, namely teppo and yari samurai units. The Teppo Ashigaru who were disrupted by artillery fire earlier, probably encouraged by General Okinori's disregard for danger, rally back from Disrupted to Steady.

...

The only strategy you ever need.

Literally me when playing any game while drunk.

In a feat that can only be described as "heroic," General Suketeru actually beats General Shide in the next impact phase, losing 5 men but killing 29 in return. They also somehow withstand a flanking charge by other Ming cavalry. Unfortunately for us, General Shide's unit passes its cohesion check and remains steady - but not for long, as our Yari Samurai smash into them from the side. The Ming attempt to break our encroaching infantry with a cavalry charge, but somehow our Yumi Ashigaru withstood the charge and are now giving a good account of themselves in melee.

In the right flank, Ming General Nio Chengweng's cavalry battalion loses over 220 men in a turn and a half from a veritable deluge of lead from our 2,000 musketeers in that area. His unit automatically breaks, unable to withstand such an assault. His terrified cavalrymen run into the trees to our left, and in the void they leave, we put our melee units forward.

In the center, we finally engage the enemy in melee. One of their protected musketeer units critically fails a morale check during the melee phase against our Yari Samurai and rout. One Ming light artillery unit and one bow unit, seeing their comrades fleeing, are dispersed and Disrupted respectively.

I build hot air balloons and drop incendiary bombs on the enemy army. Then after they're all dead, I go up to the enemy general's corpse and teabag him. Suddenly their giant enemy crab comes out of the sea and I get in my mech and beat its ass before finishing it off with my katana which was folded over 9000 times and can slice through a castle wall. Then I return home to my lovely anime schoolgirl waifu.

Meanwhile, in the alternate universe that this thread's scenario is actually happening in, I ask why we're even in this battle when the enemy has a superior artillery position. My commanding officer tells me it's for honor and to make Grolious Nippon gleat again. I take a gigantic swig of sake and think about how I'm going to bone his daughter if I get back alive. Then I start to make a battle plan.

Once we get their cavalry and artillery out of the way, they're pretty much done for. If our cavalry manages to pull off a successful charge against the enemy artillery, we send a bunch of guys through the forest, outflank them and capture the hills. Then we drag anything we have that shoots to the top of the hills we just took and give the enemy a taste of their own medicine.

I'm unable to play this games in any other way so I spend hours building a 1/10 force and just overwhelm the enemy zerg style

I am a strategic genius, unmatched in all the lands.

That's a pretty detailed plan, but the battle is already halfway through the phase where it devolves into a clusterfuck of men madly swinging weapons at each other and battalions are refusing orders.

Despite your genius, 's decision to send General Suketeru to his own death has finally bit us in the ass. A second flanking charge routs his cavalry, and two battalions of Ming cavalry rush forth to pursue them. One deigns to charge at a Sword Ashigaru battalion on the way, and another charges a Teppo Ashigaru battalion.

Meanwhile, in the center, we autobreak another unit through determined musket and archer fire, and through the gap the routing Ming battalion leaves we pour in a disrupted Sword Ashigaru battalion. Three of our Yari Samurai battalions charge and meet the enemy in close combat, while on the right flank we are beginning to push against the enemy in the forest.

Maybe we can bait their charging cavalry into getting bogged down and rekt by our spearmen. If they have any cavalry left after that, we can just toss some flak at them. We can't let General Kamikaze's heroically pointless death be in vain.

Although that would be the best position to take, their cavalry have ridden past our spearmen, and the left flank has devolved into a clusterfuck where nothing makes sense anymore. Our Teppo Ashigaru battalion actually manage to fight their mounted assailants, losing 7 men to kill a whopping 40. This causes the enemy to fall back out of melee, and after two volleys of musket fire, the Ming battalion routs.

The Center is basically units fighting in melee whether they're meant to be fighting in melee or not. Our Samurai are - just as expected - holding their own against their Ming counterparts. Meanwhile, in the right flank, we sweep left. General Okinori's cavalry unit routs two Ming battalions that allows us to do this.

Focus on securing the center hill.

Looks like part of their forces are in position to be hit with an attack on two fronts from gunners and melee. We should end up crushing their flank, which will make taking the center hill all but guaranteed. At that point the battle is basically won.

Welp. We managed to accomplish our victory conditions and win the battle.

Anyway, the game isn't really suited for CYOA, since the realistic portrayal of mass warfare in this era makes it so that there are only few "grand" decisions to be made such as "infiltrate through the forest." Little tactical decisions like two-step attacks with musket and melee infantry aren't really worth posting about.

Point was to introduce Sengoku Jidai to you folks since it's pretty obscure. It's a good game that deserves more attention. *Everything* has an army list in the game, even fucking Tibet or Wako Pirates.

SJ has a sister game, Pike & Shot Campaigns, which is basically the same thing except it's set in Europe. There you can remove Kebab with Polish Winged Hussars in the 1640's.

Pretty cool, OP. I tried Total War before, but I really didn't like it all that much. This seems neat though.

That's too bad. Those are the most fun. Real-time tactical is my favorite type of strategy game. We need more of these threads with games that people's decisions can really have an impact on.

Someone should do one for Syrian Warfare. Seeing your poor tanks go up in flames from an ATGM or BTRs blow up from a lucky RPG shot is always fun.

It is pretty neat. There are army lists for an autistic number of factions from the 12th to 17th centuries. The game sports a dynamic campaign system and, best of all, a random battle map generator, which basically ups replayability by a hundred times. You can defend Japan against the 13th century Mongol invasion or stamp out rebels as Ming or Qing China.

Really, the random maps make the game special. Pic related is from my Joseon vs. Manchu playthrough. Impassable mountains divided the map into several parts and both me and the AI had to account for this in terms of deployment and tactics. In multiplayer, an opponent bamboozled the shit out of me by employing a very clever deception using forests and a stream that prevented a cavalry charge on my part.

Similarly, also in multiplayer, I hid about 5 battalions in a patch of forest and waited for the enemy to wheel to face my main attack. Then I let them loose, flank-charging my opponent and causing him to ragequit.

Does the campaign feature an overworld map? Do units earn experience and follow you from mission to mission?

Yes to both. Here are a couple of screenshots from my Pro-Ming Tibetan campaign against the Japanese. Tibet actually has pretty good cavalry.

Units gain experience and elan as they fight, win and lose. Every spring season when the player's treasury fills, they might lose or gain points in these two values as replacements refill their ranks.

Experience levels in the game are as follows:

Elan levels are as follows:

The game will then take these two values to give a unit its final in-battle quality rating which are:


A unit like Samurai will only gain experience, but may lose a lot of elan depending on the course of the campaign. So while their experience may be "Battle-Hardened" their elan might fall to "Nervous," so they'll go from "Superior" rating to just "Above Average."