Ronin

Hey guys,

Just wanted to post something for the sake of keeping in touch, and share some cool gaming stuff I've been getting up to.

I recently picked up some figs for a second DBA force, the post-mongol samurai. Then, while at Hot Lead with Ben I had a chance to pick up some Osprey gaming books, one of which is Ronin: Skirmish Wargaming in the Age of the Samurai. How fitting!

This post has no pics for 2 reasons 1. I'm at work right now. 2. I haven't painted anything new since the last samurai I posted.

What I have done, however, is crafted up some forces. I've decided this game is one where I'll simply own all the models, rules, and terrain, and every once in a while I'll bring the stuff along for a skirmish.

Since I've been stuck in Chicagoland all week I've had plenty of time to build what I think will be fun, balanced forces. This way when we play list building won't be a concern, you simply pick your faction of choice from what I've already got here.

I've made 150 (for multiplayer) and 200 point lists for 4 factions in the game. Here's the breakdown:

Bushi 1: The bushi have a rule that the band must consist of either 2:1 ratio of ashigaru to samurai, or be 100% samurai. Bushi 1 is the all elite samurai list. Each one is a powerful warrior on his own, with cool abilities (primarily kenjutsu, which allows you to re-roll attack and defense dice). The downside to the list is low model count and no shooting. So losing a single guy to shooting will hit hard once the melee gets stuck in.

Bushi 2: This force is a couple of samurai leading a group of ashigaru. At least one Ashigaru will have a teppo (arquebus), which pack a punch. Unfortunately, if the teppo doesn't manage to take an opponent out this buntai probably doesn't stand a chance once combat hits.

Sohei; These bros are warrior monks. They have good stats, the best weapon in the game, and are fearless. To balance this they don't have the armour of the samurai or any shooting. I think these guys will be really fun to play, and hit like a ton of bricks in melee. Where the samurai are nigh untouchable by bows, the sohei will have to be more careful with their movement.

Ikko-Ikki: A mixed band of Buddhist uprisers. These guys can take samurai and sohei, but their monto (believers) aren't as good as the trained and armoured ashigaru of the Bushi. There's a rule in the game that no band can be more than 1/4 teppo, and the Ikko-Ikki easily work around this limitation by spamming 4 point peasants with no weapons. The main tactic here is guns. Oh and a super sneaky ninja is hiding somewhere amongst the ranks...

I'm super amped to paint these models and have a few games. We played a couple small games already, I found rules are simple and fun. The strategies aren't super complex but aren't absent either, hoping 3 and 4 player mashups will add a new dimension for sure.

I'm also planning to hit the fish store to stock up some japanese village terrain.

Also, it seems the six has a fledgling 9th age community, and I'm doing my best to insert myself into that.

Peace.