Sunday, March 29, 2020

How Many Samurai does it take to field a DBA-RRR army?

I recently purchased up an old collection of various 15mm ancient and medieval figures at a collectors show in Woburn, Massachusetts that were likely someones prized wargaming units back in the day.  A review of the DBA 3.0 list showed that by and large there were enough stands to meet any combinations a couple of times over, but there were some questions to be resolved.

Like, how come there were 16 stands of 4Bw present and all the spear/pike were 3Sp? I recall that 3.0 made a number of new distinctions between Solid and Fast troop types and that Fast Spears didn't provide side support but 4Sp (Solid) did.  So, okay the Ashiguru types at 3Sp moved faster, since I had 10 stands of them I could always rebase a few stands to 4Sp if that made sense someday.

The Samurai are 4Bd, except most of what I got were 3Bd, so again Fast as opposed to solid.

Here is the mess of stands that came with the acquisition representing one faction (the 'black' army)


When reviewing the DBA-RRR lists (since we generally use these for renaissance period games) I noticed that many alternatives were available (like 5 more 4Bd, or 5 3Bd, or 5, 5Wb, or 4 Sh).  Not clear if the shot should eventually be 3Sh (Fast) or 4Sh(Solid) since DBA-RRR hasn't been officially upgraded to 3.0 yet, I left the 10 stands of Ashiguru Spear/Pike as 3Pk and the 5 stands on 4Sh as 4 to a base.  Again I can always recombine a couple of stands as required in the future and I recall that Samurai armies at one time were thought to be fast in deployment and attack?


I have a similar question about the excess Samurai 4Bw stands, were some of them like to be 3Bw (Fast) types as well?  For now the 6 stands are in the waiting drawer awaiting some future decision on deployment.


I also added from some unpainted figures three more cavalry stands (3Cav) but did not try to go to double deep 6Cav since it wasn't clear if the back rank would be more cavalry figures or more likely some type of Ashiguru blade or spear types.

Finally I painted and added five stands of 5Wb to cover the options for crazed Monks, Sohei irregulars or similar.  By basing them 30mm deep I can use them as Warbands or even as Hordes (more common in 3.0 as I see from the lists) but I think the Wb is a better fit with fast everything else?

So an interesting mix of all sorts of Samurai types, but will they actually be able to fight well?  With blade armies on foot most people seem to do well but we will see.

In the box I obtained there was still another force (a 'red' army) with most of the 4Bd and 3Bd stands already completed.  These will go out to a friend to finish off for his own take on Samurai warfare.  Perhaps an AAR will be in the future of their meeting together?


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