Two More Games of Ronin

I got in two more games of Ronin – Skirmish Wargames in the Age of the Samurai this weekend. One on Friday night and one on Satruday night.

I'm loving this game.

GAME ONE

Friday Night Christian came into town with his girls and played a game with my kids.

SCENARIO

We played the Skirmish Scenario.

I can’t remember what the minor objectives were.

I think we rolled TWELVE turns for the game length!

FORCES

Both side were pretty much identical – both had a Bushou and a Samurai and four Ashigaru (two with Yari, one with Yumi, one with teppo) – so each of the kids got to play the buntai’s Bushou or Samurai and two Ashigaru.

My kids took the “Crab Clan” Bushi Buntai – mostly in blue, with samurai armed with Tetsubos. Christian and his kids too the ”Lion Clan” Bushi Buntai

THE GAME

(Remember: click on the pictures for a bigger version)

Christian and his girls against my kids.

End of Turn One – the Lion cland charges forward together… mostly… The Crabs seem a little out of sorts – not so determined to rush into combat.

End of Turn Two – the Lions have formed a battle line and let fly with a shot from their teppo… harming no one..

Turn Three - The Crab clan finally gets it’s act together and forms up a battle line.

The Crab Teppo fired, The lion clan teppo reloads. The archers have been firing all along but with little effect.

Turn Four – contact!

The end of the Turn Four – not looking good for the Crab clan – Two of their number are lightly wounded and another stunned, whereas they only managed to stun one of the Lion Clan.

Turn Five – the battle rages on! Finally the Lion archer hit the Crab teppo gunner. Two of the Ashigaru stabbed each other with their yari – the Lion ashigaru taking a grievous wound! And some more stunning going on.

Turn Six – the last turn we played before the Lion Clan had to pack it in – The lion archer is hit and wounded (I think by the Crab archer). The grievously wounded Lion Ashigaru is finished off, but the Crab Bushou is Grievously Wounded!

The Crab thus ended with one victory point to the Lion’s zero… had the game gone antoehr couple rounds it might have been entirely different – with the Crab Bushou Grievously injured and all…

A fun game – I think we’re all getting the hang of this.

GAME TWO

Saturday night Rick, Dave and Patrick showed up. Patrick and I played some bandits against Rick and Dave’s Bushi Buntai.

SCENARIO

Again we played a skirmish scenario.

The Bandits had to kill the Bushi’s leader

The Bushi had to capture a figure of rank two or higher.

The game was to last 7 turns.

FORCES

”Lion Clan” Bushi Buntai - Rick and Dave

Bushou

Heavy Armour, Katana, Wakazishi, Naginata

Command, Naginatajutsu, Intuition, Powerful

46 points

Samurai

Heavy Armour, Katana, Wakazishi, Naginata

Command, Naginatajutsu

@30 points each

2x Ashigaru

Medium Armour, Armour, Katana, Yari

@18 points each

2x Ashigaru

Medium Armour, Armour, Katana, one with Yumi, one with Teppo

@18 points each

Bandit Buntai Tim and Patrick

Leader

Heavy Armour, Katana, Tetsubo 

Commander, Tetsubojutsu

30 points

2x Bandit Gashira

Light Armour, Katana

Commander

@20 points each

1x Bandit Gashira

NO Armour, Katana, Yumi

Commander, Kyujutsu

24 points

2x Bandits

Light Armour, Katana, Yumi

@16

5x Peasants

Improvised Weapons

@4 points each

THE GAME

(Remember: click on the pictures for a bigger version)

Turn One –The bandits line up on the hill, the Lions charge at full speed to close the distance as fast as they can! Arrows were fired but missed wildly.

Turn Two – The Lions surged forward, the bandits held their ground – the archery was a bit more telling this round – One of the lion Ashigaru was lightly wounded, another was grievously wounded! The bandit gashira archer was also lightly wounded.

Turn Three – The Lions continued to charge forward a full speed. A few of the bandits came down off the hill to meet a few of the Ashigaru – killing two of them. A Bandit archer grievously wounded the Lion Samurai. Lion and Bandit archers were wounded by arrows.

At this point we wondered if, in the campaign, it might be a good time for the Lion to pack it in and concede – it looked like it was going badly for them – two ashigaru dead, one wounded and the samurai grievously wounded….?

Turn Four – The Lions passed their morale test and we carried on… The teppo armed Lion Ashigaru charged in to fight a peasant. The Bandit leader and one of his bandit underlings charged in to fight the grievously wounded Lion Samurai. A peasant charged in to distract the Lion Bushou, while a gashira and another peasant attacked the Lion ashigaru archer.

Peasants were slain by the Bushou and the Ashigaru with the teppo (and the Bushou collected his first head!). The Lion Samurai and Ashigaru archer also met their ends… (and the bandit looted the Samurai! I need to come up with better “loot counters” I just gave the bandit a treasure chest I had kicking around – which looked a bit silly…).

Things looking worse still for the Lion Clan… Four of their six original number dead – only two of the bandits peasants killed…

The next round (Turn Five), however, the Bushou charged up the hill engaging BOTH archers up there. The Bandit leader charged into that mess, but the remaining Lion ashigaru charged him to take the pressure off his Bushou! A Bandit archer joined the Bandit leader, and a Bandit Gashira and Peasant joined the fight against the Bushou.

I got a little caught up in the game and forgot to take pictures of the results of the round and the following one, but, if I remember correctly one Turn Five the Bushou slayed the two Gashira, and the bandit archer – only the peasant remained! The Bandit leader , with the aid of one of the bandits took down the remaining Ashigaru.

Turn Six – The bandits passed their morale check, then everyone stood off and watched the Bushou slay the remaining peasant in contant and collect his head. The remaining bandit archer took some shots at the Bushou, lightly wounding him.

Turn Seven. The Lion Bushou charged and attacked the Bandit Leader, a Gashir and two peasants came to his aid, but it was no use. The Bandit leader was slain…. and that was the end of the game.

The Bandits scored 8 victory points; 3 for the samurai, 1 for each of the Ashigaru, and 1 for a surviving bandit that looted the samurai.

The Lions scored 11.5 victory points! 3 for the Bandit leader, 2 for each of the two Gashira, one for the bandit archer, 1.5 for three peasants, and 2 for the two heads collected! A Lion victory – but at a cost!! They lost 102 points worth of stuff – that would be a quarter of their full roster for the tournament in one game!

The bandits were beaten down pretty hard too – losing 92 points themselves and their leader! I think the bandits need to play a bit more of a cagey game against the hard hitting, well armoured Bushi – keeping their distance and shooting and NOT letting the bushou get into contact with the leader or gashira!

Another fun game – lots of tension - could have gone either way!

Coming soon on Tim’s Miniature Wargaming Blog:

Ummm… I haven’t been painting much the last day or so… hopefully I’ll get back on that over the next couple evenings and have another buntai or two finished up over the next week.