[Faction Discussion] Goryeo

[tokimitsu]

Those pics I attached are from 신돈 in 2005 in MBC

The story about 공민왕 who tried to reform Goryeo and 신돈 who came into power as a Monk. 14C's story.

[Augustus Lucifer]

Also, how many provinces are you planning on making Koryo proper? Ideally, it ought to be eight ( Chungcheong [Gongju], Gangwon [Wonju], Gyonggi [Gaegyeong], Gyeongsang [Daegu], Hamgyeong [Hamhung], Hwanghae [Haeju], Jeolla [Jeonju], Pyongan [Seogyeong]), but for game balance purposes that would probably be excessive. I can try to find something on the administrative divisions of Koryo to see if they differed substantially from Choseon.

There are 8 cities in Goryeo. The minimum amount of cities held by a faction at game start is something like 6-8, with the max being much higher.

Kaegyong (Capital)
Sogyong
Namgyong
Dongyong
Kyoju
Cholla
Tonggye
Sohae

[jalen911]

Goguryeo≠Goryeo, It's not same age. And in Goryeo's age, Goryeo already lost control of East-north plain of china. That's mean Goryeo lost a place can provide them good and enough horses. They may have some Heavy horsemen,but they can not make big horse units like Liao,Jin,Mongol. So I really suspect Goryeo's horse army's quantity and quality.

[jalen911]

BTW,Goguryeo was be conquered by Tang in AD 666. And Goruryeo was pay 11 times tribute to Tang for ask peace and show their loyalty to Middle Empire !

[jalen911]

In my opinion, Goguryeo should be have good arhers and good footman, few good heavy horse-man, few light horse-man.

[Baeksu]

BTW,Goguryeo was be conquered by Tang in AD 666. And Goruryeo was pay 11 times tribute to Tang for ask peace and show their loyalty to Middle Empire !

It was 668, and it was conquered by the Tang in conjunction with Silla and became part of Unified Silla. And Korea didn't become a tributary state of China (that is, the sadae-kyorin system) until much later.

At any rate, we're talking about Koryo, and this has no bearing on the current topic.

[magick]

BTW,Goguryeo was be conquered by Tang in AD 666. And Goruryeo was pay 11 times tribute to Tang for ask peace and show their loyalty to Middle Empire !

Goguryeo wasn't conquered so much by the Tang as they were by Silla, who had aid from the Tang.

Please get your facts straight.

[STELLover]

Goguryeo was conquered by the allied Tang and Shilla army- it was suffering from immense foreign invasions- after the great victory in which more than 1.5 Million Sui army, and eventually the dynasty was demolished in the invasion of Goguryeo- its army was devastated- to the point it needed some restrengthening- Shilla Kingdom used this oppotunity to launch another invasion- another reason that Goguyreo fell, was because it suffered from a lot of internal strifes and rebelliones of powerful generals

[jalen911]

Goguryeo wasn't conquered so much by the Tang as they were by Silla, who had aid from the Tang.

Please get your facts straight.

, I get my facts straight by Chinese history book. You get yours, dont you ? It's pretty big difference. But it's pretty sure Tang sent over 300,000 troops to crush Goguryeo. I dont know how much is so much aid for Silla by your mean.

[STELLover]

Its called Historiographic Bias

[jalen911]

heh, indeed......

[Augustus Lucifer]

It's like me as an American asking an 18th Century brit to write the history of our revolution. "ungrateful yankee pigs" is bound to show up in there somewhere. This seems to happen a lot in East Asia, because Chinese histories are the most encompassing and definitive, yet they are also blatantly tinged with the bias of their own world view as the nation under heaven surrounded by barbarians. Luckily for us, whether Tang or Silla played a bigger part in the conquest of Goguryeo has no bearing on our mod, so there's no real reason to argue those semantics.

[STELLover]

It's like me as an American asking an 18th Century brit to write the history of our revolution. "ungrateful yankee pigs" is bound to show up in there somewhere. This seems to happen a lot in East Asia, because Chinese histories are the most encompassing and definitive, yet they are also blatantly tinged with the bias of their own world view as the nation under heaven surrounded by barbarians. Luckily for us, whether Tang or Silla played a bigger part in the conquest of Goguryeo has no bearing on our mod, so there's no real reason to argue those semantics.

Wow- Nice Essay A+

[jalen911]

I agree with you ^^! Lucifer

[Faris ad Din]

Jumping in late into the thread, and inadvertent bump!

I am no great artist or Korean historian or game programmer - I just made an observation watching the movie "Musa" (무사), which is a historically inspired movie, based on the Goryeo period. Throughout the movie, there is a tension between two types of troops - even among the small escort team.

These types appear to be:
1. 용호 - Yongho troops; they are equipped with finished leather scale and lamellar armor. Notably, they have a higher status and more privilege in the party (and likely in the military as a whole, whose customs they are bringing with them).
2. 주진 - Joojin troops; they are dressed with no armor at all, with basic brown cotton/linen 'uniforms' one often sees in depictions of many early Korean armies, and levy units of later Korean armies. They speak with a very coarse accent and carry themselves about in a lower-class fashion - and one of them explains how he was conscripted or would have been arrested and imprisoned - so he is serving his years of duty until he goes home. We can assume he and most of the others are farmer stock. As much as the Yongho troops have higher status and privilege, the Joojin troops have lower status.

The overall commanding officer of the group also seems to personally command the Yongho troops; the Joojin troops have their own leader or senior sergeant (he's the archer - was probably a mountain woodsman in civilian life).



Notes:
2:55 - A Joojin soldier collapses, exhausted, as the soldiers march through the desert. The commanding officer. exposition of the maltreatment of the Joojin troops, and their resentment and the tension. You can compare this scene with the beginning scene of the movie in Part 1, where a soldier collapses of heat stroke - but he is apparently a Yongho soldier by the look of his armor, and his hair is cut off to be taken back to his homeland Goryeo. The Joojin, on the other hand, really are portrayed as treated as human dirt.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Xlj8...eature=related
4:22 - The troop of soldiers is on low rations and forced march. A pair of Joojin soldiers are caught stealing food from the supplies, and are to be punished - when a third Joojin soldier bursts out with indignation at the unfair treatment of their group, while the Yongho soldiers receive more food. While he is not guilty of a crime, he demands to take the punishment instead for them.



3:40 - one of the Joojin soldier's personal accounts to his comrades. Choice: military service or imprisonment.

I see how the movie portrays these two groups - but I still am not clear on what they are. I tried a brief search, but perhaps someone else can find it better. I don't like Musa - it is very overly dramatic and exaggerated. Still, it can be examined as it treats the period of history being discussed.
My question is basically: What exactly are Yongho and Joojin troops? What is the real difference between them?
Now for some very poor Korean:
내 질문은 용호병하고 주진병은 도대체 무엇입니까?

As for jalen911's drawing on Chinese history textbooks - of course they're biased towards glorifying modern China. Korean textbooks are biased towards glorifying modern Korea. If Tang is the one who principally defeated Goguryeo - well, it doesn't matter in the results - Silla defeated the Tang forces once the two were finished anyway.

Historiographic Bias!

[Augustus Lucifer]

That's some interesting stuff, I didn't know they had any movies about Goryeo during our time period. Thanks.

[Faris ad Din]

Sure, check it out - but be warned, I don't like that movie because it's so exaggerated. The officers were not these invincible handsome guys with three-inch-broad huge 30 pound swords. They're following a the classic Korean romanticized almost mythical depiction of heroes - similar to the Chinese own depiction of heroes/immortals with their ornate armor and huge halberds. That kind of stuff would be more fitting for a non-realistic MMORPG.

However, if AUH is not going to be completely historically accurate but made with a freer creative hand, then sure... the officers can be these powerful ornately-armored guys with topknots and no helmets and huge broadswords...

There are many other Korean historical movies and series, and some from the Goryo period too. There are plenty plenty. I just am not fluent in Korean and I'm not a Korean movie/TV series/soap opera fan, so I don't know any names.

혹시라도 중세 고려시대 영화이나 텔레비젼 쇼 아라며는 소개 해주세요!
제가 미국에서 태어났다고 한국말이 잘 못해서 죄송합니다...

If anyone knows any Goryo-era (old inaccurate McCune-Reischauer spelling: "Koryo") movies or television shows, please let us know!
I apologize for my poor Korean because I was born in the USA...

[Yelü Dashi]

Musa is an awesome film, the biggest budget Korean flick at the time I believe. Yes, historically accuracy is not its strong point but I like the ensemble cast, Zhang Ziyi isn't even that annoying. Its got great locations, its mulitlingual, and features intelligent Mongols ! I also really that old Korean dude, the guy that sails away on the boat at the end, a great actor.

As for inspiration for AUH, I've actually got some of the original concept for some of costumes in my vast repository of source material. For Korean units, we're not actually lacking much in terms of conceptual ideas. In fact, the opposite is probably true, we have too many potential concepts but we seem mired in deciding on an accurate roster (even with several Koreans on the team).

[Faris ad Din]

Zhang Ziyi did pretty well in the movie. That old Korean dude, the archer - was apparently the sergeant or head of the Joojin peasant-conscript troops who

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

actually were the only ones who survived in the end - all the 'elite' Yongho troops got killed off, and the peasant Joojin troops took up the fight and finished all the attacking Mongols in the forest.

As for inspiration for AUH, I've actually got some of the original concept for some of costumes in my vast repository of source material. For Korean units, we're not actually lacking much in terms of conceptual ideas. In fact, the opposite is probably true, we have too many potential concepts but we seem mired in deciding on an accurate roster (even with several Koreans on the team).

Haha, I'm more than sure. There's so many modern-day film depictions of period Korean history that the information must be all over the place. As is the problem for many other nation's artifacts, actual weapons and armor used in battles rarely survive - as is the case with European plate knight's armor. Not a single suit of real knight's armor used in battle survived. The hundreds and thousands of suits of European armor we have are often 3/4 size artistic decoration, or just ceremonial suits for kings/nobles (some never worn).

I figure the majority of the Goryo army was not too different from the preceding Unified Silla period or the succeeding Joseon period - they wore not much armor - just clothes, maybe some brimmed helmets or no helmets for the levy peasantry, and polearms - spears or halberds. Then there were the professionally trained archers and cavalry, whose armor is harder to redetermine exactly.

As a minor side detail, I read a story that cotton was unknown in Korea until the Mongol conquest in the 14th century. The Mongols banned the import of cotton seeds to Korea because they wanted to keep exporting cotton cloth there - when a Korean scholar visiting Mongolia hit upon a way to smuggle ten cotton seeds in his pencase back to Korea - and he planted all ten, and only one seed grew and thrived - whereupon cotton spread in Korea and became widely used. So Goryo uniforms won't be made of cotton (linen was used since ancient times) - though that is probably not useful information, and I may just be recounting a legend!

[Temuchin]

Hi, new to the discussion section.

As a asian history student in my school respectably I'm absolutely excited to see an asian based mods to pop up.

However, I was skimming through the Goryeo section (well, since I am Korean Canadian and this is my major area of studying) have some concerns about the overall military aspects of Goryeo.

A) I'm not sure if this came up or not, but Goryeo was NOT a cavalry heavy army at all.
Yes there are battles such as Guiju where mass cavalry flanking won the day,
but Goryo officials at the time all agree to the prior to Yun Kwan's campain into the Jurchens that they have been highly ineffective against the Jurchens (the later Jin dynasty) because Jurchens are cavalry based and majority of Goryeo troops were marching and travelling on foot.

And this is why the Goryeo's military reforms took place, installing a special forces unit called "Byulmuban(별무반)", which consisted of mainly cavalry troops, supported by monastery supported auxillaries and infantry.
This special unit was very effective against the Jurchens at first, but it was not strong enough to hold down the newly gained territory in the northeast.

in fact, the most cavalry heaviest army in medieval Korean history was not Goryeo, but Joseon. Joseon was not too lenient with Goryeo's lack of effectiveness against the nomadic tribes such as say, the Jurchens, which became the most critical problem of Joseon's border safety and to their great concern actually have kneeled down the Joseon king and forced him to perform Kowtow(also known by the westerners as banging your head on the floor nine times in such incidence as Lord McCartney's trip to China) during the rise of Manchurian Qing Dynasty. They institute a voluntary cavalry system, where men enlisting to cavalry (so you can clearly see that this is a prestigious job inside the army) provides his weapons, armour and horses, and most of all, they were effective. there are records of skirmishes of Joseon cavalry where troops as small as 300 units defeats 10,000 or more Jurchen troops in battle.

Now, I will not say that Goryeo's horsemen incapable, as there are serious leads that follows to Goryeo's experiments with cavalrymen and active use of it, but I doubt that Goryeo would be regarded as a cavalry powerhouse. Heavy cavalry, yes. great quality? I doubt it.

B) I saw pictures of Goguryo's heavy cavalry, or rather dubbed Gaema-musa(鎧馬武士; since they ride on armoured horses) somewhere down in the post. I'm afraid to say that as cool as it looks and Korean fans of the mod anticipating it will die to see it implemented on the game, but that type of cavalry was severly outdated and it was not used after the fall of Goguryo. In fact, historians are not even sure if Goguryo mounted traditional heavy cavalry in the battlefields of the 7th century against Tang, since Tang cavalry was relatively light and relied on manoueverability compared to traditional heavy cavalries such as Northern Wei or Sui, so Goguryeo may have kept up with the advances and made their own changes. And even if they used them in famous battles such as Jupilsan or Sasu, it's probably certain that they have lost their place in the Goguryo (and the following Silla) army because they were heavy, slow, expensive and most critically, were outmanouevered by Tang cavalry which we can now see and conclude was much more advanced in nature.

Yes I realize that Jin dynasty were famous for its heavy cavalry (tied in chains to maximize the shock value if i remember correctly) and it did come back to the medieval battlefields, but I am overly unsure if Goryeo's heavy cavalry would wear scail mail, with neck protection, and with plated northern style helmet which in fact were all obsolete in medieval battlefields.

Goryeo troops of the time wore chain mails (쇄자 & 경번갑), and we see that Joseon troops wore plated breatplates as well as paper armour(지갑) which served as a bulletproof vest at the time. Therefore I suspect as well that Goryeo troops would wear armour such as so, or Mongolian Brigandines(두정갑) much like Joseon cavalry which became widely popular after mongolian invasion.

But uhm....yeah there should always be a room for creativity...I'd like to see those Koguryo cavalry


C) I am very concerned with people uploading pictures from dramas. Although they are fun to watch, Korean dramas are very historically inaccurate when it comes to props and costumes. if you are a designer or a concept artist, I strongly suggest that you take it with a heavy pinch of salt. I mean seriously, the armour shown on Shindon(which was the posted image) was also used in Jumong(depicting the beginning of Goguryeo) and Daejoyoung(which depicts the fall of Goguryo and rise of Balhae). Do you get my drift?

I suggest looking at Goryeo-Dogyung(고려도경-it was written by a Song diplomat that travelled to Kaesong; it seems that they had diagrams, but only the written part exists today) to idealize the Goryeo military of the time. But word of caution though; the writer was very critical of the general culture and lifestyle of Goryeo. Also, Stephen Turnbull has written many wonderful books with colourful pictures that shows Korean troops with historically correct armours. why not look at those?

I don't have a lot of time during the summer since I go to Korea this summer to travell around, but I'll try to find and post some pictures and primary sources such as Goryeo Dogyung for you if the history department wants to skim through it. I don't mean to be critical and be a smartass about small things, but hey, I love my mother country. I want to see my own equally beautiful culture portrayed accuratly as it can be.

I can't wait to play this mod.