This is an interesting discussion, I think. I totally get Erwin's point about the Yumi being antiquated by this time period, and I think he's right. I know Samurai were interested in teppo... My first question is, Date clan aside (I know it's hard
), did Samurai personally adopt teppo in great numbers, or were they more likely to hand them out to ashigaru?
Since this is an infantry discussion we can disregard cavalry for a moment. Elianus is coming up with ideas to make the yari samurai better equipped to fight in melee. I think this makes sense historically, after all the yari was more often than not the samurai's preferred main weapon, correct? But then, the yari is already an effective melee weapon when the unit is in spear wall, and I believe it was Miyamoto Musashi who wrote that samurai learned to make tight formations with spears. Two questions seem to emerge: did samurai ever fight with their yari when not in tight formation? and did samurai ever go to battle in great numbers with just their swords?
There's a thread on the Rome boards with a discussion on swords vs. spears. I'll quote one comment:
I read the article - it is mostly about dueling but it's a great read. We basically come back around to the idea that swords are great for flanking spears but terrible for running at them head on. So, since we can't tell yari samurai to use their swords instead of their yari, the katana samurai do indeed serve a tactical role without necessarily having to arm them with bows or guns.
As for balancing, it seems the yari should be strong enough to hold off a sword from the front, but should lose when being flanked. This can be approached from a few angles... Give yari samurai more morale, maybe give them a higher defense? (If this was Medieval 2 we could simply give them a shield value which would add to their frontal defense value.) Or maybe increase the yari melee altogether, but also raise the katana samurai's charge value when not mounted?