Mettle Blades and Skill **BETA ver 005 12tpy RELEASED 30May**

[Fra70]

I appreciate ALOT your mod and i will follow it closely .

I will like to add something ( ive expressed other notes in my mod introduction ) regarding the SAMURAI class ...and my thoughts about their weapons . Are all things that i plan to insert ( or i already did ) in my mod but i like to share this thoughts with you .

Its a common knowledge that every high grade Samurai should find on horse ( or almost arrive on horse on the field ) , so i think that mounted samurai should be the most realiable and able to be important on the field even dismounted ( something we do rarely in gameplay ) . What is then the dismounted samurai ? They are of course poor samurai , but not only, ...of course they should be inferior to the mounted ones even when the latters are dismounted ...they should be few also but ALOT better armed and skilled than ashigarus ... ALSO mounted samurai should no suffer attriction ( come on they did have 2 attendents each ) . A gift of samurai troops should be obtained every time you gain a vassal ( that was common )
The Ronins could be done very varied without having the fear to create silly units ... a Ronin could be a rogue samurai , a samurai loyal to your cause , a coward escaped to a defeat .... there you can have ALOT of fun creating many little ( and characterized ) warbands , with regional characteristics too ( they should be your "mercenaries" )

WEAPONS

The YARI should be only weapon without a CAP ( or with a very high one ) ...shouild be very balanced in melee attack and melee defence
The Katana should be avaiable for a very limited number of troops ... very good in melee attacks and a melee defence comparable to the one of the yari ... the katana troops should have a slight higher morale (there is difference to go for the kill with a katana than with a yari )
The Naginata should be a great defensive weapon ...CAPPED of course but with a very high melee defence ..perfect to pin enemy precious troops

CHARGE bonus should be greatly lowered ...its impossible to charge with long pikes ... and with a sword there is really no difference between assaulting and parryng and risposte . also a charge with a naginata is a difficult affair
Also bonuses against cavalry should be dropped expecially for ashigarus ...lines were usually thin

[Hazbones]

Its a common knowledge that every high grade Samurai should find on horse ( or almost arrive on horse on the field ) , so i think that mounted samurai should be the most realiable and able to be important on the field even dismounted ( something we do rarely in gameplay )...

In MBS, I plan to follow historical sources as much as possible. On the battlefield, there were normally just 3 samurai units (2 mounted and 1 on foot). These were the common samurai and not the Hatamoto or Kashindan units. CA gave us plenty of ways to control the AI and tell it which units to recruit. I cannot control the player of course and they will recruit as many as they like. I won't put any caps on the regular samurai units but cap the Hatamoto and Kashindan ones.

I will give my cavalry units the ability to dismount simply because historically there were some units like the Bow and Teppo Cavalry units that only used their horses to get from one side of the battlefield to the other. Once there, they would dismount to fight on foot. I personally think it is stupid that a unit of cavalry just stands there and watches a siege waiting for someone to open the gate for them. In reality, they would dismount to join the assault. IMO.

What is then the dismounted samurai ? They are of course poor samurai , but not only, ...of course they should be inferior to the mounted ones even when the latters are dismounted ...

My samurai units will all have the same unit stats and then an added bonus to their stats if they are mounted. Their mounted bonus will go away when they are dismounted.

they should be few also but ALOT better armed and skilled than ashigarus ...

Unit sizes will be scaled depending upon which OS you pick. Provincial units are huge and the standard samurai units are a little less than 100 men.

ALSO mounted samurai should no suffer attriction ( come on they did have 2 attendents each )

I like this idea and will probably make my samurai units ignore attrition too.

A gift of samurai troops should be obtained every time you gain a vassal ( that was common )

MBS will have this feature too. In fact, there is a whole OS dedicated to vassals. When you capture a new region, there will be a limited selection of units you can recruit from your vanquished foe!

The Ronins could be done very varied without having the fear to create silly units ... a Ronin could be a rogue samurai , a samurai loyal to your cause , a coward escaped to a defeat .... there you can have ALOT of fun creating many little ( and characterized ) warbands , with regional characteristics too ( they should be your "mercenaries" )

MBS will also have a wide variety of mercenary units to choose from. Pirates, Ronin, and Peasants are all part of the merc pool in my mod. The ones you have to pick from depend upon the region you occupy. Their unit sizes are standard across the board (small) and their morale is low due to the fact that they are fighting for money, not honor or loyalty to their boss.

WEAPONS

The YARI should be only weapon without a CAP ( or with a very high one ) ...shouild be very balanced in melee attack and melee defence
The Katana should be avaiable for a very limited number of troops ... very good in melee attacks and a melee defence comparable to the one of the yari ... the katana troops should have a slight higher morale (there is difference to go for the kill with a katana than with a yari )
The Naginata should be a great defensive weapon ...CAPPED of course but with a very high melee defence ..perfect to pin enemy precious troops

My mod has specific weapon classes and types. I have done alot of research and adjusted stats for how they were used historically. I think they are pretty close to what you are talking about here.

CHARGE bonus should be greatly lowered ...its impossible to charge with long pikes ... and with a sword there is really no difference between assaulting and parryng and risposte . also a charge with a naginata is a difficult affair
Also bonuses against cavalry should be dropped expecially for ashigarus ...lines were usually thin

I have greatly tweaked charge bonuses as well. I don't know where CA got their stats from but I just could not justify the numbers they were using. Charge bonuses are way down.

[weirdoascensor]

Really, I'm Curious...Is OS selectable? what feature do you use to make it happen?

[Hazbones]

Really, I'm Curious...Is OS selectable? what feature do you use to make it happen?

It is fairly simple... I just don't want to reveal the method I used to create this feature until after I release my mod.

I'll be happy to explain it to you after my initial release.

[Hazbones]

Here is a proof of concept for selectable OS's in MBS.

PROVINCIAL OS (proof of concept, not final)

Notice that in Provincial OS the faction creates units that are named after the region they are recruited

and with a little flick of the switch...

CLAN OS (proof of concept)

Notice that in Clan OS the units are named after the clan from which they are raised.

EDIT: I have not created the launcher to "one-click" switch the OS yet. This is still a manual feature at the moment but it is still a quick feature even doing it manually.

[Fra70]

Very interesting ..units will remain so big ?

[Hazbones]

Very interesting ..units will remain so big ?

The philosophy for the Provincial OS is to quickly raise large numbers of troops to meet an attack. They are poorly trained and poorly armed but the hope is that their numbers will be able to stop whatever the threat is.

As for the Clan OS, their philosophy is to raise large units (not as big as the Provincial OS) of purely clan troops with as few outsiders as possible.

The Prov OS Peasant units are 300 strong but the faction adjustments CA included in the game shaves some of those troops off each unit. This means that you'll see different numbers for each faction.

The Clan OS Peasant units are 200 but you can see they are shaved off too because of the faction adjustments in the game.

The ashigaru units will have the same size units as the peasants but don't worry, the samurai units are MUCH smaller. The foot samurai units are between 50~125 men (plus or minus depending upon the faction adjustments). The mounted samurai are between 40~80 men. The samurai units have a LONG recruitment time but great stats!

NOTE: The vassal and military OS have their own unit sizes as well. You can read more about them in the OP.

[Gorhaax]

Here is a proof of concept for selectable OS's in MBS.

PROVINCIAL OS (proof of concept, not final)

Notice that in Provincial OS the faction creates units that are named after the region they are recruited

and with a little flick of the switch...

CLAN OS (proof of concept)

Notice that in Clan OS the units are named after the clan from which they are raised.

EDIT: I have not created the launcher to "one-click" switch the OS yet. This is still a manual feature at the moment but it is still a quick feature even doing it manually.

Sounds Awesome, so this is basically an option for calling units by clan or province? Will really help me to remeber the best places to recruit units from.

[weeeee659]

They do more than that. The OS you chose changes how you do pretty much everything. Each has its pros and cons.

[Hazbones]

Sounds Awesome, so this is basically an option for calling units by clan or province? Will really help me to remeber the best places to recruit units from.

Well, with all of the OS except the military one it will help you. The military OS absorbs its enemies and so you won't see any difference in unit names. The units will still have the region stats from where they were raised but that is the only way to tell you got them from somewhere outside your starting regions.

[Hazbones]

Today I will let you see my next set of units that are nearing completion; Early Ashigaru

Originally I planned to have an early and late version of each unit but since I found out that there is no way to use the game calendar to allow units to become available, I decided to tie the early and late versions of each unit to the building levels. Now, as you produce higher level buildings, your units will look different! See, it wasn't so bad!

And now, I will introduce you to our next unit set:

Sagami Early Ashigaru

Our lovely model Bob is seen here wearing a simple Hara-ate style armour, which only covered the chest and groin areas, leaving the thighs and back unprotected. This was a common early armour used by the ashigaru prior to the standardization of armaments. Notice that the rear of the armour is left open and the only other real protection they had was sleeve armour and maybe the old style suneate (shin guards). Most of this gear was looted rather than provided for so there was a severe lack of uniformity.

Here are a couple in-game shots to see them in all their glory. Ignore their colors for now. I will fix that before release.

In-game shots

These are Sagami Ashigaru. The same unit will look slightly different in each province.

Ok, now I am off to bed.

[Castiel]

Nice!
But since the units rooster is so big, can new units actually "replace" old ones when the building is upgraded or the old units gonna stay?

[Hazbones]

The "early" units (or old ones as you refer to them) will be assigned to only a couple levels of a building chain and then all levels above that you will see only the "late" units.
You won't have access to the old units once you go beyond their level.
Of course MBS will have units that are unique to each region so if you capture a new region and that region only has level 1 and 2 buildings, you will only be able to recruit the "early" versions of the units until you upgrade past level 2.

Did that make sense?

[Castiel]

Yes of course, thanks for the clarification, my concern was if there's no way to erase early units then with a huge units rooster of this mod then it's gonna be really confusing but you you wiped it away

[Hazbones]

Yeah, that has always been my issue with other mods that have large unit rosters too. It's no fun when you have to go "shopping" through a whole catalogue of units to find the one you want every turn.

And, to further reduce unit "clutter", the units available in region A are not even visible when you look at the recruitment queue in region B.

[Stincky]

would this concept be able to work for rots? i really like what you have done thus far, definately wanna see how this will turn out--

[Hazbones]

would this concept be able to work for rots? i really like what you have done thus far, definately wanna see how this will turn out--

Thanks, I am working diligently to get to Alpha on this. I know there are people waiting on me.

and yes, it could work with ROTS and FOTS in theory though my mod is only being developed with vanilla game improvement at the moment.

[weeeee659]

Thanks, I am working diligently to get to Alpha on this. I know there are people waiting on me.

I check this thread everyday to see how progress is going. I'm so excited!

[Hazbones]

I will try to keep at it then.

I am now finishing up the early ashigaru models, unit cards and stats. I should be moving on to the late ashigaru tomorrow. Expect another preview for them soon.

[McCarronXLD]

Wow, this looks promising! Very ambitious I am especially happy you are wanting to include TROM and the Recolor mod with it!

I did have one question, and one suggestion (more of a personal wish, not sure if it is feasible or it would fit!).

Question: Will the battles be really slow? I really like Darthmod and TROM's changes to make the battles more cinematic (animation improvements, longer battles) so we have time to watch the fighting as well as command, and so that units do not rout so easily.

Suggestion: Something I have always dreamed about was units having the same depth as Generals. Having their own leaders with portraits who gained skill points and had skill trees just like Generals do. That's why I modded my own game to have recruitable Generals.. just because the battlefield lacks character. Use my Generals like units. I'm not sure if it is even possible to do this with regular units or if such a RPG system would fit with your mod, but I just thought I'd share my own ambition with someone who is doing something amazing.

Either way best of luck with the mod and I can't wait to try it.