New horses

[AnthoniusII]

The horses previewd in Rome 2 are the best ones made for a TW game (even if they are in alpha fase of development.
Could CA made a DLC that would replace the horses (bodies) of the S2 with those of R2?
Please give us a chance to have real fun playing with Takeda!

[Forward Observer]

I doubt they would import the new horse models to an older game although modders might be able to.

However, regardless of whether the Rome II horses look better than Shogun 2 or not, they would be just as incorrect for 16th century Japan as the ones used. Domestic and imported horses during this period were very small compared to European horses. They were very similar to what the Mongols used.

By the 19th century, Japan was importing and breeding European size horses, but prior to that they were still riding horses not much bigger than Shetland ponies. 20th century Samurai movies have merely perpetrated the myth of Samurai cavalry using large European sized thoroughbreds because that was all that was available in any quantity.

These pictures have been posted before, but just to remind people.

Re-enactors on authentic sized native Japanese horses.


Mongolian re-enactors


Cheers

[Kraut and Tea]

LOL

Samurai riding pony sized horses make them look alot less fierce and dangerous!
Who would have expected that.


What`s next? Highland warriors actualy didnt scream during their notorious highland charges but continuously muttered a faint "Miau"?

[Erwin Rommel]

Or maybe....

[weirdoascensor]

Mongolian Pony Cavalry don't have problems taking European Order Knights...But The Japanese aren't Mongolians after all...

Erwin, I thought you'll post some other Picture...

[Erwin Rommel]

Like this?

[Hatamoto]

European horses weren't that big at the time either. A lot of amateur and professional historians forget to check how big horses were over the rest of the world when commenting on the size of Japanese and Mongolian horses. If I may quote several posters from other forums:

That doesn't match up to what I know. The typical European warhorse of the time, had a average height of about 140-150cm or 14 to 15 hands, and the North European breeds were even smaller.

Shetland pony and Donkeys are only about 70 to 100cm high, which are far smaller than Japanese horses so I don't think that's a valid comparison. It seems many people think of Shetland pony and baby horses when they hear the word "pony", but a pony refers to a horse less than 147cm, and with that criteria many European warhorse of the time would be called ponies as well.

Thoroughbreds are bad comparison as well. They were developed solely for the purpose of galloping flat ground as fast as possible for a short time. They might be big, but are very fragile animals and are completely unsuited for military use.

It's difficult to give a precise account of the size of average Japanese horses, but there is a valuable data. 128 skeletal remains of Japanese warhorses were excavated from Kamakura, which were killed during city's siege by Nitta Yoshisada in 1333. The horses' remains shows the average height of being 130cm.

The "great" horses that appears in Japan had an average height of about 140cm, so I think it's fair to say the average height of a Japanese warhorse was around 130cm. They were indeed smaller than European breed, but not by a significant margin. Mongol horses, of which Japanese horse breed originated from, were also around that size. That didn't stop the Mongols from using them as armored shock cavalry. Also, we should consider than average Japanese were a lot shorter than modern Japanese.

Another argument I have is the condition of a good horse in Japan. Size was obviously a factor, but their personality as well. It was considered that the more violent and intemperate the horse, the more better it was. Such horse were called a ??, and was greatly prized. If their only purpose was battlefield taxi, why would that be? Wouldn't it be the opposite?

Is that the test conducted by NHK?
That "experiment" is very questionable since AFAIK the horse they used didn't receive any prior training in carrying armored rider, or even if he/she was practiced in galloping long distance at all.
Just imagine equipping a fat guy in full armor who never ran before in his life and forcing him to run, he won't last long.
As for the height.
128 horses were excavated from Kamakura along with the dead riders.
They were killed during the attack of Nitta Yoshisada.
Their average height was 130cm, and the largest one was 140cm.
Not only Mongol horses but most horses in the world in 16th century was around 120-160 cm high, not so different from the horses excavated in Kamakura.
Some were even smaller.
The Swedish horse, which were used prominently by King Gustav Adolph, was small.
There is the famous portrait of Gustav Adolph on his horse, and his horse is, as you can see, very small.
http://www.teachersparadise.com/ency...reitenfeld.jpg
The Swedish horse of Gustav Adolph's army were only 112-133cm high, even slightly smaller than Mongol horse.
And it's very clear that they performed cavalry charges.
So I don't think size of the Japanese horse is a problem.
As for the power of the horse, this photograph might tell us something.
http://hikoma.lb.nagasaki-u.ac.jp/jp/target.php?id=2545
This dobbin horse is a indigenous Japanese breed, and it's carrying 4 Komedawaras.
Obviously the farmer knows that a dobbin can carry this much weight and walk, or he wouldn't put so much on it.
1 Komedawara weighs about 60kg, so that would at least be 240kg.
And even a fully armoured rider would be less than 100kg.
Of course this is a dobbin and not a war horse of a samurai, but it tells us that at least some Japanese horse were able to carry and move with huge weight.
And I think there's too many primary sources telling about cavalry charges(for example the Zohyo Monogatari) to deny them.
This is an excerpt from page 93 of Zohyo Monogatari, an account of an unknown small battle told by Shinroku, a Samurai's servant, translated by me.

"...There were Kanto Samurais on our side who were riding their horse well, and since the battlefield was flat ground suited for cavalry battle, and enemies and allies alike were involved in heavy fighting, they instead of participating in 2nd wave of the spears, formed a unit of about 30 picked riders, and some of them held spears, some held swords, some held bows and some held guns, and the 30 cavalry charged into the right flank of the enemy.
The enemy would have been at least able to resist if they were charged from the left flank, but since they were attacked from their right with horses, they couldn't offer any resistance, and all they could do was to panic.
And when the cavalry unit charged, (our) soldiers from the 1st wave supported them by firing arquebuses, and the enemy couldn't do anything, and we easily routed the them.
Nowadays everyone fights dismounted in battles, and they haven't fought on horse for a long time.
Those Samurais from Kansai, unlike those from Kanto, aren't used to fight mounted so I think they simply didn't know how to defend against mounted enemies."

I'm not saying the "valiant charge of the invincible Takeda cavalry legion" is true.
There were no massed cavalry charges like that of medieval Europe in Japan, that is obvious.
Japanese cavalry's role was more of a "medium" cavalry than a heavy cavalry, and they would charge into the enemy only when their line was broken or from the flanks, and certainly there were also many samurais who fought dismounted, and cavalry charge would have become less common in later sengoku jidai due to the spread of firearms(as the excerpt above says).
BUT, my point is that Japanese horses were entirely capable of galloping and charging with armoured rider.
If there was no cavalry charge at all, then the myth of "Takeda cavalry legion" wouldn't born in the first place.

If anything, all the horses in all the Total War games are too big.

[weirdoascensor]

And does The R2TW Horses are the correct size for its era? Is it look alike with Mongolian Ponies?

Back to Technicality...Its a very big If...Will CA still support older games?Doubtful. And Porting Mod sounds Illegal...and thats IF it is technically portable...

[GingerAle]

love ponies! lol