For Honor or For Glory? A Tokugawa (Matsudaira) AAR Updated Jan 8th

[Axis Sunsoar]

Pictures in a week you say? That's an awfully long week it seems ....

I jest of course, I understand far too well the irritating habit real life has of getting in the way of this sort of thing. I just read all the way through what you have written so far, and I enjoyed it immensely. Your writing style is gripping and I especially enjoy the way that you go beyond just the events of the game to present a full story. I eagerly await additional updates.

+Rep naturally

[theSilentKiller]

Time passes rapidly and my thirst for this grows even further! I hope some new updates will come soon, though real life is important! No access to the computer? That's bad...

[waveman]

Just internet actually. I'll see if I can get back into this soon though!


....not yet, apparently. I haven't touched this campaign for a year and a half, but I've got some thoughts for it

[waveman]

New update today!!! (I'm writing it as I speak. Er, or as I write.... I guess...) I just re-watched The Seven Samurai, magnificent movie

We're nearing the end of my Abe Sadayoshi arc, and after there'll be a change of pace and focus.

[waveman]

18.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Abe Sadayoshi labored up the hill, using a yari to aid his ascent. The slope was treacherous with loose rocks and the detritus of war: corpses, discarded weapons, and slippery blood. He finally reached the top with his retainers and surveyed the scene: the place where several hundred men of Mikawa and Gamagori had fought and died, and where 150 samurai had gallantly fought to the death. In such a way they had prevented the Saika right wing from collapsing in on the fleeing Tokugawa center and anhialating it, even when the rest of their comrades had broken under the hot July sun.



These men had bought Sadayoshi precious time. The only lightly-harassed right wing had swept in, bolstering the resolve of the failing center, and gifting courage to those who had lost it and turned tail. Their momentum stalled, the Saika lines had no choice but to abandon their chase and face the Tokugawa infantry, for Sadayoshi and his mounted retainers had ridden down any men who broke away from their larger formation. This allowed the Tokugawa archers to rain death on their Saika foes - both those fighting in the central wood and those streaming in from the hill-top, the regrouped Tokugawa warriors hot on their heels.


In the end, it was these low-ranking soldiers who had won the battle, their far reaching strikes that struck down so many of the enemy.


Yes, Sadayoshi would propose that a monument be built on this hill for the samurai who had so delayed the enemy and given their lives in the process.




February, 1550
The Saika were broken, at least for now. Fuyuyasu was dead and his body had been discovered on the field, pierced by arrows and spears. His son had died under mysterious circumstances. These events, coupled with Okubo Moritoki's march back into Seki lands to reinstall Seki Iekata by ousting the Saika garrison from his capital meant that the Tokugawa had some breathing room in the west. In the east, Tokugawa Hirotada continued his campaign with Takeda Nobukada, the rash young Daimyo of the Takeda who was breaking the eastern powers with at the head of an army 15,ooo strong. Uesegi Mochitane had pleaded with Hirotada to spare his life and protect the last refuges of his clan, which Hirotada had accepted.


But the winds of fate are fickle, and no sooner had the snow melted than Sadayoshi's network of spies began reporting that the Asano clan, fallen from their former glory yet still a force to be reckoned with, were preparing for war with the Tokugawa.



Sadayoshi surveyed his forces, worn down after the bitter struggle with the Saika, and knew he must send for help from Hirotada.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

If this part of the battle report is anticlimactic..... then it's fitting! Fuyuyasu had better infantry than Sadayoshi and did break the Tokugawa center, but those samurai on the hill managed to hold up about half of his army so the rest of the Tokugawa had to deal with two groups of about 1500 and mopped them up pretty easily, once the routing units had recovered

[Lugotorix]

Good update. The Seven Samurai is one of my favorite films. It depicts the peasants plight during famine and lawlessness, without the glamour that anime and the like often glosses over. Life was often awful for the common man during ( or in that case after) the Sengoku.

[waveman]

Tanks Lugo! It's kind of inspired an interlude of sorts that will take place after my focus on Sadayoshi is done. He's got one major campaign coming up

[waveman]

19. Opportunities Missed

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

In the end it was a full year before the Asano clan mobilized its full might: some twenty thousand men, with three quarters focused in Inuyama and Mino to threaten the Tokugawa holdings in the Kansai, so hard fought for. The other five thousand were to harass the Tokugawa heartland from Iwamura.


The year 1550 had passed by in a flash: skirmishes in Kano and Owari, but nothing out of the ordinary between two powerful clans. More worrying at the time was the resurgent Ikko-Ikki insanity that was spreading through the Kansai. The Rokkaku had been forced from their holdings, Rokkaku Ryoko and her son Munetsune fleeing to Sadayoshi's stronghold of Nagashima-jo.


In the East, Takeda Nobukado rapidly assaulted several clans that had submitted to the Tokugawa, infuriating Hirotada, but there was nothing that could be done to halt the headstrong young daimyo.


With a full year's warning that the Asano clan were going to mount an offensive, it almost seemed that someone within the clan itself desired the Tokugawa to learn of it. Still, every month of 1550 without reinforcements put Sadayoshi more and more on edge, and only once winter arrived did he allow himself to relax - but only ever so slightly, even then. And he was able to root out more Christians, thank the gods.


Sadayoshi had under his command some nine thousand men, with a thousand as garrisons throughout the Tokugawa holdings west of the Yahagi-gawa. Two thousand were south under the command of the stalward Okubo Moritoki, pushing the Saika south with the tentative backing of the Seki and a rebellion led by Kitabatake Sanetoki. Another two thousand had been diverted to Okubo Yoshikazu, Moritoki's son, in Owari to guard against a possible Asano assault there. But beyond yet more skirmishing, no attack was forthcoming. At least the boy was blooded, Sadayoshi thought.


It was to Sadayoshi's great relief then that as the year changed he received news of two very welcome developements: Okubo Moritoki's punishing advance and the revolt of the Kitabatake had persuaded the Saika to make peace with the Tokugawa - for now, Sadayoshi knew - and even more welcome was news that his lord was finally marching west.


Disgusted by the antics of the new Takeda daimyo, Tokugawa Hirotada was marching west with as many men as could be spared from the east. If nothing else the arrival of these veteran warriors would force the issue between the Asano and Tokugawa.


"So," Rokkaku Munetsune said slowly, his brow creased in consternation, "the Asano have given up their main advantage: we will be able to draw on even numbers as them!"


"And?" Sadayoshi prompted.


The young Lord Rokkaku thought for a time, but eventually conceded that he did not know what other advantage the Asano had given up. Sadayoshi looked expectantly at his son.


Abe Nagahisu, smiled thinly. He was more slender than his father, but it had taken him years to recover from the wounds he had suffered in a rash solo attack on a group of Oda warriors. "A mistake more telling than numbers, if we were not outnumbered by such a large margin: they have given up the initiative. When Hirotada's warriors arrive we will strike where we want, when we want!" and he slammed his palm on the map.


Sadayoshi nodded aprovingly at both of them. "For in the end, what can a man do but fight his hardest, and fight his smartest? Did you follow that Young Lord?"


The two men of the Abe clan and the Rokkaku boy on the cusp of manhood looked to the fourth occupant of the room. Ieyasu slowly nodded.

[Alwyn]

I like the way that you are building up the tension and creating a sense of anticipation, as armies march towards battle. I wonder if you would like to enter this AAR or your Carthaginian AAR in the MAARC.

[waveman]

Subitted!

On another note I just cannot catch a break with S2, for some reason it;s not letting me use any mods. Re-re-re-downloading the game now, so fingers crossed...

.... aaaand we're good!

[theSilentKiller]

Ahhrg, the tension is unbearably but great update! Giving up the initiative, as Nagahisu said, might be the decisive factor but only if exploided correctly. The question is, will this be the case?

[Caillagh de Bodemloze]

It's really good to see this going again - and I'm glad the endless downloading solved the problem with the mods. These are great chapters; I like your characters very much.

[waveman]

20. The Initiative

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

The fragile staet of near-peace between the Asano and Tokugawa was shattered in 1551. While the West had seen a tesnse yet peaceful year, in the central Tokugawa provinces there had been near-constant skirmishing between Asano forces and men under the command of Okubo Yoshikazu, eldest son of Moritoki.


Fighting on even terms, both sides resorted to lighting fast hit-and-run tactics, each seeking to critically unbalance his opponent's hold on the Kano-Owari regions. That delicate balance changed, however, in April with the arrival of Tokugawa Hirotada, Matsudair Hidenaga, and 45oo veterans from the east.


Sadayoshi had the pleasure of presenting a letter dispatched from Yoshikazu to his father Moritoki. The old soldier was bursting with pride as he read of his son's victories, his escapes from defeats, and the ambush he had laid on the Asano - by marching into an amush meant to entrap him - knowing that Hirotada was soon to arrive. Two thousand Asano warriors were slain or scattered to the winds, and another four thousand a mere two months later in a field battle in the north of Owari, and with that the threat to the Tokugawa's eastern flank ceased to exist. Hirotada continued to march west, leaving Yoshikazu unhampered to assault the Asano castles in the area.


With the Kitabatake and Seki to hamper any potential attacks from the south made by the weakened Saika and the Ikko-Ikki locked in combat with the Hatekeyama clan to the west, Sadayoshi, Hedenaga and Hirotada drew up plans to march in force from Nagashima-jo north into Inuyama and challenge the Asano at the seat of their power. Okubo Moritoki was recalled from the south, and so Tokugawa Hirotada and his Three Generals would march north with ten thousand men. With Okubo Yoshikazu's raids diverting several thousand Asano soldiers eastward, they would be facing equal numbers.

THanks for the comments guys! We'll have the deciding battle in the next major update!

As far as fixing the problem goes, the combination of redownloading and deleting some files fixed it, so we should be good to go

[waveman]

21. The Other Side

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Miyagi Shigeharu woke at dawn, just as the sun began to caress the clear spring skies, to bathe and purify himself in a brisk mountain stream. Emerging from the cool water, he donned his linnen fundoshi -his loincloth- over which he threw on a black shirt patterned with white squares and bamboo shoots. Breeches next, which reached slightly below his knees, and then he returned to his house, where his wife Keiko had prepared a simple breakfast of rice and vegetables.


He then put on the rest of his armor, socks, wajari sandles, shinguards and thighguards, gloves and silken sleeves with metal plates, his cuirass armored skirts. Keiko tied his belt for him and with the help of a maid and a manservant arranged shoulderguards, then presented to him his tachi and wakizashi. Shigeharu placed a carefully written poem in his kabuto, placed a cloth on his head, then the kabuto over it. The armor was dark, as the lords of the Asano clan favored, though faded from use, the drawstrings frayed in some cases.


He left the house before the sun had revealed herself, bidding the house farewell and walking away with a bag of food and a yari slung over his shoulder, making his way down the mountain. The edge of the sun had just crept above the western peaks when Shigeharu spotted another lone figure trotting towards him. "Ho, Shinshichi!" he called in greeting.


The other, not quite as tall and in armor that was ever so slightly more worn, returned the greeting, pulling at his luxurious mustache. "Do you have any food? My sister has sent me off with only a few plums!" Shigeharu was happy to trade a rice ball for one of his friend's fruits, and together they made their way down the mountain. Before too much more time had passed the pair were joined by the Yamagawa brothers Haruki and Masaharu. Their father Yamagawa Haruzen was growing too old to fight, and especially to March for days. Living further down the mountain, the Yamagawa brothers were privy to more news than either Shigeharu or Hideharu were, and eagerly related their news to their neighbors: men were being called to war in both the eastern domains of the Asano and here in the west. Haruki, shorter and thicker though he was the elder brother, had heard that bands of Oda samurai had been violating Asano territory to the East.
They continued walking down the dirt track that led to Miyagi Danjo's house; he was Shigeharu's eldest brother. Soon their band had swelled to ten samurai and thirty or so foot soldiers, from bright-eyed youths to weathered veterans. They gathered in front of Miyagi Danjo's house squatting in the shade of the great line trees that covered the slopes. Other groups of men arrived and began chatting with their distant neighbors from differing slopes, cousins and friends who were not seen so often. By the afternoon there were some four hundred men gathered before the house, and that was when Danjo and Masayama Shoichi emerged from it.


Danjo was Shigeharu's half-brother and, at 29, a decade older than him. He was tanned from his time in the field, and his clothes and armor were of superb quality - rewards that were a testament to his success in several punitive attacks on the unruly neighbors of the Asano. Dark brows hovered over intense, intelligent eyes; before was a mouth that rarely smiled, a stark contrast to Shigeharu. When Koyama Shinshichi made to comment on his brother's dress, Shigeharu merely shrugged, for Danjo was a good, if distant, brother.


Masayama Shoichi was a few years Danjo's junior but had been tasked with riding through the mountains to summon men for the campaign season. While a few men had yet to arrive, most had already so the warriors were separated into groups. Danjo told them that they would be marching to the plains around the castle of Inuyama, since clans to the east were gathering suspicious amounts of men. The possibility of a pre-emptive strike was heavily implied.

[Caillagh de Bodemloze]

I really like the little details of things like getting dressed, and the plum-for-rice-ball trade. That sort of thing makes it all seem much more real. Danjo is an interesting contrast to Shigeharu, too.

Despite - maybe because of - all the ordinariness, there's an definite feeling of foreboding in this chapter. No doubt there will be horrors to come...

[Rabbit55821]

Good job on your 2nd-Place MAARC win! It was a tight competition to say the least. I must admit I haven't read through all of this as I was only just introduced to it through the MAARC, but what I've read is really good and an example of some very good writing!

[waveman]

Thanks to the both of you! I'm currently swamped with rl stuff, but I've elected to keep posting short updates to build up the the battle - and maybe even start it - rather than let a month or more go by.

First one to be up shortly!

[waveman]

22. The March

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

The march was not long, yet it felt so to Sadayoshi. Possibly because of the sullen glares the peasants cast towards the 10ooo Tokugawa soldiers, possible because he itched so to be rid of the threat that had been looming from the north for an entire year.


They marched in two staggered columns: the first of 5ooo men, the second, further west, 4ooo. The remaining thousand men were distributed between the vanguard under Ii Nagaochi's command, the rearguard, and various scouting parties.


The land itself seemed to feel the tension that had only grown between the two opposing factions over the last few months. The air was still and a light mist lingered over the land - not enough to allow for secretive maneuvers, but enough to set the men on edge. A few timid deer flitted through the forest's shadows, and the normally opinionated birds were largely silent.




Gozuroku reigned in his horse, raising a clenched fist to halt the nineteen mounted samurai riding scattered behind him. Something was not right. He kicked his horse into a brisk trot to reach the crest of the small hill before him; it was surrounded by open fields which were in turn bordered by forest on all sides save for the east.


The birds. That was it. Until now they had heard nary a bird call, not for joy nor pain nor fear, but now they were crying out in alarm, rising from the forest, and before him, from the edge of that same forest came 25 riders.


Certainly, enemies.


Gozuroku wheeled his horse around, back to his men, praying he hadn't just silhouetted himself before the rising sun to the enemy. "Tenzo! Botenmaru!" he barked. "On your feet boys, find some bushes and signal attack when the enemy closes, near the edge of the hill's far side."


The pair shared only the briefest of glances before leaping from their saddles, tethering their mounts and sprinting up the hill to hide in the scrub, chased by one last order: "Ride back to Commander Ii and tell him the enemy is two RI almost due north, in the forest!"



A few terse minutes passed, and Gozuroku's other men eased their way forward. A tree branch suddenly fell, and that was their signal - they kicked their mounts over the over the crest of the hill and into a gallop, crashing through the ranks of the Asano scouts. In a few heartbeats six of them were down and one of Gozuroku's men as well, and they were in persuit of the rest, and Tenzo and Botenmaru were riding in the opposite direction.

[Alwyn]

Tension and a sense of something wrong are suddenly exploding into action. I look forward to seeing how the battle develops.

[waveman]

Thank ya, it's been a while since I've put any screenies up and I was hoping to do a small update tonight, but photobucket is unfortuantely down at the moment, so once that problem takes careof itself I'll have a short update - and then we can get on towards the battle in earnest