Daimyo set of Rules in 20mm - Japan's Sengoku period/Sekigahara 1600: Koboyakawa Hideaki's clan

Hideaki looks at at  valley below mount Matsuo still not knowing in which side he will fight on the 21 october 1600. This is the 5th clan I made for Sekigahara but with over 40 in the battlefield there is still a long way to go.

His army was the 3rd biggest on the battlefield with 15.600 men and its defection to Ieyasu's side decided the course of the battle.

For the first time I converted a few Ashigaru to use the ōtsuchi (big hammer). Recently I managed to get the 2017 Japanese movie Sekigahara, a brilliant movie which places Mitsunari as the hero of the story (and Ieyasu as the villain) where plenty of ōtsushi can be seen in action.

The ōtsushi in action hammering a few heads.

The mounted Samurai are the usual Zvezda. Its Sashimono  and Nabori also taken from the 2017 movie Sekigahara. They are completely different from the ones in Samurai-Archives and they look great on the battle scenes. Which of them are the true ones?

Koboyakawa Hideaki's model is a resin copy of the Zvezda General with another head using a variation of the eboshi-nari kabuto.

Close to the already painted Hideaki is a war drummer also from Zvezda.

I included some shields in both archers and teppo stands.

The foot Samurai are again the usual Zvezda. Is funny how these excellent figures put an end to other 20mm plastic Samurai being produced elsewhere.

Some teppo Ashigaru are conversions from those grizzly Zvezda  figures carrying severed heads. 

The majority of the Ashigaru are the usual Red Box.

The other group is mixed Zvezda and Red Box.

Here they go down mount Matsuo to hit Ukita Hideie in the flank. 

Next: more BEF or Punic Wars. 

Daimyo set of Rules in 20mm - Japan's Sengoku period/Sekigahara 1600: Otani Yoshitsugu clan

Otani Yoshitsugu was a very famous general of the period and a close friend to Ishida Mitsunari. He tryed to convince Ishida on not going to war against Tokugawa Ieyasu but as a true and loyal friend he fought at Sekigahara were his tactical skills were showed once again. He had a small army as his son was in charge of a much bigger one. Otani Yoshitsugu was also suffering from leprosy and his health was deteriorating forcing him to be transported in a palanquin. At the end of the battle he committed seppuku  and instructed that his head would be cut off and buried. Even today it couldn't be found.

The palanquin were Otani seats is made of plastic card. The Otani figure is the Zvezda General of the Samurai Army Headquarters. The head was worked with putty in order to make the white headdress that covered his sickness. The seated Ashigaru are conversions from the same box with new heads. All other figures are a mixture of Zvezda and RedBox as usual.

Next: Sturm-Panzer Abteilung 217 for Normandy 1944. 

Daimyo set of Rules in 20mm - Japan's Sengoku period/Sekigahara 1600: Ii Naomasa clan

Ii Naomasa was one of the best generals of its time, so brave that he died from the gun shot wounds taken at Sekigahara fighting for Tokugawa Ieyasu while leading his division from the front.

His men were all clad in red armour and with red flags making them easily recognisable in any battlefield of the Sengoku period.

Once again I advise you to see and read the excellent Samurai Archives and their Samurai Heraldry Gallery easily available in the web.

Ii Naomasa model has a transformed head with an incision in the helmet to carry a big U shaped Evergreen horns. The Horo of the Messenger is painted blue something I would never know if it was not for Samurai Archives.

Ashigaru become very smart in their red outfit.

The Teppo Taisho (commander of arquebuses) is a Zvezda Samurai with the sword turned into a fan.

All individual Sashimono carried by Samurai of Ii clan had their own named written on it. So no two were alike.

Daimyo set of Rules in 20mm - Japan's Sengoku period/Sekigahara 1600: Kuroda Nagamasa clan

Some 8/9 years ago I got hooked on Samurai. Zvezda released their 3 boxes on the period and RedBox followed with Ashigaru, Ikko-ikki and more. Zvezda figures were just incredible and RedBox followed in its funny but very 'wargamable' style.

I looked in the web and found loads of information on the period and some nice free sets of rules like Damyo from Ian Duncan. Here they are along with supporting material:

http://www.oocities.org/duncanis100/rules.html

I saw movies then (once, twice...) like Ran, Kagemusha, Furin Kazan and Ten To Chi To looking for inspiration along almost everything Osprey edited  and Stephen Turnbull wrote. Driven by usual madness I made a huge collection of boxes from the brands above.

As usual also after painting two clans I got fed up and I turned don't know were to... The damn samurai were far more complicated to paint than anything I had painted so far!

But the Sengoku period is just something so amazingly colourful that a few days ago the Bushido code banged my head again and here I am painting Samurai for the second time (and viewing the same movies, and books and web articles...).

My original idea was to portray all armies of Sekigahara 1600, the biggest battle of the Sengoku period between the Western army lead by Ishida Mitsunari and the Eastern army of Tokugawa Ieyasu but I think nowadays I will also do Takeda, Nobunaga and Uesugi clans, famous for previous battles and maybe I will leave some of the Sekigahara clans out. Its just too much.

Recently I found a pure gold mine, in fact 7 long pages with hundreds of clans and their flags:

http://www.samurai-archives.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=1638&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=0

Let's go to the figures. This clan is Kuroda Nagamasa's that fought for the Eastern army of Tokugawa Ieyasu against Ishida Mitsunari's western army in Sekigahara.

Kuroda's figure is the Zvezda general in the infantry box. He had to have a new head from another samurai. The top part of the head was then squashed after heating and his helmet bent to become similar to the original Kurada was using:

The Nobori bearer is a figure from the Zvezda command set.

The  kneeling Samurai  in not a lemon seller, no sir, he carries the Horo, the symbol of the messengers.

Zvezda Samurai cavalry. They are great figures whose painting I tryed to keep on the simple side but trying to give an individuality to each. The uniformity of the clan's cavalry is achieved by the horse's harness being of the same colour (which was mostly non-existing in reality) and one of two types of sashimono (flag on the back) this clan had.

Foot Samurai from Zvezda. I chose the blue sashimono this time. I suggest to you to always paint all samurai in one colour first - as I already prime them in black its easier - and then add small detail in different colours. This will speed your painting process and you will have an extra clan more rapidly.

The Ashigaru ranks: Yari (back), Teppo (arquebus) and bow, all Zvezda. The Ashigaru, foot soldiers from lower classes, were 70% of Samurai armies by the year 1600.

The Ashigaru were trained and lead by Samurai so I converted one Samurai as an officer of Ashigaru, one for each 5 or 6 stands.

Next: the Ukita Hideie clan (I know that because I already started it).