China: Warring States Era Lists

[Aesthete]

My apologies if this has already been covered:

Are there any available beta or experimental lists for Warring States era lists?

Also, am I correct in my understanding that official lists will be available in 2009 in some sort of general Far East Asia book?

Thanks

[rbodleyscott]

Are there any available beta or experimental lists for Warring States era lists?

No

Also, am I correct in my understanding that official lists will be available in 2009 in some sort of general Far East Asia book?

Yes, and they are looking pretty good, although some rebasing might be required as the infantry are mostly MF (with portable defences).

[Intothevalley]

There was discusison of a Ch'in list here:

viewtopic.php?t=4829&postdays=0&postord ... na&start=0

I would think other Warring States armies should look pretty similar, at least for the core troops. I reckon the chariots should have bow in addition to light spear, or bow if only one capability was to be dished out. Other states would probably have less light horse (with the exception of Chao).

I think official lists will be available from late 2009 from what everyone's saying. Seems like a long time to wait....

[ethan]

Yes, and they are looking pretty good, although some rebasing might be required as the infantry are mostly MF (with portable defences).

interesting, possibly quite powerful...

[Intothevalley]

Yes, and they are looking pretty good, although some rebasing might be required as the infantry are mostly MF (with portable defences).

That is interesting - are the portable defences due to the mention, in various Warring States texts, of caltrops being included in the inventory of armies at that time? Or are there battle accounts of their usage?

Also the MF/HF debate, I'd be interested to know what made you come down in favour of MF?

[rbodleyscott]

Yes, and they are looking pretty good, although some rebasing might be required as the infantry are mostly MF (with portable defences).

That is interesting - are the portable defences due to the mention, in various Warring States texts, of caltrops being included in the inventory of armies at that time? Or are there battle accounts of their usage?

Also the MF/HF debate, I'd be interested to know what made you come down in favour of MF?

"T'ai Kung's Six Secret teachings", from the later Warring States period, states: "When infantry engage in battle with chariots and cavalry, they must rely on hills and mounds, ravines and defiles." Also: "When fighting on easy terrain the rule is that one chariot is equivalent to eighty infantry men" and "one chariot is equivalent to ten cavalrymen".

The following tactic is recommended if the infantry must fight chariots or cavalry in open terrain: "Order our officers and troops to set up the chevaux-de-frise and wooden caltrops, arraying the oxen and horses by units of five in their midst, and have them establish a four-sided martial assault formation. When you see the enemy's chariots and cavalry are about to advance, our men should evenly spread out the caltrops and dig ditches around the rear, making them five feet deep and wide."

On this basis we feel that Medium Foot is undoubtedly the correct classification for Chinese infantry of this period, even though this will require rebasing of existing armies. As they are only put in position when the enemy mounted troops are about to advance, we treat the above defences as Portable Defences.

[Aesthete]

Are there any available beta or experimental lists for Warring States era lists?

No

Also, am I correct in my understanding that official lists will be available in 2009 in some sort of general Far East Asia book?

Yes, and they are looking pretty good, although some rebasing might be required as the infantry are mostly MF (with portable defences).

Thanks for the reply

For my part, no rebasing is necessary as I haven't even started purchasing the miniatures yet. I'm about to though. Getting everything ready, based and painted by mid to late 2009 seems just about ready for my speed.

[Intothevalley]

"T'ai Kung's Six Secret teachings", from the later Warring States period, states: "When infantry engage in battle with chariots and cavalry, they must rely on hills and mounds, ravines and defiles." Also: "When fighting on easy terrain the rule is that one chariot is equivalent to eighty infantry men" and "one chariot is equivalent to ten cavalrymen".

And in difficult terrain, one chariot is worth forty infantrymen!

The following tactic is recommended if the infantry must fight chariots or cavalry in open terrain: "Order our officers and troops to set up the chevaux-de-frise and wooden caltrops, arraying the oxen and horses by units of five in their midst, and have them establish a four-sided martial assault formation. When you see the enemy's chariots and cavalry are about to advance, our men should evenly spread out the caltrops and dig ditches around the rear, making them five feet deep and wide."

Ah, the 'Fate of Dragon Grass' - Excellent!

I won't have to re-base either - I have them in HF or MF versions (equating to Sp or Ax(X), if anyone remembers what those are)!

[rbodleyscott]

"T'ai Kung's Six Secret teachings", from the later Warring States period, states: "When infantry engage in battle with chariots and cavalry, they must rely on hills and mounds, ravines and defiles." Also: "When fighting on easy terrain the rule is that one chariot is equivalent to eighty infantry men" and "one chariot is equivalent to ten cavalrymen".

And in difficult terrain, one chariot is worth forty infantrymen!

I wasn't aware of that. The penalty of getting one's quotes second hand.

Neverthless, the info does suggest MF to me and Nik.

[Intothevalley]

Some text from a memo on military strategy written by Chao Cuo in his memorandum entitled "Guard the Frontiers and Protect the Borders". It is dated from the Western Han dynasty, and I lifted the following from Yang Hong's 'Weapons in Ancient China'. It might help inform classification of infantry (at least for Western Han and perhaps late Warring States):

"According to the book of military strategy and tactics an area in which there are ditches and gullies of 15 feet wide, waters too deep for war chariots, forests and mountains, streams and rivers, hillocks and mounds and bush land is the field for foot soldiers, one of whom is better than two chariots; a vast expanse of plains with few hillocks and mounds is the ideal terrain for the operation of war chariots, one of which is better than 10 infantrymen; locations overlooking enemy positions across valleys are places to use bows and arrows, and one archer is better than 100 soldiers with short weapons; when the contending armies are facing each other at short distances on a grassland that offers manoeuvrability it is best to use soldiers with long-shafted halberds, one of whom is better than three fighting men armed with double-edged swords and shields; a field overgrown with weeds and bamboo, wood thickets and dense grass is the place to use soldiers with short-handled spears, one of whom is better than two men armed with long-shafted halberds; a terrain of winding roads, dangerous corners and passes is the place to use soldiers with double-edged swords and shields, one of who is better than three archers".

I think an important part of this is that those with 'long-shafted halberds' do better than swordsmen on open ground, whereas in closer terrain they perform poorly against troops with 'short-handled spears' - presumably because of the latter's ability to penetrate the former's formation more easily. 'Infantry' in general perform better against chariots in close terrain. Perhaps this argues for classification of all but those armed with 'long shafted halberds' as MF, with the halberdiers as HF. This might get the infantry vs. infantry interaction right (at least according to the above), but I'm not sure if it would favour the halberdiers too much against chariots in the open - maybe classifying them as heavy weapon (rather than some kind of spear) would ameliorate this advantage.

[rbodleyscott]

Yes we have seen this one before.

Problem with halberds (HW) as HF is that they would only be at a disadvantage in the impact phase, after that they would be equal to chariots. Hardly a 1 chariot is worth 80 infantrymen situation. (I know we don't specify men/base representation for chariots, but it must be more than 3 chariots per base!).

Well we will think on it a bit more. Thanks.

[hazelbark]

"T'ai Kung's Six Secret teachings", from the later Warring States period, states:

The following tactic is recommended if the infantry must fight chariots or cavalry in open terrain: "Order our officers and troops to set up the chevaux-de-frise and wooden caltrops, arraying the oxen and horses by units of five in their

I didn't realize ancient chinese wrote in French. "cheveax-de-frise"

Man those Chinese were brilliant.

[hazelbark]

While the basing will be annoying, I am most pleased that some serious thinking is being applied and these armies will nto be trotted out as simple classification.

So excellent. Expectatation now suitably raised.

[marty]

I hope the portable defenses will be optional. The points spent on them would detract somewhat from the traditional Chinese human wall

martin

[Draka]

Define traditional Chinese human wall as opposed to traditional Roman, Greek, or any other infantry-based army's human wall?

[marty]

I mean "traditional" in a wargaming rather than strictly historical sense. In the various systems I have played your troop purchasing point goes a long way in most chinese armies.

Martin

[Intothevalley]

Problem with halberds (HW) as HF is that they would only be at a disadvantage in the impact phase, after that they would be equal to chariots.

Agreed that the HW would be evens in the melee phase (assuming they managed to stay steady, and both were graded average). However, spear-armed troops would do even better in the melee phase if they stayed steady, and if disrupted would be no worse than disrupted HW armed troops. If the chariots didn’t disrupt the infantry then they’d break off and have another crack in their next impact phase.

Hardly a 1 chariot is worth 80 infantrymen situation. (I know we don't specify men/base representation for chariots, but it must be more than 3 chariots per base!).

Well we will think on it a bit more. Thanks.

It would be difficult to equate 1 chariot with 80 infantrymen – unless they were mob or MF with no combat capabilities (which you may be considering)! However, as T’ai Kung states, in difficult going 1 chariot is worth only 40 infantrymen, i.e. they are only half as effective. Therefore, instead of looking at absolute numbers perhaps we should look at relative effectiveness in different terrain, which I will have a (probably cack-handed) attempt at.

Measuring the chariot’s efficacy as the ratio of expected average chariot hits inflicted to average hits received (assuming both are steady at impact), with four superior chariots (no extra combat capabilities) attacking a block of 8 average infantry 2 deep:

MF with spear:
Open 1.17 (impact) 0.78 (melee) 1.56 (melee, infantry disrupted)
Uneven 0.58 (impact) 0.58 (melee) 1.17 (melee, infantry disrupted)
Rough 0.39 (impact) 0.39 (melee) 0.78 (melee, infantry disrupted)

HF with heavy weapon:
Open 1.75 (impact) 1.17 (melee) 1.56 (melee, infantry disrupted)
Uneven 1.17 (impact) 1.17 (melee) 1.17 (melee, infantry disrupted)
Rough 0.78 (impact) 0.78 (melee) 0.78 (melee, infantry disrupted)

MF with heavy weapon
Open 2.33 (impact) 1.17 (melee) 1.56 (melee, infantry disrupted)
Uneven 0.88 (impact) 0.88 (melee) 1.17 (melee, infantry disrupted)
Rough 0.58 (impact) 0.58 (melee) 0.78 (melee, infantry disrupted)

Note that the above figures don’t take account of potential for base loss in the impact phase for the subsequent melee.

It comes down to what degree you want the terrain to affect the chariots versus infantry – T’ai Kung reckons chariots are half as effective in difficult terrain, whereas Chao Cuo reckons that they are 20 times less effective! Looking at the above figures, at impact they are 3 times less effective against MF spear in rough compared to the open, 2.2 times less effective against HF/HW, and 4 times less effective against MF/HW. The respective figures for melee are 2, 1.5 and 2 times less effective. You could try and factor in the MF’s greater likelihood of going disrupted (or even fragmented) against mounted in the open, but this would increase the disparity between performance in the open versus that in terrain. In any case, the MF/spear’s melee performance is no better than HF/HW if disrupted, and much better if not. Of course if you put portable obstacles into the mix then the chariots would probably be screwed whatever terrain they attacked in!

In addition to this, if the interaction between ‘short weapons’ and ‘long weapons’ alluded to in Chao Cuo’s memo were to be taken into account we’d have to think about how the infantry above would cope with, say MF swordsmen. MF with spear could be expected to beat MF swordsmen in all terrain types. HF/HW would have a significant advantage in the impact phase in the open, which would decrease in uneven/rough terrain, but would be at a disadvantage in the melee phase in terrain. Although I haven’t been able to find much reference to interactions of different infantry types, the fact that infantry are often divided into ‘strong crossbows’, ‘long weapons’ and ‘short weapons’ (among others) in many texts suggests that they had their uses in different circumstances.

I think that on balance the HF/HW combination better reflects long-weapon interactions with both chariots and other infantry types. However, if you aren’t too fussed about the latter, then the MF/Spear combo will give a very clear separation in the performance of chariots in the open and in uneven/rough terrain, at least in the all important impact phase.

[rbodleyscott]

I hope the portable defenses will be optional.

They will be.