Warring States Mixed Infantry units

[jonphilp]

Out of interest why are the Warring states /Western Han not allowed to field a mixture of separate close infantry /crossbow units along side mixed infantry/crossbow units. The army list covers 373 years, one assumes that a gradual change would have occured as new units formations/ weapon combinations were tried out. I would have thought that mixed battle formatons would have taken more training to function perhaps with the conscript/provincial units the last to move to mixed formations so on a battlefield separate & mixed units would have been found .

Jon

[babyshark]

The list authors note in the book--somewhere--that the nature of army lists necessarily requires them to set some fairly arbitrary cut offs in terms of who gets what troop types. They tried to do this with army boundaries, rather than within the armies themselves.

That, I suspect, is the answer. As unsatisfactory as it may be in some circumstances, I think it is likely a more practical solution than the reverse. Those who recall a certain earlier rules set will no doubt remember the Medieval German list, in which all options were allowed for in the list.

Yipe.

Marc

[benos]

more than one other set of rules had knightmare german lists that you couldn't work out

perhaps it is more to do with tactical doctrine and effectiveness recorded in the evidence (they may have been no records of such a combination) though i would have thought that shortages of one or other of the weapons would have caused the combination, perhaps it was to avoid the cherry picking of units that wargamers are prone to.

Ben

[MarkSieber]

IIRC, there was discussion in a previous rules set that there was documentation of a force of mixed units being used against a mounted opponent, but in only one or two instances.

[nikgaukroger]

IIRC, there was discussion in a previous rules set that there was documentation of a force of mixed units being used against a mounted opponent, but in only one or two instances.

Mixed units were used at various times against various enemies - there was no transition for one to another, it was an option available.

[sergiomonteleone]

Out of interest why are the Warring states /Western Han not allowed to field a mixture of separate close infantry /crossbow units along side mixed infantry/crossbow units. The army list covers 373 years, one assumes that a gradual change would have occured as new units formations/ weapon combinations were tried out. I would have thought that mixed battle formatons would have taken more training to function perhaps with the conscript/provincial units the last to move to mixed formations so on a battlefield separate & mixed units would have been found .

Jon

Hi John
I completely agree.
In fact in my opinion they should have splitted in two different army lists Warring States and Han, because of different period and different army.
Sergio