Nippon Castle for Warhammer Fantasy Battle - Part V – Seven Years in the Making

The completed Nippon Castle

Note: Parts I, II, III and IV of the construction of the castle.

Also of note here is the real world castle this was inspired by: Kakegawa castle 

Boom, and just like that…well, not really just like that, as this was a lot of work; the castle of the Army of Nippon is finished. What started back in the winter of 2013 is complete, seven long years later. When I say complete, there is still some more stuff to add here and there (mainly the moats), but it’s ready for warfare.

In terms of the moats, I’m working on getting a darker shade of blue/green to make it look murky rather than the “bright” blue it currently is. An old broom is providing the rushes that I’m gluing down with my hot glue gun in small dabs.

In all, it’s fairly practical as the roofs are removable in the manner of a dollhouse and the interior is painted.

One of my oldest friends and one of the people I gamed the most against in the 3rd Edition days brought up a great idea of running some smaller games where ninja have to fight samurai! This is a great idea as I have plenty of both (although the last two samurai of my quest are surprisingly frustrating to get!)

Now that it’s finished? It’s time to clear it off the gaming table as Willmark Jr. and I are looking to get some 3rd Edition Warhammer games in over the upcoming holiday break!

As I noted previously, next for terrain is a more traditional European-style castle in the vein of the Warhammer Mighty Fortress (good write-up on the Games workshop kit here). It’s going to be a bit smaller in terms of footprint to fit on the table and more utility for siege games.

Like drawing inspiration for an actual Japanese castle for the Nippon one, I’m drawing from England for the next one — in this case, Harlech Castle in Wales.

Also of note, this will be the 2nd traditional-style castle I made for Warhammer. The original one was the one we used for our games of siege way back in the day. It’s long since gone. It survived many moves over the years and various storage closets/rooms when I was living in apartments. Somewhere along the way from my last apartment to my first house it was lost or damaged — or maybe both. Sadly, no photos exist of it either.

So on wards to the next project. Toothpicks, foam core, cardboard, masking tape, glue, hot glue, thin cardboard, milk cartons, scotch cartons, Popsicle sticks, and patience are all that are required. Hopefully this next one doesn’t take me seven years to finish.

So, how did I do on creating a Nippon castle set in the world of Warhammer?

Inspiration for Warhammer Nippon Armies – Shōgun, Ran, Seven Samurai & More

Inspiration for actual Games Workshop Asian-inspired materials was hinted at in the mid to late 1980s, but never delivered on. Nippon and the East in general is mentioned in the 3rd Edition Rulebook and had an ally section in Warhammer Armies, but it ended with the advent of 4th Edition Warhammer and the changes it entailed. It is important to note that 2nd Edition Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay did have a Nippon list that, with a few tweaks, is quite usable.

Fortunately, the world of the internet allows for this constraint to be eliminated.

In Warhammer, Nippon (Nihon) is analogous to Japan of our world. What it is not is mythical China. This can’t be overstated because all too often in Warhammer circles I hear suggestions about a Nippon army that would make it more like Cathay. If I wanted to create a fantasy Cathay army, there are a number of resources out there, but that’s not the point of this blog post.

So, in no particular order, here are two of the best inspirations for a Nippon-themed world and Nippon army that can help, in my opinion of course.

Shōgun — The book written by James Clavell and the TV series are both excellent. It is a pseudo-historical telling of the late 1500s and the unification of Japan by Tokugawa Ieyasu, the first Tokugawa Shogun, in the form of “Toranaga.”

Shōgun is the quintessential TV mini-series of the 1980s and consists of six parts. Richard Chamberlain stars as Pilot-Major Blackthorne. Blackthorne is based on the real-life exploits of an English sailor who was shipwrecked in Japan in 1600, William Adams.

Shōgun covers nearly all aspects of late 1500s Japanese life — from the peasants to ninja, the start of the geisha, betrayal, honor, bravery, as well as romance. The ambush of bandits at night in a village, ships, ninja! The only thing it lacks is the actual Battle of Sekigahara , which it all leads up to.

The rising tension of the plot makes an excellent backdrop for Nippon vs. Nippon battles or, perhaps more likely as I do, reasons for mercenary Nippon to go and plunder the Warhammer World.

Ran (pronounced “Rahn” to our Western ears, at least mine) — the movie by the legendary filmmaker Akira Kurosawa. Ran is essentially King Lear, but far richer in the telling. Ran is widely regarded as one of the greatest movies of all time. I agree. Any Top 10 movie list in the All-Time category that doesn’t include it is no Top 10 at all.

Ran is rich in its visuals and massive in scale. I think perhaps the only true way to do it justice is to see it in a movie theater (which I never have, but would love to).

A side note is that Ran has one of the best soundtracks for any Asian-inspired game. I listen to it often when working on one of my Nippon army projects.

Ran is indispensable to a Warhammer gamer interested in a Nippon army, as it has literally all the right army units on display throughout (remember I use the 2nd Edition Nippon list for 3rd Edition Nippon armies).

Other Good Sources Include (but are not limited to):

• Oriental Adventures by Zeb Cook (1st Edition AD&D). Some folks have a hang-up about this work — tell them to pound sand. A lot of people seem to want it to be “epic China,” which it’s not. I think the rules are quite well done, especially considering the timeframe. 
• Kobu of the Two Strings. This might seem surprising, but I found this extremely well done.
• The Seven Samurai. Many people don’t realize that they have seen this movie — in the form of The Magnificent Seven. The soundtrack of The Seven Samurai is great too. Oh, and it also inspired George Lucas with the droids in the original Star Wars trilogy.
• Japan: Memoirs of a Secret Empire — a documentary narrated by Richard Chamberlain. It’s too short (I wish this was 40 hours long!), but it is excellent. It’s not really a secret, but meh… it’s just the title.

Endnote: This should not be taken to mean that I dislike a Cathay army or its inspirational sources — far from it. I think epic China is a fine topic, and if I ever did an army inspired by it I’d go with something like Kung Fu Panda! Panda bear warriors would be very cool. Clay warrior golems, river dragons, etc.

Let me know your thoughts! 

Nippon Warband Mercenary Scum!

That's right as outlined in my thread over at Dogs of War Online I've been working on again/off again on my Nippon mercenary force. I've got a lot of stuff on the bench right now but as we are in the waning month of summer here in North America mt thoughts turn back to painting. So with that I finally finished up a unit for the Warband of Nippon: a unit of 25 samurai.

As with all of the units of this army I'm making them flexible enough to be used in varying editions of Warhammer:

• When used in 2nd Edition they will be fielded as ashigaru with hand weapons. 
• In 3rd Edition they fall under Empire as a "Count As" force. From that list they use the stat line for Eratzsolder with light armor and hand weapons. 
• For a true 5th/6th Edition Dogs of War force? Well... they don't really fit at all unless I used them as Norse Marauders but the base sizes don't really work. With that said I don't really think I can use them as is in any form really as the Core choices for  Dogs of War are pikemen and crosswbowmen. The only thing that comes close for the 20mm bases in the Special Choices are... dwarfs, not really helpful there GW.

So without further delay here are the ashigaru/ronin/lower class samurai as promised. They are not the best unit I've ever painted but considering the stop start nature of them at least they are complete. I tried to keep teh colors somewhat muted for most of the warriors as some later units will really stand out, these guys I wanted less, flash but still painted a few brighter colors.

More details are over at the thread at Dogs of War Online, including what is up next for the army and the Nippon Castle.

Nippon Castle for Warhammer- Part IV

Wow, the Nippon castle has been garnering a lot of attention on the web, keep up the comments guys and many thanks; especially the shout out here, thanks Scot!

I've stepped back and taken stock of where I am with the project at this point which is to say a lot further along then when I really picked it back up in October. Overall I'm pleased with the pace I've been on and have been enjoying the whole project. I've even found time to work on other projects like the siege equipment, paint a few units and other things that strike my fancy.

But, the title of this post says Part III so what am I working on right now in relation to the Nippon castle you ask: As I mentioned in Part II I've been re-reading my stack of White Dwarf magazines from the range of #220-235. In particular, in #225, Nick Davis' "Jungle Fever - Part 2" where he covers the creation of his Lizardman Castle has been of particular interest. #224 is where the rules appeared for 5th Edition Siege rules for moats which I'm drawing on as well, so here is the point of this post, moats.

As you can see, I've started on the beginnings of a moat for the castle. The moat will obviously surround the entire castle to simulate a Nippon fortress situated on the lowlands of Nippon (or Nihon?) near rice patties perhaps? I deliberately started at the most difficult part of the moats, the corner towers knowing the wall sections would be far easier. I also took inspiration from the corner board sections of 3rd Edition Talisman.

From there, once finished I also have been formulating ideas to create a way to raise up the entire thing so it will sit on a series of cliff walls to simulate a mountain top type of castle. That is further off and I will be using fair amount of paper-mache to make the mountainside.  In this, the 6th Edition High Elf Army Book has some interesting photos of minis and mountains so we'll see.

Note- my overall progress of my Nippon Army is tracked over here at Dogs of War Online.

Speaking of paper-mache, I took a brief side track to work a tomb/barrow, first seen in the 6th Edition General's Compendium on page 52. I started out when I looked at a barrow I created about 15 years ago. I was going to pull that apart but just decided to create something from scratch. Then remembered the barrow in the a fore mentioned General's Compendium. You'll have to excuse this photo as I remembered to take it as I was applying the paper-mache. But I digress, here is the barrow:

As you can see, the top will be removable because I'm insane apparently and need to add all kinds of stuff to the interior..

And if the barrow/tomb were not enough of a bonus, I've also been working on redoing the river pieces of the terrain that Jeff and Dave created 25+ years ago! I widened them a few years back but now I've added gravel to the river edges and will be painting them shortly. Need to add a few more bends and another river crossing part. You'll have to excuse the quick photo on this one too, I only remembered to take a picture after I had already started on it and undercoated one.

I think that's all for now. Good gaming in the new year everyone.

WM

Nippon Castle for Warhammer – Part II: From Real History to Fantasy Table

While I haven’t updated the blog in a bit, I have been plugging away and highlighting my progress on the Nippon castle for Warhammer Siege but also could be used with the rules for Warhammer Historical Siege and Conquest.

One of the things I’ve been trying to reconcile is that it’s not an Asian/Oriental/Japanese castle, but a castle set in the mythical Warhammer world. Those are two very different things, but it seems I have a hard time separating it!

As such, the walls and castle are very symmetrical, which is very unlike a traditional Japanese castle, which snaked back and forth with large sprawling grounds and multiple walls and moats. Since gunpowder was not widely used in medieval Japan, castles were for the most part made of wood and with very large moats. This had the practical effect of said castles taking up a very large amount of ground.

What I created, however, is a conceit to the physical limitations of building a castle at 28mm scale and my gaming table, which is 5x6 in terms of feet. It fits, but even with centering it in the middle of the table there isn’t a ton of room on the edges (note it’s not centered in the photos below). While rules exist for playing siege games across the editions, I’m planning on using the siege rules for 3rd Edition, warts and all.

One benefit of using the 3rd Edition rules for Siege is this lack of space is accounted for with Remote, Encamped, and Ready zones that are part and parcel of the rules. For those not in the know, these rules formed areas outside of the tabletop where action took place — essentially “off table” as it were.

As is depicted above you can see the corner towers are all complete now, along with the previously completed corner wall sections.The tops of all four towers are removable to facilitate the placement of war engines and miniatures as needed.

After I took these photos I began the process of gluing down stones an gravel in preparation of painting in the not too distant future. I'm also in the process of determining what the "inner" courtyard will look like so stay tuned.

Dogs of War Online 3.0

Just a quick heads up, and sort of a shame-less plug... (hey it's my blog , right?)

I've been spending a lot of time dusting off the forum over at Dogs of War Online After years of neglect in my very busy life, the forum has been updated to the new version of MyBB, the CSS theme updated and new features added to the site with the Wiki and User Map functions updated as well.

Now, this may seem like a fools errand as Dogs of War was/are probably the least supported army for Warhammer Fantasy Battle out there and with the changes to the game via the Age of Sigmar, but... I look at the situation as no different then the state chaos dwarfs around 2007. For years we had a very vibrant community and were quite content to create tons of material on our own all free of GW, now that is even more magnified. Warhammer Fantasy Battle is now free of GW stifling anything they don't like, the community can really create what they want.

So with all this said the site has been dusted off after years of neglect from me. We still have a small cadre of folks who post there but are looking for more, to build up the community of like minded individuals. But its not just Warhammer or even Dogs of War, stop by and participate in the OT forums, discussions of other RPGs even. So whether you pay Kings of War, Age of Sigmar or 9th Age or even some other war game, stop on over.

I'm still an administrator over at Chaos Dwarfs Online and in a lot of ways we're "sister-sites" of a kind, sharing similar goals and outlooks. But given my newly freed up time I figured it would be best to devote my time to building a great community at Dogs of War Online as well.


As a personal note: its the only place you find my army blog as I assemble my force of Nippon using 2nd/3rd edition rules. I've blogged about Nippon here and here, as I've wanted a Nippon force since the late 80's and have been working ever so slowly to assemble one. Now with my renewed interest in Warhammer it's really gathering steam now. I'm building the force under 2nd/3rd edition rules, but I'm also looking to configure them to be able to be used in Kings of War, and 9th Age, possibly even as a 3rd edition "Count As" Empire force . Or even a 5th Edition Dogs of War force! Sky is the limit.

So as the bard said "Cry havoc and let slip the Dogs of War!"

Warhammer 3rd Edition – Going Back to the Best Edition

I’ve now just exited a really busy period in my life, having left my part-time job of ten years. So what do I do with this “abundance” of time? I’m going back to the coolest edition of Warhammer — that being 3rd Edition — that’s what (aside from the never play-tested rules for Siege)!

I say “going back” because I really never played all that much in terms of the new editions (a fair amount of 5th Edition games, but not much else). So with GW unleashing the Age of Sigmar or the fan-driven 9th Age… why bother with any of that? It’s been interesting that GW avoided “Edition Wars” that plagued D&D for so long. Are we now at that point? I’m sure people probably kept playing editions they liked previously; I simply wonder if it’s more pronounced now with the Age of Sigmar retro-con.

So with this in mind I dusted off my 3rd Edition books this weekend and started looking through everything. That old familiar feeling came back — what a great game it is! A mess, large and unwieldy to be sure, but oh so much fun. There is actual strategy in the game, there is actual consideration of movement and formation, lots of random fun, and devastating and cool spells.

The main reason I did this was as I get back into the hobby after a nearly three-year absence. I’ve started working on my Army of Nippon. The Warhammer Armies book has Nippon as a mercenary contingent that can only be hired by Dark Elves? What the Hell is that? But imagine my surprise when I was tipped off to the fact that 2nd Edition Warhammer Fantasy Battle had them as a full army in Ravening Hordes!

So armed with this knowledge I’ve commenced an Army of Nippon and plan on tinkering with the 2nd Edition army list. I may not have to do much, as it appears that gamers were to use the 2nd Edition Ravening Hordes until Warhammer Armies came out. I’ve been working on terrain and securing minis. Right now I’m focused on acquiring ninja; I don’t know of anyone who has one of each of the entire lineup, so I might be the first? Big shout out to my brothers over at the Oldhammer forum.

I feel at home there with my like of the older editions of the game. Shameless plug: for those looking to help me out with trades or purchases, my want list is here.

On a side note: I really like the look of the art and presentation in 2nd Edition as it mirrors up to the presentation of 1st Edition Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay, which is another favorite of mine from back in the day. You can read my thoughts on some classic campaigns from back in the day here and here.

In a way I’ve gone home as it were, so I guess you can go back.

The Dogs of War Nippon Army Style

Years ago I created a Nippon army list, its fairly crude and I have updated it a few times, but never really play tested it.

Somewhat because of this I starting to formulate a strategy for my own Dogs of War force, but one based on Nippon.

I've been a big fan of the Nippon forces since back in the 3rd Edition Warhammer days and always liked the look of them. Plus I've never really seen a good assembled force or really many at all. It's always been a shame that Games Workshop never released an actual army for them. But no matter, between the old range being available (somewhat) on eBay and these guys from Curteys Miniatures I think I'm going to be OK for the kind of force I want to assemble.

While the GW range was/is nice for 5th/6th edition Dogs of War its never really held my interest. Plus add to the fact that in order to get them now its either crazy prices off of the GW UK website or crazy prices off of eBay. Not willing to do either really. As I mentioned that's where these Mounted Samurai from Curteys come into play: 12 metal minis for $47? Yes please, GW should take note.

One of the coolest artillery sets in Warhammer

 

So with all that as I noted above I'm formulating a plan as most of my Warhammer stuff is packed up in anticipation for a move to a new house. So what I'm doing is seeking out all of the parts that I'm looking for before I start my force. This will be a novel idea for me as I usually acquire minis as I'm painting. Starting off I'm going with the Nippon Rocket Crew from Games Workshop back in the 3rd edition days. and thanks to a few chaps over on Chaos Dwarfs Online I think I'm set with that part. I will be getting the Rocket Launcher and 3 out of the 4 crewmen which is fine with me. Fine because when I run these guys as Dogs of War I plan on using it as a "Count As" Halfling Hot Pot, when used as a "Count As" Empire force I'll use it as a undersized Hellstrom Rocket Battery.

My buddy Baggronor over at Chaos Dwarfs Online (now Chaos Dwarfs Online) also has informed me that he has some 3rd Edition Games Workshop Ninjas as well. After all, even a renegade warband of Nippon mercenaries is going to have some ninjas squirreled away inside of it!

Other ideas include: a mounted Geisha for a wizard along the lines of the PC game Shogun: Total War; a band of mercenary dwarfs, a converted unit or from (Curteys line) of crossbowmen from Cathay. I don't see the Nipponese Samurai or their retainers using crossbows but a mercenary force? Sure in the right hands. This opens up possibilities of a renamed Marksmen or Miragliano renamed as well. Other ideas are a giant, but not as a Eastern giant per se, rather painted up like normal. The reason for this is I want to tie into the Old World as well. This as yet unnamed force has been fighting all over the continent and is made up of various parts. At its core is the Nippon forces yes, but other elements as well. It will be weird painting the giant in such a manner will make him appear unusual because his supporting troops will look so different.

That's it for now. Drop me a line ion the 3rd edition Citadel Oriental line of miniatures or the army in general.