This is a repost of a topic I posted in the Ronin Forum. Ronin is a ruleset from Osprey, set Feudal Japan.

well, I managed to pull it off, not entirely gracefully, but it looked good. I dropped all the factions to 100 pts, had three players so one ran 200 and 100 each for the other two. (I was one of the other two - running the bandits.)

My grand plan would be to have 4 players, two sides, but issues that could lead to internal fightin on both sides, but with three players, I simplified that, and allowed, for example, both the Sohai and the Bandits to gain pts looting bodies. It didn't matter, since they mostly ended up as the bodies.. but I get ahead of myself.

The  Sohai/Bandit, psuedo Ikko Ikki (we will use Ikko hence forth, now that it clear that this is not using the Ikko buntai rules) side had the goal of killing the Daimyos nephew. His side had to leave from a specific point on the map,  preferably with the hostess, to get back to the village where his troops were stationed.  They start at the Tea House.  I had  a house rule that they must complete the ceremony, or loose VP (honor) so each turn he would roll a die, and if he got a 6 the Bushou, Sensei and Hostess could leave. Add one to the roll each turn, so he would automatically get to leave on turn 6. He rolled a six right off.. 

The Ikko split his forces and tried to  defend the bridge with a Senior Sohai, Sohai and Initiate and the Hatamoto and one Senpai moved to take it and he sent his other two initiates to cross the river. 

My bandits worked on fording the fast moving early spring (very muddy) stream to meet his Bushou, Sensei, Senpai, and a Yumi samurai.  A lot had hung on the idea that he would be stuck in the tea house, so I need to mod that house rule some. 

I also ruled that my one Teppo Bandit could have a +1 on his first shot - a rule that shows up in a lot of civil war and Napoleonic. He didn't want to waste it. So he jockeyed for position to shoot at the only armoured enemy he could get into range, the Hatamoto on the bridge.  But before he could get a decent shot, the two sides met on the bridge, and a Ninja popped out on the opposing side and started making for the Teppoman.

Here is the battle on the bridge. After that I didn't get any pictures.

If i do this scenario again - and I probably will - I will drop the Bandit with the Yari in favour of another Teppo-man. One of our big problems was initiative.. the opposition would generally strike first, and toast our units before we could counter.. I need to see if I was doing that right.. (update- I wasn't)

It wasn't pretty anyway. The Bugai/Koryu combination toasted the Sohai/bandits. One Senpai dead, and not a man alive on my side. I admit this was partially our weak strategy. We split weak troops and faced strong troops.. I mis-judged how much weaker we were, despite our greater numbers. I may also have mis-played some rules.. I will be looking at that more closely.