STW War Story Part III - Western Uprise

Chapter 8     Full Assault

    Spring 1544 - the 15th year of Mori Motonari's campaign. From the barren lands of Chugoku, the Mori clan now also controls the entire Kinki, Shigoku, half of Chubu (central region), as well as northern Kyushu (9 states).

    Last winter, Lord Mori Motonari had a major victory in Chikuzen. The 1160 army of Imagawa was defeated by 910 of Mori - and now Lord Mori has advanced into the province of Hizen, hopeing to completely cut off Imagawa's main military supply. Motonari had anticipated that many of Imagawa's men would move to Chigoku for the defense of this river province.

    Meanwhile, the siege in Tosa was over, and reinforcement has arrived Bungo. With the extra men available to continue sieging the Bungo castle, Mori Saigo Iezane (now rank 3) was finally assigned a serious assault mission - terminating Shimazu in Hyuga.

Spring 1544

Hyuga: Mori (762) vs. Shimazu (295)

    After the recent three years of losing battles, all Shimazu Takahisa (the Shimazu daimyo) had was 295 loyal men left in Hyuga. Iezane's mission was sad - brining an end to a generous previous ally of Mori. Mori invaded the Nagato province of Shimazu in 1530, but Shimazu Takahisa not only agreed for a cease-fire but also for an alliance later on.

    Shimazu Takahisa sit his troop on the mountain of the left. Counting their numbers, Iezane knew there were hidden troops in the forests. Since we already have absolute numerical advantage, the Mori army proceeded uphill, anticipating for a larger loss than the enemy.

AT the same time of the central advance, our warrior monks on the left flank had taken care of Shimazu's archers. Under the heavy archery fire of Mori, Lord Shimazu finally charged down - and was soon surrendered by hundreds of Mori soldiers.

Shimazu's loyal peasants soon followed their Lord to charge down. Lord Shimazu's elite guards were skilled in battle, and Mori was actually losing more than Shimazu. But being 5:1, these brave fighters had little chance to stand for long.

Eventually, the small group of enemy ran out of their strength and hope. Killing 26 in total, Lord Shimazu's heavy cavalry group sacrificed their lives along with their daimyo. So that's about 130 men... where are the other half?

The answer is the mountain on the opposite side. After making sure the enemy were purely YS, Iezane surrounded the enemy by all available troops. The enemy had a height advantage, and were of high honor. Seeing the glorious death of their daimyo, the Shimazu soldiers were as solid as castle walls. Iezane's army suffered a great losses before the enemy were finally routed. Throughout the nasty hand-to-hand fighting, Iezane was standing in the first line!

Shimazu was destroyed - firstly by Imagawa, and secondly by Mori. In this battle, Iezane bravely led his own unit, himself took the life of 5 enemies -- suddenly his fighting skill were largely improved, from H0 jumped to a H4! (perhaps by killing some high-honor soldiers, even Shimazu Takahisa)

After 15 years of life as a "commander", Mori Saigo Iezane finally killed the first enemy using his own hands -- and also the second, the third, the fourth, and the fifth. Now Iezane's is no longer considered a lame taisho, but among the tougher!

Hizen: Mori (714) vs. Imagawa (926)

    At the same time, Lord Mori Motonari's soldiers stepped onto Hizen. Imagawa's soldier once gathered a slightly larger number, but of course, inferior in honor.

    But soon Motonari started to worry. The enemy was again almost entirely archers, and the good weather and open plain provides them a good place to shoot. Our troops could not move fast enough, yet the ashigarus are definitely not archer-breakers (they rout too easily).

    First, lord Mori concentrated the whole force assaulting the enemies' right flank, who starting shootomg at us. But soon the enemies' center and right closed up -- and the Mori's army were surrounded by thousands of arrows. They blue sky was filled with dark matters flying in between. The slow movement of our troops soon showed the disadvantage - although we also caught many nearby archer groups and killed them in hand-to-hand, we also suffer a lot of losses from every direction!

    It was a bloody battle. With more than half of the men routed and dead, the rest of the Mori army were finally able to trap the enemy taisho, routed him. Soon he was killed by our ashigaru!

    With both sides losing more than half of their men, the battle of Hizen ended with a field of corpses. The enemies ended up in the castle were actually of a larger size than Mori. Soon Motonari moved more reinforcements from Chikuzen, the original unit of Saito Toshimasa in Nagato (and later Buzen).

    This nasty battle also took the life of another Iezane's old comrade, Ouchi Fujuyasu. The two yari samurai leaders that fought with Iezane in his first battle were both dead...!

Summer 1544

As expected Imagawa's reinforcement had arrived in Chigoku, the river province. Since the Hizen castle still had a significant amount of enemy troops inside, Lord Mori was unable to launch another attack this season. The only order was to let Mori Saigo Iezane to assault the fromer Shimazu (now ronin) castle of Hyuga - to avoid a prolonged siege. If Hyuga army is freed, Mori Saigo Iezane's men could assist the attack of Chigoku and other provinces.

Hyuga: Mori (589) vs. Ronin (97)

    The majority of the former Shimazu soldiers in the castle were yari samuri. There seems to be no better way to directly break in the castle.

    Our furious worrior monks charged in the arrows and brought the head of enemy Taisho! The castle gate was soon broken - and the enemy, though very high-honored, were finally slaughtered with no mercy. That's the formal end of the clan Shimazu.

    Killing none, Iezane's army collected another victory. In a few days he received the promotion to rank 4! Looks like Iezane has been trusted more by Mori Motonari. What will be his next mission? 

Autumn 1544

    Just the next season, the number of enemy soldiers in the small castle of Hizen were reduced to half. Leaving Saito Toshimasa (R3) to continue the siege, Lord Mori launched a toatl assault to Chigoku, challegning the young Imagawa Ujizane. You might recall, don't Imagawa soldiers primarily archers? That's only true in Chikuzen and Hizen -- with all their archers killed or retreated into the Hizen castle, now Chigoku was left COMPLETELY yari samurai!

    Also, Mori Saigo Iezane was ordered to attack Higo at the same time. If Imagawa Ujizane decides to defend Chigoku, then Higo will be taken easily - while our archers will enjoy a good time killing the enemies defending the bridge...

    Imagawa also launched a total assault this season! Knowing Hyuga was emptied, Imagawa collected 300 soldiers from the south and attacked Hyuga. The only monk unit of Mori retreated into the castle.

    Also, Lord Imagawa seems to know that Chigoku is not truly defendable as they don't have archers. Imagawa Ujizane himself has arrived Higo, hoping to defeat Mori's second assault team of Mori Saigo Iezane -- one year ago still known as a lame general that cannot kill any enemy himself...!

    Furthermore, lord Imagawa had coordinated the soldiers in Hizen castle to charge out - maybe there were expecting their comrades in Chigoku, but they don't know Chigoku was also attacked by Mori Motonari!

Higo: Mori (516) vs. Imagawa (440)

    Imagawa Ujizane did not bring too many soldiers on the battlefield of Higo - maybe too confident? Now this is another good chance of Iezane, now a fresh Rank 4. If he can defeat lord Imagawa, he will be definitely distinguished from other generals in Mori clan.

    The Imagawa army now rested on the slope of the corner. The only reasonable attacking point would be from the smaller mountain just in front of it. There is a not-too-shallow valley near the edge of the battlefield - maybe our monks will pass from there.

    The archers soon arrvied in their positions, shooting at the Imagawa army who charged down. Iezane ordered all archers to hold position at any cost, untill the slower moving YS arrived from the back. In the meantime, the monks were ordered to ran up the hill and flank the deadly enemy archers occupying the high ground!

    The monks suffered great losses, but once in contact, they broken into enemies' archer groups with little trouble. Also at this time, our YS and SA had destroyed the morale of Imagawa soldiers charging down. These Imagawa soldiers were probably frustrated by their daimyo hidden on the top of the mountain, watching the death of his men doing nothing.

    The enemy is now on the run!

    Iezane soon ordered the warrior monks to aim at the enemy daimyo - and since Ujizane was fleeing with his soldiers, he really could not concentrate on fighting. The monk group cut into the entire fleeing horde with no trouble, and finally took the head of Imagawa daimyo!

    A total victory, 71% of Imagawa's men were dead. Although again killing none himself (YS was really too slow), the fame of Mori Saigo Iezane was now widely spread. Recall he is a rank 4 now!

Chigoku: Mori (745) vs. Imagawa (660)

    With absolutely no archers to defend the bridge, the Imagwa army spread into a long line of YS. They were not yet informed of their daimyo's death -- which just happened a few days ago.

    Without archers, the bridge purely became the stage for warrior monks. The assault was lead by the chrage of a full monk unit, followed by all the YS and YA, also the daimyo Motonari.

    The enemy were ruthlessly slain by the elite monks of Mori. The enemy broke into chaos within a few minutes!

The enemy Taisho was also killed in the chase. Mori Motonari with his heavy cavalry now does not have to worry the long spears, and enjoyed killing the slow-running enemy yari samurai from behind!

The warrior monks, truly honorable, killed 114 of the enemy samurai. The Imagawa yari samurai of Chigoku also perished, along with their daimyo.

Hizen: Imagawa (212) vs. Mori (461)

    The third battle of the season. Saito Toshimasa, the general responsible for the siege of Hizen had not really fought a battle since 1530. All of his three previous victories were obtained because of enemy retreat. His first chance to demonstrate his ability (an H4 archer) finally came.

       It was a simple one in turns of numbers. The enemy archers were constantly raining arrows at us. However, as long as Mori's YS proceed with no fear, finally we could use our numbers to push them into the corner, either rout them or finish them.

    As planned, although YS move slowly, the archers were finally outnumbered and killed.

WIth quite a large losses due to the enemy's archery fire, Saito obtained his first real field victory - and was promoted to rank 4 as well. Now the Mori clan has two R4 generals and a R5 daimyo.

    The harvest of 1544 was normal, under the normal tax rate. Mori Motonari also announced that the tax rate will be reduced next year, to comfort the peasants of Kyushu.

    With Imagawa dead, the southern two provinces of Kyushu now fell into the hand of Takeda, the realm of cavalry. Looks like it finally came to the time to break the next alliance - Takeda! 

    On the east, both Hojo and Takeda had accumulated a large number of troops on the border. Can Mori's eastern borders hold until the large reinforcement of Mori Motonari, Mori Saigo Iezane, and Saito Toshimasa arrive from Kyushu?