One of the Horde
| STW War Story VI
One of the Horde |
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Dear noble lords of Hojo, this is Miyoshi Tadayoshi, your host of the war
story. In the last chapter, the Hojo army succumbed the samurai of Oda in
Wakasa, Omi, and Iga. 
Spring 1542
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The siege of Omi and Iga castle are going well and there
weren't too much Oda's men in the castle by spring 1542. As the result,
Hojo Ujiyasu immediately asked an attack to Yamato, where Oda's defense
was minimum. The enemy retreated! 
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Summer 1542
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In the next season, I was assigned to assault Tamba with the entire
available army! We were fully aware that Oda had a large army in Tamba,
but we expected the defense would be weakened because now Kawachi and Kii
are both exposed to Yamato.
At the same time, Lord Hojo Ujisuna assaulted the castle of Iga! |
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The outcome of the surprise attack in Tamba was better than we have
thought. Most of Oda's men have moved to Kawachi and the defending enemy
left in Tamba decided to retreat!
With the large army at hand, I should comfort the peasants of Tamba well. |
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The castle assault of Iga-Ueno was successful. The enemies, who just lost badly to the mighty heir of Hojo Ujiyasu last autumn, had little chance to stand in front of the great daimyo of Hojo!
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A good news! The free victory of Tamba has enabled myself to be promoted
to a Rank 5 general in the clan. Also, my fame is wider spread across the
nation! 
Hail to the ashigaru of Hitachi! |
Spring 1543
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| Little things happened in autumn and winter of 1542. The
harvest was good, and under the farm upgrades completed last year the clan
had a huge budget of 12078 koku to spend! More farm upgrades were started
of course!
Soon it came to the spring of 1543. Oda has been pushed to Kawachi and
Kii, and Hojo holds the front of Yamato and Tamba. The two clans have
roughly the same number of army. Hojo have two rank 5 generals (Hojo
Ujiyasu and myself), while Oda has two rank 3 (Oda Nobuhiro the daimyo and
Kanamori Nagachika (rank 3), who is joining the Oda clan this year)... |
Summer 1543
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The assault was carried out in the next season! Two attack
were launched, with almost all available army from Tamba (led by myself)
on Kawachi and Yamato (led by Hojo Ujiyasu) to Kii. We expect that a large
number of troops is going to be drown to Kii for the defense! 
So the attack of Kii is probably just a fake, but Oda decides to
concentrate their defense in Kawachi, then we will take Kii easily,
too.
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Well, Oda decides to share their defense in both province! So we decided to
attack both provinces at the same time! The Kawachi battle, led by myself,
came first and we were facing 1500 Oda's men on the battlefield! |
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The enemy taisho was skilled and 2/3 of them were samurai. However, there was no alternative! Our brave yari samurai crossed the river in the rain, while our archers released their arrows towards the other side of the river! |
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The enemy taisho decided to personally come to the front with all the Oda
archers as the rain is really reducing their archers' effectiveness. The two
army, a total of more than 2000 men clashed on the bridge tip! A slaughter
house in the rain!
Finally our archers have depleted their arrows, and they were also
ordered to join the battle! Everybody could only think of killing the enemy
in front of them, or there is no way to return! Either we die or they die! |
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Some of our yari samurai were fleeing, but the majority had stayed intact
and kept fighting. Finally we took the head of the enemy taisho, and the
enemy turned around!
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Myself killing 6, the victory of Hojo was obtained with a total of 1100
corpses laid on the ground of Kawachi. Oda's fine generals, Kanamori
Nagachika (R3) and Akechi Mitsuhide (R2), were all killed in this battle.
Kawachi is ours!
I admit I was lucky! It might be myself who end up dead.
But still much thanks to the elite samurai of Hojo. Their courage and fine battle skill enabled us to stand against the grand army of Oda long enough! |
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On the other hand, Hojo Ujiyasu, the great heir of Hojo's army has marched into Kii. They've surrounded the forest where Oda Nobuhiro's men are hiding. Although we had slightly more men than Oda, the enemy's units were mostly well armored (bronze) samurai. |
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| The yari samurai and yari ashigaru of Hojo marched into the forest from many directions! The enemy gave up their chance to fight, and marched away from the forest. Now they have lost their height advantage. Hojo Ujiyasu ordered all fighters to pursue and try to intercept the enemy on the slope downhill! | ||||||
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Here we go!
Despite the height advantage, with all archers sitting on the far back
shooting, the yari troops of Hojo were slightly outnumbered, more seriously
on the left flank! |
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| Quickly yelled for help, all units of archer rushed to help. Showing here is one of them flanking the enemy on the right. The Hojo's front was about to collapse soon. Could they arrive on time? | ||||||
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| The reinforcement was a great success. The flanking had completely handled the Oda yari samurai while the other archers were doing a great job altering the numerical disadvantage of Hojo. The enemy daimyo is fleeing! | ||||||
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| Oda Nobuhiro was killed! We have destroyed the
Oda clan! WooHoo!
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Autumn 1543
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However, as Hojo Ujiyasu arrived in Kawachi and I was
dispatched back to Tamba, Mori Motonari launched a grand attack to us - a
betrayal of the alliance! I said long time ago our emissary was doing a
poor job - the alliance was just a piece of paper! 
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| Spreading the archers wide open, Hojo Ujiyasu asked all
archers to hold their fires until many of Mori's soldiers have crossed the
bridge. Due to the light wind, our arrows were not so effective so their
usage was primarily scaring the enemy but not to kill them on the bridge.
The yari troops were waiting in the second row behind the archers. It
is worth mentioning that the first group of fine-armored (silvery) troop,
our homeboys of Hitachi, was shown on the battlefield! |
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| Mori's men attempted to cross the bridge several times, and were all defeated (scared) by the arrows of Hojo. Mori Motonari himself was finally leading the charge while our arrows had mostly depleted, but he was soon on the run! Can Hojo's men intercept him? | ||||||
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The answer was no, unfortunately. 
The fast horses of Mori Motonari enabled his hasty retreat to the other
side. Also, Mori's men were soon rallied and marched towards the bridge.
If we chase over now, all of our men would be packed up on the other side
of the bridge, which was very undesirable.
Hojo Ujiyasu ordered all of his men to pull back as soon as possible, waiting for the next wave of Mori's attack. However, by this time almost all of our arrows were gone. |
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| Mori Motonari led another attack across the bridge not long after! It was the only perfect chance to win the battle. Hojo Ujiyasu asked everyone to join the fight! | ||||||
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| Finally after killing 13, Mori Motonari fell down the horse!
We killed the enemy daimyo and the enemy started to rout!
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| The enemy was packed up on the bridge and massacred with
little mercy. The silver-armored yari ashigaru was doing great!
Mori Motonari is dead, and his brother has taken the command of the Mori clan. |
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| The harvest of 1543 was normal, but still brings us 11521
koku for the coming year. Our clan is rich!
Our new enemy is Mori. However, the independent forces of Ise and
Yamashiro has not been taken care of. What would be the Hojo clan's next
move? |
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Hojo324
Oda
67
Mori
1358