TMWWBK House Rules for the Boshin War and Hypothetical Expeditionary Forces

I've used The Men Who Would Be Kings (henceforth TMWWBK) for Boshin War games for quite a bit now, but while I do like the core mechanics, there are some ways in which the rules aren't exactly there when it comes to the specifics of this particular period – one for which I am fully aware it was not specifically designed. Here I've consolidated a few – largely untested – jottings I've done over the last few months, some original to myself, some more or less replicated verbatim from Dan Mersey's (now-defunct) blog, and some based on The Last Samurai Rebellion supplement for TMWWBK by Eric Wood of the University of Edinburgh's History and Games Lab. At some stage I might do a more formal document, but this serves as my current round of jottings. None of these have been tested yet besides the armoured characteristic, but I think most of these should be okay as is.

Infantry Profiles

Mixed Infantry

For representing troops with a mixture of spearmen and gunners, I propose a special downgrade for Regular Infantry valued at -1 point. Mixed Infantry roll half as many dice (rounded down) when firing, and can also downgrade to Antiquated Muskets for -2 points. They cannot Skirmish, but they can still form Close Order and use Volley Fire.

You probably could still have Poor Shots as a separate downgrade, but I think the above is better at reflecting the limitations of a mixed formation.

Irregular Infantry

Irregular Infantry, which should be used to represent genuine irregular forces, should have Fieldcraft for free, and the option to take the Light Infantry bonus (i.e. no Difficult terrain movement penalty) for +1 point.

Tribal Infantry

Tribal Infantry would seem to map on easily to various traditional forces, but they're hard to fully square. I would suggest that Tribal Infantry be divided into two broad archetypes: Shock Troops and Heavy Troops. Shock Troops are the same as Tribal Infantry as is, but should have at least one of either Veteran or Fierce to be fielded; they also ought to roll on the Regular Infantry profile for Leadership. Heavy Troops should move at only 6" and be affected by Difficult terrain, and thus cost -1 by default, but can be made Armoured (2 hits required per casualty in melee) for +2 points. Both types should still be able to fire, to reflect the use of various miscellaneous ranged weapons like pistols, the odd rifle, and the odd bow. The Well-Armed Sharpshooters profile could also be used to depict samurai archers and arquebusiers.

Shinsengumi rifle units (which do seem to have existed, by the by!) are probably better depicted as Fierce Poorly-Armed Regular Infantry.

Cavalry

Types of Cavalry

Japan had historically had quite poor horses for cavalry, and even during the Sengoku period horses were generally used for mobility, with mounted samurai often dismounting to fight. As such, any modernised cavalry mounted on native horses should be rated as Irregular, while traditionally-equipped horsemen are Tribal; optionally, you may also consider reducing the movement of these cavalry 10" from 12". The one exception was the small cavalry troop that formed part of the Denshūtai, which can be rated as Regulars, and optionally as Lancers.

Artillery

Limbers

For +1 point, Crewed Weapons can have limbers. While limbered up, Crewed Weapons can move at a rate of 8" per turn, but cannot move At the Double. Limbering and unlimbering is a Free Action, but takes up a full turn.

This differs from Dan Mersey's suggestion of having limbering/unlimbering be a tested action, and letting guns move at 10" per turn. Artillery already has to deal with a lot more randomness in activation owing to having no Free Actions, I find.

Horse Artillery (Europeans only)

For a further +1 point, Crewed Weapons can be specifically Horse Artillery. Horse Artillery moves at a base rate of 10" while limbered, and can move At the Double.

Rockets

Rockets cost the same as any other Crewed Weapon. They can fire, over the heads of intervening units, at Close range at between 8" and 16", and Long range up to 32", rolling 2D6 per crewman. Rockets cause Pinning tests as though every hit caused a casualty, but inflict casualties as though the target is in one level of cover higher than it is. So for instance 5 hits at Long range would cause only one casualty, but the unit would test for Pinning at -5 to the roll.

The 'official' rules for rockets have it that they cause no casualties, but cause one Pinning test for every crewman in the firing unit. This is, I would argue, a bit much. Given that the number of Pinned markers you have not only reduces your chances of passing a Rally test, but also increases your chances of routing, the possibility of causing a unit to take four Pinned markers from a single round of indirect fire is enormously powerful. Having done the maths on this, my proposed method increases the chance of taking a Pinned result, but brings down the average number of Pinned results per round of fire considerably.

Special Artillery Types

Armstrong field guns were still in use in the British Army in 1868, and there was one battery of six 12-pounder guns operated by Saga (also known as Hizen) Domain. Being breechloaders gave them a somewhat better rate of fire, but the mechanism was delicate and suffered from significant reliability issues. The unit gets +2 on their activation roll when attempting to Fire, but each time it fires, it must roll 1D6. On a result of 1, the gun has had a mechanical failure and can no longer be fired. Alternatively, if your unit represents a battery rather than an individual piece, a crewman is removed on a result of 1 or 2 to represent a single gun breaking down.

The French La Hitte system of bronze rifled guns came about in parallel with the Armstrong, and remained in French service until after the Franco-Prussian War. Twelve were sent to Japan as part of the French military mission to the Tokugawa Shogunate. While more robust than the Armstrong, it fired a lighter shell (4 kilograms) which also had to be detonated at fixed ranges. La Hitte guns have +1 Firing if a model in the target unit is exactly 16" or 32" away, but -1 Firing otherwise.

Both of the above cases I would think have enough of a disadvantage to offset their advantages, but points cost may be raised by 1 or even 2 if you find that the drawbacks are more of an edge case (I suspect the La Hitte one might warrant this.)

Discipline Ratings

As a general rule, I would use the following scheme for assigning Discipline values:

• +2: European troops, Indian troops, forces trained under direct and intensive European supervision (i.e. the Denshūtai and some Chōshū and Satsuma contingents), or certain veteran or especially motivated forces (e.g. the Shinsengumi and Shōgitai for the Shogunate, and the Kiheitai of Chōshū).
• +1: African troops in French service, and any relatively well-trained or motivated Japanese units (Shogunate regular troops, most Chōshū, Satsuma, and Aizu forces, and the odd 'tip of the spear' for other domains like Tosa's Jinshōtai or Sendai's Gakuheitai).
• +0: Troops that are not untrained as such, but not specifically drilled for modern conditions or necessarily strongly motivated enough to make up for it (includes the French African penal battalions). Most minor domain forces (i.e. not Satsuma, Chōshū, Aizu, or Shogunate) will fall into this category.
• -1: Militias and other hastily-raised irregular forces, or units with particularly poor motivation (e.g. several Shogunate allies at Toba-Fushimi, other than Aizu and Kuwana).