Samurai VS the World

[GameBawesome]

We all know the samurai, either historical or romanticized, they we're skilled warriors.

This Thread is mainly focusing on death battles like that show Deadliest Warriors. If a Sengoku period samurai army we're to face various famous fighting classes or cultures, like examples:

Samurai VS Conquistadors
Samurai VS British Red Coats
Samurai VS Aztec Warriors
Samurai VS Spartans
ETC

There is only one rule: Nothing past 1830 AD

 

[Richard V]

We all know the samurai, either historical or romanticized, they we're skilled warriors.

This Thread is mainly focusing on death battles like that show Deadliest Warriors. If a Sengoku period samurai army we're to face various famous fighting classes or cultures, like examples:

Samurai VS Conquistadors
Samurai VS British Red Coats
Samurai VS Aztec Warriors
Samurai VS Spartans
ETC

There is only one rule: Nothing past 1830 AD

Conquistadors were small bands of largely amateur free booters. Their success relied on the exploitation of the naivete of native chiefs and their vast inferiority of arms. The Japanese would have neither.

The New Model Army was a professional force with superior weapons to the Japanese. Mid-17th century muskets would have no difficulty against Japanese armor, but the small caliber Japanese arquebus might not do so well against heavy breast plates worn by cavalry and front rank pikemen of the time. Plus the cavalry had wheelock carbines and infantry artillery was also better. All things being equal the English probably win.

Pre-gunpowder armies stand no chance.

 

[wcv215]

Conquistadors were small bands of largely amateur free booters. Their success relied on the exploitation of the naivete of native chiefs and their vast inferiority of arms. The Japanese would have neither.

Yeah, if you want a more logical fight putting the samurai up against tercios would probably be the way to go.

 

[James Ricker]

Samurai vs the Knights Templar
That one would come down to the Commander's skill.

 

[Richard V]

Samurai vs the Knights Templar
That one would come down to the Commander's skill.

From the same time period yes. Japanese armies of Sengoku period would have firearms and plate armor vs the Templars’ lance and chain mail combination.

 

[Dargonaut]

Except Samurai made their weapons out of iron sand.... Which is terrible for making weapons out of.... At least they have guns

 

[Balaur]

Except Samurai made their weapons out of iron sand.... Which is terrible for making weapons out of.... At least they have guns

A katana is a sharp piece of metal moving at high speeds. Get hit in the flesh/clothes and your day is getting ruined, exact metallurgy doesn't matter.
The complete 180 the internet has done from seeing katanas as "best sword evar" to "worst sword evar" never ceases to amaze.
Anyway, this should be in ASB or NPC.

 

[Dargonaut]

A katana is a sharp piece of metal moving at high speeds. Get hit in the flesh/clothes and your day is getting ruined, exact metallurgy doesn't matter.
The complete 180 the internet has done from seeing katanas as "best sword evar" to "worst sword evar" never ceases to amaze.
Anyway, this should be in ASB or NPC.

But metallurgy does matters, Japanese Katina are well made fantastic swords but only with proper iron ore that can be smelled into quality steel, but Samurai back in the day didn't have access to these quality ores and so they turned to iron sand which handicaps the effectiveness of the weapon, also of course getting hit with a sword hurts a lot, but when the Samurai come across steel clad templars with better swords and armor, by virtue of resources, it will be more difficult for the Samurai to win. So long story short, yes a piece of metal moving very fast will hurt a lot, but if that piece of metal is made of inferior steel and liable to snap when put up against better steel, then maybe one should bet on the guys with better swords and armor.

But at least the Samurai got guns

 

[Richard V]

I don’t know where this idea that iron sand makes bad steel comes from. Iron ore comes in varying qualities. The trick is to turn ore into high purity steel, which the Japanese did an excellent job of. It is entirely possible to take high quality ores and end up with less pure steel. The reason East Asians folded their steel a dozen times is to drive the impurities out. It’s labor intensive, but it works.

Tests have shown surviving swords had exceptionally high purity. Granted the Japanese also made crappy swords that didn’t get passed down to present time, but they had the means to produce very clean steel.

Another way you can turn crap ore into some of the best steel you can find anywhere is the crucible method used in Middle East and India. Ore is not the limiting factor, technology is.

 

[RGB]

I think the most important question in all of this is, what is either army doing? Armies exist on campaigns. What is the campaign about? If it's about taking fortifications, the defending side has a huge advantage that can even offset the technological disparity, for example. If it's a raid, the side geared towards raids can do well even in absence of steel and guns. If it's about destroying the other guys, then the reverse would be likely, but that would also depend on how big the respective armies are, what quality they are ("conquistadores" are anything from knights and professional soldiers to just sailors and opportunists of all kinds, for example), and what terrain they're in (a tercio could well do worse in a jungle than a core of samurai supplemented with local troops, but also much better in other circumstances).

Basically though, downtime armies should generally overcome uptime armies, and armies with wider battle experience should overcome specialists who are outside their comfort zone.

Another way you can turn crap ore into some of the best steel you can find anywhere is the crucible method used in Middle East and India. Ore is not the limiting factor, technology is.

With the caveat that prior to industrial steel, having good ore massively improved your chances of producing something decent regardless of your technique. Crucible smelting or layer welding don't completely negate the quality of the source material.

 

[TRH]

I'm no expert on Japanese warfare, but I have to assume that just like knights, samurai would not be the entirety, or even necessarily the majority, of a typical Japanese army, any more than knights were in Europe. Army size, composition, supply, and tactics, along with conditions like terrain and weather would all be likely to matter more than the individual skill of the warrior. Probably the most humiliating defeat in Spartan history came at the hands of Athenian oarsmen throwing javelins at them.

 

[wcv215]

downtime armies should generally overcome uptime armies

Think you might have that backward.

 

[RGB]

Think you might have that backward.

Maybe I got the terms wrong. Disambig: chronologically later armies should overcome chronologically earlier ones.

 

[stevej713]

Deadliest Warriors was one of the stupidest shows ever made. History has shown that if you take 1000 well-equipped and individualistic warriors and pit them against an experienced army of 500 peasants, the former will be destroyed by the latter. Armies win battles, not warriors.

 

[Diego]

Samurai VS Conquistadors
Samurai VS British Red Coats
Samurai VS Aztec Warriors
Samurai VS Spartans

So, I think that you are more or less comparing equipment and tactics, as numbers, quality of soldiers and commanders would all be equal to both sides, unless specifically said so to compare a particular scenario.

Samurai Army from late Sengoku Jidai vs Western European Army from 16th century. The Samurai Army has gunpowder weapons, yari spears as long as pikes and naginatas, their characteristic armor, mounted samurais and bows, the Europeans have pikes and halberds, gunpowder weapons, plate armor, bucklers, and knights. The Western European Army Wins, Europe has overwhelming superiority in armor and cavalry which give them tactical superiority.

Samurai VS Aztec Warriors - Samurai from any period wins, as they have at least Iron and Horses.

Samurai from 12th century VS Greek Phalanx Army - The samurai can beat them if they use their superiority in cavalry and archers to attack the flanks and rear of the greeks. If the greeks are from a late period it will be harder as they started to use more auxiliary troops. If the opponents were not greeks but Macedonians from Philip or Alexander I would say that the Samurai Army has a slightly advantage of being 15 centuries in the future.

Samurai from 12th century vs Roman Army of 2nd century - Rome wins easily, they have a better combination of shields and armor, auxiliaries to make up for their deficiencies in cavalry and light troops, they have tactical maleability and superb system of communication.

Samurai from 12th century vs Western European Army of 12th century (Probably France) - Western European Army has a slight advantage because of their better armor and shield combination, and better cavalry, the europeans have more options of weapons to use too.

If you start putting variables in terrain, numbers, awareness, information, and command, the situation can go to any direction that you want, I am considering that:
The battlefield is a plain wide grassland without rivers.
The weather is dry.
Both sides are of equal size, can prepare themselves for battle as they want and know the enemy composition, but can't change the terrain or make fortifications.
The commanders are both competent and at the same level.
Neither side is in friendly territory.

 

[Lord High Executioner]

A katana is a sharp piece of metal moving at high speeds. Get hit in the flesh/clothes and your day is getting ruined, exact metallurgy doesn't matter.

Would it be too nitpicky to point out that the primary weapon of Sengoku period samurai wasn't the katana?

 

[CountPeter]

So I am going to probably annoy a fair few people by going against the grain on a lot of things. I am also going to sound like something of a Weab, but I want to assure people that I don't think Japan would win everything on the list. First of all...

Would it be too nitpicky to point out that the primary weapon of Sengoku period samurai wasn't the katana?

THANK YOU!
The Katana is an excellent weapon, and certainly proficient at getting through armour if used properly, but it really wasn't a primary weapon. The Yari and the Tanegashima (spear and gun specifically) were the dominant weapons of the Sengoku period. And their uses in many way were not comparible to that of European forces as I will get into momentarily...

That out the way -

Aztecs.
I am in no way saying that an Aztec army would beat a Sengoku era samurai army, but I also think that there is a grave underestimation of the prowess of the Aztec military.
Firstly, Obsidian is no joke when it comes to weaponry, like, to the point where there are multiple spanish acounts of a horse being beheaded mid combat due to it. The Maquahuitl in particular is an incredible alternative to steel weaponry, particularly as it's shape compines many of the advantages of a quarter staff and club with the sharpness of obsidian. There are drawbacks, but it was very much a potent weapon.
Aztec society managed to do a decent job as a technologically primitive culture against the advanced spaniards whilst also dealing with rebellion and plague.
That is not to say that Aztecs would fair well against the others on this list in a pitched battle, but that they have more of an edge that I think people are realising on smaller skirmish levels.

Next -

Japanese armour and defences
It goes without saying that wood is not as strong as metal, and that the comparitive shortage of metal does naturally result in stronger armour. But armour is not just about strength.
Japanese defence tactics have a lot of quite clever things going for it which might easily catch an unprepared army off guard.
Firstly, the armour (whilst again not as strong) was much easier to mass produce. Where the type of armour often looked at for a european army was largely restricted to those who could afford it/knights etc, the Okashi Gusoku was mass producable and largely foot soldiers would use in in conjunction with a series of portable wooden palisades. A conventional european army and a japanese army facing off against eachother would find that there is a lot more layers to get through the normal japanese soldier than the normal european soldier, although the officer class of the Japanese would have a notable disadvantage.
There are lots of other examples, and in no way am I saying that the Japanese defacto win, but that armour, defences and how you use them do not have mere strength as the deciding factor.

 

[GameBawesome]

I’ve been seeing somethings about where this scenerio takes place. Let’s say it takes place on an open plain, each army has 500-1000 men, and the reason, not important. This isn’t an alternate history scenerio, it’s more of a Army death battle, to compare each army strengths and weaknesses, and who would win

 

[Diego]

Would it be too nitpicky to point out that the primary weapon of Sengoku period samurai wasn't the katana?

Would it be too nitpicky to point out that the Samurai is a glorified Mounted Archer?

 

[TRH]

Would it be too nitpicky to point out that the primary weapon of Sengoku period samurai wasn't the katana?

No more nitpicky than it was for me to point out that Japanese armies were more than just samurai. If this was simply a deadliest warrior thing, then we could let it slide, and just have the samurai rely on his katana instead of his bow. Turning it into a question of armies means that we can't just ignore things like that.