Ronin, by Osprey!

[PF]

The factions and swords for hire sound a bit like Lotow and a lack of flexibility but I will probably buy it nonetheless.
It would be sweet if there were monsters too. Or an expansion with them.

[marcusluis]

Any more news on ronin ?

[Varangian]

Nothing really. It looks like since it's an August release that Osprey is focusing on IHMN first.

I'm definitely looking forward to this one as well.

[Pentaro]

Too bad, that's a long wait! It would be great to see some band examples so we could know what to paint in the meantime. I really want this game to succeed around here.

[NurgleHH]

News would be Great, and something about the Game mechanics

[Smith]

Hi all,

As has been said, we're in full In Her Majesty's Name mode at the minute – more information on Ronin will be coming in the next month or so. The book is at the printers as I speak.

In terms of what you can get painting... samurai, ashigaru, sohei, ikko-ikki, bandits, Koreans – I can't think of any samurai figure you can't use for Ronin. Of course, there's North Star's figure range, which will offer several options not currently available. There's still no monsters though I'm afraid.

Gameplay-wise, the most enjoyable element (for me, anyway) is the close combat system: players have to choose how a figure fights – all-out defense or offense, or a balance between the two – it's not just another "I swing, you swing" melee system.

If you don't like the sound of factions, it's perfectly possible to build your own gang using the character archetypes (off the top of my head, there's probably around 50 different archetypes) in the book – everyone has a points cost (and there's plenty of skills and options right from the start to personalize them), so you can have a sohei, a ninja, four samurai and a few bandits working together. Of course, the factions have some unique flavour that would be lost by going down this route, but it won't break the game. I'll post up a starter army from the rulebook on Tuesday to give an idea of the size of game, and a rough idea of how much characters cost.

[Dewbakuk]

Isn't he a nice man

[joroas]

A very, very nice man! 

[Pentaro]

Isn't he a nice man

Indeed.

[pocoloco]

Can't wait till Tuesday now! 

[redzed]

looking really interesting, how easy to use for non-Samurai games?

[WuZhuiQiu]

Alright! Any wako pirates or Ming Chinese?

[Smith]

The bandit faction will see you right for wako, and there is a dedicated Ming list too.

I suppose it would work for non-samurai games - I'd never really considered it... Yeah, I guess it would. You'd probably have to establish what each archetype counts as, and the skills might need renaming, but I think it'd work we'll for musketeers or something quite swashbuckly...

[WuZhuiQiu]

Swashbuckly? That would suit some of the local players' collections.

[redzed]

..but I think it'd work we'll for musketeers or something quite swashbuckly...

well I'm in 


..and I might buy some Samurai as well, cos you can never have too much lead.