Gunpowder

[Cratebox99]

Yes someome had to ask..

I know next to nothing about Japan culture, but Google tells me firearms were a thing during the Sengoku period, should we expect gunpowder in-game eventually?

[Nox]

There was gunpowder and they used it for sapping but that's not here.

What they didn't have was the metallurgy to make barrels for arquebuses (a kind of smoothbore heavy musket)

Late in the sengoku period it was the dutch who offered the japanese guns in exchange for the right to trade for things that the japanese had - silks and crafts. The dutch were the main traders at that time.

What the dutch wanted in exchange however was that the japanese allow christian missionaries, which only a few daimyo allowed.

Even if there were guns, the characters we are supposed to be playing wouldn't have access to them.

[FentaRino]

Originally posted by Nox:

There was gunpowder and they used it for sapping but that's not here.

What they didn't have was the metallurgy to make barrels for arquebuses (a kind of smoothbore heavy musket)

Late in the sengoku period it was the dutch who offered the japanese guns in exchange for the right to trade for things that the japanese had - silks and crafts. The dutch were the main traders at that time.

What the dutch wanted in exchange however was that the japanese allow christian missionaries, which only a few daimyo allowed.

Even if there were guns, the characters we are supposed to be playing wouldn't have access to them.

Arent you mixing the dutch with the portuguese? The portuguese were the jesuits dudes. Also depending on where is the game located nanban could make more or less sense

[cruiser]

Gunpowder weapons like matchlock muskets were very very widespread during late Sengoku Jidai. After the Portuguese sold them some, the Japanese produced tons of matchlocks by themselves, and armed their ashigaru (peasant levy gradually turned into professional soldiers) with them, as well as the samurai, to the point where by 1600, Japan (as a whole) had the second most matchlocks in the world, second to the Spanish Empire. A survey of late Sengoku Jidai battles concluded that 60% of casualties were caused by matchlocks, 30% by yari (long spear/pike) and 10% by bows.