Realistically how did these types of battles play out?

[Thatunnecessarilystrongguy_On_IG]

I love the over-the-top concepts of one vs 1000 type fighting that Musou games present to us but realistically I can't imagine a weapon being sharp enough in those days to be effective after a few kills or impacts with the armor of the times, and I'm not savvy at digging up historical documentary type content to learn more about it. Like, a person of Guan Yu and Lu Bu level is considered some incredible warrior but to achieve this how many people are we really talking they beat? A few dozen? hundreds? Thousands? It's inconceivable to imagine any single man, even if they're the size of modern giants like Brian Shaw and Hafthor Bjornnson, prevailing in armed combat against more than 2 opponents maybe 3. No matter how good you are someone is bound to stab you and not many human beings are handling a stab wound in the year ~180-220 and being okay. I feel like these guys probably get more of their legend from leading an elite unit of dozens or hundreds or thousands of expertly skilled troops than being singular God-like forces themselves on the field. Hell one arrow from a peon with some luck will kill anyone for ♥♥♥♥♥ sake.
Any documentary links/article links would be nice, or just discussion here.

[kripsterpher]

The stages of the game will also be based on famous battles which took actually took place in ancient Japan
So here's this giant enemy crab

[Dadoosan]

It's likely just history playing up people without any real substance. It's highly unlikely any of these people killed nearly as many as is suggested. It's more likely that they had sway with the populace and the local lords, and used that to spread propaganda about themselves. They were probably skilled, sure, but there's only so far that can go on a chaotic battlefield. It's more likely to be true if we're talking about duels.

[awanderingswordsman]

It's surprisingly controversial how ancient battles actually took place. If you play something like mount and blade that takes a more realistic approach to health and damage, you'll realize even a very giant force will be reduced to one winning in like 30 seconds tops and yet historical records have battles going on for hours or days.

One popular theory is the dynamic standoff where battle lines actually don't engage that hard and very few people actually die while the formations are still good. Once one unit breaks though, kills really quickly pile up. This means in order to really push the battle one way or the other you need a squad brave enough to push into an enemy formation and break it which is relatively suicidal. If you succeed, even losing your life to do so, the enemy formation could break down and it quickly turns into a rout.

I would imagine most famous historical warriors were actually just good at breaking into a formation. Even though they might only personally kill 2-3 people doing that, their allies following in could turn the entire tide of battle. This means that yes, the units they led needed to be elite as well. This is mostly for infantry engagements.

On horseback a heavy cav charge is enough to break a lot of lines even before it hits because who wants to be on the other side of many tons of armored horse running at you full speed. Meanwhile light cav could position themselves in flanks either crashing into the side of a formation or at least hindering their movements because of that possibility. A lot of well known warriors like Lu Bu were actually most famous for their archery. Horse archers in particular were kind of OP for most of history, especially on offense where they can simply stay at range and run away if a powerful force comes at them. On defense, they lose some of that mobility advantage.

Historically Lu Bu has a much less impressive battle record, losing and fleeing for his life quite a few times. The "battle" of xiapi was also a siege lasting a few months where eventually morale plummeted so far people on Lu Bu's side surrendered.
Historically there aren't very many castle assaults. Generally the goal is to besiege the castle and starve them out while the defenders goal is to last long enough for reinforcements to come or the invaders to run out of supplies themselves and be forced to leave.

Still, even historical record is not fact and stuff from almost 2000 years ago especially is hard to gauge.

[thorin.hannahs]

If you haven't read Kingdom (manga) you might want to give it a go. It has that Dynasty Warriors vibe but it deals a bit more with tactics, strategies, politics and campaign lengths. Sure it does the warrior worth a thousand thing but most of the time (later) it is armies engaging each other, vying for position to defend or either break enemy formations using the landscape such as rivers or hills.

[awanderingswordsman]

Kingdom is very much exaggerated in all aspects but it's amazing. The anime is even pretty good after the first 2 seasons (and even those seasons are good except the awful awful cg in season 1 and super lazy normal animation in season 2 with tons of panning stills). There was a big gap between season 2 and 3 and from 3 onward it's got solid production quality and the same amazing story.

Kingdom is sort of the story of how than Han was formed in the same way the romance of the 3 kingdoms is the story of how the Jin dynasty was formed. Kingdom is the story of the first person to unite all of china into an empire, the Qin dynasty, which lasted like 20 years and then was replaced by the han but it's basically the same dynasty with a new ruler and coat of paint. A lot of the stuff in kingdom is accurate but a lot isn't and the main character, Xin, is not a real person.

There's no show out there with better ancient military campaigns and battles.

[Sacra]

I think one version of the ToTAl translation has a section where a historian explains that most of the feats at the time were due to the fact that the average soldier was just a nameless farmer. They had nothing but their bodies and maybe a pitch fork.

The people we know from the games were on another level because they had actual armor and weapons to fight a war, plus the actual training to be a killing machine.

I think that's the main inspiration for the morale system the game has.

If you're a no one and you see a bulky guy slash someone with zero effort, you'll definitely run for your life, no matter how many of you are.

It's like having LuBu from the games fighting a bunch of toddlers.

And there's also what others mentioned already. Fights were more a sit and wait game than actually an all out brawl.

Even the romance, pushing the story to a much higher level, is full of sieges and fire attacks ambushes.

When you have never seen a fight and you face a guy that has survived many battles already, you'll probably run for your life, no second thought lol

[Shad]

DW9 actually did a decent job at portraying what these engagements were - long campaigns across huge areas, sometimes spanning months. It just isn't as exciting.


On the opposite end of Kingdom, we have Ravages of Time: actually set in 3K era, but with very heavy political emphasis (and very badass battles too). Every major battle is a game of simultaneous 5d chess with multiple opponents.

[ssharess22]

Musou games are obviously not historically accurate is spectacle all around, like the samurai cinema (chambara) a Jakie Chan movie, or a spaghetti western.
It is a retelling of a historical saga in a over the top way. Enjoy the fun and the incredible moves.