Making a Samurai: AC and Armor problem

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

Samurai are the subject of so many misconceptions. No wonder designing a samurai class is almost impossible.

In the Genpei War (around 1100, IIRC) samurai weremainly horse archers. They wore heavy, boxy armor and may not even have traditionally carried swords.

In the following civil wars (Kammu Restoration: 1333-1336 and Sengoku 1467 to 1615) samurai were genenerally swordsmen and axemen, especially in the Kemmu Restoration, in which much fighting took place in the forests. Samurai still tried to fight on horseback, but often had to fight on foot instead. In this period, ashigaru often joined battles, using either loan swords (short swords) or spears. By the end of this period, though, the samurai relied less on them, except for gunnery.

In this period, the sword was used roughly equally as often as the spear, but swords are more portable and had higher esteem. Also, a spear duel probably doesn't look as cool as a sword duel, but that's just my opinion.

The "light armor" period came about after the Siege of Osaka (1614-1615). The famous samurai Miyamoto Musashi fought as a young man in this long battle. Following the civil wars, the samurai period was gradually drawing to a close. Without civil wars, keeping samurai busy and blooded was difficult. (The Shimabara Revolt, in 1837, has such wimpy samurai that the getting-old Miyamoto Musashi decided to write a book on how to fight.)

Since samurai weren't really warriors anymore, but were generally aristrocratic poseurs, they rarely wore armor. However, they did train and some were quite good. Jubei Yagyu was one such skilled "bathrobe samurai"; he fought in duels and skirmishes in this period.

So... which period are you interested in? That helps determine things like which armor type to wear.

 

[Sitara]

I'm interested in the very lightly armored samurai type usually seenin anime; you know the oneswho wear onlya gi and cut everything down lightning fast with their katana's.

Sadly D&D doesn't yet support cloth wearing martial classes, so I have to upgrade to hide and reenvsion it as a heavy padded robe.

 

[IanArgent]

I'm interested in the very lightly armored samurai type usually seenin anime; you know the oneswho wear onlya gi and cut everything down lightning fast with their katana's.

Sadly D&D doesn't yet support cloth wearing martial classes, so I have to upgrade to hide and reenvsion it as a heavy padded robe.

There does seem to be a bit of a gap right now for that. Role-wise, that's a striker, but the only 2-hand striker we have right now is the Barbarian, hardly a good fit for the samurai of legend, and also not a martial character.

If you wanted to go katana+wakazashi, the ranger would be a good fit (as mentioned earlier), but it sounds like you want either single sword (either 1H or 2H). You could take a look at warlord, in the Samurai as leader-of-men aspect. Or see what you can do with a high-dex fighter (perhaps with a strong Ranger/Rogue multiclass component), starting with the Great Weapon build.

 

[Lord Ernie]

If you're going anime style, why not Musashi dual-wield? The Tempest Fighter might work (since they're better in light armor/chainmail), or else Ranger. I think more Ranger than Fighter when I think of Samurai, personally, since they tended to be lightly armoured, good ranged fighters that are better at moving and killing quickly than at trading blows. Rangers don't have to come with a Nature theme anymore (I'd say delete the 'required' skill), maybe replace one of their class skills with diplomacy, and you've got a pretty good Samurai.

 

[Sitara]

Well as I already said before in the beginning, I do NOT want TWF. I want the pc to weild a single sword (fullblade reskinned as a katana/no-dachi). My nly problem so far is that even if I bump dex upto 16, that still gives me an AC of 16 with hide.

 

[James McMurray]

Barbarian would fit, just reflavor the rages as kata and iajitsu.

 

[Stalker0]

My nly problem so far is that even if I bump dex upto 16, that still gives me an AC of 16 with hide.

Which is only 1 less than a fighter in scale...and you have a much better reflex defense and initiative, and you have full speed. Doesn't seem that bad to me.

 

[eleventh]

Also, a spear duel probably doesn't look as cool as a sword duel, but that's just my opinion.

There's a pretty sweet spear duel in one of the Kurosawa movies, IIRC it was The Seven Samurai.

 

[Shroomy]

There's a pretty sweet spear duel in one of the Kurosawa movies, IIRC it was The Seven Samurai.

I think you're referring to The Hidden Fortress.

 

[Victim]

Which is only 1 less than a fighter in scale...and you have a much better reflex defense and initiative, and you have full speed. Doesn't seem that bad to me.

Why would a fighter in scale necessarily have bad DEX? A number of powers and feats use a fighter's dex, so sword, spear, or flail using fighters will probably have at least competitive Dex.