Well, this isn’t exactly a mountain village, but rural village is what I’m going for with my upcoming games of Ronin and mountain village is the category the buildings above are categorized as at Oshiro Models.

Ronin is a low model count (5-12 models) title from Osprey that I picked up a few years back during the pandemic. The rules read well, reviews of the game online are good, and it comes up often when folks are searching for samurai/feudal japan skirmish games. I’ve always liked the cover and how the artist, Jose Daniel Cabrera Pena, has captured the feel of a small conflict set against a remote location. This is far removed from the massive clash or arms in Warhammer or even Lion Rampant. Low model count, showdown in a remote location…seems easy to hobby.

So, I’ve had the rules for a few years, and even the models for over 12 months, but it was a recent trip to Japan at the beginning of the summer, that bumped the project up the queue. Above is your distinguished author at Miyajima Island in the Hiroshima Bay. The mountainside on Ronin’s cover seems a bit too much to model for this intrepid hobbyist, but a small village on a lush island, that seems doable.

With the well loved Citadel Grass Mat, I’ve got the greenery and the Mountain Village buildings from Oshiro are the best match for the Ronin cover. Though Miyajima Island is famous for its large, bright red Torii Gate that sits in the bay, I’ve opted for darker wood color on mine to get closer to that rural feel of the Ronin cover, but in a setting of lush vegetation rather than the mountainside.

The grey statue I pulled from a gacha machine (essentially a vending machine with random chotskies) in the gift shop of Nijo Castle in Kyoto. It came in three parts, but after assembled painted up quickly to serve as a focal point to the village. The scale is larger than 28mm minis, but not too big. It’s perfect and using it as a feature in my games of Ronin is a fun memento of my recent trip.

The river is from Battlefield in a Box, but I dressed it up with some lily pads and other vegetation. the various bamboo shoots, bushes, and trees are from the sort you find for aquariums. Though the overall table isn’t as dense and lush as a real island jungle village, it this is plenty for tabletop gaming. In fact, this may be too much. Ronin games at 100pts are played in 2×2 spaces which is what is seen above. Not a lot of room to move models around. I might need to remove some of it or enlarge the play space a little.

As is the case with all of my hobby projects, it needs to pack away cleanly in a Really Useful Box. The entire village fits like a glove. With my game’s setting out of the way, it’s time to start working in the participants of this little remote village.