MARCH TO HELL SENGOKU TAKEDA CLAN

Takeda Clan STL Miniatures: The Cavalry That Defined Sengoku Japan

Takeda Shingen’s banner carried four characters taken from Sun Tzu: swift as wind, silent as forest, fierce as fire, immovable as mountain. Fūrinkazan. It’s the kind of thing that would sound like marketing if the Takeda hadn’t spent decades proving it on the battlefield.

Part of our March to Hell: Sengoku collection, available in 15mm and 28mm as digital STL files with both pre-supported and unsupported versions included.

Samurai and cavalry warfare

The Takeda reputation rests on mounted warfare at a time when most Japanese armies were built around infantry masses. Whether the famous cavalry charge worked exactly as later accounts describe is something historians still argue about, but the effect on the period is not in doubt: the Takeda were the force other daimyō built their plans around, and Nagashino in 1575 is remembered precisely because breaking them required a new kind of army.

The infantry mattered too, and in a specific way. Takeda ashigaru carried notably long yari, longer than was standard elsewhere, which turned a spear block into something that could hold ground against cavalry and pin an enemy formation while the mounted samurai went round the flank. Speed and shock at the front, a solid anchor behind it.

What’s in the range

• Takeda Clan mounted samurai cavalry
• Long yari ashigaru formations
• Elite samurai infantry with yari, yumi bows and katana
• Mounted commanders and daimyō
• Infantry support units

The sculpts carry the period detail that makes a Sengoku army distinctive: sashimono banners on the back, armour with visible lacing, and clan identity that separates a Takeda unit from a generic Japanese one across the table. Built to face our Oda Clan collection, so you can field both sides of the rivalry that shaped central Japan.

Refighting the Takeda campaigns

Kawanakajima is the obvious one. Five separate engagements between Shingen and Uesugi Kenshin over twelve years, fought over the same stretch of ground, and the fourth in 1561 was bloody enough to be remembered as one of the most vicious battles of the entire period. It’s a gift for a campaign because you can play the same terrain repeatedly with different plans.

Mikatagahara in 1573 is the other, and a more one-sided scenario: Shingen catching Tokugawa Ieyasu in the open and demonstrating exactly what Takeda cavalry did to a force that couldn’t refuse battle. Both need two armies that fight differently to work as scenarios rather than mirror matches.

Compatibility and scale

The models are sculpted to standard wargaming proportions and work with the systems written for the period: Test of Honour, Ronin and Daisho for skirmish play, Pike & Shotte, Swordpoint and Warlords of Erehwon for larger engagements. None of those publishers is affiliated with us or endorses these models.

Cavalry-heavy armies make a strong case for 15mm. Mounted units eat table space, and at the smaller scale you get room to actually manoeuvre a cavalry wing rather than shuffling three models around a crowded board. At 28mm the horses become showpieces: barding, tack, the rider’s armour and the banner all on one model, which is why cavalry is among the most rewarding things to paint at that size.

Bases are not included.

Printing cavalry

Horses need more thought about orientation than infantry. Legs are the classic weak point on any mounted print, because they’re thin, they carry the weight of the whole model, and they’re usually the first contact point with the build plate. Tilt 30 to 45 degrees, support the underside of the barrel properly, and check what automatic support generation has done to the legs before committing a plate.

Around 0.03mm layer height handles gaming pieces at either scale. The long yari shafts are the other part that needs attention, and on Takeda infantry they’re longer than usual, which makes them more prone to warping if they print unsupported along their length.

Frequently asked questions

Why do cavalry models fail more often than infantry?
Because the geometry works against you. A horse’s legs are thin, they support the entire mass of both mount and rider, and they’re often the lowest point on the model, which makes them the first thing the printer builds with nothing underneath. Automatic support generation frequently under-supports them, and a leg that separates halfway through a print takes the whole model with it. The fix is to check supports manually on the legs and belly before printing, orient the model so the legs aren’t building vertically into empty space, and accept that heavier supports here are worth the extra cleanup. Both pre-supported and unsupported files are included, so you can start from our supports and adjust, or build your own from scratch.

Do the long yari need special handling when printing?
They benefit from it. Takeda ashigaru carry longer spears than most Sengoku infantry, and a long thin shaft printing at an angle across several centimetres is exactly the situation where resin models warp or snap during cleanup. Orient the model so the shaft isn’t unsupported along its length, add support at the midpoint rather than just the ends, and be gentle when removing supports. If you’re scaling down to 15mm, check the shaft thickness in your slicer first, because what prints reliably at 28mm can become too fine to survive at the smaller size.

How long does it take to print a cavalry-heavy army?
Longer than an infantry force, and for a specific reason. Resin printing time is driven by the height of the tallest object on the build plate rather than the number of objects, so a plate packed with 15mm ashigaru takes roughly the same time as a plate with three figures on it. Mounted models are taller, which pushes the whole plate’s print time up. In practice a plate of cavalry takes noticeably longer than a plate of foot troops, but you’re still looking at an overnight run rather than days. Printing your infantry and cavalry on separate plates is more efficient than mixing them, since the tall models won’t drag out the time on the short ones.

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