I've arrived at most of the same conclusions other posters have, but it's worth A: writing them down and B: submitting them to scrutiny. My class changes mostly mirror GM81-PD's , whose suggestions are excellent (although not updated for newer material).

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1PoZkvAY9gKzEojpVUYrXCPPkaBc-uVi3gJHxawITBQ0/edit?usp=sharing

Cohorts! Everybody loves them. In preparation for a more military-focused upcoming campaign, I have expanded upon and altered several cohort powers in order to make the Mass Battles more flavorful and fun. I have intentionally modeled many of these on units seen in Shogun 2, due to my players' familiarity with that game.

Going to post the Homebrew changes to Mass Battles here directly (found in the last section of the above Drive) as a preamble to the cohorts- otherwise, some of the material might not make much sense.

• Earth Stance: In Mass Battles, when your cohort is the direct target of an effect that would cause your army to suffer panic, it suffers 1 less panic, or 2 less at rank 4 or higher.
• Capture a Position Strategic Objective: 10 panic to enemy
• Assault: 1+Command+Bonus success attrition
• Challenge: Scheme action (not scheme+movement)
• Hold the Line: Support action, same as Reinforce but no grabbing new terrain (replaces Reinforce)
• Reposition: Movement action, TN 2 Tactics, occupy unoccupied terrain or set up a flank (add 1 bonus success, +1 for every 2 bonus successes on this check to next successful Assault)

The cohorts themselves are mostly a set of mix-and-match attributes, with only a couple having properly "unique" abilities.

Abilities:

Archers: When the leader of this cohort performs the Hold the Line action (or a Reposition action if the cohort also has the Swift as the Wind trait), they may spend (Op) as follows:
(Op)(Op)+: Choose one enemy cohort. That cohort suffers 2 Panic and 1 Attrition per (Op Op) spent this way. Increase the cost by (Op) if the target cohort is in Obscuring terrain.

Banzai: When the leader of this cohort performs the Assault action, if they succeed, they may inflict panic equal to their ranks in Performance (minimum 1).

Disciplined: When the leader of this cohort performs the Assault action, if they succeed, they may add bonus successes equal to their ranks in Meditation (minimum 1).

Heavy Armor: Targeting this unit with the Archers ability costs 1 additional Opportunity.

Lancers: When the leader of this cohort succeeds on an Assault action, if they succeed, they also inflict panic equal to their ranks in Survival (minimum 1).

Rank Formation/Spearwall: When the leader of this cohort performs the Hold the Line action, they may spend (Op) as follows:
(Op)+: After an enemy cohort attacks this leader’s cohort, the enemy cohort suffers attrition equal to (Op) spent this way until the start of their next turn. Cavalry suffer one additional attrition per (Op) (Op) spent this way (rounded up). While this effect is active, the cohort suffers 1 additional attrition from Archers.

Sturdy: When the leader of this cohort performs a Hold the Line action, if they succeed, they may add bonus successes equal to their ranks in Command (minimum 1).

Swift as the Wind: When the leader of this cohort performs an Assault or Reposition action, they may spend (Op) as follows:
(Op): Once before the start of your next turn, when an enemy performs an Assault action against you while commanding a cohort without this trait, increase the TN of that Assault by 1. If the Assault fails, you may immediately take the Reposition action.

Warcry: When a leader of this cohort performs the Assault or Hold the Line action, they may spend (Op) as follows:
(Op)+: One enemy cohort per (Op) spent this way suffers 2 panic.

Cohorts:

Conscripts: Banzai. Increase the TN of Attack actions while commanding this cohort by 1.

Yari Ashigaru: Rank Formation.

Yari Samurai: Rank Formation. Heavy Armor.

Yari Sohei: Rank Formation. Warcry.

Naginata Samurai: Heavy Armor. Sturdy.

Naginata Sohei: Sturdy. Warcry.

Tachi Ashigaru: Banzai.

Katana Samurai: Discipline. Heavy Armor.

No-Dachi Samurai: Banzai. Discipline.

Tetsubo Sohei: Banzai. Warcry.

Yumi Ashigaru: Archers.

Yumi Samurai: Archers. Heavy Armor.

Yumi Sohei: Archers. When the leader of this cohort spends Opportunity to activate their Archers ability, they deal 1 additional panic.

Yumi Ki: Archers. Swift as the Wind.

Light Ki: Swift as the Wind.

Yari Ki: Lancers. Swift as the Wind.

Naginata Ki: Heavy Armor. Swift as the Wind.

Katana Ki: Discipline. Swift as the Wind.

Sohei Ki: Swift as the Wind. Warcry.

On 6/13/2019 at 4:11 AM, Orolando said:

I've arrived at most of the same conclusions other posters have, but it's worth A: writing them down and B: submitting them to scrutiny. My class changes mostly mirror GM81-PD's , whose suggestions are excellent (although not updated for newer material).

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1PoZkvAY9gKzEojpVUYrXCPPkaBc-uVi3gJHxawITBQ0/edit?usp=sharing

Do you play with all these houserules? These are quite hefty and impactful changes...

I like some of them (Striking as Air jumps out at me), but you're going to have a lot of broken tetsubo and otsuchi littering your battlefields with that first Crit modification. Those things don't seem all that brittle to me.

3 hours ago, The Grand Falloon said:

I like some of them (Striking as Air jumps out at me), but you're going to have a lot of broken tetsubo and otsuchi littering your battlefields with that first Crit modification. Those things don't seem all that brittle to me.

That's actually the specific newest addition, and I'm still on the fence about it. It mostly came about because of my players' complaints that they didn't really get a "reward" for dropping a crit to 0. In the case of tetsubo, which are already durable, I don't foresee it being much an issue, but it definitely could be for some other blunt weapons.

10 hours ago, Avatar111 said:

Do you play with all these houserules? These are quite hefty and impactful changes...

I could take or leave most of the class tweaks, a lot of them are just personal preference (Skulk on Investigator, for instance) but the Air/Water derived stat swap, Veiled Menace change to give it a weapon niche, and an axe kata of some variety did seem necessary. Shields in Shadowlands were also a little strange. For the most part I've been trimming the changes down, rather than adding to them over time as I get more and more used to the rhythm of the system. It should be noted that the majority of my group would be characterized as "gamist" players in most other contexts and they love fiddly little options and things like Intrigue conflicts over freeform roleplay. We previously played A Song of Ice and Fire RPG extensively, and it's got every aspect (good and bad) of FFGL5R dialed up to 11.

Edit: And yes, we do actually play with all these changes. They've been settled in the group for a couple months by now (with the exception of a couple very small tweaks my players requested).