It’s a Boeotian Rhapsody circa 479 B.C.
Boeotia: 479 B.C
Ihave always been interested in the Ancient period, and have large armies of Egyptians and Assyrians, and Late Romans and their Hun, Goth and Frankish enemies. When two of our group decided that the new Wargames Atlantic Persians and Victrix Greek hoplites were calling to them, I was both happy and sad. Happy because it brought back memories of one of my earliest, now long-gone armies, made up of Garrison figures and some (what I call) ‘Harry Secombe’ style Miniature Figurines. Sad because it would probably tempt me into another spending flurry!
My wallet was saved, because Malc was obsessed with the Persians. They were easy to assemble, colourful and fun to paint and twenty plus units soon appeared. Such is the drive of our small group, that he, and Adrian (of Adrian’s Walls fame), raised an equally impressive opposing Greek army in short order!
I now had access to a pair of extremely attractive armies – at no cost to me, in either time or effort – so that was a great result! The question then became, what rules were we going to use, and which historical battle would we choose to refight?
The rule set we chose was a home-brewed set, largely based on Armati, covered in some depth in a previous article on the Apocryphal Well revisited way back in November 2015 Issue 391 of Miniature Wargames.
Any reader who recognises the above, made up, battle from Charles Grant’s book The Ancient War Game, will not be surprised with my choice of historical battle. This is the Battle of Plataea: an interesting and very tactical battle. I love Charles Grant’s style of writing, and – considering his description dated back to 1974 – his research was well ahead of its time, for a wargaming guide.
BOEOTIAN RHAPSODY
The battle took place after a couple of weeks of manoeuvring and skirmishing, culminating in the loss to the Greeks of their supplies (game wise, this will be covered in a smaller action as a prequel to the main event). As Grant notes, this battle is overshadowed by the heroics of Thermopylae the previous year. The cause of the war can be traced back to 500 B.C, when the Greek colonists appealed for help from Darius 1st of Persia, against their parent states. This led to an invasion by Persia which was expelled by an Athenian army at Marathon in 490 B.C.
The Persian empire was then troubled by revolts, until in 480 B.C, Xerxes, the successor to Darius,
attempted to take his revenge. He assembled a large army in Asia Minor, crossed the Hellespont and moved into Thessaly and Thrace. The Persians met a Greek force at Thermopylae, and after three days, defeated it, thanks in part, to some Greek treachery! Things didn’t all go the Persian way. Their fleet was defeated at Salamis, and this caused Xerxes to abandon Athens and head for home. General Mardonius was left to hold Northern Greece over the winter. THE BATTLE
The following Spring the armies met at the river Asopus, with the Greeks holding the slopes of mount Cithaeron. They would not abandon the rough terrain, in which the Persian cavalry was disadvantaged, and the Persians remained in their stockaded camp. Two events changed this stalemate. Firstly, the Greeks lost a crucial supply train ambushed by the Persians and secondly, they poisoned the wells being used by the Greeks. They had
no option but to move nearer the Persian camp and to a new water supply. It is also believed the Greeks were buoyed by a Persian cavalry attack being routed with high officer casualties.
We decided to play the Supply Train Ambush using our own set of Men of Bronze rules.
For Men of Bronze the forces are as follows: OBJECTIVE
The objective of the game is for the Greeks to cross the battlefield and exit with the supply units. They enter on turn one, and are allowed a single unit, one turn in advance of the main force, as scouts. The Persians are allowed to deploy their units either off table on any of the three sides which are not the Greek entry side, and/or in the woods or out of sight behind the hills. The Greeks win 3 victory points for each supply unit escorted off the Greek exit point, and the Persians win 3 Victory points for each captured or prevented from leaving the table. Both sides score 1 point for each 10% of the enemy forces starting point total, either destroyed or captured. Deduct the losing sides Victory points from the winning total and the winner can add one Arete point to the Plataea battle total, for each point it exceeds the enemy total Victory points by.
Using our home brewed set, the same victory conditions prevail but the winner is then allowed to upgrade the fatigue total of one unit for every two victory points obtained. PLATAEA
The battle of Plataea, as stated, took place when the Greek army attempted to retire from the forward position it had occupied. This was commenced overnight and rapidly fell into chaos. The Spartans held their ground, the Athenians retired and drifted further away from the centre and the other forces retired as planned in the centre. This chaos was a gift for Mardonius, and he led his cavalry against the Spartans.
More Persian cavalry advanced against the Athenians, and their infantry soon followed up. The ill discipline and sheer numbers of the Persians led to their undoing. They crowded together and when the Spartans and Athenians counter charged, they were unable to skirmish, and then retreat, and they suffered high casualties. Mardonius had thrown himself into the fight, and – when he was killed – the fight went out of the Persian forces. Many were killed during the retreat and the remainder withdrew to the camp. The Greeks stormed the camp, and showed no mercy, and there was much slaughter.
The outcome was that the remainder of the Persian forces withdrew from Greece, and the Persian threat was over.
We set up the forces at daybreak, as the Greeks began to realise the pickle they were potentially in! It may be worth running through an outline of how our rules work (for those amongst us who haven’t got a six year old copy of the magazine to hand! Ed.)
MOVEMENT
Movement is standardised: Infantry 6”, Light infantry, LHI and LMI and heavy chariots 9”, Cavalry and light chariots 15”. Infantry only may retire facing the enemy at half speed.
ORDERS
The order system works by army wing, division or battle, call it what you will. Each army is divided up into three or four command units (let’s stick to ‘divisions’) made up of any number of your infantry, cavalry and chariot units. Regular divisions roll 3 D6’s and succeed on a 4, 5, 6. Irregular divisions roll 3 D6’s and succeed on a 5 or 6.
For each success, troops in a division may move, change formation or, only once in a turn, fire. If some troops in a division move in a different direction, that requires a separate order, as do any unit (or units) further away than 18” from its divisional commander. The opposing commanders dice for initiative then the winner moves a division, followed by the loser. The turn then continues until all forces have attempted to carry out an order.
RANGES
Firing ranges are 24” for foot bows, 18”for Slingers and horse bows and 12” for javelins. The procedure is very simple. The firer rolls a D6 deducting 1 from the score if over half range, and compares this to the defenders roll on a D6, which is adjusted for armour or open order, as per the army sheet. If the firer wins, one hit is inflicted on the target, in the event of a draw or loss there is no effect.
DAMAGE
Close order foot can take 4 hits before removal, chariots, cavalry and most LHI and LMI take 3 hits, Light Infantry take 2 hits and skirmishers take 1 only.
COMBAT
Melee is also easily resolved. If troops have sufficient orders to contact an enemy, then a melee may result. The troops being charged may react out of sequence as follows. They can:
◗ Turn to face the charge or... ◗ Counter-charge or... ◗ Evade or...
◗ Stand and fire.
is not without risk, if a hit is inflicted on a unit the commander is with, a further D6 is rolled and on a 6 the commander is hors de combat, and the leader is then removed. The GOC dying causes a deduction of one from the army morale total, and a divisional commander causes a half point deduction.
This procedure continues each turn unless the winner chooses not to follow up the pushed back enemy, or one side is removed due to the appropriate number of hits being inflicted upon it or successfully manages to break off from the melee.
MORALE
Army morale is calculated at the outset. One point for each close order unit, half a point for each Light and Peltast unit. Each turn a unit is lost the total Army morale is reduced by one or half a point as appropriate. Also, it is reduced by one for each commander lost. Once the total reduces to half the original number the army morale is broken and the army must then withdraw from the field and the battle is lost.
THIS IS GETTING TIRING...
We have recently introduced fatigue to our games as an optional set of rules (see recent articles by Mr Tuck in this magazine. Ed.). Each unit in the force, is given a fatigue total, the greater the number the better the unit. Each time a round of melee is fought, the fatigue total is reduced by one. If all the fatigue points are used up any additional rounds of melee are fought at a minus one for each negative fatigue total the unit has. Fatigue can be recovered up to its original total by one increment per turn providing a unit is neither moving, firing or fighting in a turn in which it has at least one successful order.
FIGHTING PLATAEA
Moving on to the battle of Plataea, the map of the battlefield is shown below with the initial deployment for each side.
The Greeks are divided as follows: three divisions each with four Hoplite units of one type only per division and three of the lighter troops split as desired. This gives an overall force organised as three divisions of seven units each.
The Greek army break point is sixteen with one point for the Hoplite units and the Peltast units and a half point for the archers and zero for the skirmishers. Once the army loses eight points the battle is lost!
PERSIA
The Persian force is split into four divisions two of cavalry and two of infantry split into two equal cavalry divisions and two equal infantry ones.
For a total of four divisions two of cavalry with four units each and two of infantry with ten units each. The army break point is eighteen with one point for each unit, except the light cavalry scoring at half a point, and the skirmishers scoring zero. Once there are nine points of losses suffered the battle is lost!
All the Greek forces roll orders as regulars, needing 4-6 for a successful order and all Persians – except for the Immortals, Good Allies, Allied Hoplites and the heavy cavalry – count as irregular and thus require a 5-6 for a successful order. The named units are regular and therefore require a 4-6. All Persian troops, both infantry and cavalry (except the Hoplites) are bow armed.
TERRAIN
The terrain effects are as follows:
The high ground counts as rough terrain for cavalry but not infantry. It does not cause a movement penalty merely a fighting value reduction to the ‘in rough terrain’ column. Fighting whilst in the river causes all troops to be deemed as fighting in rough terrain.
The above should be straightforward to convert to your favourite Ancient ruleset of choice. The battlefield is easy to lay out, and the objective of the battle is straightforward.
Due to the lock-down we have not had a chance to play this as a multi-player game, but we hope to do so very soon. Judging by the photographs, Malc has produced, all taken by him under strict Covid rules it is going to be very colourful, and a good first game back for us all. I cannot wait! ■