Atkins Wargames

In the Battle of Thermopylae of 480 BC an alliance of Greek city-states fought the invading Persian army in the mountain pass of Thermopylae. Vastly outnumbered, the Greeks held back the enemy in one of the most famous last stands of history. A small force led by King Leonidas of Sparta blocked the only road through which the massive army of Xerxes I could pass. After several days of confrontation the Persians attacked but were defeated by heavy losses, disproportionate to those of the Greeks. This continued on the second day but on the third day of the battle a local resident named Ephialtes betrayed the Greeks, revealing a mountain path that led behind the Greek lines. With the rest of the army dismissed, King Leonidas stayed behind with his bodyguard of 300 Spartans and the 700 man Thespian army even though they knew it meant their deaths, to allow the rest of the army to escape.

The disproportionate losses of the Persian army alarmed Xerxes so that when his navy was later defeated at Salamis he fled Greece leaving only part of his force to finish the job of the conquest of Greece, which was defeated at the Battle of Plataea. The performance of the defenders at the battle of Thermopylae is often used as an example of the advantages of training, equipment and good use of terrain to maximise an army's potential, as well as a symbol of courage against extremely overwhelming odds. The heroic sacrifice of the Spartans and the Thespians has captured the minds of many throughout the ages and has given birth to many cultural references as a result.

( Wikipedia)

 

When scouts initially informed Xerxes of the size of the Greek force, and of the Spartans who were performing preparations which included naked calisthenics and combing their hair, Xerxes found the reports laughable. Not understanding the ritual significance of the Spartan preparations as the actions of men with the resolution to fight to the end, he expected the force to disband at any moment and waited four days for the Greek force to retreat. When they did not, he became increasingly frustrated by what he perceived as foolish impudence on the part of the small Greek force. On the fifth day Xerxes ordered his troops into the pass.

The Greeks deployed themselves in a phalanx, a wall of overlapping shields and layered spearpoints, spanning the entire width of the pass. The Persians, armed with arrows and short spears, could not break through the long spears of the Greek phalanx, nor were their lightly armoured men a match for the superior armour, weaponry and discipline of the Greek hoplites. Because of the terrain, the Persians were unable to surround or flank the Greeks, thus rendering their superior numbers almost useless. Greek morale was high. Herodotus wrote that when Dienekes, a Spartan soldier, was informed that Persian arrows were so numerous that they blotted out the sun, he remarked with characteristically laconic prose, "So much the better, we shall fight in the shade." Today Dienekes's phrase is the motto of the Greek 20th Armored Division [4] At first Xerxes sent in the Medes, perhaps because he preferred them for their bravery or perhaps, as Diodorus Siculus suggested,^[25] because Xerxes wanted them to bear the brunt of the fighting—the Medes had been only recently conquered by the Persians.

Along with them he sent relatives of those who had fallen at the battle of Marathon ten years earlier. According to Ctesias the first wave numbered 10,000 soldiers under Artapanus. Enormous casualties were sustained by the Persians as the disciplined Spartans who sought to maximise enemy casualties orchestrated a series of feint retreats, followed by a quick turn back into formation. Waves upon waves of soldiers would go to the front, stepping upon the bodies of their dead comrades, only to die. Ctesias writes that Xerxes sent 20,000 more men driven by whip-wielding officers who flogged them whenever they retreated; these fared no better. Fifty thousand more Persians attacked on the second day of battle, but were repelled. After watching his troops fall before the Greeks, Xerxes decided to send in the legendary Persian Immortals. Leonidas arranged a system of relays between the hoplites of the various cities so as to constantly have fresh troops on the front line. Yet in the heat of the battle the voracity [of the Greeks] was such that the units did not rotate out but continued to fight and overcame the bounds of the battle to kill many of the elite Persians^[26]—even the Immortals lacked the power to break the determined and driven phalanx, and they, too, were forced to retreat with heavy casualties. The casualties on the Greek side were small: Ctesias claims that the first 10,000 Persians killed only two or three Greeks. It seemed that with regular reinforcements the Greeks could go on ad infinitum.

After the second day of fighting, a local shepherd named Ephialtes defected to the Persians and informed Xerxes of a separate path through Thermopylae, which the Persians could use to outflank the Greeks. The pass was defended by 1,000 Phocians, who had been placed there when the Greeks learned of the alternate route just before the battle; they were not expecting to engage the Persians. Xerxes sent Hydarnes with the Immortals through the pass. Surprised by the Persian attack, the Phocians offered only a brief resistance before retreating higher up the mountain to regroup. Instead of pursuing them, however, the Persians simply advanced through the pass unopposed. For this act, the name Ephialtes means "nightmare" and is synonymous with "traitor" in Greek.^[27]

Final stand of the Spartans and Thespians

Leonidas, realizing that further fighting would be futile, dismissed all Greek forces save the surviving Spartans and Thebans on August 11 the Spartans having pledged themselves to fight to the death, and the Thebans held as hostages as Thebes' loyalty to Greece was questioned. However, a contingent of about 700 Thespians, led by Demophilus, refused to leave with the other Greeks. Instead, they chose to stay in the sacrificial effort to delay the advance and allow the rest of the Greek army to escape.

The significance of the Thespians' refusal to leave should not be ignored. The Spartans, as brave as their sacrifice indubitably was, were professional soldiers, trained from birth to be ready to give their lives in combat as Spartan law dictated. Conversely, the Thespians were citizen-soldiers (Demophilus, for example, made his living as an architect) who elected to add whatever they could to the fight, rather than allow the Spartans to be annihilated alone. Though their bravery is often overlooked by history, it was most certainly not overlooked by the Spartans, who are said to have exchanged cloaks with the Thespians and promised to be allies for eternity

The fighting was said to have been extremely brutal, even for hoplite combat. As their numbers diminished the Greeks retreated to a small hill in the narrowest part of the pass. The Thebans took this opportunity to surrender to the Persians^[28]. After their spears broke, the Spartans and Thespians kept fighting with their xiphos (short swords), and after those broke, they were said to have fought with their bare hands, teeth and nails.

The Greeks killed many Persians, including two of Xerxes' brothers. In this final stand, Leonidas was eventually killed; rather than surrender, the Spartans fought fanatically to defend his body. To avoid losing any more men, the Persians killed the last of the Spartans with flights of arrows

 

THERMOFLASK IN JUSTIFIED ANCIENTS:

I know that you dont have 1800 stands of Persians, well i assume you dont...that sort of weight of lead is going to bring down any table. Simply put every stand of every ancient foot unit you and all your mates and club own on the table, and call em Persians. When one is destroyed replace it at the back until you have had 1800 stands destroyed or the spartans are dispirsed.

 

ORBAT : SPARTANS

HOPLITES: One Unit of Foot. Trained Close order, Heavy, Phalanx, Testudo, Javalin (they're throwing captured spears at the Persians) High Morale.

ORBAT: PERSIANS

IMMORTALS: 10 units of Foot Close Order, Medium, Trained.

PERSIAN SWORDS: 1700 Units Of Foot Open Order Light.

PERSIAN HORSE: 80 units of Horse Close Order Light

 

The Map.

Impassable mountains to the Spartan left. Open terrain for a width of one base, then Impassable sea terrain to the right.

There is enough space for the Spartans to engage only one unit at a time. The pass extends for 15 base depths.

 

Victory conditions.

The Spartans win if they destroy all 1800 Persian stands.

The Persians win if they destroy the Spartan Stand.

After 40 turns the Persians discover the pass through the mountains and may bring up to 30 of their swords units on a flank march behind the Spartans.