Battle Report: Men of Bronze- Battle of Pedasus

[Eric Farrington]

This is the continuing recreation of the Ionian Revolt. The Ionian Revolt was a revolt against the Persian Empire by the Ionian Greeks and their allies prior to the Greco-Persian War. It took place from 499 to 493 BCE. It was a land and sea affair, so I am using a combination of Poseidon's Warriors and Men of Bronze to re-create the campaign. Both are from the Osprey Wargaming Series. In addition, Men of Bronze has a specific supplement for the conflict called The Ionian Revolt.



Herodotus gives us details of three battles between the Persians and the Carians . The Persians won the first two engagements, despite a strong challenge by the Carians . These twin defeats had the Carians on the ropes and desperate. They resolved to fight the Persians one more time, but this time launch an ambush on the road near Pedasus.

As the Persians approached near night, the Carians attacked. The ambush was a great success and the Persian general Daurises and his commanders were killed. This forced the Persians to fall back to regroup, and saved Caria from a siege.

For today's battle, we decided to skip over the 2 defeats of the Carians by the Persians. We know very little about them but they seem to be relatively straight forward battles. The first was the Persians forcing a river crossing. The Carians were then reinforced by the Milisian army and fought again at a sacred grove. The Persians won again.

That was the lead up to the ambush at Pedasus. A last roll of the dice by the Carians versus the Persian war machine.

Forces:
Despite the various losses to the Carian army, we are going to assume they still had a relatively standard Greek army at this point. That means, we will go with:

Carian Army
Drilled Hoplite - General
2 Militia Hoplites
Peltasts
Psiloi

The Persians will be using a more standard campaign field army.

Persian Field Army
Cavalry - General
2 Archers
2 Drilled Infantry

Set-up:
This game has a unique set-up, but uses the normal 72MU by 48MU board. However, this game will be played length-wise instead of long-edge to long-edge. You can find the details of the set-up in The Ionian Revolt supplement.



The Persians vanguard was the Drilled Infantry, followed by the cavalry, archers, and more drilled infantry as the rearguard. The Carians are in a crescent to ensnare the head of the Persian column with peltasts and psiloi on the edges, then militia hoplites, being anchored by the drilled hoplites in Pedasus.



Mission:
The game will use the rules for Men of Bronze based on the Ambush scenario. This game will also have the Dusk Approaches complication.



If you are so inclined, you can see more details and the outcome of the battle on my Blood and Spectacles blog here:
bloodandspectacles.blogspot.com/2023/07/battle-report-men-of-bronze-battle-of.html