Prelude:After many months at sea a large white cloud was spotted steady on the horizon. It stretched as far as the eye cloud see. Hoping for land and a much needed chance to replenish supplies, the
Argo made a slight course change and rapidly closed under sail and oar.
With a prayer to Zeus, Herakles prepared the landing party. He stopped the Centaurs drinking as they would be needed to carry and loads. He stepped beneath decks and roused the mighty Minotaur from it's dark confinement and ordered the hoplites to strap on their armour and take up spear and shield.
Aotearoa: Wiremu saw the strange
Waka (canoe) approaching the shore and ran swiftly back to the village to rouse the tribe. Kahurangi, the local hero, begged the old Tohunga (witch doctor/ priest) to call to Punga - the hideous god of all things ugly - and consult the omens. Punga answered the call, arriving among the trembling villagers with the legendary Maui. Taking Kahurangi aside, Tohunga whispered that his scrying had revealed bad omens (1, 1 and 2 on the Māori
Prophecy dice!).
Kahurangi round up a force of Elite Maori warriors and a few slaves to fill out the ranks….
****
Hours later, water gathered and forage being loaded into the voyage-battered hull of the
Argo, Herakles looked around him. The natives had decided to evict the trespassers from their verdant land. He muttered a prayer to Zeus.
Among low scrubs, small hills and trees, a freshwater stream ended a long journey from distant snow-capped peaks, reminiscent of Olympia - to cross a silver-white strand and empty in a swirling eddy in the blue waters of the Pacific...
The Hoplites - a mere six of them - formed a small Phalanx and faced off across the stream against a group of muscular warriors, who had just now engaged in a fearsome display of gestures, foot stamping and tongue-pointing (some among the Greeks heard the word "
Χάκα" (Haka)). With them was a leader of some description, and a chanting priest. At the rear was a small group of lightly armed men of slightly different description, slaves perhaps but united in the bright afternoon against the strange Bronze-clad aliens who dared stride their shores.
From among the inland glades on the Argonauts' right came the thudding of hooves, arriving just in time, barely sober, the four Centaur archers. Who knows what foolish taunts they had drunkenly yelled to anger the natives so as they galloped and caroused far from the camp?
Punga advances on the raucous four-legged trespassers...
On the left, heavier hoofs in the sand, drooling at the mouth, strode and bellowed a Minotaur - raging with anger and pain in the blinding daylight after months chained below decks.
Among the swirling, troubled waters where the stream offered it's rich, fresh water to the Great Ocean, bubbled and chuckled something deeper - soon emerging as a small group of azure water spirits...
Zeus opened the fray hurling lightning and vaporising a Maori warrior. The Minotaur lumbered down the beach towards Maui and the water spirits, chains awhirl. Herakles and the hoplites marched down hill towards the stream.
The Māori hesitated, as one shocked at the sights before them. The Minotaur screamed in fury and charged into Maui before he could be surround by Maui and overwhelmed by the splashing spirits. Maui judging the Minotaur’s top-heavy stumble perfectly as it cleared the stream… He raised his mighty Jawbone fish hook and with a prayer to his ancestors and Punga swung it in a mighty arc. Staggering backward on legs unsteady from so many months at sea, the muscle-bound bull-man fell, his great neck broken and blood soaking the pristine sand.
The fateful march of the Minotaur...water spirits to the left, Maui lurking...
With a roar of triumph the Māori were heartened: these invaders were not so strong after all.
Zeus, sensing a change in the balance of the fates, shifted to eagle-form and, on great silent wings, swiftly glided towards Maui. The shock of such powerful magic again caused the Māori to hesitate, allowing Zeus to shimmer back into his warrior-god form. Punga sprang into action, summoning
Taniwha to aid Maui against Zeus. The fearsome
Taniwha - a shark-beast of the sea not unlike the fearsome Kraken, erupted from the dark stream-waters and drove Zeus back with the fury of its many-teethed attacks. Zeus recovered and hurled down lightning, driving the monstrous apparition back to the weedy ocean depths from whence it had come.
Kahurangi veered towards where Zeus and Maui exchanged blows among the reeds, but was knocked off his feet by a hail of arrows from the Centaurs. Herakles tried to finish him but, stumbling backward through the scrub uttering a prayer to Punga, Kahurangi scrambled beyond the reach of the bronzed hero.
Further up the stream gully, Punga closed on the Centaurs while the Hoplites and Maori warriors finally met in combat, splashing calf-deep in the stream - soon the chill and numbing waters ran red with blood…
As the hoplite phalanx marches to attack, Zeus hurls bolts of lightning among the Māori warrior elite:
Zeus roared in rage at the impudence of these people, daring to defy his designs and awing all but Punga.
As friend and foe trembled before his might, the God strode forth, charging into Maui. The tanned hero, although in taken aback of this mighty and alien deity, closed his eyes momentarily, calling on the power of
Hawaiki, cleared his mind and calmly swung his mighty fish hook in an arc catching Zeus behind his knee, Zeus staggered. Sensing Zeus was weakened, and far from his power base, the mighty hero dispatched the God with a casual back swing and turned to grimace at a stunned Herakles.
Moments before his stunning downfall, Zeus demands all Tremble before his Might:
The Centaurs reared and scattered at the loss of their god, snorting and braying with fear and skittering backward. The Hoplites closed ranks even more tightly - this was looking worse than Thermopylae! With curt orders they tried to beat a strategic retreat backwards and uphill, to warn the others on the Argo of what had happened.
Punga had other ideas: the violation of Aotearoa ended here. He harried the Greek warriors in their retreat, gaining more food for his followers. Down by the stream, Herakles stood firm, his mighty club swinging as he vainly offered resistance, but Maui’s blood was boiling and his tanned arms lifted the deadly fish-hook. The mighty hero was last seen falling in a hail of blows and the Māori closed on him with a righteous cheer, swiftly ending all resistance…
******
(AAR Co-authored by Neil & Graham)
Tremendous OGAM battle at the Perth Miniatures Gamers Group last night. My gaming buddy Neil joined me for his debut game of OGAM, bringing his unique, beautifully constructed and well thought Māori force, replete with a pantheon of colourful Polynesian Gods, terrible legends and fearsome warriors. They took on the wandering Argonauts in a chapter of the adventure that is lost to history...
Excellent entertainment which saw the Argonauts flung back into the sea.
Welcome, Guest. Please 
April 18, 2024, 04:20:48 PM
