*

Recent Topics

Author Topic: Battle Report: Homer's Heroes - Hold the Shrine  (Read 2281 times)

Offline Easy E

  • Scatterbrained Genius
  • Posts: 2348
  • Just some guy who does stuff
    • Blood and Spectacles
Battle Report: Homer's Heroes - Hold the Shrine
« on: 31 January 2023, 03:26:01 PM »


Today is a test run of my Work-in-Progress game; Homer's Heroes: Bronze Age Bad Boys. The game is a model vs model skirmish game to represent heroic retinue's fighting against each other in Homeric -inspired combat.  As such, the heroes are the main focus with a retinue of soldiers attracted by their fame.   

The hero Adonis and his faithful friend Butes and their retinue had been travelling near the Bosporus.  Along their journey, they encountered the famous Thracian hero Diomedes and his companion Euryales.  The two squabbled over a sacred spring, before Adonis drove the champion of Athena away. 

After his defeat, Diomedes was eager to repay Adonis and his patron Aphrodite back for their slights.  His troupe shadowed Adonis until his retinue settled in at a local shrine to Aphrodite.  Diomedes prayed to Athena, and decided to strike back at Adonis for his impudence.     


Forces:

In Homer's Heroes both sides always have 1 Hero, 1 Second, and then 8 soldiers of varying gear.  Some can be traded in for a chariot as well.  Then, each Hero also has a Patron Greek god or goddess that offers them special bonuses. 

Adonis and his retinue have the following composition:

Adonis- Hero
-Aphrodite
-Sneaky- The Hero can re-roll a single dice in an Opposed "Hide" test
-Armor, Shield, Hand Weapon

Butes- Second
-Two-Handed Weapon, Armor

4 Soldiers
-Spear and Shield

2 Soldiers
-Javelin, dagger, shield

2 Soldiers
-Bow, dagger

Diomedes of Thrace and his retinue looks like this:

Diomedes- Hero
-Athena
-Glare- The hero can use a "glare" action to freeze an enemy in place with an opposed roll.  The model loses any unused activations. 
-Spear, Shield, Armor

Euryales- Second
-Spear, armor, shield

Chariot
-Driver- Dagger
-Soldier- Spear, Shield

4 Soldiers
-Spear and Shield

Mission

Today, Diomedes is looking to settle his old score with Adonis and his patron.  He tracked him to a small shrine to Aphrodite and decided to attack it.  Diomedes intends to destroy the shrine as revenge. 

The shrine will have 8 structure points that Diomedes must remove in order to destroy it before his retinue is forced back or the game ends. 

We also rolled for complications and got the following:
-Bad Omens
-Delayed Troops
-Glare
That is a lot of complications! 

Set-up

Today's game will be played on a 36 x 36MU board.  1 MU will be 1 inch. 

The shrine is set up in the center of the board.  We divide the board into 4 sections and determine the following:
-Dangerous terrain
-Level 1 hill
-Linear difficult terrain
-Difficult terrain

This scenario also allows the defender to set-up a special piece of terrain as the shrine per the scenario rules.  It has 8 structure points.   

We then rolled up deployment and got the Scattered result.  In this case, we take turns placing models on the table, as long as they are no more than 8 MU from each other. However, the Delayed Troops complications means some troops may not be available at the start of this battle. 

Adonis has 3 spearmen and an archer delayed.  Diomedes has his second, Euryales; and 2 spear armed soldiers delayed.

When all was said and done, the table looked like this:



Well, with all the preamble out of the way.  It was time to get on to business!  Of course, you can see the full results and some post-game thoughts after the battle on the Blood and Spectacles blog here:

http://bloodandspectacles.blogspot.com/2023/01/battle-report-homers-heroes-hold-shrine.html
Support Blood and Spectacles Publishing:
https://www.patreon.com/Bloodandspectaclespublishing

Online Harry Faversham

  • Galactic Brain
  • Posts: 4377
Re: Battle Report: Homer's Heroes - Hold the Shrine
« Reply #1 on: 01 February 2023, 07:32:20 AM »
Great AAR! When will the rules be published, I'd buy them in a heartbeat?
"Wot did you do in the war Grandad?"

"I was with Harry... At The Bridge!"

Offline Easy E

  • Scatterbrained Genius
  • Posts: 2348
  • Just some guy who does stuff
    • Blood and Spectacles
Re: Battle Report: Homer's Heroes - Hold the Shrine
« Reply #2 on: 01 February 2023, 03:00:01 PM »
Thank you for the support.

The game will be out sometime in Q1.  I will post up here when it is ready for download.

   
« Last Edit: 01 February 2023, 03:21:50 PM by Easy E »

Online Harry Faversham

  • Galactic Brain
  • Posts: 4377
Re: Battle Report: Homer's Heroes - Hold the Shrine
« Reply #3 on: 01 February 2023, 03:53:21 PM »
Thanks E, look forward to sending my Heroes on their quests!

 :)

Offline Dubbya

  • Scientist
  • Posts: 241
Re: Battle Report: Homer's Heroes - Hold the Shrine
« Reply #4 on: 03 February 2023, 09:46:08 AM »
Fun report, count me as another interested in when it's released! Chariots, not enough games feature them, especially in any meaningful way.

Offline Easy E

  • Scatterbrained Genius
  • Posts: 2348
  • Just some guy who does stuff
    • Blood and Spectacles
Re: Battle Report: Homer's Heroes - Hold the Shrine
« Reply #5 on: 01 March 2023, 03:10:02 PM »
For those interested, the rules are now available on the Wargame's Vault here:

https://www.wargamevault.com/product/425627/Homers-Heroes-Bronze-Age-Bad-Boys?src=newest_since
« Last Edit: 01 March 2023, 09:11:09 PM by Easy E »

Offline scotty

  • Scientist
  • Posts: 469
Re: Battle Report: Homer's Heroes - Hold the Shrine
« Reply #6 on: 01 March 2023, 06:25:45 PM »
Superb AAR, thanks for sharing

Offline Easy E

  • Scatterbrained Genius
  • Posts: 2348
  • Just some guy who does stuff
    • Blood and Spectacles
Re: Battle Report: Homer's Heroes - Hold the Shrine
« Reply #7 on: 06 March 2023, 02:19:20 PM »
For those interested, there is a break down of the design goals and how I solved some design challenges for Homer's Heroes" Bronze Age Bad Boys on the Blood and Spectacles blog here:

http://bloodandspectacles.blogspot.com/2023/03/wargame-design-homers-heroes-bronze-age.html




 

Related Topics

  Subject / Started by Replies Last post
2 Replies
3062 Views
Last post 02 March 2009, 02:47:03 PM
by Ruarigh
20 Replies
14897 Views
Last post 01 December 2009, 03:41:58 PM
by abhorsen950
3 Replies
2128 Views
Last post 18 January 2012, 08:37:59 PM
by Sangennaru
15 Replies
17098 Views
Last post 22 May 2015, 04:32:22 PM
by d phipps
4 Replies
905 Views
Last post 07 September 2021, 08:52:01 PM
by Marine0846