text: [Themes: edutainment, historical]
  
  There are ten Campaigns available from Ancient History ranging in length from one to nine battles and rated Easy, Medium or Hard Difficulty. Each Campaign has the same format, you are a Commander of 1000 Warriors who you command in battle and in every fight your objective is to kill as many Enemies as possible while losing as few Warriors Killed as possible. Warriors you lose Killed are subtracted from your Warriors total and if this ever reaches 0 then you are killed, ending the campaign.
  
  For every Enemy you kill you earn 1 Score Point and for every Warrior you lose Killed you lose 1 Score Point, your objective is to get the highest Score possible which is revealed at the end of the story if you leave a comment. If you are killed (your number of Warriors reaches 0) then you will be given the option to return to this page or finish the story and leave a comment, likewise if you complete a campaign you will be given the chance to return to the main page and try another campaign or finish the story. Your Score is carried over whether your Campaign ends in successful completion or death and completing all the campaigns will give you the highest score.
  
  So, in chronological order, here are the available Campaigns:
  
  [Author's Note: In this story game you become a commander from ancient times, leading your brave warriors into the greatest battles in history! Ranging from Ancient China to Carthage, Greece and Rome this story gives the reader the chance to command in over thirty battles in ten different campaigns to see if their decisions can win glory on the battlefield or merely consign themselves to an anonymous grave! The reader will fight alongside some of history's greatest commanders like Alexander the Great, Pyrrhus of Epirus and Bai Qi, the Human Butcher, in their quest to become the greatest general of them all! Let the fight begin! Author's Note: This is the long overdue and far more ambitious sequel The Trojan War, if it proves popular I will follow it with a sequel (or two) based, initially, on the rise and fall of Rome. I hope the reader enjoys the game aspect of this and good luck gaining the highest score possible! The Campaigns are best played in order and I've tried to include a mixture of countries and cultures in the selection of battles but naturally these are just my choices of ones I think might be interesting... :)]
  
  > 1: The Greek-Persian War (490-479BC) - MEDIUM DIFFICULTY
  It is 490BC and the future looks dark for Athens, Sparta, Thebes and the other small city-states on the Greek Peninsular. The mighty Persian Empire, which stretches across Egypt, Eastern Europe and Asia as far as the Indus River, is turning its mighty gaze towards Greece, desiring to add her lands to her vast domain. Only superior courage and strategy will be able to save Greece, and by extension Europe, from the vast armies of Asia...
  
  > If you want to play this Campaign click here
  You are King of the small city-state of Plataea and you have always looked to your alliance with neighboring Athens and your small army of 1,000 Warriors to keep your land and people safe. It seems unlikely this will be enough now that an enormous Persian fleet has appeared off the beach of Marathon intent on beginning the Persian conquest of Greece. You march your men out to join an army of 10,000 men from Athens, the Persians number between three and ten times greater than that.
  
  The Persian army is already camped on the beach by the time you and your allies arrive. The Athenian commander Miltiades intends to launch a bold charge on the Persian horde with a very long thin line of warriors, hoping to wrap around their flanks and overwhelm them. The strongest Persian troops are traditionally placed on the right so Miltiades requests that your warriors take up position on the Athenian left flank but doesn't insist upon it.
  
  > follow Miltiades' instructions
  You and your warriors deploy on the Athenian left flank and at the signal you join the rest of the army in advancing across the beach, increasing to a jog and then a cheering run as arrows start to fall. Your Warriors smash into the Persian right flank but the Persian Immortals, a well-equipped force of 10,000 men, fight back bravely and for a time your warriors make little headway against them, suffering more casualties than you inflict. The turning point comes when the Persian left flank and center collapse and flee back to their ships prompting the Immortals to form a rearguard and follow. You have been victorious this day but your bloodied men are too exhausted to pursue the beaten foe.
  
  You have Killed 210 Enemies.
  You have Lost 290 Men.
  
  > Victory
  The victory at Marathon earns Greece ten years of safety until a new Persian Emperor, Xerxes, takes the throne with one burning ambition: to bring all of Greece under his control. Leading the largest army the world has ever known he crosses the Dardanelle Straits and begins marching his army south through Macedon towards Greece. The Athenians, intimidated by the sheer size of the Xerxes' army, are unsure what to do but the Spartans know exactly what to do and march north with a small army 7,000 men led by their King Leonidas to bar the narrow pass of Thermoplyae. You march with them: opposing you is a countless horde numbering anywhere from quarter of a million to over two million men.
  
  The odds are at least 30-1 against you but despite that the Spartan King Leonidas is almost irritatingly cheerful, when warned that the Persian arrows will blot out the sun he comments that he likes fighting in the shade! Leonidas intends to hold the pass with his Spartans while other allied forces wait just behind, reinforcing his men as they are required. There is a narrow path which goes over the mountains and emerges behind the pass: Leonidas recommends that you and your men guard that to prevent the Persians from surrounding you.
  
  > hold the mountain path
  You climb to the top of the mountain to hold the path and for two days you watch the Spartans fight in the pass, miraculously repelling every Persian assault and inflicting heavy casualties. Finally at dawn on the third day you catch sight of a large column of Persian soldiers climbing up the path towards you. Recognizing the importance of preventing them from trapping your allies you send a messenger to Leonidas and at the same time order your men to charge down the slope.
  
  Initially your charge catches the Persians completely by surprise and on the narrow path they are unable to maneuver. Your men slaughter the enemy in their thousands, driving many of them off the steep cliff to fall to their deaths on either side, it is only when the Persians begin launching thousands of arrows up the hill at you that your exhausted men break off the fight and withdraw. Your bold charge has slaughtered an incredible number of enemy soldiers and brought Leonidas enough time to march most of his army to safety: Leonidas and his Spartans remain behind as a rearguard and are slaughtered to a man. You and your blood-covered killers are able to rejoin the half of Leonidas's army that escaped and join them in marching south to safety.
  
  You have Killed 4290 Enemies!!
  You have Lost 290 Men.
  
  > Defeat
  After the defeat at the Battle of Thermoplyae Greece looks doomed but a bold naval attack at the Battle of Salamis destroys much of the Persian fleet and frightens Xerxes: afraid of being trapped in Greece he decides to flee back to Asia with most his army. A large part of his army is left under the command of Xerxes' General Mardonius but inspired by the example of the Spartans at Thermoplyae within a year the cities of Greece led by Athens, Sparta and Thebes have united to assemble an army not much smaller than that of the Persians. The two armies meet near your own city of Plataea.
  
  The Spartan King Pausanias, successor of brave Leonidas, commands the Greek army and is divided with the Athenians over strategy: he wants to hold the south bank of the Asopus River to the right of Plataea while the Athenians want to hold a right to the left of Plataea, meanwhile you are arguing for the Greeks to assign more men to defend your city of Plataea itself, which is in the center part of the battlefield and currently only guarded by the Thebans. Pausanias finally gives up and tells his commanders to fight the battle as they think best.
  
  > join the Athenians on the ridge
  You join the Athenians on the ridge and watch as the Persians assemble and then charge up the hill: you and your allies respond by charging down the hill. Your Warriors slice through the enemy ranks, which break and run, but you are unable to pursue them as the Persians launch waves of arrows at your men who fall back. The Persians do not attack again: on the other side of the battlefield Mardonius has been killed fighting the Spartans and the Persians, repulsed in all places, retreat from the battlefield. Once more your Warriors have taken part in a victory that has helped save Greece.
  
  You have Killed 440 Enemies.
  You have Lost 190 Men.
  
  > Victory
  It is all over after the victory at Plataea, the last Persians flee Greece never to return and you resume your peaceful rule of your kingdom. You do better than the other commanders of the Greek-Persian Wars: both Miltiades and Pausanias are disgraced and killed, the Persian Emperor Xerxes is killed by his own bodyguard fifteen years after Thermoplyae. The victories at Marathon, Salamis and Plataea defeated the Persian attempts to conquer Greece and prevented Eastern conquest of Europe. By the time of your own death forty years after Thermoplyae the city-states of Greece have grown rich and powerful but tensions are rising between the two most powerful: Athens and Sparta. Within a short time your son will be engulfed in the most destructive war Greece has ever seen.
  
  You have completed this Campaign!