Bolt Action - Operation Galvanic first wave

Back to Bolt Action and this time with a campaign which I devised to mobilize our US Marine and Japanese forces in the club. So I designed a four game mini campaign based on events on Tarawa November 1943 during operation Galvanic. What I did I took the pacing and some interesting events from the actual fight and used them as themes of the games. The campaign starts with US first landing wave hitting Red Beach two at morning. Then second wave with some tanks will land on the shore. After the beachhead, fighting moves on to have some bunkers assaulted and finally all fighting will end with final japanese Banzai assaults ending also the campaign.

We started this week by having the first game, where US Marines started the attack by wading a shore in shallow water. While japanese on the shore poured murdering fire on attackers from good firing positions. This scenario used the amphibious assault rules from Warlord website. The game was ten turn custom scenario which turned to be quite interesting fight where both players had a bit different tactical challenges. After all the fight was bloody, as expected and at first it seemed to be a turkey shoot for japanese. But when the americans got some ground under their feet, their respectable firepower started to bring down the brave defenders. First game ended japanese victory because the Marines never reached their objectives. So next wave will have hard time to clear the beach defenses.

Barbed wire defenses on the killing zone on the beach.

Japanese defenders in the bush by the beach.

Imperial troops in good positions.

Sergeant organizing troops to man the positions.

Red Beach two from approaching Buffalo.

Buffalo have reached the shoreline.

Most of the US troops are still wading amidst the murdering fire.

The Leathernecks reach solid ground and start hard fighting.

Some are just so lucky, or is it skill?

Aerial view on the shoreline.

Victorious defenders pouring fre on attackers.

Nice game. Next will be the assault of the second wave with some tanks. Lets see how it goes.