Dennis Peter - Empires in flames: the Pacific and the Far East

Allies beware the Burmese jungle teems with camouflaged Japanese soldiers

This book is a supplement to the tabletop wargame Bolt Action. It focuses on the Far East and Pacific theatres during World War II, from the Japanese invasion of China two years before the official start of the war in Europe through to the Allied plans to invade the Japanese home islands in 1945, and the end of the war.

This supplement provides a context for your games set in the Pacific Theatre, addressing common historical questions asked by players such as: How did the relatively small, lightly equipped Japanese Army conquer the territories of the colonial powers so quickly? How were they eventually stopped and what kind of battles were fought? What was the terrain like and what factor did this play tactically? By answering these and other questions, we hope that you will enjoy a more rewarding game and perhaps gain a glimpse of what the brave men of many nations endured in the Pacific Theatre.

This book is not intended to be a definitive account of all the campaigns fought in the Far East, such a subject would (and does) occupy many volumes of equivalent size. Instead we aim to present a primer for this area of the conflict that points out items of interest as we go. Should anything pique your curiosity you will be able to find many resources to dig deeper into it: World War II is undoubtedly the most written about war in history. The special significance of the war in the Pacific to so many nations means it is one of the most keenly studied and extensively dissected parts of the war, a fascinating and dramatic topic in its own right.

One of the main ways this book aims to bring the history directly into games is through scenarios designed to reflect real-life incidents or recurrent themes of particular campaigns. There are additional scenario rules in this book appropriate to the special conditions under which battles were fought, whether amphibious landings on occupied islands or chaotic night fights in the midst of dense jungles.

For those of a historical persuasion when it comes to fielding their armies, weve added various extra units from specific time periods and areas of the conflict. On the other hand this book also speculates on the what if battles that can be fought using adversaries or equipment that did not see battle during the real war.

The scenarios in this book are written with the assumption you will use reinforced platoons from either the Bolt Action rulebook, the relevant historical Theatre Selector from an appropriate army book or one of the Theatre Selectors presented here. However you should feel free to use armoured platoons from the Tank War supplement where you feel it appropriate this will allow you to play the same scenario using either reinforced or armoured platoons (or a mix of both!), with a resulting great variety of feel and balance to the scenarios played.