One Hobby Goal Down – Bolt Action Japanese

To kick off the year, I managed to get my Japanese army for Bolt Action out and playable.

Following my own tutorial which made painting rather swift, and previously posted on this site:

All paints are Citadel Contrast over a white primer. Goregrunta Fur on the boots, pouches, belts, helmet straps and rifles. Darkoath Flesh on the skin. Two coats of Ratling Grime on the metal parts of the weapons and any hair. Then the entire figure gets covered in Skeleton Horde.

Initially I had used Militarum Green on the helmets, but the rather nasty mould lines (even with a good amount of clean up) were still pretty visible (the Japanese Warlord kit is decently old and soon to be updated). So instead I used Tamiya’s Field Grey:

Oh and I also put a bit of silver on any swords and bayonets.

I really like the final result, and the speed of this scheme is fantastic. I managed to finish off 20 infantry and get a further 40 painted in a couple of days over Christmas.

My game this week was less successful.

I did Banzai charge a bunch of US Marines so I suppose historically it was on point (ignoring the European looking terrain). However it seems Banzai charging is not the most viable tactic for winning games of Bolt Action. It was pretty much a Japanese massacre. It did get me wondering how viable and mainly melee/close assault army is in the current edition of Bolt Action? It could be fun to try.

My thoughts so far include mainly 10 man squads, all rifles to save on points, and maxing out the infantry squads in your platoons. Lots of chaff, infiltrating suicide guys to keep the enemy occupied as you approach, crucially making sure your guys don’t get shot up. Maybe tanks to operate as a sort of mobile cover too.

Here’s everything painted so far, I’ve only got a couple of bits to go and I’ll have nothing knocking around waiting to be done for my Japanese.

Let me know what you think, and if you’ve been successful with the assault in Bolt Action in the comments, or just how unviable you imagine it would/should be.