ArmA Tactics Operation Tempest Mission One

The first mission of the Operation Tempest campaign is called “Leave No One Behind” which deals with the team attempting to secure an operator who was incapacitated and captured during an ambush on their patrol. With no open support from the local government, the team must move through the village of Lagados and engage any local militia that were left behind to hold Derek Masters when the mercenaries supporting wanted terrorist Ibrahim Soltani fled the area.

The remaining team members who must infiltrate the village and secure Masters is Ian Ellis (M4A1 AR, Frag Grenade, and Medkit), Marco Salazar (M249 LMG, Frag Grenade, and Medkit), and Stanley Dodds (M4A1 AR, Frag Grenade, and Medkit). The two AR troopers also are automatically equipped with silencers which must be attached during the mission at the cost of one Action Point.

In ArmA Tactics each soldier has two Action Points per turn, and these can be used for movement, engagement of targets, throwing grenades, assuming a defensive posture, reloading, and attaching a silencer (if one is equipped). Although a turn based game, the enemy is quite aggressive in pressing forward, flanking, and otherwise making my life miserable on the LED battlefield.

This image taken from the opening cut scene shows one team member performing a ridiculously unnecessary roll off of a moving train that was just about to stop anyway. These are “special” forces to say the least…

Also from the cut scene to set the stage for the mission – actually he took one right in the head and if you look close enough you can see blood spray and what I am sure is brain matter flying out of a new hole in his head.

Even in this shithole somehow they still manage to get DirecTV.

The team deploys on one side of the map and in true video game fashion must navigate to the opposite end of the map to find the vegetable, I mean operator.

The map in the game is vividly detailed and actually quite useful in determining how to resolve most combat situations.

Moving forward incrementally and taking an observation point while retaining one Action Point is critical when trying to cross open ground. Here Stan and Ian on the right actually have both of their AP’s remaining as I send the automatic rifleman Marco across the street.

Sometimes it is useful to blow a turn simply doing nothing more than grouping up your team to regain some cohesion. One player stuck away from the others is a sitting duck against two or more enemy units.

Here the team is caught crossing the street and has four active targets. At times like these it is better to fall back and improve your odds by making the enemy come to you.

And if they don’t oblige throw a grenade over the wall.

Here we were able to sneak up very close to this enemy over several turns and were able to eliminate him with silenced weapons.

Clearing this last tango triggers the final cut scene which ends the mission.

During the cut scene the team locates the miraculously recovered Masters when a militiaman puts his hands up to surrender. In what can only be described as an act of cold blooded murder, they open fire on the poor bastard and kill him (carelessly firing at a target directly behind their obviously alive teammate that they came to rescue in the first place).

After-action Reports

25 rounds fired with a 95% accuracy rating resulted in 14 kills and one war crime. But we rescued Masters who apparently is none the worse for wear after being shot in the head with a 7.62mm round during the opening cut scene.

Only two killed by grenade is kind of weak as one exploded directly behind an enemy and didn’t even wound him.