It was always going to end like this...

Even seeing Cthulhu sends men insane... so having him physically attack you... well...

Panic as the tankettes back into each in their efforts to get away...

Cthulhu moves out of the temple as one hapless soldier is run over by a reversing tank.

The monster is big enough to cover both tanks.

They don't survive the encounter!

The remains of the HQ group are the next to fall. Not something to slow Cthulhu's inexorable murderous advance.

Unable to get past the monster, some soldiers flee into the city and are attacked by more cultists.

They are forced back and pass into another chamber.

With a couple of soldiers trapped behind Cthulhu, others facing attack by cultists, and the rest about to be eaten (or something)... things aren't looking good for the Japanese!

Though the ones retreating from the cultists might (?) manage to find a way out of the city.

At which point, perhaps best to draw a curtain over the next part...

The beast awakens

 

The rest of the force cautiously enters the city while the officer leads his HQ group to check out the temple.

As the officer climbs to the top of a column the force starts moving further into the city.

 

As he stood there, long tentacles appeared from a well in the temple and snatched him...

 

 

It was so quick that noone knew what had happened. The corporal led a couple of men to investigate.

 

 

Suddenly a winged, tentacled monstrosity rose up before them.

 

 

One brave soldier fired at the nightmare while the rest of the force panicked. Hastily reversing to try and turn around, two of the tanketes colled with each other... (Rolling for combat/morale, I treated each tentacle as separate and with 'god' facing Hordes. One tentacle rolled a 1 as the man it was facing rolled a 6!)

 

 

Utter panic as Cthulhu surveyed the scene before him...

  

Skirmish in the ruins

 

As the ambushers fire on the Japanese one of the soldiers is hit and falls to the ground.

The Japanese return fire as they face their attackers...

But as their return fire is ineffective and they lose another man, although one of the attackers also falls. The soldiers decide to charge the ambushers instead ...

The charge results in two more attackers down as the survivors withdraw.

 

And the rest of the force enters the city as the first section takes up a defensive position in case of another attack.

Ruins in the jungle

 

Crossing the stream the Type 97 TE-KE tankettes stopped as the path lead to the entrance to a ruined city, the low surviving walls into the jungle on both sides. The tankettes stopped at the entrance as the officer and his command group came up to evaluate the situation.

No point sending the TE-KEs in - not a good place for tanks! The 1st Section got the job of checking the entrance out...

 

Along the overgrown passageway they went. At the it opened, as the section started to spread out, they came across the remains of a cyclopean temple-like structure ahead of them.

 

Shots fired! Figures clad in brown robes egged on by a strange purple robed figure! Caught by surprise the section readied itself for combat...

Somewhere in the Pacific

 

A couple of under strength infantry sections and three light tanks edge their way alone an overgrown jungle track in an attempt to outflank Allied forces...

All goes well until they are slowed by a stream crossing the path...

The terrain gave me a chance to use a load of one foot square terrain pieces I bought at a convention many years ago. Probably about thirty years ago.

Second Japanese squad.

 Is now finished.

Nothing else to say about it - same as first squad.

Though have also done a machine gun.

Next squad has separate heads - not happy with that but...

Japanese Type 98 Tank

 This just about completes my Interwar Japanese tank 'needs', though haven't got any of one I want - my first Japanese 'tank' was a converted Type 92 tankette following the Airfix magazine article of long ago (must dig that out sometime - still got it!

Must admit I prefer this colour scheme with strictly limited amounts of yellow. Still not very good on the flag insignia.

As with all Frontline tanks, basic and the odd bit snaps off, but they are fine for wargaming, easy to put together and cost half as much as many other companies!

Currently working on the second EWM infantry squad. I've got one more but it has separate heads - not liked by me! For the future, I've put in what might be my last 'big' order for a while - German WW1 infantry to act as Interwar Freikorps, few other infantry supports and artillery, plus the Frontline bridge - wanted something like that for a while, both for WW2 type battles and Newhaven.

Japanese Type 97 TE-KE light tank.

One of the armies I'm revisiting from the past is my Japanese WW2 army - an army that had it's genesis in the 60s with Airfix Bren Gun Carrier conversions (long gone!), lots of scratch built artillery and, later, plastic and carved balsa tanks. Currently I'm using this army as a good birthday/Christmas option. Some tanks already acquired, some painted.

 

Type 97 TE-KE, as usual with my WW2 stuff it's a much cruder paint job than many WW2 gamers manage!

However, it does the job and looks OK on the table. The varnish was supposed to be a matt finish...

 

A (very) basic 20mm Japanese artillery park

Many years ago I had loads of Airfix and Matchbox WW2 Japanese infantry. By many years, this little collection started in the mid 60s. Anyway, at some point I started producing artillery on a semi-mass production scale (I think originally based on an Airfix Magazine article). Wheels could be an issue, but ones like the 70mm battalion gun Type 92 simply used spare Tiger/Panther road wheels drilled out - and I simply expanded this to other guns...

Some of these guns 'survived' and I've finally got round to doing something with them. To be fair, I haven't done much with them!

I've assumed they won't all be used at once so only did three crews.

37mm infantry gun and 70mm battalion gun using Tiger wheels - didn't bother drilling out holes on the wheels, just painted them on.

Two 75mm infantry guns, one with Tiger wheels the other with the more normal spoked wheels. These days, of course, I would cast spoked wheels myself - the Rose Napoleonic limber wheels would probably do.

Crew are very crudely done - one isn't even Japanese, he's a British colonial figure. I painted them with Vallejo Japanese Unif. WWII - don't think this is really right, seems too light and too yellow.

At some stage I fully intend getting metal figures and guns for the Japanese. Meanwhile, I'll probably continue going through my old figures as well.

Frontline 20mm Type 95

Part of my birthday present from my son and his partner, three Type 95 light tanks.

Basic standard, works for me. The Japanese use of Arabic numerals is a bit help on markings!

To be fair, my attempts at painting the Japanese flags are not brilliant but they'll do the job!