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Post by aducknamedjoe on Apr 12, 2019 2:20:45 GMT
Not sure if there's enough interest to start a terrain-specific sub-board, or if this is just the sort of post that "General Discussion" is meant for, so I'll just drop this here.
I'm not generally someone who's into the "hobby" side of our, er, hobby. I'd much rather get troops on the table (or floor) and roll dice than spend hours painting, varnishing, and gluing.
That said, I have recently spent a couple enjoyable afternoons on a pair of "rough and ready" terrain experiments for 54mm's.
The first is an experiment meant for outdoor "garden" wargaming, and will be (if finished) a wooden stockade fort of the type you might encounter in North America during the 1750s.
It's made with twigs and branches found outside, cut down to size, and glued together with wood glue. Here's the first foot-long wall being left to dry, with a couple bricks on top of it to keep its shape:
And here's the wall after drying. Now I just need to figure out how to do a parapet before I do the rest of the walls:
I'm hopeful it will be something that I can leave outside indefinitely, and so the experiment is to see if my method of construction will be able to withstand the elements for any decent length of time.
The second experiment is for indoor gaming, and is even more horrific looking. It's a large house/strongpoint, made out of cardboard and white glue. I've made it so all the roofs are detachable so I can fit guys inside, and the windows were measured to be able to accommodate both kneeling and standing shooting poses (about an inch off the ground, an inch tall, and two inches wide). As you can see, my arts and craft skills are not exactly award-winning.
Not pretty, but it meets my standard for "army men gaming" which is to be functional. Plus it's big; I could probably fit six, ten man squads across all the levels and rooms and rooftops. I'm looking to do another couple buildings for a small town or farmstead, and then I can play some "outnumbered defenders fight off hordes of technologically inferior enemies behind hastily erected defenses" type games.
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Post by jhonpog on Apr 13, 2019 21:26:56 GMT
I really like the dimensions and functionality of the building. Are you tempted to cover it in sand and glue or filler to get adobe or concrete look ?
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Post by aducknamedjoe on Apr 15, 2019 19:38:40 GMT
Thanks!
Hadn't really thought of it; not really sure of the best technique if I did decide to texture it. I play a lot on the floor, so I'd be worried that sand might rub off and get everywhere. Any tips?
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Post by leswhite on Apr 15, 2019 22:07:30 GMT
You could try textured spray paint, I've had some success with PLASTICOTE brand. They do 4 or 5 different colours - sandstone, grey, etc. All you need to do is give your card board a coat of paint with any of your favourite paints, acrylic works best, of the colour nearest the textured paint, so sand base for sand stone. Once painted the textured material doesn't rub off so it should save your carpet
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Post by aducknamedjoe on Apr 17, 2019 0:19:55 GMT
Ah, good call on the paint, I'll have to see if my local hardware store has that or something similar.
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Post by jhonpog on Apr 17, 2019 5:25:24 GMT
or if you were feeling particularly nuts you could try cladding the building in cut up cardboard pieces to simulate brick or rocks or timber. Glue with PVA?
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Post by leswhite on Apr 17, 2019 18:35:55 GMT
aducknamedjoe, Interested to see what your finished building turns out like. You might also try using foamboard for walls , it comes in various thicknesses, it can be cut to be able to have it flat packed for storage and then built up when you are gaming. The outer part is a thick paprer which paints up quite well and you can even use the textured paint on it. It comes in White or Black, the white works quite well as adobe if you can't be bothered to paint it. It is easy to cut windows and doors in it too. Also for your indoor games have you tried carpet tiles as fields, they come in various colours of brown and green and are sturdy, leave no mess and can be stacked when not in use. You can cut them in strips to produce roads and even make curves to have the road go anywhere on you floor. If you get Blue tiles you can even have a river or shore line. If you want the water shiny just wrap some ceranwrap around the tiles OR maybe get some shiny Blue floor tiles, the self adhesive type.
I've also found artificial turf samples very useful, they come as small offcuts 9 inches X 6 inches, out of places like HOME DEPOT. There are variety of colours and tuft lengths which can be overlayed on the carpet tiles to show various crop types or used as the undergrowth under trees for jungle look.
I'll dig out a picture to show what I mean.
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Post by leswhite on Apr 17, 2019 19:04:56 GMT
Found a couple of pics to illustrate my previous post. First one has a set up using the Carpet Tiles, brown, as the groundwork with the artificial turf samples laid on as fields. The Buildings are NEWRAY and BMC, figures are AIP. Second one is a basic ruined corner building using an small offcut of Foam board, about a six inch square cut up and slotted together. This is enough of a defensive point to fight over and could be placed next to a cross roads. The figures are old AIRFIX US Army conversions, just to show the size of the building. Attachments:
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Post by aducknamedjoe on Apr 18, 2019 20:28:25 GMT
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Post by aducknamedjoe on Apr 18, 2019 20:50:21 GMT
Also, quick update on my outdoor terrain experiment: I've built the 2nd wall, though still trying to figure out the best way to affix a parapet that will hold up. The wood glue is decent, but a bit brittle if the piece is dropped (I've had to re-glue the 1st wall already after it tipped over on brick while I measured it for the parapet...). I'm not sure a better construction method though, open to suggestions for increasing durability. In future I may end up buying solid wood blocks and gluing sticks to the outside of them, though I don't think it would give the same aesthetic affect so I'm trying to avoid that if I can. Here's some pictures with Private Forescale in the foreground.
And here is is propped up on one of the support beams to see where a parapet might fit:
Almost ready to defend the back yard...
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Post by jhonpog on May 2, 2019 5:48:18 GMT
nice work nothing like using wood to make something look like wood Hows your building coming along? I like way you can stack it. Might have to pinch that idea..
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Post by aducknamedjoe on May 5, 2019 1:39:09 GMT
Thanks jhonpog ! Unfortunately the wood glue doesn't seem to stand up well to rain, so if anyone has other suggestions for ways to attach wood that will better withstand the elements I'm all ears... And unfortunately no new progress on the building, still planning a couple more with the next one likely a smaller outbuilding of some kind. I would recommend, if you copy my idea, to do what I did not and add a ring of "destroyed" walls within the first level so you can lift that off and have ruins if the building gets hit by artillery. I plan on doing that with the next building. That said I did manage a brief Rorke's Drift-esque skirmish with the building I do have and some plastic walls representing a fortified country manor(see below pic).
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Post by jhonpog on May 5, 2019 21:20:40 GMT
nice pics how about a hot glue gun? That is water proof and should stick to the timber ok. Failing that 2 part epoxy glue should do it
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Post by aducknamedjoe on Sept 17, 2019 5:02:26 GMT
Bought some two-part epoxy so once it stops being so mosquito-ey here in DC I'll give that a try. In the meantime I've been putting together materials for a stylized "toy soldier"-esque gaming table with some brightly colored felt for grass, roads, rivers, and crop fields. I've also been experimenting with a cheap, simple method for making trees and think I've hit on something I really like.
It's just an extra large pipe cleaner, of the kind you get at any hobby store like Michaels, cut and twisted around a 6" length of stick and glued to a stand, but I rather like the stylized look. I think it fits in with an old-school type table and it's stupid simple (and cheap) to make.
The color's actually a little lighter green than shows up in the photos, and I like the tree trunk effect of using a stick from an actual tree...
I'm planning to make a good dozen or so.
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Post by jhonpog on Sept 20, 2019 0:08:46 GMT
that's a neat trick with the tree I like it I'm looking around for something like that myself.
Hey I forgot to ask you abou the plastic barricades you had in a previous post where are they from?
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