Hi, welcome to the fifth and final part of my guide to teach you what not to do when you make a board, so you can learn from my mistakes. If you missed them, the previous parts are here:
Part 4 – The Lost Chapter, and Buying My Way to Success
So, the finished product looks like this:
…plus this:
..plus this:
I think it’s probably gotten me to an extremely high number of permutations of arrangement. Not infinite, but a high value.
My key takeaways I would say are:
- Think through everything you’re going to use items for.
- For something so big, make a small test version of everything before committing to the materials and build.
- A big scale means you don’t need to stick with the detail paints. There was no way I was going to paint the base with a large citadel base brush, so why did I use citadel paints?!
- Compensate and anticipate how different materials react. Would my paints look more similar if I’d PVA sealed the cork and MDF first? Maybe, I should have tested it.
- Keep it simple and do it well.
- Don’t be annoyed if you decide to buy something ready-made if you’d struggle to do it yourself but make that an informed, sober decision, taking into account your bank balance and other spend commitments!
So, what’s next?
Well, I’m going to put the board on stilts. This will help when playing to make the space underneath (otherwise known as a table) to be usable for books/warband sheets/cards etc and bring the table closer to eye level to make it less awkward bending down to check line of sight. I’ll use some actual wood to do this, which I’m intending if I shape around the base as well as down should resolve my centre warping.
I’ll be doing a few painting fixes, and possibly repainting the lava, as well as magnetising the cork.
Walls. I still want walls. Now that I have the columns, my plan is to make foamboard walls of the right size to run between them and use the column shape as a support. I’m going to investigate other materials however to thicken them and make them stony. Thanks to the Discord community, I’ve been told a few ideas on how to texture the foamboard to look more like stone walls. I’m testing each method on a stone doorway first. Fingers crossed and maybe it will turn up in a future article.
I need board entry points that I can move to match the deployment. Doors are one thing, but I also like the idea of some steps up onto the board.
Altogether I’m really happy with what I’ve now got set up to play with. It’s been a lot of rewarding effort, but playing Warcry on it feels great, the vast amount of varying height platforms I can use really makes the battles take place in 3D, though at times that does make units with flying a bit OP, but my Bottle Knights of Squigdonia don’t mind that at all :-D.
