Step by Step – Tiny Plastic People

09 Aug

I made a Warcry board – A guide to what I learnt not to do – Part 5 – The Finished? Product and What I Learnt

Hobby, TerrainStep by Step, Terrain, Warcry

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 1 - Inspiration Part 2 - The Base Itself Part 3 - Modular Bases 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. I am…

01 Apr

Founding Felstad (Part 3)

Articles, Hobby, TerrainStep by Step, Terrain

Welcome back! Last time, I had tried out carving some foam, now it was time for the next step in adding some elevation to my board. I had some 75mm thick XPS foam from an attempt to make a budget Loonshrine for Age of Sigmar, so I decided to use this as the basis for a large tower/riser thing. I started by roughing out how it would look with some stairs, made from layers of 10mm XPS foam. Then, as it looked a little plain, I added one of the Hirst Arts ruins to the top. It always helps to…

11 Mar

Neonheim Build (Part 5)

TerrainNecromunda, Step by Step, Terrain

A short update this time. With the majority of the structure modelled in, it was time to start developing the infrastructure and earth surrounding the pool at the bottom of the board. For this I went for Sculptamold, which is a mix of plaster and fibres, that forms a reasonable strong base layer. The pool water will be transparent resin, but that will be a future activity. Other people can get really good ground and earth effects with Sculptamold, but I haven’t ever had much luck with that. It is easy to work in-around things though, and for filling large gaps.…

03 Mar

Founding Felstad (Part 2)

Articles, Gaming, Hobby, Terrain, TutorialsFrostgrave, Step by Step, Terrain

When I last left you, I’d made a whole bunch of single storey scatter terrain. This was a good start but I really needed some larger pieces, and especially some elevation, to make the table more varied and fun. The first thing I did was grab a couple of bits from Gale Force 9’s Battlefield in a Box range. These are nice pieces and if you’ve played any games at a games store you’ve probably seen them, as they’re made of resin so are nice and robust, and they come pre-painted. Of course I needed them to match the rest…

25 Feb

Neonheim Build (Part 4)

TerrainNecromunda, Step by Step, Terrain

With a lot of the initial board structure built, I moved over to the less complete right-hand side. While adding the previously fabricated cardboard I-beam walkways, I also added some plain foam panelling down the wall for some visual interest. Whilst the walkways looked pretty unsupported there, I had planned to add some vertical pipes for support: to add a bit of cover for games, and also increase the feeling that this area of the board was more of a maintenance space for the original builders of the district. One thing worth covering is that I deliberately staggered these new…

11 Feb

Neonheim Build (Part 3)

Hobby, TerrainNecromunda, Step by Step, Terrain

Continuing my Necromunda Underhive terrain build. Originally I'd planned for 25mm thick floors through-out the board but for visual interest I wanted to fit some beams in underneath the floors on the right-hand side, so I went with 12mm floors for the upper levels. Floors going in. I added some damage to the second floor up, I'm not sure yet if I'll keep it open or have it with some rough repairs, both could look quite interesting. I kept the cut out piece in case I wanted to add the collapsed part as rubble somewhere below. Gantries Then to link…

09 Feb

Founding Felstad (Part 1)

Hobby, Terrain, TutorialsFrostgrave, Step by Step, Terrain

Having got a copy of Frostgrave 2nd edition for Christmas, Osprey Publishing’s fantasy skirmish game of “wizards, battling through a ruined frozen city in search of magical artefacts”, and with lockdown continuing, I had plenty of time on my hands, so I decided to make a table for it. This was my first large scale terrain project so I was leaping in at the deep end, but I hoped that the crumbling, snow-bound nature of Felstad would help cover any mistakes I made along the way. A couple of years ago a seller was offering a bunch of Hirst Arts…

04 Feb

Neonheim Build (Part 2)

TerrainNecromunda, Step by Step, Terrain

Back in the Underhive. With the basic arrangement fixed I sketched out some ideas for how I wanted to develop the board, particularly with a balance between aesthetics and usability. I had this big buttress roughly in the middle of the board and I thought about taking it up to the top like it was supporting some upper level of the hive. In the end, however, I decided that was probably quite visually boring and I wanted something with some more shape/depth to it. A broken bridge/arch seemed like a good move as it also implied a world out the…

28 Jan

Neonheim Build (Part 1)

Hobby, TerrainNecromunda, Step by Step, Terrain

Introduction Having gotten into some play-by-comment Necromunda during the Covid lockdown(s) I thought this would be a good excuse to make up some specific Necromunda terrain. I've fancied some kind of vertical board, like the cool-kids have, for a while now so, I finally set off to put something together. This series isn't intended as a tutorial but as I work through things I'll try to include some details of what I've done and thought processes behind it. I really fancied doing something very neon and cyberpunk but I didn't want to go too high tech for necromunda (wish I…