Jerre Posted January 23, 2012 Share Posted January 23, 2012 I am thinking off making a trenches terrain board as soon as my space wolf army is finished. In the meantime I am looking for ideas how to do this. I got the idea for this when watching some of the Blue Table Painting youtube videos in which they show off their own trenches terrain board. I am considering the following ... At a local hardware store they sell foam insulation plates that are used for insulating roofs. These come in 60 cm x 120 cm and in thickness of 5 cm and 2 cm. I was thinking off using the 2cm thick plates as the base and cut out the trenches out of the 5cm plates and glue this on top of each other. If I place 3 next to each other, I get a 180 cm x 120 cm surface (just short of 6x4 feet). These foam plates are made to click into eachother (edge on one side, groove on the other). I am thinking of making the design of the trenches so that I can place them ABC, BCA and CAB so as to give a bit of modularity. Making them completely modular will be too much of a hassle I think. The idea will be that infantry, walkers, MCs and bikes can move through the trenches, but vehicles cannot. I am thinking of making the trenches about 9-10 cm wide, enough so that a dreadnought can fit between comfortably. With the 5cm height of the trenches, regular troops will not be able to look over the trenches to shoot, so I will be making several large alcoves in the trenches that are elevated so a regular trooper can see above the trench edge. Both sides of the table will have one plate (not the same one) that is not completely blocked by trenches so that vehicles can pass. I also bought a plastic terrain kit to make a wide bridge (landraider shoot still fit on it), so that will be another way to cross the trenches with vehicles. For the moment I am considering to have both table halves hold a seperate trench line. Or should these go over into each other? I am still looking for materials for the trenches. I bought a large pack of wooden (popsickle) sticks. But I think I will need some diversity otherwise it won't look natural enough. Any ideas on what else I can use? Preferably cheap and easy to come by ;) For the board texture, I am considering of making a mix of pva glue, brown paint and sand. I'd like the board to have some texture but not too much so that I can still place terrain pieces on it, between the trenches. On my old board I glued sand on the mdf plates and then spray painted it. But through wear & tear, some of the sand has come off, showing the plain mdf color beneath. Adding paint to the mixture should help me with that. Does anyone have any idea what ratio of paint/sand/glue I should use? Any help or ideas would be appreciated! Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/245920-new-terrain-table/ Share on other sites More sharing options...
mactire Posted January 23, 2012 Share Posted January 23, 2012 please put up pictures if you start this project :thanks: Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/245920-new-terrain-table/#findComment-2975162 Share on other sites More sharing options...
lhg033 Posted January 24, 2012 Share Posted January 24, 2012 you may find this inspiring: madscuzzy's trench table uses forgeworld trenches and foam Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/245920-new-terrain-table/#findComment-2975683 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jerre Posted January 24, 2012 Author Share Posted January 24, 2012 you may find this inspiring: madscuzzy's trench table uses forgeworld trenches and foam I saw this tread as well and posted in it a few days ago but haven't gotten a reaction from the OP. Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/245920-new-terrain-table/#findComment-2975778 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ensis Ferrae Posted January 25, 2012 Share Posted January 25, 2012 That thread was great, and inspires me to make a trench table as well. TBH, my idea for a trench table takes a much larger inspiration from the actual trenches of WW1... no concrete bunkers, craters, no-mans-land, barbed-wire galore. @Jerre, I personally would avoid making a trench that a bike or walker can "comfortably use" because some smaller or normal sized vehicles could use them as well. Perhaps instead of using the trenches, you could make bridges, or some sort of hard point where they can traverse the trenchworks, OR you can make hard points (bunkers) that instead of taking the more or less standard bunker form, are like open gunners pits, where heavy weapons teams, dreads and other walkers equally can use? Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/245920-new-terrain-table/#findComment-2976868 Share on other sites More sharing options...
madscuzzy Posted January 25, 2012 Share Posted January 25, 2012 Mmm... well, apologies on the erm, late reply... In terms of the mix, its just a random mix of PVA, sand and paint. The key thing is to balance the medium (i added gel medium in too, to give it some body) and sand. The paint is just there for colour. Not too watery and not to thick, or the sand becomes difficult to apply. From playing experience, you may want to start thinking of making it playably fun, or narratively playable. Having narrow trenches are nice and realistic but the restrictions placed may cause you to actually not always use the trench as it can be inconvenient at times to play in. My goal was to make my trench compatible with GW's 6 tile system, so it can be swapped around a bit, making it a lil less limited in config, but it is still difficult to play in. The FW trench set is insanely expensive and while has a nice feel to it, it did create may constraints that I had to consider when building it. I couldnt really put in large gun emplacements, or have anywhere to put say, heavy weapon teams etc. , so while I understand his point, if I were to make another trench, I would have to kindly disagree with Ensis Ferrae and make one that can function both as a trench and as something that can act as a 'lower level' of sorts. Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/245920-new-terrain-table/#findComment-2976947 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ensis Ferrae Posted January 25, 2012 Share Posted January 25, 2012 madscuzzy, I completely understand what you are saying about usability on your table. I don't think that the GW system is very suited to a trench table, and so we try to make do with our cool ideas, and throw out some others. If I actually can make a trench table myself, things will probably not work out quite the way I envision in my head right now. I think that ultimately, anyone who makes a trench table will be doing so with some narrative, campaign, or other "non-competitive" format games. By "lower level" do you mean something like the outer wall to an absolutely enormous factory type urban board, where the "trenches" can form a basis for multiple floored buildings? Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/245920-new-terrain-table/#findComment-2976984 Share on other sites More sharing options...
madscuzzy Posted January 25, 2012 Share Posted January 25, 2012 Oh the narrative is definitely there. When I was building it, I couldn't help but imagine my armies trudging through the lines, akin to the early ideas of WW1... and when playing, only then can really get to see the psychology of sending troops across No Man's Land, risking getting shot at, even despite having PA. Tanks are a definite must to have if you wish to assault across, and only in doing so can you actually break the defenders of the trench. It is a brutal brutal table, that, IMHO, is not really meant for beginners to play. The system, while simple, does illustrate the warfare pretty well, granted you can't cut down troves of infantry using 2 machine gun nests along the sides, but the idea is close... Hmmm... what I mean as a lower level is more like a double tier board. A trench table is essentially a board with lines/trenches dug into it, which is almost like a lower level, but not a very large at that... its almost just 1.5 levels. One can almost 'ignore' the trench lines themselves if the trench lines are not obvious. Having large dug in areas, which vehicles such as artillery can hunker down in, or places where dreads can get cover in, can offer better combat ground for the game, kinda like having a double level board. Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/245920-new-terrain-table/#findComment-2977153 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jerre Posted January 26, 2012 Author Share Posted January 26, 2012 Mmm... well, apologies on the erm, late reply... In terms of the mix, its just a random mix of PVA, sand and paint. The key thing is to balance the medium (i added gel medium in too, to give it some body) and sand. The paint is just there for colour. Not too watery and not to thick, or the sand becomes difficult to apply. Can you give some additional info about the gel medium? From playing experience, you may want to start thinking of making it playably fun, or narratively playable. Having narrow trenches are nice and realistic but the restrictions placed may cause you to actually not always use the trench as it can be inconvenient at times to play in. My goal was to make my trench compatible with GW's 6 tile system, so it can be swapped around a bit, making it a lil less limited in config, but it is still difficult to play in. The FW trench set is insanely expensive and while has a nice feel to it, it did create may constraints that I had to consider when building it. I couldnt really put in large gun emplacements, or have anywhere to put say, heavy weapon teams etc. , so while I understand his point, if I were to make another trench, I would have to kindly disagree with Ensis Ferrae and make one that can function both as a trench and as something that can act as a 'lower level' of sorts. For the moment I am looking at the design more from a gaming angle: where can I place models, where can I place terrain, will the models fit, do I have enough cover, can vehicles make it across on multiple routes, is it suited for every deployment type, is no one side or board configuration unbalanced, ... . The rules we will be using for it is another matter. Even if I make the trenches wide enough for an APC to fit in, that doesn't mean we can't have a rule that says they can't deploy or move into the trenches. That's just something you agree upon with your opponent before the battle. I am also looking at the trenches as a lower level of the board, just with restrictions on what units can use it. But I might take this a step further and drop the edges of the board so that the whole board resembles a massive hill that has trenches dug into it. That would give vehicles on all sides of the hill cover as well. Something to think about ... Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/245920-new-terrain-table/#findComment-2977512 Share on other sites More sharing options...
madscuzzy Posted January 28, 2012 Share Posted January 28, 2012 Gel medium is just one of those other mediums available in the art stores... Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/245920-new-terrain-table/#findComment-2979714 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jerre Posted January 31, 2012 Author Share Posted January 31, 2012 I went to a local hardware store yesterday evening and had a look around for anything that could be used for the project. I was looking at the section about wall fillers and that does seem the best thing they have to add to the paint/sand/glue mix. I won't try to overdo it, but I just want it to be a bit thicker than just paint with sand. If I were to make both the walls of the trenches and the floors with wood, I believe it would be too much of the same material, especially since I am going to make the trenches really wide. So yesterday I had a look around for some other materials to use and my eye fell on some plastics that are used in these parts to fill in fences (for privacy purposes). The smallest pack they had were 5 cm wide and one meter long and I think you get 25 or more of them for 15 euros. The 5cm width would make them excellent for walls. They are not straight (width-wise) but have a few ribbles in them, giving it a bit of texture. I could spray paint them metal, slap on a wash and maybe some rust pigments to get a simple and fast system. I don't know how easy it will be to cut them up but since it's plastic and it's not that thick, I think I should be able to manage. For those that don't know what I am talking about, here's a picture ... http://img18.imageshack.us/img18/201/fencee.jpg If I would be using this, I would cover the floor of the trenches with the same mix as the rest of the board and push in the wooden pieces (maybe prepaint them as well?). Any thoughts on this? Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/245920-new-terrain-table/#findComment-2981826 Share on other sites More sharing options...
madscuzzy Posted February 1, 2012 Share Posted February 1, 2012 Id say give it a try... bit by bit... Ive not worked with that material so I can't really say if it will work. One thing about terrain though, is to take note of scale... for it to look right, it needs to work with the models, not just us...:lol: Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/245920-new-terrain-table/#findComment-2982992 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jerre Posted February 7, 2012 Author Share Posted February 7, 2012 I watched this review by GirlPainting yesterday : This might be what I am looking for. Especially since it has a color allready so no need to add paint and experiment with ratios. It's also available (made by?) a firm in the Netherlands, so that would make shipping and taxes easy for me. Any thoughts on this? Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/245920-new-terrain-table/#findComment-2987296 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jerre Posted February 9, 2012 Author Share Posted February 9, 2012 In stead of going all out and do the table right away, I am considering doing a smaller project first so I get to test all these materials. One of our 40k players has his painted imperial guard army set in a display case in our FLGS. I might make a trenches display board that fits in the display case for his army. Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/245920-new-terrain-table/#findComment-2988886 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jerre Posted February 9, 2012 Author Share Posted February 9, 2012 I got my hands on some materials and have taken a look at the scale of it, using one of my marine minis. The first pic shows the popsicle sticks that I want to use for the "floor" of the trenches. Keep in mind that I will be putting some terrain paste and press these in so I will not just glue them like this to the foam. These are cut at about the width of the trenches that I will be going for. http://img221.imageshack.us/img221/2702/dsc02702xu.jpg I was told that these were going to be too wide for scale purposes, so I cut one in half to show the difference. It might be true that the half width ones are more to scale but with the width of the trenches, I think these will be too long for it. They look flimsy and not sturdy, which is more what I am looking for. http://img267.imageshack.us/img267/1688/dsc02704fv.jpg I also got a hold of a piece of the green plastic that I mentioned before. These are just short of 5 cm. Taking into account that I will put the terrain paste and the wooden sticks on the bottom, I think this will be the right height to get just to the top of 5cm high foam. They are not flat so this will have some depth when I paint it. I still need to decide what I will use at intervals as a vertical piece to break this up (and also at corners). I could use plasticcard for this? http://img860.imageshack.us/img860/6367/dsc02706t.jpg I was also planning to make some areas that are even wider in the trenches but that are at a higher level so the minis can look over it and shoot out of the trenches. I made two shots at different heights. I favor the first one the most but I fear some models that are low on their bases (kneeling marine, IG heavy weapons team, ...) might not be able to look over the edge unless I go for the second height. http://img535.imageshack.us/img535/9602/dsc02708q.jpg http://img834.imageshack.us/img834/5210/dsc02710xh.jpg I am looking for some constructive critisism so don't hold back :angry: Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/245920-new-terrain-table/#findComment-2989224 Share on other sites More sharing options...
hendrik Posted February 10, 2012 Share Posted February 10, 2012 wood seems like a material far to precious/unwieldy in the universe of 40K, I would asume by then should they start trench warfare it did be something more industrialised. i also recommend getting the imperial armour book with the death corps of krieg in it, i'm sure you'll find a lot of ideas in it Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/245920-new-terrain-table/#findComment-2989866 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jerre Posted February 12, 2012 Author Share Posted February 12, 2012 I got hold of the blue foam this weekend for the trenches test project. I had made some stencils last week so I could play a bit with it the location of the trenches on the board. I ended with the following ... http://img829.imageshack.us/img829/2338/dsc02761u.jpg Since this will be a display, I opted to start the trenches next to the board edge. So the viewer gets to see into the trenches from the side. Behind the trenches, there's more than enough room for the IG player's tranports and tanks. And up front, he can even place some extra infantry if they don't all fit in the trenches. I will also include an elevated firing position, so I get to try out all the things I want on my final trenches game board. I also ordered some of the ultrabase terrain paste, so I can try that out as well. Any thoughts on the layout of the trenches for the display is welcome! Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/245920-new-terrain-table/#findComment-2991080 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jerre Posted February 12, 2012 Author Share Posted February 12, 2012 wood seems like a material far to precious/unwieldy in the universe of 40K, I would asume by then should they start trench warfare it did be something more industrialised.i also recommend getting the imperial armour book with the death corps of krieg in it, i'm sure you'll find a lot of ideas in it Maybe, but for me, it wouldn't look right if there was no wood involved :tu: Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/245920-new-terrain-table/#findComment-2991083 Share on other sites More sharing options...
madscuzzy Posted February 15, 2012 Share Posted February 15, 2012 I guess depending on the theme you have, wood may be acceptable. Note that on some worlds, wood can be stronger than many metals too, so a sturdy wood may be able to be used as basing. another thing you can do is to use them as metal planks, if you are able to avoid the grain textures that wood usually has. The FW trenches are pre-fab, which looks great on a full 40k table, but admittingly, does feel a bit strange if used with say, other game systems. I am primarily 40k, so I am cool with it. A wood one may work with say fantasy, or LOTR. Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/245920-new-terrain-table/#findComment-2993468 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jerre Posted April 7, 2012 Author Share Posted April 7, 2012 Now that my display board for my wolves is done, I'm going to devote some time on his project. First of all, a picture of the result of some tests I did. The green plastic used here was recovered from the garden and was severly warped which made it impossible to allign it properly to the foam. But I have since bought some new pieces, so the final result will be much cleaner. http://img208.imageshack.us/img208/2069/dsc03727w.jpg I mainly learned that the glue I intended to use wasn't ok, but I have now switched to something else that does work. But I will be using all the materials that are on this picture. The colored paste that I bought to texture (and color) the board, is sticky enough that when I press in the wood pieces, they hold on to the board. Next up, I cut out the trenches into the display board that I will use as a test for my game board. http://img21.imageshack.us/img21/1127/dsc03721c.jpg For the wooden 'floor' of the trenches, I intend to paint these up front and then press them into the base so I do not need to paint it on the board. To make it easy on myself (I hope) I have glued these to a piece of paper. http://img546.imageshack.us/img546/9555/dsc03725k.jpg I now intend to airbrush these (undercoat and basecoat) and then drybrush them. I used a weak glue so I hope They still come off from the sheet of paper without too much hassle. http://img401.imageshack.us/img401/6691/dsc03724r.jpg This afternoon, I also started to work on a test piece for the 'walls' of the trenches. I bought some H-shaped plasticcard yesterday. I cut these up and placed the pieces of green plastic in between. This will break it up a bit and give me some edges to higlight. http://img269.imageshack.us/img269/7758/dsc03733h.jpg http://img824.imageshack.us/img824/1580/dsc03731n.jpg I do not intend to glue the pieces of 'wall' foam to the 'floor' foam until finaly assembly. This will allow me to airbrush and drybrush the wall sections without chance of messing up the floor sections. Afterwards I will only need to apply the texturing paste to the top level. Everything needs to dry now and then I can take out the airbrush and start applying some color. Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/245920-new-terrain-table/#findComment-3034201 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jerre Posted April 8, 2012 Author Share Posted April 8, 2012 I got the airbrush out today and put some color on my test pieces. I first undercoated both pieces with the vallejo black primer. http://img141.imageshack.us/img141/9969/dsc03737l.jpg http://img4.imageshack.us/img4/7744/dsc03738gh.jpg http://img196.imageshack.us/img196/5457/dsc03741sx.jpg After it dried, I airbrushed the wooden parts with vallejo model air dark earth. http://img571.imageshack.us/img571/1556/dsc03742g.jpg The wall section was airbrushed with vallejo model air rust. http://img813.imageshack.us/img813/7326/dsc03745y.jpg Next up will be some drybrushing and maybe a wash. Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/245920-new-terrain-table/#findComment-3034759 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Warsmith Aznable Posted April 8, 2012 Share Posted April 8, 2012 Very nice, so far! Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/245920-new-terrain-table/#findComment-3034867 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jerre Posted April 9, 2012 Author Share Posted April 9, 2012 I made some more progress on the trenches test display today. http://img96.imageshack.us/img96/5295/dsc03775ge.jpg I drybrushed the wooden floor section with khemri brown. It gives a slight highlight but the wooden pieces are too flat to pick up a lot of paint. I'll try to roughen up the next batch with a iron brush or something similar. http://img716.imageshack.us/img716/4677/dsc03781u.jpg The wall sections got a drybrush of a mix of boltgun metal and tin bitz. I then applied a liberal wash of deval mud for a weathering effect. I also started to work on another wall section. I finished the "gun emplacement" section where the models will be able to stand and have line of sight out of the trenches. http://img269.imageshack.us/img269/6476/dsc03784zp.jpg http://img826.imageshack.us/img826/2550/dsc03786k.jpg I'm going to let this dry overnight before I continue with the rest. I propably don't have enough of the H-shaped plasticcard so I'll have to go shopping for those before I will be able to finish them. It looks like the floor sections will peal off the paper without problem so I can now start on doing the same for the other floor sections. With all the techniques sorted out, I don't expect it will be much work to finish the test display piece. Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/245920-new-terrain-table/#findComment-3035559 Share on other sites More sharing options...
hendrik Posted April 9, 2012 Share Posted April 9, 2012 i like the process so far! Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/245920-new-terrain-table/#findComment-3035665 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jerre Posted April 10, 2012 Author Share Posted April 10, 2012 I made some more progress today. I added the colored textured paste on the surface of the part that was already painted. I don't know if I am going to leave it like this or add a wash and a drybrush. http://img444.imageshack.us/img444/9804/dsc03790bl.jpg I also finished making the walls sections. After this is dry, I can start painting ... http://img441.imageshack.us/img441/9843/dsc03793nx.jpg Link to comment https://bolterandchainsword.com/topic/245920-new-terrain-table/#findComment-3036464 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.