The city of Gath, Reinforced Ruins +2019-03-24-

[ST.Lazarus]

Then they burned the houses of imperial faithful and broke down the walls of Hive Gath, and burned all its fortified buildings with fire and destroyed all its valuable articles...

- Last astro telepathic message received from the Betania sub sector

 

 

So in a fit of madness I have decided to redo my 8*4 cityfight table with a goal of learning to use modern materials and solutions to rid my self of the classical problems that pop up when making terrain.

 

The issues I have had before that I want to minimize or eliminate is;

 

- Warping of mdf bases

- Time spent on each piece

- Durability

- Cost

- Painting

- Getting realistic looking terrain that is also playable 

 

Yesterday and this morning I got some work done on the first test ruin, what is left is to paint it and put down another layer of adhesive. So far the new way of doing things is working out really well. instead of using spackle I have been using a homemade variant of Lukes aps modeling compound and that alone has provided a much more durable base but also saved something like 2-3 hours in construction time.

 

The rubble is homemade using casting plaster and instead of small rocks I have been using cork. When I left home today it was still drying but the rubble was already hard enough to stand up to the rigors of wargaming.  

 

[Jolemai]

Will keep an eye on this for ideas (as my own plog has ran out of steam/time of late).

• Are the pillar supports just sprayed white or are they a different material?
• What are you using the separate the floors?

[ST.Lazarus]

Parts of my old city was already painted and as I pulled the houses from their old mdf bases a bunch of pieces came loose, and as I'm reassembling them I don't bother to find the "correct" parts instead just using the first that I find.

 

The floors are separated by wooden "toffe Apple" sticks to give the buildings better proportions, the floors and inner walls are made using foamboard. 

[Pearson73]

That's a really solid start, I'll be watching this keenly.

[Elzender]

This first building is already looking amazing, I will definitely keep an eye on this thread.

[GrandMagnus]

Awesome, I'll ned to keep up with this to get some inspiration.

[ST.Lazarus]

+++ INCOMING DISTRESS HAIL +++

This is Victor Ledning, ship-master on recon destroyer

HIMS ULVEN

+++

we have been hit by heavy (STATIC) planetside anti ship ordnance, all men are to abandon ship.

+++ 

(KLAXON) my command staff will leave on Aquila lander 065-555 carrying vital information (static),

my one regret is that I have but on life to give to the emp..... 

+++ SIGNAL LOST +++

 

 

[War Angel]

Oh I'm following this. How did you make the bases that you put that lander on? I was thinking of doing something like this but I don't have the ship. Unless.... did that come wth black reach?

[Gederas]

Oh I'm following this. How did you make the bases that you put that lander on? I was thinking of doing something like this but I don't have the ship. Unless.... did that come wth black reach?

Iirc, yes. It did come with Assault on Black Reach

[FlamingDeth]

No, black reach didn't come with any terrain. The crashed Aquila came with the one before that.

[ST.Lazarus]

Oh I'm following this. How did you make the bases that you put that lander on? I was thinking of doing something like this but I don't have the ship. Unless.... did that come wth black reach?

 

The base is made of extruded pvc (Foamex/foamalux) that is then covered in homemade sculptamold. The aquilla lander is from the 4th ed starter set Battle for Macragge.

[ST.Lazarus]

 

Another ruin, this one will be fortified with supplies and sandbags when the adhesiv has dried. 

[Bjorn Firewalker]

Impressive work.

[MagicMan]

Looking amazing so far. Love a terrain blog.

[Sherrypie]

Very impressive work, the amount of plaster and rubble lathered everywhere really makes it feel more like a real ruin instead of just a piece of terrain for a game. Keen to see how they improve with details when you get that far.

[Tallarn Commander]

Wow! This looks like it's straight out of WW2 Stalingrad or Kkarkov!

 

Using the foam solid 1st floor is a great idea. I think I'll have to steal it. :)

[Ryltar Thamior]

Some very cool looking efforts there; good to see some classic 4th ed stuff like the old CoD building parts in use as well

[ST.Lazarus]

Thanks for the kind words! I imagine Gath as a bit of a mix of crusader era Jerusalem, a massive cathedral and a Stalingrad like battle that has been going on for 30+ years.

I finished up a test crater today, the photo is a bit horrible because the lightning in my work spaces is really bad during the evening so it might be a bit hard to see that the terrain is only painted using spraycans and washes.

[Bjorn Firewalker]

The shell crater looks great!

[Johanhgg]

Nice work! Really nice! Looking forward to see more!

[ST.Lazarus]

Decided to finish the first ruin piece yesterday so I could try out some painting techniques before i move on. The pictures is a bit washed out so I will try to get better ones during the week.

It's painted using different spray cans and washes except for details like the decoration around the door, fire damage and the Aquilla wing. The base colour is a dark ochre, followed by a heavy cream and then topped of with a off white dusting. It then gets washed with watered down sepia wash, after this stage I do all the hand painted details. After it all has dried I put down a final layer of home ground material, using my three mixes of light beige, marble white and a light brown sealing it in with watered down pva all over.

[ST.Lazarus]

More parts of the aquilla lander, been playing around with the basing material and i think that my darker shade has gotten to light, as the shades changes when adding the adhesive i been worried about it either getting to light or too dark. more experimentation is needed. 

[Bjorn Firewalker]

Excellent work on the crashed Aquila.

[Pearson73]

Continuing to produce some good work and at a fast rate of production too.

 

I think bringing some more darkness into the shades will help add some definition.

[ST.Lazarus]

The reinforced ruins are now finished, I used the greenstuff world flexible sandbags and I think they turned out great. I been playing around with the base mix and have a thought on how to get in some more darker variations, will try to get up a test piece during the week.