In 21 days I’ll have a house, a dedicated painting area and room to set up a large 4x6ft, or larger, table. This means that I can now, after many years of resisting, start thinking about terrain.
In my current dwelling, a 650 sqft apartment, there just isn’t room to store a collection of terrain. I played at it for a while. I had a few hills, a few trees and a couple of bits and bobs. In a pinch, it worked. However, it just wasn’t good enough and what little there was took up way too much space. Living in a small space teaches you to prioritize and really think about what’s important and what is an unnecessary indulgence. I hope I remember what I learned in the new place. I still don’t have unlimited space and don’t want to abuse what I do have.
Two things make wargames look as good as they do, painted miniatures and quality terrain. There is an undeniable awe-factor to the beautiful spreads to be seen in magazines, online, or for the very lucky, at conventions or a friend’s basement. If you have one in your own basement you don’t need to hear my theories on what makes a good terrain setup, because you already know. Please, any hints, advice, or links would be well appreciated in the comments section. I am still in the planning stage so will listen to any suggestions, even if they seem to contradict what I’m about to say.
The first stage of planning is to figure out what my needs, wants and limitations are. I will have a largish room for painting, modeling and storage. Games will be played in an adjacent room, so all pieces must fit through a standard door. I want everything to fit on a shelf or in a box on a shelf. I’m not looking to spend a lot of money, but don’t mind investing over time. I also don’t want to spend a long time getting something playable going.
As for my wants. Most importantly, I want the terrain to look good. I spend a lot of time painting even rank and file troops and I don’t want them to be swallowed by a mis-matched and scruffy set of scenery. Next on my list of important wants is that I want the terrain to be practical. No sand-tables or model-railway layouts. I don’t, however, mind crafting support pieces that will prop-up top-heavy miniatures on slanted surfaces. Finally, I want it to be versatile. I wouldn’t mind a fully sculpted set of terrain, at least as far as hills, roads and rivers go, as long as it can be packed up and I have enough storage for a couple of sets. I don’t need a 2″ hex set that will allow me to re-create any battlefield imaginable.
Another important consideration is time and money. In a perfect world I would have a good looking, workable setup to start with, followed with a slowly collected advanced setup. If my perfect terrain setup takes a couple of years to build, so be it, as long as I have something that looks good in the meantime.
There’s no need to re-invent the wheel and there are a few terrain concepts that I’ve seen elsewhere that really appeal to me. I really like rolling terrain, whether from a good hex-based modular setup or a good groundcloth covering filler for hills. If I stuck with my original plan from way back in time where I only gamed in 6-10mm, just painting 28mm for fun (curse you David Imrie and your beautifully paint 28mm units) a good set of rolling terrain would look wonderful and the small miniatures would have no problem staying upright compared to their top-heavy 28mm bigger brothers.
I also like when forests are created by placing individually based trees or clumps of trees on a dark piece of cloth so that troops can move through the forest easily by pushing the trees around while the cloth clearly shows where the forest begins and ends. The same concept can be used for all manner of dense terrain such as rock-fields, heavy brush, bog and fields, where whatever crops are present as based in squares to be removed as troops pass through.
There are also some things I’d really like to avoid. My biggest pet peeve in terrain setups is when hills don’t match the ground either texturally or in colouration. The same goes for the bases of trees and other features where the ground should match but obviously doesn’t. If you are flocking your ground it is an easy thing to flock the hills with the same material. On the other hand, a groundcloth can be hard to match with flock. Even when gamers sprinkle flock and clump foliage over their mats it still doesn’t look right.
I also don’t like felt. Unless it is painted the solid colour stands out. Unless it is re-textured, it always looks like felt. Finally, the edges are thick and often curl, creating an unsightly transition between felt and table. If anyone has suggestions on how to deal with these problems I’d love to hear them. As I already mentioned, I like loose trees on something like felt or cloth as a functional piece of terrain. It just doesn’t always look the best.
I was out tonight watching some games of Warmachine/Hordes at the local store. There’s a decent amount of terrain for 40K, but the players were needing very specific terrain for the scenario. The players were forced to improvise with paper, napkins, poker chips and masking tape. While it look as good as it sounds the masking tape gave me a good idea. Mark the positions of terrain with masking tape, much like an actor’s marks on set. Just lay down an X centered under a piece of terrain so that if it is moved it can easily be replaced in the same position.
I have some rather poor pictures taken on my cellphone from tonight which I will post up the my next blog entry. Until then.
Tyler
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