Sunday, January 22, 2017

New Year, New Gaming Board!

Part of my 2017 New Year's "Gaming Resolution" was to "up my game" with terrain solutions and what better way than to start with the gaming table?  After reading through some posts on "Steven's Balagan" about ground cover, basing, and flocking, I decided to go with roughly the same formula he has on his "parched" gameboard.  If you follow the link you can follow the formula I used, which was an earth color, followed by a dark sand, and highlighted with a pale sand.

I glued the crap out of the flocked board, effectively hardening and sealing the flock.


 Next, I painted it in an earth tone I had mixed at "Home Depot" here in the USA.  This matches, almost exactly, the Tamiya Flat Earth XF-52.

Board let to dry
 I started experimenting while the board dried to see if I wanted to use a lighter shade or darker shade for the drybrushing work.

 Remember too that this will also be used for all of my infantry bases, terrain bases for trees and hedges, and basically any other piece of terrain I make.

Experiment with both shades of dark sand.



COMMENCE DRY BRUSHING OPERATIONS!
 The drybrushing went well but I have to admit, it scared the crap out of me.  The whole board looked like a desert wasteland or another planet.  Not much like the Mediterranean or central Russia in summer.

15mm Sci Fi trooper 

starting to add flock.  I still need to "soften" the edges up on the grassy parts.
 As the table started to take shape, I put some ground troops on the table.  Dave stopped by to say hi, and I broke out some Naps for picture-taking opportunities!  Admittedly, since I worked most of the weekend, I hadn't planned on gaming but the table was crying out to have some pictures with troops on it!

British Rifles!

 Once the grass flock was added, it assuaged my fears completely about the desert look.  The parched look I was hoping for was achieved!

Dutch standing in for Portuguese

French columns - I love how the bright table brings out the color of the miniatures.  I feel as if my board was too dark.


The board color also brings out the terrain details nicely and I feel as if the terrain and buildings stand out so much more now. 




So I still need to "lighten" the edges of the grassy areas up but lightly adding more flock, as well as sealing the flock in with more pva.

16 comments:

  1. Really nice outcome Steve! Great stuff mate!
    May the rest of your 2017 resolutions be similarly successful :-)

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    1. Thanks Paul! Heres hoping so although life has been intervening alot lately thats for sure.

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    1. Thanks Ken! You will need to come over and game on it now. I need to add more flock but the dry brushing really got the look i was going for.

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  3. You left it on a cliffhanger, SW! "Sealing the WHAT?"

    Nice table - it looks really good. Maybe one of these days I'll have a permanent game table setup and can to the same. Until then, I'm a "door man."

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    1. Thanks for the heads up Ski! I went in via my phone and uodated the post :)
      It's gonna look better when I put more of the flock on. Hey nothing wrong with dining room table or door and sawhorse gaming!!!

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  4. Wow, that looks incredible! I need a good desert Mat, and a winter one. I'll have to dig into this, see if I can pull off something similar.

    V/R,
    Jack

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    1. Thanks Jack! I still need to add some flock to it to make it less desert and a little bit further north and east.

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  5. Huge project, it looks quite nice. Reminds me of terrain in WWII Italy, or ancient Carthage.

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  6. It's epic looking mate!
    It really looks the part. Well done.

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    1. Thank you Darren! Its a work in progress so watch this space.

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  7. Bravo Zulu Steven.

    That looks the cats pajamas's mate. I am really impressed with this...And jealous.

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    1. Thanks Paul! I had to order more flock as i ran out. Need to move the location a bit further north and east!

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  8. It looks great so far! It's just the backdrop I imagine for the Peninsular War :D

    I've been thinking about making a terrain mat lately, but I don't know if I game enough to justify it!

    Best of luck with the rest of your resolutions!

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    1. Thanks Ben. I really just wanted to "up my game" when it came to terrain and putting these things on the table. My table had a "blah" factor going on. I love the look of textured tables.

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