Thursday 14 January 2021

Lockdown 2.0 Project Log Day 20: Terrain Making

 Hi!

I'm busily rummaging out some suitably old school bits and bobs to put together some cheap and cheerful scenery for my sci-fi projects.

As a handy reference, I'm using How to Build Wargames Terrain, the old GW book that came out during the height of the Red Period of Citadel and it's full of simple projects using easily obtainable materials and is a fantastic source of inspiration.

I'm a huge fan of the old 2nd edition scenery for 40k and whilst the projects featured in the book are towards the simple end of the spectrum, they look like great fun for a lockdown side project that only requires household supplies, packaging materials and some green flock.

If, by the end of the lockdown I have a decent selection of cheaply made scenery, all the better!


I've got the first piece almost finished and will get photos of it tomorrow once I have the base finished and will post my progress with the rest here but one of the things I like about the book is it encourages you to make stuff yourself rather than just buying plastic scenery and shows to some extent how much GW has changed over the years.


Another thing I like is that it's got some very modest suggestions for a good battlefield set up to get folks going, namely A Gently Sloping Hill, A Wood, A section of River, Stream, Crevasse or Ravine, An Area of Difficult Ground, Buildings and Ruins, An Area of Very Difficult Ground.

I hope to make all these odds and ends and the obligatory spiky cactus too and I'm also using lots of old pictures of GW's rather fantastic setups as inspiration as well!

Its going to be an interesting process as I've never had a green battlefield before but I am thinking of setting the campaign in an overgrown frontier world which has traces of lost civilisation as well as abandoned settlements and the odd carnivorous plant too.

I think I do need to purchase some pre-cut mdf for bases but otherwise, I'm fairly sure I have nearly everything I need in my flat at the moment so watch this space!

All the best!

8 comments:

  1. Cool, good to see that you've been hard at work. I've got what seems to be a later version of the same book - mine's blue and must be more recent as it includes some plastic Brettonians. If anything defines old-school terrain it's got to be those ork buildings and the cocktail-stick space cactii!

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    1. I really need to pick up a copy of that one too as they're really handy guides to terrain making for wargaming which combine simplicity of construction with a good finish and making them usable in a game!

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  2. That book was such an inspiration to me.

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    1. It's super handy! I didn't have a copy of it back in the day but it's a really good resource!

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  3. Love that terrain, as 2nd was where I started. My first two armies are all based green because of it. I’ve been collecting some odds and ends plastic containers for terrain making. Maybe I’ll join you once I get some of these squads done.

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    1. Go for it!

      I really need to try and get some more troops painted too!

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  4. Hi! I'm looking forward to seeing your terrain pieces. Is the second picture from the GW book about making terrain? Cheers, Karl

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    1. I think so! If not, its from the Ork Armybook!

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