From MilesR: Real Estate (1,075 Points)

I've been absent from the Challenge for a good part of this year dues to pesky "real-life" stuff but have been working in the background and finally have a few projects that are ready to post.  Lets start with the terrain one:

It's often said that the only tangible form of investing is real estate.  To some degree I support that idea and have carried it over to my wargaming hobby.  I present to you the first 15 of a planned 30 2x2 ft terrain panels that will become the basis of all my future gaming both at home and at conventions.

I have some 2x4 ft panels which are just too big to transport and also some 1x1's which are two small (but both will work with these).  I went with a 2 ft x 2ft by 1 inch high design as it gives enough depth for depressions like rivers and trenches but still stores easily and each panel is light weight.

It's the Goldilocks principal applied to gaming.

There are 11 flat panels, 4 river and some shore lines completed so far.

I'm really very pleased with how the rivers came out, especially given all four river sections are complete rebuilds after the "pink resin disaster"

I'll add some details on how the rivers were made below.  The water coloring is based on mixing white, green, brown and black craft paint in four different blends and then blurring the edges.

One river has a built in ford section.  These panels will work with miniatures of any scale.

Hey wait a minute.  There are only 8 panels shown in the pictures.  How do you know that I'm not pulling a fast one here?  I'm not, it's just my table is only 8x4 feet.

Proof of the other 7 panels?

Here you go, there are 7 additional flat panels that have been completed to date

A shot with all the panels in the picture - they add up to 15.

I'll also made 3, 2ft x 8 inch shore line panels.  I need a few more but theses panels will allow me to use a nice cloth for a large body of water of beach landing.

These panels will see their first use at Cold Wars when I'll be running my "Sink The Tennessee!" ACW skirmish game.

 Construction is simple - the base is a 1/4 inch sheet of MDF cut to 23.5x23.5 inches.  A frame of 1/4 inch plywood that's been cut into 1 inch strips is then attached around it.

The interior of the frame is filled with 3/4 inch extruded polystyrene foam and then covered with a flexible pre-mixed tile grout.  I used a full gallon bucket on the project and it was very nice that it came pre-colored as "earth"

After the tile grout set (about 12 hours) it forms a rock hard covering which has a nice "pebbly texture.

Add ground foam and some other details and boom the panel is done.

The ground foam is fixed in place by using a layer of undiluted matte medium.  Once that's down the ground foam is added - is 4-5 different types and the wet the foam by spraying it with some water and finally adding a additional layer of dilutes matte medium (roughly a 50/50 mix with water).

I prefer Matt medium as a fixative since it never yellows like some PVA glues can.

My high tech river painting pallet - a styrofoam plate.  Yup it doesn't get better than that.

The waves in the river were made by laying down some toilet paper and soaking in diluted PVA glue.  You can then push the resulting mush to form waves.  I'll do some more detailed how-to posts on my blog.

The foam rocks are primed with a 50/50 mix of black paint and Matt medium which makes them very durable and easy to paint ip.

Let see for points, there are 15 full size panels and the three shore line sum up to a panel as there are each 8' inches wide and were all cut from the same price of MDF,  lets go with 16 total panels.

In terms of points, well we need to do some math (yipeeee!!!)

1) 24 x 24 x1 = 576 cubic inches per panel

2) 576 x 16 panels = 9,216 cubic inches in total

3) Each 6x6x6 terrain cube = 216 cubic inches

4) 9,216 divided by 216 = 42.67 cubes

5) 42.67 x 20 = 853 points

While I want to build another 15 panels, I think these may be it for this year's Challenge.  Oh, there's some other terrain items nearing completion.  Large scenery projects often become very complicated and sometimes you just can't see the forest for the trees...

STOP THE PRESSES!!!!!!

We need to add some trees and a cabin to this post and keep this submission all terrain related.  A few years ago, I made some tree stands which were, ummm shall we say bad.  It was a rush job for a convention game and I've always been a bit self-conscious about them.  The design concept worked but the execution was well you see in a bit.   I've always wanted to re-do them and decided to do so this week so I cut some new MDF bases, pried the trees and other details off and got to work - the results are:

Here they are - 14 "tree Plates" (11 deciduous and 3 conifers).  They're all squished together for the photo but can cover a 6x4 table well (if you wanted it completely forested.

A close up shot with a 15mm scale French Infantry battalion.  These will work with both 15mm and 28mm scale figures.  Given what we're all used to with trees for 15mm scale figures they'll look a bit large but are actually (scale wise) more appropriate for 15's.  There's also enough room between the trees to move figures about.  The trick with any forrest set-up is to balance the visual appeal with playability.  The trees are removable to also facilitate play.

 Let's take a closer look - there are 7 different ground foliage types used on each base.  I really like the dried up leaves which add a nice color contrast to all the greens.  I also tried to darken the overall look by using an eye dropper to apply diluted brown ink in the ares roughly "under the trees"

 Some pines trees.  I was able to salvage a lot from the old "tree plates 1.0", including some of the scenic tufts.  I've found having small but vivid color changes like the flowers on the lower right draws a viewers eye away from some of the bland aspects of the stand like the cheap pine trees I used.

I also experimented with colored tile grout to use as dirt.  I still need to work on my skills.

A nice view of a river front somewhere in the American wilderness.

Also finished yesterday was a small cabin.  It's a resin kit from the old Architects of War line.  I've got one of just about every kit they made and they're just sitting around in unbuilt in their boxes.

A close up of the cabin.

Ok here's a comparison shot of tree plates 1.0 vs 2.0 - the first iteration of these plates was somewhat uninspired.  The design concept is simple.  I use woodland scenics premed trees which come with a plastic base and a tree with a peg that slots in.  I glue the bases down and leave the Rees detachable.  The detachable part if for storage and transport.  These trees take up about 1/3 of the space needed when stored as separate bases and trees in a big bag.

Terrain making is VERY messy.  I do have a lot of clean up work to do post challenge.

In terms of points, I'm using the following estimate

When squished together the trees occupy a foot print of 34x24 inches and are, on average 4 inches tall (some higher but there wasn't all that much effort expended on making trees).  Those dimensions equate to 3,264 cubic inches but there's a lot of air in there, so lets discount that by 30%.  So 3,264 times .7 = 2,285 cubic inches which converts into 10.5778 terrain "cubes" (at 216 cubic inches per cube)

10.5778 time 20 points per equals 211 points

The cabin is 4.5x4.5x5, so let's just add 10 points for that.

Thant brings this rather long and tedious post to a total of 1,074 points.

A note of apology, Some of you may notice that I have a bit of a points drop over the course of this weekend and may decide to bestow upon me the title of sandbagger.  It's a description that's likely deserved, but todays points bomb was not intended.  Life just got in the way as I had a number of business issues that required attention, mostly in the UK dealing with the unknowns of Brexit.  Some of these projects lingered longer than they should have.

On a personal note, as an American, I would like to thank the British, our most reliable of allies, for deciding to join us on the podium of Political Stupidity.  It's a bit less lonely there now but I do wish you had elected to show us a better example rather than emulate us in sympathy.

__________________________________________

Wow! Absolutely amazing work Miles. Your skills in developing brilliant terrain has been very inspiring to watch over the past few years and this is no exception. I really love the variation in textures and colours in your terrain boards. And those rivers! They are superb. PVA with toilet paper for sculpting waves? Now, how brilliant is that?! And then to top it off your redux tree bases are stunning as well. I especially like the assorted undergrowth you've put in for visual interest.

I redid the math and came out with an extra point so we'll run with that (besides, I HATES math). 

Okay folks, don't come out of your shelters yes, that's only the first of three entries from Miles today...

Curt