Frankly, 2020 has been a terrible day, week, month and year, especially in terms of my painting output. I just barely made the cull, and haven't really had much time, or desire, to touch the brushes. So, having took a few mental health days off, I tucked in to landing on Challenge Island.
One
of the many items in the hobbyhorde was a 3d printed sphinx I'd asked a
friend to print as an edifice for a New Kingdom Egyptian DBA army I'd
started. What's an edifice? In reasonably clear Barkerese (DBA 3.0, pg
7):
An
EDIFICE is an isolated large building, such as an Amerindian or other
pyramid, a pharos, a monastery, a temple or ruins. It has no economic
value, denizens or defensive value.It is treated only as BAD GOING,
except when it is being used as a CAMP.
Now, DBA puts some size restrictions on area terrain features, described in less clear Barkerese (DBA 3.0, pg 6):
Each
must fit in a rectangle of which the length plus the width totals no
more than 9BW [base width, usually 40mm for 15mm figures). Only one
feature can have a length (maximum dimension) of less than 3BW. Every
feature must have both a length and a width (maximum dimension at a
right angle to its length) of 1BW.
Reading this, I thought it would be a perfect entry for Awdry's Atoll. Prior to landing, it is always wise to consult the Challenge Island triptik, courtesy of the Snowlord and Associates Auto Club:
For
me the challenge, and laterally the bonus rounds was always about
having fun, often scratching a creative itch. Weaving a narrative
through an idea was always the goal and in order to best compose these
frivolities I would often start with a blank CD or DVD. Given the
geographical alliteration, Awdry's Atoll, I am proposing as my challenge
a Desert Island Disc! I would like to see all manner of creativeness,
command stands or even terrain pieces that start life with the humble CD
or DVD. (If proving difficult to obtain then any circular basing
material of a 120mm diameter will suffice.)
I started off by gluing it to the CD, after using some painter's tape to mask the hole. This doubles as proof it actually is a CD-ROM base:
Next, I glued the bottoms of four Woodland Scenics palm trees to the disc, followed by a LOT of ballast. Usually, I add the ballast after painting, since I usually ink and dry brush it. But, this time, I decided to try priming it, since I was using a colored primer. So, prior to priming, it looked like this:
Primer was Army Painter's Skeleton Bone. I've been experimenting with Games Workshop's contrast paints, and generally had good results with khakis. After that, I lightened the sphinx with Delta Ceramicoat Ivory, and dry brushed the base with Ivory and Ceramicoat Antique White. Then I hit the sphinx with Skeleton Horde contrast paint. After that, it was static grass, and then cutting a self-adhesive felt circle for the bottom. Easy peasy.
Not too bad for a few hours work, most of which were waiting for things to dry. On to calculating points with mathematical and statistical precision, as Miles is not the only statistician-challenger (as opposed to the statistically challenged).
Now, not counting the palm trees, since I didn't paint them, the sphinx is approximately 3" high, and 4.7" in diameter. This gives a conic volume of 17.34 cubic inches, or roughly 18 cubic inches since the sphinx is not a perfect cone. Since points for terrain are awarded by normalizing to a 6"x6"x6" cube (216 cubic inches), this is 0.08 of a 20-point cube equivalent, or roughly 2 points. Adding in 30 more for Awdry's Atoll, this gives me a whopping 32 points, and puts me just north of the 20% mark for the Challenge total.
From DaveD - Aaah our resident mathamagician will be impressed! In the words of Maximus "are you not entertained" . That's a fine creation you have there - I am going with 35 points with little mathematical logic , but a heap of creative emotion as I likes it! - that will fix him!
