Let's have a positive terrain thread.Post pics of cool tables and pieces, share tips and tricks, discuss your latest projects.
I got my son interested in wargaming so we also started doing terrain together. Made some cliffs from XPS plastic and I tried making some trees from flock and jute rope. I also took some old tin cans and sprayed them with a metal primer to make some gypsy solos for gaming boards. My next idea is to make more rock piles and craters for lighter scatter terrain.
And here are some of the cliffs we did.What are some best practices for making craters? I've seen guides for doing them from tin foil pie plates, others use chunks of XPS.
>>96697778Imo still one of the best beginner tutorials.
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>>96697769Duude, where do you live that it looks like you've taken those photos on my windowsill?
>>96697850Poland
Posting some cool stuffs.
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>>96697753Fuck yeah>>96697912I want to fight on your table scummer
>>96697753Is basing welcome here?
>>96699837I guess so.
How dare you bake my thread for me
I finally got around to finishing my fur battle mat. Bases occasionally don't stand straight and you can't roll dice on it, but it looks kinda neat.
Now for some inspirational stuff.Saved this one some time ago.
28mil Barrels from toilet paper rolls.This one is mine, pretty much sums up the whole process in one pic.
I really like toilet paper rolls as material.These look so real, I was asked if I was working on my car's muffler when I made these.The key is the rust effect paint job.Apply sand mixed with PVA in a random fashion, then undercoat black.Paint the whole thing silver, pick out the sandy parts by drybrushing, bring them up from a dark brown to a glowing orange, tone back down with lots of black wash, apply silver and orange drybrush again where it's needed.
These are super simple yet super messy.
>>96701922Also: >>96701922You can see some of the finished barrels from >>96701856 in teh last pic.
The good old spiky 40k 2nd ed. cacti can be pushed up to the next level with a nice paint job.
I make posters from cut outs from supermarket flyers.Mostly labels of booze bottles but also other cool looking stuff.
Picked this toy fire truck from the streets, I regularly go through bulky waste when there is some, lots of great finds.
I saw a "spider skeleton" in all the Halloween decoration stuff on sale at the moment and was really tempted to buy it to use as the basis of a terrain piece. The only problem is I think it's just a bit too big. I think a 30cm circle is about the max sized base I'd use for that kind of "flavour" terrain but the spider skeleton was about 40cm wide. I could maybe fold the legs up more or something but then I don't think it would look right as an old giant skeleton sitting in the middle of a wasteland.
Basic tips for making a better looking table1) Make coherent terrain, think about where your board takes place in, and place your pieces as if you were recreating a real place in the setting rather than an artificial paintball arena. A major issue that I see in bad terrain images is that players blindly take whatever terrain pieces they have available at the local shop terrain shelf and throw them all over the table with no coherency or theme. Avoid this at all costs. Do not put tree terrain on a volcano mat, do not put buildings on top the roads on your city mat. This should be self explanatory to anyone but unfortunately needs to be said still.2) Make hills for 2D mats environments that would realistically not be a flat surface. A city or village mat being flat works mostly fine, but if you're playing in a forest, desert, mars, etc. the flat board will look out of place and strange without some hills. Even making a few large platform hills to break up 30-50% of the table into elevated terrain can instantly improve the look of a neoprene or cloth mat tenfold. 3) Do not care about symmetry or competitive play layouts. Avoid these like the plague, they always look unrealistic and bad. If someone at your group insists on using these layouts then try to convince them otherwise, and if that fails, refuse to play with them. Foster a community where to get games in people need to put in effort to make the board look good. 4) Objectives. Objective markers are no different from any other terrain piece. Make sure they match the rest of the theme of the table. Come up with an idea of what the objective represents, why would the armies be fighting over them? Of course, avoid neoprene circle objectives at all costs.
>>96697753can you not make the terrain general AI? It looks like shit
Idk why he thought that was a good idea
>>96702006>never recognized the clear and deliberate fascist iconography that KFC has until now>he's even called "The Colonel"
>>967042145) Keep your gaming trinkets and tools off the table as much as possible. A board that is covered in dice, books, measuring tools, tokens, dice trays and your snacks will always instantly look worse to the eye. Obviously for some games you'll need tokens or dice to track status effects, but try to limit this as much as possible and remove them whenever they're no longer necessary. Investing in a side table or under-table shelf to put your books and tools on is a wise idea.6) Less can be more. You don't always need to make a cramped Mordheim or Necromunda style table for it to look good, making a nice table doesn't need to be expensive either. Something as basic as a grass mat with hills and trees, or a wasteland board with nothing but rocky outcrops and formations can be perfectly pleasing to look at if the colours match the board
>>96704273Wtf... That layout isn't even tournament legal
>>96704282>>96704221Bitch you too thursty.
>>96697753Nice table anon, care to share your techniques?
>>96700110>my threadPost proof of ownership or kys.
>trolling and shitposting in one of the nicest threads on here because you have nothing better to do in your lifeAnyway. I need to make some rocks.How the fuck do I make rocks like these traditionally? They look great but I'm not using 3d prints
>>96705855Like I'm talking about the natural faces and cracks and stuff
>>96705855I'd go with tree bark.You can get in the arts and crafts or on amazon.
>>96705865If they're made with foam, I'd get a few spikes/sculpting tools, then just press-draw the patterns into the foam like the stonework in >>96701826.As for how you'd make them realistic, for me it's looking up a shitload of photos of actual rocks and ruins until it clicks.
I recently got my hand on an unreasonable amount of styrofoam and was considering building a full table worth of modular labyrinth walls.But I'm wondering: is there any point of making these for wargames?Even for TTRPGs, honestly: you only have encounter in one room after another, do you really need to represent the corridors in between?It's too bad, I already built enough rock formation AND enough scifi buildings to fill an entire table and some more, I don't know what to do with this styrofoam.
>>96706554For wargames not really, but for dungeon crawlers it's great.I guess this goes for RPGs too.Pic is my WarhammerQuest setup.
>>96706554They are fun for small narrative wargames like Mordheim and Frostgrave
>>96706554Whatever you do, make sure to weigh the bases. Styrofoam walls are gonna fall over the moment someone looks at them funny.
i've finished a pair of old school ork houses, they were really fun to doto be honest i just made them because i found the material in the trasbin in front of my house, i dont play anything retroi have two more built and prepared to be paintedmaybe i will try gorkamorka with a friend just to use them as i dont have amything to use them with
and the other onei posted the first one some days ago on the /grog/ generalfor the ones that dont know, during 40k second edition ork houses looked like this
Shit I haven't been able to work on in almost a year. There's a whole pile of other cardboard buildings I've glued stuff to waiting for me to have a chance to prime again.
I have currently started on some terrain to purpose for multiple games I have been playing recently. I am following some guides and will post whenever I end up finishing them. They are a set of like 5 or so hills. Split between desert ones and woodland/greenland ones. Using cardboard so hopefully I don't fuck it up too much.
>>96710692Some buildings I've been working on this months, fully playable interiors and all scratch from wood and foam and card
>>96710706Oops forgot pic
>>96706853>>96706833Kino af
>>96706833>to be honest i just made them because i found the material in the trasbin in front of my house, i dont play anything retroWell they don't have to be "retro ork buildings". They could just be adobe buildings. I don't play historicals but I've always wanted to do a North African style table.
>>96697753the AI table for the general is gay. Don't do that again
I made this a few months ago. I haven't been able to work on it since, have had some health scares and doing some house work but im feeling better and the house work is done. Hopefully this weekend or next I'll be able to bang out some more stuff.
>>96712658Heres a side shot.
And here's the other side. I wanted to add bones and other bits but this was mostly a spure of the moment build and very little was planned ahead of time. I'll definitely go back and add some stuff though.
This was the last bit I did before I got sick. Planning on making a larger game board out of this one off terrain piece.
>>96712689that middle piece is pretty great. gonna be a cool board, anon
>make outline of toxic waste pool with scrap and nearly expired clay>realise this could have just been a few layers of scrap cardboardOh well, its fun to glue bits together, going to put filler in the holes soon then skim the whole thing. Still needs more toxic waste barrels.
Anybody got stuff that uses storm drains and gutters? Looking for a little inspiration for a future project.
>>96712658Where's the fingerblasting goth girls edit?>T4ARDthanks cap...
Here's everything I've managed to finish in 2025 (except one base for a large forest, but it's nothing more than a piece of MDF with sand and flock).
Nice stuff in here, I always like reading this thread.>>96706554I feel you, I got these 2 interlocking pieces that would be a great cityscape with a dungeon under it, but there isn't a game I know that plays on a table like that.
I recently finished these and am working on a bridge to go between them. Painted to imply a roof on both because I 'ate Van Saar bastards with lascannons up towers.>>96715858Excellent work anon, is that the house and dwarfen hold you posted wips of in /whfg/?
>>96706554>enough rock formation AND enough scifi buildings Could make some ziggurats, ruins and jungle themed table.
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>>96715858>>96717704>>96712658Good stuff, keep it up anons
I'm debating getting a hotwire table, like a proxxon or a hercules or something similar. Anyone got a recommendation, or tip on what to avoid, before I drop $150+?
>>96720216I have a few jungle scatters, but yeah I guess I could go for a good few more.A ziggurat could be really fun, especially if I make it a bit modular, but I was wondering:You can't really carve bricks or stones, in styrofoam. So you are stuck with solid shapes. It works ok with monoliths, rocks, or even concrete buildings, but for pre-modern stuff?Is it possible to cut it in little bricks and assemble them? Or should I just make the shape out of the foam and then cover it with air-drying clay which I can shape into looking like individual bricks?Maybe the best idea is to make it look like a neatly maintained ziggurat rather than a ruin, with its stucco exterior intact.I will try a few things
>>96715858Absolutely amazing lad, how did you do the rock face on the Dwarf Hold please?
Some cool terrain pics I saved over the years.
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>>96722323My dumb ass thought this was the Krusty Krab
>>96717704Oh it's the guy! With the kickass gang and the tiny midget dude.Love your stuff, you inspired me to choose Goliaths for my first gang.
>>96721176not that guy, but to me a well made jungle board has to feel claustrophobic without ruining the gameplay. it's wet, humid, anything brightly coloured kills you, and the jungle is eating everything around it.
>>96722332God damn that's pretty.
