"Winter/Polar/AntArctic/Frozen Scenery & Terrain" Topic

I broke down and ordered my first terrain/scenery bits: I'm building the first locale in my campaign, a "hardened" research station built into a giant, melting glacier: Ice Station Romeo.

To that end, I hereby solicit any and all advice on building winter, polar, arctic, antarctic, frozen, glacial, snowy, etc. scenery and terrain.

I'm working at 15mm (1/100-ish) size/scale, on a small (3' X 4') table using Force on Force and Tomorrow's War as my rulesets. Near Future/Post-Modern/Sci Fi/New Cold War motif.

For terrain bits, I went with Combat Wombat and Tim's Terrain turrets/bunkers/buildings and a couple ExoShelters. I'm going for a mostly dug-in, hardened, surprisingly well-protected "research" station-slash-secret weather weapon installation.

I may bolster the structures with some GameCraft TW stuff if and when I can afford it.

Any advice on ground cloth, base flocking, building treatments, fake snow drifts, etc. is well appreciated.

Pics of my foibles sure to follow.

8)

I'm working on winter terrain as well. I purchased a great many snow flocked trees at an after Christmas sale at Sears. I plan on purchasing a painters tarp from Menards (which is tan in color), and spray painting white over much of it – but leaving some patches the tan color as well. The tarp I have my eye on is 6' x 12', but there's other sizes as well. I'll drape the tarp over my regular hills. I already have dirt roads from WizardKraft that have some flocking, which should still look right even in a winter scene.

My plan is to create the battlefield for Eylau, 1807.

Grey and blue grey….

Overspray in pale blue white.

Highlight in pearl grey / white.

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white christmas tree wrap (the skirt to hide the stand. Mine has little flecks of glitter, and its wispy and white, makes a nice snowfield for small games.

Snow flock sprinkled on loose makes any base a snow base, and afterwards you shake it onto the groundcloth, then gather it for re-use.

Clouds of snow are quilt batting. I have a white sheet of felt under the fabric. Get the ground Styrofoam to sprinkle on it.
The river of ice is plastic for drop ceiling lights.

White glue mixed with cornstarch makes good ice

JLundburg, I love the aerosan snowstorm!

Awesome ideas, thanks.

What scale are those Aerosans? That race is amazing.

Those are 28mm from Company B
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Sorry it's that time of the year up here, "I Hate Snow"

But great ideas, Mmmmm maybe later this summer!

For a lot of snow terrain, if you have a heat gun or blow drier, you can simply take some of the cheap white insulation foam and use the heat to condense it into a rather hard and durable form. It even works well with rivers and similar.

Beasts of War did that with their snow board that they were showing off a few weeks back, and I did it for a few things with my undead army (Based them off of the Scourge from Warcraft).

I have info on my snow board here:

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And a 'how to' for a snow cloth here:

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:-)

I went with a white sheet.

Trees with snow on them add significantly to the overall effect, as do muddy roads with snow mixed in, and gray, frozen streams and rivers.

Yeah, I went with white fleece blanket that my wife picked up. Didn't want to get bogged down trying to create the "perfect" tabletop. Projects of mine have bogged down that way before.

I would suggest getting a hot knife to cut ice bergs or even crevasses in glaciers out of foam. They add a nice touch.

Phil

Haven't put it out to play, yet, but it's even cheaper to get fleece remnants at a fabric store. I've a bunch of near yard wide , about five foot long, I'll put down someday for fun in the snow.

When snow sounds like fun, in the summer. ;->=

Picked up some spray flock for more permanent base covering, but haven't tried it yet. Again, cheap-r-us; picked up at end of Xmas-season sale.

Doug

Magic Wash – Blue Tint, for any ice-based races/monsters needed. Here's a link to some Frost Giant figures, and some Winter Wolves I did up for a pending G2: Against the Frost Giant Jarl game, for this Summer.

Here is some information on how to make an Ice Bridge (Construction on top of page, photo's of a completed ice bridge located on the bottom of the page), as well as some ice spires/stalagmites (I've painted some white, with the blue wash -- no photo's yet, sorry).

I am also getting ready to paint some carved up foam insulation pieces for ice cavern terrain pieces. I'm waiting for warmer weather to get them painted, but here is the plan, sans pictures:

1) Carve out irregular terrain pieces, from a 4' x 8' piece of pink insulation foam, using a band saw (Done!);

2) Paint them white (200+ varied shaped pieces), using Ceiling White latex paint (Menards/DIY store), using a Wagner Power Painter (Harbor Freight sells a knock-off painter for ~$20, new; got my used Wagner, off e-Bay, for the same $$);

3) Apply Magic Wash -- Blue, to finish them, with a blue tint, and gloss, to give them the icy look.

4) Place the finished 'ice' pieces end-to-end, on top of a white sheet, with blue streaks added, to form passages through the 'glacier', in the patterns needed to form the ice dungeon layout;

5) Kill the PC's -- [ahem!], I mean, play the game…

Cheers!

Thanks again for the many ideas.

I'll be starting out fairly simply, so fleece remnants seems like a good idea.

I'll be playing this campaign for a long time, so I'll be referring back to this thread as the months go by, to keep adding to the terrain and scenery bits.

I ordered a few structures for Ice Station Romeo from various sources, we'll see how well they all go together (so far Combat Wombat/Tim's Terrain, Shapeways, and CorSecEng; I hope to add a bunch of GameCraft TW Structures for the Humans and possibly some Brigade 15mm turrets and bunkers).

I really appreciate the painting and materials tips and tricks, I'll be gaming this campaign/scenario for years to come.

Cheers. And don't stop with the cool ideas, demos, pics, blogs, etc.

I got hurt this year with major 2nd degree burns, while also doing some extensive home renovations, so my wargaming plans were delayed.
I found that spray paint on canvas doesn't work so well, therefore I'm considering making a real terrain mat with caulk, Woodland Scenics Snow, and a little sand. This has turned into a major project. Its times like these that I REALLY miss the Terrainguy, and his excellent mats…
Until then, I'll probably use white fleece.

You might be able to find some pre-frosted trees in Michael's or JoAnn Fabrics (or related hobby stores).

Otherwise, wait until the Christmas villages show up (or go on sale after Christmas).

I'd consider light blue-gray felt, and overspray it with white texture paint or white splatter effect paint (or both).

For a Hoth scenario I ran some years ago, I took white cotton sheets, soaked in water, and then dried while they were all scrunched up. I then sprayed light grey patches and let dry.

Then I repeated the procedure: wet, scrunch up, dry and spray with light blue patches.

The result was very pretty, and looked very convincing, creating a "shadows and peaks" effect on a flat cloth.

Regards,
Keith F.

That's a slick idea, kmfrye!

Tx Lion, I'll see about putting up some pictures on my blog.

Keith F.

Otherwise, wait until the Christmas villages show up…

As I saw Halloween show up the end of last month, probably won't be such a wait, and the stuff I'm seeing on sale already suggests you should see discounts pretty soon.

The after X-mas sale periods seems to get shorter every year, so don't dawdle on that…

[Somebody liked my fleece suggestion! I get SO little accomplished, I LIVE to see progress vicariously!]

Doug