"What terrain to make for ECW" Topic

Looks like the club may be playing a lot of ECW come the new year, so I wanted to get a jump on making some terrain. Have to have a nice looking table to go with the figs!
Any suggestions for common features to give the table an ECW feel.
Project will be in 28mm
Pics would be appreciated.

Hedges and more hedges, and maybe a bridge.

And some gentle hills and some woods. You'll also need some slightly rough terrain to replicate the uncultivated, slightly marshy pieces of land that figured into many ECW battles.

I would suggest you get a copy of Decisive Battles of the English Civil War by Malcolm Wanklyn (2006). It has decent descriptions of the terrain of the battles covered in the book – Edgehill, 1st Newbury, Cheriton, Marston Moor, 2nd Newbury, Naseby, and Preston.

Jim

It does depend on the campaign … all the talk of hedges and more hedges is not at all right for the midlands – battles like Naseby and Cropredy were fought across medieval ridge and furrow open fields.

Don't think of the English landscape as it is today.

Although most rules take no account of the effect the ploughing had on the action, there is good reason to believe that the battles were fought along rather than across the furrows …

Thickly hedged closes on the western edge at Naseby (Sulby) but otherwise completely open and all ploughed.

Phil

As Phil says, hills, woods, streams and ditches, marshy bits, ploughed fields. Plus a few hedges for the odd battle which featured them.

The Enclosure Laws hadn't been passed during the ECW.

"The Enclosure Laws hadn't been passed during the ECW."

There has been enclosure well before the various acts of the 18th and 19th century. Kett's Rebellion in the 16th century and "Captain Pouch's" of the early 17th had enclosure as major grievances. Roger Mortimer enclosed common land (though with a ditch) in what is now south B'ham which raised the ire of the locals. They filled in the ditch but were fined £300.00 GBP Luckily for them, he was disposed of by Edward III and they were pardoned from paying almost all of it.

However, there was far less enclosure and in most parts of the country hedges, when present, often marked very ancient boundaries rather than dividing up fields.

I think the modern English picture of the traditional countryside probably colours the representation of many a wargame table, with far more hedges placed than would be seen for most periods and most regions, both British and abroad.

In some places, with the grubbing out of many hedges to make more economically useful arable land, the size of fields has returned to pre-enclosure sizes.

"How to make cheap effective Hedges"

Go to your local "Dollar-type Store". Buy a package of the "tongue depressor" craft sticks (about 6" long -- bare wood are better than colored) as well as a package of those dark green "scrubbing pads" (about 4"x6" with 8 to 10 in a package). You will also need white glue, green paint and scissors (but don't use SWMBO's good ones) as well as flocking.

Cut a scrubbing pad lengthwise in half (giving you two 2"x6" strips). Now cut each of these lengthwise in half BUT where you made a nice straight cut the first time, this time use a wavy uneven cut.

You should now have four 6" long hedge strips flat on one side and irregularly shaped on the top side. Glue these to craft sticks (and you can but some slight bends in them if you want) and let dry.

Once dry, mix green paint and white glue and "wet paint" the pads (but not the sticks), then dip them in flocking and get them well covered. Let dry.

Later use the same process with the sticks using a lighter flocking (preferably close to the color of your ground cloth or table color).

You now have two feet of very usable hedging from just one pad . . . and you still have a bunch left . . . and you haven't broken the bank or even come close to it.

-- Jeff

Half-timbered houses always look good for ECW; an inn sign in English lends flavour.

Re: Hedges.

Wanklyn's book (referenced above) does describe the geography of all of the battlefields he includes. As others have stated, hedges were not quite as common during the mid 1600s as they were in later centuries.

Here is how I used the method described by Jeff to make my hedges using pot scrubbers. link There are other methods described, just Google (or Bing, etc.) for war gaming hedges.

Jim

I use the Hudson & Allen bldgs available from Vatican Enterprises.

wargamescenics.com

They are a hard foam that can be spray painted (I prime them with spray paint) without the paint dissolving the foam.

Before painting

There's this book from the Touching History series available as a pdf:
link

Stick a windmill in there for interest, one features on the famous Battle of Naseby map by Streeter.

Finally! Someone mentioned the windmill! You must have a windmill. You're mot really playing pike and shot without a windmill.

If we are looking at buildings, here are a couple of views of Water Eaton manor taken on a battlefield walk (Gosford Bridge to Islip Bridge) yesterday.

A period manor house of all stone construction and surrounded by open fields which still show their ridge and furrow (it belonged to John Lovelace during the Civil War) …

Phil

Ravelins, Gun Bastions, Breastworks and Star Forts if you want to add some defensive positions.
Windmill, Barns (many types), cottages, manor houses, farms etc for human habitation.
Plus terrain like rivers, woods, hedgerows etc.

I have made many of the above, feel free to check out some pics on my website: paulsmodellingworkshop.com
Alternatively try searching for ECW terrain on the Warlord Games website.
Paul