"New Downtown Terrain boards" Topic

I have managed to work on the MDF terrain boards I asked the nice people over at pendraken to make up as a custom job last year. They have sat in the garage unloved and I found an excuse to get them out and worked on. I like the idea of MDF tiles from a storage perspective and also that they "could" be used across a number of games systems depending on how you paint them. When I put up the idea for my WW2 nightfighter game there was some interest from Air, Naval and Sci Fi gaming that this could be adopted. This is just to give you a feel on how I got on for an air combat game.

As these were made up specifically for the Downtown game (Vietnam Air Combat) I set about hand drawing on the terrain features in pencil before painting. As usual I got bored so started painting before finishing all the prep.

First up was putting on all the rough terrain. This is was a simple job of sand over flexible filler/pva mix.

I ran out of sand for the rough ground which I still need to get on with. So moved on to the next stage which was adding the base colours using household paint I bought from a local DIY store.

The base coats were just to give me an idea. I also left the persistent AAA hexes unpainted at this point as I am going to add the detail to these hexes using plasticard.

which look a bit like this

The airfields are a bit overscale but as the boards are for me I was happy with the overscale.

The four rows of five boards give me a flexible layout that lets me keep the target area in the centre of the playing surface. This was a downside of the "old" felt cloth

Simple 4 x 2 arrangement for a CSAR mission

3 x 3 arrangement for a photo recon game

5 x 3 arrangement for D1 early war raid by the USAF

and finally a 5 x 2 arrangement for a USN raid North West of Haiphong

I am now adding more AAA and target hexes to the surface

I am now just starting to add in the waterways. I am using a green undercoat and then adding in brown which lets me delineate a bit better without it being too stark. Eyes and Hands aren't too steady though and the amount of work needed around Haiphong is quite a task.

Regards and more info over on the blog as always

link

Nice work. Downtown is a neat game. A bit more planning-intensive than some folks like--unless you're an experienced player, I don't recommend just sitting down, slapping together a plan, and firing the starting pistol.

A rewarding game, though, especially when everything comes together.

Brilliant work on the board details ,I bet it felt good seeing all the time and effort taking effect.
For larger scale boards I have used the gritty masonry paints which may work well on top of the sand/PVA mix you have already done.I find it helps seal and hold the mix for the long term.
The plasticard for the urban/buildings has come out very well indeed. Nice one.

Nice work. Downtown is a neat game. A bit more planning-intensive than some folks like--unless you're an experienced player, I don't recommend just sitting down, slapping together a plan, and firing the starting pistol.

:) Totally agree, D3 is next up to be played out in sequence using the new terrain which will be a lot more problematic to talk through than some of the more simpler scenarios. I got into this for the very planning idea, I was awful at 1 on 1 fighter combat but putting a raid together and getting the timing right was more to my style of play. I have been playing Downtown now for about 5 years.

As of tonight I only have two target hexes to finish off and then it is back onto painting the area around Haiphong which is a nightmare. Then it will be the rivers, then the roads, then the targets and then finally put it all back together and merge the surface together with some more green paint and dry brushing.

I have just worked on some of the Oddzial Ozmy SAM and Radar markers to replace the CinC ones I used on the larger hexes as well. They need an undercoat and a paint job.

Wow, nice work!

Very cool!

That looks really great!

Thanks for sharing.

That's really impressive. I like it!

Very nice, those boards really set the standard.

Nice boards! My question is what size are the hexes? an what process or how did you place them on the board, an outline them?

I'm thinking of doing a similar board but with 3"inch hexes, for my CY6 games.

fullmetal2015

Apologies fullmetal2015 for being a bit slow

These are 1 1/2" hexes which I had them laser cut and marked by the nice people at Pendraken