"Roads - What to use" Topic

My requirements are very specific I am a gamer first and modeling is a definite second. At the minute I use thin card lightly misted in various sections with rounded ends as it allows for an infinite variety of road shapes from a limited number of sections as they can be overlayed while looking acceptable. They deape over gentel hilss like Hexon II. However there pattering is not great. So is there a flexible medium that is thin (0,5mm or less) that has a rougher texture than card and can be coloured without stiffening? Oh and to make it really hard it would be good if it could be laser cut.

Just today I read a tutorial on road making that uses thin plastic sleeves called "Copy Safe Pockets" which I thought was very interesting and that I wanted to try out.

For both asphelt and dirt roads.

link

I use masking tape. You can color it if you want but the basic color is fine for dirt roads and has a nice rough texture. And it's cheap.

Are we talking dirt roads, cobble, paved, or what?

For dirt roads I use….dirt. Specifically clay soil from a baseball field infield. For other roads I use scatter/ballast. For paved modern roads, print your own on card stock.

Same as Extra Crispy.

We use Woodland Scenics ballast for roads, even for one off battles. Just vacuum up when it's done.

For my All Things Zombie games I use printed cardstock. Not super happy about it, but it gets the job done.

Here some pics

You can see the road network of glued down ballast. Battle of Rivoli

This is the Battle of Stones River we did for Historicon. Again glued down ballast.

Cheers, Xin

I make mine out of felt. I get the sheets that are 9x12 and 25 cents each. I cut three three inch strips and spray them with that spray on stone texture paint. I then hit them with what ever color I want the road to be. TO finish them off I paint the long edges with cheap green paint and dip them in flock before the paint dries.

They are cheap, easy to make and flexible. They drape nicely over whatever terrain cloth you have and they stay in place because the felt on the bottom tends to catch on whatever it is laying on.

Ours are 8" x 8", and 50 cents each.

I'm being gouged!!!

For paved roads, thin craft foam. Has a good asphalt texture, easily paintd (actually, you just have to weather it, cut into the pieces you want.

Thats for paved roads, of course

For years, I've just used strips of brown felt lightly sprayed with tan (to give them a mottled "dirty" look) for dirt roads. Not awesome, but flexible, sticks to felt underneath (e.g. the grass green cloth I use as the base), plus it's extremely durable, extremely reconfigurable, and extremely portable.

- Ix

Take a look at rubberized shelf paper. Cheap, textured at least on one side, flexable and will take paint.

Chuck I like that idea and think I will try it, perhaps this weekend.

I use long strips of felt with edges and an irregular middle strip added by using a green marker pen. The strips are about a metre long. They drape over hills and can form realistic bends, they cling to my flocked terrain and don't move. What they loose by not looking brilliant close up they gain by having proper curves and very few joints to show gaps or move in play. I am thinking of making a new batch with flocking added with z flexible glue rather than marker pen this time.

Felt with a bit of paint and flock on it works very well for dirt roads.

When I was a kid I used to make roads outr of sand poured on the game cloth.

These days I use felt or masking tape.

Roof shingles. !!FREE!! Find a broken bundle at your local Home Labyrinth and ask if you can have one for free. You can spray paint them whatever color you need. Cut to whatever size or shape you need.

Great info, not trying to thread-jack, but…

How wide do you make your roads for 20mm (1/72) and for 6mm?

Ground scale distortion has large effect on 1/72 scale, I make mine wide enough for a single vehicle (off top of my head I don't remember the measurment but I measured the width of an M-1 tank model and used that as my road width. For 6mm I did twice a vehicle width, for two lane roads.

What dimensions do other people use?

My roads are 40mm wide (this is for 20mm and 28mm).
That's wide enough for a stand of multi-based troops or a tank, depending on period.
If you make your roads too wide, they end up taking up half the table.

for 1/72 we use 75mm and for 1/144 50mm, 37mm, and 22mm and occasionally 15mm. The thickness indicate respectively, 50mm 2 lane unlimited tonnage. 37 mm typically 40 tone limit 2 lane . 22mm 15 tonne limit single track(ish) and 15mm civilian card 5 tonne limit.