"Buildings a Maneouvre Group history" Topic

Really my history with buildings starts with Stargrunt II. I built lots then all fold flat and designed to fit 25mm (ish) figures. The majority were two story urban then along came some 3 story tower blocks and a couple of 3 story buildings with apex roofs for an inspired by nimegan bridge scenarios but hopefully ok for general use. Then came military buildings large 'corrugated iron" type structures just about capable of holding 1 or 1/72 tanks along with block houses, airfield towers, blast walls to separate aicraft stored together, and even the main types of emplacements at the Merville battery in Normandy. Plus a few bridges. After a bit of use it became clear that tactically the 3 story buildings did not do a lot especially at 1/72 scale the long views they might have are not there in a 1/72 game which can only sensibly model a small area. The military buildings after a flurry of use got less and less use, there are not many times they are better tactically than a civilian building so there utility was not great. The one building that did get regular use of the taller buildings was the church, not too big and most villages had one and one vantage point had its advantages and disadvantages.

When we moved to 1/144 scale many of the buildings we not reproduced at the smaller scale. By then it was obvious that many of the buildings offered nothing additional tactically so not worth the effort. Similarly the Arab building series was kept to a sensible minimum. Minor changes changes in design offer few if any advantages and makes set up harder. The artistic aspect is not really that important if there are 10 or more buildings in a town and the road network somewhere near credible. In those circumstances only see roofs. This came home to me one day as I stood above the rooftops on a pedestrian bridge, all I could see were rows and rows of roofs not even many of the roads.
The experience with 3 story buildings showed us that more than 3 story's was a waste of time nobody with any tactical sence would normally use then, certainly not in the villages we use which, for playability purposes seldom go above 15 buildings and very rarely above 20 buildings.

So putting aside the artistic bit a modeler I am not nor do I aspire to be with respect to wargaming, thst aspect is of no interest to me; so what size and number of story buildings do you use and if you use lots of 3 story buildings it would be interesting to see your reasoning.

I usually don't go above 2 stories, now that you mention it. Trees should be higher than most structures anyway. I think that unless you are gaming at 1:1, skirmish, then I suggest just going for the impression of a BUA. I have to crack a smile internally when I hear a comment of "but those trees are not to scale!

If you are after a large town or cityscape then 2+ stories helps portray such a populated area providing you have a lot more 1 and 2 story surrounding them. Just my aesthetic suggestion.

Dye minis, we are sort of 1:1 so the number of buildings on the board is of neccesitating limited,
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I have played some StarGrunt games with 3-storey buildings. The games were all played in a science fiction urban or corporate office park environment, either in the GZG or Traveller universes.

The 3-storey buildings worked well for placing snipers and overwatch teams. Sometimes an objective would be to put a transmitter or something on top of a tall building.

My more recent games have taken place in more remote places with smaller buildings for research facilities, buildings and facilities at a mining site, a remote secondary starport, etc.

A shoebox is the largest building in my current inventory. Shoeboxes make good buildings. You can turn the top upside down and you get a walled roof area. Greeblies become the HVAC system. Etc.