Building Hawkeye's Mordheim

Hello all,

I've been building Mordheim terrain for a few years now, but when I moved to the US, not all of my terrain made the move with me. In order to try to rebuild the city, I've been working on some pieces over the last year or so, and I'm giving a few examples below. In addition to as yet unfinished buildings, I'm including some completed ones with suitably 'atmospheric' photography. For 'atmospheric', read 'poorly photographed'. I promise I'll try to improve on the pictures when I re-photograph everything for the gallery.

Anyway, on to the pics, and then after that, some explanation and discussion!

The picture above is one of the atmospheric pictures of a square in the city.

And this one's an 'atmospheric' shot of a back alley.


This is a shot of 'The Gilded Lily', a former house of ill-repute. Work still to do on this includes a tiled roof, various patches of sand and rubble, and (obviously), a paint job.


This is 'The Worried Weasel', a tavern, and connected to it is the 'Pax Arcana' Trading Post.

Some more shots, from different angles, of these works in progress to follow...

Wow, this is great! I like this scenery a lot! Really great building and architecture!

And now for some more pictures!


Another shot of 'The Worried Weasel'. Work still to do on this one includes a wooden sign on the roof so that it forms a platform, of sorts, for missile troops. I'll be putting one on each roof. Then it just needs a lick of paint.


This is a shot of the rear of 'The Wicked Weasel' with the 'Pax Arcana Trading Post' to the left. The Trading Post still needs a staircase up to the attic space, and the yard needs some sand, some barrels and debris, and so on.

As you can see, I base all my terrain and buildings. Because I have to transport them in the car every week when we game, they tend to get battered, so bases are essential. However, I make sure to base all the buildings on the same material (6mm masonite or mdf), and texture it with a textured wallpaper I have that looks like cobblestones. This way, we simply butt the bases together and voila! City streets. To cover the odd gaps that appear between bases when everything is butted up together, I'm going to build 5 or 6 rubble bases of different sizes and shapes that we'll simply pop on top of the gaps. This will cover them, as well as providing patches of difficult ground and some cover for models.

Thanks, Cianty!

Well, some more shots to follow, but first a few comments on how I built them, and what my building philosophy is (philosophy! ).

As you can see from some of the finished buildings, I like to use the Mordheim building sprues (the plastic parts), but with foamcore walls instead of card or plasticard. I like the sense of realism the extra thickness creates. However, it's very hard to get my hands on those plastic bits these days, so I've been forced to build timber frame houses instead -
'The Gilded Lily' is a case in point. That will go on to the same sort of bases as the other buildings, which will allow me to have a little garden at the foot of the steps.

On to the pictures, though!


So, this is the front door. I don't know if you can see it or not, but there's a little pool sunk into the rock of the elevated courtyard. Perfect for snipers, or for hiding wyrdstone!


And here's a side shot of 'The Gilded Lily'. The first shot of it, in the first post, shows the steps up the side.

I like this building, mostly because I thought carefully about the gaming potential for it - hence the holes in the walls and the ruined roof (which still needs tiles). Inside, to indicate that it was once a wealthy, finely furnished place, it will have chandeliers hanging from the ceiling, some wall hangings/tapestries (made from crumpled paper or crepe paper), and even some mirrors (I have a few tiny mirrors from a craft store).

By the way, sorry for the super wide pictures of doom - it's tough to fit that whole city square into a narrower picture!

VERY NICE!

The "atmospheric shots" are REALLY cool [I've got to remember that excuse ]; I LOVE the way the sunlight hits the statue in a dramatic, cinematic fashion [Cecil B. would have been proud! ]. The pool at the Guilded Lily is a REALLY nice touch as well as a bit of entrenchment. The courtyard at the Wicked Weasel is a fine idea. EXCELLENT WORK!

These are really good, can't wait to see 'em painted!

And don't worry about picture-width... Narrow pics are for people with too low screen-res anyway

I love the way these look! keep us updated on the progress, for I'm taking valuable notes for my next buildings here! (I love how you roughened up the big stones of your foundation) good useage of the plastic mordheim bits too!

Thanks everyone!

Nala - yes, I'm very good at 'atmospheric' photographs. I like the pool at The Gilded Lily as well, but I'll admit it was a real pain to cut and hollow out. I hope it gets some use! Once it's based (maybe this weekend), I can get some paint on it.

Unwanted - happy you like them. And thank goodness the wide photos aren't too much of a problem. I was really struggling with photobucket yesterday.

Ezekiel - Thank you! I got that texture to the foundation of The Gilded Lily by getting a stone from the garden (your basic garden variety stone ), and pushing it into the foam over and over. The pattern stays in the foam, and you have foam that looks like rock.

Now I just need more foam!

The Wicked Weasel/Worried Weasel (I haven't decided which to call it yet - any votes will be appreciated!) is a building that I'm pretty proud of. I was going to build another tall tower building, but decided to build a more sprawling complex of buildings to give some different game play potential. So, there's a covered alley that leads into the courtyard, and above that is an attic space that will be reached by stairs. In the attic space, the roof tiles have come away in two holes - perfect for snipers! The taller part on the corner gives some elevation, and models can see through the front door (the one at an angle under the overhang where the sign is) all the way through common room at the back door, meaning that bowshots right through the building become a real possibility! The signs on the rooves will add that extra bit of playability to the building by allowing models to climb onto the roof, but still have a flat platform to stand on (as well as some cover!). Plus I'm just hoping that it will look cool!

That's some awesome scenery there.

I like the idea you mentioned of adding makeshift wooden platforms on the rooftops. Gives the idea that the mercs have been around for enough time after the catastrophe to rework the ruins into temporary bases and whatnot.

Plus, it's really cool running along planks while being chased by some weird mutant creature.

Hey Catferret,

That's exactly the image I have of Mordheim - ruined, yes, but the Mercs have been there for long enough to build a few makeshift structures or barricades. And that's only AFTER I've built the rest of the stuff. There's a lot of terrain I want to build, but where to find the time?

Great work Hawkeye. Your buildings (and table) have a lot of character and playability. Keep it up.

Damn you Hawkeye. LOL.

I had just told myself no more new terrain for a while and then you put your awesome pics to taunt me. LOL.

I really love what you did. I love the fact that you thought of putting 3 smalls windows in a row. Something simple but neat.

The foam is also a great touch. Please keep us posted on how it goes.

Wow amazing stuff, I've never really bothered making my own scenary but this stuff and all the clever tricks your using (never heard of wallpaper being used as cobbles before ) are inspiring me to do so.

What type of wall paper is that?

Well, there are all sorts of textured wallpapers that might be right - the best thing to do is to check out the wallpaper section in your local home improvement store, and try to imagine what the patterns with little squares on them will look like when they're drybrushed! It works pretty well, and one roll is enough to give you all you need for consistency between your terrain pieces.

Grrr now I've got the scenery making bug. I love the Wicked weasel, can't wait to see it painted.

Wow, that´s great stuff!

Nice stuff! man i need to get motivated to build more terrain, or finish my first batch!

I wish i was into mordhaim when it was new so i could have a bunch of building sprues to work with like you.

Hey hawkeye, i have a request: What is the exact measurement of the plastic corner stone pieces and the straight beams. I am still unsure of how tall to make my terrain and i want to stay close to the original diminsions.

Thanks in advance and also thanks for the great pictures!

The "official" size from the boxed set building was:
First floor (ground level) 55mm.
upper floors 50 mm.

Althought the corner sprue piece was exactly the same, ground level walls needed a "corner piece" at the bottom that added the extra 5mm.

Hope that helps.

Thats some nice terrain you got started cant wait to see it painted!! I hope our buildings look 1/2 as good as these...