My Mordheim terrain - under construction!

robh wrote:

Height is certainly an issue that needs to be solved.  The ability to climb is an important part of the game and having such a wonderful selection of scenery, not to use would be a shame.

I fully agree. But I suppose it remains to be seen how it all works out. It obviously depends on the warbands playing - some are naturally more oriented towards shooting, while other warbands aren't entitled to the use of missile weapons at all. Still, I imagine the speed- and close combat types of warbands to be able to use the height, the levels and covers in the tactical game of maneuvering and attacking the enemy from different angles, planning diving attacks and luring enemies into vulnerable positions. The one thing I could suspect preventing this type of game would be that maybe it just takes up too much movement, thus holding players back from entering the upper levels, but I really don't know yet.

robh wrote:

The security of the walkway and figures on it can never be guaranteed in use, but I am sure something could be done with the range of micro magnets that is around these days. Maybe clamping the walkway end and the terrain floor between 2 strong magnets (suitably camouflaged) would hold them securely.

I did consider trying something with the magnets I use for basing regiments, but it seems to restrict the possibilities of setting up those walkways flexibly, unless magnets would be attached to every possible point of attachment to balconies and floors. We'll see how it works, and if it results in too many crashes and in-game superglue fixes of broken miniatures, then I will definitely reconsider.

robh wrote:

How do they make and install those walkways? I can't logically see that, so for me, they look wrong.
But as I said, that is probably just me.

Fair enough! I see your point, although I actually like the look of ruins being zig-zagged with fragile boardwalks across many levels.

Wow, u just managed to make a attractive gaming table in a short ammount of time. Its looking really good. U have a strong on going style in painting and crafting. everything blends well into everything.

The idea to have some raised platforms would be a great expansion. to bring more variation. U should definitly do it. Maybe more than one platform.

Maybe u should make a blasawood crane as a scenery piece. To explain how the ladders where brought up, haha. would be a nice piece of scenery.

As far i can tell from my 10-games gaming experience, scenery is a big thing. Vampires and Skaven with the "sprint" skill are able to charge 18" so if there a straight lines of movement they will hunt some minis down.
And Ranged Weapons can be really powerful if there is not much cover.

Adding some variation at the ground level will make ur table way more variable and change gaming experience, i guess.

Nice table!!! Thanks for sharing the progress, very inspiring!!!

Thanks a lot PJB! Platforms will definitely be my next project. And great idea with a wooden crane - I like that a lot! Gives me something to think about - that could make a cool piece at the gaming table. And maybe incorporate some rules for using the crane and moving the boardwalks around...? Could be fun! I'm already thinking of scenarios with blocked areas, toxic rivers etc. where the players would have to provide passage to certain areas of the board using the crane and the boardwalks...

haha, sounds like a nice scenario. 1 Warband is lifting the cargo with the crane an a ship/coach and the other one is attacking.

https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kran#/media/Datei:Old_crane.jpg

Should be a fun piece of scenery.

That's a sick crane. And moveable too! Like a Doomwheel. Thanks, PJB, you just ripped a day out of my June schedule!

Haha, u are welcome. Maybe i go for a crane too, haha. And we will se

An amazing looking board Ellegaard! Really cool stuff I do like the long walkways as they connect the battlefield from another level, which would be nice to play on!

That's a damn fine looking table! Everything ties together well, which goes a very long way to a great looking board (not something I've ever managed myself...), & between the large pieces, scatter terrain, & surface design gives a full-looking board which should still be playable.

Incorporating height into games can be tricky, it's true. Walkways are useful to making upper floors playable, especially if you 1) put wyrdstone upstairs in buildings & 2) put tall buildings with walkways sticking out in deployment areas, so warriors can start the game already above ground level. Making that seem realistic can be difficult, but hey, Mordheimers are crazy enough to life in the City of the Damned, who knows why they build these things?! Maybe the taint of Chaos just made walkways grow there (the buildings of Praag were warped during the Great War with Chaos, it's canon!).

The risk of putting miniatures on raised walkways comes down to players, & taking care not to destroy miniatures is part of friendly play. If it's a worry, rule that a miniature can't stop anywhere it can't be placed safely, or replace miniatures in difficult spots with a counter, holding the miniature in place if it's needed for aiming. There are ways to work around these risks.

But again, & mostly, that's a beautiful table you've built up already, & you can rightfully be proud of it.

robh wrote:

Very few of us play with the oppressive tight alleyways and streets where short scrap timber walkways are a viable option. Partly because that amount of scenery would be cost and time prohibitive to produce and partly because trying to move figures and actually play the game in that environment is really difficult.

I am struggling with just this issue in building my table. The original thought was that I wanted all these cramped and twisting alleys, with upper floors connected by short planks of wood.

But then I set up what I've managed to build so far in this fashion it fills a little corner of the tabletop. It will take years to actually achieve.

wongwyrd wrote:

I am struggling with just this issue in building my table. The original thought was that I wanted all these cramped and twisting alleys, with upper floors connected by short planks of wood.

But then I set up what I've managed to build so far in this fashion it fills a little corner of the tabletop. It will take years to actually achieve.

Yeah, been there, done that.....and now doing it again for another game

Only options are to struggle through and complete the terrain as you imagined it (if you can without abandoning it), or to compromise and do a few sections of dense buildings with some well thought out open areas.

A canal/riverside with a wharf can take a lot of table area but needs only a building or two and can be filled with a lot of smaller drop in stuff like cranes and piles of trade goods. Similarly a Graveyard with a few crypts and some dead/decaying vegetation covers quite a lot of ground or a larger ruined building set in walled grounds with statues.

Having both dense and more open terrain on the table also helps play balance as all warbands get advantages and disadvantages. All dense terrain makes "shooty" warbands very weak and melee heavy ones too powerful.

Robh's very right about that. Open areas with small scatter terrain are good for mixing up a battlefield & providing variety, without too much effort. Graveyards are pretty fun to model, lots of companies make the right bits for them, & they fit the Mordheim aesthetic; but you can also do docks if you have some water for them, decayed parkland, or just a town square or market ground. An open area of board with a statue in the middle is an instant square!

Also remember that you don't need as much terrain as you think to give the impression of a full board. A table will feel like a dense, challenging battlefield without being really cramped.

This is an interesting discussion. Clearly the biggest challenge of our hobby is getting things done - like the age old joke of painting all your miniatures. There are many approaches to this - from the impatient speed painters to the slow, thorough guys who can spend days painstakingly painting a single model.

I personally belong to the impatient group; I absolutely hate unpainted miniatures and ad hoc terrain. Possibly it's a result of my lack of imagination or a case of OCD, but it just disturbs me to see a great battlefield with a neon-colored lunchbox representing the target building. Or finely painted miniatures with unfinished bases.

I can see that I started this thread in November; I probably started building a month or so before that, but it didn't take me more than half a year to have a more or less full table. Looking back at the process, I took some long breaks in that period due to work, studies and family, so it really wasn't a daily effort that seized all my spare time.

Once you get into the frenzy of knocking ruined buildings together, it actually goes really quick, and basically you can come a long way by having a whole bunch of simple, L-shaped ruins, walls and scrap, and then a few more complete center-piece-type buildings with multiple floors, balconies and bridges. The advantage of building Mordheim terrain is that it doesn't look wrong at all even though the woodwork is sloppy, the walls are leaning, the flooring is uneven, and the tiles are randomly glued to the roof construction. You don't need the same attention to detail and precision as you would in many other cases; messy and chaotic will do just fine and even enhance the whole atmosphere of Mordheim.

I believe that in one focused evening you could make several ruined pieces in a matter of hours if you have all the tools and materials at hand. The process, as I approach it, is really simple: Just cut out a base, roughly cut out the walls out of corrugated cardboard, cut out sticks of balsa wood with scissors for the half timber, fill the area between the timbers with some sort of filler, glue rough sand to the base and let it dry. Spray everything black and start dry brushing the wood, the base and finish the walls with a color of your choice. And that's it! Additional details can always be added later, such as moss, flock, dried leaves, grafitti, all sorts of junk and thematic stuff.

My point is that while it seems like an overwhelming task to complete 8-10 basic ruined buildings and structures for at least a full starting Mordheim table, it's actually not that difficult or time-consuming as you would think. If you can live with the standard of terrain of which I've posted pictures here, then it's certainly not out of reach to build a playable table in a matter of months. And I strongly encourage everyone to give it a shot - it's so satisfying to have a complete collection of terrain. And it's not nearly as impossible as you might think!

That way of doing the walls is REALLY interesting. Cool work.

Nice twisted set of scenery, love the small details, books and hangouts, has alot of LABYRINTH-Character ( the Bowie mOvie ), is there more to come ?

Thanks, a lot, Flødebolle! As of now, I’m done with my terrain; technically it’s complete, and there’s enough to set up a full 4’x4’ table. Of course you can never have enough terrain, but sadly I’m quite busy at the moment and don’t really have the time to expand the collection right now. I’m sure I will at some point; I love building, imagining what Mordheim would look like and trying to make it come alive. The challenge is also - apart from not having enough time - limited storage space where we live. Where the hell so I put this stuff when I don’t use it...? I might lend it out for the gaming club (good old Rogue Trader in Frederiksberg); that could free up some space, but then again, having your own stuff at your own place is just really awesome!

I love this

I really like the mottled look of the plastered walls. Really gives that macabre look of Mordheim that many of us love!

well done Ellegaard, some nice pieces you have done there, the buildings must been close to where the comet came down, they defy gravity !

Brian