Test for 6mm WAT on a 2mm board

I dug out my 6mm terrain and minis just to see how they would look on my 2mm board. I have an upcoming game of What A Tanker! and I wanted to see how the terrain would work.

I think I will use some of my not quite finished Shermans and some not quite finished German tanks because I haven't based them. Even though I have used minimal bases, they still don't quite sit as well on the terrain as I'd like. If you are going to use contoured terrain like this, you might as well have minis that hunker down into it.

This doesn't mean that I have turned anti-basing on vehicles. I'm still planning on basing all of them because I use steel for the bases and I line my carry cases with that magnetic paper so they don't move at all. This preserves their paint job and also keeps those guns straighter for longer.

(Wow, I have a lot of Shermans! I must have more than 50 of them.)

As a bonus, I found four 15mm T34s I had forgotten about. My 15mm WAT collection just grew by 50%.

Project 2mm Terrain: Update 10

Last week, I hurt my back while trying to suppress a sneeze because I was holding my dog at the time (ridiculous as this sounds) and I didn't want to drop her. It got worse Thursday and Friday, but with drugs and ample use of a TENS machine, on Saturday I felt pretty decent so I thought I could flock my board as a relaxing afternoon diversion.

I'm pretty happy with the initial flocking. There's plenty of helpful Youtube content out there on how to flock and armed with that knowledge, I put down this first coating for the general fields. The dark patches are going to be heavy woods and I'm thinking a mix of coffee grounds and a dark green flock will be good to represent this terrain, plus eventually a canopy of coarse turf as the tree tops. The medium brown represents bogs and marsh and I'm thinking about using some static grass and coarse dark green turf for that.

I think I do need to consult with Lukes APS, Mel the Terrain Tutor, and maybe some others because I'm not sure whether I seal this layer and then do another or just keep layering on and then seal.

I may have overdone things on Saturday because my back is a bit sore this Sunday. I did take some pix and post them because I'm happy with the progress.

Project 2mm Terrain: Update 9

Now that renovations have finished, I got a little time this weekend to do some miniatures stuff. I got the urge to work on my terrain board. I was hoping to start flocking it but instead I'll settle for blocking out the heavy woods, swamp, and other terrain, because white background is the devil when it comes to flocking.

One of the reasons I had problems is that I discovered that I only have 2 inch brushes or 00 brushes. Nothing in between. So it meant slathering on with the big brush and then having to use the small brush to put in the edges.

Nevertheless, this is progress!

I must say the board looks radically different with the contour lines now blending in.

Trumpeter in March

With the rush to finish our home renovations, posting (and all miniature activity) has taken a back seat. Renovations are done (yea!) so I'm posting about the Trumpeter game on the first Friday of March.

It was an interesting English Civil War battle with 2mm figures using the Rampant rules engine (in this case Rebels and Patriots with some modifications, instead of the more temporal Pike and Shotte).

The main modification was automatic passing for movement activation. This made keeping formations possible and worked nicely. I'm not entirely sure whether the formations are built into the game and just renamed or whether they were modifications.

The battle started from a historical deployment. You can see more pictures at The Dying Gaul and he has another account of the battle.

 My initial thought was to push on the right and hold up on the left, falling back if necessary. Another Parliamentary commander showed up so I gave him command of the left starting from the artillery.

I had expected the Royalist to really push hard with both cavalry, so I was surprised when that did not happen. I felt a little bad for giving the other guy a command that wasn't really seeing action, but that wasn't what I anticipated when I gave him those troops.

On my right, I managed to win the cavalry battle by 1-2 punching the Royalist horse with one of my reserve units. I then used them to roll up the infantry.

 Here you see the Parliament horse on the right chasing off the Royalist cavalry, before wheeling to roll up the infantry.

Eventually, after doing nothing for a couple of turns, Rupert finally got the Royalist horse moving forward. However, they suffered from dismal activation rolls so no more than one unit was able to attack per turn.

This meant that the lone Parliament cavalry unit was able to fend off the entire Royalist attack, with minor assistance of a dragoon unit.



The end is nigh with the Royalist infantry threatened from the front and rear.

Good fortune was on the Parliament side for even when I lost a battle, I managed to take out the opposing horse through distracting them with a pursuit.

Project 2mm Terrain: Update 8

The project has taken a back seat to house renovations, and as a result, I've lost a lot of momentum and my will to complete it has fallen off quite a bit. Perhaps documenting where I'm at will help me get my mojo back on this.

Basically, I have completed the terrain elevations. I have also put some boards around the outside, which cleans up the edges and provides support and rigidity.


I have partially sealed the entire thing but I think I will wait until I get to some Mod Podge to do the job properly. I have to see how much dirt brown paint I have because I want to paint the entire thing with three different browns: regular dirt, a darker shade for swamp and bog, and a different brown for forested areas.

Once I have that done, I can put the roads in and flock it. Then it will be about putting in buildings and fences and other features.

Trumpeter in February

After being snowed out for January's meeting, I wanted to make February's game. I was a little late in arriving but managed to get in a game of Rebels and Patriots but set in the French and Indian war.

It started out two players a side with the British attacking a French settlement. The bulk of the French set up in the settlement. I had the left with a couple of militia units and a unit of Coureurs des Bois. This unit I made the backbone of my defense because of their better shooting. I would keep them at long range and use them to snipe the British. I took the three units on the left and the reinforcements.



This first shot shows after turn 2. The French got lucky with their reinforcements showing up on time and in a good location on the far right. Being veteran line, I had one unit in close order and had it charge a British unit right away. Despite taking heavy casualties going into the fight, I made it to contact. For the rest of the game, the French line would keep pitching into the British unit, slowly grinding down.


Elsewhere, the British tried to shoot their way into the centre. That was going to be tough to do because the French militia unit behind the stone wall mounted a stubborn defense. Eventually, the French got reinforcements to support the gallant militia unit and the British conceded the day.

In this image, you can see the remnants of the final British push on the walled paddock. The sustained and effective fire of four French units concentrated on these two British units proved too much.

Project 2mm Terrrain: Update 7

Woooo Hooo!

✅ 80 ✅ 90 ✅ 100  ✅ 110 ✅ 120 ✅ 130 ✅ 140 ✅ 150 ✅ 160 ✅ 170 ✅ 180 ✅ 190

I've completed all the hills on the board! It took a lot longer than I expected but I did get faster as I went along.

Here's the board almost complete with just the corner to go. I finished it the next night. Despite each contour being only 1mm, there's some really substantial valleys in the board.

Things I learned

Well, I've learned a few things that, if I ever do this again, I would do differently:

• Not do every contour line. I would just do every second contour using the foamcore and use polyfilla to smooth out the contour lines
• Put reinforcing bars. About half way through, the board started to warp and it's now at about 1/2 inch on both ends. 
• Cork is a neat material to use. I would use it more often for contouring because it is easy to cut using scissors, flexible, and resists compression. It is pretty expensive if you need to use a lot.

What's next

1. Add some 1x1 bars to the back to straighten it out.
2. Since I have decided to keep the contours showing, trim some of the paper overhangs so that all of the contours are clean.
3. Seal the board so that it won't absorb water when I flock.
4. Mark the locations of the waterways, roads, and buildings.
5. Figure out how tall to make the trees.
6. Figure out where to put the woods and how to do them. One woods is marked on the board. I've seen another map with woods in other locations.