Bearwoodman in Frostgrave: An Incomplete History

[Constable Bertrand]

Wow what a wonderful frostgrave campaign. You have done so well making set pieces for each game.

[Bearwoodman]

The Maze of Malcor: Scenario Six

The Cloister

The next scenario was called “The Cloister” and required a partially collapsed covered walkway around a central area that was once lawn but had since become overgrown with bushes shrubs and a number of trees. This had my modelling friend and I scratching our heads as to how best to represent this best on the table top in a way that:

a) was playable;
b) was not excessively time consuming to build;
c) did not take up too much of our limited storage; and
d) left open the possibility that it could be used in future scenarios/games. 

This last point was a key concern as the structure was clearly going to be large and we did not want to spend a long time making something that was simply going to take up a big chunk of our available storage and never see the light of day again.

As luck would have it, the build up to the game coincided with a family holiday to Normandy which included a visit to Mont St Michel.  To anyone not familiar with this remarkable place it is essentially a roughly round large rocky outcrop just off the French coast that can be walked to when the tide is out.  It has been fortified by the addition of defensive walls and turrets behind which shelter various ancient buildings crammed together to form narrow winding cobbled streets all overshadowed by a large fortress-like Abbey perched on top. Apparently it withstood all English attacks during the 100 years war and would not look out of place in innumerable fantasy settings from Harry Potter to Middle Earth. The thought struck me as I entered the main gate that the place would be great as the setting for a 1-1 scale game of Frostgrave and it was easy to imagine (despite the summer sun and the crowds) wizards and their minions creeping and battling on the ancient ramparts and through the shadowy halls. And the icing on the cake was that it had a Cloister! My wife could not at first understand why I was so excited about this particular area of the Abbey (and when she found out she rolled her eyes!).  I took some photographs for reference.







Armed with my holiday snaps and I discussed the with my friend and we came to the conclusion that the simplest and most flexible approach to the issue would be to make a large number of separate pillars which could then be lined up to represent the pillars holding up the covering over the walkway.  We would not model the covering itself as this would make it too hard to access figures underneath it (and it was meant to be ruined in any event).  My friend had previously made simple pillars from toilet rolls attached to hexagonal mdf bases which had featured in previous games so our initial plan was simply to mass produce these.  We probably would not need all of them again for a single game, but pillars feature quite regularly in Frostgrave scenarios and are nearly always useful as extra terrain even when not specifically required, so they would not be single use items.

Thinking back to the Cloister at Mont Saint Michel I began to have concerns that toilet roll pillars might be too large and think to create the correct impression.  My friend’s son then suggested cake decorations so I had a look on a Chinese shopping app famed for low prices and found they were selling a pack of 4 plastic pillars for £1.76.  I ordered all 6 available packs and qualified for free shipping.  When they arrived I was very pleased with their useful size and solidity. 

They did suffer a little from mould lines but looked far better than toilet rolls would have done. 

I added a cardboard cap on each and attached them to the same hexagonal bases that my friend had used for his toilet roll pillars.  Happily this allowed enough space between each pillar for a figure on a 25mm base to pass between them.




I then realised that while the hexagonal bases meant that the pillars would fit together to form a straight line very evenly and neatly, they would not neatly and evenly fit around a right angle (square or octagonal would have worked better). 

I therefore decided to make “special” pillars on square bases to go in the corners that each of the 4 straight runs of 6 pillars on hexagonal bases could connect into. These pillars were special because they were made by me from cereal packet and therefore simple straight square section shapes. 

It was noticeable that the plastic pillars were very smooth and to try and add some contrast and texture I tried spraying them with some stone texture paint from B&M.  I am not sure if it made much difference, but it did seem to stick to the plastic.

I then primed them black and then added a zenithal highlight before I dabbed on a few different shades of vaguely stone-coloured paint using a bit of ragged foam from a blister pack.  I then called them done.

Meanwhile my friend was making the grassy area that the Cloister would surround.  He made out of a piece of mdf and a lot of flock.
 


We paired them together for the first time on the day of the game and were relieved that when placed on our usual Frostgrave board they seemed to fit together pretty well. 
 




We hadn't really built a Cloister, but we decided that if one knew (as all the players did) that it was intended to represent a Cloister then when looking at it a Cloister would probably be brought to mind.  Good enough.



So we had the scenery.  But this scenario didn’t just require scenery…

[Pattus Magnus]

Very nicely done! The cake decoration pillars look quite good painted up.

[snitcythedog]

Very practical solution.  Looks like it will be a fun game. 

[Vagabond]

When I  started to read about your visit to St Michel I  naturally though you would model the whole island for a one off game, a single cloister was a bit disappointing. 

Tremendous work on all these scenes, I'm very impressed both at your crestivity and incurable insanity. Your comment about your wife rolling her eyes when you wanted to photograph the cloisters made me smile. Mrs V is in a lot of my phots to provide scale to the subject. she thinks I'm more than slightly bonkers.

The docks and gondolas were very neat, I've often thought about doing a harbour side but you must have a lot more storage space than I do and the furnace was truly a work of a mad genius.

Strangely only yesterday I  was trying to break a cork into pieces to make a Construct, I'd seen someone do it before but they must have more strength and skill than me, I see you have cut yours and I  may have another go at this, afterall I had to drink a lot of wine to obtain the cork, I  really should use it although the blobby constructs from clay might be easier.

Keep up the good work and I'll be back in 6 to 12 months time to see how you're going on.
Cheers

[Bearwoodman]

Thanks for the comments all, I was pleased with how the pillars turned and I am sure they will feature in many games in the future (although I suspect that it will be rare for me to need all 28 at once!).

Vagabond: thanks in particular for the "incurable insanity" diagnosis. I had been considering seeking help for my condition but on the basis of your evaluation that it is too far progressed to for any cure to have effect I might as well just embrace it.

On the other hand, your threat to revisit this thread again in 6-12 months time makes me feel like a teacher being given notice of a potential Ofsted inspection. I now feel pressure to ensure that my metaphorical classroom walls are nicely decorated, my metaphorical lesson plans are compliant with the current curriculum and (on the basis that a smaller class is easier to manage) as many as possible (if not all) of my metaphorical pupils are expelled immediately before your return.  Which I think basically means I need to have posted something about painting figures and playing games. So here goes:

A notable feature of this scenario is that it is the first scheduled appearance of the main man himself, Malcor the Mad, along with his Advisory Council. I decided to use a figure my son had made out of the North Star Wizards plastic sprue for Malcor. He looked quite striking to me, with his pointy collars and pointy beard and I "double based" him to try and make him seem more substantial and important than the other human figures in play.



I am still not sure if he is quite impressive enough to be the big bad boss of the whole campaign, but he would have to do.

For Malcor's three person Advisory Council I used a set of three very Shakespearean looking witches. I am not sure of the manufacturer as I purchased them from the sale section of this very forum. I toyed with painting them in brighter more adventurous colours but in the end went with traditional black for ease and future flexibility.









It turns out black is harder to paint than I remember.  But again, they would have to do.

Next I had to review the capabilities of my newly painted Senior Leadership Team and plan some unpleasant surprises for the trespassing warbands...

[snitcythedog]

Just saw this post and these will be great additions to the campaign.  I would be very interested if anyone knows the manufacture on the witch coven.  They are very not bad. 

[Bearwoodman]

Yes, they very nice traditional ugly sinister witches! And they came with a small cauldron that I have not yet painted. Note that I had to replace the right hand of the last figure as it was missing, as was the top of the staff of the first witch pictured, so they would have looked a bit different originally.

[Daeothar]

They look familiar.

So I checked my lead pile and it turns out I have a completely different set of 3 witches! 

I have a vague recollection of that one witch lacking a hand was actually stirring the cauldron, but don't quote me on that...