Fallout: Heading East

[Constable Bertrand]

The armour turned out nice, the weathering and BV helmet really finish him off. I agree about the green colour too.

Another gamer with the desire for trains on their board. can anyone resist?

Not sure what you mean about the play train track, but a few of us around here have used plastic track to great effect. Potter over to the railway discussion board and have a look at the goldiloc/fast lane sets

Cheers
Matt

[Wyrmalla]

By play train track I mean this chunky blue stuff that doesn't resemble real train tracks at all. Somehow the toy set that this building came from was the first image I found online. Most of the buildings are missing (damn why are all the good bits gone?), but I'm finding what was there to be pretty serviceable.



Heh, and there's a railway board here? Well I'll be a son of a gun... I know that one of the model train shops in my area has tons of old track spare, but naturally it'd wind up being expensive. There's also a stall at a car boot sale I go to which sells die cast models, including trains, which may have some. Really its whatever fits the scale (what is 28mm in railway measurements?) and is mighty cheap that'll do.

[zizi666]

Look for O-scale 2-rail tracks. I was Lucky to get hold of some 2m Lionel plastic tracks (3 switches plus about an equal amount of curved and straight pieces)
Next stuff I got off ebay were 2 dummy diesel locs and several (freight) wagons. The dummy locs are way cheaper than the powered ones. the brand is Kusan and their wagons are all in plastic. Another lot of wagons I procured appears turned out to consist of wooden models with metal detailing (doors/steps, ladders, wheels)

One thing to look out for with those O-scale rails is that the standard ones are 3-rail. The 2-rail version I got was apperently from a battery powered train set.

You can find pics of some that stuff here :
http://leadadventureforum.com/index.php?topic=5961.msg762892#msg762892
http://leadadventureforum.com/index.php?topic=56635.0

Most of it came from here : http://stores.benl.ebay.be/trainz/

[Constable Bertrand]

Ah, yes that's useless!

As I mentioned, there are the toy train sets available. But in terms of scale railway (in brief) there are a few options. "O" scale on the larger 1:48ish size, or On30 - narrow gauge O scale (1:48) which runs on HO track. Peco do a special narrow gauge version with different sized sleepers.

There is also S Scale but harder to find.

Check out the many railway threads for ideas and discussions on scale. Our own Michi and Bedwyn(?) are the rulers of scale railways in gaming. Check them out. My thread on Christmas 2013 trains has a run down of current plastic toy train sets available at the moment.

Cheers
Matt

[Wyrmalla]

I've never been fond of model trains. All those different letters for each scale confuse me. I'll probably just wind up sorting it out by eye in a second hand shop rather than trawling ebay for a particular size of track. =/

I picked up four little girl's toy dolls houses today. They're cheap things, Barbie/Hello Kitty I think. Oh the hell I've gone through trying to buy them though (um, which I won't go into here). Anyways, they come in two parts to allow access to their interiors. I'll be glueing the so they can't be accessed, and I'm considering splitting one in half so I can make two ruined buildings from it (by making the remains of walls and floors along the edges of the half of a building). These'll be based and put in along with some ruined picket fencing probably. Hey they may be cheap toys, but I think they'll be great for pre-war suburban buildings.

Just the first one here. The other side of this building's not been touched yet.



Uh, I don't know what I'll be doing about all the hearts on the Hello Kitty one I have...

Is covering up the entrances with planks a good idea? Like the trains station below neither have interiors. I stuck on the planks to symbolise this, but would they look better without them? From a gameplay standpoint using the 7Tv ruleset I'd allow players to spend one activation searching a building for loot. If the building;s barricaded then they must either pass an agility (to squeeze in through a hole) or a strength (to tear off the planks) test, which costs one action, or with the use of an item such as an axe, crowbar or sledgehammer, break through the barricade. Though in that case people may ask "why can't we go in there and fortify it?", to which I'll have to respond "because, uh, the floor's made of lava and, uh, you don't want to wake up the ghouls in the basement". ...Sure, that sounds good.

Here's the train station after I let my craft knives and glue at it.



I still need to at sand to it, but that takes effort and there's gaps to fill. I'll be placing some posters about it of course (there's a few notice boards there for little ones as a bonus too). ...Of course not having any train tracks handy may make this thing look a little out of place on a board for the moment.

I also picked up one of the new Renedra desert dwellings. More to just have a look at what the model's like and for ideas.

Ah, now to go back to college and remember that I'm two weeks behind on my coursework. =P

[Wyrmalla]

I've put together that Renedra mud hut which I bought yesterday. Oh hell what a horrible kit. Would it be so difficult to add inserts to a model for ease of putting it together? I feel like every piece just didn't want to sit right. Now that its together and based I need to fill in the gaps and add sand (which I hate doing, I need to buy some proper PVA glue). I'll have a look at other Renedra kits at the next wargaming show that I go to (picket fences and tents), but I don't think I'll be buying one of their huts again unless they're going for less than retail (for £16 I don't want to deal with that hassle again).

The model doesn't look bad now that its built, though I may just make my own out of clay later. In the original Fallout games post war mud huts were common, be they the basic ones in Shady Sands, or what I expect are sandcrete prefabs that Vault City uses. Actually I think damn near everyone who wasn't using pre-war structures made their buidlings with a sand base. Fort Aradesh, and other NCR fortifications (not set up on top of existing pre-war structures like the scrap walls of McCarran) would probably by made from sand like old French Foreign Legion garrisons (though maybe with a few Hesco bastions thrown in to make them look a wee bit out of place).

The pre-war house has been tidied up a little too (insomuch a barricaded 200 year old house can be tidied). However I'll be basing the shacks that I set aside last week (or was it the week before...) to be worked on. Hmn, perhaps its all the different colours that're involved (hey twenty shades of orange are still different colours), but I can't bother myself to paint those things. =/

[Wyrmalla]

So here's the ex-doll house.

This is the front btw.


And this is the rear. The house is made from two of the same front piece stuck together, I just removed the awning thing from the back part.


Oh and the interior's unpainted in case anyone notices. I didn't bother with adding furniture or painting it as nobody will probably look. There's stickers of rugs, paintings, and other crap though which I left on in case someone does look in. I suppose all the fixtures were torn off by looters or for firewood. All that junk about the building's base is supposed to be for barricading up the home's windows (or its been torn off them), but I suppose the owners didn't finish.

I'll need to keep my eye out for more of these. A whole neighbourhood would be cool. Just over two weeks till the wargaming shows start, here's hoping I'll be up to my eyes in debt by the end of them (um, I mean I'll be completely responsible with my money).

Anyone know any companies which make bare trees? I had a look about the local model shops yesterday, but none of them sells any (apparently they're too expensive to buy in. Yeah trees with foliage are cheaper than those without...). Modelzone did some, but they went into administration. Papa needs himself some dead trees. =(

I began painting the train station too as is the mud hut primed. I'd like to finish them them now (unpainted stuff can remain unpainted for ages, but I hate having primed models sitting about), though yeah, those shacks need done. Must stop distracting myself. Saying that I may give some charity shops a search tomorrow for cool things. =P

[Messyart]

You could make trees with electrical wire and tissue bathed in PVA?

The house looks excellent.

[zizi666]

Woodland Scenics has tree armatures.
deciduous :

and pines

You'l find better pics on their website, but for some reason I couldn't get them to show up in the message.

And then theres the GW wood, nice dead trees if you leave the canopies off but maybe a bit pricey :

[max]

I used wire, covered in masking tape and covered in PVA and sawdust to make trees. For dead ones just leave them at that.

Nice house BTW 

[Wyrmalla]

See I could use wire and PVA, but I'm lazy. I'd rather not build a production line when I could just pick up a bag of a few dozen. ...Hey I'm a spoilt westerner, I contract others to make my dead trees!

Ah, it was indeed Woodland Scenics. Pine should do. I'm probably making a dendrologist cry though for placing pine trees in the deserts of Utah.

Eww, and goodness no on those GW ones. I've seen them being used by others, but they're just a little too cartoon like for my own tastes (more a Malifuax thing perhaps). ^^

Right, I've left it late in the day, but I'm heading out to sift through second hand shops for kid's toys. I shall wear my creepiest clothes for added effect. That train station's half painted, but there's probably no point in me finishing it without having the rails. Then again I suppose when I actually buy some tracks having that done will give me less work. So ah, there may or may not be more terrain posted tonight at some point. ...Although I really should base those shacks at some point.

[Mr. Peabody]

Those Woodland Scenics armatures dry-brush up just fine. They have decent bark-texture, but not all the way up the tree...

[Wyrmalla]

I was actually that bothered about whether the trees had a texture or not. I mean it'd be great if they did, but nobody'd probably care too much of those pointy black things had a huge amount of detail on them. I'll see about perusing that site a bit to see if there's anything else useful, but tah for pointing me to them in any case zizi666.

Trying out my new camera. I'm still iffy about it and trying to work out how the thing actually works, but how're these looking? Better than the old camera I hope.






The flash is a little strong. You can see the shadows it produces about the bottom right of each of the photos. If I stick a lamp behind the models when taking pictures hopefully the light coming from the opposite direction will fix that.

Aside from buying that new camera I hit about twenty charity shops today. I don't know what it is, but they were all pretty crap. Now they seem to be geared towards "vintage" clothes and bits of tats. Maybe it was the area, by the University, but I remember those shops as having better stock (I've picked up loads of old roleplaying games and wargames there before). What did annoy me was seeing some great die cast classic American cars sitting in a shop's window, marked as "for display only". Meh, I'll see about going to a car boot sale at the weekend before my shift in the charity shop. I swear that I'll buy something useful by the end of this week! 

[Sinewgrab]

Eww, and goodness no on those GW ones. I've seen them being used by others, but they're just a little too cartoon like for my own tastes (more a Malifuax thing perhaps). ^^

I heartily disagree - while they seem cartoonish at first - take a good look at the trees twisted by radiation in Fallout 3.  I think they work wonderfully.

[Wyrmalla]

Without the leaves maybe, and they don't look entirely terrible, but I really dislike the models Games Workshop's been putting out lately. Mind you if I see any of their stuff going for a few pennies I'd pick it up. I just wouldn't spend the cash that they're asking on those toys. =/