Table top WIP

[rcketscientst]

[My apologies up front for wall of words, and the pictures, or lack thereof.  I have not tried linking in images, so not sure how it is going to go with this post.  It will be a bit of trial and error.]

So, I went down this rabbit hole.  I did not realize it at first, but suddenly it was about 18 weeks later, and I find that I have poured 90% of my hobby time into this one project (granted that real life has provided a few things that required my time during this period.)  And I am not done yet.  Almost, so I feel comfortable that the light is not an oncoming ghost train, but still, I know I have time I must commit.  I am now doing the math, evaluating how much sleep do I really need?  The desire to roll dice is strong, but if I start, will I ever finish the project?  This is not a tale for the faint of heart, or children, or those with a short attention span.  Turn back now.

It began innocently, I was doing OK with my status quo.  Sure there was some grey plastic buildings and enamel paint on figures, but my threshold team was doing OK.  I was getting the hang of the solo deck, and putting together pre-made lurker teams to speed up playing.  There was even a recurring cult leader/high priest that seemed to be shaping up as a fine nemesis.  The team was taking on a life of its own.  There were some setbacks along the way, to be sure.  And sadly fatalities; Daryl and his brother Daryl, Bob, little Timmy and Rex, Barnaby the accountant, and Minnie.  Dear Minnie.  But they sacrificed for a noble cause.  Making omelettes, and all that.  Team leader Bruce Leroy and Agent John  "Tequila" Wooshinski were juggernauts of justice.  My terrain started to seem inadequate for this epic tale, my table bland and passé.   The taste of ash formed in my mouth.  Of course, while I continued to peruse the forum and see all of the inspiring reports and tableaus posted, my ennui for what I was using just increased.  What was I to do?
One of the ideas that stuck with me was the concept of a modular component board, as admirably developed and demonstrated by Cutp.  So a plan was set in place.  I have a large thank you to Cutp for his patience in answering my questions during this process. 

[At this point I would also like to say one more thing that is absolutely needed for a project like this: a very understanding and supportive spouse/significant other.  I Love my wife, and want thank her for having patience while I built this thing in whatever room of the house I needed to each day.  End of gushy part.]

A confession: I have to admit part of my desire to use this modular system was due to being an inherent slacker and laze about.  I realized I could switch between eras, and utilize the various terrain pieces I have, with just a single table.  At least that was what I told myself at the beginning.  Things are always so rosy at the beginning.

I was also getting into Shadows of Brimstone at this point (thanks Litebrite), because co-op games are better for family game night than anything competitive.  I just feel bad beating up on my children, even if they are in their twenties.  The new town expansion came out, so I decided to shove a round peg in a square hole.  Why keep it simple?

Sarcasm aside, you really need to think through what you want when it is all said and done.  I needed a table with some form of grid for one game, but nothing too obvious for other games.  And the grid size is going to drive a minimum in some areas (cannot have less than 1 square), but how does it scale up?  Every insert needs to be close to some multiple, give or take. 

Further adding to the requirements, I have been collecting terrain kits.  There was no way I was going to be able to make the table with terrain, and then get to use it in this decade.  I tend to move at a glacial speed.  So I had kits from Old Glory, Micro Arts Studio, Plast Craft, 4Ground, Sarissa, GF 9, and even some Games Workshop stuff.  The size of inserts needed to accommodate as much as possible, I wanted to minimize needing flat inserts and simply setting stuff on top of the table.  The trick was going to be determining what size inserts were going to work for them all, and be some multiple of the grid size.  And I wanted to keep the overall table size big enough to use for games of SA.

[rcketscientst]

Yeah, well, I used lots of scratch paper and graph paper, made drawings and diagrams.  Broke things down to 1/16th and 1/32nd inch configurations (SI would not have been better.  It would have just provided an exponential amount of fiddly calculations.)  Finally, I realized this was not rocket science (sorry, it had to be said.)  Close was going to work fine for the board game, and SA uses a measuring tape, so grid patterns were moot.  Aided by a bottle of red, dry, liquid courage contemplation, decisions were made.  Time is infinite, pads of engineering paper are limited.

At the same time, material procurement was going on.  I knew the basics, such as the overall two dimensional footprint (no bigger than 2'x3'.)  Cutp's input about material thickness, framing, supporting structure, et al was critical to get me off dead center.  Tooling was also a concern.  I started with a razor saw and a utility knife.  I ended with a box of clamps, a machinist square, and a 10-inch table saw with a Diablo 80 tooth blade.  And a significant pile of wood.  No sheep.

I settled on a square, base insert size of 8.5 inches, with additional inserts of 4.25 inches width (half), and 12.75 inches width (one and a half.)  These sizes actually covered most (94.67%) of the buildings I either had or that are available on the market.  The actual SoB town game board was 19 inches by 28 inches, but I did not want to go that narrow.  The width was left at 2 feet, and the length was shortened to 28 inches (from my three foot baseline.)  I can limit deployment zones if a true 3 feet are called for.  It left a border of one "square" around the outside of the table, and two "streets" that were a tad over 3 "squares" crisscrossing the board.  The square peg might just fit in the round hole.

Construction began, lessons were learned.  And re-learned.  Not too much blood was lost.  I made a piece part list, including (where necessary) the grain direction.   I found that you can buy something pre-cut to 2', but do not trust Them.  Measure everything yourself, with an accurate measuring device.  For myself, I was way to used to tight tolerances, so tape measures were not good enough.  The machinist square was my choice.  Good, solid, thick steel.  It is not going to flex or stretch, or wear.  Spend the money on a good tool, it pays off in the long run.  Less reworks, and things actually can come out square.  Lots of glue later, the basic table was finished.

[rcketscientst]

My laurels needed resting, but that was just the start.  I realized that surface texture was going to be an issue, and it would certainly make the difference between an urban environment and a rural one.  The square peg got bound up again.

A friend suggested some of the technical paints that are on the market now, sold by Secret Weapon, or Vallejo, or GW.  Interesting idea, however I needed to cover a rather lot of board and each of the inserts for each building, and I still have mortgage payments, so that thought was abandoned quickly.  The solution was textured matte medium.  It comes in several sizes of particulate, and more importantly, it comes in bulk.  And one can buy it on Amazon, which meant work could continue while it was brought to the construction site.

Paint was another commodity that was needed in bulk, so craft paint or house paint.  I found that so far I have only used a single 2 ounce bottle (at US$1.57 per bottle), so my mortgage is safe again.  Craft paint means no airbrush (I am not that brave), so some cheap, large brushes are needed.  If you want to use the Kolinsky sable go for it, but I found the bag of brushes for a couple dollars worked just fine.  This is not going to be a Golden Daemon or Crystal Brush entry, it is terrain.  You still want to do a half way decent job on it, because you are going to be looking at it a lot, maybe more than some figures.  But controlled dry brushing is fine, you do not need to work on the zenithal highlights or object source lighting.  Seriously.



A good variety of glues are also needed.  Depending on substrate and the material the building is made of, I used everything from wood glue (the yellow stuff) to cyanoacrylate.  With a wood surface, sealing the intended bonding location first with a paint primer, then using a gel type cyanoacrylate gets you fairly good results.  At least, you will destroy the building before you can pry it off the wood surface, so that seems sufficient.

After it all gets painted, you want to seal the surface.  Top and bottom, just to minimize the chance of moisture incursion and potential warping.  If you have covered the bottom with a couple of good, thick coats of paint, you might be OK.  I just found that there were nooks and crannies that my brush did not quite get into, so a spray sealer resolves that issue.  I also put a thick, glossy coat of sealer along the bottom edge that is going to resting on whatever table surface I set this on.  I am going to be putting furniture pads there also, I just wanted a non-porous surface for the pad adhesive to stick to.  Nothing worse than the game top shifting during a dynamic game session, and hearing a screech coming from your dining room table surface.  Talk about sucking the joy out of things.

So this is where I am.  I realize now that I will need a second board for city scenes.  Instead of the earthen texture I will need something cobblestone-esque.   Definitely different colours.  But that is all in the future for now.  I need to finish some roofs and paint some buildings.  And the scatter terrain.  And the miniatures.  How could I have forgotten those?



My apologies again for the length of this rambling post.  Of course by now, if you are still reading, it is your own fault.  Nobody made you do it.

[ojdota]

  thats a very nice board you have, cant wait to see more 

[cutp]

congrats rcketscientst!

looking good

before u start another board, try and finish one insert board and building at a time (IMHO)

this may give u a great sense of incremental progress! (otherwise it always looks like you're not done)



PS one of the 2' x 2' board I showed I've re-flocked and tiled 3 times!

get that stuff to playable quality then upgrade as time and OCD permits!

:p

[dinohunterpoa]

Very nice, CONGRATULATIONS! Please keep us updated! 

[Mason]

Dunno how I missed this earlier....

Brilliant, mate.
I like where you are going with this.
Plenty of potential uses for those scenery elements other than SA.
 


As you are using whats amounts to Old West buildings for this board I should refer you to my Cow Town of Upsheet Creek, which may provide a few ideas to steal. All simple stuff, no rocket science....

http://leadadventureforum.com/index.php?topic=60011.0

Just look at the pictures, there is a lot of silliness in the large thread.