Monday, November 1, 2021

Generic scenery and wargaming terrain on a budget

Time to finally do som painting

It's been quiet from the 'blog-front' here for a while now, but as already mentioned in an earlier blogpost; 'Even more about protective covering' I had 3D-printed a lot of different scenery items, and had even more in the making at the time of writing, that needed to be painted. Even thou we're still fighting Covid-19, we do not have as many restrictions as earlier like home isolation and quarantine anymore. -So it was time to go to go back to work and catch up, resulting in less time to 3D-print new items, painting them or gaming.  Besides I got into a diversion of military modelling, and spent some time by the lake with my new RC boat

But finally I got around to do some painting. So what to paint my newly scenery items like, and where and when should they represent???

Home made wargame terrain

Home made wargame terrain

Generic approach

Despite I'm quite new to tabletop gaming, there are a lot of different eras, conflicts, scales and games (both historical and sci-fi) I would like to play. I don't have unlimited space at home for all my modelling hobbies, so I can't just go ahead and make scenery items for every game, battle or period I'd like. So I've decided to make and paint scenery items so generic that I can combine and use them for as many different games, settings, eras, scales and conflicts as possible.

Since I've already got 54mm miniatures for gaming in the old west, Sci-fi, and for post WWII conflicts in Africa and the Middle East, it was clear that I had to go for some kind of scenery they all have in common. Besides, the Middle East might be a suitable 'theater' for future wargaming projects as well, since it's the most war thorn region of the world through the whole history. 

I decided to go for a desert-like, sandy, dusty wasteland scenery, as it will be suitable for different eras and conflicts in the Middle East and Africa, as well in the southern parts of the 'Old West' or in a Sci-fi setting on a Mars-like or 'Tatooine' planet.

Home made wargame terrain

The painting it self was straight forward; Solid layers of tan color(s), washed with dark brown, and drybryshed with 'Titanium Buff'. All painted with cheap craft acrylics.

Home made wargame terrain
By just adding some craters to the rocks make you have a Middle East/African battlefield or a Sci-fi setting

Home made wargame terrain
For vegetation I selected plants and trees I don't think would look out of place in a sandy and dry habitat 

Home made wargame terrain
This was 3D-printet in black PLA and simply drybrushed with various 'browns', starting dark followed by lighter shades

Home made wargame terrain
Adobe style buildings can be found in The MiddleEast, Africa and in southern parts of Northern America

Home made wargame terrain
With generic scenery further period and location can be set by adding periodic or geographical items. Here is some detail to set the scene to Middle East or African wargames

I also made some terrain pieces with other bits and pieces I had laying around.

Home made wargame terrain
When 3D-printing you sometimes add 'Rafts'to your print to make your model stick better to the printbed. When done printing you separate them and usually throw the raft away. I found some of the rafts from my previous 3D-prints to be so sturdy and of irregular shape that I would try to use them as terrain bases. The greenery is just lichen for Christmas decorations found in craft stores. Thanks to Rick Astley for providing one of those circular bases in the middle. I knew he was never giving me up...

Home made wargame terrain
Circular CD-bases again. I think this is one of the Mrs' 'Game of Thrones' seasons...
The rocks are made by cutting blue and pink extruded foam to shape and painted.

Home made wargame terrain
This is made by adding pieces from 'The Force' and 'The Corps' playsets to a raft for 3D prints. A CD or any other suitable base will work as well
Home made wargame terrain
Even stationary vehicles can act as periodic gaming terrain, and add some cover for your troops. The toy car was to correct scale, but looked a little too pristine  at first...

Home made wargame terrain
The 'battle mat' is made by a tan piece of inexpensive cloth simply stippled with different browns and greens acrylics by a coarse sponge. Roads, rivers and lakes are just fabric in a different colors, and are loose to change the scenery for different scenarioes

There are still a lot of interesting and available free 3D-files ready to download and print out there, but in this scale I'll just have to limit myself as I already have challenges with storing it properly. Besides I should have enough scenery and terrain by now to make up interesting games.

Now it's about time to let the (war-) Game(s) begin, so please follow the blog for updates!

Sunday, October 24, 2021

New steam locomotive for the Garden Railway

The new locomotive

Finally after all the Covid-restrictions we're, for the time being, allowed to take up normal activities again. Due to the Covid-19 I hadn't been to any Model Railway Exhibitions for about 2 years, either in Norway or abroad. So when there was a small Model Railway Exhibition held in Norway last week I just had to go. It was very nice to meet fellow modellers again. On this exhibition I also found a G-scale Steam locomotive from LGB that I've wanted for a while, but haven't seen in many stores, so I ended up buying it.

Like most LGB-stuff in G-scale it's narrow gauge, and it's made as an even lighter narrow gauge standard as it is a "Feldbahn". A prototypical Feldbahn would be made to 600mm gauge in real life, but LGB has made it go with their 45mm gauge tracks, so the model has a slightly broader gauge than the prototype. The LGB rolling stock in the "Feldbahn-series" is very short and will fit my very small garden railway well.

LGB Feldbahn


The model is very well made and looks good, and it runs superbly. I noticed that the cab is open, and you can see all the details in it, except for the crew (!). Usually LGB includes a engine driver in their models, but obviously not here where the cab is so open. On the label on the box there is a picture of the loco with an engine driver, but when I searched the internet for this model I found both models with and without the driver.

The Crew

It seemed obvious what I had to do; I had to add some crew, at least an engine driver. Before I went ahead and ordered one from LGB I wanted to see if I could find any suitable figures to print in our 3D-printer. At Thingiverse I found two I figured they could be used for an engine driver and a fireman; Man With Cap (1:32 scale) and a figure from the German Africa Corps (1:72 scale). I scaled both the figures to about G-scale, and mirrored the Man With Cap in the slicer, so I could have a conductor as well from the same figure. They were printed on "standard" resolution at our Flashforge Finder to save time, and to see if they looked good enough. After some painting with cheap acrylics from the craft shop, I think they did. They are viewed at a distance anyway.

You can still see the layer-lines from the FDM-printer, but I think they turned out surprisingly well keeping in mind that these are printed in standard resolution. So well, that I didn't consider to print them in a higher and more time consuming resolution    

The train

Fitted in the cab of the locomotive I think they look good enough. Instead of only having one engine driver if he was to be included or not originally, I now have an engine driver, a fireman and a conductor.

LGB Feldbahn

LGB Feldbahn

LGB Feldbahn












Monday, October 11, 2021

Exploring new Horizons in military modelling

I've been fascinated by Radio Controlled boats ever since I was a kid, both the fast ones and especially the true scale models. - And in particular military ones. Back then there were no RTR-models (like today), only kits of varying skill levels. I never got around to build a scale boat of my own because it just seemed way to complicated.

Recently I went with my son to hobby store i Oslo called Sami RC, when he was going to buy a petrol powered RC car. I was actually not so interested in those cars, so I went looking in the shelves with boats while he was shopping. And among all those not-'fine scale' racing boats, I saw one RTR scale model boat of a Combat Boat 90 by Pro boat. It needed not more than a battery to be ready for action. So while my son got his car, I finally got my RC boat. A boat which was both a military scale model and a fast one (just like the prototype).

Pro boat CB90 RC boat
It's planing easily as the prototype

The boat has a high level of details and looks great just out of  the box. Machine guns and flag was included and can be attached. No scale is specified on the box, but by it's size I've calculated it to be about 1:26,6 scale. With about only 55,88 cm it fits nicely into at toolbox with it's controller and is easy to carry along.

Pro boat CB90 RC boat
Every thing you need for a running session, fits in a toolbox

You also need a battery-charger, but I already had one from my RC Tank and RC Car which I could use. After charging the batteries it was time to try it out. Luckily I live by a lake, and I won't recommend to use models like this in the sea, as the salt will make metal parts corrode. 



At full throttle it looks like its going to fast, but I've calculated it to be close to the prototype though. I've found out that you can set the controller to 75% power, which actually looks better and closer to expected 'scale speed'. A benefit of this is that your batteries will last for a longer running session as well; about 30+ minutes contrary to the 14 minutes if you have 100% and full throttle almost all the time.


Pro boat CB90 RC boat


It is a fun boat to operate, and I think the only con is that it has no reverse. I also added powerfull magnets inside the hull on both sides, so I can dock to my friends magnetic quay which is built to about the same scale.

Pro boat CB90 RC boat
It's a nice Scenic quay my friend have made

Pro boat CB90 RC boat
With magnets in both boat hull, and in the tires along the quayside, it docks easily with a steady hand. 


Another benefit for me is that this model is of the same type of Combat Boat (Stridsbåt 90) that was used by the Norwegian Coastal Artillery, and are now in service with the Norwegian Coastal Rangers. This will serve as inspiration for me if I would like to personalize it through the winter, so my Combat Boat doesn't look like all the other similar Pro Boats. If so updates will follow.

A Norwegian Stridsbåt 90 (Photo: Forsvaret)



This is a summer hobby, and the season seems to be over here in Norway this year. It's very therapeutic just to sit back with a cup of coffee or a cold beer, and just navigate your own boat around.





Saturday, April 17, 2021

Fighting Covid-19

Dead simple rules for killing boredom during social-distancing, home isolation or quarantine

There have been a little quite on this blog lately, but that's not the same as I've not been doing anything. I've been busy painting a lot of those 3D-printed items as seen in my previous blog-post, and covering painting is not that exciting (although it takes time). During this time we have also been living under this Covid-19 situation for a year, and I guess we all just want to go back and have a normal day soon. During my own short term quarantine I started to write on these very simple and easy to play rules to kill some time and looking forward to we all can return to our normal lives again.

Fighting Covid Wargame

It is so simple and you don't need more than would fit in a little bag. This is truly a 'Wargame in a bag':
Fighting Covid Wargame

The rules

I've also uploaded the rules here if you want to print them out to have a try on this game.



The Game

As in real life (by now) I let only about half of my men or less to be vaccinated against Covid-19 and benefit from that protection. A "V" was added to the underside of their base.

I 3D-printed "virus-tokens" in two different colors, and let the minority blue color represent a virus-mutation. Any gaming tokens or similar kan substitute for "viruses". Othervise you'll need som dice and a tapemeasure.

The Covid-19 kit was found on www.Thingeverse.com and could be downloaded for free. I resized the kits making it smaller and more suitable for my Army Men
The Covid-19 kit was downloaded fro www.Thingeverse.com for free and resized ta make it more suitable for the game

This was the initial game set-up with a unit consisting of 2 regular Covid-19 viruses and 1 mutant virus in each corner. My Army men started on a 'hill' in the center.

Fighting Covid Wargame
It's nice when you can have a zip of your scenery

All the Virus-units, unless 1, moved toward the Army Men very fast. To try to keep initiative the captain ordred his men to follow him into a melee with the closest threat.

Fighting Covid Wargame
He is brave....

Until the next turn.....
The captain was the first casualty, and non of the other troopers made it off the hill before they were surrounded by viruses and taken out one-by-one.....

Fighting Covid Wargame
...-but stupid

Fighting Covid Wargame
The charge failed and the others didn't come of the hill as they were engaged and surrounded

Fighting Covid Wargame

The flamethrower-guy did really put up a fight, but was finally outnumbered and taken out.

Fighting Covid Wargame



Fighting Covid Wargame

The After Action Review

A game took about 30 minutes and 7 turns to complete. Therefore I had time to play several more games, and I think it wasn't before the 4th time I was able to eliminate the viruses. 

Alternatively you can add a couple of figures, but then you should consider to keep them less protected (no fasemasks or vaccine).

These rules are very simple and doesn't cover every aspects that may appear during a game. If any doubts just make your own decision of whats likely and I encourage you to make your own "House-rules". This was also the first game I was able to use my 3D-printed Dicetower (with 4 bafflers). As you can see it's not fully painted, so I'll guess I'll have to go back painting now...




So until next time; Stay safe guys!!

Saturday, October 17, 2020

Even more about protective covering......

Wargaming

Last time I wrote about protective covering, I wrote about how to protect your litte soldier's paint job. If you're using your troopers for wargaming you'll want to protect them for being spottet and shot at by their enemies as well. This cover can be buildings, bunkers, strongpoints, sandbag positions, foxholes, (abounded) vehicles, bombshell craters, hills, rocks, trees, woods, vegetation and general "clutter". -Anything that can give them some needed protective covering and concealment during the battle. If you're gaming outside, its pretty easy to give them both concealment and protective cover, as the nature will take care of that just like the real thing. I live in Norway and playing gaming outside is not an all year activity, so I prefer to be inside.
Making own terrain for wargames
Outside you can easily add cover, and the scenery looks good.


Tabletop gaming

As many of you using your soldiers for wargaming inside already may be familiar with, is that 'Tabletop (war-) gaming' is ,by it's nature, pretty flat. It's limited how hilly scenery that can be created on a tabletop, and easily stored away when not in use. To add some interest and challenges to the otherwise flat tabletop, some kind of covering to prevent being seen or hit by enemy fire is most useful and needed. Suitable covering can be improvised and made by easily, cheap and accessible things that you have to hand, and can be virtually anything. Or you can use items more adapted for your army men.


These photos were taken during my very first wargame as I wanted to try it out. I used unpainted plastic soldiers and things I could easily find at home; my kids' obsolete Moomin playhouse, books for hills, a folded ruler for a wall, cut down toilet-dowels for foxholes and coffee capsules for low vegetation. The game was good fun though, and I decided to paint my soldiers for a start. Then it's just escalated...

Making own terrain for wargames
Even in the "toybox" usefull items for wargaming can be found and customized. I've descirbed how I repainted those two vehicles in the front in an earlier post, and det Beetle in the back needs som heavy weathering and will act as cover. The bushes are form an old farm set.

Playsets

If you buy your army men in cheap 'playsets' in boxes or buckets, you usually get some 'scenery-items' such as bunkers, trees, sandbagpositions, fences and czech hedgehog along. They are not 'finescale' and they are often hollow with molded details on only one side. If you paint them, they can look pretty good.
Making own terrain for wargames
The fences, sandbags, ruin and the czech hedgehogs were obtained from the two playsets in the background and painted.
Once upon a dice in the west
When I tested my own "homebrew" rules (Once upon a dice in the West), I covered the table and books with a suitable sandcoored cloth. The fences, cactuses, trees and a wagon were from old playsets. The building and well is from my old 'toybox' and were made in Western Germany by Vero back in the 70ies. The figures are Britains Deetail and are from my old toybox as well.

Some Playsets or scenery items are available from more established plastic soldiers manufactures like for instance Airfix, but are usually a little more expensive and harder to get. The availability is nothing like it was back in the 'good old days' unfortunately.
Making own terrain for wargames
Two buildings fromAirfix' 1:32 scale range. They've been around since my childhood and I'm found of them even if they have very thin walls for such buildings in such a scale. I'll let them giver my troopers a cover-save.

Plastic kit manufactures

If you are into 54mm or 1:32 scale plastic soldiers, you can find a lot of useful accessories and kits from different main 1:35 scale manufacturers like for instance Italeri and Tamyia. Being kits they are usually more expensive, but you can be lucky to find them really cheap on close-out sales, at sale-stands at exhibitions or simply secondhand from fleamarkets etc. 

I know of one exception to this, and that is Amera Plastic Mouldings who makes some cheap scenery items in 1:32 or 1:35 scale in vac-u-formed plastic. I haven't tried them out (yet).
Making own terrain for wargames
All these kits are 1:35 accessories from Italeri. Kits are usually more fragile and expensive than the other options in this post, but these I found very cheap at a second-hand market. I've not  come around to repaint that shed in the midle back yet, and I also plan to build that well soon.


DIY

There are a lot of resources on the internet that shows you how to turn cheap and available items into good looking scenery-items for your wargaming and plastic soldiers. On Youtube there are some online 'clinics' showing you how to do it as well, and one om my favorites is Mel 'The Terrain Tutor'.
Making own terrain for wargames
The rock-formations are made by cut and painted blue styrofoam pieces, and glued to old CD-discs I'm done watching. The light and moss are Christmas-decorations from the craftshop modified to suit my purpose. The burnout marker I built from a discripton from The Terrainturor on Youtube:



DIY with paper

On the internet you can usually find a lot of free and downloadable paperkits which you can just print to get useful scenery-items for your tabletop gaming. For their games intentionally, Combat Storm use to have a couple of buildings, some walls, sandbagpositions, cars and containers free to download from their page. Another suitable free of charge printable models in 1:35 scale and just about right for "Armymen-scale" are the easy to build military vehicles from Dave's Card Creations. I especially like the M113 APCs and HUMMVs. And here you should be able to find several free building kits. One advantage with these is that they can be resized to your needs before you print them.

DIY in plastic

This is a what this blog-post was really to be about, and a very new chapter to me. Due to other needs in our family, my family bought a 'cheap' 3D-printer. When not in use for it intentional purpose, I got curious if it was usable for my hobbies being wargaming with toy soldiers, model railroading or RC-hobby as well. After a visit on Thingeverse, a website with thousands of files of models you can print for free for your own use, I was not in doubt anymore; There are a lot of different useful (everyday) gadgets there, but also literally thousands of files that can be printed into 'scale models' as well. You are not limited to print just scenery items as I've done in this post, as vehicles, figures, gaming miniatures, tokens, markers, dicetowers and even "hill-kits" are available on Thingeverse as well. I decided to take on my wargaming as I wanted more covering items and scenery for my otherwise flat tabletop.
Making own terrain for wargames
Here is a selection of what I've been printing so far. I'm not completly done yet for my 54mm wargaming, and have a model printing while I'm writing this.

There are actually not a lot of files scaled specific to 1:32, 1:35 or 54mm on Thingeverse. I discovered that many files/models for tabletop gaming was scaled to 1:56/28mm, 15mm or not to a specific scale at all. Since I wanted to use this to get my 54mm soldiers reviewed earlier in this blog, items they could take cover behind during 'combat', I simply edited and scaled the 28mm and 15mm files/models I wanted up to 1:35 scale. A 28mm model scaled to 160% is about 1:35. The reason for this is that our printer has a limited print-bed to 14x14x14 cm, and my 'Matcbox clones' are probably closer to 1:35 than true 54mm scale anyway. Besides, when you scale up models you use a lot more filament/plastic when you print them. Printing to 1:35 instead of 1:32 saves a little plastic, and is notable when you print many models. This is another advantage with printing your own In the scenery; You only print what you need, as you don't have to buy a whole 'set' to just get some of the parts in it. In the long run this will save you for both money and space taken up by items you really didn't need.

Large models usually comes in several files, and you have to print them separately and assemble them as a kit at the end. What to do when you need larger parts than the printbed on your 3D-printer can accommodate? As you can edit and scale files and models up and down, you can also edit it by cutting it up i pieces and print them separately and joint them together afterwards.
Making own terrain for wargames
The models on the top row are multiple files printed separatly and joined in the end. The wreck on the bottom row was to large for my printer when I scaled it up to about 1:35 scale, so I just "cut" the file in 4 and printed them separatly. It was very easy. 

So what does it costs? When we bought our printer it costed about $ 498, £ 385 or EUR 422. Now days you can get them even cheaper if you wants to assemble it like a kit yourself. Another thing you'll need is filament, the plastic you need for printing. We use a PLA-filler which is non-toxic or with no (harmfull) fumes. One roll of about 200m of PLA-filament costs about $ 20, £ 15 or EUR17 here. How many models you can get out of each roll of filament is depending on scale and size on the models you want to print. These models in approx 1:35 scale are printed from the same roll of filament:
Making own terrain for wargames
And it's still some filament on the roll, I can use for smaller models.

On the downside it takes some time to get your models. Much longer time than go to the store and buy one. First you have to use time finding the models you want to print and then further time editing (converting the file in a slicer) the file before printing. Printing takes (a lot of) time, and it's more time consuming to print larger models than smaller models. And it takes even longer time if you print in thin layers. Now I seriously consider to start wargaming i 1:72 scale, as it will save time and plastic, and give more models for each roll of filament. 
Making own terrain for wargames
Patience is needed! The barrels to the left took 7 hours and 5 minutes to print. The L-shaped sandbagposition down at the right, just over 5 hours, and  the 1. floor of a larger building to the top right about 12 hours and 13 minutes (!) Due to the heat involved you can't just leave it over night or do it while at work...

I know some are skeptic to 3D-printed models due to the printinglayers, as can be seen as small lines in the model. -Especially on slopes. Thicker the layers, the more visible they become. Despite this, many printed models have good details and looks realistic, and I think they will look even better when painted. And unlike some playsets items, They have 'depth', thickness and details on all sides. You can print smaller and sharper objects and details if you buy a even more expensive 3D-resin printer with even more expensive filament, but that's not for me. I hope to find a easy way as I think it's too time-consuming to sand them smooth afterwards. Perhaps priming with car body filler on rattle-can will work?

You can still get 3D-prints even if you don't have a 3D-printer. If You don't have a friend with a 3D-printer and a lot of time, who'll let you use his or her printer, you can buy ready 3D-printed models from Shapeways. Often you can get them resized to your need as well, but do check the price first! Mostly if reasonable priced, but a few times I've found some models on Shapeways which I've also found for free on Thingeverse, but the difference is that on Shapeways it costs about the same as 4 full rolls of filament (!). Perhaps their printquality justifies such a price?

Conclusion

Is this a really cost-saving way of modelling? To buy a 3D-printer is not cheap, even thou the price seems to decrease with time. You can get a very decent printer for a fair price, but is still seems to be a big expense for many of us to buy it in the first place. 

If you do buy one, you'll not have very many other expenses to it (as they are straight forward to maintain) except for buying filament for printing your desired models. One benefit is that you can find files and models to use and print for free on for instance on Thingeverse, and there are a lot of other websites with free 3D-models as well. Just be aware that it's not legal to print free models from Thingeverse to sell them commercially, and probably not from any of the other sites as well. You'll save money on buying models, as you don't have to buy as many anymore because you print them your self. -And you only need to print what you actually need, so you don't end up with a lot of 'extras'. 

Another benefit with 3D-printing is that I can use it for my other (modelling) hobbies as well. I can use it for my model railroad hobby (luckily I'm mainly modelling in H0 1:87 scale) and I'm not very tempted to try to print something for my RC-car as they mostly are in 1:10 scale. I'm considering to maybe try other wargames as well, since new gaming miniatures suddenly became very available with this printer. So I can use it more on my other modelling purposes, and I think that is the key to consider if this is a cost-saving way of modelling; If you only need a few models, it'll be more expensive than you saves. But if you needs many models I think you'll save a lot of money in the long run despite the initial cost.
Making own terrain for wargames
Here is a selection of other useful items I've printed either for using or testing. I've always wanted a dicetower, and this one is quite large and heavy and have 4 bafflers inside. The two small buildings on the left of the tower are H0 scale (1:87) for my odel railway. So are those two figures closest to them as well. The buildings turned out fine, but the figures was just too small to look good with our simple printer. The Stormtrooper to the left of them are printed to different scales as a test. The largest one is 54mm and the smallest is 1:87. In the middle from left to right is 28mm and a 1:72 scale version. I actually think that the 28mm version looks the best of them. At the very back is G-scale figures (1:22,5 scale) for my garden railway, and printed to look our little family. I'm the one to the left. To the right in the picture is a couple of 54mm figures and test prints of weapons so I can customize regular Army Men. The two weapons at the top are actually "Lego"-guns, but they look just right when scaled to correct size. I wrote about them in my previous post. 

Is it complicated? -No, you don't need a degree to to this; it's very easy to learn how to use it. My wife was able to handle our 3D-printer after just browsing the manual, and it was actually her that sat it up.

If I was to buy a 3D-printer again, would I've done other considerations? Yes, I would considered a printer with a heated printbed (keeps your model level), accepting more than just PLA-filament, and could print a little larger than just our 14x14x14 cm. It would be nice to be able to print very small and detailed parts on a resin-printer for my model railroad, but the price can't just justify it as I don't need that many models.

Eventhou I've got fascinated by this, I'm not turning this blog into a blog about 3D-printing. For me it's just another modelling tool. -But a usefull one, because there are not very much plastic soldiers, accessories and wargaming scenery easily available in Norway, and ordering them from abroad is expensive due to tax-rates, customs and shipping. I just wanted to share my experiences so far, both possibilities and limitations, so you can make up your own mind if it's a good thing or not. I think I'm going to be busy for a while now painting all these items I have printed a during all this time in 'Home isolation' due to Covid-19. I should be covered now, so maybe I'll try to print something else for my wargaming scenarios next time. -When patience strikes.

Stay home and stay safe!
Making own terrain for wargames

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