Friday 26 September 2014

Terrain is everything - Project Ω - Realm of Battle board.

And now you can see why there were no teaser pictures for this project. There's no picture I could take that wouldn't reveal what this was. Anyway, I was really lucky because I'd been planning to pick one up for a while and then one appeared on eBay, collection only but in Manchester. Working there and with a colleague who was prepared to pick it up gave me options. In the end the seller brought it in on the train as I work right next to the station. 

Now I do regret the fact I didn't make my own but Liam, Ben and Otty have the official GW boards so I felt it prudent to have something that would sync up with them. Of course winning it at auction for £70 certainly eases my conscience a bit! I'd sat on the auction, put in a bid well above that knowing full well what one costs in the real world and it ticked over onto £70 from about £68 and no one else bid, I couldn't believe it. Gotta love that adrenaline rush when you're expecting ebay snipers!


Of course the loft conversion has meant its been stored at work for the last six weeks but I finally got chance to bring it home. In that time I've thought long and hard about how I was going to paint it and one thing I wanted to do was add a little more texture to the surface so I could get a more interesting effect. I thought about adding PVA and flock like my Armies on Parade board but decided it was too rough. Eventually I decided to use PlastiKote Stone effect spray paint. I hoped this would add the texture but bond effectively before being covered in Red Oxide Primer.


So first up was masking all the skulls. Yeah I know they're almost universally disliked but I can live with them.


I'm considering making all the bone pits as Digestion pits. I'm worried the lime green will be a little overwhelming though, don't know whether to go with yellow ones like my original digestion pit, opinions welcome.


I was actually quite surprised how much texture is on the boards already but I still wasn't sure how it would drybrush for me. I've obviously seen lots of them and play on them regularly but I wanted a finer texture and I also hoped it would help mitigate all those figures that slide down the hills.


So here's the final spray. If I'm honest I'm worried the texture won't actually bond to the plastic. It may have bonded better if there was a primer on first but hindsight is always 20:20. Certainly by the end of the day it was still moist to the touch with nearly 12 hours of drying...


I got through the whole can and it does say thin multiple layers work better than thick ones. Well you can see the coverage isn't complete so it's certainly thin enough in some places, it's just the thicker areas I'm concerned with.


Afterwards I removed the generic sticky tack with the interesting result that whatever propellant/varnish is used to try to seal the texture to the board made the tack become ultra soft and sticky. I had bright blue tack all over my fingers, not good when I was about to start painting our new bathroom white!


Hopefully you can make out some of the added texture, I also did a final spray from about 2 foot away which resulted in those large spots, at the top middle and left. Some nice variety I think. Havign removed the tack I then ran a cocktail stick along all the cracks just to ensure they were not disguised by the texture paint.


Can't wait to add the Red Oxide Primer, I've got one and a bit cans, with another on order. I'll do a light coat all over with the cans in stock and then finish it up with the new one so I don't end up with four boards in one colour and the last two in another.


A final note is that right about the the time this was bought the new Imperial Sector Battle Board came out. Of course I was very interested in this but aside from the ridiculous low price I managed to get my Battle Board I didn't go with the City one for a number of reasons. It's not as versatile for one thing, there are only a couple of tiles and there are no variations in height. You pay a premium for the detail and although it's lighter and more compact I just think it's style over substance. If  there had have been some raised plazas or a dais, nothing they haven't already tried on the Forgeworld boards, it may have been different. There's plenty of examples in the Dawn of War video games they could have referenced and they could have found a way to have it positioned in a variety of ways just like this board. Such a missed opportunity in my book.

14 comments:

  1. Very nice score there.. 8) congrats.. nice start and looking forward to seeing it finished.. surprised it's not red 8)

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    1. It's not red... yet! The next update will indeed show it's true colours.

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  2. That was a good score Dave. Nice idea on the stone texture paint. Be interested to see how it progresses as you paint and bring it to life!

    Though the city boards do look rather cool, they appear to be very difficult to play on. The lack of flat surfaces means minis are constantly toppling over, and dice are almost always cocked. I've seen videos of guys basically rolling off the board just to get non cocked dice! LOL.

    Surprised GW hasn't come out with a "City Board Rolling Surface (TM)".

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    1. I should imagine it is indeed a nightmare. funnily most of my games with Ben are all rolled in a box. He has a wooden pillar that it sits on, it saves a lot of hassle though does feel like each roll of the dices is a monumental undertaking in it's formality, ha, ha!

      Next update soon.

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  3. Great buy Dave.

    Also good idea with the Plasticote, I was going to use PVA and sand for my armies on parade tile but not so sure now having seen what you've done, thing is I do go the PVA sand route for my model bases as I think you do and was wondering in your opinion is the consistency simular between them both.
    If so Dave its a real time saver and think I might do the same.

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    1. I think it depends what you're after. PVA and sand was just going to be too coarse for me for gaming purposes. The texture paint may be better but it may be less durable, I'm not entirely sure. I've just added the second coat of Red Oxide Primer and the first wash, which is a mix of black Satinwood paint [a B&Q paint for painting wood skirting boards], water and PVA. I'm going to add a number of drybrush coats of vermilion and eventually gamble it all on the remaining Matt Floor Varnish my brother used on his vivarium which spectacularly failed first time! Still if it goes wrong I'll repaint it vermilion and go again.

      If you're only doing the one board then PVA and sand may give you a more interesting end product, more realism, and if you have the materials to hand it may be the ideal solution. I don't imagine it's massively time saving between spraying on a coat and paitning PVA and sprinkling sand. Overall the texture is a muche more even finish and allows the molded texture to still show through including all the stones and bones, with PVA I think that would obscure it.

      The alternative option linked just above the picture of the texture paint was flock and PVA with some plaster powder thrown in. The end result is like a very fine wood chip. Ultimately it's whatever result you're after taking into account cost/convenience and the fact that the board is less relevant to AoP this year. So I would definitely choose the path of least resistance, which is why I've abandoned my new board and will use my old one this time :( Such is life though I may be able to prepare it for next year, get a head start on it now.

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    2. Thanks Dave, loads to think about, errrrr...... think Im going to stick with the plan and PVA sand the tile, with only four weeks to go not sure I should be rocking the boat and yes its just for display really so it should be fine.

      Its a shame that AoP is only store based this year (tut tut) and not going to Gameday or whatever they call it now not that my amature effort would do much anyway but I liked looking at what the 40k community painted/made, gives you ideas and inspiration, Maybe next year would be better for me, more time/experience and all that.

      Looking forward to seeing how your gaming tiles turn out Dave, looks good so far.

      Thanks for the advice.

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    3. My effort last year was only 2.5 hours for the board and 1.5 fot the backdrop. Personally I think it's more about the army [although I was going to spend a significant amount of time on my intended board this year] it's an opportunity to showcase what you've painted this year.

      In reality GW has actually affirmed this view by not making the board compulsory so whatever you come up with I'm sure it'll help show off your Scythes, you're really only scaling up waht you do on the bases anyway.

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  4. Great stuff! I have the same feelings about the city board they put out - a shot and a miss. So much opportunity for raised sections. Maybe the height would have made storing it or producing it an issue, who knows?

    Either way, love what you're doing here, keep it up!

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    1. I think even with raised sections it could inter-lock as the standard board does, with the four hill sections fitting together in pairs and the two flat sections sitting together. I don't think it would have been any bigger than the standard board. Also there could have been more realistic city elements, like the Forgeworld ones - flat areas and plazas to place buildings. That way there would have been areas that wouldn't have resulted in cocked dice.

      The original is an amazingly versatile and clever design, the city one is a missed opportunity - looks good but is neither clever, practical or versatile.

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    2. Feel the same. At £200 the price was one hell of a shock too.

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    3. And when ebay offers for the standard one can be half that price you'd have to be desperate for a city board at that price. If they did sell them singularly or in pairs I might pick up a couple eventually. They'd be a nice alternative starting point for Armies on Parade boards, especially and Ad Mech army.

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  5. Nice catch Dave, I've always wanted one of the broad sets myself but the price tag is divorce material lol

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    1. Ebay is seeing them go for around £100, I was obviously very lucky because interest did not spike at the end and there was no delivery costs. Alternatively gifts for geeks has it for £140 plus £6 postage http://giftsforgeeks.org.uk/shop/scenery%7Cgames-workshop-scenery/product/907064342/citadel-realm-of-battle-gameboard/

      It's still a lot but as an investment it's good value. The guys have always said it was the best thing they ever bought which was one of the deciding factors for me. Granted they got them when they first came out for about £150, so third party sellers had them for £125ish which is around the price they paid, maybe they should have wiated for ebay ;)

      As an alternative there's always orphenox's amazing scratchbuilt version in the first link. It looks so easy to make and probably a fraction of the price. Sure it's a fair amount of work but once it's done it would be worth it.

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