Terrain is everything - fences

Here's a 'Birthday treat' from me to you, which is why this post has come a day early. The terrain and tutorials are some of my most viewed articles so I thought I'd bring one of my oft-pondered terrain ideas into the blog.

Back when I was gaming in 6th form my mate Liam, he of the scratch built Warhound and Warlord, used to make a fair bit of terrain too. One of his best ideas were chain link fences. Using aluminium car-body repair mesh and some wooden pegs [which his dad, a pub landlord, used to have loads of from tapping the kegs]. I'm not sure if the wooden pegs even had two grooves in or Liam ran a hack-saw down them but these fences were awesome, cheap and quick to make. I loved them so much when I got to uni and our local purveyor of all things cheap and cool, Trago Mills, had 5 packs of the mesh 'cheap-cheap' I bought some. Now I know that pack is still around somewhere but do I know where? Do-I-eckers-like! And I'll be damned if I buy anymore only to find them, bearing in mind this stuff isn't so 'cheap-cheap' anymore.

Anyway, in it's stead I've loads of Granny Grating. One of my work colleagues had some vouchers for Fred Aldous and I got around five A3 sheets, more than I could possibly find a use for. I thought I'd knock up some fences but I was going to turn the grating 45° so I got me some diagonal chain link fence. However, just the other day I was leaning on the fence at my local train station only to realise that stuff was square, not only that but it was blue, exactly the pale blue Anita's craft acrylic I have. It must be some anti-corrosion coating, although there's plenty of Devlan Mud washed into all the creases. So I got the urge to finally make these beauties, from real life no less, purely as a test.

You'll really only need three things,

1. a base, here I've daringly chosen some mounting card, I'm playing 'warp roulette' yet again!
2. Some Granny Grating
3. Some Rawplugs, wall-plugs, whatever you call them

As you can see below I've cut some 6" strips of grating [handy for movement guessing] some 6" bases, angled at the edges so we can rotate the fences around each other for maximum fence deployment. I've cut a chunk out of the grating as this slides down the centre split of the plug.

These are all PVA'd together and I'll be hot melt gluing them to the base when I next pick this up. They're super quick to do, which is as well because I'd rather be doing 20 of these than the 2 but I just want to ensure the cardboard doesn't warp too much. I have a stock sufficient for this task and I'd rather use it up than cut hardboard for more durability but also more heartache.

Really looking forward to the painting though as the red 'rockcrete' with blued, corroded steel mesh should look quite striking!

Dark Angel Terminators, but not Deathwing!

Here's some original Terminators and these were painted just before the Deathwing supplement came out so were Dark Angel green. There's something about the pure white armour reinforcement that I love. The blending on the green is really nice too. The Captain was going to be THSS armed but clearly I sold them in my ebay frenzy!

This standard marine is also missing a weapon. Maybe the Dark Angel upgrade sprue would achieve that... Fundamental concern is the paint, I like the paint I've done but it's not Deathwing and that'd require stripping. 'Course, I have the pictures but it's not the same. Now that Dark Angels have been brought [slightly] into the 41st Millenium having a Deathwing force may be the easiest option for me. Easy meaning a cop-out over the whole Dark Angel Green issue! "Chicken!" I hear that little voice shout in my ear.

eBay sales I may regret

Here we have one of my eBay sales that with hindsight I may regret. These are some of the Close Combat Terminators. As you can see they're a little more bulky than your average Termie because they got into the rough stuff, also a Cyclone Terminator and some figures from the original box set though I note the Assault Cannon isn't present. Back row you have a TH+SS in Deathwing colours. A Cyclone Terminator which I got from a friend, he also has a chainfist at his feet. Next is another TH+SS in Deathwing colours, I think I used a yellow base with a thinned chaos black for these. All these bonwhite colours where mixed on the fly, no ready mix paint and highlights back then for me! Then we have a captain with the original power fist/combi-grenade launcher and lastly the Lightning Claw Terminator [the other pair of lightning claws I got went on the Librarian Terminator I'll be using as Belial and realise now I've never included a shot of him here...]

On the front row is a standard Terminator but with TH+SS armament. This guy was undercoated in a satin Racing Green Car spray that had really good coverage and was spot on for Dark Angels green but I don't think I ever got passed that undercoat on any of the figures I primed with it, which is a shame. Then we have a standard Terminator with Storm Bolter and no left hand and lastly a set of TH+SS with what looks like one of those tiny Heraldry shields you used to stick on and still come molded to the Black Reach Terminators.

Some of these I do regret, the CC Terminators are really tough looking and would stand with the slightly bigger plastic variety now, in particular the lightning claw one looks awesome. I'm certainly short of a few bits of armament for my remaining lead [pb] Terminators. The painting on the Captain also looks really good [considering I had no bonewhite colour] and I'm sure I'd have been able to bring him into my existing line up. The Cyclone is also something I may play around with in my list.

What can you do though? I'm sure I got a good few quid for them and at the time I got a digital camera with the proceeds so I can't complain, despite it having broken since then. So I debate getting rid of anything 'surplus' at the moment which is tough because I have some figures I'm just not sure I need anymore...

Terrain is everything - Standard Template Constructs - FREE Terrain Templates

Standard Template Construct (STC) systems were advanced computers created during the Dark Age of Technology, which are said to have contained the sum total of human technological knowledge. An STC system was possessed by every group of human colonists before the Age of Strife, allowing them to build all of the equipment necessary for survival on an untamed colony planet. It enabled the colonists to build efficient shelters, generators and transports without any technical knowledge and using almost any locally available materials. The user simply asked how to build a house or a tractor and the computer supplied all the necessary plans.

One of the primary goals in this blog was to formalise any tutorials and templates that I had, to help other hobbyists. The 'STCs' I've created so far for my buildings have received a lot of hits on the articles, although I'm not sure how many new structures have been built but I'm appreciative of all the good vibes coming my way, thanks. In the 10 years since I first posted this article some of the links have been misplaced. I'm working through editing it to be up-to-date so people can access both the original page and the .pdf of the STC.

 

Here's the STCs for what I've created so far, if it's BOLD then it should be up-to-date [Oct 2021]. But, if you have any issues or the link doesn't work please comment below, I will always respond even if it takes a while to do so:

• 40k Tower Page | STC
• 40k Outpost pg1 | pg2 | STC
• 40k Container pg1 | Scatter container search | STC
• 40k Hex Tower 1 | STC
• 40k Ruins | STC
• 40k Vulcan Plateau | STC
• 40k Hex Tower 2 [now reclassified as the Spyrle Forward Observation Platform] | STC
• 40k Single Storey Ruin [Caffeine Plaza] | STC
• 40k Mercury Plateau | STC
• 40k Standard Manifold Coupling, aka the Modular Plug Socket | STC
• 40k Cetacean 'Vent' Tower and Baleen Roof Extension | STC

'Adeptus Mechanicus unapproved plans' - STC's liberated by the Free Radical Collective that don't contain quite as much detail, instructions or corrections but it's better they're available to you so you can tinker with them. Then one day I may get around to fixing them:

• 40k Dawn of War Plasma Generator | STC
  Build tutorial: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 |
• 40k Targus Assault Blockade | STC
• 40k Cathedral Tower | STC

Print and Play STC building templates - a variety of pre-textured simple buildings to quickly populate your battlefield. Just print and stick to foamboard, cut out and stick together [be fair warned these templates are all considerably large filesizes - 40-90MB due to the many textures added to the templates. Please do not download if you are unhappy with this. I prefer to spend my time making FREE templates, not working out why one file is bigger than it should be]:

• 40k Administratum Tower 1 [2 storey] | STC
• 40k Administratum Tower 1 [3 storey tall] | STC
• 40k Administratum Tower 1 [2 storey wide] | STC
• 40k Administratum Tower 1 [3 thin and tall towers] | STC

• 40k Black Tower 1 [2 storey] | STC
• 40k Black Tower 1 [3 storey tall] | STC
• 40k Black Tower 1 [2 storey wide] | STC

• 40k Green Marble Tower 1 [2 storey] | STC
• 40k Green Marble Tower 1 [3 storey tall] | STC
• 40k Green Marble Tower 1 [2 storey wide] | STC

• 40k Generatorium [2 storey] | STC
• 40k Generatorium [3 storey tall] | STC
• 40k Generatorium [2 storey wide] | STC

Terrain is everything - 40k Ruins.

I've already shown a ruin off in a previous post. I didn't really need a sketch for these, I'd already got the Illustrator files to retain consistency in the shapes used. As I was hoping to use bits cut out from the extra cereal box reinforcement this would speed things up and keep the aesthetic going, oh it was recycling too, it's nice to be green!

However, my plan did involve creating two panels, joining them in a corner, then 'ruining' it so that I could create another corner piece with the bits cut off. That way doubling up on my terrain and allowing the corner pieces to be stretched to create as large or small a ruins as I wished.

These were my first attempts at battle damage which initially is heartbraking but then quite rewarding, didn't know if I could bring myself to do the same on the hex platforms... but I managed it.

Here's the two corner pieces, so you can see how the ruin could be expannded. no floors as yet

Here's the painted version with floors and base. An undercoat of black household and craft paint mixed with PVA glue and a small amount of plaster is an ideal base for the Red Oxide spray paint. Further shading and highlights still to go.

I've prepared a .pdf template for this in case you want to try one. I've another template to prep for a smaller ruin, I'll get onto that as soon as I can.

Carsharing in a Mycetic Spore, NOT!

I recently read a comment on one of the blogs I frequent [I'm not sure which] where someone said that since the Tyranid FAQ came out it had 'nerfed' the use of Tyranid Prime's with a Warrior Brood in a Mycetic Spore. I read this and moved on but it kept niggling away at me and so I checked out the Tyranid FAQ.

And here's the FAQ in particular

Q: If a Tyranid unit takes a Mycetic Spore, can an Independent Character join the brood before deployment (and hence deep strike in with the brood)?
A: No.

I mean REALLY?! What is that? There's just one Tyranid Independent Character - the Tyranid Prime and he's got special rules regarding how he interacts with his standard Warrior bretheren he adds +1 to WS and BS. As an IC the Prime can join this unit and according to the 5th Edition rules an 'IC may begin the game already with a unit, by being deployed in coherency with them' [p48]. So a Prime begins the game with his unit in their pod and it's not like there isn't room, nine Warriors can fit in one pod so if you only take a brood of three there's room for the kids and a couple of DVD players for the trip!

Additionally the rule book covers Dedicated Transports and states 'The only limitation of a dedicated transport is that when it is deployed it can only carry the unit it was selected with (plus any ICs).' So an exception for Independent characters that start attached to a unit, and specifically mentioning that an IC can start with a unit inside a dedicated transport (just not Tyranids).

So why specifically do the Tyranids not like to share their Spore Pods? I even asked the manger at my local GW and he said he'd been shocked when it came out. Lets be realistic though, this isn't the fault of the rules, the Prime or the Warriors this was an FAQ that seemed to answer a question that really didn't need asking with an answer that most would have thought the opposite of all existing rules. I'm sitting here now, wondering who were all these people asking this rule? I mean all the exisiting rules state this wasn't an issue so which idiots went and made the rule Tzars at GW shine a light on something that didn't need fixing only for them to fix it with a bolter round to the cortex!

I can understand the furore over the Doom of Malantai leeching wounds from mounted troops. That's a rule that conflicts with the core rule set to the advantage of the Tyranid player, but this is a rule that is amended to be different to the core rule set to the disadvantage of the Tyranid player. It might have been nice to have had a little clarification for this answer, a simple 'No' just doesn't cut it in my book.

Dark Angels genesis vol 4 (and a bit)

Sadly, my photography isn't too hot on these but I thought I should at least point out my oft mentioned Dark Angels are being attempted, if not with any worthy results.

First up is a plastic Missile Launcher Marine, I think he was free on a White Dwarf years ago. This was my first attempt to get the really dark green I was after and it's nearly there but a bit neon on the edges because it's nearly black everywhere else.

I went to the GW and asked about how to paint Dark Angels and let him show me on one of my Advanced Space Crusade Scout Sergeants [with a back pack he could even be an Assault Marine! I've five of these guys]. His is a bit greener but this was a really quick job and I was quite pleased with the results, the extra green makes him stand out a little more so I'll try to get some more done so I can finally get a feel for how to paint them.