BUA (Built Up Area) templates.

I had recently refurbished a number of older structures and constructed new ones for ancient and musket era use and as buildings are now individually based I needed to make some templates to define a BUA. These newer models now replace the older style {1} which had troops were crawling over them appearing as the aftermath of a drunken brawl.

The templates are primarily used for hamlets or villages and will define the area of ‘rough ground’ that troops will move through; buildings and trees can be moved aside to allow this. Under DBA 3.0 a BUA, as other terrain features, has a set maximum and minimum dimensions. In the first photo are four BUA templates of different sizes. These are cut from a flooring material which I use for all my terrain features, such as roads, rivers, hills, wood, gullies, and rough ground.

After painting and dry-brushing, I cover them sparingly with electrostatic grass leaving the interior exposed. Photo number two shows the completed templates with a road section added to show their similarity. 

Photo three shows a mid-sized template with houses and trees in position. The houses lack the final detailing, but are shown here to give an idea of scale. 

{1} Previous style constructed five years ago. Click here and scroll down. Please note, much of what you see in the photo has been replaced (upgraded) as of this year. 

Village repairs.

I had recently finished the hamlet ‘White Orchard’ which is featured in the Witcher Game series. Its architectural style can be best described as East European and constructed with timber walls and covered with thatch. I was very pleased with the results, but unfortunately the older structures in the collection now paled by comparison.

You can see from the photo these buildings were quickly constructed, based and decorated. This looked okay, but I found storing them a problem. In the White Orchard collection all the structures have a minimum size base to aid storage and I have more options with village size and shape. Trees now have their own bases which permits their use with other structures.  

The first step was to trim the bases and make new ones for the trees. With Milliput, I covered the walls and scored timber supports, doorways and windows. After the walls were dry, thatch roofs were added and scored. These were left overnight to dry and the following morning all the structures were given an undercoat. 

Painting followed a similar style as seen in the original photo, but you can notice the difference. Adding a mixture of white glue and sand, the bases for the building and the bases of the trees were covered, later painted, dry-brushed and covered with some ‘green’.

Satisfied with the results, the same technique can be used to construct similar structures for a planned campaign in Burma, early 19th century. 

Waterways.

Waterways are not used here often as the Picts rarely come out of their box to do battle. This past week I have added four Middle Eastern armies two of which may make use of waterways for seaborne landings. This prompted another look at waterways and possibly improving what I already have in the terrain box.

The DBA 3 rule book does specify the dimensions of a waterway and the addition of beaches. The latter do look nice, however, the first waterway constructed had irregular shaped beaches protruding from the waterway which had a tendency to curl, thus spoiling the effect.

To avoid this, the newer pieces would have straight edges with sections of beach painted along the waterway’s edge. The first step was to sketch possible curvatures on paper and to maximise the amount of variation; I would construct the waterway in two sections (40 cm x 16 cm) so sections could be interchangeable with one another.  

From scrap material (vinyl floor sheets) I was able to produce six sections. Painted dark blue, these would later be painted a lighter shade to produce a wavy effect. With a pen, I marked the areas that would be painted as beach.

At a relaxed tempo this took a day to complete.