This page is the final part of this project (until I make more boards!) and a bit of a review of the results and how well they have worked.... To see the construction of this please refer back to the first and second parts of this series of articles. For more pictures of the boards in use please go to the Battle reports section of this site where they have been used a bit.
It has been over a year since I finished them and I have used used them a few times and had time to think about how well they work. Making 16 boards each with different styles and features meant that there are some odd ones of out and I will
continue to tweak the boards as I use them more. Because the boards are all quite unique, there is a limited number of combinations that I can use the boards for. I realised this when I constructed them
and that is the trade off between having generic boards and fully featured boards, and I went for somewhere in the middle.
The boards have remained reasonably durable but I have lost a couple of the interlocking teeth. I don't know if this is caused by me accidentally cutting into the rubber when I was constructing the boards or not. I've alawys thought that if the teeth become
problematic then I can chop them all off and just butt the boards together. They are heavy enough that they shouldn't slide around too much if that was the case. Luckily I have a good place to store them where they are out of the way and can be stored flat
and this should help extend the life of them and make the investment in time and $$ worthwhile. I think
that if you are planning to make terrain boards, then storage of the boards is something worth considering before you start.
Where to next?
I would like to add some large coast/river boards where i can have a very wide river (eg 1foot wide) using 2 separate boards joined together and also use those pieces as a coast line. I'm still not 100% happy with how some of the terrain pieces
such as woods and BUAs have to sit on top but I dont know how to make this work at this point. Any new boards will need to be started soon otherwise the materials I used won't match, such as paint and flock which will get used up or dry out! Another consideration on whether
or not I make more is the weight, as the 5mm MDF is pretty light when its only a couple of boards but once you have 16, they are very heavy to transport around.
Click on the thumbnails to see the full sized image
This board shows some of the benefits of having a terrain board system with the ability to have recessed features. I like the the fact that the board can have a relatively useless lake and rocky ground sunk
into the board but it doesn't have to have a big impact during a game.
The water still needs few more layers to increase the depth of it but I ran out at the time.
>
A board that combine a couple of large features with the roundabout making the board look different. Since creating the board I have my doubts as a modern roundabout is really a 20th century invention and a
think a simple crossroads would be better.
The pictures show the layout with the hill close to the actual roundabout. The plan was originally to have a town based around the roundabout but that became too difficult during construction as space for the
town wasn't allowed for. During the construction there was a problem with the flocking and flock on the hill clumped together for some reason, and you can see a lump of it in the middle picture. In the third
picture you can see patches created by the drybrushing which look a bit funny in this picture, but are fine (and more subtle) on the actual board.
The board was designed to have a town with outlining fields. However this was forgotten during the construction and the hedges along the roads means that town bases can't be placed there. This was a problem
with a number of boards as I didn't factor in where towns would go when I glued all the hedges down. Regardless the board looks very good and with a bit of repositioning it will make for a very nice tile when
a town is placed on it (once some of the hedges are removed).
>
This board is another that has come out well but could still be improved on. My original plan was to have a town with a river flowing through the middle and a small jetty etc, but I never completed the town
part or found a way to integrate the two well, and still have a removeable buildings. The banks of the river in places haven't been detailed and were just painted to blend in.
I think the next logical step is to make a custom base on the board with a fixed dock and roads but with removeable buildings. Or I just add fixed towns to the boards......