I like building terrain. In fact, it’s probably my favourite part of the hobby. Several years ago I received the gift of the Pegasus Bridge box set from my good friend Matt while touring the Normandy Beaches. While I had been dabbling with Bolt Action and 2nd World War wargaming, tiring with yet another rule update in 40K, acquiring the set is is what really got me going . I would have the bridge and I would model as much of the significant areas nearby. over time I've added to my Normandy scenery …Still haven’t finished the bridge though!
First of all, here’s a few of my bits and in addition a very quick tutorial on German weapon pits. So the picture above is made up of several items, notably the Wurzburg Radar From Dave's wargames https://en-gb.facebook.com/Daveswargames/ lovely little kit. I have added a little extra detail but it is fine as it is. Several MMG and gun positions the latter is from the Pegasus set. Courtesy of the nice folks in Customer Services at Warlord Games I have 2 more of these for future projects, one I refer to later here, the second for a beach position for Juno beach and the third for Pegasus. This item isn't normally available on its own but for the price of a resin tank for each Warlord sent me the position, gun and crew. Thanks Guys in the foreground a tank trap and wire entanglement the concrete obstacles are from Rubicon's tank trap set and the wire, is the usual wire.
The trench section- is inspired by one I saw on John Bonds Blog - great work, great blog, if you haven’t visited it yet then go take a look…when your done here. Excellent source of inspiration - ok lets be honest here I have just plain copied some of is stuff its really top notch and I get a bit frustrated when he doesn't post for a while. How dare real life get in the way of the hobby!
This is one of three trench sections, the other 2 are still WIP and one has one of the German 5.5 Gun positions I mentioned built in. The wattle trench revetment (just watch the Brecourt Manor scene in episode 2 ' Day of days' of Band of brothers) is a Renedra fencing product. The sand bags are Milliput and the terrain is Blue ( although its black now for some reason) High density foam covered with filler and sand.
The intention is that they will form part of defences for tables representing either the Douvres Radar station- which had a couple of the gun pits and held out several days after the landings, or for the Hillman Fortification, wire obstacles, minefields and other bits and pieces are in varying stages of progress.
If you've never heard of the Douvres or Hillman sites-
This is an old one and the picture isn’t great but I’m sure you will recognise an old Airfix favourite.
Made of foamboard and embossed plasticard, I just had to have one of these, it’s getting on a bit now and it probably needs a bit of an update as my technique has changed since I did this. But it still looks ok on the table. That's a very brief selection of the terrain that I have. I'm expecting this to be one of the biggest sections of the blog eventually. I do really enjoy Terrain.
Ok so I mentioned a swift Tutorial
Something simple to start with- support weapon trenches/positions.
First of all…. Yes, there is a mould line on the mortar man’s hand! He doesn’t know it yet, but he’s booked into the field hospital for a swift bit of surgery soon!
I’ve done a couple of these as part of 736 Regiment, 716 Infantry Division. One of the ‘Fortress’ divisions that manned the Atlantic wall in Normandy. I have a couple more planned for other projects or variations on a theme- I fancy doing some stuff for battles in Alsace/Lorraine and in the Hurtgen forest at some point. The troop parts are from the old Bolt Action Germans, the Blitzkrieg box and the weapon and accessories are from the AfriKa Korp set. The other position has a Medium Machine Gun team has you will see shortly. So they're the same basic design.
This image is taken from the Osprey Publishing book German field fortifications 1939-45 ISBN 978-1-84176-761-1. Good read, good source of info on defensive positions, but I would also point you to this site which features German Field defences on the Eastern front – many of its contents were used on the western front too. A swift look online will also find you a scale calculator so that you get it correctly sized.
So, In the picture above I have used a thin layer of plasticard, a layer of Cork tile and a layer of laminate floor underlay 5mm deep high-density polystyrene. Great stuff for terrain making and will feature here several times again. You could of course just use 2 layers of either cork or the underlay, I must confess I cant remember why I did it like this. There was probably some very logical reason but I cant recall it now. The ground texture is premixed crack filler from the Pound shop. I don’t use modelling sand. £3 + for a 200g bag! I think not. No, a bag of sharp sand from your local DIY store will last for years (if she who must be obeyed doesn’t ear mark it for another garden/DIY project.) Artist’s acrylics are used to paint it all, I have a 4-paint scheme that I use on everything which I will demonstrate another time along with my preferred vegetation options. Of course, if you feel like trying your hand at one of these then obviously ‘decorate’ it to suit your terrain.
Obviously the troops get chopped at the waist ( don't throw the legs away, there's always a conversion around the corner) but in order to get this right you need to understand a little about Field defences so again I recommend the book. They wont all be at the same height as the floor is not all one level- refer to the last picture and the diagram of the position to see what I mean.
If you have any questions, drop me a line it would be great to get some feed back.
Next time around on the terrain front, more progress on the trenches. A French tank turret Tobruk and a 5 cm mortar Tobruk.
Cheers
Andy
6,5 out.
The larger Wurzburg mdf kit can be had from Dark Ops, the nice people at
Sarissa helped me to find one.