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    Old Style Wargame Terrain - Building Hills

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    George Georgiou
    1) Hills are an important strategic consideration for generals in battle, offering high ground and cover. 2) There are different types of hills that can be made for wargaming, including stepped hills, round hills, kidney-shaped hills, and half hills of varying sizes. 3) Stepped hills are a convenient option that imitates hill slopes with flat areas to place models, with instructions provided on how to construct a sample stepped hill for Warhammer games.

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    Old Style Wargame Terrain - Building Hills

    Uploaded by

    George Georgiou
    2K views3 pages
    1) Hills are an important strategic consideration for generals in battle, offering high ground and cover. 2) There are different types of hills that can be made for wargaming, including stepped hills, round hills, kidney-shaped hills, and half hills of varying sizes. 3) Stepped hills are a convenient option that imitates hill slopes with flat areas to place models, with instructions provided on how to construct a sample stepped hill for Warhammer games.

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    Old style article on building hills for wargaming.

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    1) Hills are an important strategic consideration for generals in battle, offering high ground and cover. 2) There are different types of hills that can be made for wargaming, including stepped hills, round hills, kidney-shaped hills, and half hills of varying sizes. 3) Stepped hills are a convenient option that imitates hill slopes with flat areas to place models, with instructions provided on how to construct a sample stepped hill for Warhammer games.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as pdf or txt
    2K views3 pages

    Old Style Wargame Terrain - Building Hills

    Uploaded by

    George Georgiou
    1) Hills are an important strategic consideration for generals in battle, offering high ground and cover. 2) There are different types of hills that can be made for wargaming, including stepped hills, round hills, kidney-shaped hills, and half hills of varying sizes. 3) Stepped hills are a convenient option that imitates hill slopes with flat areas to place models, with instructions provided on how to construct a sample stepped hill for Warhammer games.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as pdf or txt
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    Some key takeaways from the passage include that hills provide strategic military advantages and that there are various methods for constructing hills for wargaming, such as using different materials, shapes, and terrain features.

    Some examples of hills that are described include round hills, kidney-shaped hills, three-tiered hills, half hills, and stepped hills.

    You can vary the appearance of a stepped hill by how you position the tiers and what angle you cut for the outline. Suggestions are made to make each tier the height of miniatures and to cut the angle between 45-60 degrees for the edges.

    Building Hills

    Some examples of hills you can make.

    LANDSCAPES: HILLS
    Throughout history, great generals have pored over maps and picked their battlegrounds
    with care. When formulating their battle plans, generals would consider carefully the lay of
    the land, as this dictated how they deployed their troops. In particular, hills were a critical
    factor they offered commanding positions on which to set up cannons and gave cover to
    reserve formations of troops.
    For practical gaming purposes, hills are traditionally built so they are 12"x8", but you can of course
    make them whatever size you want. When it comes to shape, you can't go wrong with the versatile
    round or kidney-shaped hills shown in the diagrams near the bottom of the page.
    Example of a Three-Tiered Hill

    Stepped Hills
    The most convenient hill for gaming is a stepped hill. This stylized approach imitates the slope of a
    hill while it still offers flat, open areas where you can put models. The idea was developed from the
    contour lines used to represent elevation on topographic maps. From this concept, it is easy to
    imagine that each contour line represents a level or tier on the gaming hill.
    You can vary a stepped hill's appearance by how you position the tiers, and what angle you cut for
    the outline. As a guide, we suggest you make each tier the same height as the miniatures in your
    collection, and that you cut the angle somewhere between 45 and 60 degrees for the edges.
    Example of a Half Hill

    Round Hill

    Kidney-Shaped Hill

    Three-Tiered Hill

    Half Hill

    Making a Stepped Hill


    When planning this hill, we decided that we would construct it with Warhammer games in mind. The very top of the hill is the size of
    a movement tray to allow the deployment of regiments and war machines. The bottom tier has enough space to deploy a line of 10
    archers.

    Trace the outline of the Warhammer


    movement tray onto a sheet of 1"-thick
    insulation foam and then draw an oval
    guideline 1.5" around this. This defines the
    outer edge of the top tier. Cut out the top
    tier.

    Once you've cut out the top tier, shape the


    sloped sides by slicing away thin slivers of
    polystyrene (you can also use a foam
    cutter). Try to make a rounded, 45-degree
    angle without cutting into the movement
    tray outline.

    To make the bottom tier, trace the outline


    of the top tier onto another 1"-thick piece
    of insulation foam. Next, draw the outline
    of the bottom tier by tracing around a line
    of archers. Cut out the bottom tier and
    round off the edges just like the top tier.

    Mark the Masonite by tracing around the


    bottom tier. Cut out the base with a
    beveled edge try to make the angle fit
    with the curve of the bottom tier. Glue the
    three pieces together with hot glue or
    white glue and leave the hill to dry.

    Apply filler to smooth over the gaps


    between the steps (spackle will work).
    Glue patches of gravel and sand onto the
    hill to give the effect of patches of stony
    ground. Give the whole model a coat of
    textured paint.

    Hand-paint the hill with Chaos Black to


    seal the foam. Next, basecoat the model
    with Scorched Brown. For the rocky areas,
    hit them with Graveyard Earth, then a
    drybrush of Kommando Khaki, and then
    Bleached Bone. Lastly, apply a thin coat of
    white glue over the model and sprinkle
    with static grass (don't put glue on the
    rocky areas). Ta-da!

    There are many other types of hills you can make just by altering or combining different scenery techniques. Here are just three
    ideas.

    Cliff Face
    A cliff is basically a hill with a sheer rock face modelled onto one side. From a gaming point of
    view, a cliff is particularly useful as you can place an artillery piece right up against the edge of
    it, and enemy troops can't attack over the Impassable Terrain!
    A simple way to make a cliff is to begin by constructing a stepped hill in the normal way and
    then break it in half. As counterintuitive as this step may be, you'll end up with a natural break
    that you can easily finish by sculpting and texturing the break to look like a rock face.

    Caves, Barrows, and Mines


    An interesting addition to a hill is a cave opening. To make the cave entrance, you can simply
    cut out a hole into a side of a hill and sculpt and texture the sides to make the rock look as
    natural as possible.
    To give the cave character, you can add skulls and bones scattered around the entrance. To
    turn your cave into a barrow or mine, you can add a ceiling support and sides to the entrance.
    A good way of constructing this is to use pieces of slate. By adding decorations such as runes
    or totems, you can create a theme based on a Warhammer army like Dwarfs or Skaven for
    your cave.

    Mounting Trees on Hills


    When setting up your battlefield for a game, why not place small bases of trees on top of your
    hills? This combination looks very natural on the tabletop for both stepped and sculpted hills.
    If you really like this approach, you can go a step further. Why not attach trees to a hill
    permanently! All you need to do is glue the trees in the same way as you would to a normal
    base, except that you have different levels to attach the trees to.

    Here are a few examples of hills. Whether they're gentle slopes or caves, cliff faces or tree covered, there are all sorts of hills
    available to the terrain builder. Hopefully these examples will spark your creativity.

    Hill Examples

    Rocky, Forested Hill

    Barrow

    Sea Cliff Face

    Desert Cliff Face

    Dwarf Carved Hill

    Desert Hill with Ruins

    Hill with Cliff

    Boulder Hill

    - Original Article written by Rick Smith, with material from How to Make Wargames Terrain

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