Force on Force - scenery and concepts

Up until now I'd sorted my scenery - especially what I term "scatter" scenery into four rough periods:
a) Ancients, Dark Age and Medieval - when pretty much everything was expensive and had some value.  (There was a separate box for Samurai stuff because of the cultural differences).
b) Pre Industrial - the era from the English Civil wars through to the Napoleonic wars.  Some items have become substantially cheaper than in the earlier period but the full benefit of the industrial revolution and water and steam power and machines has yet to be felt.
c) Industrial - which loosely was when the benefits of the industrial revolution were felt by the people at large.
d) Science Fiction - the realm of the future and also the oddities like the Carnivorous plants etc.

Force on Force - and I now realise Post Apocalyptic - pushed things into a fifth grouping - namely modern.  Look at the following items...

The sofa is probably good for the Victorian era onwards (so fits into Industrial) as do the Mattresses since the circular bits represent coil springs.  "Wheelie Bin" - I would say 1990's onwards, although research on Wikepedia would put it at 1970 onwards in Western Europe...

Wheelie bin

And lastly metal beer kegs...

1950's onwards.  (The beer kegs came out of a model railway bargain bin - OK, so at OO/HO scale then a little tiny for 28mm but given that beer kegs come in all sorts of sizes, then perfectly acceptable).  

So, I think we are going to have a new category, probably "Modern Era".   

I see the Sofa as a hotel reject, with springs coming through the covers and now found outside a shanty hut having been "rescued" from the disposal lorry.  As one of the Gripping Beast boys said, what it really needs is a couple of children sitting on it who are playing.  

Whilst on Force on Force I've been looking at cheap scenery....

All three vehicles came from Poundland, and there's a few others already in the Force on Force Box.  The Humvee is 5mm too long for true 1/56tj scale on my calculations.  The Tractor - admittedly large although with a small seat I see as one of the new generation of "super tractors" - probably supplied by a kindly meaning but ill informed church/charity given African standards of maintenance and the cost of spare parts.   

Having just done a bit of surfing then might be time to go back and see if I can get a couple more of hte minibuses for use as Taxis with a respray...

  

 

An idea on the subject of bases: great minds think alike

I wish somebody had told me about movement trays in my teens as it would have speeded up many a battle involving Airfix Napoleonics.  None of the pictures in the books or magazines at the time had them, so we didn't copy them.

Since then, the whole subject of bases has moved forward.  Often no longer mere bits of green card (often cereal packets in the Airfix days) they are now works of art in their own right, with sculpted add ons, tufts and other embellishment.   Movement trays have evolved as well, moving from the simple square or rectangle to all sorts of trays, especially ones used for skirmishers or weapon crews.  

At the Derby World Championships last year I bought a pack of the support bases (WGB-base 2) from Warlord Games.  They are in the webstore but you have to search for support bases or squad bases: try looking through their catalogue and I can't find them.

The pack contains 2x2 figure, 2x3 figure and 2x5 figure.  I thought that they would be ideal for Muskets and Tomahawks, particularly for Indians or Civilians/Militia who are likely to be in relatively large numbers.  I also thought that the ones in lines were very appropriate for walking down a wilderness trail (Some smaller movement trays - say 4 bases are a likely purchase at Salute 2013).

Now, it would seem that I'm not alone in this as a great idea, except that someone makes it even better.  

One of the blogs I follow is A Conflict of Interests except that what the author has done is to make some bases with just terrain on it.  The following picture is unashamedly taken from Jonas M's blog to illustrate the point I am trying to make.  

Suffer a casualty - just pop in a blank but scenic made up base.  So, lots more versatility.      

Gaming Cloth: Chlorophyll Green

A while ago on one of the blogs/forum that I follow there was a fair amount of activity on the subject of gaming cloths, with I think the Two Fat Lardies saying that what they took to shows was an old army blanket.  

Shortly after Christmas I was in B&Q looking for something else and in the clearance section was a green fleecy throw for £3.  (NOTE - they are no longer in stock - I went today to three different B&Q shops and they have all gone - you might find one in the clearance bin but I doubt it).  I thought the green matched the green I use on bases (Miniatures Paints Grass Green) and would also be fairly close to the GW green movement trays.

It's not a bad base to be working from, and click on the picture to enlarge it and you can see it does the grass green quite well - I'd forgotten quite how "lurid green" the GW movement trays are.   

Ideally the green needs to be toned down - I've thought of soaking it with a bit of brown fabric dye to take the edge off the colour, or I may just "distress" it with some spray paint.   That's what I did with one of the baseclothes that I use for pirates.  

The original base of this was a creamy/sand colour.  This picture is on the washing line where I was sprayng over it with some cheap tines of spray paint  I had picked up.   

This is it in use.  I learned a little from this that "weave" patterns will show through on close ups - which is probably an advantage of fleecy blankets.