Can't See the Wood For The Trees...

  It all started with HeroScape...

  I was aware of the game, but had not bothered with it, as its RRP was outside my comfortable price range. However, Argos decided to sell off their stock at approximately half-price and this was posted on The Miniatures Page (www.theminiaturespage.com), so I decided to pick up a set, mainly for the terrain. This led to additional purchases of expansion sets, as it was quite a fun little game and building the battlefield was a bit like Lego for war-gamers.

  One of the sets was the Road to the Forgotten Forest, which came with four moulded plastic trees, which acted as LOS blockers. However, there were only four and they were all conifers. I posited on a HeroScape forum that Valhalla (the world in which HeroScape is set) surely would have deciduous trees as well and, whilst I found some likely candidates from TableScape (www.tablescape.co.uk), at £14.00 for 5, they were slightly out of my price range.

  So I decided to make some...

  As a father of three with all the financial responsibilities that come with it and with a wife who describes all tabletop and war-gaming as “that role-play crap”, I knew that any terrain that I wanted to build would have to be cheap, so as not to incur her wrath.

  For this particular project you will need; a counter-sunk wood screw, some baking foil, a piece of plasticard or equivalent, some air-drying clay and some scouring pads. Plus all the normal kit, such as glue, scissors, etc.

  The plasticard is for the base. I used a piece cut from a plastic ring-binder, which was cut into a hexagon, so it would fit onto the Heroscape hex, approximately 38mm across the flats. In the centre of this, superglue your screw, point up. The reason we’re using a counter-sunk screw is that it has a flat head, giving a better surface for the glue to adhere to. The length of the screw is up to you – I used one about 90mm long, as I play mainly 28mm, and wanted the tree to be about three times the height of a normal human-sized figure. So depending on how tall you want your tree to be and the scale it’s intended for will determine the length of the screw you use.

  Next, the baking foil. This is for the trunk. Cut a small piece, tall enough to cover approximately a third of your screw and long enough to wrap around the shaft of the screw at least once. Crumple it slightly before winding around the base of the screw, as this then gives your bark texture. You can glue this on, but due to the nature of foil, it will stay there without it.

  Now using your air-drying clay or equivalent, add a scenic base. I use Milliput, as I had some in my cupboard and find it useful for basing all my figures. This serves two purposes – first it adds some heft to the base, making it less likely to fall over and secondly, it helps secure the screw to the base.

It should now look something like this:

  The figure in the picture is a Heroscape Airborne Elite, who is about 32mm tall, so this gives you an idea of scale.

  Next, get your green scouring pads. These are the ones that you find in the cleaning aisle, sometimes called Brillo pads in the UK, and packs can be picked up very cheaply. Cut some rough circles about 40mm in diameter, remembering that trees tend to taper near the top, so make sure some are slightly smaller.

  Now, take you first layer of foliage (scouring pad circle) and screw it down the shaft until it butts up against the foil. Continue until you have covered all but the very top of the screw shaft.

  Twist the circles around until you’re happy with the overall look of the tree. Before we cap the screw with our smallest circle of foliage, put the nozzle of your glue on the tip of the screw and give it a squeeze. The glue will run down the screw, holding the pads in place. Finally, glue you last circle on the top of the screw.    

It should now look like the picture below.

 

 

  Now all you have to do is add the finishing touches. I roughed up the exterior of my tree’s foliage using a wire brush, then painted the trunk brown, with a brown ink wash, and dry-brushed the foliage with several shades of lighter green and painted the base to match the HeroScape tiles.

  And this is what you end up with:

I was quite happy with it, because it was cheap and easy to make, it’s pretty robust due to the materials it’s made from and it looks pretty good. Hope this inspires some of you to give it a try.