fishnjeeps Posted April 1, 2016 Share Posted April 1, 2016 Since I now have a large amount of CAV Figures I now need some terrain so that I can play. This thread will be dedicated to making terrain for that purpose. To start, I went out and bought 10 sheets of foam core from the dollar store. So far, I've made 4 sets of what ill become rowhomes a large hirise building and a warehokuse structure. I also found a really good way to make homes out of something we all have laying around (or just threw away). Pics... I used hot glue to assemble these foam core buildings. The smaller ones will end up being 2 unit row homes. I'm using cardboard to make my roads. They still need to be painted but you can get the idea. The city I'm planning will be a really tight quarters area. Even the largest of CAV will fit between the buildings. The buildings are sturdy enough to hold even the heaviest of metal CAV on their roof. Infantry will be able to fight from the roofs and get better vantage points and setup traps. But thats only the beginning. I wanted some buildings that you can fight over the top of that won't block line of sight. Looking around I found a few empty blister pack plastics. I hot glued them down to some cardboard to make them rigid. A spray of rustoleum textured paint to look like concrete and they are starting to look more like a building. Plus, they are the perfect size to represent homes or habitats. A little detailing with some rms paints and I have a passable concrete house. Its not super detailed but on the table it will work out. I only used 1/2 of a sheet of foam core so far and I still have 9 more sheets to make more. I plan to be able to field a full 4'x8' city. So far. I've spent $20 in materials to make my terrain. I plan to use all of the boxes from Amazon purchases to make my own modular road system. Hopefully this will inspire other CAV players to make their own cheap terrain. 15 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
joshuaslater Posted April 1, 2016 Share Posted April 1, 2016 Looking good! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kristof65 Posted April 1, 2016 Share Posted April 1, 2016 Looks good. If you're going to do a lot more foam core buildings, I'd recommend investing in a Rabbet Foam Board Cutter by Alvin. Search for it on Amazon - you'll find that it makes doing corners a lot easier. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fishnjeeps Posted April 1, 2016 Author Share Posted April 1, 2016 Looks good.If you're going to do a lot more foam core buildings, I'd recommend investing in a Rabbet Foam Board Cutter by Alvin. Search for it on Amazon - you'll find that it makes doing corners a lot easier. I plan on using spackle to cover the foam edges enough to use spray paint safely. I decided that I'd rather do butt joints on these. Makes assembly go faster. Only a few buildings will get details beyond paint. I eventually went more laser cut buildings, but I have people showing up in a week and I want something better than books and food boxes like last game. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fishnjeeps Posted April 1, 2016 Author Share Posted April 1, 2016 I decided to do a little more work last night and I finished 2 buildings and started on my squad size CAV repair bay. The repair bay will likely be more detailed than my other building attempts. So far, the building count is 8 full buildings and part of the repair bay using only one sheet of foam core. Plus 4 blister houses made from cardboard and blister pack houses. I need to open more CAV Base blisters as the black bases came in a different size plastic than what you see above. Pics... My attempt at an apartment building with balconys. It's crude but gives some variance to the buildings. Once its painted, I can go back and add some clear plastic to the balconys to give a finished look. This is my CAV Squad repair bay. It can accomidate 4 super heavy CAV units. This could be a great objective or even be used as a deployment area. Hopefully the pics I have will show where I'm going with this. There will be buttress' between the CAV bays and a control room on the back wall. I'll also add a door that can be opened or shut. The buttress' are cut I just need to start assembling them before I add them to the actual bays. If you look carefully at the bottom you can see my reference marks that show where they will go. 9 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderator Chaoswolf Posted April 2, 2016 Moderator Share Posted April 2, 2016 Very cool! I look forward to seeing this develop. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fishnjeeps Posted April 4, 2016 Author Share Posted April 4, 2016 I got all of the buttress' made and installed. These took a little while to do. I also want to add a bay window control room on the back wall. I haven't figured out how I want that to look though. Here's some pics of my progress... Buttress' installed You can see there is plenty of room for even the larger CAV units to sit and maneuver comfortably... Here the buttress' are closed off... I added a header over the entrance. I think this gives the doors a sci fi feel. It does need some trimming though so the lines look right. In hindsight, I should have made this front one piece instead of 3 separate pieces. There's plenty of room for units to stand in the doorway... 11 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hosercanadian Posted April 4, 2016 Share Posted April 4, 2016 Looks good so far. I really like making 6mm terrain. For the foam buildings to give the textured look, have you considered plaster or modge-podge? Both will cover the small gaps and side edges and will also protect the buildings. I would recommend small bits of card or paper to add details, I found it easier than painting. Looks good. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chaoshead Posted April 5, 2016 Share Posted April 5, 2016 Looking good. I can never cut straight lines in foamboard, even with clamps and a straight edge. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fishnjeeps Posted April 5, 2016 Author Share Posted April 5, 2016 (edited) I use a large framing square and still many of my cuts aren't perfect. I plan on hiding my poor cuts with barring around the bottom. Of anything, I cut parts larger than needed and trim them down after glueing them on. I plan on using a mixture of brass etch parts and the wife's cricut explore to make some detail parts. I'm still leading how to use the cricut software to make my Windows. If it could accept the foamboard, I'd make whole buildings with it. Unfortunately the foam board is too thick even with a deep cut blade. Edited April 5, 2016 by fishnjeeps 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hosercanadian Posted April 5, 2016 Share Posted April 5, 2016 I keep threatening my wife with stealig her Cricut from her for that exact thing. How deep can it cut? 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guildenstern Posted April 5, 2016 Share Posted April 5, 2016 I keep threatening my wife with stealig her Cricut from her for that exact thing. How deep can it cut? Not very, it starts to stall after heavy cardstock tbh. Or so has been my experience. Awesome looking terrain - those bays are really impressive! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fishnjeeps Posted April 5, 2016 Author Share Posted April 5, 2016 I keep threatening my wife with stealig her Cricut from her for that exact thing. How deep can it cut? Not very, it starts to stall after heavy cardstock tbh. Or so has been my experience. Awesome looking terrain - those bays are really impressive! Supposedly it can cut up to 1/8" thick stock. However you need to adjust some advanced settings that I barely comprehend. I am comfortable enough to use it for making cardstock versions of brass etch. We actually have 2 cricut machines and explore and a mini. So far I'm the only one who's even attempted to use it. The last time I tried it I used the wrong blade and it didn't cut all the way through. I think over time once I learn the software and figure out the propper measurements for the Items I want to make, I'll be able to make some rally nice card stock or matboard buildings. But for now I need some terrain so This is where I am. Speaking of which. I picked up some cool resin terrain pieces at Adepticon this year. I'll post some pics below... These are from Broken Egg Games and they are neoprene forests. They aren't cheap, but they work well. I saw CAVBOSS was using something similar in his demo CAV games and thought they were a great Idea for forests. Just add a few moveable 3d trees and you still have that 3d terrain look without the hassles of having actual trees. (Don't know if I'm making sense here...) A pair of secret weapon gothic generators. I bought 2 for use as objectives or they make cool looking power converters. They can work in multiple scales which is always a good thing in my book. Next up, I bout a bunck of stuff from War Gamma's booth. They had these lava pools which I ended up buying 3 sets of. (2 sets are being shipped to me) These came umpainted but I started painting them before taking pictures (sorry). These again are great for multiple scales and aren't super expensive. The company also makes lakes the same size, but they really aren't lake sized, more like pond size so I passed on the lakes. They also have a volcano that I want to get later to go with these lava pools. Next, also from war gamma, I piced up a wall set with turrent. These are designed for 28mm scale, but I think I can make them work for CAV. I plan on using them as armored barriers (like a trump wall) possibly around my mech bay. The pics show them in their raw unassembled and unpainted form. I have a lot of flash to clean up on these. Also, the turrent could be used as an orbital defense weapon for senario play if I wanted. Finally, I scored some more shipping containers from my local N scale train store. These bad boys are not cheap but once I get a good number, they can be stacked and changed between games for unlimited play options. Unfortunately, they are N scale so they won't easily work for 28mm games. Some of them are magnatized and some aren't (yet) so they should stay together easier. So that is where I am so far. I think I can make a decent table with this stuff. I need to go buy some scale trees to put on my forest tiles which I hope to do tonight. Also, not terrain related, I have 100+ d12 dice coming tomorrow for use as damage trackers. 7 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Arc 724 Posted April 5, 2016 Share Posted April 5, 2016 Really well done so far! I like the direction your taking. I had an idea to make a mech bay. I really like the way you did yours. Keep up the good work. Can't wait to see more of it! 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderator Chaoswolf Posted April 9, 2016 Moderator Share Posted April 9, 2016 Now, that's what I call an update! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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